Since forum alt sock puppets are a thing here, and they force a post hidden (until moderators have time to look at it) by acting like the report is a down vote button, then when a post is flagged the forum accounts that do so should be visible and what they specifically flagged it for.
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I’m sure they are. I still feel it be beneficial to have the forum users as a community see who, and why, they think a post should be flagged and hidden.
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Maybe the reason. the person not so much. Internally, I am sure they can track if there is a flag spammer on the forums. Wouldn’t expect to hear about it, as that should be a private controlled data point for Funcom. But the reason would help, and possibly make one understand why the person was flagged.
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Personally I would like to be able to read flagged content as well, so I’m aware of what the comments contain. Making them hidden makes the practise of reading them annoying to a degree and this is a worrying practise, when reading some notes over others is more annoying; walled by annoyance. I value freedom of speech.
I’d rather flag my comments myself. I could still make off-topic comments for example, but flagging my comments accurately myself would make it easier for moderators to moderate and make the site behave fluently to all comments. For example the off-topic comments could be coloured differently or maybe the comment would have a hashtag system based on the flagging / tagging. Moderators could still modify the flags, if we make mistakes, but this would make the site more hospitable. Current setting lumps all flagged posts into a single tree of hidden posts, giving the image that they are all as bad as the worst of them due representation. Differentiating representation of separate flagged post types would be a step toward a fluent enough progression pace in the forum. In case there’s a post that clearly violates conduct, then and only then hide the post. Any other post should be visible, but tagged differently.
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Maybe the hidden content could have the reason it was flagged for better perspective if i decide to look at it, but otherwise, i think the system serves fairly well, and doesn’t need over thinking…
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I’d rather want it so that I didn’t have to be forced to do that absolutely unnecessary action. It’s not about practicality per se (it’s a side-effect), but the act itself that hides content away from our eyes, against the purpose of visibility which all comments rely on. If it was pro-freedom, it would not be hidden in the first place. Those that are crucially violating ToS, when it comes to graphical images and posting unrelated material, can be hidden (timed removal?).
That’s because commenting / posting doesn’t require self-moderation when it comes to flagging. The framework doesn’t allow us to self-flag them before posting.
These two moderation elements are not mutually exclusive. Moderator flagging can exist simultaneously with self-moderation no matter how many of us provide enough accuracy. To those like me, I would be utilising self-flagging to its highest degree.
If we aren’t given proper tools, it is absolutely certain that we can’t take absolute accuracy measures.
Freedom and social contracts constantly cross paths. This forum is set up for other users to Flag if they feel something is not “on track” with the thread idea. Actually, if not mistaken, it takes 2 flags. We are exercising our freedom to alert the moderator of something we deem not following the thread. The moderator (a person given power by the people who pay for the private forum) reviews and decides whether it should be deleted, or un-flagged. As simple as that. I am sorry that clicking a button takes important seconds out of your day, but the mechanic in place is far from suppressing freedom. You are free to open your own site, and allow people to post. Funcom, nor anyone else on the forums requires you to contribute. We welcome it, as it allows for many different views. Using freedom of speech as a reason to not have flags on a game forum (and in reality, until review can still be seen) is diluting true issues in the real world involving suppression of freedom.
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Self-moderating is someone deleting their post because they realize that it probably goes against TOS or wouldn’t pass muster with Socrates (i.e. “Is it true; is it kind, or is it necessary?”).
Self-flagging would be proceeding with something their conscience tells them is wrong, then trying to sugar-coat it. I’d be hard-pressed to see that as anything other than narcissism at best. 
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few of mine have been flagged, havnt seen them over turned. Few of them were opinions. I deleted most of them and retyped them to be “snow flake” friendly cause few people on here can’t handle “epen”
but hey, you post screen shots with boobies, no one seems care. XD
If Staff are looking into false flaggers, cool. If not, Make it know who(s) flagging all random stuff so everyone can add them to ignore list or staff step in.
