Did you just change the signature rule? If so, I appreciate that and so should the person who made this thread.

Now, putting my head on the guillotine, what about the issue of atmosphere that some of us have complained about? Another ongoing thread indicates that many visitors to this site probably go into increasing avoid mode if unhappy with things, me included. I'm mostly here to have fun discussing music, and I think I'm a typical non-spammy visitor in that sense, moderately sensitive and not here to "outgrow" that or put up with much in exchange for music talk. "Rudeness" and "insulting posts" cover the main concerns of mine, so why are many such posts seemingly tolerated? Moderators mostly wait for users to report such posts? I would think the business purpose of this site involves maximizing legitimate traffic, and hostility undermines traffic. I can say that such posts tend to breed each other.

No, the links in signatures thing has been like that since even I joined in 2009, and probably before that also.

Most people are here to have fun discussing music and other topics for fun as well. So many posts that are deemed "insulting" are left up because either:

A) We don't see them. Not every moderator regularly visits every thread, myself included. I don't actually participate in aspects of the forum that don't interest me (i.e. Electronica), so if someone breaks the rules in there, I probably won't see it. That's what the "report post" button is for. When a post is reported, I see it in my New Posts feed and then deal with it accordingly.

On top of all that, the posts usually are not deleted but rather the offending user is given an infraction or is banned for x amount of time. Whatever action is taken is done so at the moderators discretion.

B) The insult in question is a petty jab at something or someone. Removing EVERYTHING that seems offensive, even slightly so, then that creates a censored atmosphere where nobody can really speak their minds. If we policed and censored every post made, and deleted ones we think might offend someone, nobody would want to remain active on the website.

It's all about balance.

I really expected this thread to die out after last week. I should learn not to be surprised about these things...

Without wanting to rekindle old issues and reopen wounds, wisdom, let's be honest here: your reception here by many people, myself included, was a direct reaction to your own attitude, which came across (right or wrong) as superior, arrogant and intransigent. It's not that people were being rude to you for no reason --- although that's no excuse I accept --- but you did attract that treatment through your own unwillingness to listen and discuss, and to just push your own opinion.

Like I say, I'm not looking for round 2, just wanted to set the record straight. Do unto others is, I think, a good axiom to apply to your behaviour in forums like this, and not a bad motto to live your life by, when it comes down to it.

And Yac: that avatar could crush us all! HAIL! :) :bowdown: (It's like being visited by God!)

While we state that we do not tolerate rudeness and insulting posts, it's difficult to enforce that rule in a rigid way without oppressing freedom of expression as a whole. We do have lines that we draw, but ultimately it's up to the moderator to assess the situation and make a judgment about whether removing posts and/or disciplining members is necessary.
More often than not, occasions where our regular members outright insult someone else, whether intentionally or not, are relatively rare. More often than not, however, accusations of rudeness are a matter of interpretation, and it's usually better for staff to let members work through their differences without needing to constantly dictate the terms of people's interactions with one another.

If you ask me, that would be more harmful to a community than anything. Obviously, we take care of problematic members straight away. But we'd rather let individuals prove themselves as such, rather than oppress their expression by default in an attempt to ensure that they never get the opportunity to make a mistake at all.
We give people the chance to make mistakes and recover from them on their own. Having to arbitrate every instance is not only insulting to the members here, but not conducive to an environment that promotes honest discussion and expression.

Personally I think the only insults to look out for are direct, not indirect. Like name-calling. That's about it...

I know I agree and I know we're not the only ones. Perhaps those of us who feel this way could report more of the posts we find insulting? I usually don't report insulting posts simply because they're often not worse than the posts the mods let slide, but perhaps I (we) should.

But a person can get around that. Like instead of you saying "you are an idiot" you can say "...like an idiot" It's the same difference, the basic idea is still being communicated but one is direct, & the other is indirect, and implied. It just the hot head will go out and speak his mind and say "you are an idiot." The one's who use indirect insults just know how to side step something that would could them in trouble.

