RBP Ding meter?
 

Tonight I RBP'd a post I thought was a bit trollish, something I could do again and still count on one hand the total in eight years.

As I did, I wondered how many of my post's had been RBP'd over the years. Then I wondered if people would self moderate their behaviour were there a little RBP "ding meter" on their "my flyertalk" page, which alerted the poster when people were finding him "objectionable". I rode that train of thought for a second and arrived at the conclusion that it might not be a bad idea if with every RBP, an anonymous, generalized version of the complaint was auto generated to the poster being complained about. Or even a copy of the complainant's text.

Do you think these measures would help the larger community self-moderate?

Or would the fringies find a way to use them as a tool in their flame wars?

Any way those are my suggestions,

A)a counter telling you your # of RBP's
and
B)auto forward anonymous copies of RBP's to the OP.

There are lots of issues involved in RBPs. It depends what kind of messages you want your proposed "RBP Ding Meter" to deliver.

Sometimes RBPed posts/threads are simply "misplaced." Such as an airline-specific question in MilezBuzz! Forum (ans: airline forum), a question about SFO airport in TravelBuzz! (ans: SF Forum), a question about Singapore in Asia Forum (ans: SIN subforum under Asia Forum), just name a few that I've RBPed or seen the mods moved over the years.

This type of RBPed threads/posts shows the original posters either
1) don't know FT well, or
2) have trouble navigating FT, or
3) simply don't care where to start a thread.

I've seen newbies and long-time FTers starting misplaced threads all over FT. Sometimes it's one-time thing. Sometimes it happens to the same person over and over. If that's someone who doesn't learn (or doesn't want to learn) where to post, what would a "RBP Ding Meter" help in such cases?

I do agree there are posts/threads violating TOS (trolling, personal attack...etc), which the mods generally act upon quite quickly. A little help from RBPs may not hurt.

With your "objectionable" criterion, things could get messy. For example, some FTers rank SWA as #1 airline (in US I guess), while some FTers dispise SWA. What if these two camps just RBP each other's posts, accusing each other's comments not true? What about in OMNI/PR?

You are talking about self-moderating behavior. It takes both ways. I learned from the discussion that the "Thread Reputation" feature was disabled years ago because certain FTers abusing such tools for personal "entertainment." If a RBP meter would carry certain weight, I suspect it would go down the same road as the reputation feature.

If every FTer can act like an mature adult and restrain herself/himself from making non-factual comments/statements, the quality in FT posts/threads will definitely go right up another notch. Unfortunately, that's not the world FT is in today. RBP can't teach folks manners. If people haven't learned manners from the real world, I doubt our FT virtual world would make a difference in their manners.

The good news is there are enough FTers make quality posts/threads. ^

What should a "RBP Ding Meter" measure? What do you want this meter to measure? How to define/judge a good ding (vs. bad ding)? There are quite a few issues to be thought through.

OTOH, the mod team has to review every single RBP and take proper action. Some RBPs never go anywhere. Whether implementing a ding meter is the best use of mod manpower is up for debate.

In short, the proposed RPB Meter has to consider:
1) the RBPed party;
2) the reporting party;
3) the merits of RBPs;
4) the mod team;
5) how it can serve or improve FT in general.

At this point, I am not sure how it helps FT community in terms of self-moderation. Even moderation itself is a hot potato in the discussion of the new Talkboard Guidlines motion. You are welcome to the Talkboard Topics Forum to check it out.

The bottom line is if self-moderation had worked, nobody would have had to see any mod on FT. ;)

I see where you're going with this but I also agree with the analysis of lin821.

RBP's are as often for technical reasons as they are to report "bad" behavior. Plus there are many ways to abuse such a system.

I'd like to see each member get a report every month as to how many Ignore Poster lists s/he is on. Not who has them on their list but how many in total. That would be quite telling, IMO, and might possibly encourage a few folks to post in a more diplomatic, friendly and helpful way.

Of course this could be subject to a lot of abuse as well and the professional trolls might actually like to watch their number grow every month.

Just a thought.

Moderators do more than just clean up messes. They also have housekeeping (such as assisting people to maintain FAQ threads) and welcoming new people.

As Cholula points out, in some forums almost all RBPs are of technical nature (suggestions to move or merge threads).

:confused:

it has seemed to me that ad hominem comments have to be very strong to be considered a TOS violation.