175

In connection with the moderator elections, we will be holding a Q&A with the candidates. This will be an opportunity for members of the community to pose questions to the candidates on the topic of moderation. Participation is completely voluntary.

The purpose of this thread was to collect questions for the questionnaire. The questionnaire is now live, and you may find it here.

Here's how it'll work:

  • During the nomination phase, (so, until Monday, April 13th at 20:00:00Z UTC, or 4:00 pm EDT on the same day, give or take time to arrive for closure), this question will be open to collect potential questions from the users of the site. Post answers to this question containing any questions you would like to ask the candidates. Please only post one question per answer.

  • We, the Community Team, will be providing a small selection of generic questions. The first two will be guaranteed to be included, the latter ones are if the community doesn't supply enough questions. This will be done in a single post, unlike the prior instruction.

  • This is a perfect opportunity to voice questions that are specific to your community and issues that you are running into at current.

  • At the end of the phase, the Community Team will select up to 8 of the top voted questions submitted by the community provided in this thread, to use in addition to the aforementioned 2 guaranteed questions. We reserve some editorial control in the selection of the questions and may opt not to select a question that is tangential or irrelevant to moderation or the election. That said, if I have concerns about any questions in this fashion, I will be sure to point this out in comments before the decision making time.

  • Once questions have been selected, a new question will be opened to host the actual questionnaire for the candidates, containing 10 questions in total.

  • This is not the only option that users have for gathering information on candidates. As a community, you are still free to, for example, hold a live chat session with your candidates to ask further questions, or perhaps clarifications from what is provided in the Q&A.

If you have any questions or feedback about this new process, feel free to post as a comment here.

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  • 31
    I should point out that these are questions for candidates to answer, so please don't use comments below them to leave your own answers. If you have questions or clarifications about the proposed questions, comment away, but the point is to see how the candidates will respond to them. – Brad Larson Apr 6 '15 at 20:25
  • Will candidates look at the present answers, to better write their ones? Our Q&A style wasn't meant for a questionnaire. – Francesco Menzani Apr 7 '15 at 11:24
  • @Joiner In the past, they've created a separate question with a list of all of the questions. Then the candidates post an answer to answer the questions. See 2014 noms – Taryn Apr 7 '15 at 11:52
  • @bluefeet Same problem. – Francesco Menzani Apr 7 '15 at 12:27
  • 2
    @Joiner While it might not be ideal, it works. – Taryn Apr 7 '15 at 12:41
  • Why not create another meta post for the candidates only to answer? – James Mertz Apr 7 '15 at 15:58
  • 5
    @KronoS That will happen later. – Taryn Apr 7 '15 at 16:02
  • @bluefeet ah I see now. – James Mertz Apr 7 '15 at 16:04

49 Answers 49

161

A question is asked and receives some very good answers. The asker then flags this question and asks for it to be deleted because having it up will cause them trouble at work or school. Do you delete the question?

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  • 20
    Do what Brad would do. – Jared Burrows Apr 6 '15 at 20:23
  • 34
    @JaredBurrows - That may not always work out so well. – Brad Larson Apr 6 '15 at 20:30
  • With your rep and moderator status, wouldn't following be a good idea? You are leading by example. – Jared Burrows Apr 6 '15 at 20:36
  • 26
    @JaredBurrows No. Do what's right, not what's been done before. – TylerH Apr 6 '15 at 21:26
  • 2
    I'm pretty sure this is a dupe from last year: meta.stackexchange.com/questions/221594/… – meagar Apr 6 '15 at 21:30
  • 23
    @meagar This happens pretty much daily so it'd be nice to know how the candidates would handle it. – Taryn Apr 6 '15 at 21:34
  • 2
    Oh, yeah, definitely still a good question, I was just making an observation. – meagar Apr 6 '15 at 21:43
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    @meagar - I'm bringing back the Greatest Hits. Removed the "or be fired" bit, since everyone seized on that last time. – Brad Larson Apr 6 '15 at 21:43
  • If answering "it depends", please elaborate, especially with (real S.O. question) examples. – Tor Apr 8 '15 at 14:05
  • @BradLarson: Shouldn't you present a few options for what can be done in this situation? – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 8:36
127

You notice an experienced, high-rep user who has started a pattern of rude, not-constructive borderline abusive comments directed at users. How do you proceed in this situation?

