Moderating

[loobloke]

After seeing my reasonably thought out non-trolling post moderated sometime this morning, amongst countless others it is slightly ticking me off. I've been watching the coughing for quite a while now.
http://www.australianfrequentflyer....ed-virgin-experiences-32063-6.html#post474334

What I said in my moderated post (which was written up before everything was mass deleted last night) was
1. It is unnecessary for Jack Melon and Noob to defend the Virgin product, the product itself will defend itself.
2. Most of us a knowledgeable flyers, we can arrive at our own conclusions based on all our years of experiences, we don't need someone else making our own conclusion for us.
3. These fan boi posts are not encouraging people to fly Virgin but more likely to drive them away.
4. Take all the childish rubbish and coughing to VA's facebook page and leave it there.

Lately, the Virgin forum has become quite irritating, and I can assume that many members and less encouraged to participate now, myself included. You are going to be left with a forum without discussion and a wealth of knowledge but a forum filled with ridiculously biased and often poorly substantiated posts about how awesome a certain company is, and why everyone should be flying them. If you want the forum to be a little cheering ground for Virgin where the same members can post biased opinions rather than a place to share knowledge and information then say so now and stop wasting everyone else's time.

All my flights are paid for with my hard earned cash. That gives me and only me the right to decide where I want to spend it. I don't want to see every second post telling me to fly Virgin (I mainly do but that is irrelevant). I want facts, information and experiences from other members so I can judge what is best for me. Provide the facts, remove the bias and the encouragement to conform, and let us make our own opinions. There is quite a difference between self funded travel and one that is paid for, as many of you will know from personal experience.

The standard of that forum is declining, and it's not just due to certain posters, but also to moderators who give them the freedom to post any rubbish they like, and when other members point out faults, everything is edited and deleted. And you don't have to guess which group of posters will run out of patience faster and stop frequenting that forum.

That forum was amazing when I first starting reading here a good while ago. Now I'm quite disappointed in the state of it.

So my thoughts.
Decide what you want out of that forum, inform everyone so we can decide if we actually still want to be a part of it, then compliment the rules around that goal.

PS: I'm going to be extremely disappointed if this is deleted or moderated in anyway without first consulting me.

 

[nlagalle]

I'm agreeing with you here. I did read those posts last night and found them gone this morning..

What annoys me is no airline is perfect, yet some are posting as if they work for them! I'm a well known QF fan, but I won't defend them at every post.. Everyone has their own opinion.

I also wonder how much flying experience some have had, honestly some posts sound like they were written by a 15 year old..

My 2 cents worth..

 

[samh004]

Lately, the Virgin forum has become quite irritating, and I can assume that many members and less encouraged to participate now, myself included. You are going to be left with a forum without discussion and a wealth of knowledge but a forum filled with ridiculously biased and often poorly substantiated posts about how awesome a certain company is, and why everyone should be flying them. If you want the forum to be a little cheering ground for Virgin where the same members can post biased opinions rather than a place to share knowledge and information then say so now and stop wasting everyone else's time.

While there are quite a few Virgin Australia fanbois (any girls?) right now, the fault isn't just with them, but some of the Qantas fanbois that quite often troll them. If certain members didn't actively go out of their way to start these arguments, there wouldn't be any.

I thought the old adage, if you have nothing good to say, don't say anything would be quite true here, but of course, that's never going to happen. Oh, and if you think this is bad, you should see what's being said about people behind their backs on twitter. Just saying!

I also wonder how much flying experience some have had, honestly some posts sound like they were written by a 15 year old..

What a very trolling post considering what you know. Perfect example of the two sides of AFF actively starting cough. No offence, but you're just winding said member up, you couldn't be more blatantly trolling at this stage.




 

[loobloke]

My edited portion wasn't trolling. There was some clear trolling by both sides of the fence last night.
I've repeated what I wrote in my post. I took great care to make sure what I was writing wasn't trolling.

However trolling is only one of the contributing factors to the declining standard of that forum...

 

[markis10]

I thought the old adage, if you have nothing good to say, don't say anything would be quite true here, but of course, that's never going to happen. Oh, and if you think this is bad, you should see what's being said about people behind their backs on twitter. Just saying!



Good thing twitter is private

 

[samh004]

My edited portion wasn't trolling. There was some clear trolling by both sides of the fence last night.
I've repeated what I wrote in my post. I took great care to make sure what I was writing wasn't trolling.

However trolling is only one of the contributing factors to the declining standard of that forum...

