There’s a set of moderation-challenges that the post doesn’t delve into, which are the ones I struggle most with – I don’t have a clear model of what it’d mean to solve these, whereas the challenges pointed to in the OP seem comprehensible, just hard. I’m interested in thoughts on this.
1. Difficulty with moderating just-over-the-line comments, or non-legibly-over-the-line comments
The most common pattern I run into, where I’m not sure what to do, is patterns of comments from a given user that are either just barely over the line, or where each given comment is under the line, but so close to a line that repetition of it adds up to serious damage – making LW either not fun, or not safe feeling.
The two underlying generators I’m pointing at here seem to be:
Not actually approaching a discussion collaboratively. Sometimes this is legit bad faith, and sometimes it’s just… not enough willingness to do interpretive labor, or a vague underlying sense that you’re not trying to be on the same team.
Not being up-to-speed enough to contribute to a discussion. This feels harshest to take action on, even when I’m putting on my maximally friendly hat. Sometimes someone shows up and clearly hasn’t read the sequences. Sometimes they have read all the relevant background info but just don’t seem to be getting what the conversation is about, or are derailing it into a more basic version of itself (when it was aiming to be a higher level conversation)
These involve the most misunderstandings.
2. Negative Space
Sometimes, it’s not what a commenter has said – it’s what they haven’t said. They’re making some points that seem reasonable, but they’re ignoring other points.
Sometimes this is because they’re actually ignoring points that are uncomfortable, or they don’t have access to a mental-skill that allows them to notice or process something.
Other times, they respond to a bunch of comments with another full blown essay that addresses everything at once (but, take weeks/months/years to get around to it).
The most common pattern I run into, where I’m not sure what to do, is patterns of comments from a given user that are either just barely over the line, or where each given comment is under the line, but so close to a line that repetition of it adds up to serious damage – making LW either not fun, or not safe feeling.
What I used to do on the #lesswrong IRC was put every time I see someone make a comment like this into a journal, and then once I find myself really annoyed with them I open the journal to help establish the pattern. I’d also look at peoples individual chat history to see if there’s a consistent pattern of them doing the thing routinely, or if it’s a thing they just sometimes happen to do.
I definitely agree this is one of the hardest challenges of moderation, and I pretty much always see folks fail it. IMO, it’s actually more important than dealing with the egregious violations, since those are usually fairly legible and just require having a spine.
My most important advice would be don’t ignore it. Do not just shrug it off and say “well nothing I can do, it’s not like I can tell someone off for being annoying”. You most certainly can and should for many kinds of ‘annoying’. The alternative is that the vigor of a space slowly gets sucked out by not-quite-bad-actors.
Not actually approaching a discussion collaboratively.
Not being up-to-speed enough to contribute to a discussion.
Yeah, these are two of the things that have been turning me off from trying to keep up with comments the most. I don’t really have any ideas short of incredibly aggressive moderation under a much higher bar for comments and users than has been set so far.
Worth noting that we currently have a lot of discussion going on, and the more we have, the more inclined I am to support moderation raising its standards for what is acceptable, and getting more aggressive. A shift from ‘not generating discussion’ to ‘generating lots of discussion some of which may be bad’ changes the situation a lot.
There’s a set of moderation-challenges that the post doesn’t delve into, which are the ones I struggle most with – I don’t have a clear model of what it’d mean to solve these, whereas the challenges pointed to in the OP seem comprehensible, just hard. I’m interested in thoughts on this.
1. Difficulty with moderating just-over-the-line comments, or non-legibly-over-the-line comments
The most common pattern I run into, where I’m not sure what to do, is patterns of comments from a given user that are either just barely over the line, or where each given comment is under the line, but so close to a line that repetition of it adds up to serious damage – making LW either not fun, or not safe feeling.
The two underlying generators I’m pointing at here seem to be:
Not actually approaching a discussion collaboratively. Sometimes this is legit bad faith, and sometimes it’s just… not enough willingness to do interpretive labor, or a vague underlying sense that you’re not trying to be on the same team.
Not being up-to-speed enough to contribute to a discussion. This feels harshest to take action on, even when I’m putting on my maximally friendly hat. Sometimes someone shows up and clearly hasn’t read the sequences. Sometimes they have read all the relevant background info but just don’t seem to be getting what the conversation is about, or are derailing it into a more basic version of itself (when it was aiming to be a higher level conversation)
These involve the most misunderstandings.
2. Negative Space
Sometimes, it’s not what a commenter has said – it’s what they haven’t said. They’re making some points that seem reasonable, but they’re ignoring other points.
Sometimes this is because they’re actually ignoring points that are uncomfortable, or they don’t have access to a mental-skill that allows them to notice or process something.
Other times, they respond to a bunch of comments with another full blown essay that addresses everything at once (but, take weeks/months/years to get around to it).
What I used to do on the #lesswrong IRC was put every time I see someone make a comment like this into a journal, and then once I find myself really annoyed with them I open the journal to help establish the pattern. I’d also look at peoples individual chat history to see if there’s a consistent pattern of them doing the thing routinely, or if it’s a thing they just sometimes happen to do.
I definitely agree this is one of the hardest challenges of moderation, and I pretty much always see folks fail it. IMO, it’s actually more important than dealing with the egregious violations, since those are usually fairly legible and just require having a spine.
My most important advice would be don’t ignore it. Do not just shrug it off and say “well nothing I can do, it’s not like I can tell someone off for being annoying”. You most certainly can and should for many kinds of ‘annoying’. The alternative is that the vigor of a space slowly gets sucked out by not-quite-bad-actors.
Yeah, these are two of the things that have been turning me off from trying to keep up with comments the most. I don’t really have any ideas short of incredibly aggressive moderation under a much higher bar for comments and users than has been set so far.
Worth noting that we currently have a lot of discussion going on, and the more we have, the more inclined I am to support moderation raising its standards for what is acceptable, and getting more aggressive. A shift from ‘not generating discussion’ to ‘generating lots of discussion some of which may be bad’ changes the situation a lot.
+5