Good Day to you, Mods.

I am asking this on my own and not at the request of the community member who got permabanned.

Please see this post: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/s/buthLDnjI4

From the comments, we can see that some of us felt that post to be informative. Would it be possible to help us understand what led to the individual being permabanned?

Please do consider that the individual had been an active participant in the Community and is disallowed by the Reddit Terms of Service from reengaging using a different identity.

I thank you for your time and effort in ensuring a civil discussion while not being compensated financially.

The last two BLC rumour speculation posts referencing "prof" simon Holland's unsubstantiated claims about an alien signal are still up but someone's post with a rebuttal to the rumour was taken down for being "off topic". This doesn't make any sense. If this is "off topic" then the other two posts should also be taken down. Or does this rule just apply when it is a skeptical post? I do, frankly, find the BLC thing to be off topic but it is the differential treatment of these posts that is the issue.

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1gh6nov/the_blc1_signal_it_not_a_technosignatureor_aliens/

The bias towards skeptical posts and replies is seriously becoming an obvious issue of late. I hope the mods can look internally because it seems to me that at least one mod of late is jumping on anything that can be viewed as skeptical and silencing it.

*** after posting this another mod came in and deleted a couple more jokes that were movie references in a half serious reference to the comments above it. Nobody was offended and they had received upwards of 30 upvotes. No discussion or anything. So unkind and unnecessary.

I've had a few issues in the past where I've attempted to use modmail and haven't received any responses. I've escalated those issues to posts on here and was directed to use modmail as it's the most appropriate avenue for those issues but even those went unanswered.

I was recently banned for 7 days because I made a joke about a person who made a comment in all caps with random bold words and I replied that there's a street corner somewhere that's missing them, you know like those super intense preachers with signs in all caps who are yelling about Doomsday.

Taking a page from my old law classes, I don't think this is within the letter of the rule or the spirit of the rule. Even the person that I replied to didn't seem to take offense. On top of that the comment was up for 6 days without issue, it's really weird that almost a week later it's a problem even if the person I was talking to didn't think it was a problem.

Can someone please fix this and also figure out why all of my modmails seem to be ignored?

It gets frustrating when you're trying to follow the rules and trying to follow the direction of the moderation team but the communication mechanisms don't seem to work and the rules are enforced arbitrarily or possibly maliciously.

I can see how to report a post by clicking the three dots in the corner, but when it asks to provide a reason, the reasons are the usual Reddit-wide rules. Is there a way to report a post that violates a r/UFOs' specific rule?

I was looking at this thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1gd3zio/i_see_a_lot_of_posts_where_people_are_interested/

The thread was locked, with the reason given:

sigh, more partisan politics. locked.

Looking through the thread, I don't understand why it was locked.

Very few comments have been removed. The vast majority of them are, to my eye, reasonable, on-topic, and not partisan. I find the concept of "non-partisan politics" to be quaint and amusing, but I digress.

The rule that governs political discussion states:

Off-topic, political comments may be removed at moderator discretion. There are political aspects which are relevant to ufology, but we aim to keep the subreddit free of partisan politics and debate.

Applies to: Comments only

Report reason: Off-topic political discussion may be removed at moderator discretion

What rules was this thread breaking? The lock comment from a moderator contains no mention of what rules it was breaking.

What was so egregious that warranted not the removal of offending comments, but the ENTIRE thread to be locked? It's not like that thread was an excessive burden on moderator time.

What was so partisan about it? Is there even a definition? It's not mentioned in the rules.

The rule says nothing about locking threads. It says the rule applies to "comments only" and that "political comments may be removed at moderator discretion", yet the entire thread is locked?

One could argue some comments broke rule 13 ("Low effort, toxic posts and comments regarding public figures may be removed.") Great--remove them and keep the thread open.

Out of the rules that apply to "posts only," it doesn't appear to break rule 2 ("Discussion must be on-topic").

Out of the rules that apply to "posts & comments," it doesn't appear to break rule 3 ("Be substantive").

