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Why all the censorship in the forums?
- Thread starter the8thark
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Mod Note: You can report a post or use Contact Us to suggest any terms you think we should add to our profanity list. In some cases we may not agree with you, but we will discuss and consider any suggestions.
This is a little bit of a necro post. But being given forum warnings for pointing out things like what is mentioned in this topic is wrong in my opinion. Has happened to quite a few people I know of. Mention it in a topic, and that post is removed with a warning to you.
MacRumors is lucky it's only a rumour site and not anything more important. It's very important to me, as to me it's the No.1 Apple rumour website around. I really mean this. If I didn't believe this, I'd not still be here.
My point is if it was more like something related to big business, government or the like, I'd be handing all this info right on to Wikileaks. Assange and co understand this kind of thing very well.
Well despite this minor issue, I will keep using this website. It's done rather well. A good job indeed.
MacRumors is lucky it's only a rumour site and not anything more important. It's very important to me, as to me it's the No.1 Apple rumour website around. I really mean this. If I didn't believe this, I'd not still be here.
My point is if it was more like something related to big business, government or the like, I'd be handing all this info right on to Wikileaks. Assange and co understand this kind of thing very well.
Well despite this minor issue, I will keep using this website. It's done rather well. A good job indeed.
I agree that more words need to be added to the block list? I saw words censors that are not even profane yet many profane words slip through.
Really what they should do is give you a option to allow profanity or not but I have not seen one forum that has that option. Some will block all the bad ones but many will allow any word including the f word with personal insults and everything. which I don't visit anymore. Glad you don't allow that.
Really what they should do is give you a option to allow profanity or not but I have not seen one forum that has that option. Some will block all the bad ones but many will allow any word including the f word with personal insults and everything. which I don't visit anymore. Glad you don't allow that.
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The topic has run it's course in less then 48 hours? Something is fishy there. There was still rather good discussion happening there. But it was shutdown. I'm not going to guess what the real reason for this is. Cause that's not the point of what I am trying to say here.
My whole point is to say why? If the mods here want to clamp down on conversation, fine, nothing we can do to stop it, just please give us your reasons for doing so and we'll feel less unhappy about it.
My whole point is to say why? If the mods here want to clamp down on conversation, fine, nothing we can do to stop it, just please give us your reasons for doing so and we'll feel less unhappy about it.
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A thread can run it's course in less than 48 hours quite easily. It can happen in one hour, if there are enough posts that break rules, or if there are other problems (f ex the topic is so heated that the participants can't stay on-topic, etc). There's nothing fishy about that, unfortunately. It may look like there's still enough good discussion, but if the thread has caused excessive moderator work, there are likely multiple deleted posts you can no longer see. There's a limit to how much time we can sacrifice on one thread, simply to keep it open. We like discussion to continue, but some priorities have to be made.
As to "why?", the rules say you can 1) ask a general question about moderation here, and we'll answer, or 2) ask about a specific case in a Contact Us form. If there's no privacy issue, or if there is but we can answer on a general level, we give an answer.
What got me into trouble was reacting to a user who has an avatar that portrays the president as Heath Ledger's Joker. One could draw several things from the use of that image as an avatar, but the underlying racist intent is, in my mind, offensive and that user should be sanctioned for using an offensive avatar.
The president is black. That much is obvious. Does that make him a bad person? Do that make everything he does suspect? Some people think that it does, and that attitude, and those 'cute' pictures, I feel, do not belong in a computer user forum.
Sorry...
The president is black. That much is obvious. Does that make him a bad person? Do that make everything he does suspect? Some people think that it does, and that attitude, and those 'cute' pictures, I feel, do not belong in a computer user forum.
Sorry...
A post that's off-topic in a thread will get moderated if we see it, as that's a violation. Feel free to send a report on any avatar, and we'll treat it as we would any other post report.
And not all mods or admins live in the country where they have citizenship. So we're pretty well-spread-out, both as far as geography and cultural experience/viewpoints. Helps a lot as far as seeing all sides of an issue when we need to discuss something.
And not all mods or admins live in the country where they have citizenship. So we're pretty well-spread-out, both as far as geography and cultural experience/viewpoints. Helps a lot as far as seeing all sides of an issue when we need to discuss something.
Excellent!
This thread https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1590758/ is being very aggressive monitored.
