/r/modnews
An official community for announcements from Reddit, Inc. pertaining to moderation.
This is like /r/reddit, except for topics that are only of interest to moderators.
/r/reddit - Where we announce all kinds of things that aren't mod-specific topics.
/r/ModSupport - Discuss moderation issues with reddit admins
Reddit For Community to help educate and inspire mods
Mod Help Center - Searchable knowledge base for mod tips and tool guides
Programs for moderators Information on some of Reddit's moderator related programs and initiatives.
/r/modhelp - Get help from other moderators about anything pertaining to moderating on reddit
/r/IdeasForTheAdmins - Specific ideas for site-wide improvement that aren't moderation specific should go in /r/IdeasForTheAdmins
/r/help - Have questions on how to use reddit as a user? Check out /r/help!
For general questions that aren't moderation related, please send to the rest of the community team here.
This is an admin-sponsored subreddit.
/r/modnews
Hey mods,
I’m u/enthusiastic-potato and I work on our safety product team. We’re here today to introduce some new safety features and tools requested by mods and to recap a few recent safety products we’ve released. These safety-focused mod tools and filters are designed to work together to help you manage and keep out the not-so-great things that can pop up in your subreddit(s).
What’s new:
The Harassment Filter
The first feature we’re introducing is the new Harassment filter – powered by a large language model (LLM) that’s trained on mod actions and content removed by Reddit’s internal tools and enforcement teams.
The goal with this new feature is to help provide mods a more effective and efficient way to detect and protect their communities from harassment, which has been a top request from mods.
https://i.redd.it/1iuj7rijrxnc1.gif
Quick overview:
This feature will be available to all communities on desktop by end of day, and the mobile apps settings will follow soon in the coming weeks. We have more improvements planned for this feature in the future, including additional controls. We’re also considering how we could extend these capabilities for mod protection as well.
Check out more information on how to get started in the help center.
Big shoutout to the many mods and subreddits who participated in the beta! This feedback helped improve the performance of the filter and identify key features to incorporate into the launch.
User details reporting
The second new feature we’re sharing today is a new reporting option for profiles. We’ve heard consistent feedback - particularly from moderators - about the need for a more detailed user profile reporting option. With that, we’re releasing the ability to report specific details on a user’s profile, including whether they are in violation of our content policies.
Overall, you will now be able to report a user’s:
To report a user with potentially policy-violating details:
https://i.redd.it/e54ph61mrxnc1.gif
Safety guide
The third update today is that we’re bringing more safety (content) into Reddit for Community, starting with a new quick start guide for mods less familiar with the different tools out there.
The guide offers a brief walkthrough of three impactful safety tools we recommend leveraging, especially if you’re new to moderation and have a rapidly growing subreddit: the Harassment Filter, Ban Evasion Filter, and Crowd Control.
You’ll start to see more safety product guidance and information pop up there, so keep an eye out for updates!
What about those other safety tools?
Some of you may be familiar with them, but we’ve heard that many mods are not. Let’s look back on some other safety tools we’ve recently released!
Over the last year, we’ve been leveraging our internal safety signals that help us detect bad actors, spam, ban evasion, etc. at scale to create new, simple, and configurable mod tools. Because sometimes something can be compliant with Reddit policy but not welcome within a specific subreddit.
On top of all the filters, we also recently updated the “Reports and Removals” mod insights page to provide more context around the safety filters you use.
If you’ve used any of these features, we’d also like to hear feedback you may have.
Safety and the community
Currently, an overwhelming majority of abuse-related enforcement on our platform is automated–meaning it is often removed before users see it– by internal admin-level tooling, automoderator, and the above tools. That being said, we know there’s still (a lot of) work to do, especially as ill-intentioned users develop different approaches and tactics.
So, there will be more to come: additional tools, reporting improvements, and new features to help keep your communities safe, for users and mods. This also includes improving our safety systems that work in the background (outputs of which can be read in the Safety Security reports) to catch and action bad things before you have to deal with them.
As always, let us know if you have any feedback or questions on the update.
edit: updated links
Hi Mods,
I’m u/maybe-pablo from Reddit’s Content team. As we continue to build out improvements, several mod-oriented features will be removed next month: Post Collections, Mark as OC, Community Content tags and the primary topic setting.
Why are we making these changes?
Over time, we found that Post Collections and Mark as OC didn't gain widespread adoption among mods. However, with the recent enhancements to the flair navigation system, we've noticed a consistent and growing increase in the adoption of post flair. Flair allows mods to curate and organize content for their communities, which helps users swiftly navigate and filter through posts they’re interested in. We’re confident that post flair can serve all kinds of organization and navigation needs.
We recently implemented an automated system for rating and organizing subreddits by topic, rendering the previous Community Content tag and topic setting obsolete. When tested alongside the old survey-based method, data shows that the new system allows for faster and more accurate identification of a subreddit.
What does this mean for moderators?
Next month, posts that were previously included in a collection or labeled using our "Mark as OC" feature will be unbundled, and the native tag associated with them will be removed. If you’d like to keep your old collections organized, we recommend using post flair to do so.
The new rating and subreddit organization system has been successfully implemented. Mods do not need to change anything on their end.
If you have any questions about the above features, don’t hesitate to ask them in the comments below!
Hi y’all! I’m u/big-slay from Reddit’s Community Events team. You may recognize me from Mod World…if not, forget I said that. I’m here to share info about our first slate of 2024 events!
This year, we’ll continue hosting events you’re already familiar with, like Mod City, Mod Roadshows, and Mod World.
We’re also launching some new, virtual event types this year to increase accessibility for those who can’t make it to an IRL event.
Here’s a quick guide:
IRL Events
Virtual Events
Phew. That was a lot of things.
