How should RPGWatch handle emote reactions going forward?

[Redglyph]

I've done a quick test, but it seems that ignoring someone doesn't hide the emojis, unfortunately.

It's not possible to add someone to the ignore list from the emojis, either. Nor to add them at all if they make their profile private, which surprises me. For example, I can't do it from the profile of that person who's incontinently used the 'rolling eyes', nor can I add it manually from my ignore list because that feature doesn't exist. Maybe there's another way that I missed.

So it seems the forum engine has its limitations. Shame, as it could have been the simplest solution here.

 

[lackblogger]

I've done a quick test, but it seems that ignoring someone doesn't hide the emojis, unfortunately.

It's not possible to add someone to the ignore list from the emojis, either. Nor to add them at all if they make their profile private, which surprises me. For example, I can't do it from the profile of that person who's incontinently used the 'rolling eyes', nor can I add it manually from my ignore list because that feature doesn't exist. Maybe there's another way that I missed.

So it seems the forum engine has its limitations. Shame, as it could have been the simplest solution here.

The whole concept of the ignore feature is a big red herring that get's brought up a lot in this kind of thread as a pointless quick fix.

1. It redirects blame from the individual being harassed back to the individual. An implication that the abused is to blame for noticing they're being abused. Which is absurd.

2. It hides the abuse of any given system from the individual but not to everyone else. Much as we like to pretend we don't, but we all are prone to peer pressure, how others react. If 10 people are literally laughing at you every time you post, but you never see it, you'd naturally look stupider and stupider each time you posted and the number of people laughing at you would increase unchecked. It would very quickly become group think to join in the laughing, as there's no opposing counter.

3. It makes conversations ridiculous more quickly as people converse in different directions or repetitively, not having any clue that a previous poster has either already concluded a point or made the same point.

4. It actually enables abusers even more than the abused as it allows a user to post without ever having to witness the consequences of their actions, so they never get the opportunity to self-moderate. They might eventually get a message from a moderator, but by then the damage has already been done, they might not understand the moderation because it isn't worded in a way that relates to the issue, and, finally, they might just assume it's a personal attack upon them! An abuser can also use the ignore function to boast about who they ignore and encourage other posters to ignore them 'for the trolls'. not much different to emojis, so that every time the abused posts they can say "Why are you talking to XYZ I have them on ignore!" and etc.

5. The whole point of a forum is to exchange ideas, engage in discussion, help out with difficulties and, yes, sometimes have an argument or a joke. An argument isn't necessarily a negative thing, even if it gets heated. If someone is ignoring someone because they don't like opposing views, then a forum likely isn't their ideal habitat. Ergo: If someone has to ignore someone because of off-topic harassment or continued ad-hominem and whatever else, then that's a failure of the moderation. They shouldn't ever need to ignore someone. It''s difficult to blame moderators for anything though, as they are volunteers who don't have time to etc etc etc and people naturally demure from blaming those in positions of power for fear of becoming the one viewed in a biased way the next time.

There's practically zero to be gained from ignoring other users, regardless of what happens when you ignore someone.

 

[Redglyph]

The whole concept of the ignore feature is a big red herring that get's brought up a lot in this kind of thread as a pointless quick fix.

I rather see it as a good solution for small issues that don't require moderation. It means it spares the moderators extra work. How many times did this particular problem occur? It's the first time I see it here, and it's discrete enough to annoy only the person being harassed.

Use the good tool for the job at hand. It doesn't stop the victim or anyone else from calling a moderator if he thinks it's more adequate.

1. It redirects blame from the individual being harassed back to the individual. An implication that the abused is to blame for noticing they're being abused. Which is absurd.

I really don't see it that way. Nobody will blame someone for adding an annoying person to the ignore list. It's actually a wise move in comparison to responding and derailing a thread. It mimics what we should do on the street or at school when we're faced with someone annoying; in most cases, the offender will see that the bait didn't work and will give up.

2. It hides the abuse of any given system from the individual but not to everyone else. Much as we like to pretend we don't, but we all are prone to peer pressure, how others react. If 10 people are literally laughing at you every time you post, but you never see it, you'd naturally look stupider and stupider each time you posted and the number of people laughing at you would increase unchecked. It would very quickly become group think to join in the laughing, as there's no opposing counter.

That's a good point, though it's not the victim who'll look stupid but the offender. At least that's what I thought when I saw the thread in question, but let others give their opinion on that point.

