kleinbl00 Explains Why And How To Stop Vigilante Nonsense
reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/eu2k5/do_you_want_r...Posted Dec 31, 2010, 5:03 PM UTC
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reddit.com
Really I think reddit self regulated itself here, The mods/ or maybe even the users removed those inappropriate posts. The mod made a great point that people don't use the report tool, and when they do it's for the wrong reasons. REPORT PEOPLE WHO DO THINGS LIKE THIS.
TL;DR Y U NO USE REPORT TOOL!?
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You'd think.
I got my own hate-stalker out of the bargain.
End result? My mod queue generally has three reported comments a week instead of one.
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In terms of the argument itself, you had the right of it, but I'm not sure that a handful of fairly reasonable sounding comments lacking much in the way of acerbity constitutes a 'hate-stalker'... your comments, on the other hand seem a bit reactionary - why were you so hasty in threatening to ban him? Is there something I'm missing here?
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Is there something I'm missing here?
Go get some coffee, maybe a scone. It's a saga. the TL;DR is that the account above is the fourth iteration of someone so offended by my defense of r/favors that they formed r/assistance just to spite me. They continue to drop by under sockpuppets to give me grief.
Happy New Year.
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You had written me some time ago about this problem. It has been taken care of and there is no sock puppets from r/assistance that are trying to spite you. I hate for this old argument to begin again. Things are cool now and no one from our reddit is baggin on you. Let's keep it that way. I don't like hassles. Both of our goals should be to help people. Not to hassle one another.
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I actually clicked on his username after I commented and noticed the grudge-holding - add in sockpuppets, and there you go. And yeah, the r/assistance episode was total bullshit too, so if those are the same guys, it makes a lot more sense. I hope I didn't sound too critical, I just guess the examples you directly showed seemed like gentle piss rains, not the out-and-out category 5 shitstorms I've seen people with serious grudges toss at each other. I feel bad for the mods on r/energy...
Happy New Beer.
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That looks like a perfectly reasonable ending. The kind of person who will engage in that kind of behavior is generally immune to reason, proof and logic. That's the kind of person the song It wasn't me was written about. All you can do with such an unreasonable person is present a position that a reasonable person would accept, let the unreasonable person burn themselves out, and then move on.
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You're one of the few good ones man. You really are. Sorry you have to catch so much shit sometimes just trying to be an upstanding gent.
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Yes and No. Reddit is supposed to have interesting meaningful content, so in that sense, "Relax dude, it's just reddit," is a bad ideology leading to crap on the front page. On the other hand, it's too easy to get pissed off about stuff, in which case, "Relax dude, it's just reddit."
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Hmm, look at the comment he's replying to with "Relax dude"
I think reddit's serious fun too. But I can see how that dude might need to relax if he can't get his point across without fucking swearing at people.
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I meant to take back my comment.
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Last time I admitted to using the report tool for inappropriately places submissions, I got yelled at telling me that I was drunk on some fake power. This is how the people here react. If you're not a mod and simply trying to help keep the subreddits clean, then they think you're being spiteful or crazy for power. Right, because clicking a button on a site makes me powerful.
I really hate redditors sometimes. Before at the very least, asking a question in a nice manner didn't you get you downvotes. I asked a simple question yesterday and bam, i was already in the negatives within the hour. Much of the main subreddits are garbage these days.
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If you're not a mod and simply trying to help keep the subreddits clean, then they think you're being spiteful or crazy for power.
From experience, if you're a mod whatever you do you're accused of doing it because you're spiteful and power-mad.
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It's a hell of a system. The problem is, until Reddit at large learns that moderators are what keeps the place civil, moderating will continue to be a frustrating and perilous job. I really wish there were a better way to do it but I can't think of one, and it frustrates me.
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The problem is that the guy still got harassed, and even if the original posts are down some people probably still have the info. Congratulating ourselves for "regulating" it is completely missing the point that the damage has been done.
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And what do you propose, exactly, we do? Ask for everyone's personal info on registration, and hold all users under a "if you publish anyone's dox, you're getting yours published along"? Or that we close Reddit for good, and thus no dox shall ever be posted again?
The problem here is, Reddit is big. Reddit is insanely huge. There's a hellish lot of people here who are really 'great people', in the commonly held notion of those words. There are also lots of people who are just vile wretches of mankind. Then you've got people in the middle, who sometimes are horrible, other times they help contribute to some charity, and are all able to, collectively, amass tons of cash.
