Reported Content

[Morrigan]

Okay, I'm a mother of two, admittedly, and I have the brain the size of a pea *lets be honest I'm over exaggerating here, it's more like an atom* and sometimes I don't always remember when I've reported a post and I know I'm already a nuisance, ask Michael, Matt, Brandon, AndyF, and just about anyone that helps me out when I ask for it so I was curious if this was possible or if it was just pointless?

Showing a member that they have already reported a post. Mind you, I don't want it to show everyone that a post was reported, that's a little humiliating to the author especially if it was just posted in the wrong section plus I've seen that done on SMF and I immediately changed it. So really it would be nice to maybe change the color or the wording to say "Reported" to show a member that they have already reported that post.

If that's not possible then maybe a short error when you click on the link to explain that they have already reported that post?

I prefer the first option because it could still give them an option to report if the content has changed in the original post.

Thanks for listening. ^_^

[Amy T]

Never thought of that but it makes sense and should be done that way. I like your ideas.

[Brett B]

So really it would be nice to maybe change the color or the wording to say "Reported" to show a member that they have already reported that post.

Just what I was going to suggest :).

[dfadmin]

I would even go a step further.

I would really like a feature that enables me to allow users ofo a certain rank to "disapprove" posts. Like they click the report button and the report reason is queried, then upon sending the report the post is set to disapprove and vanished from public sight.

I am not saying this makes sense on every forum, but it is helpful in some instances and for certain forums. That way a questionable post can be "taken out" for a closer look by the mods quickly, nipping potential for drama on social forums in the bud.

[shought]

In addition to being able to view what content you reported it would also be nice to be allowed 'in' the 'conversation' below the report. This would allow for adding additional information after you've reported it and it would also provide an easy way for mods/admins to thank the member for his/her report.

In IPB you got a PM about the report and you would just fix it and reply to the member with a thank you, but now I've noticed a lot of staff members are 'forgetting' this (because they don't think opening a new PM conversation is needed).

So it would be cool if a member got like a section 'your reports', which would list all reports and the comments made in the report center by this member.

[Morrigan]

In addition to being able to view what content you reported it would also be nice to be allowed 'in' the 'conversation' below the report. This would allow for adding additional information after you've reported it and it would also provide an easy way for mods/admins to thank the member for his/her report.

In IPB you got a PM about the report and you would just fix it and reply to the member with a thank you, but now I've noticed a lot of staff members are 'forgetting' this (because they don't think opening a new PM conversation is needed).

So it would be cool if a member got like a section 'your reports', which would list all reports and the comments made in the report center by this member.

No. Absolutely not. Once the content is reported there is absolutely no need for the member to see/know/be thanked for what happens. If you want to thank your members then PM them personally.

[Amy T]

What would be nice is if you reported some thing but realized you reported the wrong thing, if you could delete your own report.

[bfarber]

What would be nice is if you reported some thing but realized you reported the wrong thing, if you could delete your own report.

How often does that actually happen though?

Since I was first employed here, I can't think of a single time anyone here has ever reported something and then been like "oops, I meant this post instead". Ever.

[Brandon D]

Oops, I just reported your post but I meant to report Morrigan's post instead.

[Morrigan]

Oops, I just reported your post but I meant to report Morrigan's post instead.

Curses! I hate when that happens!

[Luke]

I can see why you'd want to show that you've reported a particular post. But personally I don't see how I would forget that I already reported something.

Showing that a post has already been reported (by someone else) is a bad idea. When the Report Center was a mod, someone else did their own "version" of it that had this. I received a bunch of request for this feature. The trouble is the report center weights reports by how many reports a particular post has, and also by how old the report is. You want other members to report the same post to rank the report higher if it hasn't been seen to get more attention from the moderator, which is why I never added it (as it detracts from people reporting it if they know someone else already did, and other reasons already mentioned above).

If you report the same thing twice, it really doesn't hurt anything. The whole idea behind the report center is bridge the efforts of all the moderators to work together collaboratively (as before reports were sent as a message to every moderator).

As far as hiding a post after it's reported: That would be easily abused. I experimented with a feature where a post would be hidden after X amount of unique reports, but I don't recall releasing/committing it (as it wasn't finished).

[Amy T]

How often does that actually happen though?

Since I was first employed here, I can't think of a single time anyone here has ever reported something and then been like "oops, I meant this post instead". Ever.

It happened to me on here only a few days ago.

[Amy T]

How often does that actually happen though?

Since I was first employed here, I can't think of a single time anyone here has ever reported something and then been like "oops, I meant this post instead". Ever.

Here is a screen shot of an example of what I am talking about.


At the time I reported it I was not aware the member could edit the screen shot so reported it and shortly after I had done so it was fixed but I had no way of undoing the report. I thought about reporting it again to let the staff know to ignore the report.

[Brett B]

I can see why you'd want to show that you've reported a particular post. But personally I don't see how I would forget that I already reported something.

I think it's more an issue of preventing someone from reporting the same post over and over again.

[Amy T]

I think it's more an issue of preventing someone from reporting the same post over and over again.

which actually happens a lot on my site.

