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Hmm, I read that there was no notice given. Either way, I agree with you that personally identifiable information should be forbidden and censored by mods, adm

Hmm, I read that there was no notice given. Either way, I agree with you that personally identifiable information should be forbidden and censored by mods, admins, and the community as general policy. I may have misunderstood your meaning. I read that you support blocking offensive speech. I'm not convinced that removing/blocking the old content (as much as I did not think it was funny) is a good idea. It stokes a fire. Giving notice to the moderators, and then either replacing them, or closing submissions to that sub, and cleansing old data of personally identifiable information seems more appropriate. Under the current circumstances, it's really difficult for the community to verify that what was claimed happened actually happened: we're blocked from seeing it all. There could be more transparency, and I think that's what folks are clambering for. The firing of Victoria, santa, and the leukemia boy with no notice point to the same issue, and these were just the final straws that broke the camel's back for many people. Reddit still has an opportunity to be both an awesome community and a monetizable business. It just depends what steps are taken from here and if they're consistent with old policy, or if managers will really get introspective and work with the community to make some changes, even if they aren't the exact ones demanded in this petition. The way I read this saga is, each time something happens that demonstrates a lack of transparency or oversight in how the community operates, more people get upset: it is more evidence that the lack of communication was not a one-off mistake. Rather, it's habit and deeply ingrained.

eridius 11y ago
Why go to great lengths to preserve content in a subreddit that was found to be in significant enough violation of the rules to warrant banning? There's nothing sacred about that content that demands it be preserved. And trying to preserve the subreddit itself such that people can still participate, while merely attempting to replace moderators, would not solve any problem. The toxic community that engaged in the harassment would still exist, and there's no good way for reddit admins to appoint new people as moderators anyway, because they didn't form the community in the first place. > There could be more transparency, and I think that's what folks are clambering for. In the case of the banned subreddits, there was actually plenty of transparency, and a plethora of various posts explaining what happened. But a lot of people spread a lot of FUD about (whether by accident or deliberately I don't know) and in general did their best to obscure the reason for the banning. It really feels like there's a bunch of users who are doing their absolute best to try and stoke up the fires and create a witch hunt, which is why you get a lot of this misinformation being spread around and a lot of discredited claims being repeated over and over again. I do agree that the firing of Victoria was handled badly, mostly in that there was no notice given to the subreddits and moderators, and no plan in place for how to handle the AMAs that she had been responsible for. As for whether the act itself was justified, I have no idea, because we don't know why her employment was terminated. And we probably never will, unless she publicly states the reason herself.
- studentrob 11y ago
  > Why go to great lengths to preserve content? I don't think it's great lengths. And why? Well, because you want your userbase to trust you and increased transparency helps that. I don't care about that sub but its complete removal lends credence to the FUD you mention, or at the very least leaves it as an open question. Many people don't trust Facebook, but it's irreplaceable. It's a great way to communicate with your friends and share photos, there's no easy way to migrate your contacts list to another system, plus user adoption of a new interface would be difficult, etc. Reddit doesn't have any of those leg-ups, and as you mention the users are more technologically able. The only thing going for it is the existing architecture and userbase, but as we've seen, given sufficient alternatives, users will move. At the end of the day, EP said Reddit should not be a free speech platform, and that's something with which I'll never agree. If she had instead said, "We ARE a free speech platform, yet we also remove personally identifiable information and ban those who post it" then it would be an entirely different story. As it is, it looks like she's trying to enforce Europe's definition of free speech, which limits hate speech, and that brings more hate than it limits (see: Muslims trying to sue Charlie Hebdo, failing, and then killing them 7 years later). The scale is much different but the concept is the same. > It really feels like there's a bunch of users who are doing their absolute best to try and stoke up the fires and create a witch hunt That may be. I think there's an opportunity here for management to be proactive and more open about what direction they are taking the website. Right now I don't see that. "Wait six months, I'll give you useful tools" is not something I could say to my manager at work about my software architecture plan, and it's not something Reddit should be telling its users. EDIT: > Why go to great lengths to preserve content? Also, because this should not be a great effort. If it is, then you are admitting that the job of a moderator is difficult, and therefore they should be given more support. This is the realization reddit management is now making. I suspect the truth over what happened to FPH is both what Reddit Inc says and what the moderators say. Moderators say they have inefficient tools to tackle doxxing, and Reddit says moderators aren't doing a good enough job. Whose burden is that? The banning of FPH clearly demonstrated that admins felt it is the moderators' burden. The blackout showed the mods feel it is Reddit Inc's. I'll side with the mods as they are unpaid and don't need to do any of this. I personally don't need to see FPH, but I can see that Reddit Inc does not understand the needs or wants of its user base, inside or out of FPH.