Interested in attending? You can register now for several 2024 events at the links below! We will continue adding more dates as the year goes on!
Here’s the schedule so far:
Keep up with all of our mod events throughout 2024 on r/RedditCommunityEvents.
You can also check out event recaps and more at our home for all things mods: Reddit for Community.
I’m really looking forward to meeting more of y’all this year :)
- u/big-slay out <3
Heya Mods - back again to have more discussions with you all! Let's dive right in:
##Administrivia
Real quick, let's see what all we've done this past month - we held Mod World where on top of a few AMA's with /u/spez we also, announced reddit for community, check them both out! We also released a new tool for reordering your modteam, and as announced at Mod World we've opened sign ups for Adopt an Admin next year! I also have some less great news - we've been working with teams internally to find a way to support you all in holding your bestof contests. Unfortunately, this year, we were unable to make it happen - we're sorry about that.
##Policy Highlight
Each month, we feature a tid bit around policy to help you moderate your spaces, sometimes something newish, but most often bits of policy that may not be well known. This month, we’re talking about Rule 3 which reads:
Respect the privacy of others. Instigating harassment, for example by revealing someone’s personal or confidential information, is not allowed. Never post or threaten to post intimate or sexually-explicit media of someone without their consent.
The first bit is one of our oldest rules, known to many of you as 'No Doxxing'.
It certainly feels like a no brainer, as doxxing can lead to real life harassment and harm. We wanted to dive in just a bit as there are some gray areas we tend to see questions around. So, what does this rule mean in your community? In general, you should think of this on a spectrum — it's fine to post pictures and the name of Keanu being awesome, it's not fine to post the full name and address of a private individual, or other information that could be used to identify them. There are many communities out there that are focused on individuals who are already in the public eye, and whether these are celebrating the person or snarking on them, the same rules apply. Where it crosses a line is when people attempt to locate them or their family members or post any other types of identifying information including email address, IP's, etc.
This also holds true when a news story or viral video thrusts someone into the spotlight - whether for positive or negative reasons. While our internal Safety tools catch a number of issues proactively, context is important as always - so as mods you can utilize some Automoderator rules to help you identify potential issues in your community.
##Discussion Topic
As always we want to invite you all to have a discussion around moderation in your spaces. We do this in the Reddit Mod Council on a regular basis and want to continue to talk to more of you. Today, along with any questions or thought on the above, we want to discuss:
##In closing While you're thinking about your answers to these questions, please enjoy my song of the month – I will be, as we chat throughout the day!
edit: fixed formatting, markdown is tough!
Hey everyone, u/tiz here, I work on the Community team at Reddit.
The Adopt-an-Admin program was launched in July 2020 to provide admins (Reddit employees) with a better understanding of the moderator experience. Adopt-an-Admin embeds Reddit admins in mod teams, where they moderate alongside you, with the goal of fostering empathy and understanding of the mod experience. You can read more about the program here.
You may have missed this program as it's been on hiatus for a few months. But hey, we’re back with a fresh focus, new ideas, and a plan to expand!
At Mod World, u/spez chatted with moderators of r/AmItheAsshole about his experience being “adopted” by their subreddit (event registrants can watch the recording here). The experience was so impactful that we want every admin to have the ability to do Adopt-an-Admin. Yes, all 2,000+ admins. With this goal in mind, we’re looking to have a ton of subreddits sign up and take an admin under your wing - where you can build one-to-one relationships with admins, get an outside perspective on your community, and share how important what you do is with every single Reddit employee.
We’re looking for all types of subreddits: small, medium large, eventful, uneventful, boring, cozy, chaotic, pictures, blocks of text, snippets of text, art, shows, games, places, people, languages, memes, dreams, themes, thoughts, ideas, questions, answers, support, help, stories, cats, dogs, squirrels, and everything in between.
If you signed up in the past, please sign up again to let us know about your interest in the new year! If your sub is brand new to Adopt-an-Admin, we can’t wait to hear from you. We’ll reach out with next steps in early 2024.
Note, if you signed up during Mod World on December 2, 2023, you do not have to fill out the form again. Sign ups for ‘round 1’ will close on January 15, 2024.
Hi Mods,
It’s me again - u/enthusiastic_potato - and I’m excited to share some new data-filled updates coming to the Community Health page, which can be found in Mod Insights.
Updates:
We made these changes as a direct result of mod feedback and to provide more context around the safety filters you use. Also, who doesn’t love more community data? Ok, maybe not everyone.
Specifically, mods requested more insight into how much content is removed by Reddit admins as well as distinguished removal reasons. Also, we know you didn’t have high visibility into the effectiveness of your set safety filters across your communities, so we improved those insights with the new safety filter chart. Please note for the Admin removals and safety tooling filtering rates, data before September 2023 is not available.
These updates will be completely rolled out by Friday, December 15 on Reddit’s native mobile apps and desktop.
As a reminder, you can visit the updated Reports and Removals page (formerly, Community Health), by visiting Mod Tools > Mod Insights > Reports and Removals.
New admin removal chart in Reports and Removals within Mod Insights on mobile
New safety filters chart found in Reports and Removals within Mod Insights.
Thanks for reading! We’ll stick around to answer any questions.
Howdy Mods,
In June, we announced a pilot program to test an exciting new mod tool - Post Guidance. Since the unveiling of this program, over 200 subreddits have enlisted to participate, and we are sincerely grateful for the overwhelming support and enthusiasm expressed for this feature. A heartfelt thank you to every mod team who took the time to experiment with this new tool, provide us feedback, and collaborate with us on this product journey.
Today we’re excited to share an update on the progress we’ve made and detail our upcoming plans.