If the group joins the laughing, then it probably means there's another, deeper problem that may have something to do with the poster.

3. It makes conversations ridiculous more quickly as people converse in different directions or repetitively, not having any clue that a previous poster has either already concluded a point or made the same point.

We're talking about ignoring someone's emojis, not his posts. However, it's true that in the general case, some messages are missed, but is that any different than a normal thread when nobody is ignored? People don't read all the posts, nor do they reply at the same time.

Quoting people is the best way to reply, for all those reasons. You can also check the post number to see if anyone posted between you and the original post.

Finally, you don't have to ignore people indefinitely, either. Just do it until the crisis has passed.

4. It actually enables abusers even more than the abused as it allows a user to post without ever having to witness the consequences of their actions, so they never get the opportunity to self-moderate. [...]

It's a false problem. Not everyone puts people on their ignore list, and even if it were the case, I doubt that someone would be mad enough to continue posting without getting any attention, because that's what he's after. It's what I wrote about about his bait nor working. Also, moderators are regularly reading posts, so it wouldn't last long.

5. The whole point of a forum is to exchange ideas, engage in discussion, help out with difficulties and, yes, sometimes have an argument or a joke. An argument isn't necessarily a negative thing, even if it gets heated.

Again, it's not necessary to ignore people indefinitely. I have put people on the list for one day, just because there could have been friction otherwise. Once I cooled off, I removed them from the list. But people who are constantly irritating someone would conveniently remain on that list (unless it's a clear case for moderation).

I think it's everyone's choice to either use that feature for peace of mind or to engage in arguments that are perhaps hopeless and not necessary.

If someone is ignoring someone because they don't like opposing views, then a forum likely isn't their ideal habitat.

Couldn't we say the same about moderation, then? Or, if you really think that, why do you think it's worth making a poll when a troll is throwing a few emojis? Probably because if there's a problem that is different than just a difference of opinion, it's not a question of habitat any more, and it requires other actions than arguing...

Moderation and the ignore list are just two ways to make the problem disappear, but with a different impact on the offender.

There's practically zero to be gained from ignoring other users, regardless of what happens when you ignore someone.

I think I've shown several situations where it's useful - it's all about gradation - but don't use it if you don't like it.

 

[SveNitoR]

The whole concept of the ignore feature is a big red herring that get's brought up a lot in this kind of thread as a pointless quick fix.

1. It redirects blame from the individual being harassed back to the individual. An implication that the abused is to blame for noticing they're being abused. Which is absurd.

2. It hides the abuse of any given system from the individual but not to everyone else. Much as we like to pretend we don't, but we all are prone to peer pressure, how others react. If 10 people are literally laughing at you every time you post, but you never see it, you'd naturally look stupider and stupider each time you posted and the number of people laughing at you would increase unchecked. It would very quickly become group think to join in the laughing, as there's no opposing counter.

3. It makes conversations ridiculous more quickly as people converse in different directions or repetitively, not having any clue that a previous poster has either already concluded a point or made the same point.

4. It actually enables abusers even more than the abused as it allows a user to post without ever having to witness the consequences of their actions, so they never get the opportunity to self-moderate. They might eventually get a message from a moderator, but by then the damage has already been done, they might not understand the moderation because it isn't worded in a way that relates to the issue, and, finally, they might just assume it's a personal attack upon them! An abuser can also use the ignore function to boast about who they ignore and encourage other posters to ignore them 'for the trolls'. not much different to emojis, so that every time the abused posts they can say "Why are you talking to XYZ I have them on ignore!" and etc.

5. The whole point of a forum is to exchange ideas, engage in discussion, help out with difficulties and, yes, sometimes have an argument or a joke. An argument isn't necessarily a negative thing, even if it gets heated. If someone is ignoring someone because they don't like opposing views, then a forum likely isn't their ideal habitat. Ergo: If someone has to ignore someone because of off-topic harassment or continued ad-hominem and whatever else, then that's a failure of the moderation. They shouldn't ever need to ignore someone. It''s difficult to blame moderators for anything though, as they are volunteers who don't have time to etc etc etc and people naturally demure from blaming those in positions of power for fear of becoming the one viewed in a biased way the next time.

There's practically zero to be gained from ignoring other users, regardless of what happens when you ignore someone.

Regarding your last point: I've ignored a select few people over the years, and it is to my benefit: I don't have to read stuff that makes me annoyed. They were never abusive, just obnoxious (in my opinion) and didn't show any propensity for change despite being told what they did.

