@magnifico
I am already a moderator on another website. I have no with to a mod on here.
On the other website we went through the process of introducing much stricter moderation, one reason is the site owner was thinking of shutting it down. There was initially a lot of screaming about 'freedom of speech' etc. That died out. As a result we had a few members leave, most came back. We went from 6 moderators spending 80% of the time (a lot of their free time) managing a handful of members, to four mods doing very little at all. Traffic has gone from upto 200 posts per day, by a small few (mostly flaming) members, back to about 50 posts per day, 99% of which are directly helpful.
Other sites have also been through this painful process. Asiaexpat had to do it when they commercialized. If GoKunming is ever approached by a potential buyer, or big corporate sponsors, they will face the same pressure.
@Mods
Appreciate the work you do. If any of you wants a chat over coffee, I can share the experiences and methods learned when I was a part of the process on the other website. You know how to contact me.
@DanTheMan and Moderator
Yes, I also think the majority wants more moderation and is silent because nobody wants to intervene in a sterile debate with the main protagonists of GKM who always start well a topic with clever arguments (I do concess) but always ends in a penis size battle.
Yes also for a thumbs up/down button.
1. Sooooo....still no comment/plan/ETA on the user ratings (likes, dislikes) feature for blog comments?
2. The gokm TOS neglected to include "coerce", although gratuitous feeding is greatly encouraged.
sorry, not trying to be confrontational. just curious.
you only have 16 posts because the flame wars deter you from the forum?
so you will have at least 10 posts a month of useful info about spring city after the moderation kicks in, right?
laotou - thumbs down!!!
@Moderator
I would like to ask the same question as laotou. Update us on the status of any comment voting feature. Seems to be lots of interest in having one. Would reduce your forum headaches as users could self moderate. Also, you wouldn't have to go about deleting posts; again crowdsourcing would take care of that for you.
Problem with having user ratings as an alternative moderation solution is that it is heavily influenced by user bias, inexperience and emotions. Posts would disappear or be hidden because they contain unpopular opinions rather than bullying, being deliberately made to start flame wars or breaking other rules.
A rating system that doesn't moderate, or a Thanks system, with 0 being the lowest score could be interesting, together with a Report icon/button. A more visible link to posting guidelines could also help remind users to follow the rules.
It's by no means perfect, but on the forums I have used where it's been implemented, it works well enough. Plus the comments are still there if anyone wants the whole story. Right now on GoK, a useful comment and a flame war comment is just treated the same, and current moderation consists of vanishing comments without a record or locking a thread, sometimes both.
And laotou has another valid point; the comments that act as troll bait and enrage other users to respond don't seem to get any moderation. In a forum with thumbs up/down, those initial inflammatory comments get thumbed down fast, and subsequently saves the thread from degenerating into an unreadable flame war.
I don't foresee any updates. Still no:
Spam button
Search function
I don't think the owners have any time to bother with such things. So in my opinion the moderator things would be too time consuming.
i think everyone got the message.
ps. alien is gone? he he.
From my limited understanding, and I stand to be corrected. Not all website software has all functions. It is possible that some of the functions desired are not on the software currently used. If so there would need to be an upgrade, this means costs, time and money.
