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Accounts, Moderated Sign-Ups, and You


ArielMT
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Folks, we are at an interesting point in the evolution of Phoenixed Forums.  We have two problems to contain, spammers and ban evaders, and this is how we intend to solve them both.

We intend to leave registration completely open, but new members will be moderated for a while after signing up, allowing us to spot forbidden sign-ups before they become visible to members and guest visitors.  Lurkers, if you decide to sign up after we do this, I promise that we the moderators will make every reasonable effort to approve your otherwise-allowed content as quickly as we can during the short time your posts are moderated.

The time period new members will be moderated is until one of these two happens:

  • You give any of the moderators a means to verify your online identity, such as presence on a furry fandom or social media site.  We need to stress that, unlike a certain other furry fandom site, we are not asking for any sort of sensitive personal information like government-issued ID cards.  A reasonably active DeviantArt, Fur Affinity, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, Weasyl, or similar online presence you can point to and say is yours on any other site is good enough for us.
     
  • We approve 30 of your posts.

When either one of these happens, you'll have fully unmoderated access.

Now, here's where the accounts part of this update comes in.  In order to make this happen, we have to change the group structure.

As mentioned in the Great Red Update, access to the Red Lantern is by request only (after other conditions are met); those of you without access are in one group, and those of you with access are in another group.  Right now, you can tell which is which by the color of the word "Members," but there's no way to tell them apart by color in the group settings.

To make this change happen, we need a third group just for new sign-ups to be in temporarily.  As you can imagine, it'll be very hard to manage three groups if they all have the same name and the same color in the management interface, so we need new group names.  What we've come up with are these:

  • New Members - The new default and moderated group.
  • Members - The unmoderated group after 30 approved posts.
  • Red Lantern - The group which has access to the Red Lantern.  For those of you in this group, we're going to structure this so you're actually a member of two groups, Members and Red Lantern, and only "Members" will show publicly.

Suggestions for alternate names are welcome.

So that's it, simple and straightforward, but it will affect all of us.  We need to rename the groups, add a new group, and temporarily moderate new users.

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On 4/15/2017 at 11:51 PM, ArielMT said:

 

  • We approve 30 of your posts.

Now, because i'm British i feel the need to complain. i've got evidently more than 30 posts under my belt (46 if this gets approved, assuming i haven't forgotten about any other posts that are currently hidden) so i have no idea why i'm still being moderated. It wouldn't be an issue if i haven't seen some of my posts go two days without getting approved or erased even when mods have posted later replies in the very same thread i have (my other post itt, for the record). It seems completely unnecessary, it's frankly discouraging not being able to rely on sending prompt replies to people on certain topics and i've met the criteria to not have my posts moderated so...what's going on man?

Also, if by approved posts you actually mean likes then fucking lol. 9_9

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19 hours ago, [null] said:

Also, if by approved posts you actually mean likes then fucking lol. 9_9

I don't think I have thirty posts that the moderators liked, and I've been here for about a year

 

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21 minutes ago, Aeon said:

I don't think I have thirty posts that the moderators liked, and I've been here for about a year

 

I was just having some fun with that line, saw an excuse to be a snarky dick and i took it. xD

Cheers for lifting the content moderation btw mods, shouldn't really have taken some prodding but much obliged.

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The more I think about this, the more I think it's a bad idea. Partly because I think it was only put in place because of the one person, and partly because I think it is pretty discouraging to new members for the reasons Null mentioned. If you actually want the site and community here to grow, then it should be open and welcome from the beginning rather than restrictive and scrutinizing.

But if you don't care about that then whatever.

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34 minutes ago, FlynnCoyote said:

The more I think about this, the more I think it's a bad idea. Partly because I think it was only put in place because of the one person, and partly because I think it is pretty discouraging to new members for the reasons Null mentioned. If you actually want the site and community here to grow, then it should be open and welcome from the beginning rather than restrictive and scrutinizing.

But if you don't care about that then whatever.

To add to this, it seems like a completely over the top reaction to countering adbots and ban evaders. Now adbots ssssshould run on a limited ip band if they're advertising the same thing and with a little bit of tracing it should be possible to identify and block the entire range they operate on. As for ban evaders, well considering the forum boogeyman knows what proxies are ip banning is useless so i can see why you'd gag people at the start just in case. But, honestly who really gives a shit about him. If he shows up and hurls silly insults you the community can just laugh at him for a bit and the mods can just ban him and delete his posts asap. The problems that you want to solve with content moderation can at least partially be solved by other means and who really cares about being called a gay dick by some guy with a grudge from time to time. Point is, the current rule seems pointless and whatever virtues it may seem to have are offset by it's detrimental value towards the inclusion of new members. Seems stupid to potentially alienate thousands of people because of cheap russian viagra peddlers and one loser.