I'm not suggesting it's the best quality thread. It's a bit low effort and should have cited a source (they did in the comments, even if they didn't provide a link),

I don't care about actions applied to one thread, though I do care about things like:

• Unclear rules
• Enforcement that seems to exceed the rules
• Unnecessary shutting down of relevant, topical discussion

This subreddit is going to face and increasing amount of political content and discussion. Your rule for handling it fairly and constructively seems inadequate.

And it's yet another example of why not having a criteria for each rule is bad--an issue I've raised in the past. It's bad for moderators and bad for users.

Or I'm wrong. If so, explain why I am.

I sent this to the mod mail and they suggested I post the idea here. It's a very simple rule that I think would increase quality and deter potential misinformation/misattribution.

Now that the UAP act (2022/23?) is starting to produce many records in NARA, we've begun to see an influx of posts regarding images, documents, etc source from NARA. Given that the records will continue to be released on a rolling basis over the next year until the deadline in 2025, these posts are likely to persist as people find more, people notice details, make connections, etc.

The suggestion is very simple: if you have a post that involves material from NARA, you should link back to where you found it on the official site (in the comments if need be). This allows users to continue researching themselves, see any additional information/metadata associated with the record, and prevents bad actors from potentially providing false or altered records and claiming they are from an official source.

A thread was posted in r/UFOs about the bots swarming the subreddit earlier this week. I wasnt surprised it was taken down as it belonged in r/ufosmeta.

That said he was on the mark. The subreddit had been slow with few new threads. Then threads were being posted about a leaker breaking news of a govt program named Immaculate Constellation that was scrubbing UFOs and ARVs (Alien Reproduction Vehicles) from govt information systems.

Queue the bot armies as dozens of new threads were posted about UFO sightings and other low effort posts that served to slide threads about the ARV and Immaculate Constellation down the page to reduce their visibility.

Sure enough, now with no new threads being posted about the ARV or Immaculate Constellation the r/UFOs subreddit has quited down to the same state it was at before the leaker and his claims.

It is clear to me bots, forum sliding, and other tactics are being used to bury the UFO information that is accurate and important like the ARV.

Operation Mockingbird and COINTELPRO never ended, they just changed names and forms. With social media being a major source of news for humanity now, the govt has shifted to controlling that domain as it has the traditional news media.

That includes the r/UFOs subreddit when members starting discussing leaks of highly classified programs.

P.S. We need an AMA discussing the ARV and its components and how they function. I proposed to do one to the MODs but they stated AMAs are conducted by volunteers that requires a lot of work and that i am not known in the ufology community and as such turned me down.

10 uap reports were posted since yesterday evening eastern time. Of these 10, 8 of the reports were removed by automod.

Is this rate within the expected parameters? Like, when the mods set this up, was an 80% removal rate the expected rate?

Do I not have enough karma or something for posting? My posts never appear. I'm not likely to ever get enough karma considering I usually offer prosaic explanations and get downvoted to hell.

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1gbe9l3/could_be_a_nothing_burger_but_i_thought_this_was/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1gb6f8y/comment/ltjy7vw/

Text for those interested

"Whyd he release a book then? Words are even easier to fake than images. What's the point?

This is getting embarassing. You should ask yourself why you're so eager to make every excuse for elizondo, every assumption in his favor, and never even a inch in the other direction. And youre conveniently ignoring Elizondo's own shifting excuses and words. He already said why he didn't record these supposed orbs and none of his stated excuses match up with the lines of argument you're trying to make in his defense."

It's also suspicious that I was banned within minutes of posting that comment. I thought mod ques were so long that there'd be more a delay? Or at least that's what I've seen stated by mods around here.

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1g8tcf0/comment/lt24kbq/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

This post has been up for hours: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1g8o3jg/finally_et_signal_from_proxima_centauri_confirmed/

My post here refuting it was removed not long after I made it as being "off topic"
https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1g8pgos/comment/lt0fw2q/?context=3

If my post was off topic then so was the other and I flagged the other post as off topic and it is still up.

