Meet the MNHQ moderators. Live chat Friday 8th Nov, 1-2pm

[JustineMumsnet]

Hi all,
We promised you a webchat to discuss all things moderation (and anything else you fancy really). So, tomorrow lunchtime RebeccaMumsnet, RowanMumsnet and I (and possibly a few other team members - suspect that OliviaMumsnet might be lurking) will be on hand at 1pm to answer your questions. If you can't make it along, then do post your questions here in advance. Mind the guidelines at the top of the page now - only one question each and be nice .

It's too easy for people to blame regular / royalty and say they're being bullied. They are not a homogeneous group. I don't post enough to have any particular 'friends' on here but I don't expect everyone to be the same. Reminds me of all those 'school run is so horrible because of cliquey Mum's threads.

Really interesting webchat MNHQ thanks for doing.

ButThereAgain - it's not about justifying a decision - it's about the process of looking at a thread rather than a post and what else has been reported about the person - C F D had been reported and was 'being watched' but was still able to completely de-rail a thread then someone else (irrespective of who) bore the brunt of it.

@forthemods

Looks like quite a few of us are asking for a Mumsnet definition of bullying. Makes sense.

This is from Dept for Education's guidelines to schools and pretty much sums it up for us:

Bullying is behaviour by an individual or group, repeated over time, that intentionally hurts another individual or group either physically or emotionally.

The problem of course is when people have different interpretations of intentional, repeated hurt.

Rereading that post, I should clarify - I do think that there is some bullying on MN, just I haven't personally been on the receiving end.

Here are two definitions - for the workplace, so written for adults. How do you use that on a site like MN, where difference in opinion is a main part of the site?

Definition of workplace bullying by Amicus-MSF trade union

"Persistent, offensive, abusive, intimidating or insulting behaviour, abuse of power or unfair penal sanctions which makes the recipient feel upset, threatened, humiliated or vulnerable, which undermines their self-confidence and which may cause them to suffer stress"

Those who can, do. Those who can't, bully.
"Bullying is a compulsive need to displace aggression and is achieved by the expression of inadequacy (social, personal, interpersonal, behavioural, professional) by projection of that inadequacy onto others through control and subjugation (criticism, exclusion, isolation etc). Bullying is sustained by abdication of responsibility (denial, counter-accusation, pretence of victimhood) and perpetuated by a climate of fear, ignorance, indifference, silence, denial, disbelief, deception, evasion of accountability, tolerance and reward (eg promotion) for the bully."

@HeartsTrumpDiamonds

Do you flit around the site looking at threads and topics and generally keeping an eye on things, or are you too busy responding to individual posts that are reported? Or a combination?

How many posts that should be deleted actually are deleted, and vice versa (in your opinion) - is this something you think can even be measured or tracked?

I guess what I am really asking is - what is the objective of your moderation: is it to delete every offensive post, to have a site that is 100% "clean" - or is it to remove only the bare minimum, only the ones that are reported or that you notice, and let the boards be open and free-form?

I think we've answered a lot of this with stats elsewhere (though we'll check afterwards and post up more stats if we've missed any), but in general, our aim is to respond to all reports as well as we possibly can. There's no way, on a board this size, we'd be able to make it completely 'clean' - although of course if every single MNer upped their reporting rate by 1000%, to the extent that every single guideline-busting post was being reported, that would be great (and we'd find a way to deal with it).

but pan a lot of people join because they need advice right now

Making them wait for 48 hours is not going to help them, and why should people not be able to ask for help when they need it? Because of a few trolls?

@Pan

Any mileage in pausing the right to post for 48 hrs after joining?

The problem with that is when folks have a legit, burning issue and need advice/support there and then. We'd be loathed to deny them that.

Re bullying policies - sticking with the Dept of Education version - in schools, the number one piece of advice is to tell a teacher - this prevents it spiralling into lawlessness. There is a real resistance from some posters to reporting, but it's the best defence and the best equivalent to how bullying is effectively dealt with in schools. As soon as a teacher knows, it quickly dissipates. Although sometimes on here the bullies when warned, start sucking up to the teachers mods... giving them apples gin and the like. Just like irl.

I just don't know who these long standing, previously nice posters are who suddenly turn into death breath harpies at the sight of new posters and make them feel terrible and unwelcome.

yes, but MN isn't the only source is it? Surely? But yes it's perhaps wrong to 'penalise' potential posters/others as troll-management technique,

Pausing the right to post could often mean the difference between an abused woman getting help and not - I'm glad that wont be happening :)

@bsc

Following on from Satin- I have previously reported posts, then searched the other posts by that poster to find that they're spamming the boards... but until I report the other posts too, it seems that HQ haven't done that other bit, and mopped up spammers before posters notice they're there (IYSWIM).

