How much moderation do the forums need?
by Matthew Rossi 
Jan 21st 2008 at 3:30PM
Before we even get started, I'm going to warn you now that some of the language behind the links in the next paragraph is not safe for work, so please be careful when you click.
Warcraftchicks.com argues that the official World of Warcraft forums need full time moderation. This is an issues that I am very divided about.
I generally fall under the 'say anything' school of free speech. If you know me personally you know that, while I'm capable of expressing myself without any vulgarities at all, I'm actually a fairly salty individual and when I talk I can be rather crude. Furthermore, I'm very comfortable with discussing topics that would probably nauseate or sicken a lot of people. I grew up on a farm and spent a lot of my time doing things that most people don't nowadays. One of my summer jobs every year was working in our slaughterhouse, and I spent almost every morning mucking out stalls. To this day, I can talk about these kinds of things while I eat. So I generally have a much higher threshold before anything really bothers me, my hot buttons tending to be overt racism or prejudice, and even then I usually just opt to avoid talking to the people spewing those kinds of things.
But clearly the examples SugarChick lists are, in addition to being insanely crude, horribly racist (especially the lists posted on Martin Luther King day that she mentions) and otherwise generally unfit for social discourse with strangers (which is, after all, what the forums ultimately are) have no purpose aside from trying to be offensive or shocking.
Not only are they at best moronic, they're also absolutely pointless and serve only to clog up the forums which are ostensibly about World of Warcraft and not about random racism, sexism, crude representations of bias or raw sexual discourse. The forum guidelines even clearly state that these kinds of things are forbidden. Blizzard is not running a BBS or a message board dedicated to the free and open exchange of ideas here, even including hateful ones, they're running a forum for discussion of the game. This isn't a freedom of speech issue because there's no guarantee of free and open speech in a privately owned forum with a stated goal. While I appreciate that Blizzard isn't draconian in their moderation, I'd have to say that it could use some tightening up - I would personally have much less trouble with some of the speech here if it was being expressed in a post that had anything at all to do with the game, but my personal tastes here aren't important. Blizzard has already set the bar for what's acceptable and what's not, and it seems that a great many posters can't seem to bear to abide by it.
I can't see how some of these posts could ever be germane to the discussion of WoW, and in that case I think they should go post-haste. I'm okay with shocking, harsh or even crude speech personally, but I recognize that in this case it serves no useful purpose at all and isn't in any way protected on a privately owned forum used to help promote discussion of the game. If moderation is the only way to prevent this kind of nonsense, then I find myself rather unhappily supporting the idea of increasing the amount of it on the forums.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Forums
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Mike Jan 31st 2008 11:08AM
Blizzard asks for trouble. They never moderated those boards the way they should have been, but beyond that, look at the way it's set up where any character from your account can troll. It's asking for it, imo.
Take Everquest for example. You sign in with ONE name and that's the only one you'll be using to post with for all posterity. There's none of this hide-behind-an-alt and let it all hang out the way Blizzard has it. That just encourages the problem and makes matters worse.
When you have to stand by one name and that's the reputation that will follow you forever in the game, you might think twice before you post that "buttsex" stupidity you thought was so funny yesterday.
Blizzard deserves everything they're getting with the backlash. They brought it on themselves. They hired a bunch of incompetent moderators, way too young to know what they are doing by way of experience and made it so that if you could spell good, that was enough.
Obviously it came back to bite them. Oh and the girl from that site now claims her account has been banned for speaking about it on the WoW forums. This article needs a sequel. I'd like to know why she was banned for posting about this problem.
Good article, thanks!
Mike Feb 2nd 2008 4:40AM
Out of sheer curiosity, I stopped in over at WoW's Off-Topic forums today. I read an interesting post I've seen before. The last time I saw the same one was when Blizzard had the pedophile problem.
The post asked who actually played the game. When I left there were 3 pages of responses that all said they did not. They either flipped the account and still retained the password (sold it) or they admitted they were using a friend's account to post.
Now it seems to me you have a problem here and the worst offenders are people who aren't even paying to play the game. They are posting for the sake of self-indulgence at best or at worst, intentional agendas.
Blizzard also had the same problem when another group demanded that the word transvestite and transgender be taken off the bad-word filter. They even went so far as to contact the ACLU, to no avail as far as I know. The interesting part about that story, because I followed that one LMAO, was that all the characters I looked up who were making all the demands, hadn't logged into the game for 6 months to a year and had the worst gear imaginable. These were people who were pretending to be players but were only there for a political agenda.
