mods deleting posts at user request March 11, 2025 4:18 PM Subscribe
this is a meta to discuss the practice of mods deleting comments that don't break guidelines, but receive pushback after the fact, solely due to the original commenter coming back and saying "please delete my comment."
Do we want users to be able to request individual-comment deletions in Metatalk, a few minutes after making the comment, seemingly entirely due to how the comment was received? Can mods clarify the scenarios in which users can request single-comment deletions for things which do not at all break the guidelines [but do make the commenter look bad]?
This seems custom-made to allow trolling which is then erased from the record. What benefit does this have to the community, as opposed to the original poster who saves face?
Do we want users to be able to request individual-comment deletions in Metatalk, a few minutes after making the comment, seemingly entirely due to how the comment was received? Can mods clarify the scenarios in which users can request single-comment deletions for things which do not at all break the guidelines [but do make the commenter look bad]?
This seems custom-made to allow trolling which is then erased from the record. What benefit does this have to the community, as opposed to the original poster who saves face?
I think anyone should be able to delete their comments at any time for any reason whatsoever. I don’t care about whether it “benefits the community” or not. Everyone should have the right to revoke permission for Metafilter to host and display their content, just like they have that right for Twitter, Facebook, etc.
posted by brook horse at 5:11 PM on March 11 [24 favorites]
posted by brook horse at 5:11 PM on March 11 [24 favorites]
I don’t care about whether it “benefits the community” or not.
well, I do.
At some point the community is bigger and more important than I am. I think it has to be or why bother involving myself in it?
posted by philip-random at 5:34 PM on March 11 [15 favorites]
well, I do.
At some point the community is bigger and more important than I am. I think it has to be or why bother involving myself in it?
posted by philip-random at 5:34 PM on March 11 [15 favorites]
Then why not just have a delete button that appears when the edit window closes? It's news to me that mods will remove single comments per user request, decontextualizing the reaction. My expectation has always been that comments are permanent outside of an account wipe (or mod-initiated deletions).
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:34 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:34 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]
If nothing else, the removal note needs to appear where the deleted comment was. Not after the orphaned replies.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:43 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:43 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
At some point the community is bigger and more important than I am.
Cool, then don’t ask for your comments deleted. Individuals should still have that right. There are many instances where individual rights trump “the community” and control over content you created is one of them. It’s really utterly bizarre to me that a left-leaning space that typically values academic and creative works could think otherwise. You don’t get to decide “well, it’s better for the community that someone’s writing/art/whatever stays in this space when they’ve asked for it to be removed.”
Then why not just have a delete button that appears when the edit window closes?
I think the new site should have this.
posted by brook horse at 5:43 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
Cool, then don’t ask for your comments deleted. Individuals should still have that right. There are many instances where individual rights trump “the community” and control over content you created is one of them. It’s really utterly bizarre to me that a left-leaning space that typically values academic and creative works could think otherwise. You don’t get to decide “well, it’s better for the community that someone’s writing/art/whatever stays in this space when they’ve asked for it to be removed.”
Then why not just have a delete button that appears when the edit window closes?
I think the new site should have this.
posted by brook horse at 5:43 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
I do think there should be special cases which would be a combination of (via chat) the user and a mod trading notes and judgment call being made. But for it to be site policy that any user can at any time for any particular reason decide they want to have a comment of theirs disappear -- that just feels like a great way to undermine discourse and really do harm to the site.
This seems custom-made to allow trolling
pretty much. Even if the comment wasn't intended as such. The result of having it disappear (even with a mod explanation) can be chaotic in terms of the flow of things. And from the perspective of having a thoughtful response suddenly become kinda meaningless (or disappear altogether should the mod make such a call), demoralizing.
posted by philip-random at 5:44 PM on March 11 [8 favorites]
This seems custom-made to allow trolling
pretty much. Even if the comment wasn't intended as such. The result of having it disappear (even with a mod explanation) can be chaotic in terms of the flow of things. And from the perspective of having a thoughtful response suddenly become kinda meaningless (or disappear altogether should the mod make such a call), demoralizing.
posted by philip-random at 5:44 PM on March 11 [8 favorites]
bizarre to me that a left-leaning space that leans academic and creative could think otherwise
Why? Copyright? That's not some obvious pillar of "left-leaning" "academic" and "creative" culture that promotes transparent discourse. Neither is being able to erase your public missteps to avoid criticism.
You don’t get to decide “well, it’s better for the community that someone’s writing/art/whatever stays in this space when they’ve asked for it to be removed.”
"I" don't, the norms of the platform do, which are meant to reflect those of the userbase. Why should "you" be able to dictate otherwise? "You" can go post on Reddit or "X" if you prefer their ethos, TOS and the environment that results.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:48 PM on March 11 [16 favorites]
Why? Copyright? That's not some obvious pillar of "left-leaning" "academic" and "creative" culture that promotes transparent discourse. Neither is being able to erase your public missteps to avoid criticism.
You don’t get to decide “well, it’s better for the community that someone’s writing/art/whatever stays in this space when they’ve asked for it to be removed.”
"I" don't, the norms of the platform do, which are meant to reflect those of the userbase. Why should "you" be able to dictate otherwise? "You" can go post on Reddit or "X" if you prefer their ethos, TOS and the environment that results.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:48 PM on March 11 [16 favorites]
If comment is delete-worthy according to normal mod practice, delete. If the user who posted it decides this and informs the mods, that's considerate, but the deletion reason should still be about the content, not the user request. If not delete-worthy, leave. That's just the norms of this place. If we want user-controlled deletion, that should just be implemented in new site.
posted by lookoutbelow at 5:53 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
posted by lookoutbelow at 5:53 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
The comment that triggered this post was also in MetaTalk, which historically is less deletion prone by mods, I don't see why the same standard shouldn't apply to individual requests for deletion.
As I said in that thread, deletions do not serve the community well from one perspective. How do any of us become better socially? We watch, we listen, we learn. We tend not to consult a FAQ or guidelines IRL. Therefore one of the main ways we learn about the nature of discourse is by witnessing pushback. This how boundaries are set and maintained.
Removing the comment removes the lesson. This is why I strongly support just hiding "delete-worthy" comments. I don't think a moderation log does enough from a learn how to behav perspective (unless you are the mod, lol).
If someone wants their entire history wiped that's ok with me. But as I also said over there, and several times previously, stable identities are a foundational ethos of Metafilter, and sockpuppets are tolerated in only a very limited way. Having users be able to selectively delete comments (even very mild ones like the one in question) allows them (us) to have cake and eat it too. Be a jerk in the present, and then whitewash oneself back to angel.
As for individual creative rights etc, that's a stretch. Don't post a draft of your novel here, I guess. Otherwise it's a community. If you said something stupid at a dinner party you can't make people unhear it, you must do the work to show that it is unrepresentative of who you are. In the meantime in my scheme it is hidden.
Anyway, like I say for me this was not a good deletion, nor was it an egregious comment, but it points to a structural issue with how Metafilter creates and passes down community norms which are essential to civil discourse.
posted by Rumple at 5:59 PM on March 11 [11 favorites]
As I said in that thread, deletions do not serve the community well from one perspective. How do any of us become better socially? We watch, we listen, we learn. We tend not to consult a FAQ or guidelines IRL. Therefore one of the main ways we learn about the nature of discourse is by witnessing pushback. This how boundaries are set and maintained.
Removing the comment removes the lesson. This is why I strongly support just hiding "delete-worthy" comments. I don't think a moderation log does enough from a learn how to behav perspective (unless you are the mod, lol).
If someone wants their entire history wiped that's ok with me. But as I also said over there, and several times previously, stable identities are a foundational ethos of Metafilter, and sockpuppets are tolerated in only a very limited way. Having users be able to selectively delete comments (even very mild ones like the one in question) allows them (us) to have cake and eat it too. Be a jerk in the present, and then whitewash oneself back to angel.
As for individual creative rights etc, that's a stretch. Don't post a draft of your novel here, I guess. Otherwise it's a community. If you said something stupid at a dinner party you can't make people unhear it, you must do the work to show that it is unrepresentative of who you are. In the meantime in my scheme it is hidden.
Anyway, like I say for me this was not a good deletion, nor was it an egregious comment, but it points to a structural issue with how Metafilter creates and passes down community norms which are essential to civil discourse.
posted by Rumple at 5:59 PM on March 11 [11 favorites]
I'm okay with comments being removed at a user's request, but there should be a mod note explaining what the comment was about.
I do think we should be mindful of the effects of our requests and think twice before asking for something to be removed. Between the account wipes, mod deletions for rules violations, and now single-comment deletions, it can be hard to follow discussions. I can't be the only one who finds participating less attractive under such circumstances.
posted by rpfields at 6:17 PM on March 11 [5 favorites]
I do think we should be mindful of the effects of our requests and think twice before asking for something to be removed. Between the account wipes, mod deletions for rules violations, and now single-comment deletions, it can be hard to follow discussions. I can't be the only one who finds participating less attractive under such circumstances.
posted by rpfields at 6:17 PM on March 11 [5 favorites]
Frankly, I think if someone shows their entire arse and then later has poster's regret then too fucking bad.
Make a follow-up mea culpa, own your shit, and grow from it.
Memory-holing bad behaviours is only going to accelerate the decline of this place.
posted by coriolisdave at 6:34 PM on March 11 [25 favorites]
Make a follow-up mea culpa, own your shit, and grow from it.
Memory-holing bad behaviours is only going to accelerate the decline of this place.
posted by coriolisdave at 6:34 PM on March 11 [25 favorites]
And I say this as someone who has comments on these sites spanning twenty years of personal growth and who is absolutely certain that there's some pretty shitty views expressed along that journey. As much as it would be way more convenient from me to hide from that history, it wouldn't be true, and I have to live with that.
posted by coriolisdave at 6:36 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
posted by coriolisdave at 6:36 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
This isn’t a dinner party, Metafilter is a corporation. A nonprofit is a nonstock corporation, but it is still a corporation. Individuals can see my comment and remember it, that doesn’t mean Metafilter has the right to publicly display my information and content forever. You and any other individual who wants to can screenshot my comments and keep them personally and that’s just life, but it is in fact against leftist/creative/academic/etc. values to argue “a corporation may keep and display your information and work forever without your consent.” Plenty of other communities figure out how to deal with user-level deletions without giving a corporations a free pass to say “nope, ours now.”
Anyway, pretty much the only times I’ve wanted to delete comments were when I posted about being trans and a bunch of cis people completely misinterpreted me and made a bunch of out of pocket comments, and I 1) no longer wanted Metafilter to get to keep generating traffic off of my writing about the trans experience if they couldn’t be bothered to moderate the response, and 2) wanted to keep engaging in the thread without wading through cis bullshit that Metafilter moderators have repeatedly shown they don’t know how to appropriately moderate. But sure, I should just deal with it because it’s healthier for the community to get the chance to fuck up trans issues over and over and over and over.
If I no longer want Metafilter to have the benefit of “learning” from my trans existence, oh well. The (largely cis) community’s interests trump my right as a trans person to control my information and words. Got it.
"You" can go post on Reddit or "X" if you prefer their ethos, TOS and the environment that results.