eridius 11y ago

Why go to great lengths to preserve content in a subreddit that was found to be in significant enough violation of the rules to warrant banning? There's nothing sacred about that content that demands it be preserved. And trying to preserve the subreddit itself such that people can still participate, while merely attempting to replace moderators, would not solve any problem. The toxic community that engaged in the harassment would still exist, and there's no good way for reddit admins to appoint new people as moderators anyway, because they didn't form the community in the first place. > There could be more transparency, and I think that's what folks are clambering for. In the case of the banned subreddits, there was actually plenty of transparency, and a plethora of various posts explaining what happened. But a lot of people spread a lot of FUD about (whether by accident or deliberately I don't know) and in general did their best to obscure the reason for the banning. It really feels like there's a bunch of users who are doing their absolute best to try and stoke up the fires and create a witch hunt, which is why you get a lot of this misinformation being spread around and a lot of discredited claims being repeated over and over again. I do agree that the firing of Victoria was handled badly, mostly in that there was no notice given to the subreddits and moderators, and no plan in place for how to handle the AMAs that she had been responsible for. As for whether the act itself was justified, I have no idea, because we don't know why her employment was terminated. And we probably never will, unless she publicly states the reason herself.

studentrob 11y ago
> Why go to great lengths to preserve content? I don't think it's great lengths. And why? Well, because you want your userbase to trust you and increased transparency helps that. I don't care about that sub but its complete removal lends credence to the FUD you mention, or at the very least leaves it as an open question. Many people don't trust Facebook, but it's irreplaceable. It's a great way to communicate with your friends and share photos, there's no easy way to migrate your contacts list to another system, plus user adoption of a new interface would be difficult, etc. Reddit doesn't have any of those leg-ups, and as you mention the users are more technologically able. The only thing going for it is the existing architecture and userbase, but as we've seen, given sufficient alternatives, users will move. At the end of the day, EP said Reddit should not be a free speech platform, and that's something with which I'll never agree. If she had instead said, "We ARE a free speech platform, yet we also remove personally identifiable information and ban those who post it" then it would be an entirely different story. As it is, it looks like she's trying to enforce Europe's definition of free speech, which limits hate speech, and that brings more hate than it limits (see: Muslims trying to sue Charlie Hebdo, failing, and then killing them 7 years later). The scale is much different but the concept is the same. > It really feels like there's a bunch of users who are doing their absolute best to try and stoke up the fires and create a witch hunt That may be. I think there's an opportunity here for management to be proactive and more open about what direction they are taking the website. Right now I don't see that. "Wait six months, I'll give you useful tools" is not something I could say to my manager at work about my software architecture plan, and it's not something Reddit should be telling its users. EDIT: > Why go to great lengths to preserve content? Also, because this should not be a great effort. If it is, then you are admitting that the job of a moderator is difficult, and therefore they should be given more support. This is the realization reddit management is now making. I suspect the truth over what happened to FPH is both what Reddit Inc says and what the moderators say. Moderators say they have inefficient tools to tackle doxxing, and Reddit says moderators aren't doing a good enough job. Whose burden is that? The banning of FPH clearly demonstrated that admins felt it is the moderators' burden. The blackout showed the mods feel it is Reddit Inc's. I'll side with the mods as they are unpaid and don't need to do any of this. I personally don't need to see FPH, but I can see that Reddit Inc does not understand the needs or wants of its user base, inside or out of FPH.