Are there no moderators here?

[skylark40]

Here is an analogy for those who have a little patience.

Anyone here watch Chelsea Handler's show on Netflix?

We watched a recent show where she did an "expose" on TwitterBots. (I don't use Twitter and I did not know they had Bots)

What was interesting was, to dig into the whole Bot situation, they made a Bot themselves and then bought another thousand Bots to enlist as followers of their Bot. Then they programmed their Bot with random phrases. The Bots would then reply to a post using one of their programmed phrases.

One person spent the weekend arguing with the Bot.

So, if you think of the unacceptable posts and imagine they are the TwitterBot equivalent - it would seem pointless to rationalise or debate with a Bot, and your actions might be completely different.

The 3 choices I can think of are:
You can ignore these Twitter/forum bot like posts
You can hide these Twitter/forum bot like members (using the Foe Feature)
You can try to rationalize or debate with a Bot like member

As they say, "It's pointless to have a battle of wits with an unarmed man."

[Gerald?]

I suspect the approach is also more than just a respect for free speech.

There is a lot of advice given in the forums which could well be considered "medical advice". It is given by persons who are not registered medical professionals with expertise in the area. While this is a good thing as we get a lot of fantastic tips and advice from our fellow sufferers, it can potentially be a bit of a problem for a person who provides the forum to us.

If the forum was being closely moderated and certain advice deleted as being incorrect, the moderator then has voluntarily taken on the responsibility of making sure the information presented is accurate and correct. This would be an enormous amount of work and practically you would never be sure you actually got everything correct. By carrying out this moderation you would open yourself up to being sued for negligent medical advice. Now you could take a very light touch approach and only remove incorrect information when you thought it was very bad, or just remove posts you thought were offensive or useless. However, this is a slippery slope. Once you take any intervention you potentially take on responsibility.

The approach taken by our wonderful hosts of not taking any action to review, supervise etc allows them to say that all they provided was a forum for people to discuss. Much like a telecommunications provider, they have no responsibility for the content. They have taken no action to ensure the information is accurate and have never given any indication the information is accurate or that they endorse any of the information. Even for spam, they really rely on the members to identify it. The only place they may run a little bit of a risk with this approach is in "the announcements" section.

I am all for the Goodmans maintaining a non-intervention policy if it means we get to keep the forum and not put the Goodmans at risk of being sued.

[TASmart]

Holy Crap, xx is an AI experiment.

[Lucyhere]

Well, what do you know... yet ANOTHER thread all about xxxyxxx

Wake up people... he is loving this

[WearyOne]

Well, what do you know... yet ANOTHER thread all about xxxyxxx

Wake up people... he is loving this

Yep, you're right 100% right. No more of these threads for me.

[Madalot]

Well, what do you know... yet ANOTHER thread all about xxxyxxx

Wake up people... he is loving this

Yep, you're right 100% right. No more of these threads for me.

Agreed as well. He's on my foe list (something I NEVER do) and plan to leave him there.

[zonker]

The forum owner is enjoying his social experiment, letting a bunch of cranky sleep-deprived people duke it out.

oh, no! could it be that johnny goodman is in reality rod serling?

"submitted for your approval"......

[chunkyfrog]

We don't NEED no stinking moderators.
Just ignore the troll, unless it is more fun to poke him with a stick.

[AMESS]

Sky: I am with you. Thee are a group of people here who are just plain nasty. I cannot be sure they even have a cpap problem. Frankly, too much time on their hands. It is not right to make snide comments about what others say. Yes the board needs a moniter. If they cannot make a positive comment-then dont make any.

[LibtardsUnite!]

We don't NEED no stinking moderators.
Just ignore the troll, unless it is more fun to poke him with a stick.

the libtard bullies prefer poking
palerider and lsat and their catfish aliases love getting others to forget being decent people and pile on when they start slinging insults

Poking the troll is FUN! Especially now he has a little brother troll, amess.

but does not help anybody but you
and a good shrink would help you more

Why pay for a shrink when I have you? PHD/Engineer/Genius. Cheap at twice the price.

[Goofproof]

We do have a lot of Liberal want to be's Moderators here, but they don't know the secret handshake. Liberals don't shake hands, that would require them to take them out of your pocket. Jim

[Rhrh]

Thank you for tuning me into the "foe" option. I am new to CPAP, 6 weeks, and although I've really appreciated reading this forum (and now even have a registered account!), I am really intimidated by folks whose answer to any and every CPAP issue is "you're looking for an excuse to quit CPAP".