Back in the stone ages, I believe the Extropian list had extensive configurable collaborative filtering mechanisms. I didn't use them much, but that seems to me the actual solution. Let people trust who they want, and follow who they want. I see a Karma Score configured by me.
The failures of old mailing lists and Usenet were why social mediums universally abandoned killfiles and similar filtering mechanisms: the balance of costs was all wrong - a large number of people had to take affirmative action to ignore the small number of bad apples. It turned out to be better to actively curate the default than to thrust the burden of filtering signal from noise onto each and every user.
To give an Extropian-list-specific example: determined harassment was why Nick Szabo stopped posting there. The filters didn't help there.
The failures of old mailing lists and Usenet were why social mediums universally abandoned killfiles and similar filtering mechanisms: the balance of costs was all wrong - a large number of people had to take affirmative action to ignore the small number of bad apples.
No, I don't think that's true. You're arguing that internet user interfaces become better at hosting debates over time. If I believed that, I'd also believe that the user interfaces for holding rational discussion have gradually improved, from Usenet, to bulletin boards, to Facebook and Wordpress, to Twitter and Tumblr.
Below is a message I just got from jackk. Some specifics have been redacted 1) so that we can discuss general policy rather than the details of this specific case 2) because presumption of innocence, just in case there happens to be an innocuous explanation to this.
So... thoughts? I have mod powers, but when I was granted them I was basically just told to use them to fight spam; there was never any discussion of any other policy, and I don't feel like I have the authority to decide on the suitable course of action without consulting the rest of the community.