Idea for skin-in-the-game for moderation appeals. Mod attention is an expensive, valuable resource. Allow people to appeal by placing a deposit. If your appeal is approved, you get the money back. If rejected, the deposit is lost.
Early in the Ivermectin/COVID discussion, I posted on Twitter the best peer-reviewed study I could find supporting Ivermectin for COVID and the best study (peer-reviewed meta-analysis) I could find opposing Ivermectin for COVID. My comment was that it was important to read reputable sources on both sides and reach informed conclusions. That tweet linking to peer-reviewed research was labeled “misinformation”, and my account got my first suspension.
A second tweet (yes, I’m a slow learner—I thought adding good data to that discussion was essential) contained a link to a CDC study at a CDC.gov web address investigating whether Ivermectin worked for COVID. That tweet was also taken down as misinformation, and my account was again suspended, when the only information I added to the link was a brief but accurate summary of the study. Again, this reputable link was labeled “misinformation”.
I appealed both suspensions and lost both times. I would have put money down that my appeals would win, back when I assumed these decisions would be thoughtful and fact-based. And, yes, I would have been willing to take Twitter to court over censoring peer-reviewed research and censoring links to CDC studies, if I could find a lawyer and a legal basis. Those lawsuits would be negative for Twitter. Adding financial harm to the personal offense taken over them censoring fact-based posts would also be a strong negative. I don’t think their content moderation team is competent enough that Twitter can afford to raise the stakes.
Yeah, for the company. Ideally this is not passed on to the person doing the moderation. But yes, some better more incentive-balanced approach would be more ideal.
This reminds me of a problem I have heard about a few years ago, not sure if it still exists:
The problem was that scientific papers are usually checked from the scientific perspective, but a frequent problem is also horrible English (typically from authors who do not speak English as their first language). So some journals added “language review” as a first step of their reviews, and if the article was not correct English, they told the author to rewrite it, or offered a paid service of rewriting it to proper English.
The paid service turned out to be so profitable, that some journals simply started requiring it from all authors writing from non-English-speaking countries, regardless of the actual quality of their English. Specifically, native English speakers found out that if they move to a different country and start submitting their papers from there, suddenly they are told that their English is not good enough and they have to pay for having their language checked. So in effect this just became an extra tax for scientists based on their country.
Similarly, I am pessimistic about the willingness of companies to isolate potentially profit-generating employees from the financial consequences of their decisions.
Idea for skin-in-the-game for moderation appeals. Mod attention is an expensive, valuable resource. Allow people to appeal by placing a deposit. If your appeal is approved, you get the money back. If rejected, the deposit is lost.
Early in the Ivermectin/COVID discussion, I posted on Twitter the best peer-reviewed study I could find supporting Ivermectin for COVID and the best study (peer-reviewed meta-analysis) I could find opposing Ivermectin for COVID. My comment was that it was important to read reputable sources on both sides and reach informed conclusions. That tweet linking to peer-reviewed research was labeled “misinformation”, and my account got my first suspension.
A second tweet (yes, I’m a slow learner—I thought adding good data to that discussion was essential) contained a link to a CDC study at a CDC.gov web address investigating whether Ivermectin worked for COVID. That tweet was also taken down as misinformation, and my account was again suspended, when the only information I added to the link was a brief but accurate summary of the study. Again, this reputable link was labeled “misinformation”.
I appealed both suspensions and lost both times. I would have put money down that my appeals would win, back when I assumed these decisions would be thoughtful and fact-based. And, yes, I would have been willing to take Twitter to court over censoring peer-reviewed research and censoring links to CDC studies, if I could find a lawyer and a legal basis. Those lawsuits would be negative for Twitter. Adding financial harm to the personal offense taken over them censoring fact-based posts would also be a strong negative. I don’t think their content moderation team is competent enough that Twitter can afford to raise the stakes.
That creates an incentive to reject.
Yeah, for the company. Ideally this is not passed on to the person doing the moderation. But yes, some better more incentive-balanced approach would be more ideal.
This reminds me of a problem I have heard about a few years ago, not sure if it still exists:
The problem was that scientific papers are usually checked from the scientific perspective, but a frequent problem is also horrible English (typically from authors who do not speak English as their first language). So some journals added “language review” as a first step of their reviews, and if the article was not correct English, they told the author to rewrite it, or offered a paid service of rewriting it to proper English.
The paid service turned out to be so profitable, that some journals simply started requiring it from all authors writing from non-English-speaking countries, regardless of the actual quality of their English. Specifically, native English speakers found out that if they move to a different country and start submitting their papers from there, suddenly they are told that their English is not good enough and they have to pay for having their language checked. So in effect this just became an extra tax for scientists based on their country.
Similarly, I am pessimistic about the willingness of companies to isolate potentially profit-generating employees from the financial consequences of their decisions.