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    1. Vague plans for the next few days

      Hey everyone, really happy to see people still coming back, and especially having extremely good discussions like this one about moderation. Here's my vague plans for the next few days: Finish...

      Hey everyone, really happy to see people still coming back, and especially having extremely good discussions like this one about moderation. Here's my vague plans for the next few days:

      Finish comment reply notifications and a couple other high-priority items

      I've got comment reply notifications mostly done now, and hope to have that out today or tomorrow. Username mention notifications should be pretty simple to add on top of that as well. Other than that, I need to look into fixing a few strange bugs that have been noticed, and would also like to get through a few other things in the backlog (including doing a better job of getting the backlog listed on the issue tracker).

      A significant feature I'd like to have soon is making it possible for other people to edit the tags on topics, as well as potentially allowing editing the title or even the link. For this to be possible though, we need to have a sort of log of the changes, so that there's accountability in who's making the changes and what they're doing.

      Some more updates/additions to the Docs pages

      The most important piece is to finish writing up some info about the "trust system", which is a lot of what we've been discussing in the "Community moderators?" post. This is going to be a really essential part of having the site be able to handle growth, so not having anything about it on the Docs site currently is a really big gap.

      I'd also like to do a bit of writing/rearranging of some of the other pages before I get too much public attention, since they're pretty scattered right now and are missing some information that people seem to look for.

      Invite more people and/or get some "larger" attention

      Once those other updates are done, I'm planning to start actively looking for a bit more public attention, including possibly posting to places like Hacker News or reddit. We're going to need a pretty steady inflow of people to keep the activity level up, so I think really getting the site out there soon is going to be the easiest way to do that. I do want to have the updates/info mentioned above done first though, so that will probably still be a couple days.

      In the meantime, I've topped up all existing users to 5 invite codes again, so if there's anyone you'd like to invite please feel free. You can get to your invite codes on this page, which is linked in the sidebar when you're on your user page.

      Thanks again, definitely let me know if you have any questions, suggestions, etc.

      11 votes
    2. Community moderators?

      I think I read all of the documentation and at least skimmed most threads here and haven't found much on how moderation will be handled (I'm sorry if I missed a post where this is mentioned, it's...

      I think I read all of the documentation and at least skimmed most threads here and haven't found much on how moderation will be handled (I'm sorry if I missed a post where this is mentioned, it's very likely!).

      Basically, will it be like on reddit, with users volunteering? Or will there be more of an "admin" caste handling that on a higher level? Also I know Deimos made AutoModerator so...

      Just wondering since I've long thought that good moderation is all that really helps in keeping subreddits quality.

      16 votes
    3. Question about replies to comments.

      I finally read through your post (sorry it took me so long!), and got there because under my name it said "1 new message" or something like that. I clicked on my username to check it out like you...

      I finally read through your post (sorry it took me so long!), and got there because under my name it said "1 new message" or something like that. I clicked on my username to check it out like you suggested, and noticed that people had replied to some of the comments I made. Are we supposed to get notifications of replies (as well as direct messages), or is that intentionally not a feature yet?

      (Sorry if this has been answered elsewhere)

      1 vote
    4. Daily Tildes discussion - should we have an "about" section on user pages?

      Fairly straightforward question today - do you think it's useful/interesting for people to be able to write a small "about me" section on their userpage? There are definitely good uses for these,...

      Fairly straightforward question today - do you think it's useful/interesting for people to be able to write a small "about me" section on their userpage?

      There are definitely good uses for these, but they also have the potential to be used in spammy or otherwise bad ways too, so I'm not totally sure if it's something I want to do.

      Any thoughts or strong feelings about why this would be a good or bad feature?

      (P.S. Sorry, this is later than I'd usually like to make these posts)

      13 votes
    5. Daily Tildes discussion - annoyances so far?

      Not a very "deep" discussion topic, but I think I'll try to leave more formal ones for weekdays since that tends to be when people are around more. So just a general question: in the short time...

      Not a very "deep" discussion topic, but I think I'll try to leave more formal ones for weekdays since that tends to be when people are around more.

      So just a general question: in the short time you've been using the site so far, is there some pesky thing that's already annoying you? Something that takes too many clicks, information where you don't expect it, etc.?

      11 votes
    6. Thoughts on handling political content on Tildes

      (0) Background This is coming off a discussion in today's thread on forming new groups around whether or not to add a group for politics. I expressed there that, given my moderator experience on...

      (0) Background

      This is coming off a discussion in today's thread on forming new groups around whether or not to add a group for politics. I expressed there that, given my moderator experience on /r/ChangeMyView and /r/NeutralPolitics, I opposed making such a group given how Tildes currently stands.

      (1) Political discussion is nearly always garbage.

      I don't think anyone needs reminding of this, but political discussion almost uniformly fails to achieve anything positive in almost any social media platform. Your uncle's facebook rants? Garbage. Political sniping on Twitter? Garbage. The endless repetitive point scoring and outrage fest on most political subreddits? Garbage.

      So, we have to ask, why is this content garbage?

      (2) People want to be heard, but nobody wants to hear.

      I do not think political discussion is garbage because of bad faith trolling. That certainly exists and does not help, but usually it's not hard to ID the trolls, and excepting egregious stuff like doxxing or threats, to ignore obvious bad faith absurdity.

      The much bigger issue is that what people want to do is to be heard and validated in their political views. This is not merely that they want to proselytize or to win converts, but that they're seeking validation and a sense of rightness or righteousness in their statements.