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  • 13
    Is this not pretty much the same as this guaranteed-to-be-included community team question: "How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments? " – Radiodef Apr 6 '15 at 21:41
  • 14
    Paging Col. Shrapnel – Pekka Apr 6 '15 at 21:51
  • 3
    @Radiodef I guess it sort of got lost in there when I read that answer...blame the end of the day This is something that we've dealt with multiple times in a highly visible ways, due to the users involved which is why I bring it up. – Taryn Apr 6 '15 at 21:52
  • I think it is a great question, I just noticed the redundancy. Although, actually your phrasing may be better. The flag aspect of the community team question is narrow and has an obvious answer. – Radiodef Apr 6 '15 at 21:57
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    "or, if you like one enough, you may split it off as a separate answer for review within the community's 8". My understanding of this is that if the guaranteed two are tweaked and highly scored, the tweak may replace the question it was forked from. – user289086 Apr 6 '15 at 21:59
  • 3
    Excellent question and definitely one I think we should measure moderators by. – Benjamin Gruenbaum Apr 7 '15 at 12:42
  • 1
    The part that @MichaelT notes is technically meant for the 3 non-guaranteed ones (which are very not-guaranteed for SO), but I'll be fine to reword the one to this wording if people prefer that. – Grace Note Apr 7 '15 at 13:43
  • @GraceNote Sorry for obviously not fully reading your answer. :/ We can delete this. – Taryn Apr 7 '15 at 13:45
  • @bluefeet: Directed at certain specific users? A characterizable class of users? All users? Please clarify. – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 8:37
95

A new user has gotten into a disagreement with a more experienced user over a question closure, and complains that the site is "unfriendly to newcomers." How do you respond, if at all?

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  • 11
    I think that this could provide some valuable insight on candidates points' of view. – AstroCB Apr 7 '15 at 5:36
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    Considering this plays out on meta nearly daily (and probably lots more often in comments on the main site), that's certainly a test of the candidates patience. Especially considering how often flags are probably called by either side. – Deduplicator Apr 7 '15 at 16:21
  • 1
    I like this question, since it (indirectly) gauges the extent to which high-rep users are condescending towards newbies. Especially if you "read between the lines" of the answers... – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 8:49
94

A valuable member of the community starts vandalizing their posts and deleting them, what do you do? Do you step in and suspend? If you don't suspend them, then how do you handle it?

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  • 69
    This doesn't sound familiar at all. Are you sure this is a real life example? – George Stocker Apr 6 '15 at 21:30
  • 5
    @GeorgeStocker she just has an overly active imagination. It is so obviously made up – Pekka Apr 6 '15 at 21:46
  • 6
    @Pekka웃 Blame the blue feet, it makes me do crazy things. – Taryn Apr 6 '15 at 21:49
  • 3
    @bluefeet I thought being an SO mod makes you do crazy things ;) – Ian Kemp Apr 7 '15 at 21:54
  • 1
    @Pekka웃 See meta.stackoverflow.com/q/288229/3210837 for a recent example. Also, meta.stackoverflow.com/q/288748/3210837. – Toothbrush Apr 10 '15 at 11:41
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    @toothbrush thanks, it was meant more as an in-joke (George was at the center of one of the posts you link to) – Pekka Apr 10 '15 at 21:14
  • @bluefeet: by "posts" do you mean answers, questions or both? – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 8:41
  • @Pekka웃 Ah, OK. – Toothbrush Apr 11 '15 at 11:24
  • @einpoklum Posts means anything they've posted - questions or answers. – Taryn Apr 11 '15 at 12:53
  • @GeorgeStocker yes, it is a real life example, although not on SO: meta.electronics.stackexchange.com/q/5133/17592 – user1544337 Apr 12 '15 at 12:16
91

A user has been flagged for making a series of "trivial" edits. How do you decide whether these edits are a problem? How do you act on that flag?

