Do moderated responses vanish completely?

The moderators can still see moderated responses, but no one else can, including the OP.

You would not see the answer or response since it would be taken away completely.

In social some answers may not be helpful to you, but as long as they are not insulting to you they would not be removed.

General is a little stricter, since the answers should stay on topic.

Okay then. Thanks, you two!

And on rare occasions moderated comments are sometimes restored or restored with editing. It doesn’t happen a lot but I know two of mine were resurrected after being modded. Of course I’ve been modded a lot more than that :).

What does OP actually stand for???

OP stands for “Original Poster,” the person who started the thread.

I’ve always felt that the OP should be a part of the moderation process on their own thread – other than obvious spam. The OP is the one who posed the question, so they should have some power in directing the conversation that follows. Of course, they need to be willing to assume the responsibility that goes with that. Perhaps a Yes/No reply required, where they would choose whether to moderate their own thread or to defer to the Fluther Mods.

But as most of us know, no changes will be made to the site, so it’s just wishful thinking; but if anyone were to develop a new, dynamic Q&A site for us, they might incorporate such an option. Has anyone inquired whether BenDrew would sell Fluther, or does Twitter own this site (and its content) as well as its creators now?

@fundevogel: Oh, okay. Do the moderators do the editing?
@hearkat: That’s how I thought it was done, actually. But isn’t moderation supposed to protect the OP, too? In some cases at least?

Thank you for answering a question I’ve been wondering for years, @PhiNotPi!

@longgone “Oh, okay. Do the moderators do the editing?”

They do. Though on the occasion I’m thinking of I had appealed the modding as my wording had been a bit off and was being interpreted as harsh in a way I hadn’t intended. I suggested alternative phrasing which was used in the restored comment. Other times I’ve seen mods redact small parts of comments rather than completely mod them. When this is done a note is included in brackets acknowledging the edit. I know this has been done to preserve the privacy of members with name changes they prefer to keep on the down low for the sake of their internet privacy.

@hearkat Twitter doesn’t own Fluther, it’s still Bendrew’s baby.

@hearkat on occasion, if the thread is really going off track and not in a negative, combative way, the mods will ask the OP would they prefer to move their question to social or for us to mod the thread.

However, the OP has already made a choice by deciding to post in General. That signifies they want on-topic answers and it is not unusual for them to flag answers that are what they consider to be off-topic.

Right, thanks, @fundevogel!
@Bellatrix : Are questions in the social section not moderated at all?

@longgone The social section is moderated, but the standards are looser. Off-topic stuff or joke answers are generally allowed there, but personal attacks, spam, flame-bait, and tragically misspelled stuff is still removed.

Learning a lot here – okay. Thanks, @augustlan

@Bellatrix – I have seen that happen, but I also recall occasions where a comment was moderated yet the OP was OK with it. Sometimes there are different interpretations or inferences to be drawn from comments, and who better to determine whether a comment is “on topic” than the person who posed the topic in the first place?

@hearkat there are a team of people who make the final judgement on whether something should or should not be modded. We usually moderate but every decision is seen by the team. On occasions one of us will say “I disagree with that decision” and we discuss it. If an OP does want a post (or more) to remain they can flag and decisions might be reversed. It’s happened before.

However, to contact the OP every time we mod a thread would make it an impossible task. The OP may not be online when the mod is, they may not respond to the message and there just aren’t the mods to manage such a process. So, we moderate and if the OP or the person moderated disagrees they can always flag or contact @augustlan. That seems to work well. It’s rare we have OPs come to us and say they wanted posts left in place.

@Bellatrix – The one time I specifically remember goes back to 2008, so things may have changed since then (I don’t think General/Social were in existence yet, for example); but there were comments pulled before the OP even saw them.

That could still happen. We don’t know when people are online. The mod team see any moderated posts or questions and I guess to a point, the community has to trust we will do our job as well as we can. I’m sure errors have happened and will happen in the future, but there isn’t a perfect system.