Either way I find a person who has to uses cussing while arguing just boring. If I post something 'I like The Beatles, their songs contained a lot of chords!' and someone comes along and replies to me "The Beatles don't know fuck all about chords!" Well to me that kind of diatribe is the death knell of any intellectual dialogue. It's not worth it. And tbh I would rather someone say "F U 'cawz da beetles sux!" than having to suffer by someone using idiotic phrases like "fuck all" and see someone using obscenity to act like they are cooler and tougher than you on the internet.

How is "like an idiot" indirect? It seems to still imply a label directly to the user comparing them to an idiot. I don't really see the difference between are one and like one.

Something I think could potentially have a positive impact on forum culture is if moderation is more visible. On a couple of the more moderated forums I've been where atmosphere in general was respectful and friendly, moderators would often edit posts rather than delete them and then leave a message in that post saying it had been moderated and that participants in the discussion should change their tone. That gives a very clear message that someone is in fact paying attention to what goes on, not just to the offender, but to everyone who reads that post.

I have thought about this, I think that there are a lot of indirect and subtle insults being put out there and often it can be quite subjective to whether they are considered insults or not. I personally would like more of those posts brought to my attention through the report button and the team can make their own judgement on whether it is infraction worthy. There are some intelligent people out there who have a way of words to sound less insulting than perhaps they are intending. However there are also sensitive souls on Music Banter who might take a post as insulting or a personal attack when it might not have been the intention of the poster. If we thought this was the case we would perhaps then PM the accused poster and get their response to what they intended.

So you see, that is why reporting for us is really important. As Burning Down said, we don't check every single thread. I speak for most of us here when I say we just don't have the time too. And honestly, if I had to check every thread, every post, I would lose my enjoyment of this place very quickly.

Moral of the story: report it if you feel like another member has broken the rules, whether it be links in sig, an insult, or spam.

Yea that's how we did it in Tales forums. We left a message in red explaining why it had been moderated to help members understand the way it work. We also PMed them informing why they had broken the rules. I thought it was a really good system.

I think they're very different.

If someone says to me 'stop acting like a prick' it has very different connotations to them saying to me 'you are a prick'.

I think there is a difference between commenting on their actions than referring it to the actual person. You're not really implying that they're idiots but what they're doing is idiotic, or some kind of behaviour they "have" not "are" are deranged one way or another. That's why I think saying like and are aren't much different.

A little bit nit picky so it's not really a big deal I guess.

I think reputation also has to come into it. Everyone loses the head from time to time, but it should be accepted that we're all human (woops! Dropped my circuit board! BZZZT! Reboot.... Ah, where was I? Oh yes: KILL! DESTROY!) and will have the odd spat. Vanilla's expletive, my snipe at wisdom, others. They're not indicative of our usual behaviour, and while anyone should be rightly taken to task over any infraction, it shouldn't be made too big a deal of if it's a one-off and the person is known to be otherwise reasonable and polite.

Also, the relationship between the posters should be taken into account, if possible. Were I to say to Unknown Soldier "You're a total ****ing idiot, you know that?" I think he'd know I was messing, and the same to me: someone I know and respect tells me I'm am old fart who wouldn't know good music if it kicked me up the arse, I laugh, I don't report.

I would definitely counsel against a knee-jerk reaction, the "Mary Whitehouse" syndrome, where everything and anything gets reported, but if someone thinks someone is being genuinely nasty, then yes, report it.

Best idea of all though, treat each other with respect, or to quote Bill and Ted, "Be excellent to each other." :)

In regards to insults, I think we're going to have more work to do if we're going to deal with insulting behaviour beyond the point of name-calling. Being offended is such a subjective thing. We have users who are overtly sensitive and will report someone they don't like for a slip of the tongue, and call it prejudice. We have users with such thick skins they can take the greatest of vile utterances. How do we, each with a subjective idea of a tolerance threshold, moderate the stimuli for feelings? Personally, I bet I'd read half the reports sent in and say "These people need to harden the **** up, it's just the internet", because that's my personal take on a reasonably mild insult that may have deeply upset someone else.


That seems like singling users out. If I'm going to discuss a user's behaviour with them, it's going to be private, inside PMs. It's nobody else's business if someone gets chastised. I'm not in to public shaming.