To me the ignore function is like not hanging out with the coworker who keeps saying things that annoy me. I can listen now and then in both cases by actively seeking out the situation (like showing a post, or sitting at the same table), but often keep to other company.

 

[lackblogger]

They were never abusive, just obnoxious (in my opinion)

And what would you have done if they were abusive?

 

[lackblogger]

If the group joins the laughing, then it probably means there's another, deeper problem that may have something to do with the poster.

You just proved my point about groupthinking and victim blaming. Fell free to respond, as I'm sure you will with lots of ah buts and no, waits, but, yeah, I just sealed it in stone already. I aplogise in advance if this comes across as an unpleasant post you didn't want to read today.

 

[Redglyph]

You just proved my point about groupthinking and victim blaming. Fell free to respond, as I'm sure you will with lots of ah buts and no, waits, but, yeah, I just sealed it in stone already. I aplogise in advance if this comes across as an unpleasant post you didn't want to read today.

Care to elaborate? Though I'm not sure I'll bother to respond if your attitude remains the same. You remained on my ignore list for a long time for a good reason.

 

[Arkadia7]

Yea, the ignore function is not good in some circumstances. That is why I like where on twitter, now X, they have a cool function - mute - where you can stealthily hide the poster's posts to you. This way, the poster (who is being offensive) is unaware of them having been muted, and can keep on posting as many offensive things they want to you, but it simply won't be seen by their target (or anyone else) lol, I think its clever.

Of course, a dedicated troll can log in under a different account and then see if their posts got muted, and then start harassing the person with a new account, but they probably will quickly run out of patience if they get blocked or muted again on the new account. Anyway, probably unnecessary here, we don't need such sophisticated tools. Indeed, the guy who was doing this I saw already stated that they will stop doing it, so maybe time to just move on at this point.

 

[Redglyph]

Of course, a dedicated troll can log in under a different account and then see if their posts got muted, and then start harassing the person with a new account, but they probably will quickly run out of patience if they get blocked or muted again on the new account.

Perhaps I misunderstood because what you described is the ignore feature we have here. Does their mute feature hides the offender's posts to the victim or to everyone (which I doubt)? Why would someone else (the offender) see something special from a different account?

Or do you mean the mute hides the victim's posts to the offender (which would be devious indeed )?

 

[Arkadia7]

Oh, looks like I got part of it wrong. Mute on twitter only hides the tweets to you, but it doesn't block them from other people being able to see the tweet to you. I think. (its kinda confusing to track this down) Whereas Block definitely stops the other person from replying to you, but they get notified that they got blocked, where mute is stealthy with no notification.

It is described as a way to stay on friendly terms instead of blocking them you can mute them, which is a gentler form of blocking apparently.

 

[Redglyph]

Oh, looks like I got part of it wrong. Mute on twitter only hides the tweets to you, but it doesn't block them from other people being able to see the tweet to you. I think. (its kinda confusing to track this down) Whereas Block definitely stops the other person from replying to you, but they get notified that they got blocked, where mute is stealthy with no notification.

It is described as a way to stay on friendly terms instead of blocking them you can mute them, which is a gentler form of blocking apparently.

That's interesting. Though in a forum, it would still be possible to make harassing posts without directly quoting the victims but in a way that obviously targets them (except maybe in the victim's own threads, if that's part of the blocking feature). I suppose people have tried all sort of solutions, but nothing is perfect.

I'm a little sad it's not the 'devious' solution; it would be so delightfully confusing. It may even work.

 

[wolfgrimdark]

The mute feature on Twitter is rather nice really. I look at it this way. Ever have a friend or family member you like OK but sometimes really disagree with over certain things? So, maybe they are going off lately on some of those touchy subjects and yo don't want to read them because you find them annoying, and also afraid maybe you will say something you will regret later, but you don't want to block them as you want to remain on okay terms with them. So you mute them for a while. They can still DM you, and you can see if they post and it says they are muted ... but they don't know that. They won't know even if they have multiple accounts. If they tag you in a post you will know it, so can respond if you want.

In general mute is a perfect way to avoid a person without them knowing about it, in case you just need a break and don't want to actually block and unfollow/unfriend them.

Block, however, is clearly seen by the user you block and also removes any ties with them.

Here there is only ignore, which I mainly use for short intervals when I feel someone is being annoying, or I feel I am getting sucked into a pointless debate that I find easier to ignore (not react to) if I ignore the person that is annoying me.