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  • 16
    Looking for candidates who will calmly assess the situation, make sure to consider all points of view and then BURNINATE ALL THE GARBAGE EDITS – Pekka Apr 6 '15 at 21:03
  • 2
    @Pekka웃 My stance on garbage edits is well known :p – meagar Apr 6 '15 at 21:47
  • 1
    I have seen this a lot on review queues simple grammar mistakes though it makes the post better than it originally is it's hard to decide whether to allow the changes or to reject them a minor edit button would be great in this scenario and the editor not awarded any rep – Illegal Argument Apr 7 '15 at 16:42
  • 2
    @BradLarson; Be more specific please. Is this a < 1,000-rep user trying to farm rep with edits? Are these "trivial" edits at least marginally useful (e.g. spelling corrections, English phrasing improvements) or not? – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 8:48
72

A user had done a veeery long series of Looks OK flags in Low Quality Posts without editing anything. What would you do?

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  • 4
    Ohh - I like that one. You might want to consider adding First Posts / Late answer with "no action needed". – user289086 Apr 6 '15 at 21:06
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    Given that the low quality queue has turned into a massive flood of s**t, how can you even get a long series of "looks ok" without getting trapped by the review audits? – Lundin Apr 7 '15 at 12:00
  • 1
    @Lundin oh, you can, believe me. – Sergey K. Apr 7 '15 at 12:26
  • 1
    @Lundin as a 10k user, you can look through the history and likely will see this. On P.SE I've seen this in the past in First Posts (which might be even worse as one review completes the task). – user289086 Apr 7 '15 at 16:56
  • Do you mean without editing or deleting anything? Or, excluding delete actions, they never edit? – Air Apr 7 '15 at 21:36
  • 2
    @Air excluding anything, except pressing the Looks OK button and advancing to the next review item as fast as possible. – Sergey K. Apr 7 '15 at 22:15
63

A user continuously calls you out for your moderation style on Meta, Chat, and other venues. How do you react?

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  • 18
    This needs more context: why is the user calling the candidate out? E.g. "A user calls out your decision to close a question, but you think you acted fairly. How do you react?" – Sklivvz Apr 6 '15 at 21:05
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    @Sklivvz It could be anything, really. It's happened to every moderator. The specific most recent instance of being called out isn't as important as the fact that as a moderator, you have a shiny target on your back; how do you handle it when some of the most vocal users decide to continuously shoot rubberbands at you? – George Stocker Apr 6 '15 at 21:07
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    I know it could be anything, it's the reason why you need to specify the context: the answer, and the tone of it, varies completely if a user calls me out and I realize they are right, or they are just insulting/trolling or if they are simply misguided. – Sklivvz Apr 6 '15 at 21:09
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    @Sklivvz Over the course of a year, a user is bound to be right sometimes and wrong sometimes; but all that adds up. How do you deal with it as a moderator? – George Stocker Apr 6 '15 at 21:25
  • @GeorgeStocker: Perhaps make it "Do you react? If you do react, how would you react and in what venue?" – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 8:51
54

(Disclaimer: this is motivational rather than technical.)

You are an experienced user, and have been a member for several years. You know how the site works and the problems moderators and trusted users have to deal with.

But tell us, why today instead of last election? Why today instead of next election? What has driven you to nominate and stand up to the task now? Are you confident your intent can and will remain the same in the mid future?

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  • 10
    Several of the nominees did run in the last election and it seems reasonable to predict that several of the runners-up will run again in the next. Perhaps it would be simpler to remove the "instead of" parts of this, which might put those candidates on the defensive? – Air Apr 7 '15 at 20:26
  • @Air, well, I have already used rather than in the disclaimer. Instead of was the best alternative I could find, and I personally don't think it is that hostile. (And even if it was, putting candidates on the defensive does not mesh well with the thick skins I believe moderators should wear.) – Frédéric Hamidi Apr 7 '15 at 22:17
  • 10
    This reads like a "Why this school?" college essay. – royhowie Apr 8 '15 at 3:07
  • 5
    I think this is too abstract. Most nominees would just have to come up with some smart-ass reason for 'why now'. Also, if their intent does change mid future, I'm pretty sure they cant foresee it now. Crossing their hearts and promising they'd perform for their entire term is no guarantee it'll really happen, irrespective of how they answer this question. – Swapnil Luktuke Apr 8 '15 at 5:33
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    Personally I'm against this question because it introduces waffly stories that shouldn't matter. People don't care that I'm doing it for the children and world hunger and the rain forests and the endangered three toed sloths (well.... I think they don't really care about that as a reason for mod nomination). If you are really curious you could just ask this in chat. – slugster Apr 8 '15 at 8:52
49

