weirder.earth Moderator Guidelines

This document covers some guidelines for moderator conduct, both in their capacity as community stewards and as individuals who hold more power than a non-moderator user. That power has effects within the local instance, as well as having the potential to impact behavior and decisions made on other instances, whether or not they are federated with weirder.earth; thus, in acknowledgement of that power, plus any other privilege the individual moderator holds, moderators are expected to work actively against structural and personal biases, especially in regard to racism, sexism, ableism, and other forms of institutional discrimination.

These guidelines are not set in stone, and ought to be revised periodically as new patterns and ideas grow out of the organic process of taking care of a community.

Level of Service

• Users can expect responses to any issue raised within 48 hours. If the issue is complicated or requires discussion with other instances' moderators it may not be possible to resolve it in that time, but moderators will let the reporting user know so that it's clear that the problem is not being ignored.
• Urgent problems such as threats, targeted harassment or unexpected server downtime will be addressed within a few hours, though it may not always be possible for the response to be instant due to resource constraints.
• Moderators will always make sure that someone is available to address issues in a timely manner. Any individual moderator may take long or short times off, but the team will make sure that someone is always reachable.
• If maintaining this level of availability becomes difficult, we will recruit more moderators.

Internal Moderator Conduct

• Moderators are expected to uphold the weirder.earth etiquette and values just as much as any other user.
• When discussing issues, individual moderators should disclose when they feel that their judgement may be impaired, for reasons such as:
  • Personal history with involved users
  • Traumatic or otherwise negative experience with a topic
  • Lack of direct knowledge of culture, events, or other context critical to understanding an issue
  • (and others)
• Disclosure of a personal issue does not necessarily mean that moderator cannot participate in discussion, it is just a courtesy that allows other moderators to understand potential conflicts of interest and blind spots.

Decision Making

• Moderators may act alone on simpler issues, for example: handling clear-cut reports that violate server rules, approving accounts, and so on. When the appropriate course of action is less clear, any moderator can always get input from others on the moderation team.
• Some other things, like taking actions on other instances (besides blocking obviously harmful servers), taking a stance on fediverse politics, or just reacting to bigger problems going on, are discussed together and decisions are made via consensus. That means that the moderator team discusses the issue and hears everyone who contributes within 2 or 3 days, and if nobody objects to the idea/solution that comes up in the discussion, the decision is made.
• We strive to cultivate listenining to dissent and take concerns of all mod team members seriously.
• We acknowledge and value expertise coming from lived experience with oppression, and prioritize that expertise when making decisions regarding specific harmful content.
• Moderator decisions can always be revisited; for example, in the event that moderators act too quickly on a blocking action, and later discover additional context for the situation, the block may be reverted. Reverting an action does not necessarily negate the original decision; rather, it is a human response to gaining more information and taking corrective action.

Moderator Removal

• Reports and public complaints about individual moderators will be discussed and evaluated by the entire mod team. If the behavior reflects ongoing problematic issues, or if the moderator in question is unwilling to acknowledge the issue and enact meaningful change, the rest of the team may decide by consensus to ask that moderator to step down.
• In the event of rogue moderator behavior (targeted/bad faith banning, harassment of other individuals on the fediverse, acting alone on major issues), any other moderator may immediately demote that account to put the mod in time-out while the issue is being addressed by the team.
• Reports and public complaints about the mod team in general will be discussed as any other major topic. Vague subtoots, whether from weirder.earth or other instances, are unlikely to be taken into consideration as serious complaints about moderator behavior.
• Moderators may step down at any time, whether for time and energy limitations, continued irreconcilable issues with the mod team, or generally recognizing that they cannot uphold the expectations of these guidelines.

Handling Reports

• If the user being reported is not known to you personally, make no assumptions about their identity. Context and power relationships matter.
• Check profiles of all users being discussed in reports and use any listed pronouns (if no pronouns are listed or can be otherwise identified, default to 'they/them' until corrected).
• Do not subtoot about reports, either during or after action has been taken. Venting steam about reports should be done in private, preferably only with other mods.
• In general, suspensions/silences for both instances and users do not need to be publicly announced, unless there are significant local follows/interactions, or a wider and ongoing fediverse moderation issue. Suspensions/silences of individual users should only be publicly announced if absolutely necessary, considering that putting this spotlight on an individual risks brigading them or starting a pile-on.
• If we plan to suspend or silence an instance that has many follows from our own, we will warn users and give them time to make arrangements (except in the event of a clear need to act quickly for immediate safety). Unless there is also a wider fediverse moderation issue at play, that warning will be limited to a local scope, using either server announcements or local-only posts.
• In general, silences and suspensions can be reverted when the original issues have been cleared.
• DM the user submitting the report once it's closed to inform them of the result (including if no action is taken).

Payment

• Moderating is generally assumed to be volunteer work; some moderators may accept funds from the instance community fund, as compensation for taking on the extra burden of performing antiracist emotional labor as an individual impacted by racism.
• No power or decision-making differences should exist between individuals of the moderation team in general, which includes whether or not a mod is being paid.

Admin Sock Account

• The weirder.earth admin account should be used for making official announcements regarding moderation actions. This allows some personal distance between individual moderators and public actions.
• Buddy system! Communication from the sock account should generally be cleared by at least two moderators (this can be the person drafting the post and one additional mod) before being posted, for, at the minimum, typo scans, detail verification, and tone check.
• Personal moderator takes should come from individual accounts, not the sock account, including weighing in on fediverse politics.
• Outreach to other friendly instances should generally come from individual accounts, for the sake of maintaining continuity of discussions; in the event of trying to make contact with a questionable or potentially hostile instance, the sock account can be used to shield individual moderators from a harassment vector.

Approving Accounts

• If there isn't an obvious red flag in a new user request, give it the benefit of the doubt and approve it; the application is meant to catch literal bots/spammers/porn accounts, not do a thorough vetting.
• New uers requests that have suspicious but not outright rejectable content should be noted, with potential for quick action if the user turns out to be a bad actor.

Document History

• January 2021, drafted by @rabbithearth, edits and feedback from (@distel, @eldang), and incorporating suggestions by (@carl@chaos.social, @dumpsterqueer@ondergrond.org, CaribenxMarciaX@scholar.social).
• Released to the public for comments on Jan 26th 2021
• Adopted and published on March 17th 2021