How can Snapzu maintain its amazing 'friendly' vibe as it grows?
As most users are probably aware, Snapzu is a really friendly and welcoming place for old and new alike. For me this is one of the main USPs of the site.
I think some of this has to do with the fact it's relatively young site (early adopters are often more passionate and engaged with a site's own core approach) as well as its current invite-only status (users are more likely to bring in like-minded individuals). As a user base increases in size, attitudes inevitably diversify, and focus is harder to maintain. Reddit immigrants will surely attest to this having happened almost every time a small subreddit has had an influx of members, or been added as a default for new users.
So, with the knowledge that there is bound to be some affect on the vibe of the site as it starts to grow (which will be unavoidable), what do you think both the admins and users can do as we progress to mitigate this as much as possible?
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I don't know that it's possible to maintain the "friendly" vibe everywhere. I'm seeing a growing amount of hostility, both passive and overt. It's the nature of the Internet that people disparage opinions and even facts they disagree with. My response thus far has been to identify such hostility and then ignore the person as much as possible.
Yeah, the overt stuff is easy enough to dispel with politeness but the passive stuff is harder. Especially on Reddit, there seems to be a huge number of people that will stubbornly cling to beliefs no matter what evidence to the contrary you provide, and will respond with rude little snarky quips even if you were being civil.
For example, I saw this one video post talking about Bonsai in Tennessee. The person in the video had a thick southern accent and really mangled some of the Japanese terms. One user mentioned this and then was berated by several people defending the person in the video, claiming that's how Japanese people speak too. When I provided a links audio recordings of native Japanese speakers, proving how actual Japanese people pronounce the words, the only responses I received were, "I don't care, I'm still right."
Welcome to the Internet. Where everything's made up and the facts don't matter.
Other than a helpful link here and there I had pretty much stopped discussing anything over there the past year or so.
I haven't run into any bad comments yet, but I'm sure they'll come. Ignoring these comments is definitely the best way to go. It'll make the environment much less hostile and combative.
I wish this were true, but I think in the long term, it's not sustainable. Simply ignoring is not enough. We need to work to create a culture where trolls, etc. don't get satisfaction from posting. While everyone ignoring them would be ideal, I don't think people will do it as the userbase grows. "Raging" or responding strongly isn't going to be successful either. I think the right thing to do is quickly, briefly call them out on their BS. "Your comment is inappropriate because BLANK." If we can somehow limit our responses to trolls to a single comment like that, I think there's a greater chance of delaying the onslaught of hostile comments.
We worked very hard to create a system that works against trolls and spammers on every turn, we hope this system will hold up as this community scales. Here is an excerpt taken from our Reputation & XP: A guide to Leveling on Snapzu documentation that I think everyone should read:
We have all worked hard to get to where we are as a community, and the mature and responsible personality is something we are willing to fight for as we grow.
Yes, I was thinking the very same.
The site has the feel of a personal branding while at the same time preserving all the good that comes with anonymity. People don't usually want to ruin their personal brand - but those that do can be dealt with accordingly.
Very sound system, and I hope it works out as planned!
In the same way that reddit offers you the ability to unsubscribe from a lot of the "defaults", you could leave some of the default tribes, but that won't affect people that come here without accounts, or people that choose to keep the defaults.
Often, the people who would be in a position to counteract the negativity or hostility of a community will choose not to fight that battle, because they can just leave and make their own tribe, with blackjack, and hookers. Hell, it usually doesn't take that much; people will often leave simply because of a difference of opinion. There's no opportunity cost for them to leave and form their own group, so they will. /t/<inserttribehere> will have a sister tribe called /t/real<inserttribehere> as soon as the first major spat happens.
The cross-pollination between tribes makes it a little less isolated than on reddit, though. Since you can (at higher levels) post up to five different tribes at the same time based on topic you're likely to end up contributing to tribes you don't have listed as default. I'm not subscribed to /t/kids but I end up posting some content to that tribe because it becomes relevant to some of my topics.
Yes. I'm going to enjoy the politeness while it lasts.
I think this is the key. Trolls starve when unfed, the only reason they thrive on Reddit is because it's a smorgasbord.
This is where user tags would come in handy.
As each community grows, the hostility will increase. The only way to maintain this peaceful vibe is to make sure that this community will . stop growing, which isn't very fair to a lot of people. So the most we can do is to just ignore the meanness and be nice to all. ;)
Honestly, I think the biggest problem will be the downvoting. The downvote here means something completely different from the upvote. You upvote something when you like it, but you downvote something to report it. I don't blame new users at all if they don't understand it from the start.
