#13

I do wanna be mindful of that at least doubling the length of time spent moderating each instance

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#14

True. Really it should be a human judgement thing, not a rule. Some posts really obviously should be merged elsewhere, some less so.

It might also be a terrible idea! I am not an experienced forum moderating in this or any community.

#15

I’m glad for the feedback here because merging/splitting topics is usually a complicated decision to take and it’s not always clear how it should best be done.
But I agree talking to the people involved is usually a good idea.

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#16

yeah, as i said in the OP, often a merge is justified and makes obvious sense (“which reverb should i get?” getting merged into the reverb thread, for instance).

for those cases where it’s less obvious i think contacting before a merge would really benefit the forum. i’m very cognizant of the fact it could mean mods having to spend more time, but it might also save time if a merge has to be reverted. another point to consider - when somebody posts a new topic, they might save some thoughts for a later discussion, which could move it in a different direction (same applies to categories too), so a first post might not necessarily reflect the overall topic. a conversation would clear this as well.

more importantly though, not everybody is comfortable contacting the mods. which means (as is evidenced in this thread) that some people might not feel like posting or contributing to a discussion anymore. i think we all feel strongly about lines being one of the most welcoming online communities. i’d hate to think that some people would not feel that way, and instead of expressing it they would just withdraw quietly.

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#17

If someone feels the need to, anonymously, merge/delete threads and move posts, would it be at least possible to notify the concerned member if there is not enough time to bother about asking beforehand? Honestly, wouldn’t this just be polite and respectful behavior to other people? Yes, I think it would.

Coming back and not finding the post you might have put some work in last night leaves a very unpleasant and discouraging feeling. It certainly would not if there was a quick note by ‘someone’ saying something like: “Look, I thought your topic would be better placed here for that reason - what do you think?”

:angry:

EDIT: Also, how about some kind of hint in the newly allotted thread that the moved post was not intentionally meant to fit in its context in the first place? You are doing strange things to communication.

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#18

First and foremost: This is the best forum about music, art, technology and lots of other important topics I know. So kudos to the moderators: seems like they’re doing a great job!

I agree with @scanner_darkly though that sometimes merging topics makes them too broad. For instance there’s New to monome and modular: ask questions here – but I think separate threads for “New to monome” and “New to modular” would make more sense. I can imagine that lots of monome users would be interested in answering monome specific questions, but don’t have the time to read all general “New to modular” questions.

I also agree that notifying the OP when their topic was merged would be helpful. It also happened to me when I was quite new to this forum, and my first thought was “Oh, what happened to my post? Did I do something wrong? Did I violate any rules I wasn’t aware of…?”

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#19

Not wanting to pile on here but here’s a good example of exactly what you are talking about:

New topic started about Hemispheres, likely merged into the Ornament and Crime thread and the author, a new user, ending up confused about what happened.

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#20

Just wanted to say cheers to @papernoise’s moderation in the “Just Buy a Computer” thread. I know it’s likely much more work to operate that way, so I don’t expect it every time, but I appreciate it.

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#21

thanks! Glad to hear this!
Personally I’m glad to get some feedback about these matters (both critique and praise), because it’s not always that easy to imagine how you’d perceive something from the other side. Meaning that if you do topic moderation you tend to have much more overview about what’s going on, your focus is more on the general thing, and maybe less on the particular. While when you’re actively engaged in a discussion you might have more focus on the particular.
Not sure it makes any sense, but I guess the bottom line is: we’re sometimes still learning. At least I can say that I am.

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#22

Yeah, I agree and as I’d missed the original thread I really appreciate the link being made so that I can read previous thoughts community members have had

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#23

right on, more communication the better :slight_smile:

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#24

I still feel uncomfortable with the merging, splitting and renaming policy and I fear its not leading to something good. So I want to word my concerns here.

There was a thread about the recent downfall and the monetary issues of the Muff Wiggler forum. Then after more than hundred posts have been made it was renamed, then splitted. There are several things leaving a sour taste for formal, political and simply for human reasons.

So, I found an automatic splitting notification which leads me to the original thread but not to where my post was moved to. Also there was no notification how the new thread is named, so I had to guess again what might have happened and where I was moved to and why. This really sucks.

I tried to comprehend what happened and it seemed to me that someOne asked for a “heavy hand” in moderation and then the split was done “as requested”. I find this highly dubious and irritating. Eventually this is antidemocratic and manipulating communication, which is even worse in this case where also a political discussion took place.