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i mean new-member post moderation isn't exactly an uncommon practice.

6 hours ago, [null] said:

To add to this, it seems like a completely over the top reaction to countering adbots and ban evaders. Now adbots ssssshould run on a limited ip band if they're advertising the same thing and with a little bit of tracing it should be possible to identify and block the entire range they operate on. As for ban evaders, well considering the forum boogeyman knows what proxies are ip banning is useless so i can see why you'd gag people at the start just in case. But, honestly who really gives a shit about him. If he shows up and hurls silly insults you the community can just laugh at him for a bit and the mods can just ban him and delete his posts asap. The problems that you want to solve with content moderation can at least partially be solved by other means and who really cares about being called a gay dick by some guy with a grudge from time to time. Point is, the current rule seems pointless and whatever virtues it may seem to have are offset by it's detrimental value towards the inclusion of new members. Seems stupid to potentially alienate thousands of people because of cheap russian viagra peddlers and one loser.

oh nvmd we have the expert here

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i mean
isn't new member moderation completely pointless when it's not automatically placed on new members?
Nobody you're attempting to stop wouldn't immediately post the thing you don't want posted. 
It's needless work that only serves to drive new people away. 

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8 hours ago, FlynnCoyote said:

I think it was only put in place because of the one person,

It's not just one person.

I'm not going into detail because of the privacy of the other parties involved,
but it's not just he-who-shall-not-be-named.

Additionally, I personally think it's more off-putting to take no measures to counteract ban evade harassment of existing and active users than discouraging new ones just because they don't like the post restrictions.

19 minutes ago, Falaffel said:

i mean
isn't new member moderation completely pointless when it's not automatically placed on new members?
Nobody you're attempting to stop wouldn't immediately post the thing you don't want posted. 
It's needless work that only serves to drive new people away. 

It was in the planning stage for quite some time, it just took time from the few parties able to actually implement it.
Putting new users on restriction was something everyone on staff could do, so that was our interim solution.

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2 hours ago, Endless/Nameless said:

i mean new-member post moderation isn't exactly an uncommon practice.

I've never encountered it on any forum i've ever been a part of except this one, and i'm a basement dwelling loser that only socializes online so i've been part of a lot.

2 hours ago, Endless/Nameless said:

oh nvmd we have the expert here

No i'm just an arrogant prick as well, but then again i have had to track ips for forums in the past. Site i have admin privileges on found itself getting DDoSed, was being flooded with bots...something something bandwidth...something something no one could access the site for hours at a time for a solid month...something something i was bored and decided what i could find out. With the simple application of my eyes and google i found that all the bots were being directed through two different server hosting companies located in France. I found the exact ip bands they were using and where they were coming from, gave the site owner contact details of the French and US branches of the companies and looked into the possibility of blocking entire ip bands. They had over a thousand technically unique ip addresses available so banning on an individual basis was impractical. Depending on the forum architecture it is possible to block entire bands as far as i'm aware. So at the very least i wasn't knowingly talking out of my ass when it comes to dealing with adbots. However i'm fully aware there are people that know a lot more about this than me so if you're one of them i would greatly appreciate being told what i got wrong, i'm always eager to learn. On the other hand if you were just trying to be sarcastic then, well i'm assuming you're American so i have to say nice try but...no. You've not quite got it right there, the key lies in subtlety. Not only for your sake but for the sake of your countrymen, please try harder. God knows you as a people need someone to teach you about wit so lead by example if you're capable.

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6 minutes ago, [null] said:

No i'm just an arrogant prick as well, but then again i have had to track ips for forums in the past. Site i have admin privileges on found itself getting DDoSed, was being flooded with bots...something something bandwidth...something something no one could access the site for hours at a time for a solid month...something something i was bored and decided what i could find out. With the simple application of my eyes and google i found that all the bots were being directed through two different server hosting companies located in France. I found the exact ip bands they were using and where they were coming from, gave the site owner contact details of the French and US branches of the companies and looked into the possibility of blocking entire ip bands. They had over a thousand technically unique ip addresses available so banning on an individual basis was impractical. Depending on the forum architecture it is possible to block entire bands as far as i'm aware. So at the very least i wasn't knowingly talking out of my ass when it comes to dealing with adbots. However i'm fully aware there are people that know a lot more about this than me so if you're one of them i would greatly appreciate being told what i got wrong, i'm always eager to learn. On the other hand if you were just trying to be sarcastic then, well i'm assuming you're American so i have to say nice try but...no. You've not quite got it right there, the key lies in subtlety. Not only for your sake but for the sake of your countrymen, please try harder. God knows you as a people need someone to teach you about wit so lead by example if you're capable.