TL;DR We’ve seen some incredible results with a sharp decrease in % of automod removals. While certain metrics, such as post starts and submissions, have shown mixed results, we acknowledge that there is still progress to be made. We still have a ways to go, but we’re feeling bullish about the progress thus far.
Not so TL;DR
What you’re looking at above is an AB test analysis of 33 subreddits that we tracked for 4 weeks. Here we are comparing a “control” group (individuals who did not see the Post Guidance experience) against an “enabled experiment” group (individuals who did see the Post Guidance experience). Here’s a summary of some of the results.
*Note: FYI for those digging into the numbers, it’s worth mentioning that automod removals, mod removals, and admin removals aren’t mutually exclusive. These results are a bit more ad-hoc across 30 days of data. Our data scientist is working on looking at a longer time horizon to look at statistical significance.
The future of Post Guidance
At present, Post Guidance is exclusively accessible to subreddits that have enrolled in the pilot program. We have plans to release this feature more broadly in 2024. As part of our experimentation, we are selectively showcasing Post Guidance to 50% of desktop users within those communities. Given the positive results we’ve experienced, we are thrilled to announce our decision to expand the availability of Post Guidance to 100% of desktop users within subreddits participating in our pilot program.
While we do this, our team is also busy designing and building the following feature improvements:
Thanks again to everyone who has helped us get this far. If you’re interested in joining our pilot program, please feel free to sign up in the comments. If you have any questions or feedback about the program, the results we’ve shared, or how this feature works don’t hesitate to ask us below!
Howdy Mods,
It’s been a busy end of the year, and today we have a bevy of updates. Please dive in below.
Mobile Modmail Updates
In October we launched a native mobile modmail feature on iOS and Android. Though the rollout laid a sturdier foundation for needed tweaks to modmail, it did impact the functionality of different moderation features. Since then our team has been working on resolving various issues that mods highlighted.
Here’s what’s been fixed and improved:
Issue: The user Mod Log on iOS was inaccessible.
Solution: This was a bug that has now been fixed.
Issue: The User Profile and User Stats are not aligning in the “invite a moderator” messages on iOS.
Solution: This was a bug that has now been fixed.
Issue: iOS mods couldn’t approve an “Approved User” request
Solution: This was a bug and has now been fixed.
Issue: Clicking on the user's profile takes a bunch of new steps on iOS
Solution: We updated the “user summary card” to contain more information to minimize the need to visit the user profile card in most cases.
Issue: Enhance Mute functionality on iOS and Android.
Solution: Mods are now able to specify mute durations.
Issue: Enhance Ban functionality on iOS and Android.
Solution: Mods can now ban and unban users directly from modmail. This will roll out tomorrow on iOS.
Issue: Archiving messages on iOS is tedious
Solution: We included “swipe to archive” and “swipe to mark unread” actions (which existed on Android already).
Issue: Modmail on Android is slow to load
Solution: We improved performance so the initial load time of the inbox and the time to action on messages is significantly quicker.
Upcoming Improvements:
Discover more communities by topic on the Reddit mobile apps
We recently launched a new mobile experience to help redditors more easily discover and explore communities related to the same topic directly from a subreddit’s homepage.
As shown in the image above, some communities will have a relevant topic and their ranking within that topic (determined by recent user activity volume in the community) displayed on the header of the homepage. By tapping on the topic and ranking, Redditors will be directed to a list of communities within that same topic group to explore. In the future, we’ll also expand this to show more posts and content about that topic.
Important note: This feature respects individual subreddit discovery settings.
Post flair navigation and Mod Log
We’ve updated the Mod Log to record when a mod team member has enabled or disabled post flair navigation on mobile. This change came about thanks to the feedback we received in r/RedditModCouncil.
As always, don't hesitate to let us know in the comments below if you have any questions about the above updates.
tl;dr Moderators with Everything permissions have the ability to reorder moderators without needing admin assistance. If you have inactive moderators at the top of the list, the next active moderator on the list with Everything permissions can reorder anyone on the list, including the inactive moderators.
I’m u/agoldenzebra, and I work on Community Governance initiatives in collaboration with our Product teams. As a reminder, the Community Governance team’s work focuses on empowering active moderators, creating clearer systems for effective subreddit governance, and ensuring that you have the data and information you need to be effective stewards of your community.
With that in mind, a few months ago we introduced protections for communities with inactive moderators. Today, we’re here to introduce the next step in this body of work: providing moderators with the ability to reorder their moderator team without needing admin assistance.
Here’s how it works:
https://i.redd.it/pi35y09xxi4c1.gif
Please comment below if you have any questions or feedback. Thanks!
Edit: Huge thanks to the Reddit Mod Council, who’s discussions and feedback helped shape this feedback. Some council members have shared summaries of their discussions here, here, and here.
2nd Edit: All moderators with the requisite permissions should now have access to this feature. Thanks for your patience! During our slow rollout, we surfaced and fixed the following bugs:
If you experience any issues using this feature, please continue to report them in the comments below or let us know via a bug report in r/ModSupport.
Hopefully you were able to make it to the 2023 Mod World event earlier today. If you couldn't attend live, but registered for the event then you can still see the sessions under the “replay” tab. We will also make the Mod World videos publicly available on the site below at a later date.
The big ICYMI though is: There is a NEW home for all things moderation: Reddit for Community.
Why did Reddit build a new home for mods?
Well, because A LOT goes into modding. And that information is sometimes hard to locate when you need it. We have consistently heard from both new and experienced moderators that this could be improved, so this is our effort to do just that.
Reddit for Community will serve as a single destination for mods to access relevant resources, mod-focused product updates, tactical guidance, and understand additional opportunities available to mods only. No more treasure hunts for the most relevant and up-to-date info you need to run your communities – this site will have it.
