Okay, we've been through another round of discussion about how to try to bring the level of civility back up here.
I'm of two minds about this. On the one hand, I like that we duke it out around here and aren't expected to act like we're in Pleasantville.
On the other hand, things have gotten to the point where you can't discuss some very real political issues here (I/P, anyone?) without finding yourself in the midst of an irrational mess of unfounded accusations, name calling, conspiracy-theory, paranoia and sheer junk thinking.
I think that part of what we're seeing here is that we are being affected by the dragging down of the nation's political discourse. When you see the kinds of things the Teabaggers are saying, it makes it a little easier to go in that direction, telling yourself that it's okay because you haven't gone as far as THEY would.
But I think we can help this matter considerably by improving the technology of the site to improve accountability to standards and set some real, measurable benchmarks for whether or not HRs are being abused.
More after the jump.
I'll begin with Trusted Users, and abuse of Hide Ratings, which I see as rampant.
Now, everyone knows that assignment of TU is accomplished through a mysterious and magical algorithm involving recs and level of participation. But frankly, I've seen some pretty outrageous statements by TUs, and abuse of TU status is commonplace. Many of those with TU status are simply HRing opinions they disagree with, despite this being against the rules.
In my opinion, the only way that this can be resolved is if there is a system beyond the monitoring by a few humans to enforce the rules. And I think that's achievable with a minor technological fix.
What I propose is that when a TU clicks to HR a comment, a small pop-up menu should be invoked containing checkboxes indicating the reason for the HR. These reasons, of course, will only be the ones allowable under the site rules. The reasons checked would be visible as a label on the comment, showing the username of the TU who applied the hide rating.
This will enable collection of data on HRs, and will make someone issuing an HR accountable for WHY s/he dropped one, in a manner that is visible to all. The frequency of use by a given TU and the reason given for each HR can be captured in a database, and if a pattern of excessive use emerges, there will be a real-world record to revisit, to examine whether the user is abusing her/his privilege.
In other words, there would be some accountability to go with TU status. It's no surprise that power without accountability leads to abuses.
Programming this feature would take some work, but I can't imagine it would be THAT much work. And the added level of accountability would, I believe, go a good way toward improving accountability of TUs, anyway.
This system would also go a long way towards improving conduct on the part of everyone else, because when HRs are applied, they will be far more likely to mean something. Right now, it's frequent for an HR to be followed by a debate about its legitimacy and "counter-recing" to offset an HRs impact. If a TU has to think about what application of an HR will mean to her/his OWN status and credibility, s/he will be more judicious in using that ability, and when it is applied, it's far more likely to be accurate. A user who is chronically getting HRed under a system where an HR has some real credibility will be endangered with banning, and the oversight of folks like Meteor Blades can be focused on looking for TUs who may be abusing their privilege and non-TUs who have high incidences of HRs.
It isn't perfect, but it's something. I don't think behavior standards can be meaningful if there isn't some relatively objective way of tracking behavior.
So, that's it. What do y'all think?