59051af8edae6_floraverseiseewellthen.jpg.5632f6f8f4b644d17d4fa3929f731066.jpg

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1 hour ago, Vae said:

It's not just one person.

I'm not going into detail because of the privacy of the other parties involved,
but it's not just he-who-shall-not-be-named.

You somehow know when he turns up despite IP changes. What stops you from doing the same with other evaders?

Does this moderation policy also block private messages? If not, then what stops new members from making an account and then PM barraging their old enemies with abuse? If it does then I guess that's fine, but it doesn't really stop these same people from behaving themselves for thirty posts and then going nutso. My point is you've caught evaders, or at least the same one, plenty of times before more than a handful of posts was made. This policy is punishing new members for something that doesn't even look necessary.

 

3 hours ago, Endless/Nameless said:

oh nvmd we have the expert here

Maximum effort from you as usual.

1 hour ago, Vae said:

It was in the planning stage for quite some time, it just took time from the few parties able to actually implement it.
Putting new users on restriction was something everyone on staff could do, so that was our interim solution.

I know it's been a while since a SOTU before this month, but wasn't transparency a thing you guys were trying to do? If this is an interim solution, are you planning or investigating a better one?

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I'm sorry for going inactive here in my own thread, folks, but I have personally been trying to take all of your comments constructively.

34 minutes ago, Sir Gibby said:

I'm not sure what the big deal is, moderator approval of posts is a pretty vanilla thing around the web

30 posts sounds a little excessive though, from what I've seen its usually 5 or 10

I have to acknowledge this interesting point.  While our plan was firmly on 30, it's not inflexible, especially now that we're receiving public comments on it.

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21 hours ago, Vae said:

It was in the planning stage for quite some time, it just took time from the few parties able to actually implement it.
Putting new users on restriction was something everyone on staff could do, so that was our interim solution.

that literally has nothing to do with what i said. 
at all. 
not even a tiny bit.
but ok

 

Your plan of action for moderating posts does not match up with your reasoning for it. It doesn't accomplish what you want it to because it's not automatically placed on new members. 
Again, if a new account wanted to post the things you're trying to prevent, they would do it immediately, not after they get moderated. 
As the post moderation stands, with reasons I've been told it's there, it's completely pointless. 

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8 hours ago, Vae said:

Additionally, I personally think it's more off-putting to take no measures to counteract ban evade harassment of existing and active users than discouraging new ones just because they don't like the post restrictions.

So basically this is done to put a stop to scenarios where Banned Numbfuck comes under a new name and goes to say...Aeon to further push malicious advances in private? That's what I gather from this snippet...

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17 hours ago, FlynnCoyote said:

The more I think about this, the more I think it's a bad idea. 

Conversation your parents had before they decided to get pregnant.

 

3 hours ago, Sylver said:

Save yourself the effort and don't bother. I offered a solution to a problem that's been going on for over a year and was ignored. 

Conversations your mom had with you about moving out but it never happened.

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7 hours ago, Falaffel said:

Your plan of action for moderating posts does no match up with your reasoning for it. It doesn't accomplish what you want it to because it's not automatically placed on new members. 
Again, if a new account wanted to post the things you're trying to prevent, they would do it immediately, not after they get moderated. 
As the post moderation stands, with reasons I've been told it's there, it's completely pointless. 

Wait, really?  If that's the case, it's even stupider than I thought.

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If I understand the system correctly, new accounts are by default free of post restriction until a moderator takes notice of their presence and reactively puts restrictions under them.

If the purpose of putting new users under post moderation is to dissuade banned users from evading and posting on alts then this doesn't work, since by the time the moderator would have identified the ban evader they would, ideally, just ban them; making post moderation superfluous.

So if it creates more work for the staff, is redundant at enacting the desired outcome, and has the potential to dissuade new users from posting, why is it necessary?

 

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56 minutes ago, Zaraphayx said:

If I understand the system correctly, new accounts are by default free of post restriction until a moderator takes notice of their presence and reactively puts restrictions under them.

If the purpose of putting new users under post moderation is to dissuade banned users from evading and posting on alts then this doesn't work, since by the time the moderator would have identified the ban evader they would, ideally, just ban them; making post moderation superfluous.

So if it creates more work for the staff, is redundant at enacting the desired outcome, and has the potential to dissuade new users from posting, why is it necessary?

 

Considering the mods are fairly quick at banning these accounts as it is (I have not once seen spam and there are several evaders that are smacked down within 2 posts) I'm not seeing much point myself. Especially after having elected a new mod in a different time zone specifically for the reason of having eyes on this (small) forum at all hours. This step is a bit extra. 

