[Seattle-editorial] editorial policy thoughts continued..

[Jason Reep]

more thoughts on the editorial policy questions at hand:

seems like two main types of posts are the problems right now:

1-hate speech.  this one was almost put into the automatic hide category 
at the beginning, but defining it became to difficult and it was sort of 
folded into the safe space principle as a hide that required 
notification.  we know it when we see it but it's hard to say what it 
consists of beforehand.  seems like it's dominating the wire right now 
and aggressive action is needed.  that's fine.  i seem to remember that 
we've had sort a three tier system: posts we hide automatically without 
the need to report; posts we hide automatically but report after the 
fact; and posts that requrire consensus before hiding.  I think that the 
editors are already empowered to hide hate speech under the principle of 
maintining a safe space and notify the group after the fact.  if the 
volume is too great to post to the list every time a hide is made, then 
keep a list and post once a day to the list.  it's about accountability. 
  I'm on the fence about the use of pseudonyms.  the need to not subject 
ourselves to personal harrassment is great but so is the need to remain 
accountable to each other and the readers.

2-posts that make the newswire less useful as a news resource:
this is more ambiguous.  it includes things that pose as real articles 
but are really right-wing screed. often a pattern can be identified or 
it's an individual poster.  they can be handled on a case by case basis 
by posting a hide proposal to the list and get silent or active 
consensus.  I think that we have used a short time frame for silent 
consensus on hide proposals in the past, maybe three hours. Or, a 
special hide proposal to actively hide an individual poster under 
whatever name they use.  Often it can be determined that the same poster 
is responsible for posts under many names.  after such a proposal is 
made and approved then no more discussion is necessary to hide that 
indivduals posts from that point forward.  I can't see many ways to 
remove any steps from this.  We shouldn't make it too easy to remove 
'posts we don't like' by automatically hiding them because they are 
making the newswire less useful.

so. i want everyone to know that i intend all of my comments to be 
constructive and help move the process forward.  i agree that the 
newswire needs cleaning and that the entire mission of the website is 
subverted if it is allowed to wallow.  i'm not against hiding posts. 
i'm against the zeal to do make it really easy to hide posts.  it 
shouldn't be easy.

i'm open to the possibility of further defining for speedy hiding 
(1)hate speech and (2)ambiguous posts intended to disrupt the usefulnees 
of the newswire as a useful media resource.