Community Report Evaluation System

Scratch has limited Scratch team members and resources. As the platform grows more ST members will be needed. Moderation takes up a significant amount of resources, and Scratch is a non-profit. So, my suggestion is simple: when a comment is reported, Scratch finds two currently active Scratchers and asks them if a reported comment is inappropriate. If both agree it is inappropriate, it will be taken down and the user who wrote it will receive a normal temporary ban, and vice versa. If they disagree, then it will be sent to ST.

Extra details:
New Scratchers shouldn't have the ability to decide
Users should lose the privilege to judge if they consistently do false evaluations
Users should have the option to disable these notifications
Users should have to be over a certain age
Users must consent to receiving these

This will help ST members' time be put to better use than moderation and save ST resources.

Pros:
ST will save resources
Scratchers will have a new importance to the community

Cons:
Users could make false evaluations
Young users could be exposed to vulgar comments.

LOOKING FOR MORE IDEAS

What if it isn't inappropriate and Scratchers say it is? What if it's extremely inappropriate and vulgar and gets sent to an eight year old for them to read? Jury duty works in real life because jurors are adults who extensively learn about a case, the same thing would never be able to work on Scratch.

zispe wrote:

What if it isn't inappropriate and Scratchers say it is? What if it's extremely inappropriate and vulgar and gets sent to an eight year old for them to read? Jury duty works in real life because jurors are adults who extensively learn about a case, the same thing would never be able to work on Scratch.

Fair point. Perhaps there should be an age requirement. If people lie about their age then Scratch will be legally in the clear. As for the extremely vulgar comments, hopefully the majority would be found by Scratch's automatic moderation system. What do you think it should be (the age requirement)?

might be rejected under §7.2
apparently scratch thought i was posting unsuitable language when i tried to quote it

This does tie in with the idea of the Community Moderators program, which got closed due to issues regarding age limits and just the type of content being posted on the website. (I got my information from the Wiki, by the way; I wasn’t here when the program did exist.)

So, unfortunately, this isn’t a good idea.

I agree that this is rejected for the same reason that “Allowing Scratchers to moderate the website” is rejected. At the minimum there would need to be an age requirement for this to work, and that age requirement would have to be 18+ (the same age requirement as the moderator position requires). But it's easy to lie about your age on Scratch, and even if Scratch may legally be in the clear, that doesn't mean that the Scratch Team wants to show potentially traumatizing content to young users, and that doesn't mean parents/teachers won't be angry that the Scratch Team is showing inappropriate content to its users.

There is also no guarantee that any particular Scratcher will uphold the Scratch Team's values and moderation standards. Yes, some Scratchers may think something is not appropriate when it actually is, but it also goes the other way around: two Scratchers who dislike another Scratcher may claim that something is inappropriate when it actually isn't. This makes the subsequent ban more unfortunate, if that Scratcher didn't actually do anything wrong.

The job application, interview, and training process solves both of these issues: the Scratch Team can legally verify that someone is 18+, and the Scratch Team can ensure that the only ones who get hired are the ones who understand Scratch's values and moderation standards. But if one is at the point where an application, interview, and training are needed, one might as well just apply for the usual moderator position.

blackcow29 wrote:

This does tie in with the idea of the Community Moderators program, which got closed due to issues regarding age limits and just the type of content being posted on the website. (I got my information from the Wiki, by the way; I wasn’t here when the program did exist.)

So, unfortunately, this isn’t a good idea.

Please elaborate. It's built upon similar ideas of the community moderating itself, but not that the chances of you getting a notification like this would be low. At any given moment, thousands of users are active, many being teenage or adult Scratchers. A fair amount of people will always be available to review a report, making the chance of any person in particular extremely low. It's not like we'd have individuals patrolling the site; occasionally you might be asked to review a report, and if you're consistently misusing the feature, you lose the privelige.

blackcow29 wrote:

This does tie in with the idea of the Community Moderators program, which got closed due to issues regarding age limits and just the type of content being posted on the website. (I got my information from the Wiki, by the way; I wasn’t here when the program did exist.)

So, unfortunately, this isn’t a good idea.

^ This in addition to the fact that bias between users can make it even worse. If a group of users are against a certain user, a few people will report it for no reason and someone should just say it is inappropriate. (highlighted by @zispe already)

No support.

CSwitch wrote:

blackcow29 wrote:

This does tie in with the idea of the Community Moderators program, which got closed due to issues regarding age limits and just the type of content being posted on the website. (I got my information from the Wiki, by the way; I wasn’t here when the program did exist.)

So, unfortunately, this isn’t a good idea.

^ This in addition to the fact that bias between users can make it even worse. If a group of users are against a certain user, a few people will report it for no reason and someone should just say it is inappropriate. (highlighted by @zispe already)

No support.

Za-Chary wrote:

I agree that this is rejected for the same reason that “Allowing Scratchers to moderate the website” is rejected. At the minimum there would need to be an age requirement for this to work, and that age requirement would have to be 18+ (the same age requirement as the moderator position requires). But it's easy to lie about your age on Scratch, and even if Scratch may legally be in the clear, that doesn't mean that the Scratch Team wants to show potentially traumatizing content to young users, and that doesn't mean parents/teachers won't be angry that the Scratch Team is showing inappropriate content to its users.

There is also no guarantee that any particular Scratcher will uphold the Scratch Team's values and moderation standards. Yes, some Scratchers may think something is not appropriate when it actually is, but it also goes the other way around: two Scratchers who dislike another Scratcher may claim that something is inappropriate when it actually isn't. This makes the subsequent ban more unfortunate, if that Scratcher didn't actually do anything wrong.

The job application, interview, and training process solves both of these issues: the Scratch Team can legally verify that someone is 18+, and the Scratch Team can ensure that the only ones who get hired are the ones who understand Scratch's values and moderation standards. But if one is at the point where an application, interview, and training are needed, one might as well just apply for the usual moderator position.

Your points about people having a bias against a certain scratcher has one flaw: probability. The odds of two people who dislike the same user being chosen to review the report is one in millions.

cutellama12345 wrote:

Your points about people having a bias against a certain scratcher has one flaw: probability. The odds of two people who dislike the same user being chosen to review the report is one in millions.

There still exists the issue of letting 8-10 year olds moderating such a website.

CSwitch wrote:

cutellama12345 wrote:

Your points about people having a bias against a certain scratcher has one flaw: probability. The odds of two people who dislike the same user being chosen to review the report is one in millions.

There still exists the issue of letting 8-10 year olds moderating such a website.

As I said, there should be an age requirement. As for the issue of faking ages, what would your idea be to prevent this.

cutellama12345 wrote:

CSwitch wrote:

cutellama12345 wrote:

Your points about people having a bias against a certain scratcher has one flaw: probability. The odds of two people who dislike the same user being chosen to review the report is one in millions.

There still exists the issue of letting 8-10 year olds moderating such a website.

As I said, there should be an age requirement. As for the issue of faking ages, what would your idea be to prevent this.

There also still exists the issue of people lying about their age. The only way to fix this would be to verify the user's age using a face scan or ID scan. This might cause some backlash from teachers and parents being angry about Scratch asking children for their face or ID, which is the reason why age verification doesn't fix this.

This is still rejected under #7.2 of TOLORS, anyway.

Asking the community to moderate has some serious issues. It exposes additional community members to inappropriate content. And it opens the possibility of “gaming the system” by organizing coordinated actions (think of “mass reporting” for an example). For these reasons, I think it is unlikely we would proceed in this direction. But thanks for sharing your ideas