I found the new thread to be named RIP Mike McGrath . Of course I am not a native english speaker so I am not sure how this feels for you in the US but to me RIP sounds comic and cheap, somehow disrespectful as an abbreviation for a sleazy commemoration phrase. What is wrong with people who have to abbreviate their condolence? I usually do not post in threads named so for that reason and have seen far better fitting thread titles - how about a simple ‚Mike McGrath passed away‘“. It does not sound so much like "Um, if you have to post something about that guy, please drop it here…“.

Personally, after reading about Mikes death in that original thread I felt the need to express my feelings in the context of that very discussion. I am an adult and I considered if I find this appropriate just there and than tried to find some (few) words to express myself. Getting moved to a place where I would not have done this or to a context where I would have worded it differently is disrespectful.

What could have been a better solution? Communication is an unfolding process between people. Topics change over time and that’s a good thing - otherwise it would be pointless to speak to each other. Also this in this special case it wasn’t about some technical question that still have to be perfectly and presumably quick comprehensible over the next years. But when someone has the feeling it would be a good idea for clarity sake to partly move a discussion to a separate place - why not just opening a new thread and suggesting to carry on there without breaking things in parts. Everyone who then feels inclined to do so can copy own contributions there or leave it or rewrite something better fitting for the new context. Also in this case, why not simply moving the vital discussion about sexual oppression to a reasonable place instead of putting the answer to ‘what happens over at MW?’ and the emotional reaction aside? Now the discussion about sexism and who is more right takes place under the heading MW’s future uncertain …

I know that probably no one is trying to act evil here though I wonder if there is an American equivalent to the german saying "The opposite of good is good intentions“?

Peace

Sven

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#25

perhaps it would be wise to wait a few days/weeks before splitting topics being currently discussed.

#26

For what it’s worth, to my US ears “RIP” does not sound comic and cheap. Of course, in popular culture it is often used this way, but the connotation is not always present.

I would say the US equivalent is “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.”

I actually see this as the main value of splitting threads into new ones, for what it’s worth. Topics changing and drifting into new threads is what allows Discourse to both approximate the actual flow of human conversation, while preserving the usefulness of categorization practices like tags, thread titles and so on.

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#27

Maybe, apart from that it’s not working when you can’t follow that flow - when you look at the ‘RIP Mike’ thread a lot of the contributions have irritating references… :thinking:

#28

Tip: you can find any post you’ve written by navigating to your profile page and choosing Activity.

Yes, discontinuities occur when threads are split, but there are good reasons to do so, including protecting one ongoing discussion from a new emergent tangent.

The more thought people put into what they write and where, the less need for splits.

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#29

That’s great - I didn’t know that and it’s obviously incredibly useful.

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#30

@Leverkusen , I fully hear your concerns. There are always gaps between intent and perception – this even happens between the mods! This legibility is further obscured by the way that Discourse is structured. I totally understand how jarring + frustrating these actions can be. Does @mdoudoroff’s suggestion above help bridge this gap? Should we be investigating customizing Discourse’s software? Just let us know what you’d like to see in terms of alerts :slight_smile:

re: the title of the mentioned thread, this is in line with conventions established by others in our community. though the search term ‘RIP’ also brings up module chatter, it does include direct and sincere eulogies. I’m sorry to hear it came across the way you described, but I hope this info helps.

re: splitting that particular thread, my own read of the flow of events doesn’t raise any flags. I believe the interest (stated by a few folks in the thread) was in respectfully separating discussion about MW and discussion about losing Mike.

re: splitting threads + merging topics vs asking people to copy their contributions or rewrite, the difference is rooted in a division of labor. our “job” is to remove as much pain as possible from internet discourse, to foster conversations that will hopefully create community. moderating lines is joyous, but it is not something any of us does to flex power or ego – when one of us decides to merge topics or move posts, it is because we genuinely believe that (through our experiences watching thousands of posts unfold) it is in the interest of better conversation for the majority.

personally: when I perform moderator actions, it is with future visits/visitors in mind. I always ask myself if leaving things the way they’re unfolding will help someone who wasn’t present for the conversation easily stumble upon / search for the topics and feel like they’ve found what they need.

I am sorry that you find yourself on the painful side of our best efforts and I appreciate you sharing your perspective. I hope this message at least helps address your short-term frustrations.

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#31

As someone whose career is built on extending an open source web platform: highly recommend you think very carefully about this path. It can paint you into all kinds of corners, leave you unable to benefit from security updates, expose your users to bugs that the platform maintainers can’t or won’t help you with, etc.

(Realize this is a derail! But it shouldn’t really be on the table unless there’s a vital need that you know you have full-time people to dedicate to. With love, and recognizing the good intent behind the suggestion: it has very bad ‘code smell’. Carry on! :heart:)

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#32

oh, for sure not an informed question – just opening doors! thank you for the child lock :wink:

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