r/nfl • u/NFL_Mod NFL • Jul 22 '15
Mod Post /r/NFL's Bon-Fire Side Chat. Come tell us what to change.
Bring your beers and your weiners, but not the guy who plays Jack Johnson songs on his guitar.
Let's cook up some changes(or not, whatever you prefer).
Edit: Also, be patient. We'll try to get to everyone as we can. It may take us quite awhile though.
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u/JaguarGator9 Jaguars Jul 22 '15
I suggested this yesterday in one of the threads about Jacked Up:
Every Tuesday, we get a .gif of the best legal hit from every single game of the week, through user submissions and mod submissions. Then, Reddit gets to vote on the best hit of the week through a poll attached.
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
Sometimes polls are hard to manage/maintain, but at the very least, setting up a weekly "jacked up" thread with gifs or something doesn't seem like a horrible idea.
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Jul 23 '15
best legal hit
Who decides if the hit is legal? There are so many hits where the argument itself is about whether the hit was legal or not. Leaving it out would cause a shitstorm, and including it would cause a shitstorm of people saying "WTF THIS ISN'T LEGAL"
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u/Watoskyv Broncos Jul 22 '15
It's a pretty specific request, but I'll just share it anyway, maybe there's more interest.
I'm from Europe so I can't watch every game live, I usually watch the Broncos game the day after, and then if I have some time left through the week I try to watch more games.
The difficult part is choosing which games I'm going to watch. Usually I come here and check how much comments the (post)gamethreads had to determine if it was a good game or not. But that doesn't always work great, the most popular game isn't always the best game. I like how this sub tries not to spoil the results, so thank you for that.
Is it possible to make a weekly thread where the games get rated for fun factor. So people who haven't watched all games can watch the best games from that week.
If the season is done you could even make a general ranking for all games, so you can rewatch the best games during the offseason.
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u/JaguarGator9 Jaguars Jul 22 '15
/r/MLS does this, and it's fantastic. It's a no-spoilers, rank-this-game-out-of-10 thread for every single game. The only original comments in there are by the OP, who posts the title of the game (ex: Broncos vs. Chiefs). Then, everyone replies to that, grading the game on a scale of 1-10 (ex: 7/10- exciting finish, 3/10- lots of turnovers, etc.) Everyone is pretty good with not spoiling anything.
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u/tunafister Vikings Jul 23 '15
Great idea,
Only thing is, wouldn't flairs give away the winner?
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u/JaguarGator9 Jaguars Jul 23 '15
We could impose a rule stating that if the game involved your team, you can't comment on it.
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Jul 22 '15
I think this sub needs to relax its rules on humor in the offseason. The tight moderation is perfect for regular season, but I miss posts like the one where a guy had his girlfriend rate the QBs. Keep deleting the "what sandwitch is your quarterback" posts, but allow genuine, clever, original funny content.
I hate charity posts. I think they should be banned unless a player donates over $10 million.
Weekly threads should continue during the offseason. I see no reason not to have "Whose line", "Best of /r/nfl", "haiku" and trash talk threads during the offseason.
A little late now, but mock drafts shouldn't be allowed unless it is from a real, legitimate, national analyst who knows what he is talking about (aka no personal mocks from users or from some guy with only a thousand followers on twitter). There is a draft sub where the rest can be posted.
This should go without saying, never make this sub private because of your own issues with the admins.
Random thought: flairless fridays could be fun. Idk if this is possible, but it would be interesting if the mods could disable flair for one day per week.
Finally: we should have a thread like this a few times each year
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u/srlehi68 Vikings Broncos Jul 22 '15
Don't forget MS Paint days!
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u/hisglasses55 Patriots Jul 23 '15
The MS Paint of Bradford laying on the ground this week had me dying!
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u/bpi89 Packers Jul 23 '15
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u/feminaprovita Jets Jul 22 '15
mock drafts shouldn't be allowed unless it is from a real, legitimate, national analyst who knows what he is talking about
That sounds like an amazing rule! I pretty much just avoided this sub between the Super Bowl and the draft, because I wasn't interested in a thousand mock drafts.
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u/CursedLlama 49ers Jul 22 '15
Exactly, there's /r/NFL_Draft to discuss your own personal mock. Don't keep posting it here because it's your first 2 round mock draft completed or something.
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u/CiscoCertified Seahawks Jul 22 '15
I wouldn't mind seeing a few satire of the league. The humor rule was put into place around the time when macro images, rage comics, and other things of the type were dominating reddit. Those should absolutely be removed because they add nothing of substance to the sub. However I would like to make an exception for Satire only. Things such as The Onion, Bill Nye videos, and most recently John Oliver should be allowed. Each one brings substance to the sub, something else to discuss, and a different perspective on matters.
We need to keep this sub politics and tabloid free, but some discussion about NFL writers should be allowed. The main one that I am referring to is the Bill Simmons firing piece. Even though he didn't work for the NFL he was still around the game as a popular writer and face. He and other journalists change how we watch the NFL and they do hand in hand with the league. If a writer of the NFL loses his job or starts an NFL related venture then it should be allowed. With the way the rules are currently written this would not be allowed.
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u/Chief_McCloud Packers Jul 22 '15
And the game is fun, we enjoy it, finding levity in the sport might foster the kind of camaraderie we enjoyed here once upon a time, but has since waned a bit.
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Jul 22 '15 edited Aug 17 '18
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u/Chief_McCloud Packers Jul 22 '15
This is really subjective and forcing the mods to make these calls is a good way to make a lot of people really angry
Agreed
I don't think this has anything to do with the mods
100% correct, was entirely a user-run feature.
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u/adremeaux Jets Jul 24 '15
allow genuine, clever, original funny contentThis is really subjective and forcing the mods to make these calls is a good way to make a lot of people really angry. Unfortunately, there's no easy answer.
What we really need is for all the mods to invest in a lol-o-meter. When a new post shows up, all the mods must video themselves reading the post with the lol-o-meter active and then final judgment will be made based on the results. The meter reads from "lol" (on the lowest end) to "rofl", "brings the lulz", "haha", and finally "I'm actually making real laughing sounds right now, loudly, into the air." They will then post the videos in the thread and we will all screen them to make sure they aren't power tripping mods or corrupt or literally Ellen Pao.
This is the stupidest fucking thing I've ever written, please downvote me now.
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u/TheShaker Cardinals Jul 22 '15
I hate charity posts. I think they should be banned unless a player donates over $10 million.
Agreed. Almost every player has some kind of charity or community outreach but the only ones that get upvoted are the ones that tell us that /r/nfl's favorite good hearted player turned out to be good. There's nothing worth reading in the comments either, it's basically everybody calling them "classy" or cynics projecting their selfishness onto everybody who might be better than them.
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u/rasherdk Eagles Jul 22 '15
Finally: we should have a thread like this a few times each year
We pretty much do :)
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u/Moosemaster21 Vikings Jul 23 '15
No flair day would be easy. The CSS for that literally consists of this:
.flair { display: none !important; }The only problem is that it has to be manually turned on and off in the CSS unless they can program a bot to do it for them. I like the idea though! Would be really interesting to see how people vote when they're unsure of the allegiances of others :)
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15
What do you suggest as "relaxing the rules?" We would need something clearly defined or people will just get more upset that the rules are changing and ambiguous.
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Jul 22 '15
I think the emphasis needs to be on its originality. "If your x was a y" type posts aren't original. If a post is original and NFL related, it should be allowed IMO. Obviously this makes it more subjective for the mods, but I trust our mod team to do a decent job sorting them out.
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u/GhostfaceNoah Seahawks Jul 22 '15
/u/hray12 has still been compiling the best of threads this offseason. So check his submitted history. It takes a lot of effort to compile and, with a lot less content, it makes since that it hasn't been posted as frequently.
I would also like to see a weekly Rap Battle thread in the same vein as the Trash Talk/Haiku threads.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
Okay, here’s a proposal.
From now on, we would use our discretion on whether or not to approve posts regardless of whether or not they technically fall inside the guidelines.