Much more than I've noticed in the past.
The moderator posted
and is deleting posts commenting on this within minutes.
Not sure if this good or "soup Nazi" level moderation, but it feels too aggressive to me.
I'd point you to comments that are being censored, but I can't because they're gone.
Much more than I've noticed in the past.
The moderator posted
and is deleting posts commenting on this within minutes.
Not sure if this good or "soup Nazi" level moderation, but it feels too aggressive to me.
I'd point you to comments that are being censored, but I can't because they're gone.
This thread https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1590758/ is being very aggressive monitored.
Much more than I've noticed in the past.
The moderator posted
and is deleting posts commenting on this within minutes.
Not sure if this good or "soup Nazi" level moderation, but it feels too aggressive to me.
I'd point you to comments that are being censored, but I can't because they're gone.
Yes. I've been on this forum for many years and have scrolled through many diversions both humorous and not inside threads, but this thread got my goat for the rapid deletions and the kinda douchy approach taken. I'm sure I'e been in plenty of threads with deleted messages, but never really noticed before.
"Snappy Safari" issues are actually some of the more popular complaints around here. It's a dumb joke, and virtually any software-related news thread is immediately flooded with variations on it, distracting from real conversation.
We've deleted them for years, and we've always been more stringent about news threads than elsewhere. We've also been trying to be more public with moderator notes and other actions, helping people understand what's happening rather than simply making posts silently disappear. That effort is appreciated by some, but seen as nanny-ish by others...we can't please everyone.
We've deleted them for years, and we've always been more stringent about news threads than elsewhere. We've also been trying to be more public with moderator notes and other actions, helping people understand what's happening rather than simply making posts silently disappear. That effort is appreciated by some, but seen as nanny-ish by others...we can't please everyone.
This thread https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1590758/ is being very aggressive monitored.
Much more than I've noticed in the past.
The moderator posted
and is deleting posts commenting on this within minutes.
Not sure if this good or "soup Nazi" level moderation, but it feels too aggressive to me.
I'd point you to comments that are being censored, but I can't because they're gone.
If we went to the trouble of deleting posts and posting a mod or admin note, it was because there were lots of problems with rules violations, but we wanted to do everything we could to let the thread live.
Posting notes and doing clean-up work takes us time. It would be a lot easier to close down threads with problems, but we don't like to do that unless we absolutely have to. We want people to be able to continue discussing if at all possible.
If a post was deleted, it was for one of two reasons: it either broke a rule, or was a response to a post that broke a rule (and wouldn't have made sense once the first post was deleted).
I'll also point out once again that if anyone has a problem with - or simply wonders about - specific moderation, the Contact Us form is the way to go (link at the bottom of almost every forum page). We're happy to explain as long as it doesn't violate another member's privacy.
This.
This I think is a good decision, now people are aware of why they are deleted, especially those Safari ... jokes, I for one got sick of them.
Agreed, silently removing them unfortunately won't do anything at all to prevent more identical posts on the same theme. I for one was happy to see that moderator note about snappier Safaris. So tired of all snappier this, snappier that...
I am a bit tempted to write a browser plugin to automatically hide any posts containing the word "snappier", in any case.
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People would probably interpret those ******** in weird, unintended ways. Hmm. That could actually work - embarrass the snappy posters until they stop?
I guess there is often a fine line between funny and off-topic, but I have no problem with mods cleaning out "Safari feels ********" and the likes (especially from the news threads). The occasional post from mods about common problems sounds like a good idea to me.
One thing is for sure, I would be a lousy forum administrator, adding confirmation prompts for common annoying situations when posting, like:
"You are replying to a thread where the most recent post is over three years old, are you sure you still want to post your reply?"
"Your post contains the word 'snappier'. If the post is an attempt to be funny, it will be deleted. Are you sure you still want to post your reply?"
True but the site has taken away the ability to down vote so we'll never know how many don't like the moderation.
Point taken...
However, this thread has provided ample opportunity to express far more explicit opinions than just down voting. I posted the up votes just to indicate that there was a variety of opinions on the subject.
It's been said before, but I see it bears saying again: it makes much more sense to express agreement via an up-vote than it does disagreement. Disagreement is best expressed via words that give readers a clue to the reason for it, not just by hitting a button. Otherwise it's not helpful at all, to anyone.