[MOD] Re: moderated posting

[acidae.livejournal.com]

As some of you may have noticed, moderated posting is still in effect in this community, and that is the issue I would like to bring up today:

How do you, the members, feel about keeping arashi_on on moderated posting?

While decisions in this community ultimately falls to the maintainer, members' opinions are also important, and it would be great if you can vote in the poll at the end of this post and let your voice be heard. Before you do that, though, please first read through the short list of pros and cons I've put together.


PROS

- It eliminates posts that are against the rules from the community entirely.

This is probably the biggest reason why I would like to keep moderated posting myself. I have honestly lost count of the number of posts that broke the rules that people have tried to make (mostly of requests, fanworks, and repeated advertising), and moderated posting has been a huge help in keeping the community free of such posts. It is also possible to attach an explanation on why each post is being rejected, which is much more convenient than leaving a comment on the post before deleting it, and also more helpful than deleting without notice.


- It deters users of for-profit links from spamming the community or even attempting to sneak them into their posts.

This was the reason behind why this community is even on moderated posting in the first place. For those who had missed the whole debacle, someone repeatedly posted webgains links to various communities through newly created journals as each old one was banned and their posts deleted, most likely banking on the fact that maintainers might not be around in time to catch them until much later. The only way to bring them to a stop was to moderate either posting or membership, and if I keep moderated posting the community will never have to deal with such a situation again.



CONS

- Potential restriction of freedom for members.

While I don't really believe this is the case since all the posts I've rejected thus far have either broken the rules in some way or were redundant (eg. asking a question that had just been answered less than a week ago), I can understand why some people may still see moderated posting as a way of policing the members of the community.


- Delays in posts appearing on the community despite adhering to the rules.

I think this might be the biggest reason why members of the community will be against keeping moderated posting, because I can already think of a couple of downsides to it myself. Not only do members have to wait between posting and actually seeing their post up on the community, it also results in sporadic bursts of multiple posts in the community if I don't get to them immediately.

There are a couple of possible solutions to this: there is an option to add members to a list of pre-approved users for the community each time I approve a post, which I have already started using for regular contributors to the community, and I can keep that up for other members as well. I am also considering adding one or two moderators to help approve posts should moderated posting remain in this community.


Having read through all that, hopefully now with a better understanding of why moderated posting may be beneficial to arashi_on, please take the time to vote:

[Poll #1477561]

The poll will close in five days, during which moderated posting will remain in effect. Feel free to comment here with your thoughts on the matter, suggestions of better solutions, or any questions/concerns that you may have, and thanks for taking the time to read!

Comments

[jackie.livejournal.com]

Personally, I would rather wait for the posts of substance than be bombarded with webgains links all the time. :|

(I mean, that's obvs an exaggeration, but the idea still remains.)

[oresa.livejournal.com]

I myself once sent something like fanwork... and i was feel stupid becouse it's not in use anymore.
Everyday I came back from univercity or work and it's a lot of new posts. I think it would be a big mess if everyone could post whatever they want. So keep moderating this comm.
I just now realized how many work you have for keeping clean comm. Thank you!

[xanderave.livejournal.com]

You know where I stand.

Moderated posting = Lesser spam

It helps a lot in trying to find files especially for entries that have not been tagged yet by just going back a few pages instead of miles and miles.

[j-halo7.livejournal.com]

Perhaps it'll be good to get more than 1 or 2 mods in case 1 or 2 of your are busy or can't login everyday. Best to have mods from various time zones too to reduce the time delay. Maybe get like 5-6 new mods but their job is to specifically approve posts only?

[oresa.livejournal.com]

5-6 - not too much? I think 3 will be enough.

[ayu-mi-kay.livejournal.com]

Yes, I too think moderated posting should continue. It helps keep the community clean and I think it is needed for a community of this size.

I also agree with oresa that maybe more people should be appointed to help approve posts. This will ensure that it does not burden down the existing mods, and things get posted more frequently, esp. if it is important of new news.

