Warning for back seat moderation

BrianBoru00

Hi,
I have received a quite frankly ridiculous warning in the After hours thread on the Belfast court case.

Warned for "Sock puppeting" which is a bit of a stretch given it was a single post - not consistent as per charter.
I have contacted the moderator and I am unhappy with their response.

I have already tried to create a thread here and am not sure if it got deleted or otherwise but I believe this caution is not warranted - Its not against Boards rules or against the Charter.

Specifically its post #5028.

Can you please look into this

Thank you

Beasty

Apologies for jumping in but I need to explain some action I have just taken in connection with your post

Speculating over re-regs/prior ID's is not permitted on this site, and I could not leave your claim in public view. I have therefore deleted the post

Do you wish to pursue your appeal? If so I will ask a CMod to have a look

BrianBoru00

Yes I'd like to pursue the appeal

I've read the Boards FAQ and I've read the After Hours charter and I cannot locate anything regarding speculating on multiple accounts.

Its a stretch to claim its back seat moderating. The poster(s) in question had the same MO where they made points without backing them up . . .

It was a single post, not persistent suggestion and its a fairly drastic step to delete a comment which as I said has not breached any rules or guidelines I can find

Beasty

OK, I will alert the CMods

LEIN

Hi BrianBoru00,

I will look into this.

Please share the PM conversation where you tried to resolve this issue with the Mod.

Many thanks,

L

LEIN

BrianBoru00 wrote:

Buford T. Justice V wrote:

BrianBoru00 wrote:

Buford T. Justice V wrote:

Dear BrianBoru00,

You have been warned for posting Backseat Moderation.

Boards.ie has a team of volunteers who look after our forums and they are the ones who will give instruction or take action on a thread should it be deemed necessary.

If you see a problem with a post, report it and a mod will investigate.

Please see the Boards.ie FAQ for more details.



Buford T. Justice V

Moderator Note

If you suspect a poster of having multiple accounts, report the poster and let the mods deal with the issue. No sockpuppetry in this case so please confine commentry to the topic on hand.

Your post:

BrianBoru00 wrote: »

<snip> = <snip>=<snip> ????
<snip> joins Feb 18 and has significant majority of their posts about the rape case only.
<snip> joins March 18 and ALL posts are about the triak
<snip> joins March and all bar 3 of their posts are about this trial..


so are they
a) One and the same person who has created two aliases to try and "back themselves up"
b) three buddies texting each other to thank each others posts and try and establish a united front?

Was sort of giving the benefit of the doubt to <snip> until that ****e about being a legal translator despite the fact that she has a fundamentally flawed concept of the law and quoted US law about drunkenness as opposed to Irish or UK law.

Eh I posted a query suggesting that their either the same person or three buddies posting in communication with each other.

Its a bit of a stretch to suggest it was backseat moderating - It was a single post not a constant stream as per the rules you've directed me to -
"Sitting back as a user and consistently directing the moderator "

Again I made ONE post posing a question as to if that poster is one person or three friends - the later of which is not against the "rules" of boards.

I think its an unfair "caution"

As stated in option A of your infracted post, you queried if the poster was indulging in sockpuppetry. If you suspect sockpuppetry, report your suspicions and the mods will deal with the issue. And no, the part stating that they may be 3 friends in collusing isn't breaching Boards rules.

Querying the behaviour of other posters just takes the discussion off topic and is best dealt with by mods who can investigate any suspicions that posters may have and deal with the issue appropriately. I don't think the caution is unfair for the above reasons.

For review.

LEIN

Can I ask why you called a poster out on thread in the style that you did and not use the function?

What was your aim here?

BrianBoru00

Those three posters had continued to argue without backing it up with valid sources. Why would I report them? I didn't know if they were/are the same person or three friends or three genuine posters. Either they engaged with my post or didn't I would suspect strongly that they are the one person.

But as per charter/guidelines the report function is not there to be used every time any sort of suspicion arises.
As it happens I did suspect as a result of their non engagement that they were either the same person or three friends so limited my replies to them.

LEIN

Okay, other posts aside, you received a warning for 'Backseat moderation' for calling out a poster on thread for believing that they have more than one account(s).

BrianBoru00 wrote: »

But as per charter/guidelines the report function is not there to be used every time any sort of suspicion arises.
As it happens I did suspect as a result of their non engagement that they were either the same person or three friends so limited my replies to them.

The guidelines and charter say the exact opposite of what you have taken from it above.
If you are suspicious of anything, the report function should be used in all cases.

Regardless of guidelines and forum charters, it is the Mods job to deal with re-reg or multiple accounts where suspected and they will deal with that off thread with the admins. A poster calling this out on threat is seen as 'Backseat moderation'.

