I have one or more comments I’d like to make, but I’d like to know what sorts of comments you consider to be either ‘annoying’ or ‘counterproductive’ before I make them. I agree with some aspects of this article, but I disagree with others. I’ve checked, and I think my disagreements will be greater in both number and degree than other comments here. I wouldn’t expect you to find critical engagement based on some strong disagreement to “be annoying or counterproductive”, but I’d like to get a sense if you think for me to come out of the gate disagreeing or criticizing is too annoying or counterproductive.
I ask because I wouldn’t like to make a lengthy response that would go deleted. If you think that might end up being the case, then I will respond to this article with one of my own.
Did you know that if a comment gets deleted, the author of it is notified via PM and given a copy of the deleted comment? So if you don’t mind the experience of having a comment deleted, you can just post your comment here, and repost it as an article later if it does get deleted.
I didn’t know that, but neither do I mind the experience of having a comment deleted. I would mind:
that Benquo might moderate this thread to a stringent degree according to a standard he might fail to disclose, and thus can use moderation as a means to move the goal posts, while under the social auspices of claiming to delete my comment because he is saw it as wilfully belligerent, without substantiating that claim.
that Benquo will be more motivated to do this than he otherwise would be with on other discussions he would moderate on LW, as he has initiated this discussion with an adversarial frame, and is one that Benquo feels personally quite strongly about (e.g., it is based on a long-lasting public dispute he has had with his former employer, and Benquo here is not shy here about his hostility to at least large portions of the EA movement).
that were he to delete my comment on such grounds, there would be no record by which anyone reading this discussion would be able to hold Benquo accountable to the standards he used to delete my comments, unduly stacking the deck against an appeal I could make that in deleting my comment Benquo had been inconsistent in his moderation.
Were this to actually happen, of course I would take my comment and re-post it as its own article. However, I would object to how Benquo would have deleted my comment in that case, not the fact that he did do it, on the grounds I’d see it as legitimately bad for the state of discourse LW should aspire to. By checking what form Benquo’s moderation standard specifically takes beyond a reign of tyranny against any comments he sees as vaguely annoying or counterproductive, I am trying to:
1. externalize a moderation standard to which Benquo could be held accountable.
2. figure out how I can write my comment so it meets Benquo’s expectations for quality, so as to minimize unnecessary friction.
In general, I’d very much like a permanent neat-things-to-know-about-LW post or page, which receives edits when there’s a significant update (do tell me if there’s already something like this). For example, I remember trying to find information about the mapping between karma and voting power a few months ago, and it was very difficult. I think I eventually found an announcement post that had the answer, but I can’t know for sure, since there might have been a change since that announcement was made. More recently, I saw that there were footnotes in the sequences, and failed to find any reference whatsoever on how to create footnotes. I didn’t learn how to do this until a month or so later, when the footnotes came to the EA forum and aaron wrote a post about it.
I agree with this. We are working on an updated About/Welcome page which will have info in this reference class (or at least links to other posts that have all of that info).
The only comment I recall deleting here is this one, in which case as you can see I clearly asked for that line of discussion to be discontinued first.
Okay, thanks. Sorry for the paranoia. I just haven’t commented on any LW posts with the ‘reign of terror’ commenting guidelines before, so I didn’t know what to expect. That gives me enough context to feel confident my comment won’t be like that one you deleted.
I picked Reign of Terror because I wasn’t sure I wanted to commit to the higher deletion thresholds (I think the comment I deleted technically doesn’t meet them), so I wanted to avoid making a false promise.
I do want to hold myself to the standard of welcoming criticism & only deleting stuff that seems like it’s destroying importance-weighted information on net. I don’t want to be held to the standard of having to pretend that everyone being conventionally polite and superficially relevant is really trying.
I have updated (partly in this thread, although it retroactively fits into past observations that were model-less at the time), that’s it’s probably best to have a moderation setting that clearly communicates what you’ve described here.
