Moderation

[Devil's Elbow]

It's a big pair of boots to fill, and I'm honestly not sure who has the combination of activity, time, lack of (excessive) bias and temper to step up. I might have volunteered myself in the past, but I just don't have as much time these days and in any case I think I can get a little bit more heated than what you want from a mod...

 

[Eshnar]

Some thick skin is definitely required for the job, but mods don't need to be saints ^^
Honestly you just need a bit of patience and common sense.

 

[Lequack]

Yeah I made the decision to step down as a moderator. Nothing 'happened', I had been thinking it over for a while.

Thank you for the years of putting up with us. And welcome to us regulars.

 

[Red Rick]

Thank you for the years of putting up with us. And welcome to us regulars.

Thanks.

No more getting sticky for me

 

[Lequack]

Thanks.

No more getting sticky for me

It just won't be the same anymore.

 

[RedheadDane]

Thanks.

No more getting sticky for me

 

[Lequack]

Are you saying he was the glue that kept us all together? If so I agree.

 

[SHAD0W93]

Don’t sell them short, they’re Gorilla Glue.

 

[Rob5091]

I hope we still will get the "Red Rick" "astute" comments on forthcoming GT parcours.

 

[scribers]

Remember when the actual journalists of cycling news were mods and used to drop the mod hammers on us?

Or maybe I was dreaming

 

[SHaines]

Being a volunteer moderator is certainly not for everyone, but for the right folks, it can be incredibly rewarding.

We want folks who have been around a while, have been active, and are able to have productive discussions without throwing insults around.

Basically, when I look for moderators I'm looking for folks who don't see themselves as a bouncer, tossing people out of the bar, but as a valued member of the community who just wants to make sure things stay on track.

I'm keeping an eye on moderation while we continue the search, but for those curious about the nature of the moderator position:

• It's not scheduled, so you just use the forums as you always have. While you're around, if you see spam or a conversation going off topic, you'll be able to remove the spam with the touch of a button and can just politely remind folks to keep topics where they belong.
• You are still free to express your opinions on the news of the day as you always would, but you'd represent the larger community, so you'll need to avoid getting involved in squabbling with other users.
• We have a team of Community Managers that are here to support you. If you are selected as a moderator you'd have access to documentation on specific functions, plus you'd be able to reach out to any of us as you get up to speed, so no one is going it alone.

As I don't have the subject matter expertise of our existing crew, I'm very grateful for those of you who have used, or are willing to use, the Report option available on every post made. If there's a rule violation on the forums, clicking that button will flag it for the mods to find it more quickly. Totally optional, but extremely helpful for us.

Thanks!

 

[bNator]

Have you guys given it any thought of employing AI chat bots to filter the messages and highlight the potentially problematic content to be further examined by the moderator? That kind of thing could take a lot of load off...

 

[RedheadDane]

Have you guys given it any thought of employing AI chat bots to filter the messages and highlight the potentially problematic content to be further examined by the moderator? That kind of thing could take a lot of load off...

AI chat bots are quite likely behind a large number of the spammers bothering the forum...

 

[SHaines]

Have you guys given it any thought of employing AI chat bots to filter the messages and highlight the potentially problematic content to be further examined by the moderator? That kind of thing could take a lot of load off...

No, we genuinely haven't. Communities are built on relationships. Having real people reach out and remind another real person to try to keep the discussion respectful has a much greater likelihood of having a positive outcome than just a piece of software making guesses without context.

That said, modern forum tools use all sorts of tools to catch spam, so much of what appears for us is never visible to anyone in the forums.

If you do see spam at any point, using the report option means we can remove it very quickly. We also have tools to automatically block specific spam from ever being posted again, which makes the forum better for all of us. All of that is to say every community is built by and for people, as it should remain, from my perspective.

 

[AmRacer]

I know a bot,
her name is darkness, darkness is her name
And she can ban, ban you so hard
She cleans up in our channel
I wanna tell you, that I know a Bot
I know a bot,
her name is darkness, darkness is her name
And she can ban, ban you so hard
She cleans up in our channel
I wanna tell you, that I know a Bot
That always watches everyone here
And makes us out of trouble
There is no Take-over that succeeds
Remember that it's I who know this Bot
The bot that no one else can beat
And she kicks even if she shouldn't
She gets rid of everyone that "spams"
Yes, nothing can beat our Bot
And then came the day I didn't think was real
The channel was out of control
I never thought I would be so wrong
When darkness said to me
"I'm not a Bot,
I'm a really beautiful girl"
Which is, unluckily, now very strange to me
But nothing needs to be explained
*Because in my eyes, you will always be a bot*
Her name is darkness, darkness is her name
And she can ban, ban you so hard
She cleans up in our channel
I wanna tell you, that I know a Bot
That always watches everyone here
And makes us out of trouble
There is no Take-over that succeeds
Remember that it's I who know this Bot
The Bot that no one else can beat
And she kicks even if she shouldn't
She gets rid of everyone that "spams"
Yes, nothing can beat our Bot

