In Ellen's latest thread there are close to 500 comments. 80% of them by trolls and 90% of them off topic. After noticing that she was allowing the trolls to post anything and everything she wanted I figured I would wake her up knowing damn good and well as soon as I posted she would show up.
Glad to see everybody here is on topic.
Count Istvan | Homepage | 05.02.07 - 4:25 pm | #
There are more than a few regulars who are perplexed that they are receiving threats of banishment and Vince P. and other are allowed to camp out on the thread and post off topic all day long.
Count Istvan | Homepage | 05.02.07 - 4:45 pm | #
Guess what, I'm here... and Count Istvan, I am really uninterested in your opinion of my moderation. If you don't like it, don't come to my threads. As far as I'm concerned, this has turned into a reasonably civil discussion and it's relatively on topic. Ellen | Homepage | 05.02.07 - 4:50 pm | #
My response.
I knew you would be here as soon as I posted. And I know your uninterested about the regulars opinions about what's happening on your threads. Which explains why you have 500 troll posts and a bunch of regulars who are scared to post on them.
Count Istvan | Homepage | 05.02.07 - 5:00 pm | #
I know she reads this. Why Ellen do you think your posts ahve the most troll comments? Why is there a topic on the off topic board about you? Why are people posting here agreeing with me?
Maybe it's because you don't give a shit about the people who support you and you don't have a clue how to moderate?
I want to make one thing clear here.
I love the Newshounds site.
I love the servive they provide.
I admire the work they do
I think all of the women including Ellen do a great job.
I am not calling any kind of boycott even on Ellen's threads. ( though so many regulars are afraid to post on them that I don't need too)
But that doesn't take away form the fact that this moderator is alienating the people who support the work she does and the site that she helps run while accommodating the people who want to shut her site down.
7 comments:
TAP TAP
Is this thing on?
OOOPS! I hit the wrong button.
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I know I am fairly new at Newshounds, but I have been curious about the moderation there. I've wanted to ask about it, but as a former-moderator of other forums, I don't believe a debate about moderation is helpful to moderation, if you get my drift.
That said...
Moderating that cluster-screw of a website must be a monumental chore. I'm not sure what I would do in the same place.
As a user I am disconcerted when I see a moderator jump into a thread threatening to ban people. And, oddly, it only seems to happen to Newshounds supporters.
Would I even bother to moderate the topics? Not sure. My knee-jerk say "NO" because I don't like censorship. However, something in the back of my mind says they may have tried that already and found it didn't work.
At any rate, let me echo your words:
I love the Newshounds site.
I love the servive they provide.
I admire the work they do
And, I love the debates.
With all my love,
Aunty Em
I totally agree :) Thank you.
I know from having been on a conference call with the NH gals (about fundraising, fall 2006) how much time and effort they put into managing their threads - and Aunty Em is right, it's a monumental chore. They may literally spend hours cleaning up troll droppings on a single thread, and that's in addition to all the Fox-watching they do so that we don't have to.
I don't envy them either task, and I'm sure "engaging the trolls" adds somewhat to the thread-maintenance workload.
But, having said that, it's also disingenuous to think that once regulars stop talking, the trolls will just shrug and go away. And if the answer is supposed to be that we do stop talking to or even vaguely about the trolls...then haven't they won?
Each of the mods has her own standards for what passes or doesn't on her own threads. Ellen has always been one of the toughest. Heck, even harmless little me was once banned by Ellen. But at the point it's reached, I think the way she's implementing her standards runs the risk of News Hounds losing loyal readership and ceding commentary to the Faux Faithful. That would be a sad thing.
Thank heavens for the OT, where (almost) anything goes and our biggest problems have been bots and G-Dawg, now routinely zapped by Donna and Siobhan.
Thanks, too, Count, for this ongoing chronicle of trollmania. I'm glad someone is, as they say, documenting the atrocities.
BTW - Aunty Em - I only wish you'd been around Newshounds back when I was penning NH adventures in Oz...!
Maybe it's because you don't give a shit about the people who support you and you don't have a clue how to moderate?
Methinks this is perhaps not the best of all possible tactics.
Aunty Em,
You're right; total lack of moderation doesn't work. There are some trolls (most notably G-Dawg) who exist for the sole purpose of dragging threads of topic, where they generally sink into petty name-calling.
ET,
The line between engaging the trolls and feeding the trolls is so fine as to be submolecular. As to the trolls winning if we ignore them, why are they here?
[ET, The line between engaging the trolls and feeding the trolls is so fine as to be submolecular.]
That's kind of my point, Sergei.
If regulars stop talking, then the trolls rule.
If regulars are banned by the mods at the trolls' free-wheeling expense, then the trolls rule.
The answer isn't to cut off the regulars for their calling-out of the trolls on things outrageous... the first focus should be on the troll gallery, not on the regs, whose hearts and minds are in the right place whether or not their vocabulary is to individual moderators' taste.
I would like to see the mods strike a more consistent balance on their several threads, one which cuts the regs a little more slack than the trolls, even when the mods deem the latter to be relatively "civil."
I do empathize with the heavy moderation onus they face, esp. when the comments run into the hundreds. It can't be pleasant to handle.
But there are no favors done when sympathetic voices are silenced, whilst trolls are tolerated for taking a milder tone that still espouses nonsensical viewpoints.
Just my feeling. I love the NH gals and the work that they do, but I think sometimes their standards for regulars miss the forest for the trees, and that saddens me.
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