The only way we have to 100% combat the people who 'drop dox' is by either shaming them (impossible unless we go down to their level, I tend to believe such people protect themselves well, and allow me to adapt a quote said by someone, that if you stoop down to their level, they'll beat you by sheer experience) or blackmailing them.
Neither method is efficient, or feasible. So, the only solution is to find easier ways for users to report such posts to an authority who will delete them as soon as possible (and I do mean as soon as possible).
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Ask for everyone's personal info on registration
Reminds me of South Korean real name system
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Please to also be sending a PM.
I don't now about the mods in the giant subreddits but on mine I don't necessarily check modqueue every day.
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Why is kleinbl00 so good at everything?
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Because iirc, him and his wife were the subject of one of these witch hunts. The guy speaks from experience.
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Really? What were the circumstances?
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She turned me into a newt.
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/stares disbelievingly at IOIOOIIOIO
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Now we just need to figure out if she's heavier than a duck.
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You'd have to ask him for the details, but from what I remember, he posted something about his wife being a naturopath physician in r/skeptic, and was met with death threats and other fun harassment. A lot of the smaller subreddits have really nasty communities that cross the line from disagreeing with someone to hatefest circlejerks. For an example of this, post about being a Christian or somesuch in r/atheism.
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Why would you post about being a Christian/Muslim/Jew in r/atheism? I mean... that's just asking for you beliefs to be lampooned...
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I heard he raped and murdered a young girl in 1990
GET HIM!
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I'm not.
But if I'm not good at it, I don't talk about it.
And that's how you know I'm not Sarah Palin.
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Then run for President in 2012.
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It's like he's a prototype of one of the Magi from Evangelion.
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tldr: Go back to 4chan.
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Two changes that can help get a handle on the vigilante situation and overall bad/inappropriate conduct:
- A public information campaign about use of the 'report' button. Not just to use it, but how to use it, and how not to use it. Perhaps a reminder in the sidebar of the high-traffic subreddits that really need this, perhaps an admin post on the frontpage of the main reddit, but regardless I think making people more aware of 'report's existence and proper use would bring an improvement to the situation, giving mods a better sense of what might be going wrong at any given moment.
Though that only works if the mods actually bother to do their part, which leads to...
- Just better modding, period. Clearly something is going wrong in the major reddits (vigilante behavior that carries on for hours unchecked is a symptom of the deeper problem), and I don't think more mods are the answer, but more active ones who aren't absentee mod collectors. (note: this isn't saying "throw them all out", as there are many who are competent and active in major reddits. Just that the dead weight needs to be cut loose and replaced with more active people. Especially when the dead weight is at the top, but overall as well.)
The 'everybody pitches in to do whatever' organizational structure just doesn't work in long-term situations; it is a variation of the bystander effect, because everybody assumes someone else will do it, things fall between the cracks, take far too long to get done, small problems turn into crises, etc.
So how to do it? The head mod needs to be someone who is very active in managing that particular reddit, not someone juggling half a dozen high-traffic ones, or there in name only. Beyond that, the head mod delegating responsibility for specific tasks to specific mods is essential, IMO. And for the largest reddits that really are active 24/7, have mods 'on duty' for shifts so the place is covered 24/7. If something goes catastrophically wrong and is handled badly during their shift, it's their head that rolls.
I am certain that there are enough competent active willing redditors with enough time on their hands (cumulatively) to do this. It's just a matter of having head mods who are willing to invest time in one particular subreddit to the extent it is needed, and those who are not willing or able should step aside for those who can do the job. The tone is set at the top; absentee leadership leads to a staff that fucks around. Active competent participatory leadership results more often than not in a tight ship that runs smoothly.
tl;dr - The 'report' button needs more promotion, both of its existence and how mods would like it to be used. A note in the sidebar with with guidelines for its use in that particular reddit would be a big help. Reddits where unchecked vigilantism and other unacceptable conduct occur need a better modding strategy (possible ways to do this outlined above), and in the worst cases, need mods who are more active.
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Just better modding, period.
See, you're wrong there. Mod's are volunteers. As a mod of r/pics I can only put in say an hour per day (it's volunteer work, it takes time away from my real work, and life). By the time I've cleared the mod mail that's usually at least half an hour gone. Then there's the stuff reported on just the front page, the spam queue, all the soft-core porn in the new queue etc.
Saying "be better" when mods are already working the best they can is a little insulting. Understandable, but insulting. We are currently working on getting more mods in, and removing the inactive ones, but it's actually hard. If you don't think it is, then I don't think you understand the job mods do.
