So now that Beer Trading threadshitting is back in full-effect ...

but you already agree that that's a trolling/threadshitting response, so it should be moderated. i don't think you have cause for concern.

 

I think you are assuming the worse. The first step is for the Admin to find trustworthy BAs, and then have a process to make sure the mods don't go rouge on users. I think having trustworthy mods will not be that difficult. At least I like to think there are some reasonable, mature, kind, adults in this community... though it is the interwebs so who knows.

I disagree with this. I think a lot of ISO:FT post are very vague. I have asked if a poster was meaning 1 for 1 on a trade before because to me the offer seemed way off. My intentions were pure, and I was correct in my questioning, he did not mean 1 for 1. In fact we ended up working out a trade.

I have seen it the other way too, such as:

ISO: rare beer
FT: Beer A, Beer B, Beer C


Does this mean all three? pick 1? 1+ others not mentioned?

I really don't see how asking for clarification is considered threadshitting. I think this is where people are a little too sensitive, either that or they think everyone is out to get them. When in doubt, I try to view others as having good intentions first.

 

I completely agree with you here. Clarification is not threadshitting since people's thoughts aren't always clear. Some assume you know they're gonna have to give up more than 1, some are actually expecting to give up one. I try to be as specific as possible when I post an offer and even then I've gotten someone asking about the offer and we switch a few BMs and I assume they weren't all that interested but then they say we were both beating around the bush and waiting for the other to make an offer and I'm like I posted my freaking offer to which you replied to so how am I beating around the bush when I already laid out my offer publicly? I don't see anything wrong with trying to get at what exactly the OP is thinking in regards to the trade they wanna make.

 

Question: Will the moderators also be in charge of helping along newbies?

For instance, in ISO/FT, there's a user (not new to BA) trying to trade Stone IRS for Abyss/BCS/Parabola. It seems to me that if part of cleaning up the forum is getting new users educated, it would be helpful if the moderators were also in charge of letting such users know that Stone IRS, as good a beer as it is, is very widely available. Someone might be the white knight, but more likely, they're going to want to switch up their offer to attract more attention.

I also think if the moderators are the ones posting such information, you might lose a lot of the thread drama because, IMO (and this is purely conjecture), newbies are more likely to trust the opinions of moderators and not get all bent out of shape when they're told what to expect.

 

I agree, and I don't understand why there is so much concern about how the mods will behave--in my experience, moderation has primarily led to good things for the community being moderated. People who love BA enough that they are willing to volunteer their time and who have generally had a positive presence so far probably aren't going to turn evil just because they have mod powers.

Again, agreed. Frequently, something that seems completely clear to the OP could actually be pretty ambiguous--I think it's safe to assume that most people asking for clarification are just trying to rectify that. Some few may have devious intentions, but letting those few get away with it seems better than having every other thread blow up because someone was genuinely curious or confused.

 

plus the few that are being snarky, if it isn't obvious by their first post, they typically get louder and more obvious as the thread goes on.

 

I think that while it is unlikely that the trade will get done it's not really anyone's place to voice one way or another. Let the user ask for help first- or private message them with your opinion or a link to the trading help forum.

 

but is it? this kind of stuff goes on all of the time. in my opinion thread$h*tting is anything that can be construed as potentially indicating that the trade should not go down as proposed. there is definitely grey area.

for example BA Yeti...definitely some reports of infection, but the majority of people who have tried it say it is amazing. if someone posts a FT, and another person mentions the possible infection...is that thread$h*tting or providing information? what about people who talk about bottle count or cost discrepancies...are those thread$h*ts or information? it's in the eyes of the beholder. there are several up and coming LI breweries that are starting to do bottle releases. some as low as 100 bottles. these are rare, hard to come by, but does that mean it should command something hyped like beat that costs the same and has a larger bottle count? does it mean it shouldn't? if you chime in to talk about the how inconvenient it is to get to RR, is that useful info or a thread$hit?

depends on the moderator, depends on the poster, depends on a lot of things. if i posted the same grey area comment that a close friend of yours posted would you ding me with a demerit and not ding your buddy? who is to police the police when it comes to the grey area is my point? you (and others) make plenty of grey area posts about midwest beers...should you be dinged on them? what if you got dinged on a post and a similar post didn't get dinged? it is one thing if it is coming from the bros, but from some other BA'er who i may have gotten into a disagreement with who suddenly became a mod? i like this place (a lot) and i'd hate to be treated unfairly because a mod doesn't like me. it is different if the bros don't like me as this is their universe. i can't send the bros a killer box, but a mod, i can do that to...is that fair?

 

The key is to either not be a dick, or be an equal opportunity dick to everyone.

 

I think you have a misunderstanding on how the moderating would work-- after reading this thread it seems to me like;

Post gets flagged and reported.
Message gets sent to the mods INSTEAD of Jason and Todd.
The mods read the post, check out the context of the post in the thread and have two options:
1). Ignore it.
2). Flag it.

Option 1 results in no action. The post remains and Jason and Todd are not notified or bothered with it, though they can look over all the moderating logs to make sure the mods are doing their job properly. If they aren't acting properly, they get relieved of their duties.