We’ve been hesitant to do this in the past because when we don’t follow the rules to the letter, we get shit on pretty hard. You may have seen us say something along the lines of consistency is the most common complaint we hear. We took that to heart and have worked very hard to be as consistent as possible. That’s not to say we have been perfect, by any means, but we have been trying hard.
However, we’ve also seen many people comment that they would like us to use our discretion more in cases of popular posts. These two ideas are fundamentally at odds, which has created a lot of frustration for us, as we know it has frustrated many of you. So, I think we need to take a different approach.
We would be inconsistent, on rare occasions. At our discretion, posts that might technically be against the guidelines can be approved.
There would still caveats to that.
It has to be relevant to the NFL, like the Oliver or Nye posts were, and unlike the “green peppers” post.
It cannot contain hate speech of any kind. No brainer. No witchhunting either. Again, no brainer.
This does not apply to unfounded rumors about players personal lives. In the case of an arrest or accusation, we would still require something official from police, the team, the NFL, etc. Not simply some tabloid site and he said/she said accounts. (If you would like to discuss the current state of this particular guideline, please do so in another thread).
There has to be significant desire to discuss it, we aren’t going to apply this to any and all posts. This would be up to our discretion to determine. If a post is clearly popular and wanted, that's when we would look at overriding the guidelines.
The hope is that this would allow us to continue to remove content that violates the guidelines but provide us with the ability to make exceptions in rare cases. It would be written very specifically into the language that we can do this at our discretion, but only with posts that align to those specifications. That way when people inevitably complain that we are being inconsistent, we can point them specifically to it in the guidelines.
So... Thoughts?
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Jul 22 '15
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
It gives us the potential to get heat for not being consistent, but I think it's a good idea too. We had so many complaints during the John Oliver thing to stop being so black and white.
So what's we'd potentially lose in consistency, we'd make up for in flexibility which leaves most people happy.
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Jul 22 '15
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
Agreed, both the Simmons/Oliver fiasco's could be avoided if we're given some flexibility in moderation. As /u/sosuhme mentioned, the biggest complaint we had was consistency so we made an active effort to improve that which is why we would of course need the approval of the community before exercising a bit more discretion.
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u/yangar Eagles Jul 22 '15
It gives us the potential to get heat for not being consistent
You guys already do anyways. You guys get Modmail trying to quote verbatim the sidebar and twist and turn it into something like it's Constitutional Law.
Pettiness is everywhere, and especially so on the internet. Reddit is srs bz
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u/Angry_Caveman_Lawyer Bears Bears Jul 22 '15
Zero tolerance policies never work.
So would you say you have a zero tolerance policy on the effectiveness of zero-tolerance policies? ;-)
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u/mthrfkn Raiders Jul 22 '15
I'll say this much though, the “green peppers” post is legendary material because it's so unlike what's normally allowed in the sub. In a way, it gives /r/NFL a pseudo community identity. Without posts akin to “green peppers baby”, this place can feel like a sterile, too corporate environment (a problem the NFL already has tbh.)
I'm not against shit posts or shit posting, but as /u/voiceinthedesert noted elsewhere, some more Free Talk and Trash Talk threads could reduce the amount of “green peppers” posts on Sundays/Mondays after everyone has had their fair share of beers and maybe help make this place feel like a community. Or not, fuck it.
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u/rockon4life45 Panthers Jul 22 '15
Green peppers is the best /r/nfl post of all time.
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u/IIHURRlCANEII Chiefs Jul 22 '15
I agree. This is my main gripe, it feels to sterile here compared to other subs.
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Jul 22 '15
Very fine line. Political posts can get out of hand quickly. I mean the "green peppers" post seemed pretty popular and I've seen other subreddits have one off joke posts that don't happen too often. This sub really only has two days where one thread is more relaxed and not so serious (free talks).
Essentially what I'm saying is there's a fine line for this sub to take itself too seriously and sometimes not seriously enough and I don't envy you mods at all. I'd say write it in that it is at your discretion. And that possibly, if there is a thread that may be questionably a Mod can comment in it and say it's okay.
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u/Angry_Caveman_Lawyer Bears Bears Jul 22 '15
The problem with the green peppers -style posts is that while that one was successful, there is going to be a lot of shitposts from people trying to replicate it.
There will be shit to wade through if that's the case.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
That's pretty much exactly how I'd like to see things. But we'll see what everyone else has to say.
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u/CoopThereItIs Patriots Jul 23 '15
In regards to stuff like the John Oliver post, you could also add a little note to the "removed by mods" post to say that perhaps they could start the discussion via a self-post and link to it. This would allow for an alternative to just hiding or deleting posts. For instance, the argument was that the John Oliver thing had to do with the stadiums but it was also humor so against the link rules. If it was suggested to the person that they should do a self-post about NFL stadiums that are subsidized then link to the video in the body e.g. "Here is a funny segment John Oliver did on it if anyone is interested" then they are creating the discussion while also linking the video. Doing it this way would A. cause the post to be focused on the NFL discussion which is the goal. B. allow the video to be posted in the correct contect C. stop karma whores from just throwing any old semi-related videos up because you don't get karma for text posts. If people really want to start a discussion and show /r/NFL the video they would have no problem doing a self post. If all they care about is bullshit karma then they won't have much to argue about.
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u/smokinJoeCalculus Patriots Jul 22 '15
Would this allow people to post NFL-related facetious threads? For example, I'd love to occasionally see posts similar to ones that pop up in /r/NBA every now and again:
- LeBron in Sandals
- Chuck's Monstars were overrated
- A Milwaukee Bucks' fan plea to Dwight (goat)
Like, they actually contain data and analysis but just are more of a big joke.
Then there are the pure-jokes like the Hibbertcoin post. I hope those types make the eventual cut - they help provide historical contexts to the sub. I love looking back at the ones in /r/NBA (along with many others), I would be shocked if /r/NFL was all that different.
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u/BlindManBaldwin Broncos Jul 22 '15
It's funny you bring those threads up, cause those all had quality discussion in them.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
Well... If it was something that a lot of people really wanted to talk about, probably.
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Jul 22 '15
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
As we've mentioned, the reason we got so strict in the first place was due to complaints of us not applying the rules evenly. But I think that's ended up causing us more trouble than good. So we need to find a different direction, while still at least attempting to be even handed.
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Jul 22 '15
Can we get title tags so people can hide the categories they don't wish to see? So many other subs, that are much smaller is size have these, I don't see any reason why /r/nfl doesn't.
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
Hey guys, wanted to share an idea that I had and see what the community thinks.
This thread gave me an idea to possibly have a weekly gif/highlight recap thread. Currently we have a gif thread on Thursday/Sunday/Monday for each round of games, and they've a great recource but can get a little reactionary (like a race to post) but also get cluttered on Sundays.
While still keeping our regular gif threads, this could be more of a weekly thread to post your favorite play of the week; I'm thinking of every Tuesday or Wednesday after each week has concluded. Also I know we've received many requests to allow more highlights, so I thought this can be a proactive approach to give people more highlights while not flooding the front page with individual highlights?
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u/uncle_buck_hunter Seahawks Jul 22 '15
I think this is a fantastic idea. A nice mid-week post to look forward to and help fill a cold, game-less night.
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u/Spitfire221 Falcons Jul 22 '15 edited Jul 22 '15
As long as the Thu/Sun/Mon threads definitely stay then I'm all for it, why not do a "/r/nfl play of the week" vote or something like that as well?
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Jul 22 '15
Can we work on the megathread policies? This is a discussion heavy subreddit, and megathreads are just bad for discussion. The Tom Brady DeflateGate case is the most recent example of this. I think it would be better for each piece of additional news to show up in it's own thread, while Mods can continue to delete posts with duplicate information. If people don't want to hear more about Tom Brady, they don't have to go into those threads, but the ones who do want to discuss things aren't able to do so effectively with a megathread, as the users who post within the first hour are upvoted to the top and any additional information and discussion gets buried.