What you've suggested is nice and I'd like it if it happened, but could never work in reality.
it's their head that rolls
Another reason mods tend not to be all that public. The very idea that my head may role because I, a human, volunteering my time to help, make a bad call is really fucking off-putting. Not least when we see fellow mods get attacked IRL for misunderstandings and unwarranted hate.
tl;dr I agree more active modding is good, but this can only practically be achieved by simply having more mods. In r/pics there's like 6 of us who are active, for example.
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So you're one of the good ones, that's great. Just to make sure, you know I wasn't talking about you and those like you:
(note: this isn't saying "throw them all out", as there are many who are competent and active in major reddits.
And one thing I should have added in the comment above, is "if it's not broken, don't fix it," in that no change is necessary in reddits that are running smoothly. Whether or not this is /pics, is your call.
That's also great that the active mods where you're at are trying to remove the inactive ones, and if you said there are six of you who are active.... there are fifteen there total, that's a lot of dead weight. It's not too risky a bet to wager that most of the dead weight is higher on the list than the highest active mod (that's how it usually goes). The problem with this being it undermines the idea of anyone being in charge. It looks like it would take admin help to at the very least, put an active mod on top and let it sort out from there. (I know they have a public image of non-interference in reddits to uphold, but if they ever agree with the idea, I'm sure they would find a way to help make it happen).
On the 'heads roll' part, I'm talking about accountability. Remove that, and everything falls apart. Lack of accountability is a recurring theme in all of these problems (vigilante behavior and other inappropriate conduct, when the unacceptable stuff goes on for hours unchecked, absentee mod collectors filling the list, etc). With anything in life, when people fuck up catastrophically, they're usually removed from the role they had in the fuck up (employees, parents, un-jailed citizens, almost everyone.) And notice IRL, the few places defined by lack of accountability and where bad behavior is not handled with removal, systemic corruption and utter dysfunction and breach of trust become the defining traits of the organization and its members, tarnishing even the 'good' members. So that's why I think the idea of a head rolling for an actual major fuck up is essential.
As for the legitimate fear of the pitchfork wielding mob, you know you guys can create a group mod to be the public face, right? 'Pics_mod' or something to that effect. A small but growing number of reddits have them, /entertainment for example. So long as you take measures to prevent a rogue mod from speaking for everyone through that group mod in a way that the rest of you don't approve, it should add a layer of security and remove some of the concern. (And I'd add that this group mod should be fairly devoid of personality and polite even in the face of a 'dissatisfied customer'; it should be obvious, but if there are any larger-than-life egos among the mods there, you'd have to make sure the group mod stays on message, perhaps delegating public interaction to those who are better at it. But in your time there, you'd know what is best.)
As for /pics needing more mods (looking at the number of subscribers), you're absolutely right that there's just no way that six hardworking active mods can keep the place running smoothly. But how about fifteen hardworking active mods? Not more, just better/more active, that's what I was getting at. Though in the mean time, you're absolutely right that it may require increasing the number until the dead weight can be cleared out.
tl;dr - I think we agree on a lot of this, with the exception of the "head's roll" part (I made my case for it above). And you're right that /pics will likely need to increase its number of mods in the short term, due to the difficulty of clearing out the dead weight. Best of luck on clearing out the dead weight, and I really think the public interaction part would be less nerve-racking and run much smoother with a group mod to speak through.
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I think a lot of what you suggest in this comment and elsewhere is already taking place (like getting Admin help to re-jig the mods around) because they're good ideas.
Accountability is great, but if a mod fucks up a bit and they're strung out to dry without having their side heard, I think it breaks down a bit.
I like the idea of a join pics_mod account, having that be the official word from the mods. Though I'd worry it'd take away the more human side of modding. If other subreddits have them then it's obviously a system that works, and I think you've given me something to look into :)
I appreciate you taking the time to write your comment, and I have little doubt other mods will appreciate it too.
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I complain about that every time I see a "to arms!" comment. Even if the guy was a total jerk (like that lady harassing the family of a dying girl and the Forbes blogger who talked about a social media gaming tool), and inevitably get downvoted to oblivion.
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dude is eloquent yo
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I hope someone makes an amazing response to this, that will be reposted into a Best Of, and so on and so forth. A never ending circle of front page absurdity.
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I picture the comments as an episode of The Office. Pam is speaking to the group in the conference room.
Oscar: "May your words be engraved in stone."
Kevin: "A large stone it will be."
Dwight: "Depends on what font size is used... and if we include any of Pam's personal info."