[Luke]

I think it's more an issue of preventing someone from reporting the same post over and over again.

I get that. I don't see harm in reminding someone that they already reported that post (as long as is only based on that person's report, and not other reports made by other members). But given that you cannot see a report after you've reported it, I don't see harm in a post getting reported twice by the same person either as both would go into a single report... unless someone is doing it more than 2 times.

[Morrigan]

Yup. That was the point and I made sure to point out that I don't want it to be others that see that it's been reported but I'm asking for this because I am sure I've reported content more then 2 times even. If I don't remember and I re-read a post I re-report it. A simple change in the way it's displayed I will re-read a post and go, Oop, already reported and go back to looking at posts.

[TrixieTang]

No. Absolutely not. Once the content is reported there is absolutely no need for the member to see/know/be thanked for what happens. If you want to thank your members then PM them personally.

Maybe it's not right for your forum, but I definitely think that there should be an option to allow members to view reports they've made and staff responses to them.

I'm an admin on a forum that has a report system that's set up like this, so I do know that it is something that can be useful for some forums.

[Amy T]

webhostingtalk is set up that way.

[bfarber]

One problem with allowing users to communicate in a report record is that moderators can no longer discuss the report freely. What if they want to record IP addressed in a report, because they think someone is doing something they shouldn't? Or they need to talk about past issues with a particular user? These things get problematic when random users can view the reports.

Something to think about.

[shought]

One problem with allowing users to communicate in a report record is that moderators can no longer discuss the report freely. What if they want to record IP addressed in a report, because they think someone is doing something they shouldn't? Or they need to talk about past issues with a particular user? These things get problematic when random users can view the reports.

Something to think about.

I did, add an option 'Make report invisible for reporter'.

I really feel it will improve the 'feeling' of this report functionality mainly for the members. Now many of our mods just don't bother to send the member a PM to thank them.

(This whole 'reporter is able to view report' concept should be 'turn off-able' ( :P ) in the ACP, I guess.)

I personally haven't had a single case where we needed to talk about issues like IPs and or problems with members inside the reports. I also think the report center is not suitable for this because when there's an 'active report' you will always see this '1 report' on the top of the page, but you never know when another staff member made a reply... So using it to actually discuss things, rather than just 'document the actions taken', is not likely to happen. (This would require all mods involved in the discussion to check back every given amount of time to make sure there are no replies to their replies...)

[Morrigan]

See the problem is, on any forum that I've adminned the problems were often with repeat offenders and people that are sitting on a the darker side of grey on a particular rule. Allowing someone to see the conversations about something like that is bad. It's bad from the staff because that's a breech of privacy. If you want your staff to PM your members to thank them for reporting something then create some sort of automatic PM? See if someone can create a feature for that? I've never had an occasion that I have ever thanked a member for helping support good content on the site. They know that I appreciate it because it makes my life easier.

[TrixieTang]

See the problem is, on any forum that I've adminned the problems were often with repeat offenders and people that are sitting on a the darker side of grey on a particular rule. Allowing someone to see the conversations about something like that is bad. It's bad from the staff because that's a breech of privacy. If you want your staff to PM your members to thank them for reporting something then create some sort of automatic PM? See if someone can create a feature for that? I've never had an occasion that I have ever thanked a member for helping support good content on the site. They know that I appreciate it because it makes my life easier.

Not all forums have the same problems, not all have problems with repeat offenders or grey area rule violations. And if you allow reporters to view report discussions then you and your staff just don't post any private information in the report discussion. Most people have a staff forum, if anything private concerning a report needs to be discussed you can always do it there.

It should at least be an option to allow reporters to view discussions on their reports, not everyone runs their forum the same way after all, and what's best for one forum isn't necessarily what's best for another forum.

[shought]

Bump: I still think it'd be a great idea to have an option which would allow the members to see the comments and (maybe) edit his report after it has been made (if you can see it, then why not allow editing as well). Also within this option a button to mark a certain report 'invisible' (for non mods) would be great (to avoid members getting information on some controversial subject, one of which I can't think right now).

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Also (regarding reported content):

It's pretty annoying to not be able to see when some other staff member replied to a report. The only thing you can view (without actually going into the report center) is the number of active reports, but when a report is active for a little longer than usual (a day for instance, awaiting the decision of an Admin) and there is some discussion (by staff members) about the subject you will not be able to notice this without visiting the report center.

Maybe this could be implemented alongside the new notification system (do note, it should notify a staff member even when he/she is online)? (Or it might already be, I have to confess I'm not (completely) up to date with 3.1)

Now, how this connects to the previous:
Either one of these functions (or both) should absolutely be implemented. Because if the first function (members being able to see the report progress / comments) isn't implemented then members won't be able to see the comments, but if the second function isn't implemented then the staff as well pretty much 'won't' be able to see the comments (yes, I've personally encountered several occasions where a staff member missed some comments on a report).

On smaller boards or boards with little controversial subjects and rules there won't be much use of the report system nor comments by the staff, but on bigger boards or boards which do have a lot of rules / controversial subjects this really matters a great deal ;)