This is just the first step, and we will continue to build an easy-to-navigate home base alongside you. So keep the ideas coming of what you love, need or are missing in this home.
What can I find on Reddit for Community right now?
What else is coming in 2024?
We will be updating regularly, so bookmark Reddit for Community and tell us what you’d like more of right here.
Best,
curioustomato_
PS. I’d also like to share that my teammates (including u/MondoKayo, u/poppysnoo, u/Qu33n_of_Narwhals, u/big-slay and u/glizzygrl) may help me follow up here by responding to comments.
PPS.
Edit: Fixed the link to the replay tab
Hi Mods,
This fall, our team has been actively building a new mobile mod queue interface. Today, we're thrilled to announce the gradual rollout of these updates to moderators on both iOS and Android over the next few weeks. Mods may start seeing the revamped mod queue as early as this week, but please be aware that the rollout will be gradual and may extend into the new year (we’re taking our time to ensure everything works as intended).
This upgraded experience brings the following changes:
Here are some of the improvements you’ll see in the new queue:
https://i.redd.it/6jkdgw710j3c1.gif
A quick thank you
Over the past month, we’ve had a substantial group of mods partner with us to test this feature out, identify bugs, and provide recommendations for future enhancements. We couldn’t have gotten to where we are today without their assistance - thank you! Although we have addressed the identified bugs and incorporated numerous feedback points, our commitment to enhancing the queue continues post-launch. Here’s a glimpse of what lies ahead:
We’re excited to hear your feedback, so please drop any thoughts or questions in the comments below!
We meet again, mods
This summer we announced our plans to reinvent the desktop mod experience on Reddit and shared early designs for what a reimagined Mod Queue could look like. Since then, we’ve hosted numerous conversations with a wide variety of mods where we’ve continued to share concepts and gather feedback.
Today we’re excited to let everyone know that we’ve begun engineering this new Mod Queue. As we kick off this journey we want to be transparent about our plans, and our current progress, while also creating a space for mods to give us continuous feedback.
Where we are today
When we launch the first iteration of this new mod queue next year, it will have a similar look and feel to the experience mods have on both old and new Reddit today. Some noticeable changes will include:
We hope these changes will improve efficiency by increasing the scannability of queues, cutting down on the number of clicks a mod needs to take to complete an action, and reducing cognitive load.
Buttons have been moved underneath the content so that more actions are easily accessible.
This new layout takes inspiration from Old Reddit.
Throughout 2024, we will continue to build additional features that will provide more context and information to assist the mod’s decision-making process. These features will give mods the following abilities:
https://i.redd.it/k99zs0vknq1c1.gif
Mods would be able to manage custom filters to further tailor their team’s experience.
We want this new Mod Queue to be a customizable experience that mods can tailor to best suit their individual or team needs.
Additional mod features
In addition to Mod Queue, our team is focused on building the next generation of mod tools on this upgraded experience. We’re currently running a pilot program for Post Guidance, and are starting to ideate on Comment Guidance, an improved pinned post experience based on mod feedback, additional subreddit styling/widget options, and a revamped subreddit welcome experience. We’ll be sharing more news on these potential features in the coming weeks.
Where we’re going, we don’t need roads new.reddit
As a reminder, this new mod interface will replace the current experience later next year (important disclaimer: old.reddit is not going anywhere). As we work towards this end goal, you can expect more posts from us updating you on our progress, previewing new features, and soliciting additional feedback along the way. In the meantime, please feel free to ask any questions about what we’ve detailed above or share any feedback you may have.
Heya Mods! I'm back with our next installment of the Mod Monthly - last time we had some great conversations around policy, moderation practices, spam, and the listening sessions we've been holding. I enjoyed those and hope you all did as well. This month I hope to have more of the same - so let's get to it:
##Administrivia
First, a bit of administrivia with some recent posts you might have missed: Did you see that your users can now use collectible expressions to share how they're feeling in comment threads if you have them turned on?, not specific to moderation - but check out the progress we've made on search! We also shared resources for those of you dealing with traffic influxes due to the Israel-Hamas conflict, which will inform our Policy Highlight today. We posted an update about our progress on native modmail and are on track with the fixes we've committed to, the first three fixes we mentioned in this post will be out in the next app release - please be sure to update your app when it's available - we'll continue to keep you updated as we progress. Finally, make sure you read about the subreddit purge and follow the instructions if one of your communities is affected.
##Mod World
We announced the return of the Mod Summit World! bigger and better than before, coming virtually December 2nd!
##Mod Recruiter Pilot
The Mod Recruiter is a pilot opt-in service that helps moderators source new mod candidates from within their community on an ongoing basis, giving your mod team a regular stream of applicants to review without spending time manually reaching out to potential mod candidates. This automated service can help notify your regular community members when you post a thread accepting mod applications.
##Policy Highlight
Each month, we feature a tidbit around policy to help you moderate your spaces, sometimes something newish, but most often bits of policy that may not be well known. This month, we’re talking about Rule 1 and specifically our violence policy
This policy prohibits content involving torture, executions, gratuitous displays of dead bodies as well as requests to find where to view such content or offers to share it.
Do not post content that encourages, glorifies, incites, or calls for violence or physical harm against an individual (including oneself) or a group of people; likewise, do not post content that glorifies or encourages the abuse of animals. We understand there are sometimes reasons to post violent content (e.g., educational, newsworthy, artistic, satire, documentary, etc.) so if you’re going to post something violent in nature that does not violate these terms, ensure you provide context to the viewer so the reason for posting is clear.
Some examples of violent content that would violate Rule 1:
- Post or comment with a credible threat of violence against an individual or group of people.
- Terrorist content, this includes propaganda.