I would also suggest that you pay particular attention to the 'Discretion of the Moderator' clause in the guidelines also.

Do you still feel that you took the appropriate action on thread?

BrianBoru00

1. At the time of posting I didn't firmly believe that the other poster was multiple people.

2.

Don't back seat moderate
Imagine a game of soccer where one player kept running up to the ref and saying "you should have warned that guy" "that was offside" "time is up on this game". Annoying, yes? Sitting back as a user and consistently directing the moderator like a minion is going to get you kicked off the pitch. The correct way to bring something to our attention is to report the post.

But do not abuse this feature. Report posts which clearly break the rules not just posts you don’t agree with or from people you don’t like. That’s just being a dick.

That directly contradicts your claim

If you are suspicious of anything, the report function should be used in all cases.

Discretion of the moderator is basically a catch all and I understand the need for such a clause but again I believe I did not break the rules or come close to it - theres nothing about suspecting a user of multiple accounts and that's what it was - a suspicion.

I didn't take any "action" I merely continued the conversation so yes I don't believe I broke the rules or indeed the spirit of the thread

LEIN

Thanks Brian.

To put this to bed, you speculated and accused another poster of having more than one account.
They are two very clear-cut violations as per the boards.ie 'Terms of Use'

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To that end, I will be upholding the yellow card that you received for 'Backseat Moderation'.

I might have been a little more sympathetic to you if it was not for your very obvious attempt to find a loophole to get out of your warning.

You have two options here:

1) Accept and move on, being a little more cautious in pointing one's finger at other posters.

2) Request an Admin to review.

Please let me know.

BrianBoru00

In relation to the bolded comments

1. I have not created multiple accounts
2. I have not speculated as to the identity of the other posters.

I take issue with your claim that it was a

very obvious attempt to find a loophole to

.

I did actually read the terms and conditions and posted in the knowledge of those.

So I would like to request an administrator to review and I d also like an explanation as to how this is an obvious attempt to find a loophole

LEIN

May I request an Admin review please.

Thanks.

BrianBoru00

Is this just being ignored now?

Beasty

It's not being ignored, but some of us have other things keeping us busy

You decided someone was posting under different accounts (or "sockpuppeting"). Sockpuppeting is against site rules - you are allowed one account.

You chose to try and "out" the poster - in fact I have no doubt there were 3 different posters you were accusing of sockpuppeting

It is a mod's job to intervene in these circumstances, and not for a regular user to do so. You were trying to do the mod's job for them. That's backseat modding which is against site as well as forum rules

Card upheld

BrianBoru00

well that's pretty pathetic and immature response.

I didn't try and "out" a poster.
I didn't decide anything - i merely queried why three posters joined at relatively similar times and took an a la carte approach to discussion - it was a single post

I wasn't intervening and doing a moderators job - if you had bothered to look at the discussion and context of discussion you'd have seen that.

I note you and LEIN have not clarified how I have been deliberately attempting to find a loop hole either

If you have other things keeping you busy then why are you "moderating" . It took you less that 15 minutes to "investigate" and then a snarky response. Grow up

Beasty

You were throwing allegations about over other users. How would you like it if others started doing the same with you? Indeed you will note I had to remove the details of the posters you were throwing allegations at from the PM exchange you posted in this thread

You are here to discuss underlying topics. The mods are there to deal with problems. All you need to do is report any suspicions and leave the mods to do their job, not do their job for them

It is a basic rule of this site that you broke. The mod thought so, the CMod agreed, and I am also agreeing.

BrianBoru00

You were throwing allegations about over other users. How would you like it if others started doing the same with you? Indeed you will note I had to remove the details of the posters you were throwing allegations at from the PM exchange you posted in this thread

You're playing fast and lose with language there - I read the "rules" when I signed up to boards. So if someone throws any "allegation" about me -it would very much depend on what the allegation was. But if it was for flouting one of the rules I would have an issue as I don't flout them.

I was not 'throwing' allegations about. I was not back seat moderating. The post was in the midst of a conversation where three individual users failed either by design or otherwise to back up post and ignored conveniently when their points were refuted.

The poster(s) in question could have chosen to address criticism or ignore it in which case it would have appeared more likely they were "sockpuppeting". And If that was the case I could choose to ignore them from then on OR report it. It wasn't an ongoing "allegation", it was a single post of perhaps 10 or more I made in that thread.

If contributors were to report every time they had a suspicion someone was breaking the rules then hundreds of threads would end up being locked or the suspicions would be ignored and I took on board the boards rules as I've already outlined in post #10 above.

Beasty

I'm not playing fast and loose at all

Card upheld

Thread closed