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Now that the moderator's identity is public, a useful next step would be a public log of all moderator actions. lobste.rs has one[1] and the transparency is gre

Now that the moderator's identity is public, a useful next step would be a public log of all moderator actions. lobste.rs has one[1] and the transparency is great. [1] https://lobste.rs/moderations https://lobste.rs/moderations

tptacek 13y ago
A log of moderator actions seems like an invitation to many years of debate over the moderator's actions. The current system, of sporadic conspiracy theories regarding moderation, actually seems preferable to me.
- Pacabel 13y ago
  The debate will still be there either way, will it not? It's probably preferable to base such discussion on a correct log of the events, rather than speculation and unsubstantiated allegations.
  - DanBC 13y ago
    Mod logs are a call to concern trolls and bike shedding. They're usually a bad idea. Better is to assume good faith and accept that mistakes happen, rather than assume mods need to be kept in check and all actions need to be scrutinised.
    - krapp 13y ago
      I don't know. Concern trolls and bike shedding already happens here. Given the conspiratorial nature of some of the community, maybe a bit more transparency is a good idea. Although, where this would really be useful is with banning. Unfortunately, banned users aren't supposed to know they're banned and being able to actually see what straw broke the camel's back might give the game away. But it might help demonstrate to users what's expected of them.
      - hueving 13y ago
        > banned users aren't supposed to know they're banned As someone who has been on the receiving end of a shadow-ban several times over the years, you realize it right away if you actually pay attention. Your comments suddenly get no votes or responses.
    - hueving 13y ago
      >Better is to assume good faith and accept that mistakes happen This leaves no room for improvement of the moderation that does occur. This could be fixed by allowing people with 5000+ karma or so to see the mod logs.
  - tptacek 13y ago
    In a choice between (a) uninformed but relatively infrequent debates about the moderator (b) routinized and personalized debates about the moderator, I definitely choose (a). I have a different perspective on HN than I think many other people do here; I consider myself a guest, and don't see myself as part of what makes HN HN. In the somewhat unlikely event that Daniel and Nick do something to make the site unworkable for me, I'm not going to get angry about it.
    - pbiggar 13y ago
      That's a curious position. I've been commenting here for over 5 years, and I was reading for longer. I participate in this community in some fashion most days. If HN was taken away or ruined, I would feel I had lost an important part of my life.
    - pbhjpbhj 13y ago
      >"I consider myself a guest, and don't see myself as part of what makes HN HN" // That's very interesting. I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels you're quite a central part of what makes HN what it is. Without contributors - "guests" if you like - who add genuine value there is no community here beyond that you could find on any number of other tech/business news sites. A party with no guests ... This an especially strange comment - perhaps an attempt at modesty - when one sees in your profile, this: >"Must-read list: 'idlewords (emeritus), 'pbsd, 'apaprocki, 'patio11, 'gruseom, 'anigbrowl, 'mechanical_fish, 'carbocation, 'potatolicious, 'grellas, 'dctoedt, 'yummyfajitas, 'tzs, 'rayiner, 'DannyBee; Yeah, yeah yeah, 'pg too." which rather suggests that for you these people make HN what it is, or at least are essential to giving it the twist of flavour you seek. You've got to realise that should everyone else be forced to make a list like this then you'd be on a large proportion of them, surely? For me, I try to ignore the source of the comments before I consider them but I've been here long enough to have enjoyed many of your comments whether they added a sweet, or sour, flavour to a particular thread. Thank you. This too shall pass and anger is probably not the right response to that passing, fair play.
    - ufmace 13y ago
      Modesty is generally a good trait, but I'll say that to me, HN seems to be unique among all other discussion board I've been a part of as far as having a lot of highly accomplished and knowledgeable software people from all walks of life, from startup founders to big-company cogs to freelance contractors. There's lots of places to find jokes, memes, puns, and discussion of the latest TV shows, but I haven't found anywhere on the internet as good as HN is now for this kind of discussion.