I prefer literally every community I’m active in, all of which allow user-level deletion, to being trans on Metafilter. But I still keep trying to give the place a chance. Stupid of me, I know. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Maybe this will finally be the push I need to go.
posted by brook horse at 6:36 PM on March 11 [20 favorites]
Anyway, pretty much the only times I’ve wanted to delete comments were when I posted about being trans and a bunch of cis people completely misinterpreted me and made a bunch of out of pocket comments, and I 1) no longer wanted Metafilter to get to keep generating traffic off of my writing about the trans experience if they couldn’t be bothered to moderate the response, and 2) wanted to keep engaging in the thread without wading through cis bullshit that Metafilter moderators have repeatedly shown they don’t know how to appropriately moderate. But sure, I should just deal with it because it’s healthier for the community to get the chance to fuck up trans issues over and over and over and over.
If I no longer want Metafilter to have the benefit of “learning” from my trans existence, oh well. The (largely cis) community’s interests trump my right as a trans person to control my information and words. Got it.
"You" can go post on Reddit or "X" if you prefer their ethos, TOS and the environment that results.
I prefer literally every community I’m active in, all of which allow user-level deletion, to being trans on Metafilter. But I still keep trying to give the place a chance. Stupid of me, I know. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Maybe this will finally be the push I need to go.
posted by brook horse at 6:36 PM on March 11 [20 favorites]
this is about someone being shitty to other users, then coming back a few minutes later, after being called out for it, and having the mods erase their egregious comment. That's the scenario I'm concerned about, and given that it just happened, I think that case deserves discussion. Safety reasons are an entirely different thing!
posted by sagc at 6:40 PM on March 11 [14 favorites]
posted by sagc at 6:40 PM on March 11 [14 favorites]
This isn’t a dinner party, Metafilter is a corporation. A nonprofit is a nonstock corporation, but it is still a corporation. Individuals can see my comment and remember it, that doesn’t mean Metafilter has the right to publicly display my information and content forever.
MeFi may be a business entity, but that doesn't mean our discussions are necessarily in the frame of corporate communications. I don't think that's how very many MeFites see their participation here -- as though we're all unpaid op ed panelists or something. And, what happened to 'academic,' 'left-leaning,' 'creative?'
the only times I’ve wanted to delete comments were when I posted about being trans and a bunch of cis people completely misinterpreted me and made a bunch of out of pocket comments, and I 1) no longer wanted Metafilter to get to keep generating traffic off of my writing about the trans experience if they couldn’t be bothered to moderate the response, and 2) wanted to keep engaging in the thread without wading through cis bullshit that Metafilter moderators have repeatedly shown they don’t know how to appropriately moderate. But sure, I should just deal with it because it’s healthier for the community to get the chance to fuck up trans issues over and over and over and over.
Do you really think your individual replies to a thread 'generate traffic?' Most of us are here to talk to each other.
Anyway, what happened here was rather more someone posting another variety of 'bullshit' and not wanting a record of it to persist. What you are complaining of would be properly handled by deleting the offending comments, if they rise to that level, as you yourself note.
At least, under the established standards I'm used to. If those standards are going to change, it should be signposted. It's a meaningful change to expectations.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:42 PM on March 11 [5 favorites]
MeFi may be a business entity, but that doesn't mean our discussions are necessarily in the frame of corporate communications. I don't think that's how very many MeFites see their participation here -- as though we're all unpaid op ed panelists or something. And, what happened to 'academic,' 'left-leaning,' 'creative?'
the only times I’ve wanted to delete comments were when I posted about being trans and a bunch of cis people completely misinterpreted me and made a bunch of out of pocket comments, and I 1) no longer wanted Metafilter to get to keep generating traffic off of my writing about the trans experience if they couldn’t be bothered to moderate the response, and 2) wanted to keep engaging in the thread without wading through cis bullshit that Metafilter moderators have repeatedly shown they don’t know how to appropriately moderate. But sure, I should just deal with it because it’s healthier for the community to get the chance to fuck up trans issues over and over and over and over.
Do you really think your individual replies to a thread 'generate traffic?' Most of us are here to talk to each other.
Anyway, what happened here was rather more someone posting another variety of 'bullshit' and not wanting a record of it to persist. What you are complaining of would be properly handled by deleting the offending comments, if they rise to that level, as you yourself note.
At least, under the established standards I'm used to. If those standards are going to change, it should be signposted. It's a meaningful change to expectations.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:42 PM on March 11 [5 favorites]
I am having trouble understanding why having a comment deleted is trollish behavior, since it strikes me as the opposite. If you say something angry and dumb in the heat of the moment, and it's going to have a bad effect in the thread, why not have it deleted? Isn't leaving it in the thread going to do the thing that angry dumb comments always do, call attention to itself, make itself the topic, become a derail? Isn't demanding that your angry dumb words stand in the thread...bad?
Why should there not be the opportunity to correct a mistake? What "learning" is going to come from leaving it up?
posted by mittens at 6:47 PM on March 11 [6 favorites]
Why should there not be the opportunity to correct a mistake? What "learning" is going to come from leaving it up?
posted by mittens at 6:47 PM on March 11 [6 favorites]
In the past the expectation has been that comments that rise to that level will be deleted by the mods, the replies are cleaned up, and a mod not gives some hint what happened.
What this policy enables is people tossing bombs, and then deleting their shitpost when they get the equivalent of downvotes. It's a behavior from other platforms that hobbles self-regulation at the level of shared norms.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:50 PM on March 11 [6 favorites]
What this policy enables is people tossing bombs, and then deleting their shitpost when they get the equivalent of downvotes. It's a behavior from other platforms that hobbles self-regulation at the level of shared norms.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:50 PM on March 11 [6 favorites]
Mittens: People will see what comments inspire wide disapprobation, rather than there being a bunch of angry comments with no referent? Or if it were deleted for violating the guidelines, then there would be a note saying so. As it stands there's just a weird gap where it seems like people are angry about literally nothing.
posted by sagc at 6:53 PM on March 11 [5 favorites]
posted by sagc at 6:53 PM on March 11 [5 favorites]
It’s not safety reasons I’m talking about, though those are important too.
There’s been plenty of times where I posted about my genuine experience as a transmasc dyke, and in any thread that isn’t a very simplistic “yay trans people!”, I get cis people coming out of the woodwork to tell me how I’m actually being super sexist and men are evil, really, and there’s no way that, for example, trans men have higher rates of sexual assault victimization than trans women because trans + woman = always more oppressed than trans + man on every measure, because that is how intersectionality, obviously. It goes on and on with people getting increasingly smug about how they’ve defended women’s rights and put in place the person who clearly has no clue what being a woman is like.
I don’t trust Metafilter mods or the Metafilter community to decide who is “being the asshole” who deserves to have their words immortalized forever. I understand the situation you’re talking about isn’t mine, but Metafilter has repeatedly shown that the community thinks they’re in the right and trans people are the ones being harmful, and moderation doesn’t understand the nuances of trans issues enough to do anything about it. So either we say everyone had the right to delete their comments without justification, or we say Metafilter mods and community members get to “decide” whether someone was being an asshole and deserves to continue to be publicly shamed. Which Metafilter has shown they can’t do properly for trans issues.
posted by brook horse at 6:56 PM on March 11 [19 favorites]
There’s been plenty of times where I posted about my genuine experience as a transmasc dyke, and in any thread that isn’t a very simplistic “yay trans people!”, I get cis people coming out of the woodwork to tell me how I’m actually being super sexist and men are evil, really, and there’s no way that, for example, trans men have higher rates of sexual assault victimization than trans women because trans + woman = always more oppressed than trans + man on every measure, because that is how intersectionality, obviously. It goes on and on with people getting increasingly smug about how they’ve defended women’s rights and put in place the person who clearly has no clue what being a woman is like.
I don’t trust Metafilter mods or the Metafilter community to decide who is “being the asshole” who deserves to have their words immortalized forever. I understand the situation you’re talking about isn’t mine, but Metafilter has repeatedly shown that the community thinks they’re in the right and trans people are the ones being harmful, and moderation doesn’t understand the nuances of trans issues enough to do anything about it. So either we say everyone had the right to delete their comments without justification, or we say Metafilter mods and community members get to “decide” whether someone was being an asshole and deserves to continue to be publicly shamed. Which Metafilter has shown they can’t do properly for trans issues.
posted by brook horse at 6:56 PM on March 11 [19 favorites]
In that case, it should be clear policy.
posted by sagc at 6:58 PM on March 11 [3 favorites]
posted by sagc at 6:58 PM on March 11 [3 favorites]
I agree because it didn’t occur to me that I could have asked mods to delete my comments. I just drastically reduced my commenting about trans issues instead. It would be cool to know I can test the waters and then put my comment back on the shelf if cis people insist on being kindergarteners about it.
posted by brook horse at 7:04 PM on March 11 [4 favorites]
posted by brook horse at 7:04 PM on March 11 [4 favorites]
sagc: People will see what comments inspire wide disapprobation, rather than there being a bunch of angry comments with no referent? Or if it were deleted for violating the guidelines, then there would be a note saying so
Also, scrubbing the record makes it impossible for one user to tell whether another user is having a bad day, or they regularly toss bombs into threads.
This means, as a community, we do not have the ability to establish a pattern of problematic behaviour (per brook horse's example). Removing such problematic content means that we're left with the shadows of the grar created by them, without the ability to specifically address the problem.
posted by coriolisdave at 7:10 PM on March 11 [6 favorites]
Also, scrubbing the record makes it impossible for one user to tell whether another user is having a bad day, or they regularly toss bombs into threads.
This means, as a community, we do not have the ability to establish a pattern of problematic behaviour (per brook horse's example). Removing such problematic content means that we're left with the shadows of the grar created by them, without the ability to specifically address the problem.
posted by coriolisdave at 7:10 PM on March 11 [6 favorites]
Given that posts are copyright their authors, can (legally) Metafilter choose to keep publishing content against the wishes of those authors? Because if the answer is no then the rest of this is pretty much irrelevant. The FAQ says that by posting you have "granted MetaFilter the right to display [your] content" but it's mum on the topic of revocability. IANAL but I suspect that since the poster retains their copyright, the ability to rescind the permission to publish the copyrighted content is possibly in play here.
posted by axiom at 7:31 PM on March 11
posted by axiom at 7:31 PM on March 11
Makes sense, and if that's the case, I wish mods would drop a note saying:
"hey, not cool to drop a bomb in the thread and then request removal once people are annoyed; please consider *not dropping the bomb in the first place*. One post criticizing Canadians for using the word "American" too much deleted at posters request per our legal obligations."
Once again, seems like a scenario where a mod log + deletion notes in the exact place of the deleted comment would come in handy.
posted by sagc at 7:36 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
"hey, not cool to drop a bomb in the thread and then request removal once people are annoyed; please consider *not dropping the bomb in the first place*. One post criticizing Canadians for using the word "American" too much deleted at posters request per our legal obligations."
Once again, seems like a scenario where a mod log + deletion notes in the exact place of the deleted comment would come in handy.
posted by sagc at 7:36 PM on March 11 [10 favorites]
I agree fully with this suggestion. :)
I think people should be allowed to delete their own comments, but that doesn’t mean the deletion needs to go without comment. We can certainly set norms around when we’re going to shake our collective heads at someone doing it, I just don’t think we should take away the ability.
posted by brook horse at 7:53 PM on March 11 [12 favorites]
I think people should be allowed to delete their own comments, but that doesn’t mean the deletion needs to go without comment. We can certainly set norms around when we’re going to shake our collective heads at someone doing it, I just don’t think we should take away the ability.
posted by brook horse at 7:53 PM on March 11 [12 favorites]
(I realize this policy still opens me up to cisgender circlejerks if I delete a comment but I’ll take that risk if it means at least getting to remove the specific wording or point that people misconstrue over and over.)
posted by brook horse at 7:58 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]
posted by brook horse at 7:58 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]
I think with today's political climate as it is, that we need to be let people delete anything they want. I understand the reasons against this and would prefer it not be necessary. The community might suffer in some way from this, but people need to be able to control their online presence.
