Timeline for Make moderator messages anonymous
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
17 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Apr 13, 2017 at 12:38 | history | edited | CommunityBot | replaced http://english.stackexchange.com/ with https://english.stackexchange.com/ | |
| Aug 25, 2016 at 4:03 | comment | added | jmac StaffMod | Adam, the Community Team (which in the context seems like the closest thing to SE Customer Service in this case) do step in to handle more difficult users/situations, especially if asked by a mod or when contacted by a user. Especially in extreme cases like a disgruntled user abusing a mod or other user offline, we can't even know about it until it's already happened, and there is no way for us to create an automated system here that will prevent someone taking action outside of our network. | |
| Aug 23, 2016 at 17:50 | comment | added | user229044 | As an aside, I'm not wild about having to get a second moderator to sign-off before I can take action. When somebody is self-destructing and posting abusive comments or deleting all of their content, I shouldn't have to wait for a second mod to confirm my decision to suspend that person. | |
| Aug 23, 2016 at 14:37 | history | edited | ale | CC BY-SA 3.0 | edited body |
| S Aug 23, 2016 at 14:23 | history | notice removed | user50049 | ||
| S Aug 23, 2016 at 14:23 | history | unlocked | CommunityBot | ||
| S Aug 22, 2016 at 20:58 | history | notice added | user50049 | Comments only | |
| S Aug 22, 2016 at 20:58 | history | locked | CommunityBot | ||
| Aug 22, 2016 at 19:59 | comment | added | elixenide | I should second @BradLarson's comment. I have always felt like SE had my back, even when I wasn't being harassed. It's just that SE can't stop people from being evil. I'd very much like to see SE take whatever steps it can to stop harassment before it starts. I can handle the almost-daily messages full of expletives. But the off-site stalking is creepy and annoying and, in extreme cases, could be outright dangerous. | |
| Aug 22, 2016 at 19:51 | comment | added | Brad Larson | As a moderator, I'll state this: at no point have I felt that SE wasn't doing everything they could to help me when I was being harassed. In each prominent case, multiple SE employees contacted me directly to see what they could do to help and were actively working on it. Sometimes that involved contacting the authorities, but there's only so much you can do when someone from Turkey employs a botnet connecting over Tor to create hundreds of accounts on Twitter, GitHub, and SO to attack you. It's better to not even draw this personal attention to begin with. | |
| Aug 22, 2016 at 19:39 | comment | added | elixenide | @AdamDavis Re legal remedies: I'm a lawyer, and this isn't legal advice to SE or anyone else, but I will say that it's not a question of whether or not it's "hard" to go after people using the law. It's often completely impossible. And regarding SE customer service: if a user flips out on a moderator and engages in off-site stalking and creepy behavior, what exactly could SE possibly do to fix that from a customer service perspective? Once the user knows who the moderator is, SE's bag of tricks is pretty much spent. | |
| Aug 22, 2016 at 19:37 | comment | added | elixenide | @AdamDavis I don't understand these people, either, but yes, people do that. Certain users create new, throwaway accounts on a regular basis. IP blocks and similar measures only do so much, thanks to Tor and proxy networks. Some abusers are high-rep, but many of them are not. It's surprisingly difficult to predict which ones will go completely nuts. | |
| Aug 22, 2016 at 19:34 | comment | added | Pollyanna | @EdCottrell "civil remedies are extremely time-consuming and expensive" If a moderator is being harassed - and make no mistake, even if you hide them harassers will likely target individual moderators anyway based on comments or posts on meta - then saying, "It's hard, so Stack Exchange isn't going to do it" is a terrible attitude. There are a lot of penalties Stack Exchange can employ long before involving the legal system. The moderators are already empowered to use effective penalties. The difference is transferring the problem user to customer service. | |
| Aug 22, 2016 at 19:30 | comment | added | Pollyanna | @EdCottrell I don't understand this type of abuser. You're suggesting that someone creates a new account on Stack Exchange, performs an action that gets them banned, and they spend significant effort harassing the moderator that banned them? It would seem to me that the people who would spend time harrasing have built up some reputation or have linked their account - in other words they are harassing because they believe they've lost something valuable due to misapplication of moderation. Maybe we need more data to figure out whether the abusers really are unknowable people. | |
| Aug 22, 2016 at 19:25 | comment | added | Taryn StaffMod | A few points, on larger sites it might be possible to get buy-in from multiple mods but smaller sites where the team isn't as active that might be incredibly difficult. Also, there is typically no telling what user might go off and contact a mod elsewhere. There have been times it has been unexpected users doing that, so knowing a "user who poses a threat" isn't always clearcut. | |
| Aug 22, 2016 at 19:24 | comment | added | elixenide | This (using customer service and/or legal remedies) is not a realistic approach. SE customer service can't do anything to a troll with a throwaway account who has decided to ruin someone's life offline. And the law is generally not effective/efficient at stopping online harassment. Even if you can figure out who is harassing you, the behavior in question may not be criminal, and civil remedies are extremely time-consuming and expensive. In any case, these are both after-the-fact remedies. They don't do anything to dissuade abuse by somebody who has already decided to be a jerk. | |
| Aug 22, 2016 at 18:56 | history | answered | Pollyanna | CC BY-SA 3.0 |