Awaiting Moderation: What Does It Mean?

[Anonymous]

After reading through the forums I’m seeing all these yellow topics and comments saying “Awaiting Moderation”. I’ve never seen this before. Whats this mean?

Topic

[sparty83]

It just means one of the admins has to approve the comment.

In the past, if you had two or more links (@ mentions, or links to your album, stuff like that), it would automatically be flagged for moderation
I’m guessing that due to the amount of spam that has appeared in the forum lately, they are being stricter about comments.

[Anonymous]

@sparty83 Ahh that makes sense. Thanks!

[AMslimfordy]

This is a good question @partshade.

We’ve been hit recently by several spam-bombs and are taking actions against this. Therefore new comments by “unapproved” users will automatically require admin moderation. We hope this cuts the amount of spam on-site without severe consequences to the general user experience.

CC @admins

[Anonymous]

@amslimfordy Thanks for clearing this up. I have seen one of these spam attacks on here before and I have to say this is a great thing to have.

[Anonymous]

Another small question. Does this mean that EVERY link and things like that need to be approved or once that user is approved the links don’t need to be?

[AMslimfordy]

@partshade We are still figuring out exactly what is getting grabbed by the system, and how it works in general. We’ll answer your questions as soon as we’re sure of how it’s working.

[Anonymous]

Ok thanks!

[Bird Leader]

I’m watching this closely. If we have too many issues we will make changes. It does look like some replies and topics are getting caught that should not be.

[Optimus_Pig]

“It does look like some replies and topics are getting caught that should not be.”

I would testify to that.

[Immortal… Larry]

Hi, I’m noticing more and more issues with posts not appearing or messages like “awaiting moderation”. Also things like page 17 in the epic/mastery-points thread not showing up in the thread overview. I tried sending a message to admins and amslimfordy, but I only get a message stating “There was an error sending that message, please try again”.

Might I suggest you moderate the moderation?

[Immortal… Larry]

@admins, moderation is fine and understandable, but it would help if it doesn’t take many hours before approving a post. The way it works now it defeats the purpose and discourages people from posting. Especially the first timers who are frustrated with something already (like having a game which isn’t working anymore) won’t be able to get a quick answer.

Moderation in a active global forum like this *only* works if it can be done 24×7 within a reasonable amount of time. Having posts waiting for hours doesn’t work.

[AMslimfordy]

@larry We are a staff of a half-dozen.

[Immortal… Larry]

@amslimfordy, Yeah, I get that. Which is why this is not a very good option… People from all over the world are using this forum, spread out over all the timezones. A forum which takes half a day to include a cry for help is not going to be very productive and Nobody can expect 6 people to moderate round the clock.

What I’d suggest is to either reduce/reverse the moderation or you could consider involving some upstanding members in this forum with the moderation? I’m not applying for any moderation status myself, but perhaps consider allowing gold flingers and higher ratings the possibility to help out in moderating as well.

Any chance you could allow a large group of people to act as a primary filter with some basic rights to approve messages while keeping higher moderation rights to the admins?

[Immortal… Larry]

Editing the first post in Epic’s “Join the birdsnest arena leagues” has now disabled the whole thread due to this moderation…

[Anonymous]

@amslimfordy @Larry does make a good point there. I have seen a few comments and topics that people are asking a question in but they can’t get the answer because nobody can view or reply to the question. In my own words this is getting a bit out of hand. @larry I had that idea in my head about letting other users control the forums a bit but not really for higher ranks. Instead maybe the admins can approve of that user and then they can control the forums. I can guarantee that if we have enough trusted users looking after the forums and acting to problems fast enough that the frequency of spam bombs would drop.

[AMslimfordy]

@larry Actually that thread getting grabbed I think is a very good thing. It is serving the precise purpose we intend.

@partshade That’s not true, primarily because it is foolish to entrust that many users with such high permissions. The average turn-around for moderation is a couple hours. This is not unreasonable. And as said by myself and BirdLeader, it’s a brand new system that we are analyzing and it is going to take time to figure out what’s what. But the best news is that our spam protection is working better than it was last week. And that’s the whole point of the system.

[Anonymous]

Well as long as the system is working I guess that’s all that matters.

[Immortal… Larry]

@partshade, @amslimfordy, you can have a very good functioning system which makes sure nobody will use it.

With regard to the permissions, most systems I am familiar with allow for different level rights to be given to different people. I did NOT say that you should make people admins. All I am suggesting is allowing a small group of loyal birdnesters to become moderators. You don’t need to give them any admin permissions at all. As an admin you also keep the possibility to take this role away.

You are using bbpress?

[SweetP]

@larry, we understand the point you are trying to make, but not all systems are capable of allowing the type of moderation control you feel we should give to “loyal” Nesters. Managing such a group would mean taking time away from the large amount of responsibilities we already have, to train them accordingly. On top of that, we all must take care of our “real-world” lives, which take priority over this virtual community called The Nest.
I think our staff handles the moderation aspect in a very timely manner, unlike other sites that “will respond within 24-48 hours.”

[MVNLA2]

@amslimfordy — I don’t understand why having an entire thread disabled whenever the main post is changed serves a useful purpose. It’s true that I haven’t seen that many spam attacks in action. You said:

@larry Actually that thread getting grabbed I think is a very good thing. It is serving the precise purpose we intend.

On the other hand, I have started several forums with the idea that the main post would be periodically update so it contains the best info. Does this mean that every time I update the main post, the entire forum will go to moderation?

[AMslimfordy]

@mvnla2 When a forum post is edited to contain large amounts of html, I think it’s a good privacy and security protocol to require moderation of that post. The benefits of this new system is that the user who does the editing won’t be “sent to Rio”, but will see the resultant post as pending moderation.

[MVNLA2]

@AMSlimfordy — Does that now mean that I can update the Self-Destroying Levels forum, and it will only go to moderation, not Rio?
Also, does that mean that if I update another main post that
a) contains no HTML, or
b) has a very limited amount of HTML
it will not be moderated?

[Bird Leader]

I have disabled the new moderation feature for now while I try and figure why it’s catching so many false-positives. It shouldn’t be. I will report back when I have something.

cc. @admins

[sal9]

@birdleader It’s seems to be affecting the main comments as well. A few comments are being filtered for no apparent reason.

[Immortal… Larry]

@birdleader Thanks! That’s a great relief, although probably not a solution on the long run. Please don’t underestimate the value of involving loyal nesters (not me!).

@sweetp, There’s plenty involved people in here who don’t need a lot of “training” OR management. As a matter of fact, I am absolutely certain it would reduce the workload for the admins instead of increase it. It is mostly a matter of selection. Is there really nobody in this forum who you would trust to be a capable moderator in your forum?