I saw the comment that inspired the post and I don't think it's an example of what I'm talking about. I just think it's best to blanket allow, even to the detriment of the larger conversation.
posted by neuromodulator at 8:18 PM on March 11 [7 favorites]
I saw the comment that inspired the post and I don't think it's an example of what I'm talking about. I just think it's best to blanket allow, even to the detriment of the larger conversation.
posted by neuromodulator at 8:18 PM on March 11 [7 favorites]
The "good for the community" argument doesn't really hold up for me. I've been a member of a lot of communities both on and off line, and like, people say stupid shit, get called on it, and then say "oh shit, I didn't mean that sorry" and everyone moves on and the moment is done. Most human communication is bound to a specific place and specific time and if you're not there at that time, you miss it. Communities have still managed to exist for millennia before the written word, and then longer before it was wide spread. Communities managed to form and exist in chat rooms and games and whatever online medium with no lasting record. Deleting something doesn't make it not have happened, we all have memories, we can all still tell tales in MeMail and offsite. All the ways communities keep memories alive.
And look, if someone is using a tool to be a troll, ban the troll not the tool. I've been here long enough to remember the absolute certainty people had that being able to edit a comment would lead to terrible behavior, and like... unless fixing typos is anti-community in some way, that just didn't really materialize beyond like 1-2 people trying it once, getting told to knock it off and then either knocking it off or getting banned for being trolls.
Mostly, though, I'm just puzzled by this idea that we're all a bunch of helpless folks with the memories of goldfish and that there's no way to enforce community norms without a permeant record of public shaming.
posted by Gygesringtone at 8:34 PM on March 11 [11 favorites]
And look, if someone is using a tool to be a troll, ban the troll not the tool. I've been here long enough to remember the absolute certainty people had that being able to edit a comment would lead to terrible behavior, and like... unless fixing typos is anti-community in some way, that just didn't really materialize beyond like 1-2 people trying it once, getting told to knock it off and then either knocking it off or getting banned for being trolls.
Mostly, though, I'm just puzzled by this idea that we're all a bunch of helpless folks with the memories of goldfish and that there's no way to enforce community norms without a permeant record of public shaming.
posted by Gygesringtone at 8:34 PM on March 11 [11 favorites]
Given that posts are copyright their authors, can (legally) Metafilter choose to keep publishing content against the wishes of those authors? Because if the answer is no then the rest of this is pretty much irrelevant. The FAQ says that by posting you have "granted MetaFilter the right to display [your] content" but it's mum on the topic of revocability.
Yeah, MeFi really needs T&C that have been looked over by an actual lawyer, and i hope that's something that gets tackled immediately after the long-awaited bylaws. Or at the latest after a real board gets elected.
posted by adrienneleigh at 8:34 PM on March 11 [4 favorites]
Yeah, MeFi really needs T&C that have been looked over by an actual lawyer, and i hope that's something that gets tackled immediately after the long-awaited bylaws. Or at the latest after a real board gets elected.
posted by adrienneleigh at 8:34 PM on March 11 [4 favorites]
Deleting something doesn't make it not have happened, we all have memories
That's only true if everyone is reading every thread and every comment and gets to see the problematic shit rather than, as I my own lived example, I wander into a thread and see something problematic and have no way to know if that is an example in a pattern of behaviour, or is just a one-off very bad day.
Without the public record, we must rely on the mods - those oh so trusted, ever-present, omniscient beings - to be the sole group of people able to discern those patterns.
posted by coriolisdave at 9:23 PM on March 11 [4 favorites]
That's only true if everyone is reading every thread and every comment and gets to see the problematic shit rather than, as I my own lived example, I wander into a thread and see something problematic and have no way to know if that is an example in a pattern of behaviour, or is just a one-off very bad day.
Without the public record, we must rely on the mods - those oh so trusted, ever-present, omniscient beings - to be the sole group of people able to discern those patterns.
posted by coriolisdave at 9:23 PM on March 11 [4 favorites]
My understanding has been that you've always, since the early days, been able to contact a mod to ask for a comment of yours deleted (or edited).
I'm not sure what would have happened if someone made a habit of making borderline-trollish comments and then asking for them to be erased, but I don't think this general ability to ask for a deletion or edit represents a new policy at all!
And while I'm not unskeptical of how a self-serve deletion button (next to each of your comments?) might play out, being responsive to individual deletion requests strikes me as just the decent thing to do.
posted by nobody at 10:17 PM on March 11 [3 favorites]
I'm not sure what would have happened if someone made a habit of making borderline-trollish comments and then asking for them to be erased, but I don't think this general ability to ask for a deletion or edit represents a new policy at all!
And while I'm not unskeptical of how a self-serve deletion button (next to each of your comments?) might play out, being responsive to individual deletion requests strikes me as just the decent thing to do.
posted by nobody at 10:17 PM on March 11 [3 favorites]
Do we want users to be able to request individual-comment deletions in Metatalk, a few minutes after making the comment
No, not in my opinion. Not in MetaTalk or anywhere else. I acknowledge there are valid other views and brook horse describes one of these pretty well. But as a general approach, I don't think people should get to throw bombs into a thread then disappear them because they changed their mind, leaving everyone else wondering what the fuck happened.
If it is now the case that people can just have things deleted on a whim, this change needs to be clearly communicated so that it's the same situation for everyone. I have been here a long time and it's only in the very recent past this has even been a thing that was possible. If we want people to be able to do this, the function should be built in to allow them to do it themselves. Either way, there should be a marker left to identify something was there - not in a vague comment that may or may not be left by a moderator, but at the exact place the content was removed.
I agree there needs to be a lot of work done on a terms of service and my view is that should include an irrevocable licence for MetaFilter to publish any and all posts and comments in their original form and context. I also acknowledge this needs to be reconciled with the need for people to be able to wipe their entire history.
posted by dg at 10:20 PM on March 11 [4 favorites]
No, not in my opinion. Not in MetaTalk or anywhere else. I acknowledge there are valid other views and brook horse describes one of these pretty well. But as a general approach, I don't think people should get to throw bombs into a thread then disappear them because they changed their mind, leaving everyone else wondering what the fuck happened.
If it is now the case that people can just have things deleted on a whim, this change needs to be clearly communicated so that it's the same situation for everyone. I have been here a long time and it's only in the very recent past this has even been a thing that was possible. If we want people to be able to do this, the function should be built in to allow them to do it themselves. Either way, there should be a marker left to identify something was there - not in a vague comment that may or may not be left by a moderator, but at the exact place the content was removed.
I agree there needs to be a lot of work done on a terms of service and my view is that should include an irrevocable licence for MetaFilter to publish any and all posts and comments in their original form and context. I also acknowledge this needs to be reconciled with the need for people to be able to wipe their entire history.
posted by dg at 10:20 PM on March 11 [4 favorites]
Quick note to say, as the person developing the new site, I'm not not following MetaTalk very closely and it would be extremely helpful if someone or someones (not me!) could set up something documenting any proposed new features. I personally am not keeping a list because of time constraints.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 10:26 PM on March 11 [5 favorites]
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 10:26 PM on March 11 [5 favorites]
Maybe as a corollary to the moderation-log request, someone can request their comment be deleted but then their profile might get a note attached to it, "wiped: a comment about pro-bird posters & cloaca arrangement"
Presumably well-founded deletions will disappear like unseemly gas at a dinner party; but a reminder that you might be remembered for being *that* person that threatened to organize against other posters civil rights because they weren't sufficiently polite to you (to pull an infamous example from Mefi's history) might stick.
Bonus: It wouldn't be a *secret* mod note field either.
posted by CrystalDave at 10:46 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]
Presumably well-founded deletions will disappear like unseemly gas at a dinner party; but a reminder that you might be remembered for being *that* person that threatened to organize against other posters civil rights because they weren't sufficiently polite to you (to pull an infamous example from Mefi's history) might stick.
Bonus: It wouldn't be a *secret* mod note field either.
posted by CrystalDave at 10:46 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]
I like that, CrystalDave.
Alternatively, It'd be great if we could actually retain the history of comment changes (including deletions) - eg clicking a "this comment has been edited" link that shows you the full history of that link.
(note: this would not be appropriate for safety-related deletes, such as brook horse outlined).
This would allow a thread to be 'cleaned up', avoiding further potential derails, whilst keeping a record attributable to that user.
posted by coriolisdave at 10:51 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]
Alternatively, It'd be great if we could actually retain the history of comment changes (including deletions) - eg clicking a "this comment has been edited" link that shows you the full history of that link.
(note: this would not be appropriate for safety-related deletes, such as brook horse outlined).
This would allow a thread to be 'cleaned up', avoiding further potential derails, whilst keeping a record attributable to that user.
posted by coriolisdave at 10:51 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]
Mod note: My understanding has been that you've always, since the early days, been able to contact a mod to ask for a comment of yours deleted (or edited).
That is my understanding also as a 20 year member of the site and as moderator for 2 years. People can give drop us an email and ask for a comment to be removed per the FAQ.
If it becomes a case of someone repeatedly asking to have comments removed, then at some point we'd start telling them no, but as a one off here and there, it's fine.
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 4:32 AM on March 12 [5 favorites]
That is my understanding also as a 20 year member of the site and as moderator for 2 years. People can give drop us an email and ask for a comment to be removed per the FAQ.
If it becomes a case of someone repeatedly asking to have comments removed, then at some point we'd start telling them no, but as a one off here and there, it's fine.
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 4:32 AM on March 12 [5 favorites]
As a compromise, perhaps we can allow people to request that embarrassing comments be deleted from the thread they were made, but also post a copy of them to a “wall of shame” where they can live on forever.
posted by snofoam at 4:39 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
posted by snofoam at 4:39 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
[You may delete your entire history if it's a safety issue]
.
.
[You may delete a single embarrassing comment only after being sufficiently publically chastised]
Mods will assess where on the spectrum your request liesSubject of thread has buttoned
posted by lucidium at 4:40 AM on March 12 [4 favorites]
what's the actual event & person this was/is about? seems i missed it.
posted by glonous keming at 4:56 AM on March 12
posted by glonous keming at 4:56 AM on March 12
Subject of thread has buttoned
We're so good at eating our own.
posted by kbanas at 5:33 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
We're so good at eating our own.
posted by kbanas at 5:33 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
FWIW Brandon's correct, mods have always been willing to delete a user's single comment on request.
It's really not consistent that a user could delete their entire history but couldn't have a moment of poster's regret. I don't love the idea of a delete button - a little friction is, I think, a good thing for the continuity of conversation - but a hardline policy here is just going to push people towards more-frequent and possibly ill-considered account wipes.
(I don't love account wipes either, and I think the consequences of having them are exactly what was predicted back when they weren't allowed at all, but the world has moved on and they're necessary for a variety of reasons.)
posted by restless_nomad (retired) at 5:56 AM on March 12 [10 favorites]
It's really not consistent that a user could delete their entire history but couldn't have a moment of poster's regret. I don't love the idea of a delete button - a little friction is, I think, a good thing for the continuity of conversation - but a hardline policy here is just going to push people towards more-frequent and possibly ill-considered account wipes.