Kay

[mystika387.livejournal.com]

i think it might be a good idea to perhaps get a moderator who lives in a different time zone so that she can check the posts at a time when its inconvenient for the other moderators, since people in this community appear to be from everywhere! yayy~ haha. also, i think moderated posting is definitely a good idea to keep the posts relevant. i hate it when i have to go through like 1million irrelevant posts in a community to find the couple i really want to read.

[acidae.livejournal.com]

In general, important news tend to be posted by the same few people, and those either already have or will be given pre-approved access so they can post without having to wait. The rules in the profile will be edited accordingly once this becomes official, which is why I wanted to put up a poll first. :)

[drigby.livejournal.com]

Is it possible to have regular posters, particularly those who share files, cleared to post without restrictions and moderating be done for everything else, on top of adding additional moderators? I haven't voted yet and will do so after mulling the pros and cons.

[acidae.livejournal.com]

Actually, I've already addressed that in one of the paragraphs in the post:

There are a couple of possible solutions to this: there is an option to add members to a list of pre-approved users for the community each time I approve a post, which I have already started using for regular contributors to the community, and I can keep that up for other members as well. I am also considering adding one or two moderators to help approve posts should moderated posting remain in this community.

But in a nutshell, yes it is. :)

[aishoni.livejournal.com]

I like moderated posting although it'll be a bummer if there's a breaking news and no mods are around to approve.
Hope you'll add in the profile that posting is moderated and posts will not appear on the comm until approved. Probably most posters tend to post first, edit later (adding more details, html fail, etc) and I don't think they can edit it until the mods approve their post.

[aishoni.livejournal.com]

and TAGS. I love when everything is properly tagged in a comm. Moderated posts will ensure that. I tend to forget to tag sometimes too.

[ohmiyazutto.livejournal.com]

I personally think it is a good idea. The posts are often only partially what everyone is looking for in my opinion and this will help to cut out those useless ones. As for the delay. I know some might be a bit worried about it but the wait would at most be a few hours right? It wouldn't be days, so I don't see so much trouble coming from this.

[godsgirl7.livejournal.com]

I see almost no down sides to moderated posting. It pretty much seems better in every way to me. ^^

[currycroquette.livejournal.com]

Yes, moderated posts please. This community needs it badly. It outweighs the cons in my opinion since most of the posts are x-posts anyway, and the requests posts are just a waste of space for me.

[gashinenai.livejournal.com]

Moderated posting is the best.
At least our f-pages won't be spammed with random stuff

[mintceres.livejournal.com]

I love the fandom and I love spammy posts.
But! everytime I see another webgain stuff arising ad everything connected to that... :/

I'd say 'Quality over quantity'
So I am for keeping the moderated posting :)

[coolnat466.livejournal.com]

MMmhh... I think it's better to moderate the posts.
I still remember all the spams of webgains links entries in another community @_@

And each time I've posted on arashi_on, it didn't take hours to be moderated afterall lol. (...Or maybe was I just lucky? XD)

Ne nee, arashi_on, 最高 <3
Don't change anything, it's perfect that way :p

[acidae.livejournal.com]

You might have been added to the list of pre-approved users if your posts aren't moderated, then XD But thank you!

[elly87.livejournal.com]

I hardly log into lj anymore, and when i check arashi_on i really wanna find out any news o check if there are questions that i myself may have, i think it would be wise to get more moderators to fasten the time the post get approved.

[kos-mos26.livejournal.com]

I dislike the whole idea that a person needs to be 'approved' in this fandom anymore, no matter where you post. There's bound to be spam, repetition and unacceptable entries just as surely as there's bound to be stupid, greedy and lazy people on the internet.

Though I understand both pros and cons, abuse will happen one way or another, whether we see it or not. Honestly I'd rather my f-list take the hit than my posting freedom, and access to news should it come from an unexpected and unapproved source.

[acidae.livejournal.com]

There's bound to be spam, repetition and unacceptable entries just as surely as there's bound to be stupid, greedy and lazy people on the internet.

But the difference is spam, repeated and unacceptable posts will no longer show up in the community to begin with, because they will be weeded out beforehand through moderated posting.