      This desire is toxic to a neutral forum, because invariably on any divisive issue, you will not merely be heard and validated, but will be challenged and denigrated. Indeed, often the challenges and denigrations themselves are the same performance in reverse. Members of each team trying to dunk on the other and earn validation for how hard they owned the other side.

      (3) To overcome this, a successful political forum must have a purpose other than mere commentary.

      On /r/ChangeMyView and /r/NeutralPolitics, we have been able to build forums which have large amounts of productive and non-hostile political discussion. The key to this is that neither forum allows for being heard, or general discussion, as its reason for being.

      On /r/ChangeMyView we limit posts to views people genuinely hold, and are open to changing (CMV rule B). This requires that OPs cannot come to troll or soapbox. It is by far the most frequently used rule of ours in terms of removing submissions, almost always on the soapboxing side.

      On /r/NeutralPolitics, we limit posts to neutrally framed questions about political subjects, which can be answered with facts. By doing this, we narrow the scope of discussion away from soliciting feelings (which is an invitation to people posting just to be heard) and towards bringing forth factual information, where people might learn something.

      I don't know what purpose a political forum on Tildes might have, but to succeed it must have a clear purpose, and that purpose must be one which excludes people posting merely to be heard.

      (4) In addition to a purpose beyond being heard, a political forum must have extreme civility rules.

      Both CMV and NP have extremely similar rules in this regard, and they are absolutely crucial to the success of the fora.

      In general, any comment or post which in any way denigrates another user should be removed. This is an extremely broad civility rule that is well past what most subreddits do. Calling another user a liar, or accusing them of bad faith posting is banned on both CMV and NP for example, even when such accusations are true.

      The prohibition on what even may be seen as justified rudeness is I think the key to a civility rule. It immediately removes from the moderation process any discretion around the substance of the politics, and makes it a neutral rule which can be applied evenly to all parties.

      It is also necessary because nothing productive ever happens after bad faith is accused. Almost uniformly, once someone is rude, if there is a response back to them, the response will be rude in kind, usually more severely. People love to try to get the last word in, and a clear, objective rule banning "they started it" spats is also an important component. CMV's wiki has a really good overview of how we enforce this rule there.

      (5) Conclusion/TL;DR

      I don't know exactly what political content should exist on Tildes. I do know that a general politics group will not work, and that rather a politics channel should be focused on a discrete purpose other than just discussion.

      I would almost certainly ban link posts from any politics group, since inherently they're going to act as just headlines for people to pontificate on, without guiding discussion towards a particular goal. I would also obviously enforce civility, and have much stricter moderation of it than I might on a non-politics forum.

      Edited for formatting

      27 votes
    7. Let's see how well Tildes handles a *real* submission...

      Welcome to the /r/ListenToThis Best Of 2017! Here there are no scores, no judgments, and no opinions - just obscure music shared by redditors, collected and arranged for you over the course of...

      Welcome to the /r/ListenToThis Best Of 2017!

      Here there are no scores, no judgments, and no opinions - just obscure music shared by redditors, collected and arranged for you over the course of several months by our dedicated mod team. This list is meant to complement other best of lists on the internet, many of which are linked in the sticky comment below for further discovery.

      Set #1 includes everything - the best of the best tracks and a corresponding all-inclusive album playlist.
      The other sets are the same content, broken up into genre groups so you can listen according to your tastes. There is a sampler (1 track per album) and a full-album (every track from every album) playlist for each group. We’ve also included a listing of the albums by set in this post as not everything is available on Spotify, Tidal, etc. We tried to prefer an artist’s Bandcamp or Soundcloud, but if nothing else was available, you may see Youtube, Spotify, and iTunes links. The final count this year is 226 artists out of more than a thousand submissions.

      What did we miss? Share your favorites in the comments… and happy listening..

      -- the /r/ListenToThis hipster facista


      Set 1 - The Full Smash


      Best Tracks on Spotify & All Albums on Spotify

      And, on the other services:


      Set 2 - Pop, Indie & Related


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums

      Apple Music Sampler (thanks /u/suckitnewtabs)


      Set 3 - Progressive & Related


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Apple Music Sampler (thanks /u/BlueRoseImmortal)

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums


      Set 4 - Hip-Hop, Trip-Hop & Instrumentals


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Apple Music Sampler (thanks /u/firewire_9000)

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums


      Set 5 - Punk & Related


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums


      Set 6 - Electronic & Related


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Apple Music Sampler (thanks /u/firewire_9000)

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums


      Set 7 - Metal


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums

      Apple Music Sampler (thanks /u/BlueRoseImmortal)


      Set 8 - Jazz, Soul, Funk & Related


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Apple Music Sampler (thanks /u/firewire_9000)

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums


      Set 9 - Afrobeat, World & Classical


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums


      Set 10 - Americana & Related


      Spotify Sampler & Spotify Albums

      Google Sampler & Google Albums

      Deezer Sampler & Deezer Albums

      Tidal Sampler & Tidal Albums

      Apple Music Sampler (thanks /u/firewire_9000)

      Youtube Sampler & Youtube Albums


      Disclaimer: The Spotify playlists are the masters. They were auto-replicated to all of the other services, and there will be some missing albums on those services. The Youtube playlists may also get a bit wonky. Unfortunately, we don’t have the resources needed to fix every hiccup or keep track of what’s missing on every service. Apple music doesn’t provide an easy import mechanism either, though if someone wants to create Apple lists, we’ll link them here. Also, Google Music and Youtube simply can’t handle the All Albums playlist, so they are omitted.


      Links to Other Best Of Lists



      Please share other noteworthy lists you've found online in the replies to this comment.

      4 votes