When reviewing recently deleted posts and current posts with deletion votes, you begin to notice a pattern. A group of users is consistently present for deletion votes, and some of the deletions begin to cause meta posts questioning the validity of the certain deletions. The deletion set gets so big that some high profile posts are being deleted.

How would you address this situation?

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  • 10
    Good question. Might want to clarify whether or not the questions being deleted are on topic. – Benjamin Gruenbaum Apr 7 '15 at 12:46
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    High profile in what sense? Highly-voted, on-topic questions, or just ones with a bunch of views and a few copy-pasta answers? – ssube Apr 8 '15 at 16:56
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    @ssube - Something in the ballpark of a post with 50+ votes, and answer with perhaps 100+ votes, and tens of thousands of views. I would say that is the lower end. I think the upper end would be something in the ballpark of 500+ votes and hundreds of thousands of views. Some background on recent discussions: meta.stackoverflow.com/a/286970/1026459 – Travis J Apr 8 '15 at 17:10
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    Votes isn't a good metric for quality, is an indicator but not the sole metric. Didn't we already learned that? – Braiam Apr 9 '15 at 16:33
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    high-profile because a fun bike-shedding question, or why? – Deduplicator Apr 11 '15 at 1:40
  • @Deduplicator - We don't delete good content. – Travis J Apr 11 '15 at 7:22
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    @TravisJ: That's a non-sequitur. – Deduplicator Apr 11 '15 at 11:06
  • @Deduplicator - you should read the linked material – Travis J Apr 12 '15 at 7:05
43

Before elected mod, you used to hang out in one of the SE chat rooms and continue to do so after being elected (ok, not so active as before, your new duties and adjusting to them take some of your time now). You consider "regulars" there to be your friends.

One of them has the habit of posting witty/snarky comments under SO questions and re-posting them in the chat room - for your friends' notice, and sometimes amusement.

The comments are not inherently bad, on the contrary they are often pointing on the questions' misconceptions or lack of useful info. But they can be taken as snark and are sometimes flagged.

First, what do you do?

  • Nothing. If the comments are flagged, they will be dealt by you - or another mod.

  • Leave them. The comments are just funny, no harm done. Not worth jeopardizing your friendship.

  • Delete whatever comment they re-post. They are snark anyway.

  • Ban the user.

  • Irrelevant. You have no friends.

  • Something else?

Second, do you tell, announce to your friend and others what you did (if they have their comments repeatedly deleted, they will notice of course, but they will not know who did, only guess.)

The point of the second part is not only whether and how your friendship will affect your actions but how you will deal with the consequences of your actions and the effects of them to your friendship.

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  • 2
    These are brilliant questions and reflects whether the candidates can take their position fairly and justly. Plus, honesty also plays a fair part in answering, which is splendid. :p – Unihedron Apr 8 '15 at 10:11
  • @Unihedro thnx. – ypercubeᵀᴹ Apr 8 '15 at 10:15
  • 5
    "Ban the user." That seems like the "wrong answer". – bjb568 Apr 9 '15 at 1:46
  • -1 I don't see why friends should be treated differently and I don't think candidate's answer to this question (words) will match their actions once elected. Its human nature I assume. – user2330678 Apr 12 '15 at 4:27
38

Here is a set of general questions, gathered as very common questions asked every election. As mentioned in the instructions, the first two questions are guaranteed to show up in the Q&A, while the others are if there aren't enough questions (or, if you like one enough, you may split it off as a separate answer for review within the community's 8).

  • How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments?
  • How would you handle a situation where another mod closed/deleted/etc a question that you feel shouldn't have been?

