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Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

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Re: Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

#121

Post by mjevans »

pmiller2 wrote: post #105
kd5bjo wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect that often the reason for not getting a job is simply that there were more qualified candidates than positions. In that case, there may be no reasons to give; someone else was selected but your application wasn’t deficient in any way.

That would be totally valid feedback if it were possible for the candidate to interpret it at face value. Given that effectively no companies provide substantive feedback, even if "there was a more qualified candidate" is the reason, any reasonable candidate is going to interpret that as "sorry, we can't tell you the reason."

My theory is that companies tend to not have an actual process, or that if they do it still ends up in the bin of human biases that their process can't quantify.

There are probably obvious things like "crash and burned on a whiteboard problem path-finding" or "requested more than was allocated for the position" (would be nice if possible compensation ranges were required in the posting); but past the obvious disqualifications (which candidates should get feedback on) there's that 'fits with the (a) team' phase. Having an 'exit value', even if generic / approved by legal, would be helpful for everyone including internal company metrics that might drive a better posting if the job isn't fulfilled.

Re: Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

#122

Post by mjevans »

jandrese wrote: post #31
Ididntdothis wrote: post #7

There seems to be a general trend to avoid explanations in a lot of areas. For example, you often get no feedback after job interviews. Google just canceled my Drive subscription after 10 years without telling why but they offered me to sign up again. No idea why and support wouldn’t tell. How are people supposed to learn and improve without knowing told what they did wrong?

There are definitely forums that don't inform you of why your post was removed because they think that trolls will use this to basically probe the defenses to see exactly how much they can get away with. Making the moderation more obscure is thought to make them more reluctant to try things. I personally don't think this works, but it is the theory. However, it is important to consider how bad actors will abuse your…

This really depends on if it's a learning moment for closing the Overton Window (#1) a little or if it's something clearly egregious.

A community is better served by making gentle and public re directions that all can learn from where possible.

#1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window

Re: Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

#124

Post by mjevans »

coreyp_1 wrote: post #71
bchimp wrote: post #52

The paper (and I only read the abstract) is interesting, but as others have noted, fairly obvious. One thing that seems to be an assumption is that the "company" needs to provide the explanation. I think it is even better if the user provides the explanation. The assumption a user can't provide it is probably because we've all seen Terms of Service agreements that are totally opaque. Back in the day when I was doing…

I'm going through a related situation right now, but I'm the one who is the recipient of the negative action. I posted a video of me playing the piano on YouTube. I got a copyright notification, that I was playing the melody to a song that someone else held the copyright for. What's the problem? Well, the melody was published in 1886 (133 years ago) under the exact name identified in the copyright claim. The composer…

I argue this is different for a //simple// "human readable" ToS.

In the lack of any clear infringement you can go through the terms of service and disprove every single one, and then come to a list of those that you're less clear about on a second pass and ask if you are mistaken about one of those portions and/or some other area that your conceptions are blind to.

At that level of genuine effort at the very least you've proven an attempt to understand (and maybe that the ToS got a little over-simplified in one or more areas, or that moderation was wrong).

Re: Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

#125

Post by coreyp_1 »

anticensor wrote: post #99
coreyp_1 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going through a related situation right now, but I'm the one who is the recipient of the negative action. I posted a video of me playing the piano on YouTube. I got a copyright notification, that I was playing the melody to a song that someone else held the copyright for. What's the problem? Well, the melody was published in 1886 (133 years ago) under the exact name identified in the copyright claim. The composer…

Similarity detection software are unable to distinguish copyright infringement, plagiarism and accidental rediscovery.

I understand that problem, it's just that it is impossible for them to own the copyright that it matched against.

Re: Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

#126

Post by chris11 »

saagarjha wrote: post #10
Ididntdothis wrote: post #7

There seems to be a general trend to avoid explanations in a lot of areas. For example, you often get no feedback after job interviews. Google just canceled my Drive subscription after 10 years without telling why but they offered me to sign up again. No idea why and support wouldn’t tell. How are people supposed to learn and improve without knowing told what they did wrong?

I think the reasons nobody tells you anything anymore is because doing so would open you up to liability. It’s probably a similar thing to why you’re not told the reasons for not getting a job, even though it’s somewhat unfortunate that it means useful context is lost…

Another reason is security. Telling the user explicit reasons for account deactivation could open you up to more sophisticated attacks. Of course this isn't a huge concern in most situations, and it can sometimes be less of a concern for older, active accounts. But this is definitely an issue in banking.

Re: Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

#128

Post by jessaustin »

saagarjha wrote: post #112
jessaustin wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a fine idea, but ISTR that if you do this too often to what they consider validly killed comments then they just tune your vouching value to zero. You have no way to know this, so it's really hellvouching.

Can’t you just look at the comment while logged out?

One vouch doesn't unkill a comment (just as one downvote doesn't kill a comment). If you vouch and the comment is immediately unkilled, then since you were probably the person whose vouch made the final difference you probably do have a positive vouching value. It is rare to see that, however, so you don't really know your own (or anyone's) vouching value. The term "hellvouch" was intended to represent that we don't know what our vouching power, not that we don't know whether a comment has been unkilled or not.

We can see whether someone else's comment has been killed whether we're logged in or out, so maybe I'm not following your question...

Re: Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

#129

Post by duahncjak »

saagarjha wrote: post #10
Ididntdothis wrote: post #7

There seems to be a general trend to avoid explanations in a lot of areas. For example, you often get no feedback after job interviews. Google just canceled my Drive subscription after 10 years without telling why but they offered me to sign up again. No idea why and support wouldn’t tell. How are people supposed to learn and improve without knowing told what they did wrong?

I think the reasons nobody tells you anything anymore is because doing so would open you up to liability. It’s probably a similar thing to why you’re not told the reasons for not getting a job, even though it’s somewhat unfortunate that it means useful context is lost…

I’m going to take this opportunity to call out Airbnb as having the best rejection experience I’ve ever gotten as a candidate. After a day of onsites (I think 9 interviews including the lunch culture interview), the recruiter called me at 6 PM and told me I was being rejected, and which of the interviews I failed (which matched my perception that I didn’t click with that interviewer). It left me with a positive feeling toward the company.

Re: Telling users why their content was removed reduces future issues [pdf]

#130

Post by TeMPOraL »

chris11 wrote: post #126
saagarjha wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the reasons nobody tells you anything anymore is because doing so would open you up to liability. It’s probably a similar thing to why you’re not told the reasons for not getting a job, even though it’s somewhat unfortunate that it means useful context is lost…

Another reason is security. Telling the user explicit reasons for account deactivation could open you up to more sophisticated attacks. Of course this isn't a huge concern in most situations, and it can sometimes be less of a concern for older, active accounts. But this is definitely an issue in banking.

This sounds like a proxy for money. Using a bad heuristic with high false positives rate and not talking about the reasons behind the false positives lets an organization to avoid paying the costs of fixing the heuristic.
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