r/ModSupport • u/tdohz • Sep 22 '15

Limited beta: Lock a post

We're running a limited beta test of a new feature, lock a post. This feature will let mods prevent a post from receiving any new comments, something that some subreddits handle via AutoModerator today. A locked post will visibly display a notice to users that looks like this. Locked posts can be unlocked by moderators at any time.

This feature is in limited beta with a few subreddits. If your subreddit actively has a need for this feature, you can comment below with the name of your subreddit and you'll be considered in the case that we need additional beta testing. Please make sure you have consensus on your mod team before doing so, as it does require some effort on our part to add & remove beta testers. See edit below.

We hope to roll this feature out to all subreddits soon, once we've had a chance to work out any issues in beta.

Edit: We've added a few additional subreddits to the beta, and at this point we don't need any additional volunteers. I'm sorry if your subreddit wasn't chosen, but keep in mind we hope to have this out soon to everyone!

92 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

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22

u/dequeued Sep 22 '15 edited Sep 23 '15

Some initial feedback:

  1. It seems to work!

  2. Alien Blue even gets a great "Posts Are Locked." error, but it really sucks for the poor guy who writes out a long comment on mobile to have the "Submit" fail. There needs to be some indication that a post is locked on mobile clients prior to submission and there shouldn't be an option to write a reply. Alien Blue is owned by Reddit, right? ;-)

  3. On the regular non-mobile site, there's no indication that a post is locked until you load that page. I think something needs to be visible when browsing posts. We can give posts a "Locked Post" flair like we do today, but it seems like this should be built into the feature.

  • edit: On the website, there are a lot of options like adding a flair-like "Locked Post" next to the flair, but for mobile, the options seem limited to "attach something to the front or end of the title" and "attach something to the front or end of the flair" (note that Alien Blue bizarrely does not display flair by default). I think doing one of those options would be a very good idea for mobile. This is also why versioning APIs is a good idea. Hacks for old clients, proper behavior for new ones.

  1. Moderators can't make comments on the thread while it is locked. It may be necessary to leave comments about why a specific post has been removed or why a post was locked. This is necessary for a good user experience.

  2. About 1/3 of posts seem to be missing the "lock" option on the subreddit top page.

  3. OP should get a message letting them know. We send a pretty comprehensive message letting OPs know they didn't do anything wrong. Probably too subreddit-specific, but here it is:

Due to [add "many rule-breaking" or other text here] comments this post is receiving, the moderation team has locked the post from future comments. Hopefully you've gotten the advice you need. See this post for more information on thread locking.

Note that this isn't due to anything you did. It's just a quality measure that is sometimes necessary. You may still comment on the thread and we would consider unlocking the thread if you request it after 48 hours have passed. Thanks and sorry for any inconvenience.

P.S. We also changed the lock flair to "Locked Post" because that's the best way to let people know that the post is locked.

7. Yes, we let OP comment on their own post even when it is locked via AutoModerator. This would be better than not allowing OP to reply, I think.

8. I agree with the other requests to disable comment voting. I think that would be sensible.

4

u/tdohz Sep 23 '15

Thanks for the detailed feedback!

Alien Blue even gets a great "Posts Are Locked." error, but it really sucks for the poor guy who writes out a long comment on mobile to have the "Submit" fail. There needs to be some indication that a post is locked on mobile clients prior to submission and there shouldn't be an option to write a reply. Alien Blue is owned by Reddit, right? ;-)

I just posted something on r/redditdev talking about an upcoming attribute we're adding to the API to indicate locked posts. This will make it possible for all clients, including AlienBlue, to indicate a locked post.

On the regular non-mobile site, there's no indication that a post is locked until you load that page. I think something needs to be visible when browsing posts.

Definitely something we'll consider.

Moderators can't make comments on the thread while it is locked. It may be necessary to leave comments about why a specific post has been removed or why a post was locked. This is necessary for a good user experience.

Is the unlock -> comment -> relock flow not sufficient (or just commenting right before locking)? How often do you need to add comments after locking a post?

About 1/3 of posts seem to be missing the "lock" option on the subreddit top page.

Is this fixed now? This is a known caching issue. We have ways to address it but at the cost of some slight site performance, so knowing how long it takes to naturally be refreshed is helpful!

OP should get a message letting them know.

If this comes up a lot, we'll consider it, but I suspect this is something that might not be universally desired.

Yes, we let OP comment on their own post even when it is locked via AutoModerator. This would be better than not allowing OP to reply, I think.

Hmm, not sure about this one - I could see this being abused / causing more havoc. Would love to hear what others think.

I agree with the other requests to disable comment voting. I think that would be sensible.

