IT'S OVER NINE THOUSAND!!!! (elections available only to high rep users)

Question

I am worried that the moderators can now only be selected from those with 10.3k reputation.

I understand that we must limit our options using some method, as too many choices would make this process more difficult.

However:

• Very high rep users are not any more likely to moderate than those in the 7-10k range - in fact I'd say their participation, by definition, tends more towards answering questions than moderating.
• It widens the gap between the high rep and low rep users. While it's not a political office, it's more of a policing function, having people who are very good at getting rep do the policing may result in moderation that tends to favor those who are good at getting rep.
• Reputation is more a measure of expertise in a variety of subjects, but does not at all correlate with being fair, impartial, and patient.
• It doesn't seem democratic at all to only allow the "higher class" to participate in elections.

I'm not saying anyone should be able to nominate themselves, but should we not consider the above further, and ask if this is the best way to determine the 30 people who will go into the primary election?

I'd rather see 50+ people go into the primary with 3k or 7k and above reputations and go through the list, upvoting those in the primary that seem reasonable, than see people who would be great moderators drop off the list because they only have a measly 10k rep.

Answer 1

There have been a number of similar arguments on the ServerFault election page as well, notably:

I think a balance of 10k and non-10k users is important in moderator circles, as it prevents grandfathering (i.e. "That's just the way it's always been done") and provides new insight.

– Mark Henderson 19 hours ago

And

I agree with that sentiment so much that I'd almost like to see a rule that no one OVER 10k can get elected moderator (prolly a thought for meta but worth a comment I think)

– Jim B 16 hours ago

Also

@John - putting aside whether or not I personally am suitable mod material or not and looking at the issue of reputation, it's possible to have >10k from answering questions but not otherwise getting involved in making the site "tick", and therefore not be good mod material or to have <5k but spend a lot of time getting involved in the site and be exactly the right kind of person.

– Robert Moir 7 hours ago

Granted I understand that StackOverflow has a lot more users with a lot more rep than ServerFault, however, I can think of a lot of users under 10k who would make great moderators. I also think you make a great point that having all the mods have over 10k rep could lead to them being biased against low-rep users. However, I think that's where the meta reputation comes into play. I saw one user with over 50k rep on StackOverflow but less than 200 rep on Meta. I personally wouldn't vote for such a candidate as a mod.

Having said all this, I am not sure what the answer to your question is... because there has to be some way to keep the number of nominations to a reasonable level. If the 30 highest rep users isn't it, I'm not sure what is. But I do see issues with the 30 higtest rep users, at least on StackOverflow.

Answer 2

In practice, what tends to happen in the election is that high reputation users generally win over lower reputation users.

I'm not saying it's right, but it is what we have observed to happen, multiple times.

Some statistics from the Stack Overflow moderator election results

Just as I went to post this, the title auto-search showed me another post on election statistics. In the comments there, Jeff suggest a strong correlation between the user's rep and their election ranking. So I added that into my graph. Sure enough, there is a correlation: approximately half of the voting behavior is likely based on the user's reputation

Therefore, I would much rather have an election where people have to make a meaningful distinction between 10 relatively high reputation users rather than reflexively voting for the highest reputation users in the list.

(and obviously this is only an issue when there are are more than 30 nominees, anyway.)

Answer 3

As @Jeff notes, people will reflexively go for the highest reputation. That is a huge loss, because - as others have noted - high reputation does not necessarily a good moderator make. I'm not saying most of the high-rep users on the list aren't capable of good mods, but there is a lot of talent going unnoticed.

How about next time, reserving some nomination slots, say five or ten, for users with less than 10k reputation? It wouldn't be any kind of Affirmative Action, as they would still have to make their stand in the elections. But I find it terrible that moderate users of the site don't even have a chance to survive the first round.

Answer 4

Reputation is more a measure of expertise in a variety of subjects, but does not at all correlate with being fair, impartial, and patient.

Reputation doesn't directly measure expertise. It is more measure of how active you are on the system.