- baddox 13y ago
  I think debate over moderators' actions is crucial and should be encouraged.
  - namenotrequired 13y ago
    I agree that it should be possible when necessary, but I'm not sure about encouraged. At least, it shouldn't go so far as to significantly impact the signal-to-noise ratio (I'd still consider them noise). Then again, I guess there's one way to find out whether it would or not.
    - baddox 13y ago
      If there was a page that logged all moderator actions, that's where the discussion could take place. I don't think it was noticeably affect the signal-to-noise ratio of the rest of the site.
      - namenotrequired 13y ago
        Thanks for clarifying!
  - eruditely 13y ago
    Depends, in good-faith communities like these they more bring harm, than say a standard phpBB forum.
- voicereasonish 13y ago
  The far more damaging part of HN IMHO is the silent banning. It's a very ugly sledgehammer which is routinely used to censor dissenting voices. Victims of it have no real recourse even if they do notice they've been censored. It doesn't make for an open relaxed environment where people can express their opinion. It's a lame, lazy and flawed system of moderation which ends up with a ton of false positives. I wouldn't be surprised if this comment gets me silent banned!
  - tptacek 13y ago
    I would be surprised if the evidence showed that a comment like this ever got someone silent-banned. Usually, when you look at the comments of people who have gotten banned, there's a nasty tone to accompany the critical intent.
    - hueving 13y ago
      >I would be surprised if the evidence showed Yet you argued in another comment that this evidence should be hidden from the community. If you have faith that the evidence would show that bans are always justified, why not argue for them to be public?
      - tptacek 13y ago
        The same comment you're referring to to make this argument answers it.
        hueving 13y ago
        >A log of moderator actions seems like an invitation to many years of debate over the moderator's actions. The current system, of sporadic conspiracy theories regarding moderation, actually seems preferable to me. That's the one I was referring to. Can you point me to the one you are referring to that says why you prefer an opaque system?
    - voicereasonish 13y ago
      Is "nasty tone" really the basis of silently banning people? Just because something offends a moderator, then all of their subsequent comments are censored? Being offended shouldn't offer anyone any special rights. If something "offends" you, ignore it and move on.
- krapp 13y ago
  At the very least, a log of title and content changes by moderators would be useful.
  - dang 13y ago
    I'm not sure what you mean by "content changes", but I plan eventually to open-source the software I use to keep track of title and url edits.
    - krapp 13y ago
      I was assuming moderators sometimes edited post content as well. If not, I was mistaken.
      - dang 13y ago
        If by "post content" you mean things that people put in text fields like comments and Ask HNs, then no, we basically never change those. I say "basically" because I did once fix a typo in one of pg's comments. But then I emailed him about it.
- mindcrime 13y ago
  A log of moderator actions seems like an invitation to many years of debate over the moderator's actions. If that's the price to be paid for transparency, I think it's worth it. The idea of a cabal of mysterious insiders ,pulling the strings while the rank-and-file plebians stay in the dark, blissfully unaware of what's really going on, - sounds more like the plot for a (bad) cyberpunk movie, than a desirable model for real life. It also strikes me as pretty close to diametrically opposed to the "hacker ethic".
  - davidw 13y ago
    HN isn't real life though! It's not a democracy, and is not meant to be all things to all people.
    - mindcrime 13y ago
      True, true... But I think (some|most|a lot) of us see it as something of a microcosm of real life, and base some our (hopes|expectations|whatever) in terms of real life "things".
rdl 13y ago
I would agree IFF there were a lot of moderators. As it is, there's no real need for accountability because there is no accountability (and there doesn't need to be).