Jim: "How about comic sans?" Then looks up at the camera with a I see where this is going look.
Stanley (never looking up from his crossword puzzle: "Comic Sans is only ever appropriate if over 36pt."
Angela: Comic Sans is never appropriate.
Michael: I've set wikipedia to comic sans to annoy interns that use wikipedia in here to look up nakey greek gods.
Pam: "How would changing text font annoy people who are looking for pictures? I'm pretty sure it will only annoy the people trying to actually learn things."
Creed: "COMIC SANS IS THE DEVIL!!"
End scene.
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As Satan's personal representative to Reddit I would like to address this issue. The Devil and his minions have nothing to with comic sans -- we didn't create it, we don't use it, and quite frankly, we are annoyed and angered at the implication that we are in any way connected to that font.
It is our understanding that it was created and continues to be managed by the Republican Party. Please direct your hate toward them.
Thank you for allowing me the time to address this issue.
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One reason why I unsubscribed PIC and WTF is because there are plenty of trolls there.
Everything should not be taken literally there... even if asked taken literally.
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Someone explain to me why I thought I was clicking on a link about nosebleeds.
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This post is why I come here. I love reddit and I want to be a part of keeping it a great community.
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It's kind of unnerving to have this on the front page of bestof at the same time as this post.
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That guy was not trying to hide himself, and the comments about his books were pretty good. No one attacked him or anything.
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...What Vigilante nonsense? Have I been missing something on reddit? can you guys fill me in?
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Just like everything else on reddit, everyones going to forget about this in two days.
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January 1st and already a contender for best comment of 2011, he is just that good.
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And not a fuck was given.
Lemme edit real quick. This is just another self proclamation post about why the OP of the orig post is so great at everything. I've resulted in just hiding his posts because it becomes very tiring after a while.
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It won't ever stop and the proof is in the cyclical nature of these events. Every time a witch hunt is on, someone posts a counter argument, everyone who got worked up feels ashamed, someone grandstands and posts about how everyone should be reasonable and it gets r/bestof'd... then two weeks later it happens again.
I can sum up kleinbl00's post in two words: "be reasonable." And that's not something everyone can be all the time. It's not in our nature and that's been proven time and time again on reddit.
You are mistaken.
A mere ten months ago, the majority of discussions about Saydrah were about whether or not she deserved it, not whether or not crazy-ass psycho-doxing was an appropriate response to a perceived conflict of interest. Of course, a mere ten months ago Reddit going full /b/tard was a rarity and something worthy of note. By contrast I've been directly or indirectly involved in no less than 5 full-metal witch hunts in the past week.
You are again mistaken. Here's the TL;DR on that little diatribe:
###Demand reasonability from your fellow man.
...and that's why the TL;DR is what I wrote, not what you wrote. Yeah, people can't be reasonable all the time. But the people who can be reasonable have a responsibility to rein in those who can't, because today you, tomorrow me.
Martin Niemoller
Tell you what, I will resolve myself to do a better job of searching out those comments which represent a reasonable line of thinking, upvote them and throw in my two cents if I have anything worthwhile to contribute.
I will admit that I play the sidelines a lot and just watch the battles from afar because too often things are either way too messy or the chances of even getting a voice heard are incredibly slim. However, I'll be more vigilant starting now.
Anyone else with me?
I am. I lurk a bit, but I can still use my votes!
Reading your posts on this topic has immensely increased my respect for you. Just wanted to stick that in there.
Actually this is the first time I've seen such a big deal made so soon after the events. I think Reddit is slowly improving.
Once the average redditor finds out the site's subreddits go on into foreverland (There's a Random Subreddit button!!) and then sticks them on their front pages, I think the site "gets better." I've learned to ignore most everything from /politics, /world, and about 40% of /AskReddit. This place is MASSIVE. There's space here for everyone.
EDIT.. Went click-happy on the Random button to the Benny Hill theme song and came upon r/ChristopherWalken, r/Mycology, and r/Durrr. Awesome.
http://www.reddit.com/r/statuegropers/
I like to think of r/bestof as my little window into an alternate reddit, where people frequent /politics, /pics, /IAmA, /AskReddit, /wtf etc etc and these kinds of bizarre internet pscyhodramas seem to explode, collapse and replode on a biweekly basis. It's like peering through the window of a giant warehouse where ten thousand retarded adolescents are condemned to perform the Mahabharata in perpetuity with foam noodles and bicycle helmets.
I love you.
Sadly, some of the foam noodles apparently have AK-47s hidden in the middle.
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Collective hindsight is 20/20.