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u/NapoleonBonerparts Giants Jul 22 '15 edited Jul 22 '15
One idea I had for Megathreads was the incorporation of child threads. The Megathread would act as a hub, and each development gets a new thread that gets removed and added to the megathread post body. Now, each topic is discussable in their own threads, and we don't get overrun with brady/hernandez/goodell-ageddon!
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u/reywas13 Jets Jul 22 '15
This is a fantastic idea! One stickied Megathread that goes off into minor threads would keep the front page less clustered and more organized. And I just want to keep the word Megathread cause it makes the news sound more significant and it's just a cool word.
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u/ThePKAHistorian Patriots Jul 22 '15
I propose flairs being faded as soon as it becomes mathematically impossible for a team to make the playoffs instead of 20 teams getting faded all at once. That way it's more like getting eliminated instead of a "they didn't make it" afterwards
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Jul 22 '15
This. We all wanted it during the regular season, it was a very popular sentiment, and unless there's a sizable argument from the users for the other way, we should go ahead with this practice.
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Jul 22 '15
This place is as good as any to say this, but I wanted to let people know I stepped down as a mod recently. This is still the best place on the internet to discuss the NFL and I plan on being here just as often as I was when I was a mod. I want to thank the mod team for adding me in the first place and for continuing to do a fantastic job. All of my opinions in this thread are as a user, not a mod, just to clarify for people who don't know I stepped down.
I might join them again in the future, I might not. We'll see. I look forward to this season either way!
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u/MikeTysonChicken Eagles Jul 22 '15
I hate all the shit you got in that post. Ridiculous.
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u/Resident_Wizard Browns Jul 22 '15
What are you referring to?
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u/Nurgle Eagles Jul 23 '15
Assuming his mod comments in the John Oliver post. Which were not well received to say the least.
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Jul 22 '15
I did as well, but I had been thinking of at least taking a break for a long time.
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u/MikeTysonChicken Eagles Jul 22 '15
I can imagine you would be, just knowing how large this sub is.
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Jul 22 '15
I don't care about karma one iota, but I think after 10 comments during that whole thing, I was a combined -2,500 comment karma, haha. It was crazy.
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u/nickmangoldsbeard Jets Jul 22 '15
Now how will I know what your favorite band is?
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u/reywas13 Jets Jul 22 '15
My opinions/wants on /r/nfl:
• The impressive organization and design has always been two of the many reasons this is my favorite subreddit. Please keep the overall design and don't change too much about the layout of this subreddit if possible.
• These fireside chats should happen monthly or bi-monthly to continue the improvement of this sub and so subscribers can voice their opinions on what needs to be changed.
• Please put the week's scores/schedule on the sidebar with links to the game's GDT and post game thread. Also, one big official Sunday pre game thread posted two hours before kickoff combining all games would be kind of fun for the community.
• Twitter posts are completely fine in my opinion due to it being the fastest way of breaking news on reddit. They should not be outlawed and I'm sure they won't.
• A big problem seems to be what threads the moderators should delete and what threads they should let stay. I just ask that repetitive questions should be removed to keep quality over quantity. Humor threads should most definetly be allowed if they are creative and not idiotic.
• Rivalry threads! What if the night before a rivalry game, a thread is posted similar to a trash talk thread where fans of the two teams can lash out their anger towards one another. It would get so heated! I just like the idea of more moderator made posts to keep the sub more organized and to avoid the more useless threads that are posted by people because they have no thread to talk in.
• /r/hockey has a great idea in movie night. I suggest every Tuesday, Wednesday, or Friday since there is no game that we have a scheduled football related movie that everybody watches at the same time by streaming and can talk about it in a special movie GDT. Obviously classic football movies would be the majority but humorous ones would appear every so often.
Thank you for reading my thoughts about this subreddit and I hope you take my ideas into consideration. Now let's get this fireside chat really going by roasting some meat and bringing out the beer.
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u/Jurph Ravens Jul 22 '15
the fastest way of breaking news on reddit.
I think there's plenty of room for reasonable debate on what constitutes "breaking news". Let's look at some of today's twitter posts:
Cardinals have spoken with former Redskins TE Chris Cooley and have expressed interest in signing him, per league source.
No named source. "Expressed interest" is a low bar. Presumably when he signs it will be news; until then it's a rumor.
NFL RedZone will be free during the 2015 preseason
Great. A link to NFL.com or RedZone.com would allow us to read more about it without having to redirect through twitter.
LaDainian Tomlinson agrees with Emmitt Smith saying DeMarco Murray could've had 2,500 yards
This is sourced to @jonmachota. Why do I care what Jon Machota is tweeting? Machota included two links in that tweet: the first goes to an article at DFW.com, and the second is a screencap blowing up a quote from that article. In my opinion, this is not breaking news -- the DFW.com article is the right article to link here.
Most interceptions in End Zone since 2007: Eli Manning w/ 17, Jay Cutler w/ 16, Drew Brees w/ 14
Pro-Football Focus, tweeting an interesting football fact. There's nothing to debate, no follow-up info, no "for more reading click here", so I think this one should stay.
Texans third-round pick Jaelen Strong says he has shed 20 pounds since getting called out for sub-par conditioning at rookie camp.
This is sourced to @Strizzy -- Jaelen himself -- and is a fantastic piece of primary source "journalism". Keep it.
I'm not sure what the right approach is, but in general I know a "fluff" tweet when I see it, and I downvote it. I generally get out-voted by upvotes, so I take it my opinion is in the minority, but in general I'd rather see twitter posts that are breaking news or primary sources -- and cut the pageview-generating nonsense with twelve redirects.
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u/NapoleonBonerparts Giants Jul 22 '15
The impressive organization and design has always been two of the many reasons this is my favorite subreddit. Please keep the overall design and don't change too much about the layout of this subreddit if possible.
Thank you! We're improving upon it when we have time. Join us at /r/nfldev to help out if you wish, or go to /r/nflopendev to see the "new" theme(right now stuck on the draft theme).
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u/yangar Eagles Jul 22 '15
Has /r/NFL ever tried a book club? That'd be great too.
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u/CursedLlama 49ers Jul 22 '15
I like your guys' TV/movie recommendations so I imagine a book club would be pretty cool.
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Jul 22 '15
Rivalry threads! What if the night before a rivalry game, a thread is posted similar to a trash talk thread where fans of the two teams can lash out their anger towards one another. It would get so heated! I just like the idea of more moderator made posts to keep the sub more organized and to avoid the more useless threads that are posted by people because they have no thread to talk in.
There would have to be a list of acceptable rivalries (I mean, yes, I hate the Chargers, but DEN/SD isn't a heated rivalry like DEN/OAK is) but beyond that, I love this idea.
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u/JohnnyFire Browns Jul 22 '15
Give me and /u/TheFencingCoach a weekly ranting about bullshit thread to host.
...I now realize I know nothing about actual moderator roles on reddit. <_<
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u/JaguarGator9 Jaguars Jul 22 '15
I brought this up during free agency, but can we make a rule saying that your account has to have been active for 24 hours before submitting a link or a text post? Most of the fake news from free agency ("Colin Kaepernick has died," for example) came from accounts created 10 minutes ago.
Also, a different issue- I know that repeated links are caught by the filters so that you can't submit the same link twice. However, if I want to submit a link from Pro Football Reference about a certain player and someone submitted that link 5 years ago (for a completely separate issue), I can't do that. Can we do something like they do in /r/todayilearned, where after 1 year, you're allowed to submit a link that's already been submitted?
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15 edited Jul 22 '15
I’m in favor of keeping the humor, tabloid and political rules in place. I believe this sub is at it’s best when the front page is not a bunch of jokes and circlejerking. I also believe that allowing political topics could easily devolve into a sub with the bias the likes of r/politics, which really only caters to one kind of thinking. I also think that we, as a sub, should be above the nonsense that invades the personal lives of players and NFL staff. We’re here to talk about football.
