@InnocentBystander@THC@Violentlight :: As mods of a Default Subverse, I don't think you have any business banning a user for reporting what they perceive to be as spam. No one says you have to do anything about it, but this is NOT COOL. Please reverse this ban at once as it is utter bullshit.
Hey there. It seems I've shown up late to this 'party'. So for a while now AOU has been reporting Evrocot posts as spam. Among others of course. But Evrocot is the most recognizable, so I'll be using his name as the example. I personally, and I believe @THC and @InnocentBystander have explained to him as well, that Evrocot was discussed specifically with the community. We also tried to explain and make the subs definition of spam clear. We made multiple attempts to explain that he was not actually reporting spam. We consider it an abuse of the report spam button. The reason we try to explain it so many times, is because we do certainly appreciate the communities help in tracking down the spam. Makes our jobs easier, and holy hell, I love that.
The problem is that we have a lot of people who use the report spam button to try and silence someone because they disagree. That is one of the reasons I became a mod. I figured that I bitch so much about what happened at reddit, I might as well do something to help protect Voat from the same fate. So when we run into people who are using the report spam button to try and silence someone because their fee fees got hurt, we explain what the button is for. We tell them not to abuse the button, because we are not stepping in to silence anyone. We protect the users from action thats prevalent in reddit right now. You simply call on the mods to smite your foes. You call on this team of mods to shut down a discussion, and your the one in trouble. We work very hard to work as the community has told us to. We don't consult with the admins, we consult with the community. So there is a site-wide definition of spam that the v/videos community doesn't fully agree with. Because it would actually be harmful to our Original Content providers. Some of who have put front page content on Voat, exclusive to Voat. Thats pretty cool. So we modified the sub definition of spam based on the feedback from the community.
Our modding is to protect the community from having a screaming minority make changes to the rules that the majority has decided upon. In this case, we have 1 user asking us to take action against accounts that we have already discussed with the community. The consensus is to let the Voats decide with these videos. We specifically asked how they wanted us to proceed with Evrocot. We were told specifically to let the voats decide. Since that is what the community has asked for, we defend it. We defend it from anyone who tries to compromise that.
So we explained to AOU many times where we were coming from. We asked many times for him to not abuse the report spam button. But he made it clear that he was going to continue to abuse it. He also made it clear that he was going to ramp it up. It was his idea of a protest to us not taking action against the videos. We let him know that continued abuse would lead to a ban. He continued. He continued so he had something tangible to take to Protect Voat. But we had told him that if he really thought that it should change, that he can discuss it with the community. He never said anything in our last sticky.
As THC and InnocentBystander have already mentioned. We create a sticky in v/videos that links to our v/videosmodtalk for discussion. It stays at the top where every visitor to v/videos can see it. It invites everyone to please let us know if there is any issues. Because we want to know. We want to make sure we are still working with the community. We want to make sure we are being the mods they expect us to be. In the interm, we have places in v/videosmodtalk for anyone to start a discussion. From there, we can create an early sticky to deal with any situation that appears to be an issue.
But I just can't apologize for trying to protect Voat from reddits fate. Allowing a very loud single person demand that we break community created guidelines and rules because he doesnt agree with them, is exactly how reddit functions.
I still think 1 month as an initial ban is way too much. You could even ask the users now what they think or link back to this comment. Sorry, I wont be able to reply again for a few hours(if this even gets through) the site has swallowed my comment 5 times already.
Oh crap, forgot to say. The 1 month ban is the time period we always use for temp bans. So that was nothing personal. We remain consistent in that so we are not putting any bias into it. 1 month ban has always been the first ban length.
AOU has made it clear that he is using Spam Report as some kind of protest. We had a sticky 2 months ago. As we mentioned before. This issue was specifically discussed with the community. This is simply one user who does not like that these users keep getting to post in the sub. Nothing we can do about that. We have tried to talk this through with him many times. Even now, his argument to Protect Voat is more posts he wants us to remove. He is barely even arguing about his ban. He is trying to convince Protect Voat that he is right and that we are not doing our jobs. We cannot, and will not be removing the posts he has deemed unworthy of v/videos. These are posts that fit in the guidelines. So this single user does not get say over v/videos. AOU does not get to override what the community wants.
AOU has had a problem with what we consider spam for a while. But he still made no effort to bring it up in our last sticky.
After our many attempts to explain this all to him, we told him that further abuse of the spam report button would lead to a temp ban. He continued because he wanted something tangible to bring to Protect Voat. I love you guys, but in this case, hes trying to use you. Hes not even trying to use you to remove his ban. He wants us to change how we mod v/videos because he feels hes right. We can't change the definition without the community. Hes the only one telling us that the current definition is wrong. We have invited him to bring it up in the next community discussion so we can be sure that the communities feelings on the issue have not changed.
