Reporting forum post violations

An extremely vulgar and explicit image of two men having sex was posted in the forum this morning. It happened in an old thread, but I believe the thread was started by a child.

This websites process for reporting such a violation is absurd and totally unacceptable.

To be clear, I am not talking about when someone says inappropriate things to you in the live chess chat window. I AM TALKING ABOUT FORUM POSTS ONLY.

The process for reporting a forum post violation is far too cumbersome. Figuring out how to do it is equally cumbersome. Using the "Submit a ticket" feature to report a forum post violation is not really what ticket submissions are for.

A ticket submission is when you are having issues with your account: such as being over-charged or non activation of service.

There are children on this forum: lots of them. I understand that many of them would abuse the "report" feature. To help prevent this you need to provide a STERN message to those reporting violations that if they abuse the feature or use it incorrectly they will be suspended indefinitely from the forum and possibly the site.

You could also limit the feature to paying members only who understand that their paid account may be suspended if they abuse the feature.

Sexually explicit photos (and other inappropriate posts) need to be reported as quickly as possible

The feature would also help you crack down on the massive spam issue around here.

It would be extremely easy for a capable web designer to implement the feature. It's a small, red, exclamation point that opens a pop up window with a form inside of it containing a warning message.

The thought of a child being exposed to that photo is very disturbing to me.

 "A ticket submission is when you are having issues with your account: such as being over-charged or non activation of service".         Steve, you've been here 3 months. The ticket reporting system is used for many things, including ordering pizza.

Relevant Ronald Strikes Back

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/help-support/report-spam-here-not-cheating-not-abuse-only-spam

I think it's appropriate to report pornography in the above thread although it says spam only, because there is some urgency when it comes to pornography in the forums. (david may disagree, If so he can say.)

The post you mentioned, btw, was part of spam, and definitely needed to be brought before staff or a mod asap.

I've been on this website for years.

Regardless, you have made a moot point. Have you ever been a member of an internet forum? If so, you would realize that a standard feature is a "Report" icon for inappropriate posts.

Honestly, this forum needs that feature more than any other forum I've been a member of. A large percentage of the members here are children. Abusive and inappropriate posts need to be shored up quickly. The current process for doing this takes too long and if you don't know how to do it, it takes a long time to figure it out.

If you read the OP, you might agree with what I'm saying.

Good to know, but it doesn't help anyone who is not aware of what you just said.

Please, just implement the feature. It's a standard feature on any internet forum. You already have it in the chat window for live games. It needs to be in the forum as well.

Message any mod or staff or all of them if you want. 

If you use the new Chess.com its a easy as clicking the button shown in this picture! 

In the new site, that help icon is visible from all but a very few pages on the site and is a quick way to send a message to the support team. 

Yes, I'm well aware of the feature.

Have you tried using it?

It takes you to a page that explains how to report abuse in the live-games chat window. Again, I am not talking about the chat window. I'm talking about forum posts.

Then, at the bottom of that page, there's a link to the "Submit a ticket" page. Which brings us back to the same problem.

When you submit a ticket, you have to copy and paste the URL of the thread that contains the abusive post. Then, you have to provide the post number so that the mods can find it within the thread.

A "report this post" feature does all this automatically. It points the mod directly to the post.

I'm stunned by the response to this that I'm getting in this thread (and another one) where everyone want's to point me in other directions (directions that directly encompass the complaints I'm making) while ignoring the best and most obvious solution to this problem.

This is not a new idea. Every forum I've ever been a part of, has a quick and effective way to report inappropriate posts. The chat window for live-games already has the feature.

Come on guys!! It's time to get on board with this. It's something this community really needs.

Perhaps management has purposely decided to not provide the feature? Maybe they don't want to deal with the volume of reports?

Put a warning notice in it. If someone abuses the feature or uses it incorrectly they get suspended. Make it available only to paying members maybe?

Seriously...the amount of time you have spent railing on this.  Do what i do...Open 2 windows to chess.com.  

1 to the offensive issue.

1 to how to report it.

rather easy actually.

Wow, seriously? So open an entire new window to chess.com just to report a post?? Do you even read what you type?

With that, you forgot to mention that you have to copy and paste the URL and grab the post number. Of course, someone who's reporting a post for the 1st time would have no idea of any of this....

    "I've been on this website for yrs".                                                                                  Member Since: Jul 29, 2016

There shouldn't be children here. There is chess.com for kids. I blame their parents.

Is there a report chat in live now? Never used to be...

I think flagging posts is good but it has to be integrated into the workflow and made hard to abuse. Since this is a home grown forum software, as far as I know, it would likely take significant changes to implement.

good admin tip godspawn ,saves alot of time

Its common sense.  If that is to much for you, then yes i can understand why youre struggling with this.  Sorry for the honesty, but its not that hard, nor does it require a hurculean effort.

Youre very welcome.  

Oh really? You want to talk about common sense? Let's go ahead and do that.

What seems more reasonable to you? Clicking a small icon that immediately reports the post, or opening another window, logging onto chess.com, navigating your way to the "submit a ticket" page, remembering to grab the URL and post number, then filling out a form?

Please do not attempt to talk to me about common sense if this is how you think.

The whole purpose of this thread was to help prevent children from being exposed to pornography and inappropriate posts. If that's not important to you, then please stay out of this thread. Truly, it's not really any of your business anyway. It's directed to the Staff members and admin of which you are not. You're the equivalent of hamburger helper and what you're serving tastes like crap.

Well, he was a mod until recently, so he knows something about which he speaks.

As for the efficacy of a report button v. the other methods talked about above, a report button at this point just puts a complaint in the pipeline.

If something is urgent (like porn would be), contacting staff or mods directly or posting in the spam thread makes more sense for fast response.

Of course, I'm just a mod, not staff nor a policy maker. Take my opinion for what it's worth.