  • In your opinion, what do moderators do?
  • A diamond will be attached to everything you say and have said in the past, including questions, answers and comments. Everything you will do will be seen under a different light. How do you feel about that?
  • In what way do you feel that being a moderator will make you more effective as opposed to simply reaching 10k or 20k rep?
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  • 2
    AM I the inspiration for question number 1, and if not how much meaner do I have to be to become it? :) – Gabe Sechan Apr 7 '15 at 0:15
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    @Gabe I think your main objective would have to be to travel back to 2011 and register then, when that question first started getting asked in these. ♪ – Grace Note Apr 7 '15 at 14:20
38

A diamond will be attached to everything you say and have said in the past, including questions, answers and comments. Everything you will do will be seen under a different light. How do you feel about that?

Source

36

For handling NAA flags:

What constitutes an answer to a question?

Related: Do answers need to answer the question, or just address the question to avoid being possibly deleted under the above criteria?

Follow up: Where are users and reviewers expected to find this information?

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  • 11
    Also, does it matter if the question is really old when the standards were different. – Shafik Yaghmour Apr 7 '15 at 13:09
31

There appears to be a growing problem with code only answers in the VLQ review queue. What is your opinion on answers that provide code without explanation or comment, should we stay the course and continue to click "Looks OK" or should there be a higher bar for answers?

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  • 5
    I think this question could be improved by making it more open-ended e.g. more along the lines of "when is a code answer OK, when is it VLQ?" Get the candidate to tell us more about their views. – Radiodef Apr 8 '15 at 5:21
  • 1
    I feel like this doesn't have much to do with moderating as it does with site policy. It's more of a meta question, no? – DanielST Apr 8 '15 at 14:33
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    @slicedtoad There has been some Meta discussion on the topic, but asking potential moderators for their opinion on it will hopefully shed some light on their moderation styles. To a lesser degree it may point to whether they tend to be more "status quo" or "progressive". – apaul Apr 8 '15 at 14:39
31

How would you handle a user or group of users that is/are upset at a moderator action you have taken?

For example, if someone posted on meta "This mod deleted my [question|answer|comment] and he is abusing his power," how would you react? What if it was a tweet or off-site blog post? What about a user editing his profile to insult you? etc.

reposted from last year with minor edits

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  • 6
    The moderator could send them to the "In praise of moderators" meta chat room for instance – Pekka Apr 7 '15 at 8:11
29

What's your view on old and highly voted link-only answers that get flagged for not being answers?

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25

Now that you are a moderator, how will you spend your time on SO in comparison to when you weren't? Let's say that there are hundreds/thousands moderation tasks to do and you see a question you know the answer, but your time is short. What's most important: answering a good question for the SO community or doing a few moderation tasks in that time?

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  • 19
    "10 moderation tasks to do" - Oh, those were the days. You may need to add a couple of zeros to that now. – Brad Larson Apr 7 '15 at 0:31
20

You received a spam flag for a historical post answering an old, off-topic (say for library seeking reasons), but useful question (well accepted by the community, e.g. 100k views and 100+ upvotes) with many legitimate answers. What will you do? When would you delete such Q&A content and when would you keep it?