- Post containing imagery or text that incites, glorifies, or encourages self-harm or suicide.
- Graphic violence, image, or video without appropriate context.
If you choose to allow graphic content in your community that does not violate the above-referenced policy (e.g., content from non-combatant citizen journalists), please ensure it is correctly marked as NSFW. We're committed to allowing nuanced discussion of this topic on Reddit within the bounds of our sitewide policies, and we recognize how important citizen journalism is. However, context is important, and content that supports violent acts against others (e.g., against a hostage) will be removed. If you want to review that type of content before it is live to your users, you can turn on our Mature Content Filter within your community.
##Feedback Sessions
We held our last session of the year - stay tuned as we'll post a readout of our learnings and how we're taking action based on what we heard soon^™!
r/NBA is celebrating its 15th Cake Day! Reddit Community Funds and /r/NBA are teaming up to celebrate with a fundraiser for The Boys & Girls Clubs of America with Reddit matching up to $25k. Stay tuned for more info on a All-Star-Community Meetup coming soon as well! r/vancouver is also holding a fundraiser for their local foodbank, while r/ClashofClans's tournament promises to be very exciting!
Speaking of fundraisers, Giving Tuesday approaches. Does your community typically host a fundraiser at the end of the year? Share in the sticky comment below. We'd love to be able to amplify them!
##Discussion Topic
On to the real reason I'm here - we want to invite you all to have a discussion around moderation in your spaces. We do this in the Reddit Mod Council on a regular basis and want to continue to talk to more of you. Today we want to discuss:
How do you think about rules in your community? Here are a few questions to get you started - but feel free to share whatever comes to mind and discuss with other mods:
Bonus: Are there any rules (aside from civility!) that most subreddits should have in their community?
##In closing
While you're thinking about your answers to these questions, please enjoy my song of the month, I will be as we chat throughout the day!
edit: formatting is hard
Hello everyone! Two years ago, we removed dormant subreddits from Reddit to free up the namespace for future creators (some of you may recall this).
We are planning to do this again beginning in the next two weeks, but will do things slightly differently this time around in order to minimize disruption to your communities.
When we did this in 2021, we didn’t offer an opportunity for mods to keep subreddits that may have had value to them–sentimental or otherwise. One of the most common issues we encountered was moderators missing the announcement and not being aware that this was happening, sometimes even months later. This was an important learning for us.
This time, we will provide a simple avenue for moderators to opt-out from this round of dormant subreddit removals – for whatever reason they see fit. Here’s how:
These changes will occur across two phases:
We will not be removing subreddits under a year old, or subreddits that have been banned.
We’ll be sticking around in comments to answer your questions.
Hi y’all! u/MondoKayo, here. One of the functions I lead is Reddit’s community events, and I have some big news to share today. Some of you may be familiar with Mod Summit – a virtual experience we’ve held in the past to bring an intimate number of Mods and Admins closer together. This year, Mod Summit is getting a makeover. We’re excited to announce a brand new experience called Mod World coming to a screen near you on Saturday, December 2nd. And guess what? You’re ALL invited!
https://i.redd.it/azod6rksxyxb1.gif
What to Expect at Mod World:
A dynamic and interactive virtual experience chock-full of engaging sessions, cool swag drops, and crowd-sourced content with you in mind. Over the last few months, we’ve gathered feedback from Mod Listening Sessions and Mod Roadshows, and curated Mod World sessions based on what you’ve shared with us. We’ll be making announcements, hearing from fellow mods and admins, and covering important, relevant topics like content moderation, power of belonging, and globalization. Craving a more personal connection? No fear – there will also be opportunities for you to interact with other mods 1:1!
Mod World will take place on Saturday, December 2nd from 8am-11:30am PST with the ability to replay sessions if you can’t make the whole thing. We’re happy to share that the content will be available in 28 languages including: English, Spanish, French, German, Mandarin, Hindi, and ASL.
Sounds great! How do I sign up?
Make sure to use u/ in the “first name” field and your username in the "last name" field. No need to enter your real name! (Confusing, we know. There was no way to change the field!)
We can’t wait to *virtually* see you there. Check out the FAQs in the comments section below. We’ll be here for a little bit to answer questions.
EDIT: added more detail on registration instructions
Heya Mods!
We’re here with an exciting new development from the world of Collectible Avatars: Collectible Expressions!
Collectible Expressions are an animated version of Collectible Avatars and a new way for people to express themselves in the comments of any post in communities where mods have enabled the feature (more on that below). These are free to use for any redditor who owns any Collectible Avatar, free or paid, and has it equipped as their profile avatar.
To use Collectible Expressions, users will be able to choose from a library of expressions created by Reddit in the post comments section. From there, their profile Avatar will be brought to life through an animated expression. This can be combined with any text that you comment with. You may even see some old faces making their way back through on launch day ;).
Collectible Expressions in comments
Ahead of us starting to roll this out on October 26th, you will find a new “Collectible Expressions” toggle under the “Media in Comments” section in your Mod Tools. Collectible Expressions will be automatically turned on for all subreddits who have used media (i.e. GIFs, images, custom emojis, Snoomojis, etc) in comments in the last 30 days.
Collectible Expressions Mod Enablement Toggle
Should you not want this feature enabled in your community, please kindly take some time from now until EOD October 23rd to disable the feature – and on the flip side, if this product speaks to you, you can enable it with the same toggle as well. You will still be able to turn off the feature after this date, but any expressions that were already used in the comments will need to be manually removed.
We are hoping that this is another way to liven up the comments, just as GIFs and images have done before, and make it easier for users to engage and express themselves. We hope that you enjoy seeing these in the wild, on or off your subreddit!
[EDIT] Updated images
Heya!