1st time I saw one of my posts flagged… I just went REALLY? Really?! Your playing a 18+ game and having a issue on a forum related to it. XD
Thou in general, I would love to see what FLAG was for, and not have reread my post 10times and go… OK… sure. No clue!
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The system message (warning?) you get when you have a flagged post tells the reason (the one they selected at least).
Eh, no. See, that’s a technicality that’s being used right now, this very minute outside of these forums to suppress specific views and opinions. “We’re not suppressing freedom of speech because you can say anything you want over in this little corner behind the stairs where nobody can see or hear you.”
I don’t know that I want to elaborate too much because I’m sure it would seriously derail this thread, but suffice to say real world suppression of freedom makes extensive use of flagging systems just like or very similar to what this forum has.
I sometimes get flagged for going off-topic, but there have been instances in which the flagging got overturned when I asked a moderator about it.
IMO, there’s nothing good that can come of anyone outside of staff to know who’s doing the flagging. That way lies vindictiveness. I can, however, see there being a benefit to the flag reason being noted on the hidden posts so people can get an idea of what their fellow community members tolerate and what’s deemed inappropriate.
I’d almost go so far as to say it should show how many people have selected a particular flag, but then that would probably encourage people to use it as a dislike mechanism, which… well, I’d rather have an actual dislike option than hiding unpopular suggestions. At least that would be informative and reek less of bullying.
I’m not saying the element needs a reason first to exist. I say we need it to show we exist.
I didn’t say we shouldn’t have flagging. I said I want to flag my posts correctly (so that you don’t have to bother), before I’m able to post them. There’s a huge difference in concept here. Moderators could still modify the flags like they do now and the rest community could still report their findings, but the point is that the flagging (tagging) needs to be a requirement before we can post.
Which is missing the balansive variable; actual self-moderation tool. We need a tool to show that we can manage these things on our own. What a better tool than giving us the requirement to flag posts before posting them commences. Properly flagging our own content gives us the power to smoothen moderator and site efficiency, but also allows us to filter content based on it thorough the search feature (and perhaps a dedicated filter tool).
I’m sorry that you feel like you have to write a reply and invest a lot more time than simply a second, coz I posted a comment signifying a specific mechanic in this forum is incomplete. Then again it’s not my job to finish it. I’m merely here contributing willingly for the cause.
Mechanic referred to lumps all flagged content behind a veil and this veil sadly doesn’t discriminate between flagged posts (they are all equally hidden, which is like giving you a life sentence for merely existing the “wrong” way), thus giving a really ’ dangerous ’ idea to light (again!). Surely the moderators can and will do their jobs, but how many comments do we “feel” behind the veil of scrutiny before any innocent (merely misunderstood) comments get their rightful visibility back by the moderators? Do you see a pattern here now? It’s like putting an innocent person into jail first, for the duration of investigation, and freeing them years later (if not at all or when we remember they still exist). Thankfully were talking about words and not actual people, but the people writing the comments do feel the fruit of misinterpretation. I’m “a bit” sensitive when it comes to this experience, but I’m not accusing you of anything if you happen to get such picture.
This produces an unnecessary workload for moderators as well, so I advice the suggestion to be taken seriously from this angle as well.
Which is not happening coz I’m here willingly (without wanting a compensation, mind you) to tell them how to proceed updating this site’s mechanism into something that allows us govern our own content properly. There’s no reason to create a site just to make this point. It’s much more efficient to come here and write a reply. I’m not into administrating a site cluster either. This is why I’m willingly here and contributing (but not accepting proposals of this kind).
This ain’t about obligation. All data is important, but messy data takes more time to process. Point is to boost the site’s efficiency level up by bringing a self-governance tool to the table.
Which is good, but one-sided. I’m sorry if my suggestion takes half the “fun” of a job away in an ideal situation, but that’s the point; to allow this happen by giving us a tool for it. Not every poster understands to bring their posts to an ideal level, but those of us who do can’t do it, coz the tool isn’t there.
