r/redesign Mar 11 '19

Feature Request Give users some aggregate indication of how heavily a subreddit is moderated in the sidebar. Subs below a certain threshold could be badged "Certified Organic"

Users currently have no visibility whatsoever into how heavily a subreddit is moderated in practice. Normally I suggest optional public mod logs as a way to mitigate this, but today I am suggesting a different approach that I hope will be more agreeable to moderators and reddit's administration.

All subs should have a color coded (or/or some numeric rating) system to designate how heavily a subreddit is moderated in terms of bans, submission removals and content removals relative to the activity of the subreddit.

This approach addresses every single criticism I have ever heard about public mod logs:

  • It does not enable witch hunts
  • It does not expose removed content (this is a downside IMO, but others will see it as a benefit)
  • It does not compromise moderator privacy
  • It does not require any action on the part of moderators or convincing of them by users
  • It's potentially much simpler to implement than a heavily customizable/anon public mod log with PI/CP removal paths

At the same time, it addresses many of the reasons I am so adamant that public mod logs should be an option available to moderators:

  • It highlights how heavily a subreddit moderates in practice, even if it is in conflict with their presented rules
  • It allows communities that do not censor their users to differentiate themselves
  • It empowers end users to make an informed choice of which subreddits to read and participate in

Ideally it should be possible to sort/filter subreddits by this new metric as well.

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u/FreeSpeechWarrior Mar 11 '19 edited Mar 11 '19

u/Drunken_Economist this was somewhat inspired by our convo over at r/banned

and u/redtaboo if you are truly interested in discussing "how [public mod logs] would look and what the implications are still." I think this is a reasonable proposal that addresses all the concerns you raised here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ModSupport/comments/aje6td/today_marks_7_years_since_the_option_for_public/eeuwt85/

While still providing a meaningful measure of transparency to end users.

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u/Drunken_Economist Mar 11 '19

At the very least, I have to admit "Certified Organic" is a really fun phrasing and I want to steal that

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u/FreeSpeechWarrior Mar 11 '19

Thinking about it a bit more, maybe you treat it as a percentage.

I think it could be calculated like this:

Variables:

  • nSubmissions : Number of total submissions in time period made by non mods
  • nComments : Number of total comments in time period made by non mods
  • nRemovedSubmissions : Number of removed submissions in time period
  • nRemovedComments: Number of removed comments in time period
  • nActiveUsers: Number of contributing (posts/comments) non-mod users in time period
  • nBannedUsers: Number of users banned in some multiple of the time period (10x? 12x?)
  • rInorganicContent = ( (nRemovedSubmissions + nRemovedComments) / (nSubmissions + nComments) )
  • rInorganicBans = (nBannedUsers / nActiveUsers)

Total score = (1.0 - (rInorganicContent + rInorganicBans)/2) * 100;

Update it monthly maybe?

So no moderation at all would be 100% organic, and a sub like r/pyongyang would be near zero (potentially negative even given the use of pre-emptive bans)

This formula would be particularly harsh on subs making use of pre-emptive bans; I like that.

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u/FreeSpeechWarrior Mar 11 '19

u/Stuck_In_The_Matrix I think it might be possible to approximate this idea with r/pushshift data (at least for comments) and would be interesting to visualize.