(I don't love account wipes either, and I think the consequences of having them are exactly what was predicted back when they weren't allowed at all, but the world has moved on and they're necessary for a variety of reasons.)
posted by restless_nomad (retired) at 5:56 AM on March 12 [10 favorites]
Everyone should have the ability to delete their comments. We are allowed to edit for a few minutes, we should be allowed to delete for a few minutes too, at the least. Currently, we can't even edit a FPP we've made! I sure hope there is SOME ability to delete a comment ourselves, no mods, in the new site, with a box appearing saying, "this comment was deleted by the user" like almost every other commenting platform on the internet. It will not disrupt much. Most people are not reading and commenting furiously in real time, despite perceptions to be otherwise. This site gets hung up on time sensitivity sometimes, me included. I think allowing deletions when requested here is fine but hoping for different with the new site, again, namely the ability to delete anything one wrote within a certain time frame.
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:01 AM on March 12 [9 favorites]
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:01 AM on March 12 [9 favorites]
Yeah, being able to edit or delete a comment within five minutes sounds about right and being able to edit or delete a post within 10-15 minutes would also be good, IMO.
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 6:08 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 6:08 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
I am increasingly exhausted by the idea that actual people should be made to suffer for the good of the community which is what it comes down to every time we oppose allowing people control over what they have posted.
I do think there should be clearer tools and practices around mod notes so that people understand in general what happened in a situation, but we don't need to let people get whipped repeatedly because they made a stupid post.
And even moreso, we don't need to let them get whipped repeatedly because they made a good post and then other people were stupid about it, as in brook horse's examples.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:37 AM on March 12 [16 favorites]
I do think there should be clearer tools and practices around mod notes so that people understand in general what happened in a situation, but we don't need to let people get whipped repeatedly because they made a stupid post.
And even moreso, we don't need to let them get whipped repeatedly because they made a good post and then other people were stupid about it, as in brook horse's examples.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:37 AM on March 12 [16 favorites]
Of course posters are allowed to ask to delete their own comments! Are you telling me if I have a moment of idiocy and post something stupid and inflammatory and embarrassing I shouldn’t be able to delete it? Comments get deleted all the time and we survive without an indelible record of our bad judgement.
Maybe don’t do it every day, but yes, posters should have this ability.
posted by Vatnesine at 6:38 AM on March 12 [8 favorites]
Maybe don’t do it every day, but yes, posters should have this ability.
posted by Vatnesine at 6:38 AM on March 12 [8 favorites]
If someone is repeatedly engaging in behavior that appears to be trolling along the lines of "make shitty comment, cause a ruckus, come back later and delete the comment" then we have ways to deal with that. People will flag and/or mods will notice if it is a repeated behavior from a specific user. That user can be dealt with accordingly.
I am adamantly opposed to two types of rules:
1. Punishing the group for one person's rule breaking, i.e. when one kid talks during class so the whole class loses recess even the kid with ADHD who desperately needs some time to run around because he has been working hard to not wiggle and to be quiet all day. If there are certain commenters engaging in trolling behavior, catch that, moderate that. Don't take away the right to delete comments from the whole class.
2. Those FB "no dirty delete" rules. On FB it's kind of one thing because the whole conversation of responses that people might have made that involved helpful information, emotional labor, etc. would be deleted too, but that's not even the case here so there's no real justification. If someone made a comment and later thought better of it, changed their position, felt anxiety about personal information it revealed, then I strongly want them to have the right to delete it. I think that is actually better for the community because it more graciously allows for growth. Again, if people are using it to troll, they will be noticed and that user can be moderated in some way. The only "delete" that is dirty IMO is when it is done specifically for trolling.
I get that users might delete a comment and it has already been copied in a response somewhere else. Oh well. I don't think the user gets the right to force others to delete THEIR comments. We can't fix for everything. But giving the users the ability to delete their own comments is IMO so obviously sensible and common and user-friendly.
posted by fennario at 7:27 AM on March 12 [5 favorites]
I am adamantly opposed to two types of rules:
1. Punishing the group for one person's rule breaking, i.e. when one kid talks during class so the whole class loses recess even the kid with ADHD who desperately needs some time to run around because he has been working hard to not wiggle and to be quiet all day. If there are certain commenters engaging in trolling behavior, catch that, moderate that. Don't take away the right to delete comments from the whole class.
2. Those FB "no dirty delete" rules. On FB it's kind of one thing because the whole conversation of responses that people might have made that involved helpful information, emotional labor, etc. would be deleted too, but that's not even the case here so there's no real justification. If someone made a comment and later thought better of it, changed their position, felt anxiety about personal information it revealed, then I strongly want them to have the right to delete it. I think that is actually better for the community because it more graciously allows for growth. Again, if people are using it to troll, they will be noticed and that user can be moderated in some way. The only "delete" that is dirty IMO is when it is done specifically for trolling.
I get that users might delete a comment and it has already been copied in a response somewhere else. Oh well. I don't think the user gets the right to force others to delete THEIR comments. We can't fix for everything. But giving the users the ability to delete their own comments is IMO so obviously sensible and common and user-friendly.
posted by fennario at 7:27 AM on March 12 [5 favorites]
Let people delete any of their own content that they want to delete, but don’t let them delete other peoples’ content. If someone wants to delete a post, delete all the text and just leave the links with a placeholder title and poster name to indicate it was deleted.
If someone uses deletion to be a jerk or gaslight people, warn them not to do it and ban them if they continue.
posted by snofoam at 7:58 AM on March 12 [8 favorites]
If someone uses deletion to be a jerk or gaslight people, warn them not to do it and ban them if they continue.
posted by snofoam at 7:58 AM on March 12 [8 favorites]
An argument in favor of deleting arguments, as counterargument to this:
Deleting something doesn't make it not have happened, we all have memories.
We also all have different schedules, and deleting a comment can avoid reviving an argument after it's been settled:
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:04 AM on March 12 [3 favorites]
Deleting something doesn't make it not have happened, we all have memories.
We also all have different schedules, and deleting a comment can avoid reviving an argument after it's been settled:
USER A: All y'all who think pineapple on pizza sucks just have immature palates!If A had been allowed to delete that comment about pineapple on pizza at the time, then E wouldn't have seen it two days later and kicked the argument off all over again.
USER B: What the HELL, A? What's that supposed to mean?
USER C: My palate is plenty fine, thank you, I just don't like pineapple and there is nothing wrong with that!
USER D: Yeah, come on A, where's this coming from?
USER A: ....You know what, yeah, I was having a bad day and shot my mouth off. I mis-spoke, sorry.
(conversation continues pleasantly for another two full days, and then:
USER E: Wait, A, what the hell are you saying about people who don't like pineapple on pizza??? You suck!
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:04 AM on March 12 [3 favorites]
Giving people the theoretical right to delete their comments but forcing them to ask a mod in order to generate "a little friction" is basically a dark pattern.
posted by dusty potato at 8:18 AM on March 12 [3 favorites]
posted by dusty potato at 8:18 AM on March 12 [3 favorites]
I don't love account wipes either, and I think the consequences of having them are exactly what was predicted back when they weren't allowed at all, but the world has moved on and they're necessary for a variety of reasons.
I wonder if the new site could improve on this by having buttoned accounts deactivated for 30 days before full deletion, I'm sure a few people have buttoned and then regretted it and returned later under a new name.
posted by Lanark at 8:18 AM on March 12
I wonder if the new site could improve on this by having buttoned accounts deactivated for 30 days before full deletion, I'm sure a few people have buttoned and then regretted it and returned later under a new name.
posted by Lanark at 8:18 AM on March 12
My concern from the other thread is that we might be enabling missing stairs and that's problematic. I do think, after having sat with it a day or so, that MORE DETAILS in mod notes is the way to go. The mod note that was posted just isn't sufficient, sorry. "One comment removed at poster's request" fundamentally does not give the same context as sagc's excellent suggestion of "hey, not cool to drop a bomb in the thread and then request removal once people are annoyed; please consider *not dropping the bomb in the first place*. One post criticizing Canadians for using the word "American" too much deleted at posters request per our legal obligations."
Brevity isn't always better.
posted by cooker girl at 8:19 AM on March 12 [4 favorites]
Brevity isn't always better.
posted by cooker girl at 8:19 AM on March 12 [4 favorites]
I'm wary of putting more work on the shoulders of the mod team, especially when user trust is low and the mod schedules are inconsistent.
I can think of many times when giving a user the ability to delete their own comments (that might have been made in a moment of high dudgeon) would have prevented a thread further spiralling out of control while waiting for a mod to come on duty, and also waiting for that mod to 1) see the request, 2) agree with the request, 3) write the mod note.
Also as already pointed out, every single other website allows users to do this. It is normal and expected in 2025. Do we really want to be a site that's an outlier for being more restrictive of user experience than X and Facebook, of all places?
posted by fight or flight at 8:35 AM on March 12 [3 favorites]
I can think of many times when giving a user the ability to delete their own comments (that might have been made in a moment of high dudgeon) would have prevented a thread further spiralling out of control while waiting for a mod to come on duty, and also waiting for that mod to 1) see the request, 2) agree with the request, 3) write the mod note.
Also as already pointed out, every single other website allows users to do this. It is normal and expected in 2025. Do we really want to be a site that's an outlier for being more restrictive of user experience than X and Facebook, of all places?
posted by fight or flight at 8:35 AM on March 12 [3 favorites]
That's only true if everyone is reading every thread and every comment and gets to see the problematic shit rather than, as I my own lived example, I wander into a thread and see something problematic and have no way to know if that is an example in a pattern of behaviour, or is just a one-off very bad day.
Not to sound flippant, but it's not like you know about those earlier comments just because they exist, you have to read them at some point: either when they happened originally, or you have to know where to look to dig them up.
Let's take this conversation for example. I currently don't know what comment got deleted at the users request, because I didn't read it at the time and I can't be bothered to go snooping around recent conversations I've missed. However, I'm sure that with about 10 minutes on reddit I could figure it out, and if not I bet that with about 10 minutes of time sending out MeMail I could. That's roughly the amount of time it'd take me to find and read them in the original context if they hadn't been deleted.
That's the way other communities function, you get a feel for who keeps the communal memories about whatever topics alive and you go and ask them if you miss something, or suspect someone's just kind of a jerk around a topic, or whatever. Plus, if the pattern of behavior is bad enough to be a big problem in the community you're going to get to witness it at least a couple of times yourself. And if it's not so bad that you never witness it yourself, then it's not so bad. All this of course is predicated on having the type of community where people feel like they'll be believed when they share their experiences, if it's not that sort of community, then it's got other problems in addition to the person's bad behavior and no amount of "Aha! I have evidence that _____ is a Jerk!" is going to fix that.
Humans as a species are REALLY good at living in groups and remembering past behaviors. I mean, I have TBI type memory issues, and don't have the time or energy to engage in as many conversations here as I'd like. I still somehow manage to keep track of who's generally thoughtful and who's mostly likely to start throwing contrarian Truth Bombs about their pet subjects.
posted by Gygesringtone at 8:37 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
Not to sound flippant, but it's not like you know about those earlier comments just because they exist, you have to read them at some point: either when they happened originally, or you have to know where to look to dig them up.
