Option of anonymous posts

[joshl129]

I think (and I know that other members would agree with me as well) that anonymity would be an awesome feature. Posts would, by default, not be anonymous, but there would be an option for making one's comment, point, or motion anonymous.

This would help in allowing the voicing of unpopular opinions, which I feel are stifled by the social pressures of council (and I know others have been worried about this as well--e.g., during executive sessions for PNGs).

However, because anonymity can open the door to disrespectful opinions or attacks, perhaps anonymous posts should be moderated (perhaps by House President(s)?). That said, I think the burden this places on moderators is outweighed by the benefits of the ability to safely voice what are or may seem to be unpopular opinions.

For those who think that moderation of anonymous posts might not be necessary, consider controversial anonymous emails from the clones@bsc.coop email address. In one instance, someone used the email address to anonymously communicate to the house that they knew, and tried out, many of the passwords that were entered on the shared kitchen computer. What got many people upset was that the tone of the author was rather threatening, in my and others' opinions (though unintentionally, I think the author claimed).

[mitar]

This is a really great idea. I think we can allow anonymous posts but so that moderators can still see who is the author. So they can look it up in the case of an issue. Do you think this would be enough? It is similar to how we currently handle things where members can bring issues anonymously to presidents.

[joshl129]

Just to clarify, it would be such that moderators would have to do a bit of
a workaround (perhaps ask you for access) in order to see the names of
anonymous posts (as opposed to the names being immediately visible to the
moderators), right? If so, I like that idea and think it would be friendly
to the house that way. If not--if it's instead immediately visible to the
moderators--I think I and other members might have a bit of an issue with
that. The reason why is that the whole purpose of anonymity here is to not
let anybody (including House Presidents) know your identity (so that nobody
judges you), unless the comment is harmful, disrespectful, or otherwise
requires that the poster's identity be known, so that the issue can be
dealt with.

On 30 August 2016 at 17:08, Mitar notifications@github.com wrote:

This is a really great idea. I think we can allow anonymous posts but so
that moderators can still see who is the author. So they can look it up in
the case of an issue. Do you think this would be enough? It is similar to
how we currently handle things where members can bring issues anonymously
to presidents.

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[mitar]

(You can just reply, because GitHub takes care of the rest.)

[mitar]

But if you would wrote a harmful comment, would you really allow moderator to see who wrote it once they request access from you?

[joshl129]

Oh no, sorry, I didn't convey myself clearly. I meant that they would ask
you yourself (Mitar) for access, not the person who wrote the anonymous
post. This would be a sort of two-factor authentication (like how online
services, like iCloud, sometimes send you a text message with a code to
enter in addition to your password, in order to log in--e.g., on a new
computer).

This wouldn't be perfect, because you yourself would still have access to
all the names of people who wrote anonymous posts. Not that I don't trust
you, but perhaps, to ensure people that anonymity is really protected to
the extent possible, this could be dealt with in the following way: You
(and you alone) would have access to this code (perhaps it is generated in
connection with, and only with, each individual anonymous post), and the
House Presidents (the account associated with the "clohp@bsc.coop" email
address), and they alone, would be able to enter this code. In this way,
the only way to work around this is to have both you and the House
Presidents work together to uncover the identity of the anonymous poster;
this still isn't perfect, but it at least introduces an element of
accountability. What do you think?

On 30 August 2016 at 17:23, Mitar notifications@github.com wrote:

But if you would wrote a harmful comment, would you really allow moderator
to see who wrote it once they request access from you?

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[mitar]

I am happy to hear that you trust me, but I do not see much difference between an admin being a person who is trusted, or a moderator. I see that both of them should have more or less the same level of trust. Also, for me an admin is an administrative position, somebody who makes things run, but moderators are those who deal with content. If we would imagine rules, what rules should admin follow to decide to expose data to a moderator? I believe that it would happen that admin would simply always accept the request from a moderator.

What we could do is that two moderators should agree on access.

[mitar]

I think you are over-engineering this problem. Or maybe I am not respecting it enough. But I think it is a hard problem.

but it at least introduces an element of accountability

I think this is an important point. Maybe instead of trying to prevent access, we should just log it. So if a moderator access information who the person is, the person gets a message about that, and it is stored into an audit log. Then community can decide if moderators are overusing this power or not and remove them from the position.

This is also more aligned how I see that trust should be in a community. If we do not believe that our elected managers are doing good job, then we are already loosing. But it is good to have a way to oversee them.

[mkanwal]

What's wrong with how Piazza does it?

1. Not anonymous
2. Anonymous to all (no one knows)
3. Anonymous to other members (not moderators)
   And moderators can delete posts if they are harmful?
   Many students use anonymous replies on piazza to ask for help or suggest
   things.

On Tuesday, August 30, 2016, Mitar notifications@github.com wrote:

I think you are over-engineering this problem. Or maybe I am not
respecting it enough. But I think it is a hard problem.

but it at least introduces an element of accountability

I think this is an important point. Maybe instead of trying to prevent
access, we should just log it. So if a moderator access information who the
person is, the person gets a message about that, and it is stored into an
audit log. Then community can decide if moderators are overusing this power
or not and remove them from the position.

This is also more aligned how I see that trust should be in a community.
If we do not believe that our elected managers are doing good job, then we
are already loosing. But it is good to have a way to oversee them.

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[joshl129]

@mitar I like the logging suggestion more than mine and the other
suggestion you made (with two moderators agreeing on access). That is also
how I think trust should work in the community.

By the way, I was just spit-balling (with no experience with this sort of
thing), and so I appreciate that you came up with other suggestions. Thank
you for taking my suggestions seriously.

@mkanwal I'm not familiar with Piazza, but with how you describe it, there
seems to be the following problem if someone chooses to post
anonymous-to-all: Although moderators can delete posts, that doesn't
necessarily prevent the harm that was done before the post was deleted (or
is that moderators' approval is necessary for a post to become visible to
others?); plus, Cloyne is different from the sort of communities that use
Piazza in that a harmful post might warrant penal action (at its most
extreme, a PNG; at its least, a talk from a manager). Do you still think
that total anonymity should be possible?

On 30 August 2016 at 18:30, Max Kanwal notifications@github.com wrote:

What's wrong with how Piazza does it?

1. Not anonymous
2. Anonymous to all (no one knows)
3. Anonymous to other members (not moderators)
   And moderators can delete posts if they are harmful?
   Many students use anonymous replies on piazza to ask for help or suggest
   things.

On Tuesday, August 30, 2016, Mitar notifications@github.com wrote:

I think you are over-engineering this problem. Or maybe I am not
respecting it enough. But I think it is a hard problem.

but it at least introduces an element of accountability

I think this is an important point. Maybe instead of trying to prevent
access, we should just log it. So if a moderator access information who
the
person is, the person gets a message about that, and it is stored into an
audit log. Then community can decide if moderators are overusing this
power
or not and remove them from the position.

This is also more aligned how I see that trust should be in a community.
If we do not believe that our elected managers are doing good job, then
we
are already loosing. But it is good to have a way to oversee them.

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[mitar]

So I like the idea really much. I think we are just searching for what would be the best way to do it. I think I will go for now with logging approach.