suggestions on forum moderation

As I have been on this forum for a while, and throughout the past year and a half that I have been here, there has been quite a lot of chat about moderation of this forum.

I have been thinking that maybe a thread about this topic, to summarise the issues raised, and to provide suggestions to NAS on forum moderation might be beneficial to both NAS as well as the user community. To other users, please feel free to add any other issues that I might have missed. And to , I hope you could spare the time to read through what the majority of the users think from their comments and try to improve the community through their feedback. I think we all share the same goal when talking about this - to make the NAS forum better.

Issues regarding spam, copybots, and inappropriate usage

I think the issue has been raised very well here in this thread: https://community.autism.org.uk/f/miscellaneous-and-chat/12621/copybot-and-forum-security, and also https://community.autism.org.uk/f/miscellaneous-and-chat/12849/copybots-offlines-etc, and https://community.autism.org.uk/f/miscellaneous-and-chat/15779/near-troll-posts/114655#114655 , and https://community.autism.org.uk/f/miscellaneous-and-chat/14345/near-troll-posts 

While it is difficult to stop spam completely, but for copybots, couldn't a similarity matching code be employed before a new post is made to prevent this? I have written similarity comparison codes in Matlab, so I think there should be some equivalent for browser languages. 

I don't have too much to add about spam and copybots, as my degree isn't in computer science, I don't have a lot of ideas on how to solve this problem. 

It would be great if others have suggestions about how to deal with spam and copybots to add to this. 

So now I'll focus more on the moderation issue, as it was what prompted me to start this thread.

Moderation on this forum

In this thread: https://community.autism.org.uk/f/health-and-wellbeing/15792/fake-likebots-as-well-as-copybots-now-upon-this-nas-forum 

NAS Moderator said:

You also mentioned that we do not respond frequently on the site. We used to moderate more actively a couple of years ago but we received feedback from users who mentioned that the moderators were too active in responding to posts. Therefore, we now only intervene if no one from the community had responded to a post . This decision was taken with the aim of keeping power and ownership with the community members, within the forum.

This is actually the main comment that prompted me to start this thread.

I do realise what  said about them is true, that they were more active in moderating and replying several years ago, but then they somehow became less involved. I sometimes use the search function to search for answers to some of the questions I have, or when I'm trying to find information to reply to someone else's question, to see if similar issues have been raised before. And when I look at some threads that are at least a few years old, moderators seem much more active. 

Back in the past...

For example (over 5 years ago), in https://community.autism.org.uk/f/adults-on-the-autistic-spectrum/3640/coping-methods---nappies/106252#106252 the first person who responded seemed to be not very understanding, but the moderator replied:

Anil A - Mod said:

I'd suggest holding off on any assumptions or associations just yet. 

Welcome to the community Bear123, I hope you find it helpful. 

which I think was very good, as the moderator's reply promoted more acceptance on this forum, welcomed the newcomer, and facilitated more people later on to be involved in the discussion.

Another example (over 6 years ago) is https://community.autism.org.uk/f/adults-on-the-autistic-spectrum/3393/disability-confident/19808#19808
Where someone asked a question on the forum

Longman said:

Could we have more information from NAS about David Cameron's Disability Confident initiative launched in July, and how NAS is getting involved?

And the moderator replied that he has passed on the original comment to their policy team who've responded, and then he posted the policy teams reply. It's a very long reply, so I won't paste the whole thing. But in the past, moderators were responsive to questions.

And, a third example (post over 6 years ago), https://community.autism.org.uk/f/adults-on-the-autistic-spectrum/3481/support-for-friends/20270#20270, -  this post had surprise surprise! TWO moderators actively involved in the discussion. It was just some minor confusion about what NT meant, but the moderators joined the chat, which seemed really good, and it facilitated the discussion a lot. The way they interacted, it seemed like they were very friendly with people on the forum. And it's nice to have moderators join in and discuss something as simple as what NT is.

Alex R - mod said:

I think Anil probably meant that NT is used to refer to people not on the spectrum (and not having other neurological differences).

Alex R - mod

 


Call for more active moderation...