Let's take this conversation for example. I currently don't know what comment got deleted at the users request, because I didn't read it at the time and I can't be bothered to go snooping around recent conversations I've missed. However, I'm sure that with about 10 minutes on reddit I could figure it out, and if not I bet that with about 10 minutes of time sending out MeMail I could. That's roughly the amount of time it'd take me to find and read them in the original context if they hadn't been deleted.
That's the way other communities function, you get a feel for who keeps the communal memories about whatever topics alive and you go and ask them if you miss something, or suspect someone's just kind of a jerk around a topic, or whatever. Plus, if the pattern of behavior is bad enough to be a big problem in the community you're going to get to witness it at least a couple of times yourself. And if it's not so bad that you never witness it yourself, then it's not so bad. All this of course is predicated on having the type of community where people feel like they'll be believed when they share their experiences, if it's not that sort of community, then it's got other problems in addition to the person's bad behavior and no amount of "Aha! I have evidence that _____ is a Jerk!" is going to fix that.
Humans as a species are REALLY good at living in groups and remembering past behaviors. I mean, I have TBI type memory issues, and don't have the time or energy to engage in as many conversations here as I'd like. I still somehow manage to keep track of who's generally thoughtful and who's mostly likely to start throwing contrarian Truth Bombs about their pet subjects.
posted by Gygesringtone at 8:37 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
Giving people the theoretical right to delete their comments but forcing them to ask a mod in order to generate "a little friction" is basically a dark pattern.
"Dark pattern" doesn't seem accurate - it's not deceptive, it's inserting a third party's judgement into something that's fundamentally permitted but has the potential for abuse. But it is definitely an impulse that arises from way-back-in-the-day Metafilter history when we had the mod staffing to handle that in a way that could potentially add value, rather than just making everything less likely to work smoothly. It's definitely not something that'd work if we don't have an expectation that mod contacts are responded to within 15 minutes 24/7 (which used to be the standard, pre-2015.)
posted by restless_nomad (retired) at 8:42 AM on March 12 [3 favorites]
"Dark pattern" doesn't seem accurate - it's not deceptive, it's inserting a third party's judgement into something that's fundamentally permitted but has the potential for abuse. But it is definitely an impulse that arises from way-back-in-the-day Metafilter history when we had the mod staffing to handle that in a way that could potentially add value, rather than just making everything less likely to work smoothly. It's definitely not something that'd work if we don't have an expectation that mod contacts are responded to within 15 minutes 24/7 (which used to be the standard, pre-2015.)
posted by restless_nomad (retired) at 8:42 AM on March 12 [3 favorites]
I just want to go on record as strongly disliking these conversations that sound like they're a policy discussion but are actually a response to a specific instance, especially because that instance is so rarely described for the benefit of those who didn't happen to be reading the thread where it happened, or didn't happen to see the comment before it was deleted. It creates this frustration situation where I'd like to join in the conversation, maybe, but there are people here who know exactly what they're talking about, and then there are those of us who are only getting vague characterizations. It's part of why, following some recent MT discussions, I've begun to feel a preference for the idea of comments not being deleted, but being hidden with a toggle and a warning, or some such. Constantly talking about incendiary comments whose content some of us know and some of us don't gets very frustrating. And maybe that's just the way it is here, and I should stop hanging out in MetaTalk if I don't like it, but I like hanging out in MetaTalk. I like knowing what's going on with the site, and the people who are invested in it. I just very much dislike this particular dynamic.
posted by Well I never at 8:43 AM on March 12 [13 favorites]
posted by Well I never at 8:43 AM on March 12 [13 favorites]
What happened:
grumpybear69, in a MeTa specifically about discussing the problem of US Americans' tendency on the site to shift threads, no matter the subject, to the US American perspective, posted something along the lines of "CTL-F 'American': 118" or something like that. Implying that the US Americans had, once again, hijacked a thread. Except, as snuffleupagus stated, "CTL-F 'Canadian': 86. This thread is explicitly for discussing the problems of Americanism. Thanks for the armpit fart." A couple other people pushed back as well and a bit later, the mod note from Brandon appeared: "One comment removed at poster's request."
In this case, at least there was some sort of record of the dropped bomb. All too often there is not. And while I see your larger point, Gygesringtone, I don't agree with it. I feel it is better to have some sort of record of people's assholery. If we decide as a community that we don't want that, fine. I'll live with it. I'm just always going to argue for MORE transparency rather than less, and incredibly brief mod notes that tell nothing of the story do nothing for me.
posted by cooker girl at 8:55 AM on March 12 [5 favorites]
grumpybear69, in a MeTa specifically about discussing the problem of US Americans' tendency on the site to shift threads, no matter the subject, to the US American perspective, posted something along the lines of "CTL-F 'American': 118" or something like that. Implying that the US Americans had, once again, hijacked a thread. Except, as snuffleupagus stated, "CTL-F 'Canadian': 86. This thread is explicitly for discussing the problems of Americanism. Thanks for the armpit fart." A couple other people pushed back as well and a bit later, the mod note from Brandon appeared: "One comment removed at poster's request."
In this case, at least there was some sort of record of the dropped bomb. All too often there is not. And while I see your larger point, Gygesringtone, I don't agree with it. I feel it is better to have some sort of record of people's assholery. If we decide as a community that we don't want that, fine. I'll live with it. I'm just always going to argue for MORE transparency rather than less, and incredibly brief mod notes that tell nothing of the story do nothing for me.
posted by cooker girl at 8:55 AM on March 12 [5 favorites]
"Dark pattern" doesn't seem accurate - it's not deceptive, it's inserting a third party's judgement into something that's fundamentally permitted but has the potential for abuse.
Well, it depends what the policy is. If it's what you said earlier-- "mods have always been willing to delete a user's single comment on request"-- I would say that yes, it is somewhat deceptive.
posted by dusty potato at 9:20 AM on March 12
Well, it depends what the policy is. If it's what you said earlier-- "mods have always been willing to delete a user's single comment on request"-- I would say that yes, it is somewhat deceptive.
posted by dusty potato at 9:20 AM on March 12
But for it to be site policy that any user can at any time for any particular reason decide they want to have a comment of theirs disappear -- that just feels like a great way to undermine discourse and really do harm to the site.
this was me way back when in this thread. And I do still feel this way ... except perhaps, maybe when it comes to the "site policy" stuff.
Because on tracking this thread, I am reminded that I'm supposed to be some kind of small "a" anarchist who believes that bottom line, we have too many rules in this world, too many guidelines, too much stuff that encourages and enables what I think of as hallway monitoring and restricts a free flow of successful conversation -- that the way forward is not more rules and/or guidelines which, however well intended, often as not only increase bureaucratic sludge.
So what to do? Maybe just propagate the notion around here that we shouldn't be assholes. And, in the context of this particular discussion, that would include saying something foolish and/or nasty and/or ignorant, realizing we've effectively farted in the elevator, then quickly (or worse eventually) deciding nah, I don't want that on my permanent record. No rule saying you can't do this. But don't do it anyway. Don't be that kind of asshole. Own your mistake and if you feel it needs addressing, then address it with an apology. Which is as simple and as humility driven as:
1. I'm sorry
2. here's that thing I'm sorry about
3. here's what I'll try to do to make sure if doesn't happen again
posted by philip-random at 10:09 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
this was me way back when in this thread. And I do still feel this way ... except perhaps, maybe when it comes to the "site policy" stuff.
Because on tracking this thread, I am reminded that I'm supposed to be some kind of small "a" anarchist who believes that bottom line, we have too many rules in this world, too many guidelines, too much stuff that encourages and enables what I think of as hallway monitoring and restricts a free flow of successful conversation -- that the way forward is not more rules and/or guidelines which, however well intended, often as not only increase bureaucratic sludge.
So what to do? Maybe just propagate the notion around here that we shouldn't be assholes. And, in the context of this particular discussion, that would include saying something foolish and/or nasty and/or ignorant, realizing we've effectively farted in the elevator, then quickly (or worse eventually) deciding nah, I don't want that on my permanent record. No rule saying you can't do this. But don't do it anyway. Don't be that kind of asshole. Own your mistake and if you feel it needs addressing, then address it with an apology. Which is as simple and as humility driven as:
1. I'm sorry
2. here's that thing I'm sorry about
3. here's what I'll try to do to make sure if doesn't happen again
posted by philip-random at 10:09 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
If it's what you said earlier-- "mods have always been willing to delete a user's single comment on request"-- I would say that yes, it is somewhat deceptive.
I'm not sure I understand? It's definitely the current policy.
posted by restless_nomad (retired) at 10:12 AM on March 12
I'm not sure I understand? It's definitely the current policy.
posted by restless_nomad (retired) at 10:12 AM on March 12
Not to sound flippant, but it's not like you know about those earlier comments just because they exist, you have to read them at some point: either when they happened originally, or you have to know where to look to dig them up
Just a UX note here: MetaFilter encourages this type of behaviour (and I think it's interesting) with the "Contributions" column being so prominent and clickable on the user profile page, and the community reinforces this by saying things like (in Ask) "is this the guy from your previous question?"
posted by warriorqueen at 10:38 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
Just a UX note here: MetaFilter encourages this type of behaviour (and I think it's interesting) with the "Contributions" column being so prominent and clickable on the user profile page, and the community reinforces this by saying things like (in Ask) "is this the guy from your previous question?"
posted by warriorqueen at 10:38 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
I think it is somewhat deceptive that the policy makes it sound like users have control over their own content and that asking the mods to delete a comment is just a procedural step, when it seems that in reality there is moderator discretion involved. (I probably wouldn't have called it "deceptive" off the bat, though, I think it's more poorly conceived or stated than deceptive.)
Anyway, 'deceptive' isn't what really concerns me as much as the question of whether users have the right to have their comments deleted or not. What you described is that the "friction" involved in asking a mod to delete a comment potentially diverts people who otherwise want to from deleting their content, which to me feels like a socially manipulative UX feature-- maybe "dark pattern" is not strictly the correct term.
posted by dusty potato at 10:42 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
Anyway, 'deceptive' isn't what really concerns me as much as the question of whether users have the right to have their comments deleted or not. What you described is that the "friction" involved in asking a mod to delete a comment potentially diverts people who otherwise want to from deleting their content, which to me feels like a socially manipulative UX feature-- maybe "dark pattern" is not strictly the correct term.
posted by dusty potato at 10:42 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
Deceptive because it’s not obvious that you can do it? I suppose but
a.) I do concur with the understanding that it’s been possible for a long time
b.) that deletion is possible but goes through a mod feels intentional as a compromise between the way a lot of web forums of this vintage worked and the way moderation on MeFi traditionally was supposed to work
It seems like the biggest holes in the approach are that trust in mods to play that role has broken down, and also that MeFi has a TOS that promises more than the site delivers in terms of control of data.
posted by atoxyl at 10:43 AM on March 12
a.) I do concur with the understanding that it’s been possible for a long time
b.) that deletion is possible but goes through a mod feels intentional as a compromise between the way a lot of web forums of this vintage worked and the way moderation on MeFi traditionally was supposed to work
It seems like the biggest holes in the approach are that trust in mods to play that role has broken down, and also that MeFi has a TOS that promises more than the site delivers in terms of control of data.
posted by atoxyl at 10:43 AM on March 12
A reason I don't comment on this site (much) is the lack of control over deleting comments. I know I'm in a minority, but I will say it, because by definition people like me will be under-represented because, well, I will want to delete this comment later so it's just easier not to write it....
