Topic: I want a way to demerit posts. (Read 1331 times)

In the present system their are many option to take action against shit post. You can ignore the person or you can report to moderator for delete the post also you can give feedback on his post history. So overall from all this above actions you could encourage good posters. Implementation of demerit post cause many problem and people can abuse this system too like people did with trust system. So their is no need to demerit if all others option are available for stop shit post. Reporting is one of the best things to make this forum clean. So we need to encourage reporting bad post and we need to think about how to encourage reporting.

Totally agree with your points.

This is not for reports as such though. This is for individuals taking independent action where they feel essentially compelled?
I guess though yes could be a result of a report hmmm well if it went that way board wide which I would not support then your priority rating system could be applied to the reports.

I though this is for mods that independly locate something they want to take action on but cant delete or ban?
I think only allow it in the tech boards anyway where it is more precise and more critical.

But yeah if I have misunderstood the scope and it was for the entire board and via reports then I totally agree with you.
I think that would be a bad idea. Keep it to tech boards is my opinion right now. Highly skilled and trained time tested reliable experts only. I support anything that assists locating the truth.

When creating systems that revolve around staff/moderation the main issue is that of time. Already, with reports, you have a massive timesink for moderators and certain types of reports are more important to deal with than misinformation (i.e. direct harm to users).

Reports that are about a single post or a few consecutive posts are much more easily dealt with than something that would require logical analysis. Certain discussions also have multiple branching paths of misinformation or incorrect statements which would require more work. On and on the queue will develop, where you no longer have moderators anymore.

They've become lawyers with paperwork stacked to the skies.

That's not sensible.

The only posts that should be dismissed or tainted before the reader has a chance to fairly analyse them personally are posts that have been conclusively debunked.

We must keep in mind the goal is always providing and assisting discovery of the truth.

Trolls aka those refusing to relent on posting conclusively debunked information as truths should be removed.

If you can not conclusively debunk a post then it must remain untainted in anyway from admin as long it is on topic and relevant.

How I envision it working is

OP
Post 2 - 50 continuously on topic and progressing in the correct and optimal direction
Post 51 - new bogus (later conclusively debunked) information is injected.
Post 52- 100  infected and reliant on bogus information
Post 101 - conclusively debunks post 51 and therefore all up to post 100 that were poisoned

New reader starts thread only has time to read up to post 99 leaves thread misinformed?

If a very concerned mod wanted to he could select the link ( to post 101) that debunks post 11...then go to post 11 click demerit copy the link from post 101 to the field and press submit. Then the post can have a demeritted by GM symbol in the header and you click that to go straight to the debunking.
This can be done for as many posts as you like that are debunked by post 101

If you are the OP then you could update that with a guide for readers to navigate around conclusively debunked nonsense.

I dont like it being a popularity thing or even based on if previously they have made bogus points. The exact post being demeritted must be conclusively and publicly debunked.

If it is ever abused then those abusing lose access to the feature.

If a demerrit is ever appealed and won. Then they lose the feature. It is not to be used willy nilly.
Conclusively debunked is likely easier to demonstrate where you may be dealing with results and answers not " opinions"

Find me a system that I can't exploit, and I'll tell you who's doing it instead.

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It sucks when both limitations and additions add more vulnerabilities that can be taken advantage of, though there's certainly one simple way that users can adopt to mitigate the impact of fledgling troll discussion which is to remove their platform by way of simply not responding.

The unfortunate reality, however, is that even if some users abstain from adding fuel to the fire, you'll have the huge number of generic posts piling up from bounty-sig users. If a user spreading misinformation/borderline-spam is left alone then the best-case scenario is that they get a bump every 24 hours. Trouble comes when you have multiple entities with the same line of thinking that post in each other's threads, or if the same individual uses multiple accounts.

After all, we should recall all about those fake conversations in the Altcoin sections and how horrendous they were before the bump update. As far as I'm concerned, our front-line defense against such users is merely the moderation team and active reporters, though the impact is definitely a fraction of the output that "bad" users provide.

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Have we simply adopted the same marketplace "carpe diem" approach, then? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

there is never a good way to fight trolls and those spreading misinformation. the problem with all the methods you can think of (including "demerit") is the negative side effects of them. we have an expression that goes "dry and wet [firewood] burn together" that is suitable here (ie. tarred with the same brush). the real question is how much negative side effects can be expect and does it overpower the positive sides? i'd say the negativity of it is bigger.

you know that some day someone is going to abuse it some place in the forum. these things are opinion based and you can never blame someone for meriting or demeriting a post. we will see in speculation board someone writes a good analysis of price rise but is demerited by someone who has placed a lot of shorts. we will see in technical boards posts being demerited just because someone doesn't like the content.

