LFGSS and Microcosm shutting down 16th March 2025 (the day before the Online Safety Act is enforced)

They are very proactive on moderation

A few people have responded here and elsewhere that this is somehow a protective thing... it's a form of "If you've done nothing wrong, you've nothing to hide"... we're very proactive on moderation, I swing the ban hammer freely and nuke everything someone says when I do so, and I also follow up all reports, and this software keeps every version of what someone has said so I can see when they've done shit and attempted to cover their tracks.

I don't buy it though, the Act has parts that talk about the duration of time that "harmful" (not illegal) content is visible, and that harm is effectively in the eye of the beholder.

With all best intents, if you don't have a 24/7 coverage of moderation and surety that when you go on vacation that someone else is covering it... this is the risk of weaponisation.

Those who have run forums for a long time have seen "fun" forum invasions, or the guy you banned register 10 accounts and start spouting off all over the place, or the "hilarity" of someone writing a crappy bit of JavaScript that does something nefarious... it's just a question of time even when it hasn't happened recently.

My fear, which I think is reasonable, is that the law actively encourages retribution by those who are moderated / banned or just trolls... because where their act of retribution was always futile in the past, it now carries real consequences for those who are named as the "officers" for the site (typically the individuals running it).

In that World, it basically incentivises the aggrieved to find their moment and act.

These asshats that we ban are apparently more creative than I, but I can think of many ways to weaponise the OSA based on what I've seen in the past.

The idea that "no politics" and "proactive moderation" and "we are fine we are superb at running sites" is going to save site operators feels to me like hubris. A lot of sites will never have action taken against them because of luck, pure luck, but a small minority will because of bad luck, that they just had the one angry troll, the one really vulnerable person, the couple of people who bully another, the few that share effed up material via DMs... hubris is not going to help you if you are the unlucky site where someone does commit suicide due to the behaviour of others, or some act of harm happens due to some subtle act of bullying that didn't break any number of well intentioned strict rules, this is out of our control.

A long time ago I ran sites in a zero tolerance way, you couldn't even tell someone to fuck off... and all that happened is the bullying, harassing, all the bad stuff the OSA targets... moves to plausibly deniable territory, soft words all deniable, by a cohort of people who are friends and effectively dislike someone else.

I've found the current style works better... I let you all swear at each other, it actually provides far better signal to me as a moderator and site admin, that I get to see it and then act on it.

In my experience, the more proactive the moderation, the more strict the rules, the more it just exists but all flies below the radar level of your rules... the outcomes remain the same. That sites haven't experienced the bad outcomes so far is little to do with their moderation, and more to do with luck.