Asking mods to delete comment(s) more than once in your life feels embarrassing and petty and you can only wipe your account once. I posted a poem in that other metatalk against literally all my instincts and that comment will be an upcoming request--when the thread is dead--which is basically now.
Seriously though, on Reddit (and everywhere else) after stuff has gone inactive, I delete everything. It's just me. Buddhist impermanence blah blah. Enjoy Bruce Cockburn's "No footprints"--the whole album is stunning.
It's fine I guess that this community wants more permanence than reddit. But perhaps people wouldn't WIPE EVERYTHING leaving massive holes in the site if they could just choose over time the 20 comments in their history that they want to get rid of. And not have to dedicate a bunch of time at once to the task, copying and pasting URLs into a single message so as not to disturb a mod more than once.
I will note that the last time I asked for two things to be deleted, I was "warned" (this is the only term that seems appropriate) that I was damaging the archive. That's friction, that's a dark pattern (all the more because my first attempt, via self-flagging, was not actioned). I refuse to feel guilty about deleting a 4-year-old comment about my favorite childhood vacation spot with zero favorites in a chatty metatalk but whatever you know.
posted by sylvanshine at 11:05 AM on March 12 [12 favorites]
Asking mods to delete comment(s) more than once in your life feels embarrassing and petty and you can only wipe your account once. I posted a poem in that other metatalk against literally all my instincts and that comment will be an upcoming request--when the thread is dead--which is basically now.
Seriously though, on Reddit (and everywhere else) after stuff has gone inactive, I delete everything. It's just me. Buddhist impermanence blah blah. Enjoy Bruce Cockburn's "No footprints"--the whole album is stunning.
It's fine I guess that this community wants more permanence than reddit. But perhaps people wouldn't WIPE EVERYTHING leaving massive holes in the site if they could just choose over time the 20 comments in their history that they want to get rid of. And not have to dedicate a bunch of time at once to the task, copying and pasting URLs into a single message so as not to disturb a mod more than once.
I will note that the last time I asked for two things to be deleted, I was "warned" (this is the only term that seems appropriate) that I was damaging the archive. That's friction, that's a dark pattern (all the more because my first attempt, via self-flagging, was not actioned). I refuse to feel guilty about deleting a 4-year-old comment about my favorite childhood vacation spot with zero favorites in a chatty metatalk but whatever you know.
posted by sylvanshine at 11:05 AM on March 12 [12 favorites]
As far as how I think it should work, I think snofoam is pretty much on target here. We need better post tombstones (which I know has come up in other MeTa threads recently) but deleting actual comments isn’t such a big issue, assuming that self-deleted comments remain accessible to mods at least in the short term. And as restless_nomad says the current approach depends on high mod availability and I’ve generally been on the side that a site this size can afford to scale down active moderation so it would be contradictory to oppose features that make that possible.
I will point out, though, that some people seemed pretty mad about anotherpanacea making an ass of himself and then immediately wiping his account, so I don’t think the tradeoffs are purely theoretical. But again I think a big part of the issue right now is that the collateral damage of an account wipe makes it attractive as a super-button that says “fuck you” on the way out, and that seems fixable with only minor compromises to user rights.
Another tradeoff with self-deletion is that it seems a little contradictory to putative goals of a mod log. Or I guess not if you think the point is just to watch the watchers but I always thought part of the idea was to make changes to comments less confusing than they tend to be in a non-threaded paradigm. But not necessarily the hardest thing to deal with.
posted by atoxyl at 11:08 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
I will point out, though, that some people seemed pretty mad about anotherpanacea making an ass of himself and then immediately wiping his account, so I don’t think the tradeoffs are purely theoretical. But again I think a big part of the issue right now is that the collateral damage of an account wipe makes it attractive as a super-button that says “fuck you” on the way out, and that seems fixable with only minor compromises to user rights.
Another tradeoff with self-deletion is that it seems a little contradictory to putative goals of a mod log. Or I guess not if you think the point is just to watch the watchers but I always thought part of the idea was to make changes to comments less confusing than they tend to be in a non-threaded paradigm. But not necessarily the hardest thing to deal with.
posted by atoxyl at 11:08 AM on March 12 [1 favorite]
Also I think more options to anonymize without deleting would be just dandy, although again that requires thinking about how to balance near-term visibility for mods to prevent abuse with long-term invisibility because that’s presumably what people actually want and expect.
posted by atoxyl at 11:11 AM on March 12 [2 favorites]
posted by atoxyl at 11:11 AM on March 12 [2 favorites]
Signal-boosting tiny frying pan's comment:
I sure hope there is SOME ability to delete a comment ourselves, no mods, in the new site, with a box appearing saying, "this comment was deleted by the user" like almost every other commenting platform on the internet.
It seems to me that a lot of the confusion caused by disappearing could be heavily mitigated by always having a 'tombstone' marking a deleted comment. This should happen automatically upon any comment deletion -- whether deleted by a mod or by a user (should the site decide to allow that). It is wild that Metafilter leaves no record of it.
Being able to see deleted comment markers makes threads with deletions much more comprehensible. If I see e.g. a couple deletion markers, it is immediately obvious that the next few comments may be replying with some context that's no longer available -- which happens sometimes and isn't a big deal. By contrast, without the markers, sometimes reading a thread that had deletions feels like I've gone temporarily insane or completely missed something. I then have to infer that perhaps comments were deleted (where in the conversation? who knows!).
If the mods also want to, as a manual action, leave a note explaining the context of some of the deletions, great! Go wild. That's probably also helpful. But having automatically created tombstones is such an obvious piece of low hanging fruit at this point.
posted by Expecto Cilantro at 12:05 PM on March 12 [14 favorites]
I sure hope there is SOME ability to delete a comment ourselves, no mods, in the new site, with a box appearing saying, "this comment was deleted by the user" like almost every other commenting platform on the internet.
It seems to me that a lot of the confusion caused by disappearing could be heavily mitigated by always having a 'tombstone' marking a deleted comment. This should happen automatically upon any comment deletion -- whether deleted by a mod or by a user (should the site decide to allow that). It is wild that Metafilter leaves no record of it.
Being able to see deleted comment markers makes threads with deletions much more comprehensible. If I see e.g. a couple deletion markers, it is immediately obvious that the next few comments may be replying with some context that's no longer available -- which happens sometimes and isn't a big deal. By contrast, without the markers, sometimes reading a thread that had deletions feels like I've gone temporarily insane or completely missed something. I then have to infer that perhaps comments were deleted (where in the conversation? who knows!).
If the mods also want to, as a manual action, leave a note explaining the context of some of the deletions, great! Go wild. That's probably also helpful. But having automatically created tombstones is such an obvious piece of low hanging fruit at this point.
posted by Expecto Cilantro at 12:05 PM on March 12 [14 favorites]
assuming tombstone markers, it would nice if they were clickable and some kind of explanation would be available via the "deleter" having clicked the appropriate option:
- off topic
- oops, overreacted
- sorry, wrong thread
- revealed too much personal info
- other
(or whatever)
posted by philip-random at 12:16 PM on March 12 [3 favorites]
- off topic
- oops, overreacted
- sorry, wrong thread
- revealed too much personal info
- other
(or whatever)
posted by philip-random at 12:16 PM on March 12 [3 favorites]
It seems to me that a lot of the confusion caused by disappearing could be heavily mitigated by always having a 'tombstone' marking a deleted comment.
Also please make it look like a tombstone thank you
posted by tiny frying pan at 12:25 PM on March 12 [12 favorites]
Also please make it look like a tombstone thank you
posted by tiny frying pan at 12:25 PM on March 12 [12 favorites]
I’m okay with tombstone markers & being prompted for a deletion reason. I’m okay with apologizing when I’m out of line.
I’m not okay with dg’s proposed terms of service, and I would take my account history and my monthly donation with me if the site took that path.
posted by eirias at 1:03 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
I’m not okay with dg’s proposed terms of service, and I would take my account history and my monthly donation with me if the site took that path.
posted by eirias at 1:03 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
I don't really have an issue with selective deletion in non-active threads and I think there are some excellent points made in this thread which have shifted my views slightly on the big picture.
But the issue at hand is immediate deletion in an active thread when there is conversation by others who are considering the thread as a whole at whatever the scale of interaction they have - minute by minute, daily, every few days or whatever. That is disruptive and not fair to the other participants and should be very rare.
If someone wants to prune their embarrassing older history in some manner on the slim chance someone else wants to drill down into it then why not - the driller into someone else's history is not likely to have pure motivations in any case.
In the case of safety, obviously deletions must be easy and swift.
Maybe the user-enabled delete button should appear for closed threads, and the ask-a-mod deletion procedure for single comments be fused or active threads.
As an archaeologist I have to fight against a "preserve everything" mentality, but even in that discipline it is understood that you can't preserve every last thing, or we'd be up to our necks in the past, that some things missing from the archaeological record were deliberate deletions and that process is itself also of interest, and in any case if everything was preserved there would be fewer gaps to discuss and interpret and theorize and it would be a kind of completionist stamp collecting exercise. Archaeology is a discipline which only exists in the present, about remains which only exist in the present, and it is therefore largely about the present. So people that treat Metafilter as something like a smells-of-smoke Library of Alexandria are, I think, over reacting, though from a place of good intentions.
In any case, nothing ever truly disappears on the internet. I think in another thread there is discussion of Metafilter having dozens of complete (and expensive) backups on the cloud, dating back many years. The Wayback Machine has over 20,000 archives of Metafilter dating back to October 12th 1999 (note the header: "(still testing, so 404s and SQL errors abound)."
When you put something on the internet it is very likely to be there forever for any kind of even lightly-motivated researcher.
The comparisons to other social media are kind of misleading. You can make a new identity on Reddit in 2 minutes for free, in many subs you will never recognize another poster, and while it is very easy to delete a single post (which you need to edit to overwrite it first or it merely disappears like an old DOS file) but deleting your whole history is actually very difficult - even on my relatively light, but long, footprint over there it would take many, many hours. Twitter likewise is massively and redundantly backed up. In both cases you don't need any IRL ID to make accounts, unlike Metafilter which generally speaking needs a credit card and where mods can, unless you have taken strong avoidance actions, connect your sockpuppet to your main if they so wish. (This is a strength of MF as I have noted: it promotes stable identities and therefore some self restraint in being a jerk).
I deleted my Facebook account quite a while ago but decided I wanted to sell some stuff on marketplace so I made a sock puppet and it was surprisingly hard - they require a cell number nowadays and upon making the brand new account they instantly suggested half of my old friends back to me even though all other info was different.
In any case, whatever the similarities and differences I don't think those three other sites are admirable in most ways nor should we be taking our leads from them. If you are disciplined in your curations, a highly selective Reddit is comparable in some ways, and certainly the metafiltermeta sub has trenchant observations of the quirks of this place that would likely get deleted here.
The fact remains though that running to the mobs for deletion of embarrassing comments in active threads should never be the norm. Going back to the comment that is the topic of this thread, I pushed back on it at the time, but really it was pretty mild and non-egregious and I am sorry the poster has apparently buttoned.
posted by Rumple at 1:04 PM on March 12 [5 favorites]
But the issue at hand is immediate deletion in an active thread when there is conversation by others who are considering the thread as a whole at whatever the scale of interaction they have - minute by minute, daily, every few days or whatever. That is disruptive and not fair to the other participants and should be very rare.