Just wondering what the protocol/process is for mods when they act upon posts that need deletion.

Thanks HQ- I do really like it here When it's good, it's very very good!

thanks BSC

We should definitely look into a poster's posting history when they're reported for spam and delete any other spammy posts they've made. We'll send a reminder around the team

The question about PBP's, do you check their history if they get reported again under different names?
The ones who return to wind up old adversaries?

Thank you for replying to my point Justine.

What I also meant when I said about AIBU is that posters do sometimes cross swords on AIBU and then because they're only human remember that poster and will sometimes react negatively if they bump in to each other elsewhere. So it fans out across the boards and posters will jump in.

I'm not saying it's done on purpose, but I will admit that I can keep a mental tally of who has pissed me off and why. It takes a lot for me to reply in a non aggressive way sometimes to these posters.

If the trigger point (AIBU) was removed, or access limited maybe these instances would happen far less frequently?

@HepsibarCrinkletoes

Thanks Rebecca, I have reported, with absolute proof (highlighting a classic schoolgirl error) and have a generic sort of response.

Thanks Hepsibar. We are very much dealing with this now, apologies for another generic response

Of course it's not 'the only source' but it is a very good source and possibly the only one an abused woman feels comfortable with at that time.

As a compromise could we have a 'just joined' for the first week of membership thereby making it easy to spot those who have joined to be goady or to troll?

@ChippingInBatshitArse

There's a big old elephant in the corner and as no-one else seems to want to brave bringing him into the middle of the room, I will.

When AF was banned/suspended it was on a thread where C F D was being a goady fucker (and had previously been reported as being a GF).

Later on, after it all 'kicked off' C F D was banned - for being a goady fucker.

AF was not unduly rude - she said that the poster might want to think about the way they wrote their posts as they could come across as bullying and that their posts came across as passive aggressive.

AF was helping the OP, the GF was just derailing the thread.

The OP was very upset and didn't wish to post anymore (because of the GF not AF).

AF was banned/suspended? Irrespective of what came before/who she is/her posting history does this seem even remotely reasonable?

Well we don't think it is very elephant-like tbh - has felt at times over the last couple of weeks as though nobody's talking about anything else

As far as we're concerned, the bottom line is that AF's posts broke Guidelines, and she was on a very clear warning about what would happen next if she broke Guidelines again.

@reelingintheyears

The question about PBP's, do you check their history if they get reported again under different names? The ones who return to wind up old adversaries?

We sure do - it can take time but we have a good dig.

Although, if they have been banned and they appear again, we will reban unless they have mailed in and then we'll explain/ make a decision depending on the specifics of the initial ban.

Do you have any Windows Phone app things in progress or to make.mobile site more friendly to them?

@Pan

I'd disagree Maryz..whether someone is a nether-region is a matter of perspective (which the mods will differ on individually), and even if the genuine qualifiers remain identified as such, it sets a culture and tone that it's okay to fling abuse around, and that HQ think it's okay.

Question: can we slow down on the gratuitous swearing please? A vital issue compared with others, I know.

Interestingly I had a meeting with reps from a load of other big community sites recently. We were trying to come up with a list of universal forum guidelines. We agreed on everything - no hate speech, personal abuse etc except one. All of the others had no swearing policy. Only Mumsnet differed. I felt quite foul-mouthed [shame].

@Shakey1500

I'm interested to know why the latest (last week?) threads on Madeline McCann were "allowed" to stay when many threads previous were zapped pretty quickly.

I'm not passing comment on the content, just curious as to why these latest ones were deemed different to others.

Our long-standing aim with threads about the McCann case is to allow one thread to run when there seems to be a 'need' for it, so that's probably the quickest answer to why these ones stayed up. Some posters do want to discuss it, and while we definitely don't want to host nasty speculation or CSI-style forensic details, we do accept that it's a massive news story and some posters do want to talk about it.

Can you tell straight away if a new poster is an old banned poster?

When or are we ever going to have a username amnesty
I've got bloody loads I don't want that I only used for chat so have no convos under them
And maybe do the usernames in a diff colour for old posts where the username no longer exists
Tis so bloody hard trying to think if usernames when they're all used up!!