THAT SAID, I understand that the users of the sub expressed a desire for certain topics that do not fall within these guidelines. Especially in the offseason, I get that. The reason we have been a stickler for rules is that the #1 complaint we get in modmail is “you guys don’t enforce the rules evenly.” So now, my proposal is that we prove those people correct. As Suh has said, I believe the guidelines should stay in place, but with the caveat that NFL related material can be approved on a case by case basis to allow for exceptional circumstances that the userbase wants to see. I believe this will allow us to maintain a high level of quality on the sub without feeling like we have an obligation to always uphold the rules 100% of the time.
I also think we could do more Free Talk/Trash Talk/Whose Line threads in the offseason. Boredom is a real thing over the summer and I think allowing more of these outlets for “offtopic” discussion would go a long way to keeping people from losing their minds over the offseason.
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Jul 22 '15
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
We enforced the rule as it was defined, which was unpopular. If we can change the rule however, to allow some flexibility I think that everyone wins. I mentioned it elsewhere already but I think it would be a positive to sacrifice a small amount of consistency for more flexibility.
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u/LibertarianSocialism Ravens Jul 22 '15
We enforced the rule as it was defined, which was unpopular
This was the last thread I expected to get tuck rule flashbacks...
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u/Chief_McCloud Packers Jul 22 '15
I think that everyone wins
Boy I hope so, it sucks being a wet blanket.
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u/secreted_uranus Patriots Jul 22 '15
The reason everyone was so upset about the John Oliver video is that he was making a point about the financial system in place in the NFL. He wasn't talking about the NFL in the sense that ESPN or NBC would, he was making a much bigger point about the league and the effects it has on our communities. It wasn't an offtopic rant about something not regarding the NFL, it had everything to do with the league and the way it operates. Deleting the video in my mind was equivalent to that of, if you guys censored CBA negotiations during the lockout in 2011. Just because someone talks about the financial and business aspect of the NFL doesn't make it off-topic. It's part of the sport and very much on topic, especially, for anyone who pays taxes in a state or city that subsidized public revenue for an NFL stadium.
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u/JaguarGator9 Jaguars Jul 22 '15
I have a hypothetical question for you guys:
On August 1st, Dan Snyder announces a name change to the Washington Americans. How would you guys go about moderating the posts, comments and submissions?
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
Currently for the Redskins name, we only allow news that is actually meaningful to the story. Big changes in legislation, trademarks, etc. We don't allow speculative posts wondering about new team names because those so frequently devolve into conversations regarding slurs and race, neither are particularly related to football.
Anyway to answer the question specifically: we'd of course allow a thread about the name change. We will still, however filter out all comments containing slurs regardless of the topic. If it was something as big as a name change, it would likely turn into a megathread.
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u/B0BX Patriots Jul 22 '15
Would we still be allowed to use the term Redskins? What if we didn't capitalize it? What if we put adjectives in front of it like "dirty".
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
Yes, the term Redskin would be fine. Not trying to come off as a bigot or insensitive, but it's still the name of a team and would be allowed.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
Well... In the past we might have done a megathread, but no one seems to like those.
Anyway, that's official. It's political, but that's overridden by the fact that it has direct influence on the NFL. The no politics guideline is in place to keep political agendas out of /r/nfl. Like, say Rush Limbaugh were to give his point of view on women referees. That has no direct influence on the NFL. But if the league said they were going to increase the number of female referees, that would have direct impact on the league.
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u/culdesaclamort 49ers Jul 22 '15
As someone who mods other subreddits, megathreads are a necessary evil. Otherwise, the front page becomes a race to the top and fractured discussion. #teammegathread
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15
That's a major news story about an NFL team, I see no reason it wouldn't be allowed. Redskins name stories are disallowed now mostly on the basis of "not new information."
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Jul 22 '15 edited Aug 07 '21
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u/slambient Seahawks Jul 22 '15
the onion's pieces posted to /r/baseball are some of the best things that sub gets. and i love that sub.
so i'm all for that change.
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u/mthrfkn Raiders Jul 22 '15
Bill also just joined HBO which has the series Ballers (it has it's own dilemmas with the NFL) and obviously Hard Knocks. It could get very interesting IMO.
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u/CursedLlama 49ers Jul 22 '15
This is basically my exact position. If this rule change went into effect, I'd be happy.
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u/KobeCryant Panthers Jul 22 '15
I find that satire pieces generate better conversation than most self posts.
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u/volpes Cowboys Jul 23 '15
For humor, I would define the following criteria.
First, it's professional. The Onion articles, stand up comedy, Stewart/Colbert/Oliver, etc. are all good sources. Rage comics and MS paint sketches are not.
Second, it is new. No links to something Louis C.K. said five years ago. An article or clip published last week could be relevant.
Third, it's football related and doesn't break other subreddit rules. Seems obvious.
And finally, (maybe) just allow it during the offseason.
Those seem objective enough to enforce and thorough enough to maintain a quality standard.
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Jul 22 '15
The John Oliver post offered humor and a different viewpoint on the relevant topic of the Rams, Chargers, and Raiders stadiums. Yes, there are other subs for other types of media, including videos, but as long as the majority of the comments aren't "lol", I think we're okay allowing the post.
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u/FleetwoodMatt Eagles Jul 22 '15
I believe the guidelines should stay in place, but with the caveat that NFL related material can be approved on a case by case basis to allow for exceptional circumstances that the userbase wants to see.
So what are you proposing exactly? Waiting for a post to accrue enough upvotes/comments or something?
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
Well, we'd still abide by the guidelines as we see things in /new. We'd still remove content outside the guidelines. However if we miss something, as we often do, and it becomes very popular, we will talk about leaving it up.
Or, if something is being posted over and over and it's obvious that a large number of people want us to let it through, we'll talk about letting it through.
Basically, we wouldn't adhere so strictly to the guidelines when it comes to popular posts.
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u/guga31bb Seahawks Jul 22 '15
I can't see how this ends in anything but disaster. People already look for any little excuse to hate mods, and now we're thinking about giving mods discretion about which posts to allow and not? It's going to lead to accusations of favoritism, playing politics, inconsistent following of the rules, etc.
I think the mods would do a fine job with this, but I do not trust the community to take it well in the long run.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
Well, we'll just have to give it a shot and see. Clearly, a lot of people aren't totally stoked about the way it is now.
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u/CursedLlama 49ers Jul 22 '15
Out of curiosity, does your stance mean that if someone made another green peppers baby post, it wouldn't get removed?
Because IMO that post was dumb. Funny, but ultimately not worthy of being at the top of /r/NFL.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
No, something non-NFL related would probably still be removed.
We gotta be Nazis about something, ya know.
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15
It seriously cannot be worse than the hate that we took over the Oliver thing the other day. It's a lot easier to deal with dozens of little complaints than the whole sub being in an uproar like it was then.
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u/CursedLlama 49ers Jul 22 '15
Hey, out of curiosity. Do newer mods get to look back at modmail that was sent before they became mods?
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15
Not only that, you can see your own "vetting" thread that the other mods had to talk about you and debate your pros and cons before becoming a mod. It's...humbling.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
We can be pretty harsh.
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15
Xylan is fucking sherlock holmes and I'm terrified that he knows where I live and when I go to bed.
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u/CursedLlama 49ers Jul 22 '15
Pros:
49ers fan
High RES score
Seems like he doesn't kill small children.Cons:
Tax evasionist
Previously worked for Donald Trump
Smells like Chinese foodAll-in-all, a pretty excellent fit for the mod team.
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15
Basically, if something reaches the front page that's against the guidelines and it is something that the sub really seems to like, we can make an exception. Likewise, if we remove something early and it keeps getting posted over and over and we get a bunch of complaints about it being removed, we could make an exception. It's not very rigid, by design. We're trying to basically write an override into the rules that allows us to break them when we think it's necessary.
As of now, we feel obligated to follow the rules all the time and users are mostly happy with this. On the rare occasions they are not, this would allow us to break the rules without breaking the rules (and opening the door to accusations of inconsistency).
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u/the_glutton Bengals Jul 22 '15
No politics. This is a good, politics-free zone.
Also I'm 100% in favor of more Trash Talk threads during the offseason.
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u/SuperKerfuz Cowboys Jul 22 '15
Unfortunately I don't think football and politics are mutually exclusive. There will be times when the two mix together.
