Brendan Burgess
Founder
- Messages
- 53,770
I think that Sylvester3 summarises askaboutmoney very succinctly in this post.
Askaboutmoney is primarily an information site
It’s not a social network.
It’s not a forum for chat.
It’s not a forum for entertainment.
There is nothing at all wrong with social networking, chat or entertainment; it’s just that this is not the purpose of askaboutmoney. Go to another website for these. Come back to askaboutmoney for information.
We try to keep the information/chat ratio high. There are other sites where it is very difficult to get the information you want, because you have to wade through so much rubbish to get at the key information. We actively delete rubbish on askaboutmoney.
The guidelines are there to improve the quality of askaboutmoney for everyone
Using meaningful titles improves the chance of getting a useful answer and allows later users to do more meaningful searches
Asking people to post in the correct forum is for their benefit
Bad language adds absolutely nothing to a post. Some people are offended by it, so why allow something which diminishes the experience for a few while adding no benefit?
Moderation is a thankless task for the moderators
The moderators prefer to be asking and answering questions. Moderating posts takes up time. However, we believe that Askaboutmoney is a better site because of it
Some frequent complaints
The overmoderation is killing askaboutmoney – users are going to other sites
It’s a matter of taste. Of course, many people prefer the chat on other sites to the heavy moderation of askaboutmoney. But we are not trying to be the biggest site in Ireland. We are trying to provide a forum to answer questions in a helpful and respectful environment with little chat.
Many people like askaboutmoney because of the heavy moderation. The problem is that people are much more likely to complain about their posts being deleted than they are to compliment the moderators for keeping askaboutmoney free of rubbish.
Some ordinary users would be much tougher if we are to judge by the reported posts.
Why not just move threads into the right forum instead of closing them and deleting the replies?
Where there is a grey area, we move threads. Where there is no grey area, we just close the threads. Why should the moderators have to do the thinking for users who are too lazy to think about the right forum to post in?
Why not edit the title of the thread instead of posting a request to change the title?
Again, it’s up to the poster to think about how best to summarise the question in its title. The moderators do spend a huge amount of time correcting the spelling and editing thread titles for meaning.
Why not simply edit out the bad language from a post?
Why not simply stop using bad language?
Why not be nicer to new posters? Cut them a bit of slack?
We want new users to read the Posting Guidelines and we encourage this from the start.
Why did you close a thread without letting me answer?
Askaboutmoney is primarily an information site. Where a thread turns into a debate, it becomes very repetitive after just a few posts and we close it. There is no best time to close a thread. If we allow you reply, someone else will want to reply to you and so on.
Some posters are very condescending to new posters!
This is an example of problem the moderators have striking a balance between over and under moderation. We delete abusive posts but there are many posts which we don't like, which we leave.
We tell people when they register that the Posting Guidelines on askaboutmoney are very strictly enforced. The introduction to the says:
Askaboutmoney is primarily an information site
It’s not a social network.
It’s not a forum for chat.
It’s not a forum for entertainment.
There is nothing at all wrong with social networking, chat or entertainment; it’s just that this is not the purpose of askaboutmoney. Go to another website for these. Come back to askaboutmoney for information.
We try to keep the information/chat ratio high. There are other sites where it is very difficult to get the information you want, because you have to wade through so much rubbish to get at the key information. We actively delete rubbish on askaboutmoney.
The guidelines are there to improve the quality of askaboutmoney for everyone
Using meaningful titles improves the chance of getting a useful answer and allows later users to do more meaningful searches
Asking people to post in the correct forum is for their benefit
Bad language adds absolutely nothing to a post. Some people are offended by it, so why allow something which diminishes the experience for a few while adding no benefit?
Moderation is a thankless task for the moderators
The moderators prefer to be asking and answering questions. Moderating posts takes up time. However, we believe that Askaboutmoney is a better site because of it
Some frequent complaints
The overmoderation is killing askaboutmoney – users are going to other sites
It’s a matter of taste. Of course, many people prefer the chat on other sites to the heavy moderation of askaboutmoney. But we are not trying to be the biggest site in Ireland. We are trying to provide a forum to answer questions in a helpful and respectful environment with little chat.
Many people like askaboutmoney because of the heavy moderation. The problem is that people are much more likely to complain about their posts being deleted than they are to compliment the moderators for keeping askaboutmoney free of rubbish.
Some ordinary users would be much tougher if we are to judge by the reported posts.
Why not just move threads into the right forum instead of closing them and deleting the replies?
Where there is a grey area, we move threads. Where there is no grey area, we just close the threads. Why should the moderators have to do the thinking for users who are too lazy to think about the right forum to post in?
Why not edit the title of the thread instead of posting a request to change the title?
Again, it’s up to the poster to think about how best to summarise the question in its title. The moderators do spend a huge amount of time correcting the spelling and editing thread titles for meaning.
Why not simply edit out the bad language from a post?
Why not simply stop using bad language?
Why not be nicer to new posters? Cut them a bit of slack?
We want new users to read the Posting Guidelines and we encourage this from the start.
Why did you close a thread without letting me answer?
Askaboutmoney is primarily an information site. Where a thread turns into a debate, it becomes very repetitive after just a few posts and we close it. There is no best time to close a thread. If we allow you reply, someone else will want to reply to you and so on.
Some posters are very condescending to new posters!
This is an example of problem the moderators have striking a balance between over and under moderation. We delete abusive posts but there are many posts which we don't like, which we leave.