Keeping a group/forum civil and on track can be quite a challenge.
Moderators
have a range of challenges dealing with keeping a group on a track:
- Posters who don't understand what a group/forum
is about (its core focus) and post stuff way outside that focus.
Clutter.
- Bad actors: those spammers/scammers trying to
pull attention away to other things that have nothing to do with the
group/forum, even if they make their post look superficially like it
belongs. I've often seen these go to incompatible or even competing products/services,
and beyond to straight out scams and malware. These bad actors are hoping
that readers are careless, thinking that those links have been vetted
already, and that all vetting is perfect.
- Posters who have a real question or concern, but
provide insufficient information about it, assuming the other participants
are mind readers. There are often several ways the issue or concern could
be taken, so others have to ask clarifying questions back at you to better
understand, and as part of vetting your post.
- Posters who don't speak the same language/culture as the group default/majority.
Tips:
- If posts get through without being held for
review, they have NOT been vetted and can't be trusted like you might
others you already know in the group. Look who posted it, and even there
could be a masqueraded or compromised account.
- Even if the content of a group/forum looks all
good, and you see active moderation happening, bad stuff still sneaks in
and can take some time to be cleared out. Making sure you report such
content helps the moderators see it as they aren't in the group 24/7 (most are unpaid volunteers!).
- If a group/forum has lots of out of scope and/or
junk content, that is probably a group without active moderation. If it is
an area that you'd like to be cleaner and be a part of, try to moderate it by
flagging bad content as moderators can't see it all. You might even be
invited to help moderate, or you can even offer if there is even someone
there who could grant you those technical permissions.
- If your post is answered with questions, they are usually honest, and jumping back at them makes you appear more like the spammer/scammers. Bad actor posters will often use bullying approach to push their suspicious content through, inviting the wrath of the BanHammer (a range of control moderators have to pause or block bad actors).
Summary:
Groups/forums can be useful and fun, but as with any other human activity, we
can have misunderstandings among honest caring people, and we can have bad
actors trying to mess things up one way or another. So be ready for the
occasional such misunderstanding, because none of us are perfect, whether flesh or
artificial. Being nice is just the least friction path forward,
especially for those of us trying to keep the arena of conversation nice.