You may recall a few months ago we posted about changing up some of the content we share with you. For our first dip into these waters, we're starting with a new monthly post that will serve as a round up of sorts - sharing content we've already posted that is worth highlighting.
We also want to open the floor a bit to have some discussions with all of you around moderation in general.
So, let's get into it!
##Administrivia
First, a bit of administrivia with some recent posts you might have missed: We recently announced new restrictions on what actions inactive moderators can take in your spaces, a one click filter that will filter NSFW content from showing up in your community until you've had a chance to review, and modmail native to our android app. We've also updated modqueues, introduced a new Automod feature to help keep your community clean from spam, and brought back Mod Roadshows!
##Policy Highlight
Each month we'll feature a tid bit around policy to help you moderate your spaces, sometimes something newish (like today’s example), but most often bits of policy that may not be well known.. This month, we’re highlighting the recent expansion ofRule 4 within Reddit’s Content Policy. You can read more in-depth at the link, but the important bit for you all to know is:
We expanded the scope of this Rule to also prohibit non-sexual forms of abuse of minors (e.g., neglect, physical or emotional abuse, including, for example, videos of things like physical school fights).
What does that mean for you? For most of you, not a lot.For mods of communities that host videos that show aggression, however, you'll want to report and remove content featuring minors having a physical fight. Please note, this Rule does not prohibit conversations about maltreatment in which survivors of abuse or concerned community members are discussing their experience or seeking help.
##Feedback Sessions
We're still hosting virtual feedback sessions, so far we've held 14 calls with 59 of you - we'll share our takeaways with you next month. If you haven't signed up yet, you still have time - just fill out this form!
##Community Funds
Over in Community Funds, we recently interviewed a moderator on how they used financial support from Reddit to create their own zine! Check it out and start thinking about ways to have fun in your community on Reddit's dime!
###Discussion Topic
Finally - and why I'm really here. ;) We want to invite you all to have a discussion around moderation. We do this in the Reddit Mod Council on a regular basis and wanted to talk to more of you. So…. we’d love to discuss:
What makes your community unique?
So, a couple questions to get you started - but really I want to hear whatever you have to share on this topic.
##In closing
While you're thinking about your answers to these questions, please enjoy my song of the month, I will be as we chat throughout the day!
Greetings, Mods and brave adventurers of Reddit
I’m back this week with an update about the improved mobile moderation experience on Reddit. Before we delve into this week's news, let’s take a look at launches from the past 12+ months.
Now that we’re all caught up to speed, we can unveil what’s next: a new native mobile Modmail experience.
Native mobile modmail
In the past, Modmail dwelled within a clunky “web view” on mobile, plagued by slow loading times and an inefficient interface. Times are about to change though. Our product team has forged a new native modmail experience tailored exclusively for mobile moderators. These enhancements debut on Android this week and will arrive on iOS in October. Prepare for:
https://i.redd.it/406gssrub2rb1.gif
What’s next?
This marks the beginning of our mobile modmail journey, and the upcoming possibilities are boundless. We're currently focused on improving the user summary card and plan to include more information on recent posts and comments as well as ban status. We’ll also be updating the mute user functionality across the app so you’ll be able to specify duration no matter where you decide to mute a user from. Further on down the road, we’d like to incorporate Modmail macros into this experience. See below for our early designs of these feature enhancements:
Early design of the user summary card
Early design of Modmail macros
Once you've had a chance to explore, we'd love to hear your thoughts on potential improvements you'd like to see us incorporate. Your feedback will help shape the future of this feature. Together, we want to craft the ideal modmail experience.
We’re also in the process of revamping the mobile mod queue experience. We intend to launch this feature later this year.
A quick thank you.
Over the past month we’ve had a wide variety of mods help us QA and test this feature. Their feedback and partnership helped us identify and troubleshoot bugs, call out areas of improvement, and provide us with some excellent ideas that we look forward to incorporating down the road. To all those who lent their time and expertise, we extend our deepest gratitude. Your support and partnership have been instrumental in helping us launch this feature.
Should you harbor any queries or wish to impart your insights, do not hesitate to reveal your thoughts in the comments below.
As of the past few weeks, we have been trialing a new community safety setting that automatically filters potentially sexual and graphic content into your community’s modqueue for review. This setting is designed to help make moderation easier and to minimize viewing potentially unwelcome videos, images, or gifs in your community – and we’re happy to share that it will be widely available to all communities over the course of the next few days.
The Mature Content Filter is an optional subreddit setting that uses automation to identify if media is sexual or violent. You can find it by going to Mod Tools -> Safety (under Moderation section) > Mature content filter. When the setting is turned on, you can set your preferences on the type of content you want filtered to the modqueue.
As of now, we will only be filtering hosted images, gifs, and videos. Note: this will not filter links to offsite sexual or graphic content. The preferences include separate settings for both sexual and graphic content.
When content is filtered for mature content it will be blurred (or not blurred) depending on your Safe browsing mode preferences. Filtered content will show up as follows in the modqueue:
As we roll out availability of the feature, it will initially be “off” for all communities, and for the first few weeks or so you can turn it on at your discretion. After two weeks, we will opt-in all SFW communities to use this feature. If you don’t want to be opted in, you can opt-out by clicking on the banner on the Mature content filter settings page.
Note: this feature filters content using automations that are already being used to mark content as NSFW, so you may already be familiar with what might be filtered.
For this particular tool, its main purpose is to label content as sexual or violent within the realms of what the Reddit Content Policy allows. In the context of this tool we define:
While our intent is to help mods keep disruptive content out of their communities, we know that sometimes our tools will make mistakes or fail to catch something that is sexual or graphic. If we do get something wrong please let us know using the modqueue feedback forms that asks “Is this accurate?” so that we can continue to improve the tool’s capabilities.