I'm sure Blizzard could have figured this out through their own means some time ago, but I thought it was interesting to point out that everytime I see a problem like this, and this is the third, the people instigating the verbal wars really have no interest whatsoever in World of Warcraft.
Think about it, Blizzard. Time to clean house. You're being had.
jay Jan 21st 2008 3:47PM
The moderation of a majority of Blizzards forums is scant at best, the thing that bug me are the idiotic posts with no clear goal that serve no point or purpose other than to irritate the reader or spark flame wars that (and lets be honest here) is sadly the majority of the posts .... take a look at the PTR forums for instance.
outforprophets Jan 21st 2008 5:25PM
I may be alone on this, but I actually like those idiotic posts. I kinda chuckle at them and some of them really catch me off guard. What I don't appreciate though, is when I'm trying to find information and all I get are those idiotic posts. That doesn't happen often at all so I'm not really bugged.
A post rating system would be kinda fun I guess, not really necessary in my opinion but I may be less sensitive to "internet garbage" than others.
krispycow Jan 22nd 2008 12:50AM
I work graveyard. I get up at 8:00 pm and go to bed around 1:00 pm pst in the evenings. So the disgusting side of the wow forums, IS the wow forums as far as I know. I don't often see the moderated side, because I have other things I'm doing in my "evening".
Yes, the immature males who revel in disgusting and bizzare posts are pretty rampant. But you just have to remember they're trying to provoke a response out of you. They're little kids with a stick poking the dog to see if it'll bite. You just have to ignore them.
Its also the "golden" time for keyloggers, as their keylogging posts will stay up longer. This is probably the biggest problem imo that needs 24 hour moderation.
There are plus sides to an unmoderated forum in the night hours,however. Discussions that expose game weaknesses, bugs, and flaws stay up longer. Topics that show blizzard in a harsh-yet-honest way, stay up longer. You see more open debates about various upcoming MMO games and topics... not just wow. Sometimes you'll get information on things you didn't even know you wanted. Game reviews, movie reviews, interesting news, latest internet fads, etc...
In otherwords, its not all bad. You have to be wise on the wow forums, just the same way as you do the internet. If something has a topic that's gross, you're likely going to see a thread on a gross topic.
Use some sense and don't open the thread. Moderate yourself. Why does blizzard have to babysit you 24 hours to make sure you don't hurt yourself?
Bloodchills Jan 21st 2008 3:58PM
Something like Slashdot.org would be nice for moderation. Let users get points they can use to moderate the forums for crap. Mod people insightful, interesting, funny... etc. Although instead of Slashdot's infamous "Troll -1" moderation, we would have to come with something less racist! ;-)
Gnomes can be Internet Trolls too!
darian Jan 21st 2008 4:16PM
To be entirely fair, the Slashdot system isn't particularly effective.
First of all, it doesn't delete any posts. They'll be effectively hidden, but they'll still be there.
Secondly, someone has to go through these posts anyway to make sure no abuse has occurred and mod the posts up. This either defeats the purpose of hiding the posts, or discourages people from actually making sure the system works.
Lastly, the system is very much bound by whims and trends. After Sony's first disastrous E3, anything pro-E3 was modded down without exception. Imagine how moderation would be skewed during "Dot Shock" or the overblown Spirit Guide issue?
While I support finding a solution, the Slashdot system is far from optimal for the given application.
Kryptonls Jan 22nd 2008 4:16AM
No - because it'd mean the as*hole trolls would end up getting rep from their guildies and it would mean the morons that ruin it for us would end up getting control.
- - - -
/signed to their petition.
Another reason why I don't go on the forums that much is explained in the write up.
Bloodchills Jan 22nd 2008 9:16AM
I don't know what ppl are talking about. Trolls do not control Slashdot, and they are even going to do another moderation change at some point to make it even better.
The fact that REAL PAID ACCOUNTS like we have on worldofwarcraft.com could be moderated far more easily than open accounts like on Slasdot. This means that it is very unlikely that the system could be flawed by the same logic that a site like Slashdot could be circumvented. Slashdot's biggest problem is that new users are often people signing up again to get posting rights again after being silenced from a lot of bad moderations.
That won't happen at worldofwarcraft.com.
