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Is the "Reddiquette" a good idea in principle? What do you think about it?
I invite you to read the whole thing here, even if you've read it in the past: https://www.reddit.com/wiki/reddiquette
A couple of prompts for discussion:
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Are the ideas in reddiquette good?
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If everone here followed it, or something similar, would that be a good thing?
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If only a portion of people here followed it, or something similar, would that still be a good thing?
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I was thinking about that Evolution of Trust game/article/demo linked here previously and this one came to me: Imagine a personality that would make internet interactions the best possible- what habits and tendencies would that personality have?
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What are some good values/ideals or goals for a site like Tildes (or its community) to shoot for, in the biggest picture possible?
I think it's a good thing to have a "reddiquette", and at the same time keep in mind that people will ignore it.
The current iteration of the reddiquette is far too long. It used to be a lot shorter.
Yeah I think THE biggest weakness in the reddiquette is that it doesn't try hard enough to make the sale. The admins never advertise it to new users, or at least they didn't for the longest time - maybe they do now with their current onboarding, but like you said it's way too long for most people to care about when it already appears most of the community ignores it there.
If I were to rewrite it, I'd consolidate a lot of things, maybe turn some things into expando bullet lists or something. or make it into a completely different more appealing medium like that evolution of trust game linked in the OP. but most importantly, it would need to have at least at the beginning, maybe throughout it, and elsewhere in the site the sales pitch for why it would be appealing for people to stick to it.
Damn, it's been a long time since I looked at that. It's gotten way too long and complex
The biggest area of reddiquette that gets ignored constantly is don't downvote opinions, downvote comments that don't contribute to the discussion.
That's not really needed here since there are no downvotes. I think "Don't be a dick" is all we really need.
I was always a bit spooked by that motto - even more spooked when they dropped it. They knew the company was potentially going to be way too powerful, and that slogan was there to try to keep them from abusing that power. :s
I agree though - I think I'd say as simple as possible, but not simpler. "Don't be a dick" for instance used to be the only rule a game server i play on had, but what constitutes being a dick? The question is even more difficult in the context of PvP! And what constitutes "evil" for google? Obviously they decided the motto was not what they wanted anymore - whether because it was ambiguous or because it was poor branding. Edit: apparently they changed it to "do the right thing" which is just as, if not more subjective/ambiguous. But it is at least a positive phrasing, so perhaps less bad from a PR standpoint.
Oddly enough, I always found the idea of the "Don't be evil" motto a bit naive—people who abuse their power don't do it because they don't know better or because no one told them it was wrong. Still, I guess it made some sense in the context of the company's culture? But really, you can have any motto you want, or code of conduct or whatever, and it will be of very little use without the means to enforce it.
That's obviously up to each individual, but I really just consider it a modern, succinct rephrasing of the Golden Rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It ultimately means each community will establish its own interpretations of what "dick" behavior is, and means the rule is flexible. For instance, in a PvP context, would you honestly expect other people to not kill you and take your stuff? No, you probably wouldn't be upset over that, as it's inherent to the playstyle. Thus, it's not being a dick if you do it to others. But if you intentionally grief people or spawn camp them? You'd probably be pretty pissed (as it'd ruin your game), so you shouldn't do it to others.
right, so the community has to come up with a slightly more explicit interpretation of what conduct is unacceptable in a given instance. It's flexible per community - especially over time - and generally is not codified or is unofficial. We have an incentive to work for tildes to be a place for civil, high quality conversations and community. If we are displaced in the future by the equivalent of Eternal September (or like what happened to voat), our culture may disappear or be isolated, our interpretation of the golden rule may be replaced with the reddit golden rule which is "I downvote and flame you when i dislike what you say, and you downvote and flame me when you dislike what I say, and moderators (sometimes) have to be the nannies to try and split us up or ban us".
The fact that Reddiquette is so infrequently enforced these days on Reddit has resulted in it becoming meaningless, especially to new users. Would Tildes have a means of enforcing a code of conduct? If the site takes off, that could become an unmanageable burden very quickly.
Interesting. I guess from my perspective I see the reddiquette more like a religious text than a set of laws to be enforced by an authority, i.e. it works by the person reading it voluntarily choosing to integrate and employ it. I think it ought to be more of a sale though - it should make a case to the reader that they stand to win more by participation than not.
there's the possibility of community shame/righteousness motivating people to abide by it, but that rubs me the wrong way. To extend the religious analogy, I don't think much of Christians who are judgmental and tell sinners they're going to burn in hell etc. etc. (no matter whether that is true or not in their view), but those who lead by example in acting christ-like are admirable in my assessment.
I agree that there's something off-putting about the idea of community shame/righteousness being the motivating factor for adhering to a set of tenets. A self-righteous community closes a lot of doors.
I also think that people like to see basic rules enforced. Here's an example from my own life. A couple of years ago, my public library decided to go fine-free. That meant users would no longer be charged on a daily basis for returning materials that were past due, though still charged after several weeks if they never returned an item or if an item was damaged while under their care. Instead of being pleased with this change, many library users were upset, especially frequent users. They saw the change as evidence that the library simply didn't care about its materials and didn't care whether or not people followed the rules. They were also hurt because they'd been trying so hard to abide by this code of ethics, and suddenly, they were being told that the code didn't really matter anymore.
I asked my original question without really having an answer in mind. I honestly don't know if it would be better to have some kind of enforced code of ethics or an unenforced list of best practices. There are up and downsides to both. When you do decide to enforce a rule, you have to be in it for the long haul. If we make a rule stating, "Don't be mean," can the site really commit to doling out warnings for every mean-spirited comment? That could get messy very quickly.
As others in this thread have mentioned, short, simple and clear is good. If Tildes does decide to have some code of conduct, and does decide to enforce it, brevity is going to be key.
Yeah, I don't think I'd like to be told not to be mean or banned for little anger slip now and then - to err is human. Like when @redacted got banned, I don't know if that's good or not despite being the one he was being a jerk to. If that becomes something that must be moderated, that is going to be a lot of work, meaning a lot of bureaucracy and/or a lot of disputes about power abuse.
The way i was thinking about this was if it were a collaboratively edited list (so it has credibility), if it were nonbinding and voluntary (e.g. nobody is going to compel you to adhere to it, beyond the sitewide content policy), BUT you had some ritual where you could sign your name to it like a promise so that it becomes significant in your own mind on a personal level - so YOU keep yourself accountable. Especially if the revision process were a regular, open source thing, where everyone's voice matters and they can feel ownership of it.
As for length, I'm a fan of keeping things short - but still long enough to be interesting. Maybe something like three or five values/principles, a small handful of simple habits which support each, and one slogan/motto to encapsulate it all.
The community moderator idea here (implemented through the "trust" system) would make it more possible to dole out warnings here than on reddit, where moderator duties fall to an exclusive group.
Well you'll need a new compound word. I suggest Tildecorum.
Users of reddit are redditors.
What do we call users of Tilde? Tildos?
Tilders. Pronounced precisely the same as tildes. To confuse people when you speak.
Tilderinas (inspired by Tumblr)
/S
I think something similar to reddit's is good, purely to manage the expectations of the community. When moderation comes around, there will be an assumption that everybody is familiar with the site's guidelines and culture -- and those who do not play nice with those guidelines will most likely have a lot of their contributions removed.
HN has a decent set, but even that is still too long.
Concise guidelines / rules are important. There will always be people who will try to walk the line or use those guidelines against other users.
It would be interesting for the community to draft this document instead of the staff.
This has been addressed here: https://docs.tildes.net/code-of-conduct
If it's enforced otherwise I'm against it.