It may not seem like it as the word "approve" is not visibly attached anywhere, but when you think about it any general community on Livejournal with rules stated in their profiles are, in actuality, restricting posting freedom in one way or other. Even the one requirement which I think would garner the most agreement from members - that is, no posting of anything unrelated to Arashi - is a restriction of some kind. Members already have their own journal to say and post anything they want. Would you prefer, then, that the community has absolutely no rules to speak of as well, so that way posting freedom will not be compromised in any way?

There is no restraint to who will get to post news, translations or downloads, only a time difference between them making the post and it showing up on the community. Again, the only posts that will be rejected are the ones against the rules, which would have been deleted anyway even without moderated posting. The difference moderated posting would make in that case is instead of them staying on the community for hours before they can be dealt with, they will never have to appear in the community in the first place.

EDIT: Sorry for editing again, but I do want to add a thank you for speaking your mind, even if you're of the opposite opinion! I hope my reply didn't sound in any way like a personal attack either, because it wasn't meant to be at all. :)

[kaiser-storm.livejournal.com]

I like moderated posting. At least it doesn't clutter my friends list and it's good to know someone has looked over the post.

[eve-aida.livejournal.com]

i dont mind with the comm being moderated..only that there maybe delays as you said but since you come up with a few solution like 'add members to a list of pre-approved users' in order to prevent that, so i think it should be ok..

[dw9lives.livejournal.com]

i am so for moderated posting! i'm always late to get my news anyway, i'd rather get it when I can and not worry about seeing the same thing over and over.

much luck and thank you for giving us a chance to give our opions! :)

oh, quick question, once I stop being lazy, I plan to share some scans, do I just click to make a new post and it'll wait until you're able to approve it and then show up on the comm? that's probably a stupid and obvious question, i'm sorry.

[dw9lives.livejournal.com]

opions... ha.

opinions!

[zephia.livejournal.com]

What if you got more moderators to delete posts that break rules instead of pruning the posts before hand? Same end result? Or maybe not.. I don't know. Just a thought.

[acidae.livejournal.com]

No because the way it used to be was that posts that break the rules might stay on the community anywhere from a few minutes to half a day, most of the time long enough to get what they were looking for despite not bothering to read the rules or even attempt to browse the community for it themselves first. If, for example, you posted a request to the community, what does it matter if it gets deleted afterwards anyway when you've already gotten what you wanted (say, comments to your fanvideo or download links) because a maintainer couldn't get to it in time? Some people might not even realize what they did broke the rules and continue to do it in the future, or they do realize but think it's worth the risk since members are so quick to help.

I'm not sure if I'm managing to get across how I view this but basically, with moderated posting I can actually enforce the rules in a preemptive fashion rather than waiting for rule-breaking posts to appear on the community first.

[nana-komatsu7.livejournal.com]

I voted the third option. Because I read the pros and cons and... there is the breaking news problem and it's the only one I don't see how it can be solved. I mean... it's hard to have at least a mod around every time... so if there are news... it's complicated to have them released when it's time. But it's my only real concern about the problem, because I don't like spammers, non tagged posts and stuff like that.

[acidae.livejournal.com]

As someone has already pointed out, the delay of posts to show up in the community is usually about a few hours' worth only, at the most maybe a day or so, and there is also the fact that news tend to pop up late in the English fandom to begin with. I don't know if that will change your opinion in any way, but I thought I should point that out nonetheless. :)

[harunomasu.livejournal.com]

I agree with moderated posting. Less spam, I think :D

[buttrflykis31.livejournal.com]

i think moderated posting is better than getting dozens of nonsense posts throughout the day, and having people take advantage of this community.

the pros and cons are each valid, but in the long run, it is up to the ones who started this site in the first place to decide. if people dont like it, then they dont have to keep coming back. it isnt like youre forcing us to be a part of this community anyway.

thanks for asking for our opinions though! and if you need new moderators, please let me know if i can be of any help. ^_^

[tatereed.livejournal.com]

Although it troubles the mods to have to check the posts to see if it's appropriate, I like not having to go through posts that are just not supposed to be part of the community. Makes catching up on my f!list a lot, lot easier.