What if we could "vouch" for users?
I know the trust system is far off. However, I think a really interesting point to include could be the ability to "vouch" for a user via a profile button. Generally, this should be if you know them off-site or you recognize them as a great contributor here.
There shouldn't be any indication to the user that someone has vouched for them-- that makes it easy to manipulate, allowing for more of a tit-for-tat with randos.
There should also be a number of factors involving the invite tree here (user 1 is the person whose profile button was clicked; user 2 is the clicker vouching for the other person here)--
- Did user 2 invite user 1? If so, it's worth a little
- Did user 1 invite user 2? If so, it's not worth much
- Are users 1 and 2 completely unrelated in the tree? That's worth the most.
- Older accounts provide more trust when vouching.
This way, it's harder to manipulate, too.
What do you guys think about this? Obviously it'll be a lower priority than the primary trust system, and will take a while to get the mechanics sorted, but I think it will be a worthwhile addition in the future
e: meant to add that trust given should be directly correlated to the trust of the person vouching; new users shouldn't even have an option to vouch, at least until their trust is x or they've been around for a few weeks.
No matter how you try to make this hard to manipulate, someone can always hack a couple accounts or just spam new accounts even if they're not worth much. I don't think it's worth the risk.
I actually meant to include this in the post, it's edited in now--
Trust given when vouching for a user should be directly related to the trust of the voucher. If the user is new, the option shouldn't even exist. That way, if someone's account is hacked, they'll either notice immediately, being a high trust user, or be a user where the trust given is almost negligible. At the point where the trust change would matter, a pattern would quickly emerge in the logs.
True, and for the time being Tildes is a small site so there isn't much desire to mess with it. However, it's going public(ish) soon and will probably keep growing, and public moderation is a fickle system I don't want to mess with. However, it's a catch 22 because while we're small @Deimos can easily just hand out mod privileges to who he trusts, but when this site gets bigger that won't exactly be so simple.
Yeah, I actually thought of this since obviously we want people the community or Deimos explicitly trusts.
Generally, there are two types of trust: explicit and implicit. Explicit is earned by Deimos explicitly giving you granular mod perms or by getting vouched for. You could also earn explicit by making constructive reports (malice tags, dms to deimos) Implicit is earned by being active on the site and earning votes/exemplary tags.
Both are extremely important to the workings of the site, but being able to generate discussion is one thing, but if you produce a few polarizing opinions, you can easily get a lot of votes. Having a way to take the explicit burden off of Deimos will be important to the growth of this site, especially if it grows at a large (albeit manageable in general) manner. Implicit trust would definitely decay at a greater rate than explicit trust.
I'd argue that to be granted trust powers, you need both types of trust.
That's true. Right now the system very much works, as Deimos can pretty much just vouch for whoever. That won't work forever though as the community grows and we start to lose track of who's who. As to your original point, I don't know if just votes are enough, but I have faith in Deimos to work something out, though as far as I know Deimos hasn't taken any concrete steps to an automated/community driven trust system.
What I have been thinking is do we need some kind of mod privileges leader board? Some way to see who has been given mod perms and on what level? I'm pretty sure some mild mod perms have been given out. I seem to remember a thread about it, and I think I applied, but nothing ever came of it (granted I do remember being a new user at the time).
That being said, I don't know if I can take on moderating as a full time hobby but I do want to help this community and see it as its best self. I suppose the system may balance itself out over time and may not even be entirely necessary just yet as Deimos seems to be handling things (although it may be beyond Deimos to manage every little thing, like topic tags and such).
I think some sort of mod list would be a good direction for the site-- but I'd avoid it being called a leaderboard at all costs. Especially considering there is one for reddit mods and that just led to "collectors."
Yes, some people do have mod powers--I, for example, can retag anyone's post. I believe some people can edit titles, too. Deimos holds the rest of the powers.
Yeah, anytime there are numbers and rankings for people to see, it becomes a game to boost them. I know I'm definitely vulnerable to that sort of thing. Not so much for like karma on Reddit, but I can get competitive for Stack Overflow rep.
Okay, fair enough. Leader board was just the first word that came to mind. Mod list or something, then.
This is what you're looking for: "Users can now be (manually) granted permissions to re-tag topics, move them between groups, and edit titles"
Deimos has explicitly said he doesn't want to do this.
Mmm, it makes sense and he has a good point, but on the other hand, I think I want to know who I'm interacting with and the authority one has in a matter.
All actions taken on a topic are logged with the name of the acting user in the topic log at the top right.
I think @thisonemakesyouthink wants to know what mod powers you have before you do stuff to their post.
Well yeah, but I'm thinking like what if two mods disagree on something right. Naturally, it makes sense to side with who has more trust? But we don't really have a way of knowing. I don't know, I was never good at this stuff.
Okay: I can edit titles, change tags, and move posts. Does that change anything about our interaction here? Are you going to respond differently to me because I have these abilities?
Being able to do those things doesn't give me any so-called "authority". They're just some janitorial tasks I get to do, to help out.
Yeah okay, fair enough. But I'm thinking like what if two mods disagree? Naturally it would make sense to side with who has more trust correct? But there's no real way of knowing.
They could get a third "mod"-type to make the decision. They could take it to the full team of people with mod-type abilities for that group - because there won't be just two people with janitorial abilities in a group. They could start a discussion here in ~tildes (or a future ~tildes.moderation).
Fuck no! Having more experience or higher responsibilities does not automatically make someone infallible (as I'm reminded frequently in a subreddit where I'm a founding mod). Moderating should never be a matter of "my badge is bigger than your badge".
Okay, absolutely fair enough. But remember that the moderation system is a trust system. That person is more trusted so it's a little different than just whoever happened to apply and lie on the form. But that moderation topic idea is smart, yeah probably better than my notion now that I think about it.
My big question is "Why?" Why do we need a system where one user vouches for another? What's the benefit in me vouching for you, or you vouching for me?
Huh?