I don't see something like :

[Post moderated. Please try to discuss without insulting others.]

.. as shaming. I'm not suggesting you should be nasty to people.

Instead of worrying about how they feel, you can let those who write posts that warrant moderation take responsibility for and own up to the consequences for doing so.

It's drawing public attention to someone in a negative way. That doesn't sit well with me. I would be humiliated if ever it were done to me. If the consensus from our users is that nobody minds, then I will of course participate, however, I find it more courteous to PM a person about their actions, which yields the same results in a more private and friendly manner.

I'd rather just give a quick & friendly 'knock it off' without taking any action. Once they've been told there's no excuse for them to continue it.

I will admit I have been known to issue a "cut it out" in regards to multiple combatants.

With a PM, you send a message to that user. With a moderation notice like that, you send a message to the whole community.

I don't think it matters so much that you wouldn't like it because I don't think you'd do anything that would warrant such moderation. Neither do I think it's a punishment's requirement that you would like it done to you before it's a valid strategy. I wouldn't like to be publicly moderated either or to go to prison for that matter. That doesn't mean I can't see the value of these things as consequences for rulebreaking.

If people on these forums are aware of the consequences for breaking rules, but choose to break them anyways, then I generally don't feel sorry for them when they suffer those consequences. Getting moderated in public is not such a gruesome punishment for namecalling in public. In my opinion, the punishment fits the crime.

edit :

I also think it would be effective; people would soon learn not to do it. Which of course would be the point of doing it this way in the first place. ;)

Fair enough, though I would like to see some discussion on what a fair way to moderate a subjective experience is.

(It was edited in to my post on the last page after posting it).

In my experience laying the law down in a public way like a schoolteacher just makes people more irate if anything.

Laying down the law in public requires that those who do so do it in a professional manner. If mods go around gloating f.ex while dishing out punishment for everyone to see, I'm sure the mod-members relations could sour quickly.

In my experience, when mods are able to moderate publicly in a proper way, it promotes respect for the rules and the moderators. I think it's a good way to nurture an environment where people treat others friendly and with respect.

This is getting interesting.

My concern wasn't just based on me being insulted in my thread and feeling hassled across the forum for it - although I think there shouldn't be much tolerance of that.

I do not endorse public moderation of individuals except for blatant violations (like calling someone a dirty word). I think deletions and private warnings would work better in most cases, plus sometimes telling people to, for example, "Please play nice, or this thread will be closed." (I think "play nice" or something similar should be an explicit guideline for behavior here, as the forum appears to exist for fun discussion of music.)

I would like for sometimes closure notices to be posted, such as "Thread closed at original poster's request" or "Thread closed because it's circular and argumentative."

Many people dislike reporting others or aren't even aware of how to report posts. With that, I suggest that moderators be assigned in sub-forums (probably based on the genres they like) to follow fast-moving threads to make sure nothing bad is happening. Again, if that feels like a burden, add moderators, please? Maybe "hall monitors" as opposed to full-fledged moderators.

To be honest it isn't that big of a problem to warrant it.

I think "General Music" has enough activity and strife for special monitoring.

I'm pretty sure all the mods visit general music.

Well I respectfully disagree.

We're here to step in when things get out of hand, not check every single post for something that someone 'might' consider offensive. I've seen people report posts just because they take someone disagreeing with them as a personal insult.

We want to treat people like adults, not children. We give you a chance to express yourself, if you can't manage to do that the first time we'll give you a second chance, if you screw that up then you're gone.
It's that simple.

This forum has always had a relaxed atmosphere and it will continue to do so as long as I am doing the job I am. I'm not here to hold someone's hand and guide them away from all the bad things that might happen. My job is to treat people like adults and say enough is enough when things get out of hand.

I agree. A quick "cut it out" or "watch it", perhaps even with a "no no" smiley will do a lot more to rein me in personally than a long PM or worse, post in that thread by a mod. I would use the old football analogy (talking about soccer here, not sure if this goes on in American Football), where a ref, though having the power (and perhaps enough of a reason) to issue a yellow card would prefer instead to just give a player a verbal warning, letting him know that next time he WILL be getting carded.