Which is good, but still one-sided. I’m not allowed to flag my own post properly, so that’s why you have to flag them if you want the comment section to maintain integrity. What about me? If I want to maintain integrity myself by wanting to keep my comments readily clear thorough self-flagging (tagging would be a better term), I can’t do so. If I post an off-topic reply to an on-topic reply, but seemingly incomplete and my comment is there just to fill in a small detail missing from the reply, my comment is flagged as an off-topic by the community AND hidden like the rest of the “unwanted”.
Not all of us know how to word things properly when it comes to integrity, so on top of the current flagging (to be modified a bit tho) I’d be pleased to have this posting requirement.
Proper term to be used is perhaps tagging.
Tagging our posts before posting them allows us to inform readers. For example tagging a post as off-topic allows readers to skip the comment, if they wish so, without fear of losing strictly topic-related info, but the comment isn’t suffering from the veil as it is not hidden either and this is the point where flagging fails. Flagging lumps all comments behind the same veil no matter of their seriousness and this isn’t a good idea.
I use the word flag as in like a banner. Flagged content is not inherently something negative. It’s merely like a cloth on a person signifying of their taste in colours and symbols. Currently at this site flagging is utilised to show something is wrong. I suggest that it can be utilised to show what’s good too.
It means that I want to uphold site integrity by tagging my own posts to start with and thus alleviate the burden of flagging. Currently the site is incapable of giving me that tool, so moderators and the community here are doing a lot of extra work. I could do that for them and keep the site fluctuating smoother.
What bugs me out is that flagging dips all content behind a veil and this veil is not where off-topic comments for example should be. Hiding a post is the maximum sentence one can bestow upon words (merely off-topic comments are hardly any of that sort, unless they also violate the ToS).
Yeah, see, too be honest I think you’re way off base there. Tagging individual posts like you propose is a step too far. It would be like applying tags to individual statements made during a conversation. (Come to think of it, that is a lot like Twitter, which by the way is now scientifically proven to make you stupid by using it.)
There’s already tagging available for the original post of a thread, but what point would tagging have for individual posts? The main utility of tags is to aid others when they are using the search function to identify threads that are relevant to what they are looking for. However, tagging individual posts (other than maybe “Solutions”) would be inane: you’d have no context without reading the surrounding posts… which puts you right back at searching for threads.
And what even would one tag their own posts with? That they’re trying to be helpful, that they have a question of their own, that they’re trying to troll someone? Would people have to reply multiple times in a row, tagging each of their thoughts as something different every time they’d normally just start a new paragraph or bullet-point?
Yes, exactly! Trying to muddle the distinction between flagging and tagging to me seems like it would invite censorship because then you’re critically trying to sort all of someone’s statements into neatly compartmentalized bins so you can read what you want. This purpose is already served by separate threads being… well… separate threads.
Now I realize that Fable’s prefered method of responding to others is to dissect their posts and comment like a professor grading a term paper (though they have backed off on this somewhat lately), but personally I find that approach extremely frustrating and even insulting. For me, it comes across as cherry-picking and makes the responses nigh unreadable because they don’t flow well, and loses the context of what the other person was saying. It’s like not being able to see the forest for the trees.
There’s no way I’d want to participate on a forum where individual replies are supposed to be washed and sorted like recycling. It seems to me that would only invite people to be more judgmental and less understanding; it wouldn’t feel at all welcoming.
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No idea what you are referring to. I’m talking about tagging my comments, that’s all. For example in order to post, I would need to tag it as off-topic if my comment is not directly related to the topic. Off-topic comments don’t deserve to be hidden like the rest of flagged comments like those that violate ToS.
Separating off-topic comments would be a step forward. They don’t belong to be hidden amongst ToS violators. It’s a different issue if we don’t know how to tag them tho, which is corrected as we experience them. Meanwhile the community continues to flag them, but flagging them off-topic wouldn’t hide them. They merely tag them as if it was us tagging them.