💾 Archived View for bbs.geminispace.org › u › admin › 6468 captured on 2023-11-14 at 10:49:59. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content

View Raw

More Information

⬅️ Previous capture (2023-11-04)

➡️ Next capture (2023-12-28)

🚧 View Differences

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Trolls at the gate

I've turned off user registration for a bit. If you urgently want a new account, feel free to contact me by email or fedi.

🖥️ admin

Oct 24 · 3 weeks ago · 👍 mozz, Addison, eph, Ruby_Witch, jsv, clseibold · ❤ 2

12 Comments ↓

🚀 clseibold · Oct 24 at 17:37:

I have a suggestion to help with people writing slurs that you can consider implementing if you want, and could help with managing this type of trolling/spam:

One thing I made sure to do for the guestbook of my capsule was not allow any uploads that had any slurs in them. Rather than deleting the messages after the fact, it's even better to do the checks *on upload* so that the user can immediately be informed that their upload was not successful (and why it's under review).

🚀 skyjake · Oct 24 at 19:04:

A list of trigger words and phrases might be a good first line of defense, although I don't relish the notion of compiling such a list.

This seems a bit trivial to circumvent, though.

With Bubble, I think the appropriate way to handle this is to keep any potentially objectionable content as a draft until the admin either approves or rejects the post. This could be extended to a new Report action that people can use on posts and comments to bring them to the admin/moderator's attention, possibly forcing the content back to draft status if some threshold is exceeded.

Subspace creation is another type of user action that needs moderating, but that could be handled via simple admin notifications.

🚀 stack · Oct 24 at 20:23:

This is a bit of sad news.

🐉 gyaradong · Oct 24 at 20:27:

Curious. Why would someone even troll here? I thought the point was notoriety. In this small corner of the web? What do they gain? I'll never understand some people.

😎 flipperzero · Oct 24 at 20:38:

It's a sad day in gemini history when one of the central capsules close down registrations due to one of, if not, THE first example on gemini of trolls doing harm and ruining a good thing for everyone.

On the bright side, we can all think of this as an opportunity to foster some organic exclusive patronage here the same some communities do on the internet: it'll be like when LUElinks had to move registration to invite only, or when Demonoid, what.cd, and h33t ran off limited user registration and word-of-mouth pass-it-down models of spreading activity to avoid unwanted attention.

🚀 stack · Oct 24 at 21:29:

May I ask what sort of trolling is happening? If it's possible to describe without accomplishing the troller's goal, of course. I suppose it's largely morbid curiosity, but I am curious if it's political or some buy-viagra kind of spamming...

🚀 clseibold · Oct 24 at 22:08:

@stack There was racial slurs posted on here yesterday, as well as a few other things. Nothing political (unless one considers supporting "alt-right" as political, but I consider it hatred).

🍄 Ruby_Witch · Oct 25 at 05:15:

@gyaradong The point of trolling is getting attention. Even if they're just getting attention from a small group of people in a tiny corner of the internet, they still get that rush from being seen. It's a very sad state of existence for those people.

☯️ eph · Oct 25 at 08:01:

I missed the drama, what happened? Someone posted a racial slur and said they’re alt-right or something?

🚀 skyjake · Oct 25 at 09:21:

Nothing too dramatic, just some slurs and other inappropriate content and subspaces.

Registrations are now back open. You can always @admin to report content that does not follow the Code of Conduct.

🍵 michaelnordmeyer · Oct 25 at 11:25:

@skyjake Thanks for your effort.

Yesterday I was looking for the [at]admin info in BBS' help, but couldn't find it. You might want to add it.

BTW, notifiying the admin openly could make the notifier a target for harrassment.

🚀 skyjake · Oct 25 at 11:31:

@michaelnordmeyer Yeah, it's not a substitute for a properly done private Report action.