WHY?

Majority of new posts are either NPI advertisements or advertisements for Lue's book and then of course the daily two posts of old content which contributes nothing news from a particular user... What has happened to this sub?

Hello staff,

The UFOs subreddit is too addictive and I can not seem to stay away from this place. But the amount of low effort posts and other material seems to keep increasing and the sub seems to be drowning in it. I can imagine you guys are already busy enough.

And can not complain too much, I hardly ever report posts on Reddit. So instead let me try to work that a bit more. Since all I have to go on are the extended rules, I was hoping to get a few extra pointers from mods. I want to avoid making reports that will be ignored for whatever reason. Perhaps it can help others as well. Here a few questions by recent examples.

Artificial Inteligized Jellyfishes:

https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fxyqku6y7o2ud1.jpeg

This one is actually a no-brainer, if it was recent enough. The rules are pretty clear on this. It's easy to follow the source and know it's unconfirmed and 99% surely AI. The question is, does it have any use to report a post after such a long time, and if not, how "young" should posts be for a report to be useful? Sidenote: how the hell did this one get through anyway?

Lost /r/movies Redditor:

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1g3dgtl/movie_titled_battle_los_angeles_and_its/

Here I'm not sure this applies;

Posts of social media content without relevant context. e.g. "Saw this on TikTok..."

But the rules say above is a general example. So my guess is "Hey I saw these in a movie.." counts just as well. Or am I bending the rules a bit too much and does this only apply on social media?

Welcom To The Club!:

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1g40zi2/whats_going_onkinda_freaked_out/

According to the detailed rules, low effort includes:

“Here’s my theory” posts unsupported by evidence.

This post does not even have a theory, or even a directed question. The other side is that it is in no way nefarious. And possibly truly someone that is freaking out. What is more important here, the almost complete lack of valuable content or trusting OP and being a supportive community? To report or not to report?

Perspective Panic":

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1g3nx03/wtf_sighting/

Seems to fit:

Posts with incredible claims unsupported by evidence.

Granted, this person made a good submission statement and at least gives the impression to make an honest report and simply does not seem to know how perspective works with a bright light. The title is terrible though and so in general this posts gives low effort vibes for me. Would this be enough to report? Or should any reasonably serious UFO report be left alone?

There seems to be many more and I picked a few different ones out at random. Also let me know if I'm not helpful here. Thanks!

New Paradigm have violated Rule 5 over and over again. They advertise their organisation or Daniel Sheehan visually through a logo, direct mention, or just a straight-up ad in nearly all of their posts. They directly link to their website in submission statements which directs users to profitable (in the thousands of dollars) but useless certificates in UFOlogy that contain documented lies and disinformation which offer zero benefit to “customers” (that term is extremely generous). They often obfuscate their website links in submission statements with a URL shortener (short.io), using https://ufos.pro/cfd-uap-red instead (awful web etiquette, dangerous, and predatory).

/u/NewParadigmInstitute generates substantial revenue through donations, course enrollments, and media monetization—facts clearly laid out on their own website, on their backend software partner Bonterra Tech’s website; “Attract donors, increase engagement, and activate your base with powerful fundraising software that lets you create a seamless supporter experience. Boost Fundraising and Engagement,” and in their parent organization The Romero Institute’s (of which Daniel Sheehan is director) Form 990 which states the Institute makes multiple millions of dollars and Sheehan personally benefits to the tune of $137K. The Romero Institute’s section on New Paradigm in their 2023 Annual Report states:

• “Our [NPI’s] website was viewed over 78,000 times by over 45,000 individuals looking for the latest information on UFO/UAP disclosure.
• “274,555 social media impressions. We launched social media accounts across all major platforms and garnered over 274,555 impressions of our messages around UFO/UAP disclosure.”
• “Danny appeared on over eight different podcasts in six weeks with a combined viewership of over 236,000 people.”

