Sensitive Claude's Journal: Suggestions on Moderation

OK, I'm back to positive karma. Another example that it is possible to regain yourself from bad karma.

Anyway, I just wanted to provide some suggestions to the sensitive moderators out there on slashdot.

The main thing is this: Keep in mind that when you moderate someone as funny, it does not help their karma, and it can sometimes hurt it if it gets the attention of a moderator who lacks a sense of humor.

What to do about this? Well, first, don't moderate in the first hour or two after a story or poll has been posted. That way you avoid having two or more people simultaneously modding someone as funny, taking them to 4 or 5 and then attracting negative mods which hurt their karma.

The other is to use the moderation of underrated. If you see something that has been both moderated as Funny and a negative, then compensate with an Underrated. Also, if something has already been modded funny, if you mod it underrated it will still contain the Funny tag in the score. Once a comment has been modded Funny, any further mods of funny are just wasting mod points. If you are going to positively mod, try to help people's karma, especially if you like the person you are modding.

We appreciate your sensitivity while moderating.
Thank you.

yah

[Wakko Warner]

Yeah, I was karma-bitchslapped a couple years back for some reason or another too. Never cared to find out why, I just posted a few times a day and was back to posting at +2 by the end of the week.

Getting mod points on slashdot is as easy as posting a link or making some half-assed "joke", usually, though the latter is of course no longer true, as "Funny" no longer counts toward karma.

Why do we even worry about it?

[sam_handelman]

I moderate a story in order that it should attract notice - because I think it is worth reading. I've only downmoderated twice - that's about 1% of the time, given that I moderated nearly once a week for over a year (I post and moderate less often now.)

The effect this has on the karma of the person who posted the story doesn't enter into my decision - nor should it.

I'm sure all the hardcore slashdotters remember the big study of moderation behavior someone did - and they found all sorts of evidence that p

Right Wing Conspiracy

[Penguinshit]

I find my posts now are initially moderated as intended (funny/insightful/interesting). By this I mean the moderation I receive is usually in keeping with the manner in which I post (I rarely post flames, although sometimes do engage in "off topic" side conversations). Many times my posts aren't moderated at all, which is fine.

However, after some time has passed I find that my posts that have been modded up then start to receive negative moderation. This has been rather steady, and I can almost set my