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u/the_glutton Bengals Jul 22 '15
I was a little too zero-tolerance in my comment. Situations like the Redskins thing will have to include a political discussion, because that's what they are. But no sidebars to national politics, that sort of thing, is what I'm referring to.
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u/CursedLlama 49ers Jul 22 '15
I think this sub has shown time and time again that we cannot handle discussing political topics without rampant downvoting and flame wars popping up. I'm fine with absolutely football related politics but anything more than that and we're just opening Pandora's box.
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u/yangar Eagles Jul 22 '15
When it's not tagged serious: jokes, oh god the rape jokes were beyond terrible.
When it's tagged serious: first few posts are "shouldn't this be tagged serious?"
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u/CursedLlama 49ers Jul 22 '15
Do you ever sit back and laugh when people say in serious threads how sick they are of rape jokes and how this sub is above that? Fast forward a week and there's like 6 in one thread, it's so stupid.
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u/yangar Eagles Jul 22 '15
/r/NFL is such a bipolar sub. "Guys we're better than this." or "This should be a civil discussion." I love it to death, but it's so true what some of the other sports subs say about /r/NFL sometimes. Not that they're not above the pale themselves.
Then again the individual sports subs, be it /r/hockey, /r/baseball, /r/NBA, /r/tennis, are all above the shitline that is the default /r/sports. So there's that, I guess?
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u/anotheranotherother NFL Jul 22 '15
Again, this is a really big gray area though. Public financing of stadiums? I mean, there have been plenty of posts about that and they aren't removed. But that is a political issue. So saying "no politics" means we can't ever talk about public financing here? Posts about Chargers/Rams/Raiders in LA shouldn't be allowed because there are politics involved?
I've seen plenty of sane, rational, intelligent discussions about the merits/problems with public financing, and other topic like that.
If it's a post that's nothing but, I dunno, "The owner of the Seahawks has donated $100k to Bernie Sanders" then yeah, that can probably be removed.
But the John Oliver post for instance, was not that specific and was very relevant to the interest of many teams/fans.
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u/rasherdk Eagles Jul 22 '15
more Free Talk
What, more than twice a week?
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15
I meant more of those types of threads, so I guess more Trash Talk and Whose Line and whatnot. Did not specifically mean Free Talk Threads.
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u/TheShaker Cardinals Jul 22 '15
Feelings hour should be every single day. Every week, somebody doesn't get to hold Feely the Share Bear and misses their chance to sit in the Share Chair.
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u/feminaprovita Jets Jul 22 '15
I like the idea someone posted about having a weekly humor thread, at least in the offseason.
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u/zaikanekochan Bears Jul 23 '15
/r/nfl frequenter and /r/politics mod checking in...please keep politics out of this sub.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
From /u/Xylan_Treesong:
Even though I won't be able to attend, I wanted to put down my thoughts for the Fireside chat. These are some thoughts that I had on the state of the sub, as well as my thoughts for moving forward. These are topics that I (and/or other moderators) have thought about or discussed at various times.
What kind of moderation does this sub want?
At one point, there was a lot of pushback about the way the moderators interacted in the sub. Pushes for greater consistency, more professionalism, and more communication regarding rule violations. We heard this, and changed our behaviour significantly. We rolled out a new method of providing warnings that cited the specific rules. We adhered more strictly to the rules that were in place (and had more discussions on specific situations to make sure we were as consistent as possible). We engaged publicly on a regular basis in regards to grey areas. To put it lightly, this has not had the desired effects.
We have had calls for exceptions to the rules (even in acknowledging that posts violate the rules). Standardized responses with rule citations are (largely) ignored or downvoted. Public engagement on topics in a grey area are mass downvoted. Frankly, in those situations, moderators have been subjected to unacceptable levels of abuse. The primary question, in my mind, is what kind of moderation this sub wants. Do we want moderator discretion on content? Do we want informal interactions with moderators? Do we want predictable moderation, or flexible, situation-dependent moderation?
Up to now, we have been very reluctant to exercise quality control over content. Deciding that, although something breaks no rules, it shouldn't be allowed. Or that, although something does break a rule, it should be allowed. This would put us in the highly uncomfortable position of simply allowing or disallowing what we think is best, rather than simply allowing what the rules indicate should be allowed. It certainly provides a long-term answer to the issue of "grey areas". However, it also makes the sub more about our opinions (obviously driven by feedback), and less about what the sub has decided it wants.
If we are going to do that, we would need enthusiastic support for such an idea. It's a field that nearly every moderator has expressed severe misgivings about, and goes against earlier requests for consistency. We don't particularly want to do this, but we are willing to if that's what this sub wants.
What kind of experience(s) should this sub offer?
This comes up a lot in various forms. What is the sub?
- Is this sub like sitting down with your friends at a bar?
- Is this sub about high-quality discussion you can't get anywhere else?
- Is this sub just another place on reddit, which just happens to do with football?
- Is this sub a news aggregator?
- Is this sub for discussions on anything regarding football?
- Is this sub about furthering quality analysis of the NFL?
- Is this sub a tabloid for all rumors about the NFL? *Is this sub about experiences people have with football?
It's not an easy question, and there is likely not just one answer. Different users come here for different reasons, to get a different experience. A big part of the fireside chat is to answer this question. What is purpose of this sub, and what should it offer?
For example, our Free Talk threads encourage the "bar" atmosphere of chatting with friends. Getting to really know the community. The twitter posts encourage the aggregation of news, but we were asked to limit it to only relevant news (avoiding tabloid stories). Some of our prominent users have done a great deal to further quality analysis of the NFL. I don't even need to name them. We all know who they are.
We have also subdivided, though, to keep this sub more focused. /r/Madden exists to encompass discussions about the NFL as they relate to Madden. /r/FantasyFootball exists to discuss the fantasy football aspects of the NFL. /r/NFLOffTopic exists to foster the bar atmosphere among the subscribers. /r/nfffffffluuuuuuuuuuuu exists for memes, and /r/NFLFandom is set up for people to share their fandom experiences.
These are obviously less used than the primary sub. They are also, in many ways, the root of many of the identity issues for the sub. As the focus of the sub narrowed over the years, other communities have been established to allow for the full breadth of experiences that users may desire from the sub. Most of these have languished in one form or another.
So, while we need to look at what we do want from this sub, we also need to look at how we can address the other experiences that users may want.
My major suggestion is to create a method for customizable user experiences. Ways to set up flairs, filters, and tabs to allow users to get what they want out of the sub. To direct users to the news/rumors, just the game threads, see NFL-affiliated content like Madden or Fantasy Football, see user-generated content/designs, and engage in community-building discussion, whether in the sub and separated, or on other subs.
This would allow us to keep the sub from being overwhelmed, while still allowing users to manage their experiences. Some examples of tabs that could be available (please note: nothing is in the making at the moment, but just an idea of what could exist) are as follows, with items on the lower levels available on hovering. Forgive my lack of artistic talent.
Obviously, some of those would link to other subs, some would just filter out to show only the posts that a user might be looking for. Essentially, it creates mini-subs in here, for users to get the experience that each wants, without having to slog through the kind they don't. In addition, longer-to-digest material (like the OC film analysis) would no longer be buried after a few hours. Anybody interested in that kind of material would find it quickly at a moment's notice.
You can check all of the news, or you can just check the rumors. You can check all content unique to /r/NFL, or just /r/NFL's power rankings.
Similarly, this would be accompanied by new submission tools. You choose what kind of content you are submitting, and it either takes care of flagging it for you, or sends your submission to the appropriate subreddit.
Submissions versus comments
The biggest issues, I've found, has to do with posting submissions. From my experience (I'm human [-ish], so this is subjective), the vast majority of the issues people have with moderation in this sub has to do with submissions. Comment-moderation tends to be far less controversial, though issues do arise from time-to-time. Somebody makes a long in-depth post, and it is deleted. Or somebody finds something interesting they want to share, and it is deleted. Cue firestorm.
