Grant MVPs rights to move threads?

[curtvprice]

Have you considered giving MVPs rights to move threads to appropriate forums? I would think MVPs would have earned the trust of the community by their answers. (Want to get those unrelated threads gone that are polluting my beloved Workstation forum. :-)

[Dan_Patterson]

This issue has been raised before and will probably appear when Jim gets the mods idea settled out.

[jbarry]

We have a "moderator lite" role that we pushed off to a next phase so that we could get the voting and MVP program up. When the new role is there, we will invite a few of the really key and active MVPs (like the two of you for example) to have this role. The abilities will be a subset of the full moderator role (available only to some Esri staff), but will include actions on threads like: move, split, merge, stick/unstick, close/open, and mark as answered. It won't include things like delete or edit.

[Riverside]

We have a "moderator lite" role that we pushed off to a next phase so that we could get the voting and MVP program up. When the new role is there, we will invite a few of the really key and active MVPs (like the two of you for example) to have this role. The abilities will be a subset of the full moderator role (available only to some Esri staff), but will include actions on threads like: move, split, merge, stick/unstick, close/open, and mark as answered. It won't include things like delete or edit.

You mean you guys could theoretically edit our posts. I understand everything else, but edit seems like too much.

[Dan_Patterson]

Ted .... hold onto your shorts StackExchange is a number of sites where everyone can edit everything with the mods serving as the fly swatters. Kind of like Wikipedia for all flavors of GIS ... check out
http://gis.stackexchange.com/ if you already haven't

[jbarry]

You mean you guys could theoretically edit our posts. I understand everything else, but edit seems like too much.

Agreed. That's why editing and deleting of others' posts won't be allowed by these selected folks with the new upcoming "Moderator Lite" role. I did mention that below, by the way, just to be clear.

But if by "you guys" you mean that Esri staff who are Forum Moderators can edit others' posts, yes, technically we can. However, it's our general practice not edit others' posts unless it's an action of last resort. And then we need to mark it as such clearly what we did and why. This is a big "trust" issue with us. We need to support and maintain your expectation that your words will remain yours, even if they are critical of Esri and our products, so long as the conversation remains professional and respectful of others. We would not change your post without contacting you first, unless what you posted violates decency or our terms of use, which we believe are reasonable.

For example, I've been a Moderator on this forum from the beginning, and I don't recall ever editing someone's post. However, I've deleted plenty of them, but only for the reasons I mentioned above.

[Dan_Patterson]

Whereas http://gis.stackexchange.com/ allows anyone to edit a post for spelling, grammar etc and the mods approve the changes ... unlikely to happen on this forum since you would have to dedicated mods checking each link. I would like to see those that post and don't close either be given notification that they still have open threads (a nag-o-gram) or the mod-lites have the ability to close a thread as answered. Another difference between this forum and the other, is that there is no incentive to upvote a thread or mark as answered (unless I am missing something).

Summer will work out the kinks.

[Riverside]

Yes, Jim, "You Guys" as in Esri people. Your statement is quite clear for the lite role.

I have looked at Stack Exchange in the past, just did not realize it was that social. Social as in Socialism, but I suppose Open Source is socialism and in that regard, I am a socialist (Marxist geographer in fact), so I will have to think about it. Now as Dan has described, in that it is a similar behavior to Wikipedia, it does sound better, but does seem a bit much, so thank you Dan for giving me that link to think about, because I do like Stack Exchange. I wouldn't see why not for dedicated mods though. A lot of the users do spend a good amount of time on the forums, and these same people would be a great addition to the forums themselves.

I do agree that there is no incentive though, outside of good will, personally, I do upvote others, but do not wish others to upvote me or check anything I have answered, I do not require anything, but I do see others needing that incentive, for sure. Curtis mentioned badges awhile ago, perhaps people that check so many answers or upvote so many times can get a badge. Perhaps Esri can setup a badging system like 4Square so as to motivate those users. Different badges for different tasks.

[Dan_Patterson]

Perhaps Esri can setup a badging system like 4Square so as to motivate those users. Different badges for different tasks.

GIS.StackExchange already has a badge system, but it is a bit overkill. There are badges for everything (sometimes it reminds me of Boy Scouts). I wouldn't recommend the same here but the ability to edit posts ... not change their context, nor delete them ... could be a useful thing for the Mod-Lites (sounds like a brand of cigarettes ... Jim can figure out a better term), since grammatical/spelling issues could be addressed. Also moving threads to their correct forum would be beneficial.

[jbarry]

Whereas http://gis.stackexchange.com/ allows anyone to edit a post for spelling, grammar etc and the mods approve the changes ... unlikely to happen on this forum since you would have to dedicated mods checking each link. I would like to see those that post and don't close either be given notification that they still have open threads (a nag-o-gram) or the mod-lites have the ability to close a thread as answered. Another difference between this forum and the other, is that there is no incentive to upvote a thread or mark as answered (unless I am missing something).