As part of the Romero Institute, which reports millions in revenue (tax-exempt profits), NPI benefits heavily from these three income streams. According to the Romero Institute's 2023 report, a significant portion of this revenue stems from media monetization, with Sheehan’s efforts—often facilitated through platforms like this subreddit—being a driving force. However, the bulk of their funding still comes from donations, making it clear that NPI is leveraging belief-driven contributions to fuel its operations.

If Coca-Cola starts posting on the subreddit under a branded username, adds a link to buy Coca-Cola in every submission statement, and features their name and/or a rep’s name in every post, and implicitly features their brand…that’s advertising. I understand NPI’s promotion isn’t direct in the way a traditional advertisement is. Their ads, however, still drive the audience toward a paid product. Their technique is an attempt to create the appearance of grassroots support while steering viewers toward their paid offerings, this is native advertising. 

NPI uses "disclosure advocacy" posts to build trust and generate interest, this is their soft sell. Also, NPI’s username is on every one of their posts, linking to their social media and website, this is part of their customer journey/marketing funnel along with their nebulous disclosure statements, obfuscated URLs, and other material. This is where it gets interesting with NPI because to me, their funnel is pretty obvious but also their strength with their advertising. The funnel is basically the process a potential customer goes through to become an actual one. It starts with them becoming aware of a product and gradually moves toward making a purchase. The funnel breaks down into different steps: first, they learn about something (awareness), then they get interested, develop a desire for it, and finally, they take action—whether that’s buying the product or signing up. This is often called the AIDA Model: Awareness, Interest, Desire, and Action.

Every post, even if not directly linking to paid content, builds a path that funnels users toward their monetized services.

This is commercial activity.

This conversation isn't about me no matter how loud I make my own voice. I'm opening this up to the wider audience. I am accusing New Paradigm Institute of crossing lines as of late in its social media marketing campaigns targeting our community. They've always been shady. I only want to go into the portions that are relevant to the meta discussion. I'm not looking to litigate the UFO subject itself.

We need to draw a line, people are being taken advantage of for large sums of money and we're accomplices if we let this happen because of rules #5 and #15. Are we making an exception for NPI?

This is copy and pasted to my conversation with the mods, which I am making public. To be clear my personal moderation is separate from the larger meta issue. Correspondence replied to the chain about my personal moderation will not be shared to respect the privacy of the moderation staff whom I respect and has a lot to contend with on this specific issue. (thanks)

Question to the community at large: Does calling Dolan a scammer qualify as toxic? Does replying to NPI posts exclaiming they're scamming people out of money qualify as rule #1 violations?

My opinion: Disagree with me or not, based on the facts the comments I made should be fair game. Please advise (meta here, personal moderation between me and mods whose decision I will respect)

https://preview.redd.it/vo2bu85f4qtd1.png?width=848&format=png&auto=webp&s=6b5cc10d9f64312ccbdfd4dd4c5be6261eb3b85c

Moderated comments:

• https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fz5nm9/comment/lr2qbuo/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
• https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fzjzda/comment/lr2rzrb/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Non-moderated comment (so far) of similar vein (is this an ok post and the above too much? That's possible too)

• https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fz24lv/comment/lr2e0y9/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Edit: Realize you can't see the moderated comments, posted below.

1. Referenced comments
   1. Will this be on the test for his scam university degree courses with Danny Sheehan's Ubiquity University?
   2. https://imgur.com/stf2pdy

One of the rules of the sub is Rule #5: No Commercial Activity

Yet we constantly see this rule broken by /u/NewParadigmInstitute and a few other smaller accounts.

Why is this permitted?

I propose, since I can tell it’s unlikely these accounts will be banned, that they at least be required to mark themselves as brand affiliated and that they get a special flair identifying them as commercial activity.

My reasoning for this is they use this sub as an advertising platform. Any information they share directly links back to their website where they advertise their products, which include dubious “academic” programs and what not.

