Why the Moderation?

Well, let me first tell you the story of "Peter the Jerk" (not my name for him, but it fits).

During the year that my second son was born, I took a year off writing on the web and instead was one of the main participants in a mailing list about Japanese baseball. There were many people from all around the world talking baseball. Opinions differed, but no real flame wars broke out. Everything was good.

Then along came Peter the Jerk. He had a friend who was coming to play ball in Japan and was "going to teach the Japanese how to play baseball." He talked down to everyone on the list, as though nobody there knew anything about baseball. Despite his arrogance, I calmly answered the questions he rudely asked (never got a "thank you" - just more declarations about how inferior Japanese baseball is). Then, when nobody would reply to him anymore, he started attacking the way non-native English speakers posted, making fun of their broken English. One person, who had posted a great deal of very useful information to the list for years, wrote me and told me that he was unsubscribing and would never participate in the list again. All because of this one ingrate.

The irony of this story is that his friend, who was supposed to take Japan by storm, didn't make it much beyond camp. Peter the Jerk then disappeared back to the hole from which he came and was never heard from again.

After I started writing on the web again, this time with this forum instead of my static ISP provided home page, the mailing list pretty much got abandoned. There are still posts there now and again, but not many. If you're interested in that non-moderated, low participation, mailing list, it's here - Yahoo! Groups].

Anyway, this forum started off unmoderated. Like the mailing list before Peter the Jerk, there was very little offensive material. Everything was good.

Then on September 29, 2001, either two people (one in Saitama, the other in New York) or a single person with multiple personalities (using hijacked machines as proxies) started posting vulgar material and attacking the people who post regularly to the forum. This marked the first time I had to actually delete a comment, and it disturbed me greatly. Repeated requests to be civil did nothing but prod these people (personalities) to more attacks. I was not going to have somebody drive off the people who actually care about Japanese baseball again, and moderation was enacted.

You can read my follow up to the entire ordeal here. After getting some advice from others who had gone through this, I did not continue to post about these attacks, as it appears to be the attention that these guys (this guy) wanted. And sure enough, after calling me all kinds of names and attempting to post for about two weeks after I started moderation, the problem went away. They (he) tried several more times, testing every few weeks, then every month, then a couple times the following season, but to no avail. In short, moderation works for keeping people away who only want to cause trouble, not participate in the community.

Now, what does that attack have to do with Peter the Jerk? Well, since I was moderating, and there was still the possibility of people getting stuck on the form and not the content, I started cleaning up the grammar of non-native speakers. One potential distraction was eliminated. (I might add, many native English speakers have a lot of trouble, too. I never noticed how many people don't know the difference between "there," "their," and "they're" before I started moderating. And don't get me started on the inability of native English speakers to use capital letters for proper nouns.) Furthermore, most people don't know how to format messages very well, often hitting the [ENTER] key in the middle of a paragraph, creating a jagged edged post. Moderating makes every post look much better. A cosmetic touch, but it helps a great deal toward making people focus on content, not form. (How many of you even notice the form?)

As for censorship. It takes a pretty extreme case for me to censor somebody. Well, not so extreme if the poster didn't bother to read the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions). I don't think it's too much to ask people to do some research before posting. The basic criteria for a post to go through is to (1) have something to do with Japanese (or Asian) baseball, and (2) to add something to the conversation. Of course, some threads (especially in Nichi-Bei) go off on tangents that get approved although I'd like to kill the thread. But attacks on people add nothing to conversations. Attacks on ideas, especially with some sort of evidence, are perfectly fine (but try to please be nice).

Then there have been attempts at advertising. Advertising Speech is not Free Speech. Some ads have nothing to do with baseball. One guy tried very hard to astroturf a baseball video game advertisement (I told him what I would accept, but he refused to follow the simple rules).

Finally, there have been a number of people simply post racist attacks for no apparent reason. You people don't see them, but they get posted here every few months. The poster realizes fairly quickly that it's moderated (after posting) and will therefore not reach his/her intended audience, and goes away.

Do you see advertisements here? I've gotten paid a total of 0 yen for the huge investment of time and materials that I've put into this site over the years. I would like it to look good (which moderation helps) and be an informative experience to those who wish to use it as a research resource. The kinds of things that get moderated out do not fulfill that mission. It is not an extreme form of censorship. And it is not a publicly funded forum.

Does that mean that I don't listen to what people want? No. If it were up to me, I wouldn't bother with the Nichi-Bei (Japanese in the Majors) section. But you people want it, so I'm providing the space. If someone else (like you) were to start a non-moderated forum that covered Nichi-Bei, I'd be more than happy to send people there. In fact, the Creative Commons License allows you to use any materials here that you like so long as you give credit to where you got them. So you can start off with my content if you like. (Note, some pieces have other copyright notices where I was given permission to republish them. Those do not fall under the Creative Commons License.)