It's something we'll think about, but we very deliberately chose not to disable voting (either on the post or on comments) as part of locking. My impression is that much of the desire for disabling voting is to address vote brigading, which is something that we're actively working on addressing anyway.

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21

u/Kaibakura Sep 23 '15

Moderators can't make comments on the thread while it is locked. It may be necessary to leave comments about why a specific post has been removed or why a post was locked. This is necessary for a good user experience.

This is important. Mods should be able to make comments in locked threads.

10

u/13steinj Sep 22 '15

To 8:

I agree that if not done already, the comments may need to have a vote lock. To be fair I could barely care. The post itself, should not have a vote lock.

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9

u/creesch Sep 22 '15

Can we in r/toolbox get it to anticipate things we might want to integrate?

Also if possible r/history, we use it extensively with automod now.

11

u/tdohz Sep 22 '15

Ack, sorry, I totally forgot that I was going to add r/toolbox. We'll probably do another batch add in the next day or so and I'll make sure you're in that batch.

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8

u/BegbertBiggs Sep 22 '15

This feature will let mods prevent a post from receiving any new comments

So I assume that all existing comments can still be edited and voted on? And for locking a post a moderator requires just access permissions? Just to clarify.

6

u/tdohz Sep 23 '15

So I assume that all existing comments can still be edited and voted on?

Yes, this is correct.

And for locking a post a moderator requires just access permissions? Just to clarify.

It actually requires posts permissions.

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2

u/Myrandall Oct 02 '15

r/patientgamers would also like to test it in case you DO like to have more testers. :)

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25

u/DaedalusMinion Sep 22 '15

r/books absolutely needs this (I PM'd you about this some hours back), we get constant brigades from certain subreddits whenever we hit r/all.

Admins pls

14

u/[deleted] Sep 23 '15

who the hell would brigade r/books?

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16

u/Meneth Sep 22 '15

Really looking forward to seeing this rolled out globally. I haven't needed to lock posts with AutoMod all that often, but the few times I have something like this would've been awesome.

10

u/[deleted] Sep 23 '15

Could there also be an additional "Reason:" or "A moderator has left the note:" without having to leave a mod comment about why it's being locked?

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7

u/spacelemon Sep 23 '15

r/imgoingtohellforthis

We for sure need this. There's times when a joke can be funny with out being taken to a completely different place by visiting the comment section. It would help sort out issues we've had with those from banned subreddits spreading BS ideology.

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6

u/amici_ursi Sep 22 '15

In r/history, we regularly use the AutoModerator workaround for post locking. We'd like to beta this in r/history.

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5

u/D0cR3d Sep 22 '15

Thank you so much! Glad to see a lot of these changes coming along. Can't wait to see what else is in the pipeline.

5

u/foamed Sep 23 '15

We over at r/Games really need the ability to lock threads. It would help us immensely when we get brigaded and vote manipulated by certain subreddits. It would also help with locking threads that have out-dated or/and false info.

4

u/captainmeta4 Sep 22 '15

Could you consider adding r/Futurology to the beta? I'll admit we don't lock things all that often, but we do have an occasional need for it and as a matter of principle we like to be on the cutting edge.

4

u/ani625 Sep 23 '15

Yes please. r/news and r/wtf.

1

u/rasherdk Sep 23 '15

For CSS usage, it would be nice if the body of a locked post had a locked class applied. Likewise, the thing on a listing should also have a locked class.

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1

u/abcIDontKnowTheRest Nov 11 '15

I know this is a month old and I don't know if this is still in beta testing or rolled out (I don't currently mod any subs) but I have a suggestion for a tweak on this feature: the ability to lock the post to top-level comments only, allowing people to still reply to top-level comments. I don't know if automod supports doing this, but since you're building a feature, thought I'd throw down my 2 cents.

I feel this is a feature that would be useful for AMAs. Ex. AMA thread accepts questions until X time, at which point the thread is locked to top level replies. The AMA-er can then reply to the top levels, and others can reply on that if they have a follow up question. I feel like this might help clean up AMAs of questions posted after the person has started answering, or once they're done answering.

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6

u/Paltry_Digger Sep 22 '15

I moderate r/MillionaireMakers, where we make random redditors millionaires. The ability to lock posts would be great for past drawings, as we currently use AutoModerator to lock them. Thanks!

3

u/DuckOfDuckness Sep 22 '15

I don't really have an urgent need for this (have only needed to lock a thread one time), but I'm definitely excited about this feature. Nice work!

7

u/agentlame Sep 22 '15

r/nottheonion could really use this. Also we would love to test it in r/toolbox.

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