Now, I’m not saying they bring nothing to the table. Some of the if promotion they share is interesting. But seeing as they are a commercial entity using this sub for commercial activity, I find it is only appropriate they they at least get marked as such.

Call me paranoid (I mean, I guess I'm in the right crowd?) but sometimes I post things, usually surrounding a shadier part of our subject and it starts to get a few likes, then BAM -10 or -15. Then it begins to crawl up again. The supporting replies, positive upvotes.

Any chance there may be, say, I dunno, an upset author, or organization at times trying to control discussions?

I get DM'd by some of these YouTubers "hey so I saw you said this" on something completely unrelated to UFOs. They watch. I think some do more than watch. Perhaps the kind of people who post fake UFOs from their porch are also the kind of people who operate in such bots. Thread for reference: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fx0gru/comment/lqiw37b/

Thoughts?

https://preview.redd.it/hqnys8q7p1td1.png?width=782&format=png&auto=webp&s=22722ce453d20ff15200aa4f00e8f11ccea25b8a

https://preview.redd.it/fmrhqrmbp1td1.png?width=781&format=png&auto=webp&s=ff7613a365725e305c4be8e68028fcadc913eaf4

I would like to recommend two changes to the posting_guidelines. Here is the current format:

Time: <date and time>

Location: <location of sighting>

My suggestions:

• Date: <date>, do not use "last night" or "last friday" because people will be seeing this post in the future

• Time: <time>

• Location: <the location of the report in the post>

• Direction: <what direction were you facing?>

That last bit is a big problem with most posts now. I find I have to ask the OP for this bit of information in probably 95% of the video posts.

And I suggest splitting date and time so it's clear we need both.

Thanks!

and it doesn't matter if it embarrasses the UFO community.

enough with the attempts to filter out parapsychological phenomenon. all aspects of psi, from remote viewing to psychokinesis to telepathy are ON TOPIC. they are all facets of the same consciousness anomaly. UAP are a part of that, not segregated from that.

there is only one reason to shy away from that: ideology. and ideology should have no place in the decision to designate something as off-topic. the decision about what is relevant should be in the hands of UFO experts, researchers, insiders, whistleblowers, and experiencers.

and they are all in agreement about the vital importance of psi for this topic. mainstream science can go fuck itself if it laughs at that. the truth is more important than mere appearances for the sake of the small-minded mainstream. if they can't handle it, they can fuck off.

at least that would be a respectable stance. more respectable than cowering before social mechanisms for the sake of acceptance from the mainstream. we can't sacrifice truth for acceptance.

You all really can’t stand behind your own policy and answer actual questions?

It seems like the last thing that happened was copy/pasting "Does legitimate good faith scientific skepticism ever require incivility?" over and over which...is no one's point.

I sure hope this new week long ban rule gets applied evenly across all perspectives. I left this sub before because any critical thoughts get responded with toxicity. I sure hope this isn't going to be a rule abused to silence skeptics. That is all.

Sorry for the tone, but I'm tired of all those footages showing things that could clearly be just balloons or flares being upvoted to the top. Every. Sjngle. Day.

I know many of those posts are made by layman and there's nothing wrong with going to an UFO sub to ask about something you've seen in the sky you can't explain, and there's nothing wrong in trying to explain it. However, why do people upvote those posts so much? Those posts take a good chunk of the "real estate" of the sub for... Nothing.

I want to see the truly anomalous, spooky, unexplainable, out of this world, mindblowing UFOs. And those few videos get buried by the freaking balloon/flare/drone/airplane videos.

I don't know what can be done about it, since I don't think just banning/locking those posts is a good strategy. Rather, it would take everyone to change their mentality about what is upvote-worthy (I'm assuming all those upvotes are organic, right??).

Anyway, is there a sub for the truly anomalous stuff?

The last two years this subreddit consisted 99% of talk about and statements froms "ufo personalities". Every single of these people has a lot to say and especially to announce....except something tangible.