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  • 2
    To clarify: the flag is on an answer, and is it relevant to specify whether that answer is old or new? Also, I think this question may lead the answer because it assumes the flagged Q&A is useful. (What if it's not useful? And is its usefulness not somewhat subjective?) If the usefulness is important, perhaps you could briefly describe objective criteria that the Q&A has met. (E.g. has this Q&A aggregated information that is not easily available in Google results?) – Radiodef Apr 6 '15 at 22:07
  • The phrasing simply prompts the responder to repeat existing moderator opinions when we actually want to learn the personal opinion of the responder. – Radiodef Apr 6 '15 at 22:16
  • @Radiodef, it would be a spam flag on an old answer like Try this open source library. It has these features..., where the poster is not a spammer (e.g. has no relation to the product). The question itself asks for some complex task, which can be solved by certain libraries, hence all the posts are of this sort. But the question and answers are useful, and you know they are. – TLama Apr 6 '15 at 22:17
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    "But the question and answers are useful, and you know they are. This is why I'm saying: define a case in your question that gets the responder to reveal to us how they define usefulness. Otherwise the answer doesn't inform us about what the candidate will actually do in specific situations. – Radiodef Apr 6 '15 at 22:19
  • 1
    I've gone ahead and edited the question to address the issues I've perceived. If you think my edit is in error somehow, please feel free to roll it back or alter it. – Radiodef Apr 6 '15 at 22:29
  • 1
    @Radiodef, thank you! I think it's more specific now. – TLama Apr 6 '15 at 22:32
  • Spam is spam – it's usually pretty obvious. If something is spam, it should and will be deleted immediately, if not by the moderator, then by the community. If it's not spam, the flag will be dismissed. This question, therefore, is really about what you would do with the question, and we have established policies for that (although that's a good question that might warrant its own posting). If, on the other hand, it's not actually a spam post and just a link-only answer, well, you have another standalone post right there. – AstroCB Apr 12 '15 at 0:48
19

A relatively new answer was flagged as SPAM and you go about handling it, but it isn't a clear-cut case, because it is in some (small) way relevant to the question. Where is the line for you to confirm or clear the flag?

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  • 2
    This is a good question. Spam flags carry heavy penalties, and a mod should know how to handle them. – AstroCB Apr 12 '15 at 0:49
19

A high profile user in a given tag notices a rash of questions about a specific subject and notes that all of the otherwise relevant answers don't really cover all the bases on the topic. He writes a self-answered question with a high quality answer designed to address most, if not all, of the ins and outs of the issue, with the goal of funneling future questions on that topic to this one thread.

Another high profile user takes offense at the intent of the first user and proceeds to open a duplicate close vote that points to a much older and highly voted thread that does not have anywhere near the detail of the new answer. Close vote passes. At this point there's a close/reopen thrashing that's going on.

Do you reopen the thread and lock it or moderator close it?

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17

What do you think you will enjoy most as a moderator? What do you suspect you will find difficult?

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  • 29
    Enjoy??? Is there any enjoyment? :) – Taryn Apr 6 '15 at 21:09
  • 2
    Well, you do get to fix what's wrong with the internet a little bit more... :-) – Sklivvz Apr 6 '15 at 21:10
  • 11
    I do enjoy hunting socks when I have spare time. – Taryn Apr 6 '15 at 21:15
  • @bluefeet I never could figure out if you are a he or a she. Martjin Pieters says you are a girl. Are you? – jkd Apr 6 '15 at 22:42
  • 3
    @jakekimds Why does that matter? But yes, Martijn is correct. – Taryn Apr 6 '15 at 22:42
  • 2
    @bluefeet just curious. Most mods have obvious names/pictures. Your picture is a bird with bluefeet. – jkd Apr 6 '15 at 22:44
  • 5
    @jakekimds Not all mods have obvious names/pictures - stackoverflow.com/users?tab=moderators – Taryn Apr 6 '15 at 22:45
  • @bluefeet I guess. – jkd Apr 6 '15 at 22:46
  • 20
    @jakekimds The gender of the moderator shouldn't matter. You should judge the moderator by how they act on the site, not by anything else. – Taryn Apr 6 '15 at 22:47
  • 16
    @jakekimds You mean it never occurred to you that bluefeet might just be.. a bird with blue feet? – Seth Apr 6 '15 at 23:05
  • 2
    @Seth No, that never occurred to me. – jkd Apr 6 '15 at 23:09
  • 21
    Deleting spammers is intensely satisfying. (I know this question is for the candidates, I just thought everyone should know.) – Bill the Lizard Apr 6 '15 at 23:22
  • 12
    @Seth: Birds have gender too, you know. – BoltClock Apr 7 '15 at 3:46
  • 6
    @BoltClock I was waiting for someone to catch that ;P – Seth Apr 7 '15 at 3:47
  • 2
    @bluefeet: When looking at a single moderator, gender shouldn't matter. When looking at a team of moderators, I don't see anything wrong in talking about gender. My experience with mixed teams has always been very good. Therefore I'm happy that you are a member of the mod team. – honk Apr 8 '15 at 19:06
17

What mistakes have you made in the past on SO? What actions did you take to rectify those mistakes? How will those actions impact your views and reactions as moderator?

