Source
r/ideasfortheadmins•
[deleted]

Something needs to be done about vote squads

This isn't a new problem. It's been a problem for years. However, since I became a mod it has started annoying me, because I have to watch "my" users karma drop like stones.

Example. This four day old thread did not have any comments with minus karma this morning. 11 hours later, 29 upvotes have been added to the top comment (22->51), and all the subreddit regulars comments have been buried in downvotes.

Possible solutions:

  • Allow mods to lock threads, so that they can not be commented or voted on. This would give mods an ability to stop vote squads in progress. (The archive function already exists, all you have to do is let mods trigger it manually).
  • Add a subreddit setting to only allow votes from subscribers + automatically unsubscribe a user that is banned or
  • Disallow votes from banned users (this would only have limited effect as not all participants in votequads are banned in the targeted reddit)

Posted Jul 10, 2011, 6:37 PM UTC · edited

1470
redtabooHelpful redditor.•

Given the amount of control you suggest giving to moderators it might be better if r/feminsims became a private reddit. reddit is an open forum which means anyone can vote or comment, each user has the same pull as any other user. I dislike downvote squads as much as anyone, but locking threads seems to me like to much control for an open forum and open to abuse. Not to mention disallowing voting by banned/unsubscribed users is easily circumvented by throwaways.

16
[deleted]•

How precisely would you "abuse" the ability to lock a thread? Mods can already delete anything, which is a much greater power.

1
redtabooHelpful redditor.•

Mods can't actually delete a thread. They can remove a thread from search, people already conversing can continue to do so. By locking a thread a mod can stop a thread once it reaches the conclusion they desire.

8
IAmAnAnonymousCowardhelpful redditor•

Mods can't actually delete a thread. They can remove a thread from search, people already conversing can continue to do so.

That's if they just remove the submission. Don't forget they can also delete comments.

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redtabooHelpful redditor.•

Sure... imagine a locked thread with all comments except for the agreeable ones deleted and no way to refute them if you wanted.

7
[deleted]•

A mod can remove every single comment in a thread. That would be one (very unfortunate) way of preventing users from accumulating unfair downvotes. Locking it seems a lot more fair. If people want to keep discussing it, they can do so in their xposts.

I'm open to other solutions though. I have already requested from huey that private reddits get a visible frontpage with instructions for how to get invited. As it is now, private reddits are rather useless because there is no way for people to find them.

0
redtabooHelpful redditor.•

That would be one (very unfortunate) way of preventing users from accumulating unfair downvotes.

Why worry so much about your users downvotes? If they wish to stop them they can delete their own comments. Personally, I wouldn't want a moderator to remove a comment of mine just to save me from downvotes. Deleted comments are still available on user pages, so those are never truly deleted either.

...private reddits get a visible frontpage with instructions for how to get invite

That's a good idea. You should probably submit it here so other users can flesh out what that would look like and the different devs that help with patches can think about it. Possibly all that is needed is the ability to add css or text to the forbidden page.

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[deleted]•

[deleted]

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[deleted]•

[deleted]

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thejoewoods•

Firstly, there needs to be a culture change on reddit that no longer rewards drama. If someone is trying to start an argument or flame war, every last person here should jump to downvote them, no matter their cause. Civil discussions should still be encouraged, but inflammatory language and facetious degrading should not.

Secondly, I really do think that there should be an algorithmic adjustment to vote content for individuals who vote in the same pattern: basically, if more people vote like you, your vote is worth that many percent less. This can be adjusted as seen fit, but should also help to encourage content further from the norm of simple imgur links that some individuals seem to detest.

Thirdly, mods should be able to "sticky" posts through means that aren't CSS or the sidebar, and they should be able to set these posts to not earn karma: that is, the post will always have a null score.