Once upon a time a user's Ignore button would be highlighted if a high enough percentage of users meeting specific criteria Ignored them, most trolls were very easy to spot, unfortunately afaik for performance reasons the feature had to be disabled.

We could also have a system similar to HN where some posts could be greyed out but since that's more intrusive I'd prefer the criteria to be strict.

The problem with all of the arguments advocating this type of system here is you are only examining the intents of it, and totally ignoring the unintended consequences of it being implemented. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

The proposal seeks to basically enable readers who are unable to invest the time or that do not have the capacity to independently verify/ confirm the post contains accurate/credible information.

So yes a filter to assist members locating the truth or rather identifying specious arguments and misleading incorrect garbage would be useful.

I don't see a problem giving time tested and well known developers / experts such a feature for the tech boards. Where they only use a feature like this to denote a post they have clearly and conclusively debunked as incorrect garbage.

I don't think it would be fitting for other areas of forum.

I do think there should be a ban of 7days and doubling each time it happens when members wilfully and knowingly promulgate false and incorrect information that has been conclusively debunked. Or if members are deliberately trying to cast doubt or outright label independently verifiable conclusive proof as trolling or lies. These types of specious defensive posts are dangerously misleading.

End of the day free speech should only really be supported with an aim to reaching the truth.
Once your "speech" has been debunked as false then continuing to exercise your free speech in the same way is simply telling lies and feeding others misinformation. This is the forums definition of trolling actually, and that is very sensible. It nicely strikes a balance between free speech and the dilution of the truth to a point where the forum is useless.

The only problem here is that in some areas of discussion there may be only a handful of people with the capacity and training  to actually know if a post has been conclusively debunked. So yes, for the tech boards the proposed feature does have a sensible usecase.

I'm not as bothered about the format as much as some here. So long as the post contains on topic relevant and valuable new points that have not been mentioned previously on the thread, then whether they are in perfect precise and efficient English is not so much of a concern for me.

There are a set of posts that belong to a space that resides within "not removable via reports" and "horrible to read". These posts come in various forms, involving ever-so-slight trolling, padded posts resting on the precipice of spam, regurgitated posts, and blatantly wrong information.

It is highly improbable that you have not encountered at least one of these posts. If you've ever read a post and immediately thought afterwards, "this post says nothing in so many words," then you share in the suffering. Reports take time to bake and it isn't that feasible to report the thousands of posts of spam (but borderline forum spam) every day nor is it feasible for moderators to go through all the reports.* I would like a system that can dissuade users from such posts though I share the same concerns of abuse once the ability for such restrictions arises.

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Example half-assed post for reference, in relation to the thread.


Real stream of consciousness bullshit right there. (don't forget to do some extra padding with spacing between each sentence!)

Or by the time somebody effectively counters the damage has already been done. Misinformation and misinformation campaigns are a difficult problem. I agree with the suggestion but restrictions need to be carefully constructed in order to avoid  abusive behaviour.

Some examples, not that the activity requirement has any correlation with likelihood of accurate information.

The worst thing about that broken line of thinking is that flooding open venues with garbage is the most effective and in the running for the most common way to censor things online today.  Because everyone is connected to everyone else simply saying "you can't post this information" mostly doesn't work, often it achieves the opposite effect. At best you can limit its reach to the general public-- but it isn't like the general public, in the broad sense, is using forums like this one in the first place.  Instead, the most effective way to suppress ideas and information today is to flood any venue where people would discuss it with trollling/nonsense/counter-"facts", racist rants, nonsense conspiracy theories, etc.   When joe blow sees all the noise he just throws up his arms and decides that the truth is unknowable.  Make everything a jumbled mess of accusations and make every participant look like a violent idiot. Burn out anyone who tries to keep the facts straight with unending walls of cheaply generated nonsense.

I think virtually everyone in this thread is reading far too narrowly into what I was discussing.  When someone posts low effort garbage, often it gets no effective counter (or takes a long time to get one).   Most high quality contributors have things they'd rather be doing with their time then wrestling in the mud with brain damaged pigs and their piglets.  They click these threads and go NOPE and close them.

Is there a way to capture their "nope" and turn it into something that makes the forum a more valuable a resource?

Is there a way to make long term contributors, such as myself, feel more empowered and proud of their community and less demoralized by people who would virtually shit all over the figurative walls-- without demanding they take on a big burdensome cleanup duty on their own?