Right now Im close to believing there are no extrateresstial UFOs, and the Navy-videos (which brought me to this subreddit) are just advanced drones by a three-letter-agency.

I really would like to jump a year ahead, and see which one of the "ufo celebrities" actually produces something, without giving him the chance to advertise another podcast, book or movie.

EDIT: Jesus Christ I checked the main subreddit and OF COURSE the first thing I see is "whistleblower' claims huge UFO announcement will happen 'within days" -_-

Here's a pseudoscience disinformation post that was clearly generated by an LLM:

https://new.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fn42uz/fact_check_james_webb_telescopes_real/

Comments on the post pointed that out.

r/UFOs rule 3 is:

No low effort discussion

No low effort discussion. Low Effort implies content which is low effort to consume, not low effort to produce. This generally includes:

    Posts containing jokes, memes, and showerthoughts.

    AI generated content.

    Posts of social media content without relevant context. e.g. "Saw this on TikTok..."

    Posts with incredible claims unsupported by evidence.

    “Here’s my theory” posts unsupported by evidence.

    Short comments, and emoji comments.

    Summarily dismissive comments (e.g. “Swamp gas.”).

Is the distinguishing factor that if it's pseudoscience or disinformation that supports a dogma or marketing agenda, then "AI generated content" is okay, but if it's actually factual information then it's removed?

That post plays make-believe that shadows don't exist.

Animals have been detecting predatory birds by their shadows for so long that it's ingrained into the brain wiring of some animal species from birth.

Yet that "AI generated content" would have everybody believe that things can only be detected by direct observation, and there's maybe a couple dozen accounts in the sub to stick up for that bullshit pseudoscience disinformation.

It's also "“Here’s my theory” posts unsupported by evidence." Because the evidence is that objects can be detected by shadow; the poster's pseudoscience theory is unsupported by evidence.

Is r/UFOs a disinformation sub like most of the rest of the subs in this information space, and quite a lot of subs on Reddit? Is the purpose to give a safe-space to the enforcement of dogmatic belief systems that are contrary to reality?

I noticed a lot of my posts lately get removed as "duplicate posts" with no actual explanation how they are duplicates. And when I appealed last time nobody responded.

Here's some recent examples:

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1flpnx0/republicans_have_killed_ufo_transparency_for_the/ (There's like 8 posts about what happened today on the main page).

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fjqy0h/ufc_legend_georges_stpierre_tweets_about_ufos_if/ (This is about a twitter post not the instagram post which was posted before)

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fjitva/senate_armed_services_committee_to_hold_ufo/ (Can't find a duplicate of this one)

https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fdfmah/general_h_r_mcmaster_to_bill_maher_about_uaps/ (I appealed this one never got an actual explanation. This video was never posted only a text post referring to this interview as a whole)

So some context on these removals would be nice. Preferably from the mods removing them. And for transparency it would also be helpful if a link was included next time a post is removed as a duplicate referring to the original post.

It's bullshit that people are allowed to get away with this kind of thing.

https://i.imgur.com/Kj4mJ6U.png

https://old.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1ffew0o/every_skeptic_needs_to_listen_to_sarah_gamms_new/lmubh1k/?context=3

Here: https://old.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1fa0bia/the_inventions_secrecy_act_ufos_and_70_years_of/

Every time I try to post something it gets automatically deleted. I've checked my user account rating and it's the second highest level so I shouldn't be held back by any built-in Reddit thresholds.

I've had a mod reply back to my last post on here telling me that this is not the communication mechanism for this and to send a mod mail. I've sent two, One yesterday and one about 12 hours ago and no one is responding.

Can someone please do a couple things to help me out:

1.) reply back to one of my mod mails to explain what's going on 2.) figure out why my posts keep getting blocked 3.) please release my post.

It's frustrating because I submitted the post almost 12 hours ago and it's no longer going to show up on the new feed so I'm not sure anyone's even going to see it.

I'm trying to follow the rules, I'm submitting good content. What's going on?