We have not been unreasonable. In order to keep our spam report button useful, we are holding a user accountable. He is simply using the spam report button as protest now. Hes not using it to help. He has made that clear. He is not protesting his ban. Hes protesting community guidelines.
So this is why the 1 month ban is fine. It gives him time to try and convince Protect Voat that v/video rules and guidelines are wrong. It gives Protect Voat the time to look into this and realize that we are working with and for the community. It gives you time to find out that this is one user having a tantrum because we refuse to work for a single user.
When his 1 month ban is over, we can create another sticky. He will have time to calm down. He will have the time to create his case with examples. As he has done in this post 6 hours ago. But so far, everything he has provided was specifically discussed in previous stickies. We are not trying to avoid discussion on this topic. We are simply trying to avoid a single user manipulating the situation to try and get his way regardless of what the community wants.
He received many warnings, the ban is only temporary, and we reverse bans when the person agrees to stop abusing the sub.
But he was spamming us with reports that did not fit the criteria. Ironically, he's spamming.
He is a monkey on crack hitting the report button but he is not ad spam for removal, and he may be an idiot for doing so, but ad spam is the only crap that should be addressed by mods in the default subverses.
Manhood, Spamalak, Insane cultists, and others are no better than ads
It's hard to disagree that these are annoying as all get out, but I'm not sure that Atko would agree with this guideline on your sidebar especially in light of his recent visit to v/News
Honestly, I don't care.
I have a great deal of respect for the guy. But..
We run it how the community wishes. End of debate, as far as I am concerned.
We are always listening. And as I've said to AOU, make a post and start a dialogue with the community if he wants change.
No one person will decide, not AOU, not even if it was Atko.
But I think that Atko is happy if the community is anyway.
view the rest of the comments →
Cynabuns ago
I think the more important issue here is the BAN that's been placed on AOU, https://voat.co/v/videos/modlog/banned
@InnocentBystander @THC @Violentlight :: As mods of a Default Subverse, I don't think you have any business banning a user for reporting what they perceive to be as spam. No one says you have to do anything about it, but this is NOT COOL. Please reverse this ban at once as it is utter bullshit.
@PuttitOut @Atko
Violentlight ago
Hey there. It seems I've shown up late to this 'party'. So for a while now AOU has been reporting Evrocot posts as spam. Among others of course. But Evrocot is the most recognizable, so I'll be using his name as the example. I personally, and I believe @THC and @InnocentBystander have explained to him as well, that Evrocot was discussed specifically with the community. We also tried to explain and make the subs definition of spam clear. We made multiple attempts to explain that he was not actually reporting spam. We consider it an abuse of the report spam button. The reason we try to explain it so many times, is because we do certainly appreciate the communities help in tracking down the spam. Makes our jobs easier, and holy hell, I love that.
The problem is that we have a lot of people who use the report spam button to try and silence someone because they disagree. That is one of the reasons I became a mod. I figured that I bitch so much about what happened at reddit, I might as well do something to help protect Voat from the same fate. So when we run into people who are using the report spam button to try and silence someone because their fee fees got hurt, we explain what the button is for. We tell them not to abuse the button, because we are not stepping in to silence anyone. We protect the users from action thats prevalent in reddit right now. You simply call on the mods to smite your foes. You call on this team of mods to shut down a discussion, and your the one in trouble. We work very hard to work as the community has told us to. We don't consult with the admins, we consult with the community. So there is a site-wide definition of spam that the v/videos community doesn't fully agree with. Because it would actually be harmful to our Original Content providers. Some of who have put front page content on Voat, exclusive to Voat. Thats pretty cool. So we modified the sub definition of spam based on the feedback from the community.
Our modding is to protect the community from having a screaming minority make changes to the rules that the majority has decided upon. In this case, we have 1 user asking us to take action against accounts that we have already discussed with the community. The consensus is to let the Voats decide with these videos. We specifically asked how they wanted us to proceed with Evrocot. We were told specifically to let the voats decide. Since that is what the community has asked for, we defend it. We defend it from anyone who tries to compromise that.
So we explained to AOU many times where we were coming from. We asked many times for him to not abuse the report spam button. But he made it clear that he was going to continue to abuse it. He also made it clear that he was going to ramp it up. It was his idea of a protest to us not taking action against the videos. We let him know that continued abuse would lead to a ban. He continued. He continued so he had something tangible to take to Protect Voat. But we had told him that if he really thought that it should change, that he can discuss it with the community. He never said anything in our last sticky.