Moderation and meta-moderation are the tools that make it work. The forums have enough traffic to support that style of moderation.
How it works is every account gets a certain number of mod points once in a blue moon. This is a timed event. The points don't stay in your acct if you don't use them right away.
Each time you mod, puts your comments in a queue for meta-moderation. Users will all have a chance to say if you were a good moderator or not.
This works on percentages. If 99% of the people say the comment you modded down was good, then your meta-mod accuracy score drops.
Yes, some comments would be modded down right away that didn't deserve it. But eventually the system would know about enough accounts to know who is accurately modding.
Here is an example:
1. New acct "Badperson" shows up to cause problems.
2. "Badperson" mods down a bunch of posts that don't deserve it.
3. In meta-moderation 70% of users found that the comments "Badperson" modded were all UNFAIR.
4. The moderation score for "Badperson" drops from each UNFAIR meta-moderation.
5. "Badperson" is less likely to get mod points in the future by the factor of 100% because all of his mods were unfair.
6. "Badperson" starts meta-modding before this happens, and mods many fair moderations as UNFAIR.
7. Because "Badperson" is meta-modding against the flow, the system knows that "Badperson" is an Internet Troll.
8. "Badperson" loses the ability to perform meta-moderations, mod comments and even post comments. "Badperson" gives up.
9. "Badperson" learns a valuable lesson about Progress.
George M. Jan 21st 2008 4:03PM
The WoW Official forums should use a voting system to keep good posts alive and kill bad and inappropriate posts. WoW Insider and Digg are goo examples of this voting system.
Angelus Jan 21st 2008 4:31PM
Although I love your idea, I must play devil's advocate and say this....
Underestimating a vast troll army's ability to coordinate post and topic voting to help propel their propaganda, would be unwise.
Gessilea Jan 21st 2008 4:07PM
I think the forums should be more heavily moderated, if only because they are really the place on the internet that most people (who don't know any better) go for information, be that new players looking for help with their class or parents investigating that game their kid likes so much. Seeing trash like the ones SugarChick lists only turns people away and gives them a bad impression of the entire community.
Jayus Jan 21st 2008 5:08PM
Go to whirlpool.net.au forums, they are how the wow forums should be run, they are all about the open and free exchange of ideas, you can pretty much say anything, within reason, however, swear, be stupid, or be blatently -ist about anything and watch your post be deleted in about 30 seconds and have your account banned for a day.
Heck on those forums you can have convesations about gender inequality with people from both sides arguing passionately and walk away friends with no-one resorted to crude or offensive remarks.
Aigarius Jan 21st 2008 4:27PM
Americanistas must stop trying to enforce their morale on everyone everywhere. If they are offended by something, they have the right not to read it, but they have no right to disallow some to write it. Morality is subjective and everyone must remember that at all times - what is unacceptable and immoral to you might be just fine and be merely a slightly amusing bad joke to me.
PeeWee Jan 22nd 2008 5:37AM
"they have no right to disallow some to write it"
Actually, in a closed environment, such as a private forum, they do have the right. Freedom of speech does not apply. This is not a democracy.
Orestes Jan 21st 2008 4:28PM
I'm all for free speech, but there are responsibilities that go with that free speech that a lot of folk (thanks to the relative anonymity of the net and poor parenting) haven't quite learned. To that end, I'd agree with the above posts suggesting a moderation system like the one on slashdot... provided the community actually steps up and enforces some standards.
As for the more egregious offenders, ban them outright.
Chilblain Jan 21st 2008 4:37PM
I don't think you could ever get it under control. There are plenty of alternative places to discuss WoW. The European forums are infinitely better.
But other than a paid character transfer, I never go to the official site anymore, and I'm better off for it, too.
Rob Jan 21st 2008 4:48PM
FULL TIME moderation. This isn't 2chan, it's the official World of Warcraft forums. New players go there to ask questions and get crushed. Logical arguments are hidden under ASCII art of strange bears.
Clean them up.
Orestes Jan 21st 2008 4:54PM
for the official newbie and help areas, I'd agree. For the realm/battlegroup forums and more social areas not so much
Milktub Jan 21st 2008 5:23PM
I'm all for strict moderation.
Free speech is great. I've gone to jail for free speech. But there's "practicing free speech" and there's "being a jackass under the banner of free speech."
Most of what goes on in the WoW forums falls under the latter.