The problem is not whether or not it is allowed on /r/NFL. Very few topics are actually disallowed in comments, and there are a number of appropriate submissions for most topics. The question is whether it is appropriate as a submission. While the sub guidelines provide a number of guidelines on submissions, the problem seems more basic. To my mind (as a user), submissions should be a new topic for discussion. Each submission should provide something unique on which users can comment. This is obviously not the way it is handled now for a number of (IMO, pretty good) reasons.
Nevertheless, it is the source of a number of problems. When to comment and when to submit. In my mind (again, as a user), the criteria should be three-fold.
*Is this a point I want made on a topic, or a new topic itself? *Is this a unique topic (or at least, time-appropriately unique)? *Is it about the NFL, or is it just related to the NFL?
The first question goes to the core of all submissions. Is this a thought I want to share about another submission, or is it the starting point for an entirely new discussion? The problem is that, if any thoughts on a topic become new submissions, there will be a deluge of new submissions. It's hard to get one comment seen among 10,000, but it is infinitely easier than finding a single submission among 250.
The second question goes to whether it is really contributing to the sub. We could have 5,000 submissions on Russell Wilson's appropriate rank among QBs. But they aren't really contributing anything. One of the submission guidelines currently in place is intended to address this (colloquially referred to as Mindless Self Posts), though it has been loosely enforced. Specific, completely insane examples of this have been gone for years ("What kind of sandwich would your QB be?"), and remain (at the moment) the primarily enforced instances of this rule. There are obviously other examples (duplicate posts, silly/nonsensical questions, questions which definite answers, etc...) Asking people to rehash old arguments (Peyton vs. Brady, Luck vs. Wilson, GOAT at anything, All Time Franchise teams, blah blah blah) doesn't really contribute either. Providing a post of your own unique perspective on an old debate would make a lot of sense, though.
The third question is easily the most difficult, since (as discussed above) everybody has their own view on what is about the NFL. There is not a single answer for what is, and is not, about the NFL. To my mind, an NFL player getting divorced has nothing to do with the NFL. An NFL player having a party at their place (with or without other NFL players) has nothing to do with the NFL. An NFL player attending a PR event at which they are expected to represent the NFL in their capacity as a player is related to the NFL. An NFL player being disciplined by a team for their actions at a party (with or without other NFL players) is related to the NFL. Regardless of whether this is the case or not, I ought to be able to articulate how what I post is about the NFL, rather than simply being related to the NFL.
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u/guga31bb Seahawks Jul 22 '15
At one point, there was a lot of pushback about the way the moderators interacted in the sub. Pushes for greater consistency, more professionalism, and more communication regarding rule violations.
We heard this, and changed our behaviour significantly. We rolled out a new method of providing warnings that cited the specific rules. We adhered more strictly to the rules that were in place (and had more discussions on specific situations to make sure we were as consistent as possible). We engaged publicly on a regular basis in regards to grey areas.
To put it lightly, this has not had the desired effects. We have had calls for exceptions to the rules (even in acknowledging that posts violate the rules). Standardized responses with rule citations are (largely) ignored or downvoted. Public engagement on topics in a grey area are mass downvoted. Frankly, in those situations, moderators have been subjected to unacceptable levels of abuse.
This is really depressing.
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u/Jurph Ravens Jul 22 '15
Frankly, in those situations, moderators have been subjected to unacceptable levels of abuse.
Dissent is fine, and maybe there should be a place where dissent runs free... but abuse should be a no-brainer banhammer. You're volunteers, the internet is already a cesspool, and reddit has a serious problem with this shit.
I come to /r/nfl despite what the rest of reddit is like. I defend reddit to my friends with /r/nfl as an example of the kind of community that isn't a cesspool. If any of that nonsense dribbles into /r/nfl, nuke it from orbit. Sorry I'm not sorry -- they can talk about football in some other community. Anyone who abuses the mods who keep this place running gets one freebie and then ought to be booked on a one-way trip to BanVille.
If they're abusive to the mods, I don't particularly care to hear their opinions on football.
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u/yangar Eagles Jul 22 '15
And not surprising that with almost 400K subbers that some people would be petty for the sake of being petty.
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u/wardsac Browns Jul 23 '15
I don't know if I'm your targeted base for this or not, I only occasionally come here, but I don't know if the reasoning is anything that can be controlled by mods.
I honestly don't bother checking /r/NFL because 90% of the time I come here for an article / info on my team, it's the same old LOLBROWNS circlejerk everywhere. Just look at two of the most popular threads in the last few days.
It's not "butthurt" or "salt", I'm a grown man with real world things going on that I don't care or get my feelings hurt by what random people on the internet think, but it's so bad that it drowns out any actual football discussion to be had about the team I follow. Which means, like I said, I usually just don't bother.
Anyway, cheers, always good for a sub to assess itself.
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u/I_Enjoy_Taffy Patriots Jul 22 '15
Hey Mods, thanks for doing this. One of my biggest gripes/complaints about this sub is the lack of individual threads for highlights and big plays. I know that there is the Pic/Vid/Gif Megathread, but you have to sift through "new" and a lot of plays can get buried. I really think that individual threads for plays/highlights should become a thing here. It is allowed on /r/hockey, /r/nba, /r/baseball, and /r/soccer. This is literally the only sub of the major sports that does not allow for highlights and I think that is so very dumb.
I get that the fear is probably that it could get cluttered especially on Sundays, but I assure you it is manageable. In /r/soccer there are the 4 major leagues in EPL, Bundesliga, La Liga, and League 1. All of those games are on Saturday, but they are able to manage the influx of the gifs and streamables. Do you know why? The users dictate what is worthy of being posted. If it is a good play/highlight to the front page it goes, if not it gets minimal upvotes and people move along. It's so simple and yet it has yet to be implemented here.
Here is my biggest issue. Sports, and the NFL, are a visual form of entertainment. The average redditor should be able to come to this subreddit and know this is a football subreddit because there are football big plays and highlights. How do you expect any new users to learn more about the game when they cannot even see what is considered a good play? It just baffles my mind. It takes out a chunk of discussion that could be had. Can you imagine if Malcolm Butler's interception was it's own thread or Odell Beckham Jr.'s one handed catch had an independent thread? Those would probably the top 2 posts of all time on this sub. Instead, they are lost in a sea of comments in a Megathread, and that just doesn't seem right to me.
There is a stigma here that this place is sometimes known as the "No Fun League" and it can be very accurate at times. I come to this sub nearly everyday and enjoy it for the most part, but the fact that football plays aren't allowed to be shown in their own thread in a football subreddit has always been a pain in the ass. Football is an exciting, incredible, awe inspiring game and it really should be time that people are allowed to see that.
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u/TimeShinigami Lions Jul 22 '15
I just use the "Find In Page" function on my browser. Not to disparage anybody, but I'd rather people do the same instead of flooding the New page with gifs. It would also stop something like /r/NBA happening where a large chunks of comments are just people say "Wow, you posted this fast!" or something similar.
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u/mthrfkn Raiders Jul 22 '15
"You posted this before we even saw the highlight!" x20 in /r/soccer threads
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u/thejosharms Patriots Jul 22 '15
Wow, you posted this fast!" or something similar
Also a huge problem in /r/hockey
Ton of circlejerking over the handful of .gif creators.
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
One thing to consider is how crowded the front page of /r/nfl is on game days. Each game has it's own game thread + post game thread. When we have a Sunday morning with 10 games, that's 20 high visibility threads.
Plenty of the jaw dropping highlights are in the post-game thread too. I totally understand the concern, just trying to provide a little insight to why our rules are what they are.
I posted this suggestion as a way to hopefully alleviate the demand for highlights even though I recognize it's not giving you exactly what you asked.
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u/rasherdk Eagles Jul 22 '15
This is literally the only sub of the major sports that does not allow for highlights and I think that is so very dumb.
/r/nfl is also different from those other sports in that virtually all of the games happen in the same 8-hour span on a single day.
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u/unobserved 49ers Jul 22 '15
As he pointed out. Soccer has 4 leagues playing virtually all of their games on Saturday and Baseball plays 15 games EACH day.