We hope that this will be a helpful step in protecting some of your communities from unwelcome content. Next, we will be looking for ways to expand our filter's capabilities while improving the accuracy and detection capabilities of the model.
And that’s a wrap! If you have any questions or comments – we’ll hang out for a bit.
Tl;dr: We’ve launched an update to protect communities from unwanted changes made by inactive moderators.
Hi Mods,
I’m u/agoldenzebra from the Community team, and I work on Community Governance initiatives in collaboration with our Product teams. This is the first time in awhile that we’ve shared a Community Governance initiative here, so I want to set the stage a little about the work we do:
A cornerstone of good community governance is ensuring that those actively leading and moderating a community have the power to make informed decisions for that community, with feedback from and in the best interests of the community. With that in mind, the Community Governance team’s work focuses on empowering active moderators, creating clearer systems for effective subreddit governance, and ensuring that you have the data and information you need to be effective stewards of your community.
Our update today will restrict actions inactive moderators are able to take. Inactive moderators currently pose several risks to communities and to Reddit, including:
Starting today, inactive moderators won’t be able to perform certain actions, including adding or removing moderators, or changing the community’s settings (type, description, NSFW status, discovery settings). In more detail:
To align with these protections, the Top Mod Removal process has also been updated.
We understand that while this is one step towards reducing interference from inactive top moderators, this is not the final step. We would like to iterate on the above work with the following ideas, although feasibility, prioritization, and timeline are still in question. We’d love to hear your feedback and ideas:
That’s all for today! Stay tuned for an update soon on u/ModSupportBot enhancements to the Mod Suggestion tool and Mod Activity Report, as well as a brand new report that will provide you with more data and information about your community so you can make more informed decisions.
Hello mods,
In light of the announcement today about the new Contributor Program, we are clarifying an existing part of Reddit’s User Agreement which states: “You may not perform moderation actions in return for any form of compensation, consideration, gift, or favor from third parties,” as well as adding this existing policy to Reddit’s Moderator Code of Conduct as Rule 5: Moderate with Integrity.
Adding this rule to the Moderator Code of Conduct and elaborating upon it is designed to clarify the existing rule and our expectations. Also, this section of the User Agreement specifically applies to mods, so it makes sense to add it into the Mod Code of Conduct. No changes are being made to how we enforce the rule.
We’ll stick around to answer questions for a while!
Rule 5: Moderate with Integrity
Users expect that content in communities is authentic and trust that moderators make choices about content based on community and sitewide rules.
In order to maintain that trust, moderators are prohibited from taking moderation actions (including actions taken using mod tools, bots, and other services) in exchange for any form of compensation, consideration, gift, or favor from or on behalf of third parties**.**
Some examples of moderator actions include, but are not limited to:
Some examples of compensation include, but are not limited to:
FAQ:
What are some examples of actions that violate this rule?
What are some examples of actions that do not violate this rule?
How do I report violations of the Code of Conduct?
You can report a violation here.
Hi Mods!
We’re excited to announce that a new automod property, Contributor Quality Score (CQS), is now available for all communities
CQS is an internal classification that was established to identify potential spammers or users less likely to contribute positively on Reddit. Every account is assigned a CQS based on a host of signals including past actions taken on a user’s account, network and location signals, and steps a user has taken to secure their account (e.g. email verification). We’ve heard from you that dealing with spam is taking up more of your time, so the goal of this update is to help catch spammy and abusive users at a faster rate so that you can spend more time engaging with your communities and redditing. These scores are then used to place users into 1 of 5 tiers:
Scores are updated regularly, and users have the ability to move up or down tiers based on their activity and/or behavior. CQS scores can then be used by moderators via the contributor_quality field in automod.
We’ve worked closely with a few communities over the past several months to test the impact of CQS by setting it up as part of their automod rule set. We’re very encouraged by some of the initial results from the pilot:
So far the rule has been great at weeding out low value users that are trolling, breaking rules, alting or predatory.
These rules have been very helpful in finding these users and actioning them. Because of these rules we have noticed a general uptick in the quality of the comment sections across the subreddit.
We do plan to keep the rules in place…even after the experiment has concluded.
Thank you!
- r/teenagers
We just wanted to send an update about our first week experience with the CQS filter (discovered through partner community post). It’s worked very well in our community - r/xboxseriesx - since implementation with very few false positives in regard to our rule set. The content flagged has been spam, or new users posting without a great understanding of community standards.
We plan to leave it enabled. Thanks for the effort here!
- r/xboxseriesx
If you would like to try this tool, you should have access to the contributor_quality field in automod. We’d recommend starting with a filter action and then moving to remove if you feel comfortable. Remember that after trying it out on "filter" for several days, you can request the Automoderator Audit from u/Modsupportbot to see what your confirmation/reversal rate is before shifting to the "remove" action. Here are some example rules to show you how this feature works:
#Basic rule filtering users with <5 subreddit karma and CQS scores of "lowest"
type: comment
author:
combined_subreddit_karma: "< 5"
contributor_quality: "< low"
action: filter
action_reason: "CQS Filter"
---
#Exclude CQS users at or above "moderate" from existing karma or account age minimums. In this rule, comments will filter if the user has a combined karma of less than 20, and a contributor_quality score below "moderate".
type: comment
author:
combined_karma: "< 20"
contributor_quality: "< moderate"
action: filter
action_reason: "karma minimum"
---
#Filter all posts posted by a user with "lowest" CQS, regardless of karma.
type: submission
author:
contributor_quality: "= lowest"
action: filter
action_reason: "lowest CQS user"
While you try it out, please feel free to send feedback or ask questions about your specific situation to r/RedditCQS modmail and we can assist you there (note: we are not using the subreddit at this time, just the modmail). We’d appreciate you sending it as a subreddit <> subreddit modmail so that we can work with your entire team. You are welcome to share feedback below in the comments as well.
