7
votes
Deleted topics
Are users supposed to be able to continue to comment in topics that have been deleted? Once deleted, topics are no longer visible to the group, but the topic is still accessible by URL and users can continue to comment. I just want to clarify if this is the intended functionality or a bug.
Deleted posts being accessible is likely intentional for accountability’s sake and I don’t know if being able to comment in them is a particular problem... that’s the way it works on reddit too. Can you think of any particular reasons it should not be allowed?
It sort of brings up the point that erasing only the post's text while allowing discussion to continue means people are just going to ask what the original post said and someone will probably have it saved and copy-paste it into the thread anyway. I think locking the thread is reasonable, and if it's important enough that discussion has to continue, then a new thread makes sense.
That’s a very good point. I wonder if automatically locking the comments section after deletion might be a good idea after all.
Edit: Although in the case of moderator removals, I have often found the comments sections of deleted posts to be a valuable place for discussing why the removal happened (e.g. through mod sticky comments) and letting people discuss if the removal was warranted. Without an outlet for that you may see a lot of “why was that topic deleted?” type posts in the groups themselves which adds to the noise there.
I still think if a post is deleted, everything should lock. You can't post to or delete anything from the topic. Then maybe have a note at the top that says Removed by user or Removed by mod / admin due to blah blah. Now if there is personal info being put out, then a mod or admin should delete that obviously.
Why? If you're having a discussion in a topic with someone (or multiple someones) and the OP decides to delete the post for whatever reason, why should that end your discussion? Now what do you have to do if you want to continue it, send the other person(s) messages? Start a new topic and try to copy over all the context from the comments that were already there?
What's the benefit of locking everything?
Yeah, I that makes sense. I still think comments shouldn't be able to be deleted or modified in a deleted topic. Just so the context is there and things don't get painted differently. That way a mod can go in and see what really happened / was said. Admins can see that stuff on the back end or dive into the db if they have to I guess. I am just coming from an accountability standpoint. Allowing comments to continue makes sense the way you put it. It's more like removeeddit.com provides a way to cover yourself and show people what was said or to look for yourself what was really said.
I disagree strongly with anything that ever takes a user's control away on things they posted. They should always be able to edit or delete if they want to.
I feel like you have a very specific idea of deleted topics being something bad for some reason, where they need to be totally shut down in different ways. There are lots of pretty mundane, normal reasons why topics get deleted though.
It's just one of those case by case things. You yourself, left posts up as they were intentionally in order to get a point across. I think it just depends why it was deleted.
How will deleted topics be monitored? People can post a topic, delete it, and share the url to people and have a kind of hidden discussion. Will these rely solely on users to report problems? Do you see it becoming tedious, moderating things in a deleted topic?
I don't think it's too much different than other topics. It's not feasible to monitor all topics (whether they're in the listings or not), so it tends to rely on reporting regardless.
I guess. But if there are eventually mods, that's a larger pool to peruse listed threads randomly.
I definitely think so, I mean presumably it was deleted for a reason.
Maybe a tiered system though: full deletion (e.g. in the case of illegal stuff), deletion by hiding (like that thread, but not allowing you to comment), and maybe something inbetween like killing a comment/thread but still allowing it to display
Yeah, IIRC @deimos mentioned potentially allowing a “disassociate” type option for users that, instead of just a full delete, would simply remove their username from posts and comments but allow them to remain visible... and potentially also allowing throwaway posts and comments as well so users wouldn’t need alts to discuss senstitive topics they don’t want the general public or anyone that knows their username to associate with them. E.g. a closeted LGBTQ user wanting to discuss that aspect of their life with other LGBTQ users without friends/family/associates learning of their sexuality.
When the post is deleted, it's no longer shown in any listings, so there shouldn't generally be any new people coming into it that will wonder about what it said. It's mostly just allowing the existing discussions to continue and will probably almost entirely be people replying through their notifications.
Not really, although as @crius said I do wonder if there is a point to making the topic invisible if discussion is allowed to continue, which other users may be interested in reading.
My guess would be the title/self-text is removed in case inappropriate or accidentally revealed information (such as the personally identifiable kind) was including in them which is why they were deleted/removed in the first place so you wouldn’t want that still readable. Even without the title/self-text the conversations can potentially continue and contribute value though.
However, in the current state the topic title remains, so if something was accidentally revealed there deleting the topic would not necessarily remedy it. I think the best way to address that problem would be to allow editable topic titles (which, correct me if I'm wrong, is part of the long-term plan anyway).
I don't think we should give users the power to hard-delete a topic. I don't see a problem with allowing them to remove their username and initial text from the topic, but allowing them to completely remove its visibility (as deletion does now) could mean that other users are missing out on valuable discussion.
I think moderators should have the ability to hard-delete topics for especially egregious content and lock topics whose comment sections may have gotten out of hand. Otherwise, topics should hopefully be left alone and moderation takes care of things at a comment level.
Hmmm... yeah, just checked and that is true... that is probably a bug or something that was potentially overlooked unless @deimos has some reason to want to leave the deleted topic title up that I am not aware of. It could also be that, as you say, since title editing is in the cards it may not be so necessary to delete the topic title since the OP and trusted users can always just edit out inappropriate information if necessary.
However I do not really agree with thinking users should not be able to delete what they post. There is major privacy issues to consider with regards to restricting that, IMO. Even if a user deletes a topic, if someone in the comments identified them by username (e.g. referencing them as OP) then not allowing them to delete (and remove visibility of the post) would mean they were still publicly identifiable despite deleting it.
I do agree that other options should be made available though... and some of those have been discussed previously, like allowing users to “disassociate” themselves from their submissions and comments, removing their names but leaving the content intact for others to still find and interact in.
Fair point, however the current deletion system still doesn't prevent this. The comments are still persisted and visible to anyone with a link to the topic (so, potentially everyone). For total privacy, topics and their comments should not be visible at all (by link or otherwise) after user deletion. It would be a shame to lose a popular topic just because the OP wanted to delete it for whatever reason, but I suppose with privacy as an absolute priority it would have to be allowable.
True, but the odds of people stumbling upon it are much lower with allowing deletion to remove visibility from the group pages at least. However there could also be a solution to this potential privacy issue while leaving the deleted post location intact (so admins/mods can still view it):
When a user deletes their submission, also give an option to “scrub” the comments section clean of references to them (e.g. maybe replacing their username with just @DeletedOP instead). This system has abuse potential, especially for trolls trying to avoid being identified, but so long as a record is kept of the original username for admins (and maybe high trust users) to see, it might not be a huge problem.
Mhm, i suppose that it shouldn't disappear because there could be meaningful discussions worth being read in the comments?
It should be enough that author name and, eventually, text content are removed.
This tripped me up on a post I deleted but still got comments on. But I don't see it as an issue, just a learning.