Bitcoin Forum

One of the disadvantages of self-moderated threads is the risk of accusations of political bias. However, self-moderated threads can be useful to reduce the number of off topic replies and spam. One alternative option could be the ability of a thread starter to restrict replies to certain ranks. This could work in both directions. For example, one could specify that replies could only be made by members or above, or alternatively Junior members or below.

I think, this feature would be welcome in Bounty Section to prevent spam from newbies.

What would the outcome of this be, off-topic replies can be written by any rank, be it newbie or legendary. and this to an extent will be a bit high handed as the forum tries it's best not to restrict forum users from posting, except only on the IT section.
The best option and that which is in use now is simply to remove/delete off-topic replies

You could open a self-moderated thread and make it your rule that you will only accept posts from certain ranks, lets say Newbies and Jr. Members only. Or Sr. Members or above. Mention in your thread that all other replies will be deleted. You have the right to do that but people might ask why you would do it that way? A reply of a member from a lower rank can also engage users in a quality conversation, it is not often the case though.
But I wouldn't limit users replying in my thread based on their rank.

The suggestion isn't a bad one but don't we have specific board for that purpose already? If you're starting a thread and you want only the opinion of higher rank users I guess that most be a serious discussion and it can be posted on the Ivory Tower board for full member above to air their views and if you're looking for lower rank replies (minus newbies) then the serious discussion will give you replies from jnr members above.

Again let's not forget those boards with rank restrictions aren't that active and the same thing might occur to the self moderated topics with rank restrictions

Also I see a big disadvantage to this because it might get abuse, higher rank users might start creating threads just for themselves and this will deprived the lower rank users with quality at hand to contribute/interact with the higher rank users and possibly get reward with merit to rank up.

And we should bear in mind that those boards by design only allow really relevant topics of discussion. If one is found to be repeatedly spamming there, they stand the risk of being restricted or banned.
Making an option to restrict lower ranks on any board is a function that could easily be abused.


There could be accusation of political bias in both scenarios.

I think that this is not necessary. There are self-generated topics where users delete messages that they don’t like. This will increase the amount of abuse.

When you have members with 100 merits earned and on the other hand 100 Legendaries with one or no merit in what is now over a year... I don't think this is going to work too well.


Probably the only section that might benefit from this but somehow I doubt theymos is going to implement something just for that cesspit as we have seen with the topic bumping problem.


he did keep his promise  ;D ;D

Self-moderating is one thing.  Excluding an entire segment of users because you don't feel they're established enough to comment on your thread seems elitist and I don't like it.  My BTC0.00000002.

Bad ideas, in my opinion.
Why?
Even Newbies can contribute something useful, or even extreme high quality.
Let's see the case of an expert in cryptography, someone like nullius, who have bunches of things to contribute.

Experts can lose their accounts somehow, not only due to hack, but also lose accounts themselves by forget their account's details after long period of inactive.
So, what if satoshi some day come back, but forget his/ her account password, or even name of his/ her account. Do he/ she deserve to restrict to make a post?

I known the fact that most of spammers, cheaters, fuders, bad guys come from newbies, but in general that kind of restriction is terrible, I think.

But if it is a self moderated thread,the option like which member can post features are better to add so the thread creator no need to moderate too much just his rules on their thread.

I think that majority of the members have agreed that excluding lower ranks from a thread is a bad idea and the problem you are having is solvable with a creation of a self-moderated thread although it has a bad reputation you can somehow lessen the damage by explaining it in your OP like a form of Note where you explain that "off-topic posts will be deleted", and if you cannot really stomach having a self-moderated thread you can take your chances by simply reporting the post to a moderator.

Yes but I don't think a moderator will delete a reply just because you don't like it. In this case because it is from a Newbie for example. If it doesn't break any rules it is not going to be deleted.
But something tells me that JetCash is asking this not because he is looking to restrict the lower ranks but actually making a thread just to hear their opinion. 

Pfft...that would cut idiotic "nice project" posts down by 90% or more in that section, but unfortunately that's not where the problem really is.  If spam was confined to ANN threads, we'd be golden.

I doubt this suggestion will take seed, as Theymos wouldn't want such a function overused, thereby discriminating against noobs.  The best option is still to make threads self-moderated and to have enough balls to delete posts that don't add anything of value.