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13 hours ago, Sylver said:

Save yourself the effort and don't bother. I offered a solution to a problem that's been going on for over a year and was ignored. I also had a possible solution to their little neo nazi problem but I figured why even bother? Most observe but they do not see.

It's mostly the same people, making the same type of responses they've been making for years. It's stagnated. So please, please, please, don't waste your time.

Now i do appreciate the advice and will likely heed it in time but for now i'm having fun so i don't really care if anyone listens, if people want to bury their heads in the sand and act like the content moderation response isn't stupid that's on them. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

10 hours ago, Tsuujou said:

So basically this is done to put a stop to scenarios where Banned Numbfuck comes under a new name and goes to say...Aeon to further push malicious advances in private? That's what I gather from this snippet...

Well, when i was slapped with content moderation (incidentally after i'd already made about 12-15 unmoderated posts here, go figure) i could still send pms freely so if i was a banned numbfuck there'd be nothing stopping me from hurling abuse at people in private moderated content or no.

3 hours ago, Zaraphayx said:

If I understand the system correctly, new accounts are by default free of post restriction until a moderator takes notice of their presence and reactively puts restrictions under them.

If the purpose of putting new users under post moderation is to dissuade banned users from evading and posting on alts then this doesn't work, since by the time the moderator would have identified the ban evader they would, ideally, just ban them; making post moderation superfluous.

So if it creates more work for the staff, is redundant at enacting the desired outcome, and has the potential to dissuade new users from posting, why is it necessary?

 

Completely true, but to add to it. After a while of seeing how long it took to get posts approved i started to have a quick glance at when mods were online. Turns out you can go hours at a time without seeing a blue username around so if someone was determined to cause problems and had half a brain they could just sign up when no mods were about and post whatever shit they wanted without fear until someone in charge rolled around. The content moderation doesn't stop shit under certain circumstances, doesn't actually do anything to stop banned users from posting and just punishes every new member for being new. It's a really idiotic and ineffective response to a problem they can't actually counter. If someone is sad enough to keep coming back here and call everyone objectively the worst thing in the world, a gay dick, repeatedly because they can't get over themselves then they will. The moderation's pointless and only serves to impede growth of the forum if anything.

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I actually agree with the naysayers almost entirely. Just not the douchey snark and talking down to Vae the mods that's going on. That always goes on when these mods so much as breathe in the site discussion. Best post, as is the norm, goes to gay dog man.

(Christ, Null. Your signature. lmao)

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I'd be less snarky if the mods were more up front about admitting when they've made a stupid call. I said numerous times last year that they needed new mods on the team to cover other timezones and they repeatedly said five was plenty. A few months pass and hey, they're asking for new mods. I wonder why? Oh, timezones, really? Who'da thunk it?

 

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2 minutes ago, FlynnCoyote said:

I'd be less snarky if the mods were more up front about admitting when they've made a stupid call.

 

You're snarky and aggressive no matter what the mods do and with worrying immediacy. 

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Y'know this thread is still about the post thing, riiiight?
Not who's idea was it first, or who likes who, or whatever.

Personally, I think 30 is a bit too much, 15, 20 max sounds okay, as long as people can be on very frequently approving posts. This is something that can't afford to be ignored or let to sit if implemented.

 

Also, what the others are saying, the restrictions should be placed on new accounts automatically, otherwise this system is almost useless.

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Personally, don't find the moderation necessary at all. The mods aren't just putting in a fairly redundant counter measure, but actually selling themselves quite short. I'm not on the front lines stopping spam and ban evasions, but this site can't be that big where it's too much for them to handle. 

Also, if I recall, mods can check IP addresses and compare them to previous banned accounts if they're suspicious, correct? Spam is obvious and will get axed with no need of a second glance, but I remember having an issue where one of the mods either (and don't quote me) said or alluded to IP checks being more than possible. Though, then there's an issue of how useful that actually is for them. I don't know...

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Things have chilled out with our most repeat offenders, so I'm personally going to be goin in the direction of maybe 5 posts or less. Admins have been workin on making it automated for a long time now. Both of our admins work a lot so patience would be neato there. 

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28 minutes ago, Sylver said:

It's a normal and valid reaction to be snarky when something a person cares about is put at risk. 

Imma stop you right there, because like, I think that's as over dramatic as your common Tommy Wiseau dark comedy scene. 

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Buddy if i turned off my phone and somethin happened on the forum u know the kinda earful we'd get if we "weren't fast enough"

also i laughed at a dumb post from tosh. Let me know where the appointment is to flagellate me so that i can be on time.

We've heard y'all loud n clear so we're looking at not doing the thing that's irritating, so the snarkiness is straight up being ignored and contributing nothing at this point. Y'all have got to chill. 

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