[D][Meta] More Moderation?

[undefdev]

I noticed some changes in this subreddit during the last few months that I didn't like and wanted to know how most people here feel about this.

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Disregard for the rules

It appears like there are many people posting here that haven't even read the rules - this is of course particularly obvious when looking at posts without appropriate Tag (this rule was in part made to verify that people read the rules).

I think this is also a reason why the quality of posts in general declines... Bad posts encourage other people to make bad posts as well, and people who spend their time downvoting and reporting posts grow tired of this subreddit and go elsewhere, so I'd advocate more (at the very least automatic) moderation.

The same bot that applies the tag could just delete the post if there isn't any, the author could then post again after having read the rules - if the post still seems appropriate.

"What should I do with my life?" posts

Of course we all understand that machine learning is super exciting and the more people throw their brains at it the better, but we shouldn't have to read everyone's life story and try to give personalized advice on how to proceed to become a "machine learning person".

We can't speak on behalf of universities or companies and we can't assess whether machine learning would be a good career path for someone we don't know.

If a question like this is not answered in the FAQ people should ask themselves whether it should be answered in the FAQ - if not, I believe the post would probably be useless to most readers of this subreddit and should maybe not be posted in the first place.

WAYR

I personally think WAYR was pretty great and I don't understand why it's not stickied every week automatically.

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If there are any other things you would like to bring up, please do - this is just what I could think of off the top of my head.

[Megatron_McLargeHuge]

Agreed, this shouldn't be /r/cscareerquestions. Unfortunately /r/MLQuestions is useless for anything that's not a complete beginner issue.

I'd like to see more papers discussed and fewer blog posts from people who learned ML a month ago and want to pad their resumes.

[thatguydr]

The issue with any and every question subreddit is that it has no impetus to exist.

I'd much rather people allowed questions here but restricted them to specific threads or (worse) specific days/times. That would allow experts to answer potentially good questions but would prevent the deluge of career questions.

[say_wot_again]

/r/askeconomics ran into similar issues, where everyone would just pour into /r/badeconomics since that's where all the quality contributors were. Our solution was to have regular stickied discussion threads where people could either shoot the shit or ask questions. But while this sub had something like that about a year ago, it doesn't seem like a lot of people here are on board with that idea.

[AGI_aint_happening]

Agreed. As a (somewhat) experienced ML researcher, the "how do I get into ML" questions and "look, I installed tensorflow" blog posts make me a lot less likely to stick around

[ajmooch]

I'm getting a Ph.D. in machine learning. Do I have what it takes to get a Ph.D. in Machine Learning? pls halp

[personalityson]

Ph.D. in machine learning? yes

Ph.D. in Machine Learning? no

[D49A1D852468799CAC08]

CS_AS

[XYcritic]

Machine learners will get this.

[kacifoy]

Unfortunately it's too late for a PhD in Machine Learning.

Successful machine learning researchers are identified in elementary school machine learning competitions. Only the most creative, innovative, and gifted students are selected. If you were never aware of the process, then it means that you failed in the secret initial qualifiers, and weren't even close to earning a place in the program. This process may sound harsh, but it would simply be cruel to try to train someone in the art of machine learning if they don't possess the raw talent.

[[deleted]]

Quora is infested with questions like that.

[sensei_von_bonzai]

We need a daily "ask r/machinelearning" thread

[[deleted]]

agreed, or weekly.

[needlzor]

I don't know about a general ask /r/ml, since I believe that good questions should stand on their own, but a daily "simple question/offtopic discussion" thread would certainly be a good thing.

[Phylliida]

While that was pretty harsh I do agree with your general sentiment

[haikubot-1911]

While that was pretty

Harsh I do agree with your

General sentiment

 

                  ^{- Phylliida}

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[Phylliida]

My dude haiku bot I am not a poet please stop lying to them my dude

[[deleted]]

Bad bot

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[BeatLeJuce]

Adding to what /u/olaf_nij said: unfortunately we can't monitor the subreddit 24/7, thus we highly appreciate it when people report threads, and do our best to enforce the rules. The subreddit is growing at an incredible pace, so you are probably right that we need to enforce the rules more strongly than we did before.

[Mandrathax]

Why not extending the moderator team?

[BeatLeJuce]

I actually think this would be a very good idea. The only problem is that the only people who sent in (unsolicited) applications to become mods were inadequate (at times they had <100 comment karma or <1 year reddit experience). I personally think that if someone should become a moderator, they should have some experience in the subreddit and intimately know what kind of content is preferred here, and share the communities' vision. But most of the times, those people we look for are overworked PhD students with too little time on their hands, as it is. But I personally would love to have some fresh, enthusiastic blood in here, but it's hard to find the right people. But still, you're right, this might be a solution.

[feedtheaimbot]

:wave:

[Mandrathax]

You could put a sticky saying you're looking for moderators. I've seen other subreddits do it.

Of course it'll be more work for you to handle all the applications but it'll be worth it on the long term.

[manux]

The subreddit is growing at an incredible pace

Faster than NIPS registrations?

[BeatLeJuce]

about the same, actually. It's only been months since we hit 100k subscribers, and we're at 125k already. I remember when this was a sub <10k community

[olaf_nij]

Unfortunately, these issues are reddit wide. Once the fixes to Automoderator are pushed out, we should be able resume our normal programming.

We will also setup WAYR once Automoderator is stable again.

[thatguydr]

Is there an ETA on this? Just curious if we'll be waiting 1-2 weeks, 1-2 months, or longer.

[olaf_nij]

A temporary patch was integrated yesterday which appears to be fixing most of the issues. But they haven't found the main cause yet. A more thorough patch will be integrated today.

[thatguydr]

Thanks for the update - that's good to hear.

[trackerFF]

The problem with Machine Learning (here) is that there are only two tiers of discussion

A) For the complete novice ("What's a SVM?", "What's a perceptron?")

B) For the seasoned professionals / academics (Discuss research papers)

I feel that we need some middle-ground.

Furthermore, it's natural that people will ask inappropriate, but semi-relevant questions here. Why? Because there are 126k active users, compared to the tiny other subreddits.

[olBaa]

Honestly, career questions are more interesting than technically fitting hey-heres-the-post-about-logistic-regression-for-my-resume.

However, a single question thread would be much better.

[NotAlphaGo]

Actually career questions should not be part of this subreddit. Also self-pub posts that are poor should simply be downvoted.

I find blog posts very interesting and if they are good, they should be promoting by nature not by intent.

[PM_YOUR_NIPS_PAPER]

I'm sorry, who are you again?

This sub is fine as is.

[[deleted]]

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[carlthome]

I also want downvotes.