Missin U <3 - lamentations for those felled by the SB

jjjusten has always been pretty good value in explaining this all on his own, tbh.

tuomas, at what stage does stating your opinion clearly begin to be enough? and don't bring the church into this, or i'm gonna fall out with the mods again and i've made such progress that'd be a disaster on a personal level.

So you think an SB from a poster who's posted once should weigh the same as an SB from someone who's regularly posted here for 9 years?

(x-post)

i think so. certainly, you've not made any case otherwise, other than believing it yourself.

for some reason i am lolling really hard

because you are watching a master at work. it's like an old wrinkly samurai getting you to fight him to prove he can kick your ass, even though you know perfectly well he's a samurai

Did you know that the Church actually sb'd Galileo, using an elaborate system involving wooden pegs, down pillows, and bread crumbs? It's all spelled out in this recent biography.

he was the only guy ever to be sb'd for expressing unpopular opinions

So you think an SB from a poster who's posted once should weigh the same as an SB from someone who's regularly posted here for 9 years?

What problem would it solve if it didn't?

i think so. certainly, you've not made any case otherwise, other than believing it yourself.

Okay, think of ILX as a little village. Now, one of the villagers has been causing trouble, making other villagers irritated, so a village council has been called in to decide whether this person should be banished from the village. Would you say that a tourist who just happens to be staying overnight at the local B&B should have a vote in the issue of throwing this villager out?

Please restrict your answer to problems that exist in the real world.

What makes you say 51 is definitely too small, Tuomas?

It depends on what's for breakfast. xxp

Keith has already given me a souped-up Suggest Ban function with lasers, a flamethrower and neon pink go-faster stripes, so ner.

What makes you say 51 is definitely too small, Tuomas?

Because no way is it 50% of regular posters, hence it's not really democratic at all. (Plus non-regular posters can click SB too.)

It's got a bottle opener on it as well, that's useful.

The "tourists" in your metaphor are not clicking the SB button, Tuomas, as the mods have said and as we've reminded you.

Look, I don't think the SB system is a net gain for the site, and it definitely has its downsides for me, as I made clear last night, but you're talking about altering it (both from a design and implementation p.o.v.) to solve a problem that literally does not exist.

Many people who read the boards are lurkers. They're not lurkers, they just don't post very much. It's a little harsh to call them 'tourists' if they've been reading for six years.

And the thing about these people, who don't post much - they don't post much because they don't have the rock hard skin required to be a regular ilx poster. I'd imagine if you were in that position, SB would be a godsend, and you'd be pretty unhappy about having your contribution to it marginalized.

The "tourists" in your metaphor are not clicking the SB button, Tuomas, as the mods have said and as we've reminded you.

Has there ever been a case where a mod has removed SBs from someone's total because they were made by unfamiliar posters? I'm asking this seriously.

Would you say that a tourist who just happens to be staying overnight at the local B&B should have a vote in the issue of throwing this villager out?

'tourists' don't get SB powers, but people that have just moved into town the week before do, if we want to make this even worth going with (good grief what am i saying)

I have removed several Suggest Bans from, for example, known sockpuppets and users registered the previous day and with 0 posts to their name, yes. On one occasion it actually prevented a poster from falling over the 52 mark. It's usually incredibly obvious when there's a sockpuppet at work and yes, those SBs are removed.

Because no way is it 50% of regular posters, hence it's not really democratic at all.
Even if it were 50%, I don't think that'd change its democraticness very much. But I don't think the level it's at is very far from representative: the turnout's a lot higher than many polls here get.

(Plus non-regular posters can click SB too.)
As I said upthread, SBs get a lot of scrutiny, but it's done by mods not by algorithm. If someone with no posts who only signed up last month SBs someone for something innocuous, that's not going to carry a lot of weight. It'll most likely get deleted. Whereas if, I dunno, estela SBs someone, I'm going to take notice. Also: it's not just posting history we look at -- if someone's been reading this site every day for 2 years, I think there SBs should count just as much as some hyper-poster's.

jjusten, upthread: "almost every SB vote has been from posters whose names i recognized immediately"

like ten clusterfuck threads back another mod said that when they looked at SB totals they did disregard ones that were from sockpuppets &c, which i'm guessing as a class includes people who are suspicious cos they appear never to have posted here.

'tourists' don't get SB powers, but people that have just moved into town the week before do, if we want to make this even worth going with (good grief what am i saying)

Okay, let's say the villager who's fate is being decided has a Tourette's Syndrome. The people who've lived in the village for long know this and have gotten used to it, that's just the way he is, and he means no harm. But the new villager doesn't know about the Tourette's, so he thinks this person should be kicked out because he's saying all those awful things all the time. Is that fair?

I have removed several Suggest Bans from, for example, known sockpuppets and users registered the previous day and with 0 posts to their name, yes. On one occasion it actually prevented a poster from falling over the 52 mark. It's usually incredibly obvious when there's a sockpuppet at work and yes, those SBs are removed.

