A few of my posts have been unceremoniously removed from the forums lately, and although this is nothing new, it did get me thinking about the deletion process.
Specifically, I've noticed that none of them had any warning or followup from the mod that performed the deletion. This occurs with all manner of different posts, from one word answers to huge essays. When things that are, for all intents and purposes totally benign to me get removed and I never end up learning why, since the mods either dun f33l liek it or aren't required by the letter to follow up beyond typing something into the "reason" field of the editing panel (which we as normal users are unable to see), it gets very confusing.
Often, when I've posted multiple times in a thread responding to various things and one of my posts is removed, it won't even be immediately apparent to me which post it was. If I was just rapid firing posts, it may not ever become apparent since I won't ever be told or shown what was removed and why unless it was waaaaaaay out of line, in which case I'll probably get chucked on probation (also without notice, my last 2 probations have occured as a result of posts since removed from the forums with no associated red text) and have to PM Oda for an explanation.
So what I'm wondering is, are the mods willing to, or even able to inform users of post deletions of their own accord? I know that on their end, all mod actions must be logged so technically there should be a plausible reason for each action floating around (although I've seen these fields left blank in the past which is disturbing - even for probies), it's just that, like I said earlier, they're invisible to the normal userbase. I feel this defeats the point of even providing a reason. Honestly, we need to be able to see those if they pertain to us. We need to receive notifications of post deletions that are more detailed than ":mod name: deleted a post of yours from :thread name:" where the link contained in said notification is dead (as normal users can't view hidden posts). Better yet, if a mod makes a conscious decision to remove a post then they should be obligated to PM the affected user stating that they have done so and why, or at the very least, if PMing each user in a mass deletion is too difficult, make a post in the affected thread with similar info to warn from that kind of behaviour. The ONLY situation I can think of where this wouldn't be necessary is the deletion of spam from throwaway accounts.
I'd like to think such a requirement would also discourage kneejerk modding since each mod action would require a visible accompanying statement as to why it occured.
Edited by AlmrOfAtlas, 22 May 2015 - 01:28 AM.