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  • This is good – mods make mistakes like anyone else and need to know how to handle them. – AstroCB Apr 12 '15 at 0:53
14

After an interaction with a user who cursed your Nazi soul to burn in the eternal fires of hades you notice you received a downvote to just one of your questions, which has a timestamp that is aligned with the whole incident.

What do you do about it?

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  • 5
    send two fast DVs to their unrelated posts? – gnat Apr 9 '15 at 20:55
  • 7
    Oh no, a single downvote! WHATEVER WILL I DO? – Ian Kemp Apr 9 '15 at 23:03
  • I don't see that this question is particular to moderators, actually. Sure, they can do more, but this can happen to anyone with some reputation. – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 9:06
  • @gnat: Just one DV. Tit for tat and less easy to blame you for it... – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 9:07
14

You observe that a user has behaved badly enough that a temporary suspension is warranted (which you do and advise the user of why they have been suspended).

After being suspended, the user contacts you back saying they are sorry and won’t repeat the behaviour and requests that the suspension be lifted. Reading their message, the user seems genuine.

Would you lift the suspension?

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12

A user has posted many answers. The user is now concerned about posting code in their answers. They look through their extensive list of answers and begin taking several actions on some answers.

  • For some low voted answers with code, they flag for deletion.
  • For some high voted answers with code, they remove the code and replace it with an explanation.

What actions would you consider taking and why? Would you attempt to deal with the situation as a whole or on a post by post basis?

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12

A user posts correctly spelled, nicely formatted, well written, clear and easy to understand question.

Question asks for advice on a nice place to make a geek party. Another user flags it as Very Low Quality.

How would you act on the flag?

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  • 12
    Suggest a nice place for a geek party? ;-) – blalasaadri Apr 7 '15 at 10:09
  • 1
    @blalasaadri if you were a nominee, you'd get my vote right now – gnat Apr 7 '15 at 10:13
  • 2
    This is an excellent question, albeit the missing context. – Unihedron Apr 8 '15 at 10:08
  • @gnat: And this stuff ever happens on SO? I doubt it. – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 9:12
  • @einpoklum question is inspired by recent discussion over here at MSO, you can search for it. I didn't refer it only because all other questions seem to omit mentioning real cases (maybe to avoid influencing answerers) – gnat Apr 11 '15 at 9:19
  • @gnat, ok, so s/ever happens/happens more than once a year/ then. – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 9:29
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    @einpoklum at a site that gets 8K (that's eight thousands) questions a day... – gnat Apr 11 '15 at 9:30
12

You stated in your nomination that you could "easily spare [insert smallish amount of time] a day" to dedicate to your moderation duties.

  • How much do you think you will get accomplished in that time?
  • Is that time spent all at once or spread throughout the day?
  • What if the moderation workload demands more - can you reliably and sustainably dedicate that time?

This question is aimed at new candidates to see if they have any idea of the scope of the moderator role.

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12

Someone flags a long and thoughtful answer using other:

This does not answer the question, though it contains lots of valuable advice for the OP.

That observation is correct. What now?

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  • 3
    This is something that happens on a fairly regular basis, and can be tricky to handle right, so I like this as a question. – Brad Larson Apr 11 '15 at 1:31
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What do you consider the most important job of a moderator?

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  • And if s/he thinks all tasks are sort-of about equally important? – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 9:05
  • @einpoklum imho than he/she should start to give priority to task , – NullPoiиteя Apr 11 '15 at 14:31
  • "Which of your children do you love the most?" – einpoklum Apr 11 '15 at 17:14
  • left one always , though i dont have even girl friend :D – NullPoiиteя Apr 11 '15 at 17:18
11

You mentioned that you were active in a problematic tag that collects a lot of low quality posts or inaccurate answers. What will you do if you are awarded a ♦ - will you go nuclear on that tag? Or will you take a hands-off approach and let the posts filter through the review queues? Will you clean up those inaccurate answers?

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