Ah yes, it wouldn't be right to have us challenging the classic misconception that "mUh fReEdUmZ oF sPeEch" means anyone is free to spout abject lunacy in a space that's used by many individuals and that any attempts to restrict such behaviour is apparently tantamount to fascism.  How terrible a thought.   

I did. Any iteration of this idea is retarded and will cause horrible unintended consequences. I suggest when people say things that you don't like you find a way to cope with it or use the existing systems instead of obsessing over new an improved ways to control the speech of others.

Try reading the full topic before overreacting.  It has since been clarified by gmaxwell that they simply meant having a way to mark a post as nonsense.  They're not proposing deducting merits from users:

This is a HORRRIBLE idea. I can not overstate this enough. Merit and the trust system are already heavily abused to the point of their being almost totally counterproductive. Adding negative merits will turn this place into just another retarded fucking echo chamber like every other site. All that will happen is people will only say what is popular, and everything else will either be punished, or silenced. This place will then proceed to completely turn into a cesspool instead of just mostly a cesspool. This MUST NOT happen under any circumstances.

This isn't going to work the way you think it will.
This is actually good thinking.
So you were on a right track earlier in the thread that you'd linked to, and which made you angry.
This guy is on the right track to the solution.

Basically, any one-dimensional solution isn't going to work in the social practice; it doesn't matter whether you call it merit, karma, reputation or something similar. It will always be vulnerable to the abuse, whether you call it "merit cycling", "karma farming", "circle jerking", "mutual admiration society" or something similar.

What could work is adding another dimension to the "merit value". It is hard for me to come up with a good name in English, but for sake of this thread lets use the word "funniness". The funniness can be both intentional and unintentional. It really won't matter in the grand scheme of things. Even now some people do give merit while posting a disclaimer that it made them laugh.

I've seen such systems working quite well on other forums that do support plugin architectures. I know this one theoretically does, but it wasn't kept up to date with the official code base, so they won't simplify implementation. I will not post links to those forums because of they aren't in English and to avoid doxing myself.

For the people like gmaxwell with mathematical mind the argument is simple: avoid attempting to order people linearly like the Real numbers. For each two real X & Y numbers exactly one is true X < Y , X = Y or X > Y. At least switch to the Complex numbers, where there are only two choices: either X = Y or it doesn't.

For the people preferring more humanistic approach I recommend familiarizing themselves with the philosophical thinking of Herbert Marcuse that he published in his https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-Dimensional_Man . This book is from 1964 so it will not contain anything related to the modern social media. But it does contain lots of very useful thought about the things that are discussed in this thread. Even where Marcuse is wrong, the passage of time and social experience gained until now will make those places obvious.

They have to both care and have the intelligence to understand the source of it.  If the motivation behind the stupid posts is that they're intentionally trying to manipulate people, troll, or because they're just dumb as a box of rocks... it's not likely to work.

And, of course, other posters know this-- so in a lot of cases people just don't bother to issue the well deserved ridicule even where the source might be responsive to it.  Instead they get responses with more confused people.

I think if we could always reliably and consistently tell who was irredeemably stupid, manipulating, or trolling then it wouldn't be a big deal-- removing their posts would be sufficient. But there is a huge grey area where we can't tell.

I've wondered if some of these are machine generated. GP2-Large tweaked for a particular subject can do some impressive writing, especially with a bit of manual fixups. If they're not yet-- they probably will be soon.

The idea that online communities can deal with junk content by just letting all readers figure it out on their own has been a bad idea for a long time, but it's on the verge of getting significantly worse.  It isn't that readers can't be trusted to sort out junk from not junk without help, by in large they can-- but it is a massive waste of their time. Unless you want to optimize for a community of spammers, idiots, and other persons whos time is utterly worthless you need to do something.

Merit is an example of something. But it's one-sided.

Right. Apparently I screwed up by using the word "demerit" in my post. Removing merits is not something I consider particularly useful.

  I was going to reply yesterday and decided to wait until today.
I would like to say all posts given merit prior to 2019 should be off limits for a year.

Also if you do give demerit power just how much power to demerit is given
 5 points 10 points 25 points?

Do we allow an entire drop to the next level?

In my case 1309 merits would be needed to drop me to Hero.

Everyone is getting too caught up on the idea that this would remove merit. I would consider it more like a newbie flag, but rather than being placed on a person it would be on a post. If the post was filled with false/misleading information then it should show up as tinted/slightly red if whomever(s) can activate this button/option use it. I'm just throwing ideas out there but this is why this is being discussed.
Drop the idea that this removes merit from someone's post/account and lets discuss a way to stop misleading comments from parting newbies and their money. A LOT of people don't read whole threads or do any of their own research, those that do should be able to protect a little better.