tptacek 13y ago

A log of moderator actions seems like an invitation to many years of debate over the moderator's actions. The current system, of sporadic conspiracy theories regarding moderation, actually seems preferable to me.

Pacabel 13y ago
The debate will still be there either way, will it not? It's probably preferable to base such discussion on a correct log of the events, rather than speculation and unsubstantiated allegations.
- DanBC 13y ago
  Mod logs are a call to concern trolls and bike shedding. They're usually a bad idea. Better is to assume good faith and accept that mistakes happen, rather than assume mods need to be kept in check and all actions need to be scrutinised.
  - krapp 13y ago
    I don't know. Concern trolls and bike shedding already happens here. Given the conspiratorial nature of some of the community, maybe a bit more transparency is a good idea. Although, where this would really be useful is with banning. Unfortunately, banned users aren't supposed to know they're banned and being able to actually see what straw broke the camel's back might give the game away. But it might help demonstrate to users what's expected of them.
    - hueving 13y ago
      > banned users aren't supposed to know they're banned As someone who has been on the receiving end of a shadow-ban several times over the years, you realize it right away if you actually pay attention. Your comments suddenly get no votes or responses.
  - hueving 13y ago
    >Better is to assume good faith and accept that mistakes happen This leaves no room for improvement of the moderation that does occur. This could be fixed by allowing people with 5000+ karma or so to see the mod logs.
- tptacek 13y ago
  In a choice between (a) uninformed but relatively infrequent debates about the moderator (b) routinized and personalized debates about the moderator, I definitely choose (a). I have a different perspective on HN than I think many other people do here; I consider myself a guest, and don't see myself as part of what makes HN HN. In the somewhat unlikely event that Daniel and Nick do something to make the site unworkable for me, I'm not going to get angry about it.
  - pbiggar 13y ago
    That's a curious position. I've been commenting here for over 5 years, and I was reading for longer. I participate in this community in some fashion most days. If HN was taken away or ruined, I would feel I had lost an important part of my life.
  - pbhjpbhj 13y ago
    >"I consider myself a guest, and don't see myself as part of what makes HN HN" // That's very interesting. I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels you're quite a central part of what makes HN what it is. Without contributors - "guests" if you like - who add genuine value there is no community here beyond that you could find on any number of other tech/business news sites. A party with no guests ... This an especially strange comment - perhaps an attempt at modesty - when one sees in your profile, this: >"Must-read list: 'idlewords (emeritus), 'pbsd, 'apaprocki, 'patio11, 'gruseom, 'anigbrowl, 'mechanical_fish, 'carbocation, 'potatolicious, 'grellas, 'dctoedt, 'yummyfajitas, 'tzs, 'rayiner, 'DannyBee; Yeah, yeah yeah, 'pg too." which rather suggests that for you these people make HN what it is, or at least are essential to giving it the twist of flavour you seek. You've got to realise that should everyone else be forced to make a list like this then you'd be on a large proportion of them, surely? For me, I try to ignore the source of the comments before I consider them but I've been here long enough to have enjoyed many of your comments whether they added a sweet, or sour, flavour to a particular thread. Thank you. This too shall pass and anger is probably not the right response to that passing, fair play.
  - ufmace 13y ago
    Modesty is generally a good trait, but I'll say that to me, HN seems to be unique among all other discussion board I've been a part of as far as having a lot of highly accomplished and knowledgeable software people from all walks of life, from startup founders to big-company cogs to freelance contractors. There's lots of places to find jokes, memes, puns, and discussion of the latest TV shows, but I haven't found anywhere on the internet as good as HN is now for this kind of discussion.
baddox 13y ago
I think debate over moderators' actions is crucial and should be encouraged.
- namenotrequired 13y ago
  I agree that it should be possible when necessary, but I'm not sure about encouraged. At least, it shouldn't go so far as to significantly impact the signal-to-noise ratio (I'd still consider them noise). Then again, I guess there's one way to find out whether it would or not.
  - baddox 13y ago
    If there was a page that logged all moderator actions, that's where the discussion could take place. I don't think it was noticeably affect the signal-to-noise ratio of the rest of the site.
    - namenotrequired 13y ago
      Thanks for clarifying!
- eruditely 13y ago
  Depends, in good-faith communities like these they more bring harm, than say a standard phpBB forum.
voicereasonish 13y ago
The far more damaging part of HN IMHO is the silent banning. It's a very ugly sledgehammer which is routinely used to censor dissenting voices. Victims of it have no real recourse even if they do notice they've been censored. It doesn't make for an open relaxed environment where people can express their opinion. It's a lame, lazy and flawed system of moderation which ends up with a ton of false positives. I wouldn't be surprised if this comment gets me silent banned!
- tptacek 13y ago
  I would be surprised if the evidence showed that a comment like this ever got someone silent-banned. Usually, when you look at the comments of people who have gotten banned, there's a nasty tone to accompany the critical intent.
  - hueving 13y ago
    >I would be surprised if the evidence showed Yet you argued in another comment that this evidence should be hidden from the community. If you have faith that the evidence would show that bans are always justified, why not argue for them to be public?
    - tptacek 13y ago
      The same comment you're referring to to make this argument answers it.
      - hueving 13y ago
        >A log of moderator actions seems like an invitation to many years of debate over the moderator's actions. The current system, of sporadic conspiracy theories regarding moderation, actually seems preferable to me. That's the one I was referring to. Can you point me to the one you are referring to that says why you prefer an opaque system?
  - voicereasonish 13y ago
    Is "nasty tone" really the basis of silently banning people? Just because something offends a moderator, then all of their subsequent comments are censored? Being offended shouldn't offer anyone any special rights. If something "offends" you, ignore it and move on.
krapp 13y ago
At the very least, a log of title and content changes by moderators would be useful.
- dang 13y ago
  I'm not sure what you mean by "content changes", but I plan eventually to open-source the software I use to keep track of title and url edits.
  - krapp 13y ago
    I was assuming moderators sometimes edited post content as well. If not, I was mistaken.
    - dang 13y ago
      If by "post content" you mean things that people put in text fields like comments and Ask HNs, then no, we basically never change those. I say "basically" because I did once fix a typo in one of pg's comments. But then I emailed him about it.
mindcrime 13y ago
A log of moderator actions seems like an invitation to many years of debate over the moderator's actions. If that's the price to be paid for transparency, I think it's worth it. The idea of a cabal of mysterious insiders ,pulling the strings while the rank-and-file plebians stay in the dark, blissfully unaware of what's really going on, - sounds more like the plot for a (bad) cyberpunk movie, than a desirable model for real life. It also strikes me as pretty close to diametrically opposed to the "hacker ethic".
- davidw 13y ago
  HN isn't real life though! It's not a democracy, and is not meant to be all things to all people.
  - mindcrime 13y ago
    True, true... But I think (some|most|a lot) of us see it as something of a microcosm of real life, and base some our (hopes|expectations|whatever) in terms of real life "things".

rdl 13y ago

I would agree IFF there were a lot of moderators. As it is, there's no real need for accountability because there is no accountability (and there doesn't need to be).