I really liked the way that in the past the moderators seemed more active, and were very much like one of us, seemingly enjoying the forum and being part of the community. I liked how they facilitated the conversations, clarified things, and provided information. I kind of always assumed that the disappearance of moderation was mainly due to new moderators being more lazy, or because there were fewer moderators than before, or maybe NAS started to care less about this forum than it did when it first started. I'm quite surprised that NAS moderator said it was because they "received feedback from users who mentioned that the moderators were too active in responding to posts". I suppose it's possible that different people have different feelings about moderation, and some people might prefer a more self-sustained community, or an autistic-led community (I guess since many moderators are NT), but myself, and many others would like more moderator involvement than there is now, or at least reply to posts that we think need urgent attention to. 

The feedback of wanting more moderation have appeared multiple times in these recent posts:
https://community.autism.org.uk/f/health-and-wellbeing/15653/2nd-call-for-a-moderator-button/113138#113138 
https://community.autism.org.uk/f/miscellaneous-and-chat/15328/could-we-have-a-moderator-alert/109173#109173 
https://community.autism.org.uk/f/health-and-wellbeing/15792/fake-likebots-as-well-as-copybots-now-upon-this-nas-forum
https://community.autism.org.uk/f/adults-on-the-autistic-spectrum/15812/has-the-nas-directly-helped-any-independent-adults-who-post-on-this-forum
https://community.autism.org.uk/f/adults-on-the-autistic-spectrum/15479/forum-contents-non-techy---if-we-could-design-it-ourselves-what-would-it-look-like/111697#111697
https://community.autism.org.uk/f/miscellaneous-and-chat/12252/moderators/70108#70108


(btw, I would suggest that NAS take a look at https://community.autism.org.uk/f/adults-on-the-autistic-spectrum/15479/forum-contents-non-techy---if-we-could-design-it-ourselves-what-would-it-look-like/111697#111697 as it's a thread about what people think is an ideal autism forum)

Suggestions...
I think the suggestions given in https://community.autism.org.uk/f/health-and-wellbeing/15653/2nd-call-for-a-moderator-button/113138#113138 are good. Since  raised the issue of some people not wanting the moderators to be too active in replying... and then there are many of us who do, then can we have a choice? The three suggestions were: 1. @mods alert to all mods, 2. visible list of active mods, and 3. a suicide risk button. Suggestion 1 would help mark spam and abusive threads. Suggestion 2 would give people the option to say that they want moderators to join in on the conversation and want a reply. Suggestion 3 would alert moderators of people who need immediate help. 

Fairness: I think this is something I'm a bit annoyed about with the Mods. They mostly only reply to parents asking questions about their children. But they hardly respond to adults asking similar questions... why the different treatment? Could the moderators be more fair, and apply the same rules to everybody? 

It seems ironic that moderators login and reply to parents asking questions (often google-able questions, like where can I find a diagnosis clinic nearby), but ignore posts about moderation concerns, spam/abuse/bullying on the forum, or posts with suicidal concerns. 

 did mention that they do respond, but in private email as it is a personal thing:

NAS Moderator said:

When we are alerted to a post that references to a user feeling suicidal, we would contact the user directly via email to raise our concerns in regards to what they have posted on the forum, and offer them information and advise. If we believe that a user is at immediate risk, we would then go ahead and make a referral to their local authority. As an organisation, we do have a duty of care, and please be assured that we to act appropriately when we are alerted to anyone feeling suicidal. Due to the sensitive nature, we prefer to contact users directly, which means that it is not visible on the community of what we have done.

I do agree that suicide is a very sensitive subject and it's best to deal with it in a professional manner. It makes sense to email the person directly about advice and alert their local authority than discussing personal issues here. But could the moderators give some hint that it has been dealt with? As lots of people are caring and are worried when it appears nothing is done. And also, more importantly, get help to the person faster when more avenues of reply are available (e.g., if the person feeling suicidal is online on the forum but didn't have his email open at the time...)

