Scratch

Jonathanpb wrote:

Very well written. 

Just a silly thought: Maybe once you've taken action (eg. removed a bad comment that someone flagged), Scratch could send an automated message to the user that flagged the object, thanking them for helping out? That way people would know if something was taken care of or not, and it shouldn't bother the Scratch Team much, since the message could be automated.

EDIT: Oh, wait... if you report someone that gets banned, what happens?

EDIT: Oh, but the automated message doesn't have to mention it - it could just be something simple like "The object you flagged has been taken care of. Thanks for helping out!"...

EDIT: Wait, but if you flagged multiple objects (let's say five) and you get three of those notifications, you won't know what objects were taken care of... well, the automated message could say what was taken care of, but if you reported a user it would make it quite obvious that the user was banned.

So many edits 
...
(Doesn't this belong in Announcements? It isn't a suggestion (unless you're suggesting that people understand better), and I think people would see it better in Announcements.  )

EDIT: Oh, but the topic name explains...    But I still think it could be in Announcements. 

Heh, I agree - this should go in Announcements. 

Anyhow, it's difficult to get an "automated" message out. Because often, one moderator will say "WHATWHATWHATWHATWHAT DO I DO!?" and try to solve it. Soon, another moderator will step in and continue working on the issue. The system would never know what is finished... Although I do like your suggestion. I can't speak for the main website, though, because I haven't a clue what goes on there.

Regardless, I think there is a balance that should be made between letting the user know things have been taken care of and actually taking care of it while preserving the privacy of the guilty. It's something that could be difficult to find an equilibrium with, though not altogether impossible. Perhaps a simple message after reporting could do the trick?

What about when you don't reply to emails for months

Blade-Edge wrote:

What about when you don't reply to emails for months

It's interesting - lots of times we get emails saying "Please actually reply to this!" So it's clear a lot of people think that we usually don't. Actually - we pretty much always do reply - to almost every message.

There are, of course, exceptions:
1. When the person writing the email uses a lot of profanity, or is otherwise clearly disrespectful towards us or anyone else, really.

2.  When we have evidence that the person sending the message is trying to game or mislead us in some way, or has otherwise exhausted their integrity.

These exceptions can run the range between funny and just plain weird. We don't respond because we don't think it makes sense to feed those dynamics.

But these exceptions are very rare - so I'd say we respond to about 99% or better of the messages sent to us. Of course, we may miss one or two by accident now and then (we get a lot), but that too seems pretty rare. If you know someone who hasn't received a response (and whose message doesn't fall into one of the above categories), by all means please ask them to send it again.

coolstuff wrote:

Jonathanpb wrote:

Very well written. 

Just a silly thought: Maybe once you've taken action (eg. removed a bad comment that someone flagged), Scratch could send an automated message to the user that flagged the object, thanking them for helping out? That way people would know if something was taken care of or not, and it shouldn't bother the Scratch Team much, since the message could be automated.

EDIT: Oh, wait... if you report someone that gets banned, what happens?

EDIT: Oh, but the automated message doesn't have to mention it - it could just be something simple like "The object you flagged has been taken care of. Thanks for helping out!"...

EDIT: Wait, but if you flagged multiple objects (let's say five) and you get three of those notifications, you won't know what objects were taken care of... well, the automated message could say what was taken care of, but if you reported a user it would make it quite obvious that the user was banned.

So many edits 
...
(Doesn't this belong in Announcements? It isn't a suggestion (unless you're suggesting that people understand better), and I think people would see it better in Announcements.  )

EDIT: Oh, but the topic name explains...    But I still think it could be in Announcements. 

Heh, I agree - this should go in Announcements. 

Anyhow, it's difficult to get an "automated" message out. Because often, one moderator will say "WHATWHATWHATWHATWHAT DO I DO!?" and try to solve it. Soon, another moderator will step in and continue working on the issue. The system would never know what is finished... Although I do like your suggestion. I can't speak for the main website, though, because I haven't a clue what goes on there.

Regardless, I think there is a balance that should be made between letting the user know things have been taken care of and actually taking care of it while preserving the privacy of the guilty. It's something that could be difficult to find an equilibrium with, though not altogether impossible. Perhaps a simple message after reporting could do the trick?

At your first paragraph: Maybe when a moderator feels that the issue has been sorted out, they click a button that sends the message? Oh wait, that doesn't really solve what you're saying...

At your second paragraph: Ooh, so when you report something you instantly get an automated message like "Thank you for reporting, we'll take care of it"?    That would be awesome (even though I'm not sure why  )!        