 

[bNator]

I see there's a lot of prejudice towards chatbots here In reality, what would be done is series of text inputs being passed to a chatbot service e.g. OpenAI which would examine these texts and try to determine abuse, foul language, trolling, etc. These would be flagged and then - and this is the most important part - examined by a human being who decides what to do. Chat bot in this case is not a mod - it's the guy hitting the report button. This kind of service would complement the manual reporting system not replace it.

Chatbots that spam this board are programmed to do just that. That doesn't mean all chatbots spam. They do what you tell them to do.

 

[topcat]

Yeah I made the decision to step down as a moderator. Nothing 'happened', I had been thinking it over for a while.

Thank you for your service. I always found you fair even when holding different views. I hope you find your new free role of sweeper on the forum enjoyable and entertaining. Contador, Nibali, Valverde and Red Rick have all retired. Thank God we still have Froome.

 

[Potomac]

Yes, thanks to our retiring mods.

I shudder at the thought of AI doing the moderation, This place is rich with satire and odd traditions and I fear an automated system would see it as trolling.

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

Whoever the new mod(s) end(s) up being, i hope CN picks someone who finally will recognise and treat trolling as an infraction of the forum rules instead of enabling it. Failing that, just remove it from the forum rules because otherwise it's just grotesque. Trolling is the single most prevailing cause of fights, namecalling, off-topic posting, thread derailing etc. but i have yet to see serious action taken against this behaviour.

 

[Salvarani]

Yes, thanks to our retiring mods.

I shudder at the thought of AI doing the moderation, This place is rich with satire and odd traditions and I fear an automated system would see it as trolling.

They would be like plenty of other posters who dont understand and think they are right all the time, when in fact they are always wrong and keeps harassing/antagonizing/name-calling everyone else for no other reason than their fragile ego and mind.

 

[ManicJack]

Whoever the new mod(s) end(s) up being, i hope CN picks someone who finally will recognise and treat trolling as an infraction of the forum rules instead of enabling it. Failing that, just remove it from the forum rules because otherwise it's just grotesque. Trolling is the single most prevailing cause of fights, namecalling, off-topic posting, thread derailing etc. but i have yet to see serious action taken against this behaviour.

Why would the mods ban someone for trolling when they did it themselves?

 

[Rackham]

Whoever the new mod(s) end(s) up being, i hope CN picks someone who finally will recognise and treat trolling as an infraction of the forum rules instead of enabling it. Failing that, just remove it from the forum rules because otherwise it's just grotesque. Trolling is the single most prevailing cause of fights, namecalling, off-topic posting, thread derailing etc. but i have yet to see serious action taken against this behaviour.

That's because far too often, the label 'troll' is simply thrown around like confetti & overused against someone who posts something another person gets angsty about. Then there's other stuff like harmless banter in a convivial spirit which might unfortunately p*ss one person off & then kaboom, the mood goes sour.

Really though, I think moderation here has worked so well because Red Rick was a very blasé moderator (or at least he appeared that way) & he let people get on with it. He's also a Rogla fan as well. Which means he has good cycling taste.

 

[AmRacer]

Whoever the new mod(s) end(s) up being, i hope CN picks someone who finally will recognise and treat trolling as an infraction of the forum rules instead of enabling it. Failing that, just remove it from the forum rules because otherwise it's just grotesque. Trolling is the single most prevailing cause of fights, namecalling, off-topic posting, thread derailing etc. but i have yet to see serious action taken against this behaviour.

Stop trolling.🤣

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

That's because far too often, the label 'troll' is simply thrown around like confetti & overused against someone who posts something another person gets angsty about. Then there's other stuff like harmless banter in a convivial spirit which might unfortunately p*ss one person off & then kaboom, the mood goes sour.

Really though, I think moderation here has worked so well because Red Rick was a very blasé moderator (or at least he appeared that way) & he let people get on with it. He's also a Rogla fan as well. Which means he has good cycling taste.

Look what you did, you made me spill my drink.

You understand that there is a definition for it, right? And that there is a reason it is against the forum rules? This forum is not above other forums and people here are not better than posters on other forums. Trolling is a thing, and mods on this forum rarely -if ever- take action against it.

 

[RedheadDane]

Maybe we need more mods.
More mods who never ban people.