For example, could the moderators post a response to posts that mentions suicide, like the ones here?
community.autism.org.uk/.../108720
community.autism.org.uk/.../56725
They have provided comments like,

Kerri-Mod said:

I’m sorry you are going through such a tough time, it’s good that you’ve let us know what’s happening/how you feel. Many people have similar thoughts when coping with so much and we hope you’re okay.

 
and information like

The NHS 111 service:  http://www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/AboutNHSservices/Emergencyandurgentcareservices/Pages/NHS-111.aspx
The Samaritans also provide confidential non-judgemental emotional support, 24 hours a day on 116 123, or by email on jo@samaritans.org.

MIND have information pages on coping with self-harm and suicidal feelings based on the experiences of people who’ve been through it that you may find helpful.
If you are very close to doing something to hurt yourself - call 999 or go to your nearest A&E department. There should be someone there to support you and make sure you get ongoing support.


and then contact the user about more personal issues in private email?

I'm not an expert on suicide, so I'm not sure what the best way to respond is. But I am very confused by why the moderators seem a bit inconsistent when replying? They sometimes to comment and provide advice directly on the forum, but other times, it seems by email only? Why not do both? If it's too personal, a general advice comment first on the forum, then email would be acceptable, I think. It would be more consistent, with some other posts where moderators have replied, and it will possibly get the information to the user faster.


Concluding remarks
This is probably the longest post on there I have made so far. And I think a lot of the issues have been mentioned by previous users as well. Since I observed quite a few "call for moderators" posts and posts about spam/copybots recently, I decided to make one as well. This one gathers information from various posts, and how things were dealt with in those posts, compared to the ones that people have raised concerns/complaints about. I'm not trying to target or attack the  (and the issues I have raised is about NAS forum moderators in general and not just one moderator), and I know a lot of you are volunteers (so I'm grateful that you are trying to help the autistic community), but I'm hoping that by expressing our feedback, and attempting to summarise the feedback (call for more moderation), we can improve the forum together. 

  • Hi Kerri-Mod, 

    Thank you very much for your quick reply. I am happy to hear that you think some of the points I have raised are interesting! I really appreciate your comment and that you have forwarded all our feedbacks to the lead moderator. 

    Best wishes,
    qwerty

  • Firstly, I would like to say thank you for reading my post!

    It's hard for me to comment on what happened on the Bipolar forum as I haven't seen your replies or what the moderators said to you. It is possible that the moderator on the Bipolar forum didn't handle the situation very well.

    I'm not sure if you've read the linked thread, but I think in that example, if the moderator didn't comment about holding off assumptions, it might have made the original poster feel "isolated, rejected and like a failure". 

    In my personal opinion, if I accidentally said something that made another person feel "isolated, rejected and like a failure" (even though I was "trying my best to communicate effectively"), I think it would be helpful if the moderators could intervene and make the person who I replied to feel less hurt. But I guess the key would be to do it in such a way that neither side feels bad about it. Not sure what you think about this: intervening but in a way no one feels bad??

    Perhaps this is not the best example, but previously (several weeks ago) there had been some big "fights" on this forum, where people were insulting and bullying each other, and people were very upset that the moderators didn't intervene. Many "call for moderator" posts became quite prevalent after the "fight". Many people left the forum because either they were hurt by other people's comments, or just generally of how the forum became. This is quite different from the moderators being too involved in communication issues, as it was quite clear during he fight that some people were "actively intending" to hurt others. Perhaps the moderators can hold back in being involved if the comments are more ambiguous, but I think lots of people would like the moderators to intervene when it is clear insults or when arguments become too intense (violating community rule 4). 

  • Yes, I noticed that as well! So weird that there are 0 views but multiple replies. I also hope the forum isn't becoming unstable again!

  • Hi Lonewarrior, thank you so much for your encouraging reply! 

    After seeing so many previous posts and threads on issues about this forum, I hope putting them all together will help make moderators aware of them, and hopefully we can improve the forum together Slight smile

  • Thanks for your reply Eccentric1! I think you have raised some very good points. 

    Yes, I agree moderating is a hard task and requires voluntary time. Your suggestion of regional focal points seems like a good idea, as some posts may not require that heavy moderation (e.g., like clarifying a terminology, or directing people to one of NAS's pages, etc).