I honestly haven’t seen any of your posts before and I missed all the excitement last night and this past week really as I’ve been busy in the garden, but I wasn’t suggesting you were trolling, certain others perhaps.

As you say, there’s a lot of factors at play.

 

[munitalP]

Good thing twitter is private

Thats true markis10, otherwise, who knows what would get reposted on these forums...

You know, just saying...


munitalP

 

[markis10]

Thats true markis10, otherwise, who knows what would get reposted on these forums...

You know, just saying...


munitalP

Or resent via PM

 

[munitalP]

Or resent via PM

LOL




anyway, my 2c worth re moderation:

Ive been hung drawn and quarterd by mods, banished, told off and even phoned, but I still come back - they do a good job of trying to keep the peace.

Some people are idiots, some people are professors - most of us are hopefully in between. In the heat of the argument, it feels that the MODS are too heavy handed, but a thread I started a long time ago actually tried to instigate the MODS had even more power to control individuals but was closed down as this was not wanted by the site owners. Their site their rules. My only comment other than what's said is there is a fine line between a draconian rule and a firm rule...

munitalP

 

[notzac]

All my flights are paid for with my hard earned cash. That gives me and only me the right to decide where I want to spend it. I don't want to see every second post telling me to fly Virgin (I mainly do but that is irrelevant). I want facts, information and experiences from other members so I can judge what is best for me. Provide the facts, remove the bias and the encouragement to conform, and let us make our own opinions. There is quite a difference between self funded travel and one that is paid for, as many of you will know from personal experience.

+100000 .. a bit over the Virgin cheer squad to be honest. In the past 6 months the signal to noise ratio in the Virgin Australia forum has dropped pretty low :-|

I also wonder how much flying experience some have had, honestly some posts sound like they were written by a 15 year old..

Amen brother.

Oh, and if you think this is bad, you should see what's being said about people behind their backs on twitter. Just saying!

Really? Do people have nothing better to do with their time?

 

[oz_mark]

anyway, my 2c worth re moderation:

Ive been hung drawn and quarterd by mods, banished, told off and even phoned, but I still come back - they do a good job of trying to keep the peace.

No beatings yet? :mrgreen:

 

[markis10]

Ive been hung drawn and quarterd by mods, banished, told off and even phoned, but I still come back - they do a good job of trying to keep the peace.

And we still manage to catchup for a drink (or two) once in a while, amazing, I thought forum posts were the be all and end all of life .

Seriously, the moderation team is here to enforce the rules of the forum, including the unlikely event one gets broken by a peer, and members are welcome to post what they wish within those rules, which dont have constraints on age/race/religion or Apple product users.

At the end of the day, the more vocal the opposition is through its own work or its customers, the more likely your favourite organisation is going to react in a way the benefits you as it responds to that increased competition, something we can all drink to (even if its non alcoholic).

 

[Lawlass]

Wow, I was all set to agree with the OP about arbitrary over-zealous moderating on AFF (a bugbear of mine), then kept reading and realised he/she wants MORE moderating of posts he/she doesn't agree with and LESS moderating of his/her own. All respect totally lost by the end of the post.

So on the other topic of this thread, as someone who doesn't have loyalty either way between QF and VA, I have to say IMHO the biggest zealots are on the QF side who seem to get personally offended when anyone suggests that maybe VA equals or surpasses QF in any respects. It's like they spent all this time building up their lifetime SCs in QF and are terrified that something better is going to come along.

But then, fanbois on both sides are pretty funny and I just reckon none of it should be moderated so the rest of us can enjoy the show.

 

[pauly7]

I am not sure what Sam is alluding to, but question why you would accuse someone of trolling. Really. Is there something going on there?

Moving on:

I'd have to agree with the a change of the forum from what used to be quite professional and trustworthy to becoming pretty loose and spammy, certainly in a couple of sub forums.

But I am at a loss however what the mods can really do? I don't think AFF was ever positioned as a more serious professional network - it just happened to evolve that way with the nature of the frequent flyers and knowledge holders contributing. Which was fantastic! I think that is now changing a bit...

On the mods : pretty much all can do is moderate when people attack each other rather than the subject which is fine, but they certainly aren't tasked with upholding standards and quality of conversation and topics.... Could that ever be a remit? I don't know... It would need some tight guidelines from Admin I'm sure...

For me personally I want to hear about VA new developments without a chorus of inaccurate, repetitive praise and also read about all the Qantas changes without the same and then people then cross posting the same inaccurate info promoting VA (again). It's just filling threads with rubbish. Then people react to rubbish and the topic goes off thread.