Feel free to discuss these suggestions, and remember that if one of these ideas is glaringly bad (I'm tired and not very rational right now), it doesn't mean that they all are, or even that the glaringly bad idea can't be adapted into a new one.

tl;dr, read bold, last paragraph

6
[deleted]•

I think they are all good suggestions. I basically agree with everything you said. "Drama" is a bit more complicated than it first sounds though. It doesn't necessarily mean the same thing to everyone. Someone who is appreciated in one reddit can be percieved as a troll in another. I wish this wasn't the case, but it is. And I'm not sure its possible to get away from that when you lump together people from all over the world.

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[deleted]•

Another solution might be 'removing' the downvote button in your sub? Sure, they can adjust their settings to get around it... But, perhaps a worthy experiment before going to the next step?

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[deleted]•

In one of the recent xposts I actually saw someone describe how to easily circumvent that with little javascript you paste in to the browser address bar. And the downvotes are useful for us to determine what our regulars consider spam, though they can of course also use the report button. In lack of other solutions it may be worth a shot though I guess.

5
[deleted]•

Might be worth asking the subs community. I think the other ideas tabled so far are troublesome to me in sense of 'public' reddits. I like that I can chime in on things I find when searching 'random' etc... having to subscribe to make a comment or vote is kind of what frustrates me about the web in general nowadays.

2
QueerCoup•

I like that first point because it give the target community the ability to decide if a karma brigade is helping or harming the conversation, and the tools to stop harm that's occurring.

Of course there's going to be objections of possible abuse, every mod feature has the potential to be abused. That's really a question of how effective the individual groups of moderators are, not what tools should be available.

2
A_Nihilist•

Shut down r/worst of then.

Oh wait, that's a feminist shill subreddit. Nevermind.

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IAmAnAnonymousCowardhelpful redditor•

Maybe for a small, controversial community a forum would make more sense than a subreddit.

1
[deleted]•

When the subreddits were implemented I think the idea was that it should be possible to establish any type of community on reddit.

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kleinbl00Helpful redditor.•

I've long held that downvote squads need to be quelled by the subreddit launching them, not the subreddit suffering them. Having suffered from my own downvote squads launched by r/feminisms (and downvote squads launched by 2XC, and downvote squads launched by r/mensrights) I find your concerns somewhat hypocritical.

Minor trollsubs are annoying but they can't really launch more than a dozen downvotes. Not only that but their denizens are happy to be banned on a regular basis so the best way to deal with them is ignore them. Full-scale downvote brigades always come from a larger subreddit; even then, the brigade is invariably a fraction of a percent of the readership. Your example undoubtedly comes from r/mensrights, with 23,000 subscribers. You're looking at ~30 downvotes.

Those 30 downvotes come from people who would be proud to be banned from r/feminisms (which, you're right, wouldn't do anything about the downvote brigade anyway). Their citizenship in r/mensrights, on the other hand, is an important part of their Reddit experience. If they faced a ban in r/mensrights for acting up in r/feminisms they'd act up a lot less.

I'm firmly of the opinion that a non-aggression pact between enemy subreddits (such as 2XC and mensrights) would do wonders for the civility of all Reddit, not just the aggressor states. In this proposed non-aggression pact, the moderators of the aggressor subreddit agree to discipline their subscribers for activity in the victim subreddit. Reciprocity would give both moderator groups a reason to join the pact - and non-compliance would cause it to dissolve. It would require no additional code or features and puts the burden of community policing on the community.

But then, I tend to overthink things.

Short of that, it is kinda weird that accounts that have been banned from a subreddit are still allowed to vote in that subreddit.

-2
TofuTofu•

Hi, mod from an affected subreddit here. We've been hit plenty of times with up and downvote brigades.

How do you imagine a non-aggression pact working? It's hard enough to get users to read the sidebar, let alone follow some voluntary system.

This is why we're basically just ignoring the problem and deleting threads as quickly as we can when it happens.