    I also feel quite strongly about the adult vs children thing. Like you said, those who were born before before neurodiversity hit schools or those who were overlooked suffered much more than the children nowadays who are diagnosed early. I'm sure many of us adults here would have been diagnosed as children if only we were born xxx years later or had parents/teachers that were more supportive. Having the forum focused on children just makes the discrepancy between the available support to adults and children even larger. 

    I also like you suggestion of having keywords tagged for newbies on the forum! When I first discovered that I might have ASD, I did take some time to be familiar with all the new vocabulary, like stimming, NT, NVLD, etc. It seems like a very useful feature, if one can hover their mouse over the word and get a definition of it. 

  • Screen capture

  • Just a little thing but not unlike many other issues with the stability of this site. Right now there seems to be no “views” on the last five posts today.

    albeit this thread alone has had 5 replies so should have at least that many views as a minimum.

    this happened before and lots of other things started happening at the same time, for instance suddenly I am not receiving any notifications for posts I requested them from. This being one of them.

    I do hope we are not about to experience total instability as we did before!

    maybe spam or bots have started to do thier thing?

    i wouldn’t know,

    just hope it doesn’t start becoming unstable all over again.

  • Hi qwerty,

    Thank you for your useful feedback - you have raised some interesting points.  The moderators will make sure that your feedback, and any further feedback posted, is forwarded to our lead moderator.

    Regards,

    Kerri-Mod

  • In regards to the point below, I'm really glad there isn't this level of moderation before. I was misdiagnosed with BP originally and was often pulled up on the Bipolar UK forum by moderators for posts I'd made when I was trying my best to communicate effectively. This made me feel isolated, rejected and like a failure. It was an awful thing to experience.

    I really like the fact that were left to discuss any communication issues amongst ourselves and is one of the things that makes me stick around.

    Back in the past...

    For example (over 5 years ago), in https://community.autism.org.uk/f/adults-on-the-autistic-spectrum/3640/coping-methods---nappies/106252#106252 the first person who responded seemed to be not very understanding, but the moderator replied:

    Anil A - Mod said:

    I'd suggest holding off on any assumptions or associations just yet. 

    Welcome to the community Bear123, I hope you find it helpful. 

  • Thank You qwerty you have managed to put together what a lot of us have been suggesting for a very long time.

     I hope the response you receive will be more than is the usual from NAS.

     Well done collating all that info your truly awesome. 

    Considering this forum is primarily for adults both parents who are autistic or have children that are it is also for us adults who are autistic . As adults the wealth of information we have living with autism is so so valuable to anyone coming here looking for advice or support.

    Children are not allowed to join this site so who else but us and parents use it?

    Anyway enough from me, I just had to say how brilliant you have been in finding all this information and putting it across to NAS to read and think hard about what you and we the members have to say.

    Take care now. () () ()

  • I fully concur and from my experience of Admin, Moderating, etc it is a hard task and voluntary time needed to do it.

    From my experience, I am aware that some solutions for various levels of admin/moderation may not be relevant here but it may help for some recognised "regional focal points" who have more that a normal users Contribute permissions.

    From an adult, not yet diagnosed, the forum seems to heavily focussed on children and adults working/living with them but those of us before Neuro Diversity hit schools are at such a disadvantage here.  We are the ones trying to deal with life, our traits/behaviours and have little/no support except for these forums.  Even the diagnosis process is contradictory (yes you are on the spectrum, no you are not = Computer says NO as it is not logical).

    Yes Adults need help to keep their job, not get their meltdowns, struggle with masks/acting to try an fit in, being used for our open/honest, trusting nature but we are left to our own devices in our own self doubt/"wrong" perceptions.

    What I also see would be useful is the ability to have keywords tagged for newbies (stimming= various twitching of many body parts that is a ASC specific term that is not yet fully part of the mainstream vocabulary (or the exact nature of it).

  • By the way, for those interested in moderation, I saw this post (it's posted over 7 years ago), that NAS does recruit volunteer moderators.

    https://community.autism.org.uk/f/miscellaneous-and-chat/1516/recruiting-volunteer-moderators 

    Not sure how it works today, but perhaps some people might be interested in moderating?