As THC and InnocentBystander have already mentioned. We create a sticky in v/videos that links to our v/videosmodtalk for discussion. It stays at the top where every visitor to v/videos can see it. It invites everyone to please let us know if there is any issues. Because we want to know. We want to make sure we are still working with the community. We want to make sure we are being the mods they expect us to be. In the interm, we have places in v/videosmodtalk for anyone to start a discussion. From there, we can create an early sticky to deal with any situation that appears to be an issue.
But I just can't apologize for trying to protect Voat from reddits fate. Allowing a very loud single person demand that we break community created guidelines and rules because he doesnt agree with them, is exactly how reddit functions.
Violentlight ago
@Disappointed
Disappointed ago
I still think 1 month as an initial ban is way too much. You could even ask the users now what they think or link back to this comment. Sorry, I wont be able to reply again for a few hours(if this even gets through) the site has swallowed my comment 5 times already.
Violentlight ago
Oh crap, forgot to say. The 1 month ban is the time period we always use for temp bans. So that was nothing personal. We remain consistent in that so we are not putting any bias into it. 1 month ban has always been the first ban length.
Disappointed ago
Well I was unaware that the 1 month ban is normal practice but I still believe that is heavy-handed for a genuine user of the site.
Violentlight ago
AOU has made it clear that he is using Spam Report as some kind of protest. We had a sticky 2 months ago. As we mentioned before. This issue was specifically discussed with the community. This is simply one user who does not like that these users keep getting to post in the sub. Nothing we can do about that. We have tried to talk this through with him many times. Even now, his argument to Protect Voat is more posts he wants us to remove. He is barely even arguing about his ban. He is trying to convince Protect Voat that he is right and that we are not doing our jobs. We cannot, and will not be removing the posts he has deemed unworthy of v/videos. These are posts that fit in the guidelines. So this single user does not get say over v/videos. AOU does not get to override what the community wants.
AOU has had a problem with what we consider spam for a while. But he still made no effort to bring it up in our last sticky.
After our many attempts to explain this all to him, we told him that further abuse of the spam report button would lead to a temp ban. He continued because he wanted something tangible to bring to Protect Voat. I love you guys, but in this case, hes trying to use you. Hes not even trying to use you to remove his ban. He wants us to change how we mod v/videos because he feels hes right. We can't change the definition without the community. Hes the only one telling us that the current definition is wrong. We have invited him to bring it up in the next community discussion so we can be sure that the communities feelings on the issue have not changed.
We have not been unreasonable. In order to keep our spam report button useful, we are holding a user accountable. He is simply using the spam report button as protest now. Hes not using it to help. He has made that clear. He is not protesting his ban. Hes protesting community guidelines.
So this is why the 1 month ban is fine. It gives him time to try and convince Protect Voat that v/video rules and guidelines are wrong. It gives Protect Voat the time to look into this and realize that we are working with and for the community. It gives you time to find out that this is one user having a tantrum because we refuse to work for a single user.
When his 1 month ban is over, we can create another sticky. He will have time to calm down. He will have the time to create his case with examples. As he has done in this post 6 hours ago. But so far, everything he has provided was specifically discussed in previous stickies. We are not trying to avoid discussion on this topic. We are simply trying to avoid a single user manipulating the situation to try and get his way regardless of what the community wants.
@Cynabuns @THC @InnocentBystander
Disappointed ago
OK thanks see my reply to Innocentbystander whwre I pinged you.
AOU ago
lol
InnocentBystander ago
He received many warnings, the ban is only temporary, and we reverse bans when the person agrees to stop abusing the sub.
But he was spamming us with reports that did not fit the criteria. Ironically, he's spamming.
Cynabuns ago
He is a monkey on crack hitting the report button but he is not ad spam for removal, and he may be an idiot for doing so, but ad spam is the only crap that should be addressed by mods in the default subverses.
InnocentBystander ago
Ad-spam is not the only spam we deal with.
The definition we use is posted in the sidebar as follows:
Spam comes in more forms than ad.
Manhood, Spamalak, Insane cultists, and others are no better than ads
Nobody has ever said it was too much in any of the feedback posts, or other. There have been requests to expand it, but nothing usable yet.
Cynabuns ago
It's hard to disagree that these are annoying as all get out, but I'm not sure that Atko would agree with this guideline on your sidebar especially in light of his recent visit to v/News
InnocentBystander ago
Honestly, I don't care.
I have a great deal of respect for the guy. But..
We run it how the community wishes. End of debate, as far as I am concerned.
We are always listening. And as I've said to AOU, make a post and start a dialogue with the community if he wants change.
No one person will decide, not AOU, not even if it was Atko.
But I think that Atko is happy if the community is anyway.