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kleinbl00Helpful redditor.•

  1. Create a closed subreddit moderated by at least two admins and at least two neutral redditors agreed to by a majority of mods in all affected subreddits

  2. Add all moderators for all affected subreddits as approved submitters

  3. Hammer out a "treaty" (crossposts forbidden from one sub to another, violators to be banned in their parent subreddit, not just their target subreddit; "flame wars" judged to be offensive by a moderator of the target subreddit must be judged to be offensive by the neutral parties moderating the "treaty" subreddit, etc) that will then be publicly posted in all signatory subreddits

  4. Post a link to the treaty in the sidebar of all signatory subreddits, as well as a warning of (the agreed-to) consequences for anyone violating the treaty

  5. Bring up any treaty violations in the treaty subreddit for adjudication by the agreed-to neutral parties

  6. Recognize and publicize that a violation of the treaty by any subreddit renders the treaty null and void, and that previous hostilities will resume in force

It seems to me that r/seduction, r/mensrights, r/feminism, r/feminisms and r/twoxchromosomes should be the initial signatories, although simply limiting it to r/seduction and r/twoxchromosomes might be a nice pilot.

I also think that if r/mensrights won't participate in the process they lose any credibility of being a level-headed, equality-minded subreddit and can be considered out-and-out trolls.

I'd be happy to start this treaty subreddit with the understanding that it would be better for all involved if I steered clear of any adjudication and might be better if I excused myself as soon as things are up and running. On the one hand, someone hostile to all parties isn't a bad person to mediate. On the other hand, I have no illusions that my presence will do anything but inflame the situation.

-3
1ck15th3kill3r•

LOL REDDIT IS SERIOUS BUSINESS BRO. KARMA ACTUALLY MATTERS!

5
ThisIsYourPenis•

when your penis is tiny, karma matters

0
[deleted]•

There have been no xposts from /feminisms to /mr at least since I became a mod. I have personally removed several in the past weeks. So don't call me a hypocrite. 2X does not allow xposts anymore so I'm not sure why you feel the need to bring them in to it. I intentionally tried to keep the names of particular reddits out of this since it is a general problem. Also, individuals getting targeted occasionally is one thing. The problem I'm referring to here is that there are several communities that suffer collectively from this.

I have in the past requested that /mr stop xposting to us. So has other mods. They're not interested.

0
kleinbl00Helpful redditor.•

You're real big on saying "not my fault" and real small on "I'll hear solutions."

I was PM'd not last week from a mod suffering under 2XC raids. One of your co-moderators chased me around for a month. r/feminisms is just as guilty of aberrant behavior as any other sub if not more so. If you aren't willing to recognize that y'all are just as inflammatory and hostile as any other sub, then y'all are going to have to accept raiding downvote brigades.

-1
sodypopHelpful redditor.•

Hey kleinbl00, mod of 2x here. Could you provide more information about this raid you mentioned? We have a policy against downvote brigades, and there's also some additional discouragement of this behavior on our submit page.

I agree with you that this is an issue that should be addressed from within each community. The effort has been largely successful in that the community now typically downvotes any submissions that post to other threads in a negative light. On some occasions we have had to step in, though these types of posts are becoming much less frequent.

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kleinbl00Helpful redditor.•

I can tell you that the moderator of a subreddit, who didn't want to mention anything publicly and who didn't want to be named, approached me about raids from 2XC. When I mentioned that you have a "policy against downvote brigades" he said "yeah, that's nice, but they never enforce it and when we talk to them we get no response."

I can also tell you that I offered this "non-aggression pact" idea to him and offered up a number of neutral names to help broker it. He was completely disinterested in the idea because he didn't view adherence by either side to be a likelihood. In other words, not only did he have severe doubts in your interest in quelling the bloodshed, he had severe doubts about his own.

I've seen your submit page. I think it's a good positive step. Nonetheless, I think the unwillingness of your side to talk to their side and their side to talk with your side, combined with the unwillingness of either side to address the middle with anything but scorn and disdain, is evidence of the fact that both sides value lip service to fairness and tolerance only so they can claim the moral high ground.