Jonathanpb wrote:

At your second paragraph: Ooh, so when you report something you instantly get an automated message like "Thank you for reporting, we'll take care of it"?    That would be awesome (even though I'm not sure why  )!        

I think there's already something like that - I noticed that, when I flagged a project about a week ago, it took me to a page that said something along the lines of "Thanks for helping to keep the website safe - someone will take a look at it for you"... I'm not sure if the same happens for comments, though    Having one on the comments would be nice, though! 

Lightnin wrote:

Blade-Edge wrote:

What about when you don't reply to emails for months

It's interesting - lots of times we get emails saying "Please actually reply to this!" So it's clear a lot of people think that we usually don't. Actually - we pretty much always do reply - to almost every message.

There are, of course, exceptions:
1. When the person writing the email uses a lot of profanity, or is otherwise clearly disrespectful towards us or anyone else, really.

2.  When we have evidence that the person sending the message is trying to game or mislead us in some way, or has otherwise exhausted their integrity.

These exceptions can run the range between funny and just plain weird. We don't respond because we don't think it makes sense to feed those dynamics.

But these exceptions are very rare - so I'd say we respond to about 99% or better of the messages sent to us. Of course, we may miss one or two by accident now and then (we get a lot), but that too seems pretty rare. If you know someone who hasn't received a response (and whose message doesn't fall into one of the above categories), by all means please ask them to send it again.

Actually, I never got an email back for one message I sent, asking about an automatic removal of one of my projects (Some people flagged a year old project, and it was autotaken off, but it had been up for a year...), but the issue was resolved and the project put back up. Which was fine by me, and so I never pursued it.

Blade-Edge wrote:

I have another question
Why are off-site actions reasons to ban on the site?

Like what? I've never know that to happen. 

Lightnin wrote:

Chrischb wrote:

+1 Flagging a comment feels like a little matter when it's just "click ok" - some people intentionally flag innocent comments as a joke. 

Abuse of the flagging system is strongly frowned upon by ST. When a comment is flagged and removed, we get a message with the comment and a link to the project / gallery page. If someone flags a comment that isn't inappropriate once, we figure it was probably an accident - but if it continues, we'll notify the flagger and ask them to stop, and take further action if necessary.

TheSaint wrote:

Actually, I never got an email back for one message I sent, asking about an automatic removal of one of my projects (Some people flagged a year old project, and it was autotaken off, but it had been up for a year...), but the issue was resolved and the project put back up. Which was fine by me, and so I never pursued it.

I remember that message, and can see our reply in our sent folder! Can you check your spam filters for it? We replied on the 7th of this month. Either way - please let us know if you do or don't find it (I've often wondered if some of our email responses get caught by people's spam filters).

Your right. I just checked, and the reply was in the spam folder. I will be sure to look there in the future. Thanks!

Last edited by TheSaint (2010-11-12 21:08:14)

Maybe you could:
when someone flags a comment/project, they would receive a notification saying "We have taken care of the problem, thank you for bringing it to our attention" or something like that. That way, they don't know if they were banned or if they comment/project was removed, but they know the problem's been taken care of... Something like that?

Lightnin wrote:

Blade-Edge wrote:

I have another question
Why are off-site actions reasons to ban on the site?

They usually aren't.  But in some cases it's kind of obvious that off-site harassment is going on that's really inappropriate and disrespectful. To us, it doesn't make sense to continue providing a free service to people who we know are attacking Scratch or its community members.

And what exactly would you specify as that?

illusionist wrote:

Blade-Edge wrote:

Lightnin wrote:

They usually aren't.  But in some cases it's kind of obvious that off-site harassment is going on that's really inappropriate and disrespectful. To us, it doesn't make sense to continue providing a free service to people who we know are attacking Scratch or its community members.

And what exactly would you specify as that?

One might be a member of a certain group that mocks Scratchers through 'crude cartoon representations', perhaps? 

Lol, who knows? 
Yeah, I think that what Lightnin said is pretty much accurate, they shouldn't offer a free service to people who they know are harassing other people who use it, even if its not on the website.

noey1212 wrote:

well I see RHY is gone but... what about scratchers like me, who never got to see him/her    I  would have really liked to see his so called "legendary programing" I feel i could have used the knowledge of programing, and studied it to make myself a better scratcher. this concerns me also for the fact that... well I never got to play his games. 

You can still view his projects, they are still visible to logged-in users. I can't provide a link to his stuff, sorry, but I'm sure somebody could find it for you.