If someone wants to prune their embarrassing older history in some manner on the slim chance someone else wants to drill down into it then why not - the driller into someone else's history is not likely to have pure motivations in any case.
In the case of safety, obviously deletions must be easy and swift.
Maybe the user-enabled delete button should appear for closed threads, and the ask-a-mod deletion procedure for single comments be fused or active threads.
As an archaeologist I have to fight against a "preserve everything" mentality, but even in that discipline it is understood that you can't preserve every last thing, or we'd be up to our necks in the past, that some things missing from the archaeological record were deliberate deletions and that process is itself also of interest, and in any case if everything was preserved there would be fewer gaps to discuss and interpret and theorize and it would be a kind of completionist stamp collecting exercise. Archaeology is a discipline which only exists in the present, about remains which only exist in the present, and it is therefore largely about the present. So people that treat Metafilter as something like a smells-of-smoke Library of Alexandria are, I think, over reacting, though from a place of good intentions.
In any case, nothing ever truly disappears on the internet. I think in another thread there is discussion of Metafilter having dozens of complete (and expensive) backups on the cloud, dating back many years. The Wayback Machine has over 20,000 archives of Metafilter dating back to October 12th 1999 (note the header: "(still testing, so 404s and SQL errors abound)."
When you put something on the internet it is very likely to be there forever for any kind of even lightly-motivated researcher.
The comparisons to other social media are kind of misleading. You can make a new identity on Reddit in 2 minutes for free, in many subs you will never recognize another poster, and while it is very easy to delete a single post (which you need to edit to overwrite it first or it merely disappears like an old DOS file) but deleting your whole history is actually very difficult - even on my relatively light, but long, footprint over there it would take many, many hours. Twitter likewise is massively and redundantly backed up. In both cases you don't need any IRL ID to make accounts, unlike Metafilter which generally speaking needs a credit card and where mods can, unless you have taken strong avoidance actions, connect your sockpuppet to your main if they so wish. (This is a strength of MF as I have noted: it promotes stable identities and therefore some self restraint in being a jerk).
I deleted my Facebook account quite a while ago but decided I wanted to sell some stuff on marketplace so I made a sock puppet and it was surprisingly hard - they require a cell number nowadays and upon making the brand new account they instantly suggested half of my old friends back to me even though all other info was different.
In any case, whatever the similarities and differences I don't think those three other sites are admirable in most ways nor should we be taking our leads from them. If you are disciplined in your curations, a highly selective Reddit is comparable in some ways, and certainly the metafiltermeta sub has trenchant observations of the quirks of this place that would likely get deleted here.
The fact remains though that running to the mobs for deletion of embarrassing comments in active threads should never be the norm. Going back to the comment that is the topic of this thread, I pushed back on it at the time, but really it was pretty mild and non-egregious and I am sorry the poster has apparently buttoned.
posted by Rumple at 1:04 PM on March 12 [5 favorites]
- oops, overreacted
Just going to use this instead of whatever I was going to type from now on, thanks :)
posted by B_Ghost_User at 1:09 PM on March 12 [3 favorites]
Just going to use this instead of whatever I was going to type from now on, thanks :)
posted by B_Ghost_User at 1:09 PM on March 12 [3 favorites]
FWIW Brandon's correct, mods have always been willing to delete a user's single comment on request.
This is definitely not correct. Back in the 'golden days of MeFi,' there was no way a comment would have been deleted because a user had second thoughts. The policy intent at the time was that people should stand by their words and think at least a little bit about what they're saying before posting it, then own their words.
Again, acknowledging the very real need of some people to be able to protect themselves because of changing times and, well, rampant facism in some people's lives, I very strongly favour the idea that a person should stand by their words and, just like in the real world, you should get to apologise for or retract regrettable statements, but you don't get to un-say them. However, if it is the community's wish that people be allowed to un-say their words, there must be a marker that something is missing to avoid conversations becoming unreadable for anyone not following along comment-by-comment. Until about a minute ago, I had no idea what had happened in the thread mentioned and couldn't even figure it out from the flow of conversation because I wasn't watching in the moments between the now-deleted comments appearing, being reacted to and then disappearing.
I know some people don't like this being said, but it's also critical that people remember removing anything from the Internet once it's been published is, at best, hit-or-miss.
posted by dg at 3:21 PM on March 12 [7 favorites]
This is definitely not correct. Back in the 'golden days of MeFi,' there was no way a comment would have been deleted because a user had second thoughts. The policy intent at the time was that people should stand by their words and think at least a little bit about what they're saying before posting it, then own their words.
Again, acknowledging the very real need of some people to be able to protect themselves because of changing times and, well, rampant facism in some people's lives, I very strongly favour the idea that a person should stand by their words and, just like in the real world, you should get to apologise for or retract regrettable statements, but you don't get to un-say them. However, if it is the community's wish that people be allowed to un-say their words, there must be a marker that something is missing to avoid conversations becoming unreadable for anyone not following along comment-by-comment. Until about a minute ago, I had no idea what had happened in the thread mentioned and couldn't even figure it out from the flow of conversation because I wasn't watching in the moments between the now-deleted comments appearing, being reacted to and then disappearing.
I know some people don't like this being said, but it's also critical that people remember removing anything from the Internet once it's been published is, at best, hit-or-miss.
posted by dg at 3:21 PM on March 12 [7 favorites]
Comment by BlazecockZombie deleted by BlazecockZombie
at time: 5:10 PM on March 12
selected reason:
contributing to derailModerator view:
Moderators may only view the content of a comment deleted by its own poster within a limited time window; that window has expired and this comment's content has been fully deleted from the database.
posted by a faded photo of their beloved at 3:22 PM on March 12 [4 favorites]
Again, acknowledging the very real need of some people to be able to protect themselves because of changing times and, well, rampant facism in some people's lives, I very strongly favour the idea that a person should stand by their words and, just like in the real world, you should get to apologise for or retract regrettable statements, but you don't get to un-say them.
Another way to think of that question is whether MetaFilter gets to indefinitely re-say them.
However, if it is the community's wish that people be allowed to un-say their words, there must be a marker that something is missingFor sure, every deletion should have a visible tombstone. It was a mistake to ever not have those tombstones.
posted by a faded photo of their beloved at 3:28 PM on March 12 [2 favorites]
I just want to say that I love calling them tombstones.
posted by restless_nomad (retired) at 3:29 PM on March 12 [9 favorites]
posted by restless_nomad (retired) at 3:29 PM on March 12 [9 favorites]
Also please make it look like a tombstone thank you
How's this?
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 4:25 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
How's this?
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 4:25 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
maybe we could earn some backup money if we call them Tombstones™ and have the triangle icon be a lil slice of frozen pizza
posted by glonous keming at 4:30 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
posted by glonous keming at 4:30 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
🪦
posted by Vatnesine at 4:58 PM on March 12 [2 favorites]
posted by Vatnesine at 4:58 PM on March 12 [2 favorites]
The advantage of a padlock over a tombstone is that it gives a sense that the comment is still visible to mods, and possibly things like archive.org
posted by Lanark at 5:19 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
posted by Lanark at 5:19 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
Honestly, and i say this judiciously: i think this MeTa is yet another proxy argument about the elephant in the room, which is that users no longer have any trust in moderation.
I'm not saying it's necessarily a bad thing to hammer out some norms, some guidelines, even some policy here! But i don't think there is any possible norm, guideline, or policy that will actually fix the issue of "do people get to delete their own posts", because that issue is just a layer of paint over the real issue, which is "how do we get users to trust the mods to do their jobs". And that latter? Can't happen until the mods are actually trustworthy, which they currently are very much not.
posted by adrienneleigh at 7:05 PM on March 12 [11 favorites]
I'm not saying it's necessarily a bad thing to hammer out some norms, some guidelines, even some policy here! But i don't think there is any possible norm, guideline, or policy that will actually fix the issue of "do people get to delete their own posts", because that issue is just a layer of paint over the real issue, which is "how do we get users to trust the mods to do their jobs". And that latter? Can't happen until the mods are actually trustworthy, which they currently are very much not.
posted by adrienneleigh at 7:05 PM on March 12 [11 favorites]
"i think this MeTa is yet another proxy argument about the elephant in the room, which is that users no longer have any trust in moderation."
I blame the Clantons.
posted by clavdivs at 9:37 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
I blame the Clantons.
posted by clavdivs at 9:37 PM on March 12 [1 favorite]
- oops, overreacted
posted by B_Ghost_User at 12:22 AM on March 13 [3 favorites]
posted by B_Ghost_User at 12:22 AM on March 13 [3 favorites]
Four letters for everyone against user-driven deletions: GDPR
posted by june_dodecahedron at 1:50 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
posted by june_dodecahedron at 1:50 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
Four letters for everyone against user-driven deletions: GDPR
Here's Article 17 of GDPR, 'Right to erasure (‘right to be forgotten’)':
I think it raises an interesting point that the law technically requires the full erasure of the data for EU users, not the removal of a name or anonymisation. Decoupling it from someone's personal identity isn't enough. The data must also be deleted from Metafilter's own data storage, which I'm not sure is going on, considering the layers of historical backups that must exist.
Another key point is that this doesn't actually require the site to give users the ability to delete their own data. But it does mean that moderators cannot fight against someone wanting to erase their data (such as in sylvanshine's example -- what the fuck, by the way) and must perform the deletion within a reasonable timeframe, unless they're happy to risk EU users taking them to court.
posted by fight or flight at 2:47 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
Here's Article 17 of GDPR, 'Right to erasure (‘right to be forgotten’)':
The data subject shall have the right to obtain from the controller the erasure of personal data concerning him or her without undue delay and the controller shall have the obligation to erase personal data without undue delay where one of the following grounds applies:The lawyers can make of that what they will.a) the personal data are no longer necessary in relation to the purposes for which they were collected or otherwise processed;2. Where the controller has made the personal data public and is obliged pursuant to paragraph 1 to erase the personal data, the controller, taking account of available technology and the cost of implementation, shall take reasonable steps, including technical measures, to inform controllers which are processing the personal data that the data subject has requested the erasure by such controllers of any links to, or copy or replication of, those personal data.
b) the data subject withdraws consent on which the processing is based according to point (a) of Article 6(1), or point (a) of Article 9(2), and where there is no other legal ground for the processing;
c) the data subject objects to the processing pursuant to Article 21(1) and there are no overriding legitimate grounds for the processing, or the data subject objects to the processing pursuant to Article 21(2);
d) the personal data have been unlawfully processed;
e) the personal data have to be erased for compliance with a legal obligation in Union or Member State law to which the controller is subject;
f) the personal data have been collected in relation to the offer of information society services referred to in Article 8(1).
3. Paragraphs 1 and 2 shall not apply to the extent that processing is necessary:a) for exercising the right of freedom of expression and information;
b) for compliance with a legal obligation which requires processing by Union or Member State law to which the controller is subject or for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller;
c) for reasons of public interest in the area of public health in accordance with points (h) and (i) of Article 9(2) as well as Article 9(3);
d) for archiving purposes in the public interest, scientific or historical research purposes or statistical purposes in accordance with Article 89(1) in so far as the right referred to in paragraph 1 is likely to render impossible or seriously impair the achievement of the objectives of that processing; or
e) for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims.