And above and beyond discussion about moderation, non-aggression pacts or anything else, both sides are exceedingly fucking tedious. I take a great deal of pride in my consistency and my ability to defend my assertions. Yet the only two subreddits where I've been downvoted enough to trip the troll filter are r/mensrights and r/2XC. In other words, my position, which by sheer stupid algebra is a moderate position, has been downvoted enough in both of your subreddits that I'm considered a troll.

And I'll take that. One of my realizations this year is that my enemies are just as important as my friends - and being considered an "enemy" by a bunch of intolerant jihadists with no interest in any worldview but their own narrow victimhood makes me feel pretty goddamn good about myself.

-3
[deleted]•

I posted this thread to discuss solutions. It seems you are real big on throwing accusations around.

Here are the stats:

If you read the titles of these posts you'll notice a difference in that some are hostile where as others are benign. I'm not going to count how many are, I think the numbers are evidence enough in themselves.

-2
kleinbl00Helpful redditor.•

Let's do some statistics, shall we? As I said, presume a quarter of a percent of your community is trolls.

r/mensrights = 23950 x .0025 = 60 trolls = 12 posts per troll

r/twoxchromosomes = 40621 x .0025 = 101 trolls = 2.87 posts per troll

r/feminisms - 8519 x .0025 = 21 trolls = 2 posts per troll

All that presumes that the communities came online at the same time, of course, which isn't the case.

Does it illustrate that r/mensrights is much more of a trollsub than r/2xc or r/feminisms? Hell to the yes. But that surprises no one. Does it illustrate that your moderation is doing some good? mmmmmaybe. r/feminisms is a new-old community; y'all revamped that just recently so you've simply got less hang-time. I might also point out that you're muddying the water when you perform CSS hacks so severely anti-cooperative that the admins had to add a third holy to the list of holies that can get you banned.

None of it really addresses my arguments, however, considering that the moderator who PM'd me wasn't from any of the subreddits above. Nor does it address the fact that your co-moderators are jihadists.

So. You will edit someone's comment to say the exact opposite of what they intended, and one of your co-moderators will spend three weeks devoting 100% of their reddit time to badmouthing Julian Assange and harassing me. And I think that's "evidence enough" that you have zero interest in dealing with "vote squads" unless they're pointed at you.

-3
therealgabe2011•

lop fuck you yoo klein man. Im Srsly tired of looking at UR gay rants. Does yoo fgag not have a life. Jeez.

-2
ThisIsYourPenis•

downvoted ↓

-3
ThisIsYourPenis•

you and kleinbl00 should hook up and produce hordes of mongoloid reddit-nazis

-4
1ck15th3kill3r•

They would be hideous in every meaning of the word. It should be illegal for trolls like them to reproduce at all.

-3
[deleted]•

[deleted]

-6
Rabbitbunny•

Oh, this is good. The feminists cry about downvote brigades...

-10
outsider•

Accusations of hypocrisy do nothing to address the problem which is germane to the submission and which has effects over the whole of reddit.

-1
Rabbitbunny•

Have you noted that I'm at -6?

Do you see the problem?

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[deleted]•

[deleted]

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Rabbitbunny•

WHOOOSH

The point I was making, and quite well obviously, is that feminists started the downvote war, and now they're crying because they're losing. They're obviously just helpless women who can't fend for themselves and need some sort of protection :D

In the mean time, Grow the fuck up. There are roving fucking morons on our reddits these days, and they don't follow reddiquette. Instead of asking questions, they downvote. Instead of understanding, debating... they make stupid fucking comments after I've already showed my cards. I trolled this subreddit to make a point, and 13 of you missed it.

We don't need to do anything about downvote brigades, they solve themselves. The good subreddits, they have no problems with this issue. It's you bickering morons who have the problems. Who gives a fuck? Leave.

Basically, fuck you dumbass. Get the fuck off reddit.

-7
1ck15th3kill3r•

lol i only downvote what my downvote brigade in r/cjkers tells me to.

-4