I have one or more comments I’d like to make, but I’d like to know what sorts of comments you consider to be either ‘annoying’ or ‘counterproductive’ before I make them. I agree with some aspects of this article, but I disagree with others. I’ve checked, and I think my disagreements will be greater in both number and degree than other comments here. I wouldn’t expect you to find critical engagement based on some strong disagreement to “be annoying or counterproductive”, but I’d like to get a sense if you think for me to come out of the gate disagreeing or criticizing is too annoying or counterproductive.
I ask because I wouldn’t like to make a lengthy response that would go deleted. If you think that might end up being the case, then I will respond to this article with one of my own.
Did you know that if a comment gets deleted, the author of it is notified via PM and given a copy of the deleted comment? So if you don’t mind the experience of having a comment deleted, you can just post your comment here, and repost it as an article later if it does get deleted.
I didn’t know that, but neither do I mind the experience of having a comment deleted. I would mind:
that Benquo might moderate this thread to a stringent degree according to a standard he might fail to disclose, and thus can use moderation as a means to move the goal posts, while under the social auspices of claiming to delete my comment because he is saw it as wilfully belligerent, without substantiating that claim.
that Benquo will be more motivated to do this than he otherwise would be with on other discussions he would moderate on LW, as he has initiated this discussion with an adversarial frame, and is one that Benquo feels personally quite strongly about (e.g., it is based on a long-lasting public dispute he has had with his former employer, and Benquo here is not shy here about his hostility to at least large portions of the EA movement).
that were he to delete my comment on such grounds, there would be no record by which anyone reading this discussion would be able to hold Benquo accountable to the standards he used to delete my comments, unduly stacking the deck against an appeal I could make that in deleting my comment Benquo had been inconsistent in his moderation.
Were this to actually happen, of course I would take my comment and re-post it as its own article. However, I would object to how Benquo would have deleted my comment in that case, not the fact that he did do it, on the grounds I’d see it as legitimately bad for the state of discourse LW should aspire to. By checking what form Benquo’s moderation standard specifically takes beyond a reign of tyranny against any comments he sees as vaguely annoying or counterproductive, I am trying to:
1. externalize a moderation standard to which Benquo could be held accountable.
2. figure out how I can write my comment so it meets Benquo’s expectations for quality, so as to minimize unnecessary friction.
This does seem like something we should telegraph better than we currently do, although I’m not sure how.
In general, I’d very much like a permanent neat-things-to-know-about-LW post or page, which receives edits when there’s a significant update (do tell me if there’s already something like this). For example, I remember trying to find information about the mapping between karma and voting power a few months ago, and it was very difficult. I think I eventually found an announcement post that had the answer, but I can’t know for sure, since there might have been a change since that announcement was made. More recently, I saw that there were footnotes in the sequences, and failed to find any reference whatsoever on how to create footnotes. I didn’t learn how to do this until a month or so later, when the footnotes came to the EA forum and aaron wrote a post about it.
I agree with this. We are working on an updated About/Welcome page which will have info in this reference class (or at least links to other posts that have all of that info).
Strongly upvoted.
Just to add user feedback, I did indeed have no idea this was what happens when comments are deleted.
The only comment I recall deleting here is this one, in which case as you can see I clearly asked for that line of discussion to be discontinued first.
Okay, thanks. Sorry for the paranoia. I just haven’t commented on any LW posts with the ‘reign of terror’ commenting guidelines before, so I didn’t know what to expect. That gives me enough context to feel confident my comment won’t be like that one you deleted.
I picked Reign of Terror because I wasn’t sure I wanted to commit to the higher deletion thresholds (I think the comment I deleted technically doesn’t meet them), so I wanted to avoid making a false promise.
I do want to hold myself to the standard of welcoming criticism & only deleting stuff that seems like it’s destroying importance-weighted information on net. I don’t want to be held to the standard of having to pretend that everyone being conventionally polite and superficially relevant is really trying.
I have updated (partly in this thread, although it retroactively fits into past observations that were model-less at the time), that’s it’s probably best to have a moderation setting that clearly communicates what you’ve described here.
Can’t individuals just list ‘Reign of Terror’ and then specify in their personalized description that they have a high bar for terror?
As an aside, ‘high bar for terror’ is the best new phrase I’ve come across in a long while.
Yes, but the short-handle given to the description might radically change how people conceive of it.