Summer will work out the kinks.

I agree with you Dan. I've seen that myself on Stack and it's a neat feature. I think that's a bit further than we want to scale to at the moment. Having the Mod-Lite be able to edit posts is something we may consider in the future. At the moment we see more potential downside than upside, but I hope most of you have seen that we try to keep our minds open to new ideas.

As for the features available to the Mod-Lite role, I listed them below, and yes, marking as answered and closing threads are two that are being included. To me, the mark as answered is a huge one, because left to their own devices (and no reminders like you mentioned) the OP marking them is still happening far too infrequently.

[jbarry]

Perhaps Esri can setup a badging system like 4Square so as to motivate those users. Different badges for different tasks.

GIS.StackExchange already has a badge system, but it is a bit overkill. There are badges for everything (sometimes it reminds me of Boy Scouts). I wouldn't recommend the same here but the ability to edit posts ... not change their context, nor delete them ... could be a useful thing for the Mod-Lites (sounds like a brand of cigarettes ... Jim can figure out a better term), since grammatical/spelling issues could be addressed. Also moving threads to their correct forum would be beneficial.

Perhaps "staff moderators" and "community moderators".

>>the ability to edit posts ... not change their context, nor delete them ... could be a useful thing

Definitely something to consider. On the one hand, it's easier for us to decide to allow editing or disallow editing. That's mechanical. What you described is something more subjective. Certainly more difficult to implement well. There's a huge gray space there created by the judgement call of the moderator doing the editing and the author being edited whether or not whether or not both would consider those edits to be helpful or at least benign. Personally, if I was someone outside Esri I'm not sure I'd like the idea of someone else other than Esri with the ability to edit my post, or post in general. I'm not even sure I'd like it if that person *was* Esri. And that's even if someone's going to go in there and do something like correct my spelling (like say, adding extraneous "u"'s). ;-) My input here is that I believe people should be free to express themselves and their their own words stand for themselves. If folks are professional, use common courtesy, are trying to help, or asking for help, it's all good. I'd be a bit more discouraged to post if I thought that someone would take it upon themselves to change anything I said, how I said it, how I spelled it, etc.

[jbarry]

Yes, Jim, "You Guys" as in Esri people. Your statement is quite clear for the lite role.

I have looked at Stack Exchange in the past, just did not realize it was that social. Social as in Socialism, but I suppose Open Source is socialism and in that regard, I am a socialist (Marxist geographer in fact), so I will have to think about it. Now as Dan has described, in that it is a similar behavior to Wikipedia, it does sound better, but does seem a bit much, so thank you Dan for giving me that link to think about, because I do like Stack Exchange. I wouldn't see why not for dedicated mods though. A lot of the users do spend a good amount of time on the forums, and these same people would be a great addition to the forums themselves.

I do agree that there is no incentive though, outside of good will, personally, I do upvote others, but do not wish others to upvote me or check anything I have answered, I do not require anything, but I do see others needing that incentive, for sure. Curtis mentioned badges awhile ago, perhaps people that check so many answers or upvote so many times can get a badge. Perhaps Esri can setup a badging system like 4Square so as to motivate those users. Different badges for different tasks.

To me the badging on stack is way overboard for what we're doing here. But I'll admit we should probably consider finding a way to incentivize and reward those who do voting. It would need to be a way that discourages "gaming" the system, and spending a few minutes a day voting up a few dozen things just to collect points. Probably something more like stack that requires your activity to be at a certain level (shows commitment) before being able to vote; limit users to only so many votes per day, etc. Our initial design was looking to be more inclusive than that, but I do see the benefit of it.

[Riverside]

Personally, if I was someone outside Esri I'm not sure I'd like the idea of someone else other than Esri with the ability to edit my post, or post in general. I'm not even sure I'd like it if that person *was* Esri. My input here is that I believe people should be free to express themselves and their their own words stand for themselves. If folks are professional, use common courtesy, are trying to help, or asking for help, it's all good. I'd be a bit more discouraged to post if I thought that someone would take it upon themselves to change anything I said, how I said it, how I spelled it, etc.

This is how I feel. It kinda changes the game thinking others may correct what you say. I understand if there is a post that is an offensive post, and it needs to be deleted, but for posts it all will come down to perception. Editing seems like a bit over the top, even for Esri. Deleting, fine. Editing is like you are changing my message, my voice. Its kinda like a control mechanism, something governments are doing all over the world where they are controlling people rights. Its a freedom, a freedom of speech that is being infringed upon globally, currently. Now if I say, oops, Jim can you delete that last line, I accidentally mentioned something that was covered as part of my NDA, then perhaps it makes sense to edit, where I give explicit acceptance (Explicit is better than implicit (Zen of Py - TP)), but this seems a bit overkill for Esri to have to do. You would need a censorship team that every day they get to review what people are "saying" on the forums. Esri personnel are already doing multiple jobs, I would just delete the post, and say, Ted sorry, you need to retype the post to help educate me that stuff that is mentioned at Esri may not be published on the forums.