Are lower rep users even using the system enough that making them a moderator will be helpful to the site as a whole? I am sure it somewhat depends on the person, but a higher rep tells me that a person is more active.

Sorting by reputation doesn't bug me at all really. I do wonder if there was a way to only sort by rep earned over the 6-12 months (rep league data?). Since I think the only important information you can get from reputation as it relates to moderation is how active a person is.

Though it might also be interesting to take into account how many comments, answers, and other actions a person has made on the site.

Some quick stats about the number of comments, including comment upvotes, number of edits, number of retagging, casting close votes, flagging content, would show their ability as a moderator much better then their reputation. Yes, that will exclude people that have a low rep too, but they can just work on being active on the site, and participate during the next election.

Answer 5

I think that this is exactly what will cause people with less than 20k rep to not even bother entering the election, and I think that it is a travesty. If you subscribe to the sentiment that someone with more reputation will knock you out of the race before the primary even begins, then you won't at least try, and you will ensure that the list is dominated with users that have over 20k reputation.

If you think you will be a good moderator, nominate yourself and make a good case for why the community should support you. My SO rep is only 12.6k at the time of this writing, which means I'm 2 - 3 rungs away from getting knocked off the ladder. I'm also a recently retired pro-tem mod, and I know I could do the job. Will I get a chance to do it? Who knows. Maybe, if I manage to hang on until the primary.

In contrast, 80k rep users should not think twice about nominating themselves, even if they know that they will prune the list by doing so.

My point is, it's no reason to throw your arms up in angst and not participate.

I think it would be a little more well rounded if SO + MSO rep was combined to produce the 'standing', since at least several running aren't very involved on MSO. Every single mod needs to be prepared to be called out on MSO if someone disagrees with an action that they took, it is part of the job, so rep here should be part of the score that says you might be qualified to do it. That should result in 30 candidates who would probably make great moderators, and I think that is the intent.

Still, that's addressing how the system could be improved, and not directly addressing the nominations being dominated with those who have very high reputation.

Answer 6

Lifted directly from comments on the election page.

@Nick Possibly its too late for this election, but a 30 nominee cap doesn't seem like the best mechanism for limiting the number of candidates. How about the requirement that all candidates must donate a certain amount of reputation (proportional to the total number of candidates) in order to nominate themselves? This would discourage joke nominations and the reputation could be reimbursed for any candidates that receive a certain number of votes, meaning that any mildly suitable candidates aren't penalised

Its pretty obvious that in reality high-rep users are far more likely to become elected, and so it might seem sensible to limit the number of candidates by rep, but that's not really in the spirit of a democratic process - there is no real reason why a low rep user wouldn't make a great moderator, its just not as likely.

In some other elections the list of nominees is restricted by financial incentives - the cost of running a campaign can be fairly expensive, and on top of that there is generally a small fee for entry. Obviously we can't demand money from community moderator candidates, but we could weed out less serious candidates by requiring that they give up a chunk of rep to enter.

This still favours high-rep candidates, because they are more willing to sacrifice the reputation and some low-rep candidates might not have enough reputation to enter (the amount of rep would probably have to scale with the number of candidates).

Candidates could receive a reputation refund if they withdraw before the end of the nominations phase (for example if the cost of entry raised above the amount of reputation they required to enter), or if they received a certain threshold of votes in the primary phase (so potentially all candidates might receive their reputation back).

Just an idea.

Answer 7

I'm very concerned that with just using rep as a criteria, we could end up with a high-volume questioner, who's never set foot in meta, never voted, and never edited anything :(

EDIT My point is that if you're not hanging out on meta, then in my book that means you're not interested in HOW the site works, you're just interested in asking and answering questions, (and maybe, just maybe, in gaining rep).

Moderators should be the FIRST people to know about the new stuff. They should be actively participating in discussions about how to edit, how to review, what suspension is, when it should happen.

And chat engagement is important too. Moderators need to be on the ball - communicating with each other about hard cases.

Just turning up to answer questions on SO without being curious how this stuff all works just won't cut it.