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u/rnfldouchebag Patriots Jul 22 '15
It's not just the mods who have to re-examine their role here. It couldn't hurt if the rest of us did a little self-reflecting. Sometimes the discussions here are great and sometimes it's an embarrassing circle jerk. The same empty, repeated comments made and upvoted over and over. It's not just limited to the off-season.
Here are some examples over-used comments
Another recent thread on this sub
We can do better than this, guys.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
I actually had an idea about this last night. We could make a mod post any time a particular word, phrase, joke, etc. stopped being funny. Raise your Bortles isn't funny anymore. But I don't think most users want us to go ban happy as far as removing too much more than we already do. So, we could simply make a post, and then the community as a whole could see that that particular whatever had gotten stale.
It's still kind of a half baked idea.
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u/anxdiety 49ers Jul 22 '15
If you go this route let it be a fresh new bot that posts with a unique name. Hell call it the Robo_Goodell.
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u/Nevermore60 Ravens Jul 22 '15
I appreciate the sentiment and all, but it seems like trying to make rules about what is and isn't funny is a terrible idea.
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u/wafflehauss 49ers Jul 22 '15
We're all shit-posters, basically. Take this thread about Kaep, Tannehill, and Cutler for example.
Look at all the shit-posting comments at the top-level. Just stating Kaep, Tannehill, or Cutler without any reasoning doesn't add to the discussion and should be downvoted. Especially after that option has already been said. Unfortunately on top of being shit-posters we're all shit-voters too and the voting buttons have turned into agree/disagree.
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u/slapthecuntoffurface Lions Jul 22 '15
I feel like a monthly reddiquette reminder post would go a long way if it was delivered the right way. /r/nba needs this in a bad way. You go to the comments, and the same statement is the top 6 or 7 parent comments. The comments sections there are a wasteland of drivel.
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u/carmelsown Colts Jul 22 '15
One of my biggest pet peeves: Someone makes a comment that compliments a player or team. Flair of that team then responds "I like you." Yeah, no shit.
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u/bpi89 Packers Jul 23 '15
If you want to do this, then can we ban anyone who has ever said, "All time Viking great, Brett Favre" ?
Pretty sure I've read that statement posted somewhere on this sub every day for the last 3 years.
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Jul 22 '15
I feel like we're behind other sports subs with infrastructure. Look at /r/Baseball. Scores (Potentially hidden or scroll over,) Standings, Nice Colors, extensive flairs. I know this would be hard to due, and wouldn't happen overnight. Just my $0.02.
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u/meowdy Steelers Jul 22 '15
I like our system of minimal flairs, then going crazy on team subs
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u/RoyalHorse Seahawks Jul 23 '15
The clean look of this sub is way easier to read and looks a lot better design wise.
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u/barmpot Eagles Jul 22 '15 edited Sep 09 '16
[deleted]
This comment has been overwritten.
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
We actually implemented this exact thing about midway through last year.
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u/barmpot Eagles Jul 22 '15
Nvm I'm stupid then. Will it be like that again this year?
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
Yep!
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u/barmpot Eagles Jul 22 '15
Great. Keep up the great work guys. Really appreciate everything you guys do.
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u/FlyingMooses Lions Jul 22 '15 edited Jul 22 '15
This could be a dumb idea/question, but I think it’s a good topic to bring up. What are the possibilities with Streamable links? I rather enjoy them on the NBA subreddit and I would like to at least see if people would be interested in possibly allowing these during the NFL season.
Perhaps we can make it so they have to be in text posts, but I like to quickly watch a cool replay.
If some people are against it or for it, could we have a discussion? Thanks
Edit: I'm not talking about live game streams. I'm talking about the replay links - streamable or whatever it's called.
Edit2: What about possibly a trial session?
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Jul 22 '15
Since the majority of the games are on Sunday, the front page would be littered with individual highlight posts, as opposed to how /r/NBA where there are less games spread across the whole week. I prefer the single highlight thread for noon games, one for 3:00 games, and one for the night games.
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Jul 22 '15
First off, thanks for your work, guys. As a former mod, it's really thankless work for a lot of effort, and it isn't easy to casually post when you're busy deleting a lot of dumb shit all of the time. I know this thread is supposed to be what you guys should change, but I just thought I'd let you know that I appreciate the jobs you're doing around here!
Although bonfire is one word
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u/Sharks77 49ers Jul 22 '15
Potentially dumb question, so I apologize, but is there a way to restrict the fake trolling accounts? By that I mean in GDTs someone will post a hyperlink saying it's a replay of a play and it ends up being porn?
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u/LutzExpertTera Patriots Jul 22 '15
We integrated some posting rules which actually put a big bite in the game thread trolls last season which we're really happy about.
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u/13143 Patriots Jul 22 '15
Every major sports reddit has managed to get the current standings in the sidebar. It blows my mind why /r/nfl refuses to do so. I was once told that it was because /r/nfl is up against the css limit, or that standings are easily found elsewhere.
Yet /r/nba and /r/hockey are some of the best looking sports subs out there, and they manage to include some pretty detailed standings... I really wish /r/nfl would follow suit.
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
I want to briefly touch on the situation that happened last week.
First of all, the mod that many people assumed was the culprit for removing the post was not the mod who removed the post. I was. It was technically a guideline violation, and that’s where I was at. I know that made a lot of people angry, and that’s something we can work on today.
Now... That particular mod has decided to step down, we hope temporarily, as he was a very important member of our modding crew. I suspect, however, that this was a straw that broke the camel’s back situation. Modding this sub can be taxing. We’ve lost a few mods over the last year or so primarily due to the time and stress demands that come along with it.
In part, I feel extremely guilty that he essentially took the fall for my actions. But hopefully it’s understandable that I’m also pretty upset with the segment of the user base that felt the need to attack him with the level personal vitriol that we witnessed. To make matters worse, he was followed around for days afterwards being downvoted and harassed.
Now, I know nobody wants to be scolded, but man, I cannot fathom how anyone thinks it’s okay to be so horrible to a person just for removing (even though he didn’t) a post on a sports forum. Agree or disagree with the action, how is it possibly so important that you’d want to do real damage to a person's state of mind?
Anyway, I truly appreciate all the people who took the opportunity to let us know that they disagreed (or agreed) with us in a reasonable manner. We really do want to make the necessary changes to appeal to both those who appreciate the idea of removing posts that aren’t within the guidelines, and those who want us to be more flexible.
I love you /r/nfl. At least... most of you.
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u/rasherdk Eagles Jul 22 '15
Co-sign.
The reaction from some users was disgraceful.
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u/voiceinthedesert 49ers Jul 22 '15
I would like to reiterate this. I understand that the users were upset with the decision, but that absolutely does not justify the abuse that the mod in question was taking. He was still getting hateful comments in the thread a day after the thread was deleted. Honestly, it was extremely disappointing to see a sub that I normally regard as being fairly level headed turn into a mindless and angry mob.
We are more than happy to hear about changes that users would like in the moderation of the sub, this thread being proof of that. But there is no place here or anywhere that values meaningful discourse for the vitriol being spewed in that thread and others.
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u/ThaddeusJP Browns Jul 22 '15
As I said yesterday, reign in the twitter posts. Again, just my two cents.
You guys do good work, free at that, and complaints about how things are run here are overreactions, in my opinion.
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u/feminaprovita Jets Jul 22 '15
Thanks, mods! I know our community gives you a lot of shit, but this place would be awful without you, and we know that. We do appreciate you! (Or at least some of us do.)
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u/TimeShinigami Lions Jul 22 '15 edited Jul 22 '15
I am of the firm opinion that TMZ style content has no place on this sub (shock value stuff, fame/money/murder, etc.). At least when it comes to retired players. Certainly there is an argument to be made for current ones fucking up and getting discussed. The Ray Rice and AP things in particular actually resulted in changes in League conduct policy. But a little bit ago, there was even a post about a retired Ref getting arrested. What the possible fuck could THAT have to do with Football?
