The main man needs to look into the matter, he has the supreme access of everything including access of the forum PM [the communication can be done using a none forum media too] and the database. No, this is not a reputation matter, this is a forum issue hence the topic is on the meta board.
The moderators in question: Russian local board moderators Xal0lex and xandry.
There are not enough public links for unusual moderation from xandry yet however since the activities concentrated in the Russian local board we can not ignore his involvement too. Again as I said the main man [Theymos] have ultimate access of everything for investigation. Let's bring everything that questions the unusual moderation.
Everything had started a few days ago when LoyceV created a topic about
deleting his post in a self-moderated topic and later it found out that the same user was deleting several other's posts too from his self-moderated topic and the fact had established that he was deleting the posts to cover the trace of his past plagiarism, current feedback abuse, DT manipulation and his tactics of offering peace to negotiate any feedback left to him. Everything about the user has outlined very well in the topic
"Should Ratimov be in DT?". It requires almost half an hour read to understand and realize the motive of the user. I highly suggest to read the topic, if you have not yet.
At some point it was discovered that Ratimov was following a very simple strategy to cover up his past and current evil activities to achieve whatever goal he has. The steps are following [the order of the steps can be different in case by case but it is believed that the executions were very similar as explained in the following]
[a.] He moves his topics to Archive
[b.] He deletes his own posts
[c.]
He moves the topic to the Russian local board. This is where Russian moderators come into our knowledge.
[d.] He reports other's posts from the topics.
[e.] Moderators delete the reported posts because now these posts are irrelevant in the discussion
[f.] He removes everything from the main topic and makes it an empty topic
[g.] He reports the empty topic to the moderator
[h.] Finally the moderator wipes out the entire topic.
A very lengthy but simple and effective strategy to wipe out any unwanted record. Anyone can delete their past posts which is not wrong but the way the whole things were done, it was not usual. It definitely is questionable. So questions were asked, we had our speculations too.
This raise concern that why he preferred to move an English topic to a non-English board [his local of-course] and expected it to be deleted or already deleted.
Therefore, unless Xal0lex was his "pal" for deleting evidence from Archival board as well, it means that some other mod helped him.
Maybe this is the reason:
I personally process reports regardless of the date of the post or topic.
Response were given but more like a few excuses with a few return questions. Sounds like a preplanned dialog in defense in case there are questions.
[....]
Why should moderators be ashamed of doing their job? What do you think a moderator should do if he sees such garbage topics in the root of the section under his control?
[...]
Do these trash topics have to stay in the section, or what? Go to the root of the Russian section and browse the pages, there are plenty of such topics. So what, let them lie around? What kind of moderator would allow such a mess? So naturally, the moderators delete them.
Anticipating a question about the content that was there, so that's not interesting to me. I see what's in those threads now. We don't need such trash topics in the section.
Unpleasant merit transactions found by GazetaBitcoin but I would like to accept speculation from LoyceV, "
It's quite normal for a Merit source to Merit someone when they use the same local board. I don't expect the posts to be bad, so it's not wrong."
[...]
Ratimov is mod's no. 1 fan!
[...]
The appreciation is mutual! The mod also also chose Ratimov as his first destination of merits, sending him an amount more than double compared to his second most merited user.
[...]
How can a moderator or moderators do not see a single user is following a pattern and using him [them] to remove many other's posts including his entire topics. Not 1 or 5 or 10. Let's read what he said.
Since the appearance of your topic, I personally have deleted no more than 30 topics. Don't forget that the Russian section has two moderators. So no need to attribute to me what is not there (nepotism, etc).
30 Topic! Out of 78 and yet nothing looked unusual to him. That's only 30 topics, how many posts these 78 topics had those were reported and deleted?
A database query will surely show the numbers and also it will show how many topics and posts were deleted by the same moderator but he never thought something is not normal.
I would like to think you were fooled on the other hand I don't know if you had any personal reason to favor a local member.
No more speculations.
At some point the same moderator became unusually aggressive in his defense too.
Is my English so bad that you don't understand? Or are you trying to troll? What is not clear in what I wrote above? [...]
When you are not guilty, there are no need to lose your control. The moderation is questionable either it was a mutual agreement or an innocent irresponsibility.
What matter is, are we going to allow moderators who do not have a sense of responsibility, the liability and loyalty to preserve the reputation of bitcointalk? An investigation is required first to find if the moderators are guilty of mutual agreement or it was an innocent irresponsibility. Second, based on the result of the investigation, an action is required.