Option 2 results in the post becoming invisible to the forum readers, but a message is them sent to the Bros who make any disciplinary decisions.

The bottom line is that the Broa still have autonomy and the final word-- the mods basically review the case to determine if it is worthy of the Bros' time.
I would like to know if the mods would be able to "edit" user posts-- possibly to make a public note like;
"edited by Shogokawada: I removed a line from your post to eliminate a slightly provocational statement. Let's keep our replies helpful!"
Of course a log of any such edits should be viewable by the bros to keep an eye on how the mods are handling things.

 

I would guess yes, although this form of moderation (which is really useful) hasn't been used on BA at any point, as far as I can tell. It would probably be a good addition.

Also, I think some people in here are way too worried about overactive mods. In my experience with a few different forums (including running one and moderating another) it's just not that big of a deal as long as you get reasonable people. And unreasonable people are pretty easy to spot.

 

glancing at this thread again, my one bit of input for today is: i agree woth kzoobrew mod nomination.

 

i am assuming the worst because time after time we've seen absolute power = absolute corruption. if it happened to col forbin, it can happen to anyone.

i've seen plenty of posts looking for clarification and plenty of posts with the exact wording that were merely pointing out the wrongness of the trade which will all know is opinion. if an offer seems way off to you, it might not be to the poster (and true that could be an ignorance thing), but whose to say? i've seen people trade beers that were super expensive and hard to get (like some of the de struise beers) and i'm shocked what they were looking for...but if that's what they want, that's what they want...and it goes both ways, people looking for expensive and rare beers for something that was recently released and hyped and hard to get...so what about new releases? they are always one sided at first and plenty of people are okay with that.

looking for clarification on those confusing pick 2 from list A or 4 from list B or a combo of 1 from A, 1 from B and if it is the last 2 in B then you can get another 1 from these 2 is also different since it is a lack of understanding, but asking how many is almost the same as saying "is that all?" - the only time when it is appropriate to ask how many is really if someone says FT multiple and for some reason those posts seem to be fine and happen all the time.

looking for clarification posts should be asking about bottle counts or cost of the beer retail, but even those could be construed as thread$h*tting, depending on what the offer is. what about instances where beer prices fluctuate from city to city? Rare was supposed to retail for $45, but went for $60 by me. there are lots of variables with beer these days and people value their beer differently.

to put in a set of moderators to police that sort of stuff needs to be done carefully. those mods will quickly get on a power trip. i've seen it with mods in every community i've ever participated in. and let's face it, people develop opinions on each other. we all have posters that we dig and posters that we don't dig. there are also lots of personal relationships that are spawned from this site and more than a few inner circles.

 

This year's stone IRS is extremely limited by me. Most stores that got it are doing 1 bottle limit. Parabola on the other had was everywhere. FW is super easy to get by me...sucaba is still everywhere. So what might be widely available to you, might not be to me. If we are to add moderators, dictating what is a fair trade vs what is not is beyond what they should do. They should work to keep things civil...that's it.

 

in response to alewatcher's post, perhaps i don't get what the mod will do. if this is just reviewing flagged posts that is different. i was under the impression that these people would moderate in addition to flagged posts...and in that case, all my concerns remain. if it is as alewatcher presented, then i'm all cool with it. i just don't think it is right to have trade forum police/sensors.

 

In many other forums the mods have the power to edit posts that weren't flagged, but when they do they virtually always mention in the post that they've made an edit-- many times leaving the original text (sometimes written with a strike through) so that people can clearly see what that mod feels is a violation of the community rules.

No doubt this could be arranged on this site (or even can be made impossible), but the bros would have a log of EVERY edit the mods made and I'm pretty sure that they wouldn't tolerate the mods bullying certain members.

 

I think the mods prob should be more for monitoring and observing and calling out inappropriate behaviors, not dictating trade value (that shouldnt be their "job"). If they decide to send a message as a mentor, not as a mod then that would be ok. We all know that there are some members who are quite influential and extremely useful for new traders, the mods being police could be a very slippery slope.

 

That's one of those things that sounds great in theory, and wouldn't be a problem if it were only 1 person doing it, but there is a real cost to pointless ISO/FT's. They clog up the forum and hurt legitimate offers from being seen by enough eyes. Given the sheer volume of noobs pouring in these days, and the fact that it can take many of those unanswered types of requests for them to even start to understand that they might be off base, there's some real value in telling them as early as possible.

And as for private messaging, yes, you could do that. But private messaging only helps that one person. A public messages helps a hundred.

 

My only issue is NO one knows for sure what is and is not going to go down. I don't feel like we need mods to tell people what is/is not going to work.

Honestly, I think I've actually seen the post in question done (although in reverse, FT parabola, ISO stone IRS). You never know.

 

Yes, but you're basically arguing for lottery odds at that point. Sure, there is always a chance, but we know damn well Stone RIS going for BCBS on the open market is akin to winning the ISO/FT lottery. And if it does happen, it's likely someone who doesn't know better, who would also benefit from the information.

I'm totally with you on people shutting up about borderline cases, but when things are clearly posted out of ignorance/noobishness, as they often are, I just think we all benefit a lot more than anyone is hurt with public education.