Pretty much the only solution I can think of is for individuals to start blocking said consistently spammy/inaccurate posters yourself so you don't see their posts and just hope that any newbies don't take their advice!!

My thoughts

Not losing sleep over it.

 

[nlagalle]

While there are quite a few Virgin Australia fanbois (any girls?) right now, the fault isn't just with them, but some of the Qantas fanbois that quite often troll them. If certain members didn't actively go out of their way to start these arguments, there wouldn't be any.

Yes there are Sam, but I have seen more where instead of a thread being hey look what virgin have done to be, hey Virgin is done this and is so much better than QF. Tt's deliberate (or naively) posting that will inflame people. There are plenty of examples posted in the last 2 weeks of this.

I've also posted many times people have their own preference to who they want to fly with and they will think said airline is better.

What a very trolling post considering what you know. Perfect example of the two sides of AFF actively starting cough. No offence, but you're just winding said member up, you couldn't be more blatantly trolling at this stage.

Actually Sam, I was commenting on the style of writing to be immature - which I still believe it is, based solely on how it is written (and not what I have now read on deleted posts). I'm not winding any member up, but merely commenting on how their writing style comes across.

 

[medhead]

Once I again I've been walking around with my head where the sun don't shine.

Isn't the answer to ignore (not block) and not respond*, then contribute facts when you have them.


* yes I wrote that and I realise the irony. Let's say I have been born again, until I have a relapse.

 

[straitman]

After seeing my reasonably thought out non-trolling post moderated sometime this morning, amongst countless others it is slightly ticking me off. I've been watching the coughing for quite a while now.
http://www.australianfrequentflyer....ed-virgin-experiences-32063-6.html#post474334

What I said in my moderated post (which was written up before everything was mass deleted last night) was
1. It is unnecessary for Jack Melon and Noob to defend the Virgin product, the product itself will defend itself.
2. Most of us a knowledgeable flyers, we can arrive at our own conclusions based on all our years of experiences, we don't need someone else making our own conclusion for us.
3. These fan boi posts are not encouraging people to fly Virgin but more likely to drive them away.
4. Take all the childish rubbish and coughing to VA's facebook page and leave it there.

Your post was partially deleted because, in your own words, it was off topic.

 

[LiamR]

Wow, I was all set to agree with the OP about arbitrary over-zealous moderating on AFF (a bugbear of mine), then kept reading and realised he/she wants MORE moderating of posts he/she doesn't agree with and LESS moderating of his/her own. All respect totally lost by the end of the post.

So on the other topic of this thread, as someone who doesn't have loyalty either way between QF and VA, I have to say IMHO the biggest zealots are on the QF side who seem to get personally offended when anyone suggests that maybe VA equals or surpasses QF in any respects. It's like they spent all this time building up their lifetime SCs in QF and are terrified that something better is going to come along.

But then, fanbois on both sides are pretty funny and I just reckon none of it should be moderated so the rest of us can enjoy the show.

I agree with you Lawlass.

However, I think we need a balance on AFF. People need to give a even, non-bias view of an airline. I think lately that 'balance' we need for AFF to function has been tipped to one side, this is mostly due to all the improvements Virgin have made.

Users need to report based on flying experience, sitting on your computer discussing how amazing another business is (No names here) will not help the community and any valid ideas can become lost.

Don't get me wrong, I'll praise Virgin when they do something fantastic, but I'll be the first to point out a flaw within the airline. Considering most of my travel is still on Qantas. I treat them the exact same way.

In my view, AFF is an online community where people gather to discuss their flying experiences. It has changed a bit over the past few weeks, but I'm sure, it the dust will settle soon and all should be fine.

Please, if anybody disagrees with me, I'm happy to discuss it with you in an open and honest way. PM me if you don't want to have a public discussion.

LiamR.

 

[jakeseven7]

Your post was partially deleted because, in your own words, it was off topic.

LMAO...uh doubt it.

At least tell the whole truth straitman

If you partially deleted every post that was off topic you'd need 100 mods!

To test your statement the off topic text below should disappear:

Rebecca Black 'Friday' is the best song eva'

 

[medhead]

LMAO...uh doubt it.

At least tell the whole truth straitman

If you partially deleted every post that was off topic you'd need 100 mods!

To test your statement the off topic text below should disappear:

Rebecca Black 'Friday' is the best song eva'

I seriously can't believe you posted this.