If this place continues to grow at this rate, the number of people who don't understand what downvoting means will outnumber us in the community who use it appropriately. I really believe the downvote should be replaced with something else, and not doing so will leave us open to be overrun by users legitimately confused about it.
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I agree. Perhaps you might want to start a conversation under Ideas for Snapzu.
I think it starts with us maintaining the niceness, being as welcoming as we can. There is a quote that I try to live by and it goes a little something like this.
Don't wait for people to be friendly, show them how. ~Author Unknown
I agree with this. To prevent culture from being overrun, we have to be the representatives of said culture. As new users come in, they will be more open to adapting to the existing culture , being new and all. If we consistently show the kind of community we want to have, we will (hopefully) continue to maintain those values.
Well baboons did this..So can we.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZcTvFqzxA0
I think part of the problem is that some people enjoy wiring others up. This is a small minority, so there still hasn't come much of those here already. In time as the user base grows there will be more of these and even a very small minority can cause disruption to many users. I was part of a small closed social network here in Norway and just one user with an agenda was enough to upset the mood of the whole place. It didn't help that the admins were lenient towards him. Things improved when he was kicked out.
The same thing happened on our teeny Linux forum. Finally everyone just ignored him and he left over a year ago.
That works. If everyone ignores the person, he will leave. The trick is to make everyone ignore someone in a medium to large forum.
I like the cut of your jib suu.. Clark!
Kill them with kindness is what I always say. I've received some rather rude comments once or twice (amidst hundreds of pleasant and even downright friendly conversations). I simply respond thanking them for taking the time to comment and often leave a :) or ^_^ and move on.
Query: I applaud your innovative approach to killing meatbags, but I have found that kindness is often nonfatal. Is there something I am doing incorrectly?
You need to be persistently kind. Bullies pick on people for the reaction they get from their victims. Don't give them a reaction and they will pick on somebody else. The vast majority of people are good but the rotten eggs stand out to us the most because it isn't the norm. Jut be persistent and continue on. The rest of the community will support you. If the bullying is bad make use of the down vote feature, that's what it's there for. If it's really bad and the user has a history of abuse report the user to a moderator or staff member.
Often good advice, but I find this doesn't always work online. I find that people who have an ideological axe to grind, whether it's political or religious or they just don't like you will always find an excuse to make a disparaging remark about something you say or post. They don't always go away. I'm seeing this on Snapzu as well, an increasing amount of comments directed not at the content of my snaps but in disparaging the topics as a whole. I'm continuing to ignore them but history suggests to me that they're not going to give up so long as I continue to post content I feel is appropriate.
Those aren't supported by Snapzu as reasonable reasons to downvote or troll a comments section though. Personal vendettas and being smeared by unstable users is where reporting the user to administrators would come into play. I was only saying kill them with kindness as a strategy to just deal with rude or more or less unfriendly people, not as a tool to combat harassment or abuse of the system.
I understand, and I'm not advocating downvoting such people. Merely pointing out that "ignore them and they'll go away" isn't necessarily accurate. I don't feel it appropriate to report people to the admins for expressing their opinions, even if they phrase them poorly.
I wasn't saying downvoting them was wrong as /you the victim/ I was saying downvoting was wrong as /the bully/. Just to clear that up, I wasn't attacking you. Also I was saying "just ignore them" was (what seems to me) the appropriate action if someone was rude or inconsiderate once or twice. I meant to express that reporting would be a viable option when you're being smeared by a user on a rampage or who is abusing the system (ie. downvoting, comments section) just to make a point. That's not what those systems are in place for, particularly the down voting, and if those systems are being abused by the same account towards you or any other user repeatedly that definitely warrants a report to an administrator or moderator.
We have no way of knowing who is downvoting whom (unless you're an admin), and I'm trying to use the downvote sparingly for inappropriate posts and comments. And of course I didn't assume you were attacking me, I simply wanted to make sure my point was expressed as clearly as possible. :)
Ultimately, it's hard to maintain a "friendly" vibe when people are verbally sniping at each other. I can snark with the rest of them and sometimes it's hard to resist the temptation to unleash it on someone I think is being particularly obtuse. Maintaining a policy of ignoring someone who always has a disparaging comment for the topic I'm discussing can be quite a challenge, especially when they don't get the hint and go away.
In the end I don't believe there is a clear cut path to success with dealing with these individuals. As Snapzu members we just need to do the best to keep our various tribe and communities friendly with one another, be mindful of who we invite to join our communities, and most importantly, lead by example.
I do. Let the Admin make the call. That's his/her job.
And that's what starts the downhill path of everyone downvoting everyone else for the perception of harassment under the guise of disagreement. Pretty soon you're in the hell of Poe's Law where you can't be sure someone said something to troll or because they're in earnest.