Okay, thanks for this info.

OK, you just need to stick to ILX and not traipse off to The Sound of Music of the Damned.

xxp, No. The mods would act appropriately. You do not need to come up with an algorithm to ensure this.

Because no way is it 50% of regular posters, hence it's not really democratic at all.
Even if it were 50%, I don't think that'd change its democraticness very much.

You don't think a majority vote is democratic?

Okay, let's say the villager who's fate is being decided has a Tourette's Syndrome. The people who've lived in the village for long know this and have gotten used to it, that's just the way he is, and he means no harm. But the new villager doesn't know about the Tourette's, so he thinks this person should be kicked out because he's saying all those awful things all the time. Is that fair?

Yes. Everyone in the village has the same rights.

so he thinks this person should be kicked out because he's saying all those awful things all the time. Is that fair?

This thing isn't run by automatons. It wouldn't be fair if the villagers actually kicked the guy out, but that's not going to happen either here or in the village.

You don't think a majority vote is democratic?
I think that an election can have a 27% turnout and still *be* democratic.

it takes a village to suggest a ban

loool

Basically Tuomas you're just saying that people who don't post as much are less worthy than people who post a lot, which is not true.

if we needed 50% of regular posters to sb someone, it would never happen. but i guess that's what you want.

We'd never agree on a definition of "regular," for one thing. (no poop jokes plz)

You don't think a majority vote is democratic?
I think that an election can have a 27% turnout and still *be* democratic.

Okay, once someone gets 51 SBs, there should be an automatic poll to decide whether or not he really gets banned. That way it would be like a democratic election, because now it isn't.

oh man, beliefs

The people who've lived in the village for long know this and have gotten used to it, that's just the way he is, and he means no harm. But the new villager doesn't know about the Tourette's, so he thinks this person should be kicked out because he's saying all those awful things all the time. Is that fair?

so, there's one vote to kick him out. what's the problem?

But what if it's the decisive vote? What if there's a family of new villagers with 10 kids, and they all get to vote?

what turnout would be necessary to declare such a poll valid?
should everyone be allowed to vote?
should the condemned be allowed to vote? should each vote count as one vote regardless of user?

tuomas veering dangerously close to the kind of rhetoric i hear not very nice people using in local politics all the time.

Last time the whole thing hinged on one vote, Mr Fuckshitcocksucker got thrown out of the village for no apparent reason.

I think Tuomas needs an enforced break so he can devote all his energies to coming up with the perfect shit metaphor for a problem that doesn't exist.

But what if it's the decisive vote? What if there's a family of new villagers with 10 kids, and they all get to vote?

Then the dude with Tourette's has to go off to a remote clinic for a month where he may or may not get treatment while the rest of the village yells for at most a couple of days about how unfair the situation is, then everyone goes back to their lives.

People would take this argument more seriously if it had ever been in danger of happening ever, by the way.

what turnout would be necessary to declare such a poll valid?
should everyone be allowed to vote?
should the condemned be allowed to vote? should each vote count as one vote regardless of user?

There would be no lower limit to turnout, just like in real democratic elections. If few people care about the banning, and the condemned wins the vote by, say, 3 votes to 2 votes, then the banning probably wasn't necessary since so few people cared about it. And if mods can indeed weed out sock puppets, then every user should have just one vote.

Thank you for your suggestion.

I don't think it would impossible to implement, would it? An automatic "Should user X be banned?" poll generated when user X gets 51 SBs. That way it would truly be democratic.

Tuomas, you're talking about two things now:

i) changing the threshold for SBs.
ii) refurendum re: temp-banning when enough SBs have been collected
iii) this retarded weighting system which wouldn't solve an imaginary problem

Re: these:

i) i can get behind in principle, although the mods have way, way, way, more information and experience about what is the right level than we do, and, if we have to have an SB system then i am happy to trust them to set it correctly.
ii) shasta suggested this upthread. my instinct is against it because i trust the mods to exercise discretion (and wish they did more) but I don't think it's a trivially bad idea.
iii) your retarded weighting system wouldn't solve an imaginary problem

If few people care about the banning, and the condemned wins the vote by, say, 3 votes to 2 votes, then the banning probably wasn't necessary since so few people cared about it

presumably you'd be as blasé about the reverse outcome?

The poll wouldn't be impossible to implement, just daft. They've already got 51 as-genuine-as-we-can-reasonably-tell neg votes against them, and that's a lot! It's more than enough to earn you a month off. A lot of users already cared a lot about it.

Also I hate to say this because it sounds like I/we don't care what users think when the truth's completely the opposite, but ILX: not a democracy.

tuomas, a question-

if 51 individual, genuine posters posted to a thread entitled 'BAN (X)' stating that they wanted this to be done, how would you feel about a mod banning (X)?