If refs gave cards for every small infringement that took place on the pitch most matches would finish with about half the players. Similarly here, if every word out of place is slapped down, soon no-one will say anything, or worse, people will move away from the forum as they'll see it as being stifling. People should know when they've crossed a line, and in most cases I believe a short but at least sincere apology and an effort not to reoffend should be all that's needed.

I want a relaxed atmosphere. My point is that fast-moving threads are where strife often takes place, with people going at each other instead of reporting posts. (That applies to probably every online community that I've followed.)

On another note, concerning informally reporting problems and moderator presence, I've only seen one moderator whose posts always make that clear. Can someone else change his or her set-up so that readers instantly will know it's a moderator? Especially if it's a moderator issuing a public No-no. Maybe that guy wouldn't have started this thread if he'd known who to contact with his complaint. And bartenders usually wear bartender-identifying clothing, you know :) Edit: on some forums, the moderator usernames are listed under each page of threads, which would help a little.

Are people not already aware of the consequences? I mean, if someone takes the time to read the rules and know what they can and can't do then surely they know that something may happen if they break them?

Then when they break them we act on it, message the user privately as it frankly isnt anyone elses business and if they do it again we take it further.

I think I see what you're saying. That if these things were made visible it may deter others from doing the same thing but if someone else does the very same thing then we would privately message them and take the same action with them too.

Really I think that beyond that, beyond having rules and acting on those who break them, I don't think making everything visible to everyone else is necessary. Not unless the problem was way out of hand and the forum was imploding as a result of all the work moderators were being given, which it isn't.

Look at my username, then back to yours, then back to mine, now back to yours. What do you see?

I'm on a horse.

Nope I disagree with this. There are members that are usually well behaved that slip up sometimes in the heat in the moment. I do not think it would be effective to pubically state their post has been moderated. Another reason is I feel like it's the whole freedom of speech thing, if you mess it up yes you get a warning (or infraction depending on what has happened), but having your post edited would not be fair. I also believe that other members will see 'moderator has edited this text' and wonder what actually was there to warrent an edit and possibly create another thread like this to go on and on for 15 pages.

As far as I'm concerned, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Are we able to actually move on now? I'd like to think we are on the same page after discussing it for 12 pages.

Jeez man, get off your high horse for ****'s sake.

party pooper ;)

Well, feel free to disagree. I've been an active member on a couple of boards with that style of moderation and I was impressed, both with how they were moderated and with the friendliness in tone on both those boards. I also liked it because it shows clearly that the rules actually mean something and are taken seriously. It means I can expect the "law" to be upheld. I like that. Plus moderators might get some cred for the work which nowadays mostly goes unnoticed.

Vanilla, you write "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". MB might not be broken, but I think it's got a few dents here and there and could use a little polish. There's always stuff that could be better. I think the "if it ain't broke" way of thinking may pacify you to the possibilities that will let you develop, improve and move forward.

Once you've been around here for a little while you should be easily able to identify who the mods are. It's not like there's hundreds of them, after all. You get to know them, they get to know you, you get to know not to feck with them and they give you a little latitude, providing you've earned it.

It's nothttps://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/i...R1OJBNFnRedoj3https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/i...PovCvgp3SmoKMy

Well this isn't those forums, it's Music Banter. What we do works fine here. None of the mods agree with this method you are speaking about so maybe it's not worth going on about?

I think the only dents are the spammers and their links. And we currently manage that fine. What I'm saying tore, is there is nothing wrong with the way we deal with people who insult each other and I don't see how public humiliation will improve the situation.

And fyi, I couldn't give a rats ass about recognition for my work, that's not why I'm doing it. It's like making music just so you can make money.

The main problem I have with Tore's suggestion is that I do not see how it is possible to apply it consistently and fairly, since offense is subjective.

Until we can address that question, I'm only casually going to consider the proposition.

Frankly, there are only three members here who are vocally disturbed by the way we take care of matters. If more would like to speak up, then I would feel more pressure to revise our strategies.