I'd suggest you report them. The squeaky wheel get oiled.
Well my attitude is always expect every new person to be a friend. And while a larger number of people will definitely bring a larger number of opinions and perspectives, I don't think we should ever expect friendliness to not be the norm. Being respectful to someone, especially when you disagree with them, is a huge mark of maturity.
And I think if someone is being rude or disparaging, call them out in a nice way. Just something like, "Hey even if you disagree, try to remember to be civil. We're a community here!" Especially on the internet, people can sometimes come off 'sounding' harsher than they meant to (we forget how much communication is nonverbal). And if someone is consistently rude, and people keep calling them out and making them uncomfortable, they'd probably leave for somewhere more 'welcoming' to their hostility.
This is really important to remember, in my experience. Some of the nicest and most considerate people I know in real life come off as pretty brusque in online interactions. They are often people given to dry humor or winking sarcasm - both things that just don't always work on the screen. I also know folks that are very good hearted, but who haven't developed an empathetic stance toward strangers - often as a result of long term social anxiety issues. It's hard, even impossible, to know if someone deserves the benefit of doubt when a post sounds harsh or rude, but I try to keep these things in mind when I read such posts. It doesn't always work, but I do try.
That's one of the reasons I use emoticons sometimes. When overused, they are annoying and evoke children's SMS messages, however, in our current age of text-heavy communication I believe they actually have real value. So many styles of interaction suffer from the lack of vocal intonation or facial expressions. A simple smiley or winky face can completely turn around the perceived intent of a post.
Yes it looks silly sometimes, but anything that adds clarity or helps convey the intended sentiment is fine in my book.
Great point. I use emoticons in that way too (much to my teenagers' chagrin) and often struggle with the connotation of immaturity that comes along with them. I sometimes end up rewriting simple messages just to avoid using them. But sometimes '/s' isn't enough, or even applicable.
"/s" is terrible. The whole point of sarcasm is that it's inferred. You don't call out sarcasm, just like you don't explain a joke. It ruins it. If you can't be sarcastic without using /s, then don't be sarcastic.
I agree. Unfortunately, in my experience some people just can't or won't infer the sarcastic intent in what most people can see is a clearly sarcastic comment. They tend to get all worked up, and then I feel bad. So the few times I have used "/s" online have been out of an abundance of caution.
Edit: I want to add that I brought up "/s" in my comment above because it is a known alternative to an emoticon, not because I think it's awesome.
Yeah, I think sarcasm is one of the forms that fares the least well in writing.
There are a lot of people who don't get that the Onion is a parody, either, but the Onion doesn't start each article with "DISCLAIMER: The following is satire and is not intended to be taken seriously. The events described here are fictional and included for comedic purposes." Why? Two reasons: 1) It wouldn't be as funny anymore, and 2) the fact that stupid people are taking it seriously is hilarious.
I don't even think it's immature--I know some people perceive it as a thing only kids do, but if you ask me it's too useful for the exact reasons you laid out to not use. I also sometimes use all caps or hyperbole in text, more so than in regular conversation, to convey that humor is the intent.
I agree with you wholeheartedly. Very well put.
You could have placeholder text for all comments boxes that just says "Remember if things heat up: trolls feed on attention. The best way to win a fight is to not enter it."
'Do not feed the trolls' sign?
Essentially, yes. There could even be a button you click when you make a last second decision to not respond, with a small amount of XP gained after a certain number of clicks. A button that just says "Bite your tounge" which then automatically hides the post thereonin
Whether we like it or not, the friendly, homey, small-town vibe of this place is going to dwindle; that's gonna be the trade off of all this growth and injection of more personalities.
Yes, invites stop the flow somewhat, but anyone can request an invite; that's how I got in.
The best thing we can do in forge on with the attitude we want to see in our community and not encourage behavior we don't appreciate. That's not going to be simple on its own, and it's probably going to be tough as shit at times, but that the only way I can see some hope of that friendliness staying.
Maybe we could have some group activities every so often for member on the site to generate some friendly camaraderie?
As a community we have to work together to shape the community how we want it to be. So if someone comes in and starts spamming/trolling then we need to take it upon ourselves to simply downvote them. Then the opposite needs to be done by us, we need to keep friendly open conversation and create our posts how we would like others to post.
I also think /t/lounge is a great place to say hi and meet everyone. We need to keep this environment friendly if anything, this tribe will be one of the first places most people go! So lets keep it friendly! =)
draconic moderation
Would it be possible to give admins the ability to ban users that exhibit unfriendly or abusive behavior? And give them a 3 strikes rule?