Thanks!
edits: three updates/fixes to automod code
Howdy, mods
In August, we shared our plans to revolutionize the desktop moderator experience on Reddit. Today, we want to continue that conversation, share some additional designs we’re working on, and address some feedback we received.
Mod Queue 2024
One of the key points we’re trying to improve on is striking the right balance between a mod queue that is too busy vs too simplistic. After our last post, we heard from several mods who liked the density of our designs and other mods who felt they were too busy, cluttered, and included too much information, thereby increasing the cognitive load. Based on that feedback, we are exploring customizations that make the queue work for all moderators.
In the video below, we walk through the basics of using the new mod queue as well as some of the customization options we’ve explored so far.
https://reddit.com/link/16hw505/video/olhu3xxzo2ob1/player
We’d love to hear any feedback on this experience. In particular, we’d love to know:
What about mod customizations and extensions?
Since the dawn of Reddit, users have been able to build and integrate tools to support their individual desktop experiences on the platform. We don’t want that to change and mods will be able to utilize Reddit’s Developer Platform to build, share, and integrate new mod features into this updated experience. Furthermore, we’ve engaged the folks at r/Enhancement and r/Toolbox to start a conversation and discuss how we can best work together and continue supporting them on this new platform.
Timelines
As a reminder, this new mod experience will replace new.reddit entirely in early 2024. We have much more information to share with you before then, and you can expect to see more updates of this sort over the coming weeks and months. We welcome any and all feedback, and we’ll be sticking around to respond to your questions and comments.
Hey Mods,
TLDR; Are you a Mod or Mod-curious? You’re invited to the Return of Mod Roadshow.
I’m u/snooseyalose, coming to you as the new Live Events Lead here at Reddit. First up is the Return of the Mod Roadshow with stops in 6 countries through the end of this year. We soft relaunched last Friday evening in Seattle, and are ready to hit the road now, and you’re invited! The rest of the dates are coming up quickly – see below and let us know you’re interested here.
2023 Dates & Cities:
Friday, August 25: Delhi, India
Sunday, August 27: Mumbai, India
Thursday, September 21: Chicago, IL, US
Saturday, October 7: São Paulo, Brazil
Saturday, October 14: Hamburg, Germany
Saturday, October 14: Washington, DC, US
Friday, October 20: Birmingham, UK
Thursday, October 26: San Francisco, CA, US
Friday, November 17: Paris, FR
Friday, December 1: Bordeaux, FR
Wednesday, December 6: Denver, CO, US
Who’s Invited?
Any – and all – mods! If you moderate a community on Reddit, whether you’re new to the scene or have years of experience, we want to meet you!
Are you in?
Don’t fret if you can’t make these dates/locations or in-person events aren’t your thing. The Mod-community events will be happening year round with more roadshow stops (let us know where we should go here) and virtual opportunities to meet and learn from fellow mods. Hint: Global Mod Summit ‘23, a fully virtual event featuring sessions for new and experienced mods (and everyone in between), will be returning on Saturday December 2, 2023 – so save the date and to tell us what you want to see/hear/do together here!
I’ll be sticking around to answer questions. We’re excited to meet a lot of you IRL very soon!
Hi Mods,
Heads up - this is going to be a long post. Strap in.
We’re in the early stages of revolutionizing the desktop moderator experience on Reddit. Engineering has already begun and ultimately our goal is to build a better-performing, faster, more stable, and more efficient Reddit that better suits the desktop needs of moderators.
Why are we doing this?
Over the years we’ve heard some common themes when it comes to efficiency on Reddit. Experienced mods have voiced wanting to spend less time in the mod queue, and expressed their frustration that the new Reddit mod queue is less scannable and not as efficient when compared to old Reddit. Newer mods have told us that it’s sometimes hard to know what action to take and that moderating in general can be overwhelming.
To help alleviate these frustrations we want to improve the future moderator experience on Reddit by focusing on:
Sneak peek: a reimagined Mod Queue
Late last year we began to host a series of calls with mods to discuss how a new and improved Mod Queue should function. The 3 biggest pieces of critical feedback we heard from mods, as it relates to the layout of the Mod Queue, were:
In our early designs, we ditched the white space and reduced the vertical space each queue item occupies, and added a variety of information panels. We’re looking into how we can utilize these additional panels to surface information like contextual user history, the recent posts and comments of the user, the reason why a post is in the queue, whether or not the item is a repost, mod notes, how mods have actioned similar posts in the past and much more. We also want to make sure this information is readily accessible with no more than 1 or 2 clicks, and also remove the need to hover over elements to see needed information. Below are a few examples of what the desktop moderator experience could look like:
We believe these concepts will improve the mod queue experience by:
Spoiler alert
There’s a good chance you’re already using this new desktop experience. Both Mod Insights and Post Guidance have been launched to help us test its performance and reliability (note: Post Guidance is still currently in beta. If you’re interested in joining our pilot program, feel free to reach out to me directly to get your community signed up).
What about old.Reddit?
No changes to the mod experience are happening on old.reddit. These changes are intended to replace the new.reddit mod experience.
Timelines
We’re aiming to launch this new Mod Queue experience in early 2024. All of you are an essential part of this process, and until then we’ll continue to host calls and discussions with mods to ensure your feedback is being incorporated into these new features. We’ve got a lot more to share, and are excited to provide regular updates on the work we’re doing to improve the entire desktop moderator experience.
Questions?
This is the beginning of an ongoing discussion, so don’t hold back. Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.