I think it raises an interesting point that the law technically requires the full erasure of the data for EU users, not the removal of a name or anonymisation. Decoupling it from someone's personal identity isn't enough. The data must also be deleted from Metafilter's own data storage, which I'm not sure is going on, considering the layers of historical backups that must exist.
Another key point is that this doesn't actually require the site to give users the ability to delete their own data. But it does mean that moderators cannot fight against someone wanting to erase their data (such as in sylvanshine's example -- what the fuck, by the way) and must perform the deletion within a reasonable timeframe, unless they're happy to risk EU users taking them to court.
posted by fight or flight at 2:47 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
Note that these GDPR provisions apply to "personal data", which has a specific meaning under the Act and doesn't apply in a blanket way to all posts or comments you might make on the internet.
That is, of course, entirely separate from ethical or practical arguments about what should happen to your data on the internet.
posted by quacks like a duck at 2:53 AM on March 13 [7 favorites]
That is, of course, entirely separate from ethical or practical arguments about what should happen to your data on the internet.
posted by quacks like a duck at 2:53 AM on March 13 [7 favorites]
Yep. Here's the guidance on what "personal data" means. Note the suggestion that it should be interpreted as broadly as possible, and includes, for example, someone talking about what times they go to and leave their workplace. So a MeFi comment saying "cool video!" isn't personal data, because it doesn't identify that person in any way. But an AskMe answer talking about a person's experiences training with their local sports team and the name of their closest city will be personal data, even if they never mention their name. Ditto usernames and profile information, especially with the optional widget that provides the location of the MeFi user.
posted by fight or flight at 3:00 AM on March 13 [3 favorites]
posted by fight or flight at 3:00 AM on March 13 [3 favorites]
Usernames are probably not personal data (the GDPR definition of which is pretty close to 'PII' under US law, but larger in its 'subjective' aspects -- sort of a penumbra). And users have control over their profile metadata.
To pick a more prominent site as an example: Hacker News, which only permits comment deletion within two hours and without replies, hasn't been sued under the GDPR yet (afaik).
They do seem to have the same 'mail the mods' guidance for people who feel strongly about removing some particular comment, especially for safety reasons.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:21 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
To pick a more prominent site as an example: Hacker News, which only permits comment deletion within two hours and without replies, hasn't been sued under the GDPR yet (afaik).
They do seem to have the same 'mail the mods' guidance for people who feel strongly about removing some particular comment, especially for safety reasons.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:21 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
Usernames are probably not personal data
From the ICO:
From the ICO:
An individual’s social media ‘handle’ or username, which may seem anonymous or nonsensical, is still sufficient to identify them as it uniquely identifies that individual. The username is personal data if it distinguishes one individual from another regardless of whether it is possible to link the ‘online’ identity with a ‘real world’ named individual.posted by fight or flight at 5:40 AM on March 13 [2 favorites]
An expectation of permanence is one of the big positive differentiating factors for MetaFilter and other old-school forums imo. Conversation is less considered, less interesting and (even...) nastier if you know you can just dirty-delete when you feel like it.
When I want ephemeral, un-findable, un-archived, deleteable conversations then Slack and Discord are great options. And by far my biggest frustration with Reddit is when the perfect solution to an obscure Linux problem has been selfishly replaced with "[deleted]".
"Deleted at user request" mod notes pop up here far more than they used to, and personally I'd like that to happen much less.
posted by Klipspringer at 5:48 AM on March 13 [5 favorites]
When I want ephemeral, un-findable, un-archived, deleteable conversations then Slack and Discord are great options. And by far my biggest frustration with Reddit is when the perfect solution to an obscure Linux problem has been selfishly replaced with "[deleted]".
"Deleted at user request" mod notes pop up here far more than they used to, and personally I'd like that to happen much less.
posted by Klipspringer at 5:48 AM on March 13 [5 favorites]
I think this is the link intended.
Note that's the UK GDPR (I'm not sure how it diverges from the EU's at this point). Its right to erasure is qualified in various ways.
I'm not finding much guidance on how the exception for "freedom of expression and information" has been applied.
To satisfy the GDPR the username could just be obscured. The comments are not subject to deletion as personal information if they can't be linked to an identity. The GDPR provides privacy rights that people are blending with the copyright that Mefi chooses to grant users.
Most social platforms don't do that -- rather they require an irrevocable license to your contributions. They can do what they please with your deletions, and they may be able to retain archived personal data/PII so long as they are no longer publishing it.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:55 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
Note that's the UK GDPR (I'm not sure how it diverges from the EU's at this point). Its right to erasure is qualified in various ways.
I'm not finding much guidance on how the exception for "freedom of expression and information" has been applied.
To satisfy the GDPR the username could just be obscured. The comments are not subject to deletion as personal information if they can't be linked to an identity. The GDPR provides privacy rights that people are blending with the copyright that Mefi chooses to grant users.
Most social platforms don't do that -- rather they require an irrevocable license to your contributions. They can do what they please with your deletions, and they may be able to retain archived personal data/PII so long as they are no longer publishing it.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:55 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
> "Deleted at user request" mod notes pop up here far more than they used to
Part of that may just be because recent previous metas have pushed for the mods to always leave notes, rather than an actual increase.
posted by lucidium at 6:00 AM on March 13 [5 favorites]
Part of that may just be because recent previous metas have pushed for the mods to always leave notes, rather than an actual increase.
posted by lucidium at 6:00 AM on March 13 [5 favorites]
Also, for the UK right to apply (and before considering exceptions) one of these prongs must be satisfied:
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:06 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
Individuals have the right to have their personal data erased if:It seems to me the only ones applicable would be the first two, and it would apply to buttoning; not leveraging these rights to selectively delete single comments while continuing to use the platform. Which would potentially also run up against the 'freedom of expression and information' interest.-the personal data is no longer necessary for the purpose which you originally collected or processed it for; -you are relying on consent as your lawful basis for holding the data, and the individual withdraws their consent; -you are relying on legitimate interests as your basis for processing, the individual objects to the processing of their data, and there is no overriding legitimate interest to continue this processing; -you are processing the personal data for direct marketing purposes and the individual objects to that processing; -you have processed the personal data unlawfully (ie in breach of the lawfulness requirement of the 1st principle); -you have to do it to comply with a legal obligation; or -you have processed the personal data to offer information society services to a child.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:06 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
I set up a feature request form for the new site.
Please check the list of requests to avoid submitting a duplicate.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 8:51 AM on March 13 [5 favorites]
Please check the list of requests to avoid submitting a duplicate.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 8:51 AM on March 13 [5 favorites]
Love it - do want the ability to block a poster, but I want to be able to see that they posted, but it's grayed out, like Mute-A-Filter currently works, or hidden but placeholder visible. If the comments are simply not there for a blocked poster that makes the convo strange. Submitted in case that distinction matters.
posted by tiny frying pan at 9:22 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
posted by tiny frying pan at 9:22 AM on March 13 [1 favorite]
Note that these GDPR provisions apply to "personal data", which has a specific meaning under the Act and doesn't apply in a blanket way to all posts or comments you might make on the internet.
As a long-standing bush lawyer and having skimmed the linked advice in a perfunctory way, I'm inclined to think the GDPR does not mean what people here keep saying it means, but that it does require personal information to be removed, which does not necessarily include published posts or comments. There are cases where specific comments may include personal information and the only feasible way to ensure any comments that do this were removed would be to remove them all, of course. I'm also aware that I am biased toward keeping the record complete, but I don't think people should continue using GDPR as a 'gotcha' for MeFi having to delete anything anyone asks it to. I could pretty easily come up with a half-decent (perhaps half-arsed) argument for refusing to delete anything not included in a user's profile based on a more thorough reading of the legislation.
posted by dg at 2:57 PM on March 13 [1 favorite]
As a long-standing bush lawyer and having skimmed the linked advice in a perfunctory way, I'm inclined to think the GDPR does not mean what people here keep saying it means, but that it does require personal information to be removed, which does not necessarily include published posts or comments. There are cases where specific comments may include personal information and the only feasible way to ensure any comments that do this were removed would be to remove them all, of course. I'm also aware that I am biased toward keeping the record complete, but I don't think people should continue using GDPR as a 'gotcha' for MeFi having to delete anything anyone asks it to. I could pretty easily come up with a half-decent (perhaps half-arsed) argument for refusing to delete anything not included in a user's profile based on a more thorough reading of the legislation.
posted by dg at 2:57 PM on March 13 [1 favorite]
all this stuff about accusing people of “selfishness” and benevolence about “allowing for growth” around deleting their own comments just makes me want to nuke everything even when i’m not inclined to do it in the first place. sure, i’m a child, whatever. but please understand that a great deal of the reasoning against doing it is coming off as really … alienating.
posted by knock my sock and i'll clean your clock at 5:52 PM on March 13 [3 favorites]
posted by knock my sock and i'll clean your clock at 5:52 PM on March 13 [3 favorites]
and my view is that should include an irrevocable licence for MetaFilter to publish any and all posts and comments in their original form and context
I have zero respect for anyone who agrees with this in 2025. Maybe it would sound like a less disgusting position if I didn't work with people who lived through shit like the three-article rule but I can't imagine looking at the world today and saying, "Yeah, let's give people less control over their information." None of the petulant 'they shouldn't have posted it in the first place' and 'you can find it on the Wayback Machine anyway' and 'of course in safety situations people should be allowed to delete' justifications excuse thinking we give people too many rights to their own content and information, actually, and we should take some of those away.
Most social platforms don't do that -- rather they require an irrevocable license to your contributions.
No they don't.
posted by brook horse at 6:23 PM on March 13 [4 favorites]
I have zero respect for anyone who agrees with this in 2025. Maybe it would sound like a less disgusting position if I didn't work with people who lived through shit like the three-article rule but I can't imagine looking at the world today and saying, "Yeah, let's give people less control over their information." None of the petulant 'they shouldn't have posted it in the first place' and 'you can find it on the Wayback Machine anyway' and 'of course in safety situations people should be allowed to delete' justifications excuse thinking we give people too many rights to their own content and information, actually, and we should take some of those away.
Most social platforms don't do that -- rather they require an irrevocable license to your contributions.
No they don't.
posted by brook horse at 6:23 PM on March 13 [4 favorites]
Those are copyright explainers from an advocacy organization and some blog. Go look at the TOS of the major platforms. Not that I think MeFi should impose such a license.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:49 PM on March 13
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:49 PM on March 13
Man, I can think of few sources I trust less to give me accurate information on copyright law than social media platforms’ TOS.
posted by Gygesringtone at 6:57 PM on March 13 [1 favorite]
posted by Gygesringtone at 6:57 PM on March 13 [1 favorite]
The second one quotes the TOS’s directly. I checked some against the actual TOS’s and they’re identical to the quotes. None of them include the term “irrevocable.” Here’s Meta’s, for example.
posted by brook horse at 7:02 PM on March 13
posted by brook horse at 7:02 PM on March 13
“[Y]ou grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, and worldwide license to host, use, distribute, modify, run, copy, publicly perform or display, translate, and create derivative works of your content.” Not irrevocable.
posted by brook horse at 7:05 PM on March 13
posted by brook horse at 7:05 PM on March 13
You are not logged in, either login or create an account to post comments
Full disclosure, I recently asked for a comment to be deleted and in my defense, I had given an answer in Ask that was specifically mentioned as not being a required response.
posted by ashbury at 4:33 PM on March 11 [11 favorites]