If ignore doesn't block emoj's then that is too bad as block should really block all forms of communication from the person being blocked.

 

[Taluntain]

Maybe there's another way that I missed.

Find any post from the user you want to ignore, click on the username on the left of the post, then click on Ignore at the bottom of the overlay card.

 

[lackblogger]

Feel free to ask if anything is unclear.

When does the Poll end?

 

[Taluntain]

Regarding the ignore feature, it really is a problem that it omits ignoring reactions completely, so it's of no use in a situation where you primarily don't want to see another user's reactions to your posts. This has been requested for implementation in XF years back, but there's no sign of it happening anytime soon (if ever). Which is really odd, because sensibly, nobody who puts a user on ignore would want to continue seeing their reactions either. So I'd treat this as an oversight, but either the XF devs have their own strange ideas about this, or just don't care about it (more likely).

There is an addon that would enable the ignoring reactions functionality, but it also comes with some other features that we might not really need (though that can always be turned off). It's 90 bucks, but we could raise that in donations easily enough if there was interest among members to have this implemented.

 

[Taluntain]

When does the Poll end?

Not while there's still an active discussion about it, it's not like we're in a huge rush here.

 

[Redglyph]

Find any post from the user you want to ignore, click on the username on the left of the post, then click on Ignore at the bottom of the overlay card.

Thanks for the tip. I thought clicking on the name on the left of the post would give the same result as clicking on the name beside the reaction.

And if the user didn't post, it can be found by searching all posts by X. Easy enough. Anyway, as you mentioned later, it's useless for reactions. Thanks for checking that too!

 

[SveNitoR]

And what would you have done if they were abusive?

I would report them to mods.

 

[Redglyph]

Here there is only ignore, which I mainly use for short intervals when I feel someone is being annoying, or I feel I am getting sucked into a pointless debate that I find easier to ignore (not react to) if I ignore the person that is annoying me.

If ignore doesn't block emoj's then that is too bad as block should really block all forms of communication from the person being blocked.

I do the same. The nice thing about the ignore in this forum is that, a little like Twitter apparently, if you're quoted by someone you ignore, you'll see the post - not the content, but the fact you see the post tells you that you've been quoted. So you can also use them without hurting someone's pride too much (nice if it's temporary).

I have no idea for the PMs, though... I'll have to ask someone I'm ignoring.

 

[SirJames]

Just to chime in on this; no matter what the results of this poll will be, removing reactions completely is not something that I would consider as I don't think that there is any reason to remove the positive and/or neutral reactions. Personally, I would prefer to keep the mildly negative ones as well because misuse so far has been so rare that I don't really see any reason to remove them over that as long as there is an alternative offered in the form of staff action.

RPGwatch and other old-style forums are good because they're NOT like the big tech platforms.

Wanting to make a place on the internet to discuss RPGS is perfectly innocent - but the big tech platforms sit around discussing how they can get people addicted, get more clicks, more view time, easier interaction, encourage doom-scrolling, show users more ads, etc. If the "inventor of the facebook Like" is to be believed, Like was a mechanism designed to provide addictive dopamine hits that feel rewarding. But, just as often, Like make users feel bad when someone doesn't Like their post. Which is actually, conveniently, even more addictive as users will return more often looking for their friends Like - similar to a junkie waiting hours for their dealer to show up - and while they wait, they scroll.

Emote reactions are entirely in the addiction mechanics category; they're not intelligent discussion. They're lazy, discourage real replies and, as we can see from negitive emote spam, offer an effortless way for people to be disruptive and troll people. We're having this discussion because emote reactions have the capacity to upset people but we're only looking at half the picture - ignoring what the absence of Likes does to peoples brains. Instead of posting naturally, people will sub-conciously start to pander in an effort to ensure they're getting their Like. Posts become corrupted. Post length becomes shorter, frequency goes up. Quality declines.

This sort of thing is why the internet sucks now.

To Big tech platforms, whether you're being made happy or sad is completely irrelevant - all that matters is the amount of time you're using the platform. They know they're fucking with peoples heads, ruining peoples attention spans, literally causing mental illness. But small sites might naively copy the big guys to get with the times without understanding these sites are evil.

Emote reactions should never have been added to this site and should be removed to restore RPGwatch back to the glory days. The site has just been going downhill since they were added. Any users in favour of them are simply caught in the addiction loop but if they get a good old-fashioned real reply they will feel just as rewarded.

Avoid incidious modern addiction mechaincs - encourage old-internet forum discussion.