So you see, moderation works well on this site, and does very little to hinder the exchange of ideas - often aiding the ideas by presenting them better. If you like the raw, emotional words of conversation, you're welcome to start your own site, and you're also welcome to use materials that you find here. Moderation does not limit your freedoms, as you seem to fear.

First of all, this is Michael's excellent gift to those of us who care to discuss Japanese baseball, and it is his to do with as he sees fit. He and I may not always agree on exactly where to draw the line on what is improper swearing, but I've never seen him deny anyone with something to say (beyond trying to stir up trouble or give us all more spam to deal with) the opportunity to do so. If I felt he was getting in the way of the discussion as opposed to facilitating it, I'd be elsewhere promptly. He doesn't. Michael's work is never done, and he does it willingly for our benefit. If that's not good enough for your tastes, we're sorry you feel that way, but don't let the door hit you too hard on the way out.

Jim Albright

I agree 100 percent with Jim Albright. In addition, Michael Westbay has done a great job as moderator to help keep individuals from making unethical financial gain or inflict unwarrented personal attacks. This forum is Michael's labor of love of baseball.

Thank you Westbay!

Moderation adds a lot more work to running a discussion forum, but it is time well spent. I can disagree with someone or they can disagree with me, but we can enjoy a reasoned exchange of views. This is something to be valued, especially as a lot of people forget courtesy when they post (I've seen it happen a lot on other sites). I, like the other posters, value Michael's work and efforts to make this forum a place for civilized discussion.

Although I don't always like it when my very subtle swear words (I think some mild swear words are needed sometimes for emphasis) are changed into something else, I agree that since this is Mr. Westbay's website he has the right to do whatever he wants. Let's face it - some adults don't always act like adults, especially when they can run and hide behind a shroud like a computer, so sometimes it is necessary to have a moderator when you have a forum where anyone can basically write anything they want.

The only complaint I have (and it's a very minor one at that) is that sometimes my grammar is corrected when it's not necessary. Although I never went to journalism school or majored in English in college, I know how to spell and I usually know when to use commas and things like that. However, sometimes my sentences or words are changed incorrectly. For example, when I write the word "teammate," it's changed to "team mate." Or when I write "Cubs manager," it's changed to "Cubs' manager." I know it's very insignificant, so please don't think I'm complaining or that I'm criticizing you.

I need to clarify something. When I wrote "Cubs manager," I meant that as in "Cubs manager Don Zimmer," not as in "He's the Cubs' manager."

Westbay-san's website is good because its presentation is clean and professional. I can't stand reading people's posts with nothing but foul language and grammatical and spelling errors. It gives me a headache and it makes it very difficult to read. We all can benefit from a few English lessons from Westbay-san. The dude is a well-educated man!

I would stop complaining and let Westbay-san do what ever he wishes with his website. Unlike some of us who do not have a job, Westbay-san has a full-time job, a wife and two kids. We should all appreciate him for spending his time proof reading and making our corrections for zero yen. All in all, it's our fault for being such poor writers.

I sympathize with you, Michael. By the way, I'm the "Japanese baseball videogame jerk," and I don't work for Konami. I'm a 21 year old guy who's trying to get a decent English speaking community going on that subject, because there are only around four of us right now. That should sound familiar to you.

Anyway, my problem with moderation isn't really about the issue of freedom. If people want to yell and curse, they should be subject to moderation. Normal people don't have conversations like that. I'd just rather have posts and replies be more prompt. I also have to agree about the posts being grammatically corrected. I've never seen that on any other moderated forum before. I think it takes the modding a little too far.

I've been coming to this site regularly for two years now, and hardly ever join discussions. The moderating and forum style really makes one feel like an unwanted outsider. That's just my perspective.

Sorry about that. What you wrote about video games read like something from a checklist of things that had to be included. It did not include any information about accessiblity to the data that drove the game. Just game play. There had been a number of people ask about how to play Japanese video games before that got no replies, so I made it an unwritten policy to avoid video game discussions. It's my fault for not making that clear.

However, the point you make about there not being a decent community for discussing video games does strike a cord and make me want to help. I was under the impression that there were a lot of sites that did nothing but discuss video games. A quick Google and it looks like the only one for Netchu Pro Yakyu is in Italian. Is that what the forum landscape looks like for all Japanese baseball video games? If so, I'll be happy to make space for your group.