Probably something more like stack that requires your activity to be at a certain level (shows commitment) before being able to vote; limit users to only so many votes per day, etc. Our initial design was looking to be more inclusive than that, but I do see the benefit of it.

Yes, this sounds about right.

[jbarry]

Editing is like you are changing my message, my voice.

I'm pretty sure we're saying the same thing. That said, the ability for a moderator to edit a post is something we don't want to shut off, even if at the same time I'm saying that it would have to be a rare extreme stretch for me to concur with someone at Esri doing so.

So... if you notice that a moderator here at Esri edited your post and you don't believe it was warranted, feel free to reply or message them asking why, or report it through the "Contact Us" link below. (Or even contact me directly, up to you.)

[Carolie04]

This issue has been raised before and will probably appear when Jim gets the mods idea settled out.

[Lady_Jane]

How about when you visit an unanswered thread that you created you get a pop-up that asks you if the question has been answered yet before you are allowed to navigate away from the page?

[withershin]

How about when you visit an unanswered thread that you created you get a pop-up that asks you if the question has been answered yet before you are allowed to navigate away from the page?

What about letting MVPs mark a thread as answered? I'm sure everyone has multiple answered threads that will never see a check

[Lady_Jane]

What about letting MVPs mark a thread as answered? I'm sure everyone has multiple answered threads that will never see a check

MVPs may not necessarily know whether the answer provided worked or not in the given situation. But in cases where the original poster replies "thanks so-and-so, that worked great!" and doesn't mark the thread as answered it would be good.

[curtvprice]

MVPs may not necessarily know whether the answer provided worked or not in the given situation. But in cases where the original poster replies "thanks so-and-so, that worked great!" and doesn't mark the thread as answered it would be good.

I think we can trust MVPs to use this feature responsibly. If so, other MVPs can undo it in cases of controversy, right?

[jbarry]

I think we can trust MVPs to use this feature responsibly. If so, other MVPs can undo it in cases of controversy, right?

I agree with Curtis on both counts.

The threads where the OP said thanks without green-checking it, sure. But a much larger set of threads where MVPs will be useful are those where a great answer(s) has been given and the OP never comes back. Not only so that the person who replied gets their points, but also so that the best content is identified for anyone who finds the thread in the future.

[curtvprice]

[if we ] give the power users on here the power to give points to themselves when it would be their opinion especially if its from their answers.

I'm innocent, Ted! I did not check my own answer, and if I had the power would not do it that lightly. (Note, I don't even see the check icon.)

I agree if this power is given to MVPs we should get some guidance. One would be not to check your own answer unless the user has responded that it solved their problem.

I'm assuming other MVPs could uncheck if they deem the check unworthy. I'm assuming MVPs would use these superpowers carefully to protect their reputations (and MVP status).

[tereshenkov]

Hi,

Good stuff. I'd go for everything mentioned earlier:

1) To be able to move threads to appropriate forums is nice. I see often folks posting a question in a wrong forum just because they are unsure if that forums is the one they are supposed to get a question asked. So it would be good to move those posts when applicable.

2) To be able to mark a post as answered is also very neat. Sometimes, it appears to be obviously the answer that worked for the person ("thanks, that worked great"). Other times, when there is no feedback available - MVPs could actually test/check quickly if this solution works (or appears to be viable). Perhaps introducing a "best answer so far" category for such posts is something we could discuss.
Naturally, MVPs are supposed to keep the play fair and do not mark own posts as answers unless applicable (or just have this option disabled).

3) Being a fairly *young* MVP, I definitely wouldn't mind getting some guidance on managing threads or other possible operations implemented as Curtis suggested.

Feel free to get in touch with me if I could do something for the community

Cheers,
Alex

[Riverside]

Thinking in the case of Spam, perhaps allow the mods to move spam to a folder for deletion by Esri, where only Esri and Mods can see the Spam folder, and only during the move operation.

[jbarry]

Thinking in the case of Spam, perhaps allow the mods to move spam to a folder for deletion by Esri, where only Esri and Mods can see the Spam folder, and only during the move operation.

I think that's a good idea. Meaning, I don't think we want to give MVPs a tool to delete posts/threads. But we can create a new forum called Spam or Trash (maybe even make this forum hidden) into which an MVP can "Move" a thread. We here at Esri can go thru that periodically (or subscribe to it), and take a look before deleting it permanently.

[Riverside]

Yes, exactly. Hidden would be best, since you don't want to expose the trash (Spam) to everyone.