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Re: blocks and support » Estella

Posted by Jost on September 3, 2006, at 13:59:04

In reply to Re: blocks and support Estella, posted by Estella on August 29, 2006, at 21:40:00

>>> The first step would be to type offenses. That is probably best done by looking through the archives and seeing what kinds of offences people are blocked for. It might be hard to come up with an appropriate category of types, but I don't think it is impossible or essentially arbitrary. One way to do it would be to see whether one person can organise blocks into types under certain headers and then see whether once the headers are given whether another poster can organise the blocks into the same headers. If so then there is inter-rater reliability for the types at any rate. There might be lots of funny borderline cases but I would say that we should have a go rather than giving up on a-priori grounds.


~~~ are there any categories that you're thinking about? (other than personal attacks, vs, something else?)

~~ have you looked through any archives, say of the last year, to see how many blocks there were and if there's any pattern to the blocks? or to the behavior of those who were blocked, after the blocks, or the behavior of those who weren't blocked? etc


>>>
>>>I'm interested in whether lengthy blocks for certain types of offences actually harm the boards. What I mean by harm is operationalised and fairly specific:

1) It harms the boards when a person who usually posts supportive messages leaves the board for a lengthy period of time / for good.
2) It harms the boards when a person who usually posts supportive messages starts posting unsupportive / attacking messages.
3) It harms the boards when a person who usually posts supportive messages leaves the boards because another poster was blocked for a lengthy period of time for a borderline offence.


~~ Have you identified the lengths of the blocks for the last year? what's the longest vs the shortest? have you tried doing a bell curve for the length of blocks?

That would be a pretty simple step, that might be interesting.

The thing about the blocks is that I'm not sure that Bob uses them for consequentialist reasons. So far, that's what you've assumed. Bob has, I guess, made consequentialist-sounding claims about the blocks, and he may believe that these claims are true-- but they still may not be the rationale.

My sense (and I admit to having no strong basis for it) is that Bob has some sort of philosophical/pedagogic attachment to the structure of blocks. If so, a demonstration that he's empirically incorrect might go only so far.

If blocks were quite harmful, without having the pedagogic benefits, you might get somewhere with him. But the harm would have to substantially outweight the pedagogy (IMHG). (G meaning "guess") How can you measure the degree of a harm--or the degree of a good that might be out there, but is more theoretical--ie the blocked person goes away mad, but learns something useful in the next situation?

Bob could still correctly point out that your study doesn't capture the benefits, and also that the harms, when weighed against the benefits, are less telling. How, for example, do you weight Good A, vs Good B, or Harm A vs. Harm B? (There are always points of view in studies--it's particularly hard to produce a study specifically to convince someone whose point of view you don't share.)

It would nonetheless be interesting (to me anyway) as to what the pattern of blocks is. And of comings and goings, and lots of other aspects of this board. If I were prone to empirical work, Psychobabble would be my dream site. (I like it a whole lot anyway, as anyone can see.)

I'm curious about Bob's algorithm for blocking. I've been online long enough (not that long, but long enough) to have noticed that s/he who owns the message board is going to run message board according to her/his lights. From what Ive seen Bob is a rather enlightened dictator, compared to others. Although democracy is a great concept, probably enlightened dictatorship works as well as enlightened democracy. So while I undoubtedly disagree with Bob on many things (or don't, who knows?), I'm impressed with the insight and evolving usefulness of many features of the board.

I'm also interested in your critique (constructive, of course).

Jost


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