As for the comment that normal people don't yell and curse in normal conversation, well, you must not have spent much time on the MLB boards. I had one regular try to start a conversation here about Pete Rose. I recognized him from his handle and sent an e-mail asking him, "why?" His reply was that he couldn't have a mature conversation on any of the MLB lists about Pete and would rather have it here. That tells me that I must be doing something right that MLB.com is doing wrong.

Anyway, my moderation is meant to facilitate communication, not hinder it, and I'm sorry that it made you feel like an outsider. You're communicating your needs much better this time. The only impression I had of the video game posts before was that of a dire need to post a checklist of features, as many astroturf advertisers do. This is a much better conversation.

And as a result of this dialog, if you can't find a place to host discussion on Japanese baseball video games, I'd be happy to see what I can do. It sounds like you can be responsible enough to keep people on-topic (Puyo-Puyo games are off topic) and decent. How does a non-moderated forum on such a topic sound, with you in charge?

yes, each and everything moderated is highly ameturish job...instead selective moderation will do the job for yoi..these days lot of FORUMS support scripts to find BAD WORDS, YELLING, and minimum number of words, and more over IP ADDRESS blocking!!!

why not use such...also make few moderators not just one so that even if the post passes all these automatic moderation then these mods can set it right!!

this moderation is the only issue i:m not used to post my views....though being an adorent fan of hanshin tigers!!

I assume you made all of those mistakes to prove a point, so I passed your message through unmoderated. Your other post earlier today didn't need cleaning. (By the way, the apostrophe on a JIS 106 keyboard is at [Shift]+[7]. I see a lot of ":"s instead of "'"s from people used to U.S. 101 keyboards on Japanese systems.)

I actually tried IP address blocking back when the attacks first started coming in 2001. As mentioned in one of those threads, the attacker was Internet savvy enough to use an anonymizer, changing his IP address every time I blocked one off. IP address blocking works against "drive by" biggots or advertisers, but not against somebody determined to harass a community.

I've been looking into other forum software similar to what you described. Most of it is written in PHP which has had security issues for quite a while. Even well written PHP applications have fallen victim to rooting. Basicly, I don't feel comfortable with PHP based applications on anything but an intranet right now.

I'm growing less content with the forums as they are. A moderation system like SlashDot would be good now that the community has grown large enough to sustain it. This forum used to be run by SlashCode, but many people had a harder time with it, as I suppose it's more geared toward technical people. It's evolved since then, and may be a reasonable alternative in the future.

I'm also a big fan of pro yakyu video games, and the English speaking community for those games is next to none. I've been browsing this site's forums for the past 2 years, and always wished there were a spot on the forums for the pro yakyu video games.

- I assume you made all of those mistakes to prove a point, so I passed your message through unmoderated.

hmmm...me tried all those? how do you know? i'm an admin of a community forum...btw, i know u can ban this post but i had to ask this question, so YOU LET my post UNMODERATED!!!? cool...dont you worry anymore..i wont write here, make your job easier!! simple and easist solution!!
thanks for reply and thanks if u let this one go!!
bye...

Mmmm. I'm glad he's not going to bother us anymore.

Keep up the good work Michael.

It's not my intention to exclude anyone. But there's no possible way to please everyone(*), so your leaving will not change my mind. I don't care about hit count, I care about the community. Moderation has proven to attract people to and sustain this community. Your experience may be different, and that's fine. It is not my place to pass judgement on your work on your forum. (If it's about Japanese baseball, how about submitting a link to it?)

I guess I misinterpreted your intensions before. You made a post on another thread that properly used capital letters and complete sentences. At the same time, you submitted the previous post (by ayya) as above. It struck me that you were trying to prove my point about how moderation makes communication easier, and you posted a demonstration of a lot of what I see. Bilingual people will have no problem understanding your point(s) on the first read. But many native English speakers will have to work out what it is you're trying to say, getting stuck on the presentation, missing the message.

* A study I'd seen on TV a number of years ago found that any free service is likely to have at best an 85 percent satisfaction rate. By the feedback I've gotten over the years, this "service" averages better than that.

The motion for a Pro Yakyu video game forum has been proposed and seconded. It appears that there's such a need, so here you go.

BigManZam, you're welcome to be the first to post there. Please set some ground rules for posting and welcome your audience.

On a related note to creating this forum, one of the reasons I mentioned that I was looking into other forum software was to allow for more writer-specific forums. Would any of you regulars like your own forum here? I'm starting to set things up so that it'll be possible. There are currently two ways of doing it, one on a Wiki, the other through this forum framework. I'd like to continue conversations along these lines off-list with those interested. Interested persons, please reply to this with your e-mail address and I'll e-mail you back - deleting the post (so as not to expose your e-mail address).