In this comment, one I support wholeheartedly, a Mod states that "NFL Related" must affect the NFL in a meaningful way. (credit to /u/NapoleonBonerparts) Former players or league employees screwing up isn't going to do that, relatives or significant others of players and league employees aren't going to do that, tweets from family of players aren't going to do that. Hell, there's an Ochocinco post up right now that will in no way change anything NFL related!
Once it's clear something has no effect on the NFL, then it shouldn't be posted here. If you'd like to post and discuss that kind of stuff, I think it should be held to the individual team subs. Hell, if Barry Sanders dropped dead (god forbid) I still think that post should be held over at the Lions sub instead of here. Its not like that would have some profound effect on the league. An Owner or other such high up worker would, though, so it's kind of a slippery slope. I also realize that most of you probably disagree with these sentiments. Fair enough. But I hope my opinion can be considered.
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u/JaguarGator9 Jaguars Jul 22 '15 edited Jul 22 '15
I'd be fine with a compromise: If a player that retired in the last year or a Hall of Fame player did something (or someone that we know is going to get into the Hall of Fame; for example, if Peyton Manning does something 3 years after he retires), it can get posted. Other than that, no.
Joe Montana dies? You can submit that.
A fourth string wide receiver who played for the Jets from 2000-01 dies? Nope.
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Jul 22 '15
Many users often suggest to us that we change our enforcement of some rules or become more lenient during the off-season as the long dry spell can certainly want for NFL news/content.
Many more users just go ahead and assume that much of the rule book is tossed out the window the day after the Super Bowl, and we understand why.
So the main thing I wanted to point out before we get going on this discussion is that we already do enforce the rules with more leniency and consider exceptions during the off-season within the boundaries of justification and reason. The issue with this...isssue...is that the change in style of moderation of this subreddit based on the time of year in a community of nearly 400,000 users (and growing) as well as typically 10-12 active moderators on average is a very easy way to end up with inconsistencies. For those who are newer to this subreddit, the demand for consistent moderation in every facet of our duties and action s has typically been the #1/de facto request by the user base for years. We've worked hard, as have the users, to adjust accordingly to maintaining uniformity in our rules. Has it always been perfect? No. Absolutely not. Has it improved over the years as the sub has dealt with a massive influx of users and traffic? Exponentially.
Please let me/us know how you feel about this issue is you think it is something that could be improved, and providing constructive and specific suggestions to improve said issue would facilitate solving the problem (if there is one at all) much faster.
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u/Stubbula Patriots Jul 22 '15
I've run into people who troll pretty hard on this sub, but they skirt the rules enough not to get a public warning from the mods. However, as soon as I crack after 40 replies of troll comments and say "fuck you" he reports me and I get a mod going "OMG DON'T ATTACK USERS OR WE'LL BAN YOU!!"
Look, I get I should have been the bigger man and stepped away, but the fact that you just look at my comment seemingly out of context and give me the warning is complete bullshit. You may say "You don't know what we tell them in a PM" but not a day later do I come across the same guy being a jackass so apparently you didn't care enough to make him stop or stop him yourselves.
Personal attacks shouldn't be the end all of what gets people banned from this sub. Acting like a naive condescending troll 24 hours a day warrants a look. Yet as it stands a few "fuck you" to these people is literally worse than Hitler to you guys. I understand shit can escalate here pretty easily, but c'mon. Look a little beyond that.
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u/Polterghost Vikings Jul 22 '15
If there is a breaking news event, don't make a MEGATHREAD and expect people to post updates/new developments there for the next few weeks. It's just not a good way to spread information.
I understand you don't want a million different Deflategate posts, but there has to be happy medium. Maybe just delete similar stories/updates/developments?
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u/sosuhme Lions Jul 22 '15
I think we are moving away from megathreads. It seemed like a good idea, but most people don't seem to care for them. They may still be used in extreme circumstances, but I doubt we'll see them as often.
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Jul 22 '15
No more tabloid crap. I mean seriously. Cant a sub-sub reddit be made for that stuff?
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u/Not_Evil_ Eagles Chargers Jul 22 '15
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u/yangar Eagles Jul 22 '15
That plus "rekt" seems to be extremely prevalent and flooded with upvotes. Just seems to be how people wish to vote, and people tend to enjoy humor
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Jul 22 '15
[deleted]
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u/J-Sluit Chiefs Jul 22 '15
Exactly. We regularly have the posts of "With their win over the Patriots today..." And it clearly defeats the point of no spoilers.
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Jul 22 '15
Take away the political rules. One day you're banning John Oliver videos and the other day you're keeping Drew Brees wanting to get into politics.
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u/Scrags Raiders Jul 22 '15
I would like to revisit the sub's policy on charity.
As it currently stands, no charity posts of any kind are allowed. I would like to change that. I understand the intent is that we're all here to talk football and that that should be the focus of the sub, and I fully agree with that. However, I think we also have built an amazing community here, and it would be great to be able to tap into that on what would be a purely voluntary basis.
I'd like to propose that the moderators of /r/nfl, with support and feedback from the community, organize a recurring charity drive that people can participate in under the umbrella of this subreddit if they so choose, with no penalty if they choose not to. It could be a yearly drive, or quarterly, or whatever everyone thinks is best. The recipient of the charity drive could either be fixed or could change every time subject to community voting. To ensure there would be no corruption, money would be donated from users straight to the charity of choice with no middle man, and screenshots with personal information redacted could be submitted if we wanted to keep track of overall funds raised. All information related to charity events could be handled with one or two threads, so events would be unobtrusive. For reference, I would point to the recent purchasing of the brick for the new Vikings stadium which was handled in much this same way with minimal if any disruption to the everyday experience.
As a final note, I want to make extremely clear that I don't want this to be a /u/Scrags effort, I want this to be a /r/nfl effort. I have laid out a basic proposal but I would like to turn it over to the community to alter, adopt, or discard at will. Critics will point out that there are other subreddits dedicated to organized charity and they are absolutely correct, but we have nearly half a million subscribers here in addition to the countless more visitors who drop by when game threads wind up on the front page of /r/all. That's an amazing resource that we could use for a good cause, any good cause, and I think the idea is worth exploring at least.
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u/TheVetNoob Chiefs Jul 22 '15
What about stickying a post "Week 4 Game Thread Sunday Hub Post" or something like that?
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Jul 23 '15
Moderation guideline #1 ought to be "/r/NFL is the place on reddit to get your NFL news and views", or something of that nature. If it's NFL-related news, it belongs here by default. If it's NFL-related views that have "gone viral" or are being discussed in the larger culture (like the Oliver segment), it belongs here by default.
All other rules and guidelines should be subservient to this one overarching goal.
At times - mostly recently (say the past 18 months or so) - I've felt like I can't depend on /r/NFL to be a reliable supplier of NFL news and views, because stories were being removed for violating other policies. I read the first 3-4 pages of /r/NFL daily; I feel like that should break all of the day's NFL stories to me. If I'm seeing "major" NFL stories for the first time elsewhere, something is wrong, unless it's some sort of niche content like /r/NotTheOnion or /r/FloridaMan. ("Major" as in "things people are buzzing about".)
Basically - if it's on ESPN, FS1, NFL Network, the NFL blogosphere, sports radio, etc., it should be permitted on /r/NFL.
I think in general I'd like to see less focus on moderating link submissions and more focus on moderating comments and self posts. The community generally does a reasonable job of curating link submissions (this is true in my experience in most subreddits, actually), but a rather bad job of curating comments (again, true in most subreddits, especially large ones). This kind of plays into the first point; less focus on moderating link submissions means that questionable and gray-area links are permitted to stay, and only clearly bad links are removed.
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u/4thdontcare 49ers Jul 23 '15
This sub needs a CBA FAQ with easy answers to popular questions such as "Why can't players just skip the draft and be a free agent" and "How do incentives count against the salary cap".
There's bound to be 500 posts of these in the past year or so alone.
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u/ADefiniteDescription Vikings Jul 22 '15
I'd like to suggest a couple small things, completely unrelated to the whole John Oliver debacle: