WAN Show Moderation and Engagement

[Alpha17x]

I like the WAN Show, it's great.  Even with it's constant technical issues, and the fact that it rarely starts 'on time' it tends to be great. Though most of the time it has news and info I heard earlier in the week, getting a different perspective on it is great. As well as the fact that Linus and Luke are are often able to go into more detail on a story with some technical knowledge or experience related to the topic. It is worth waiting for, whether it starts on time, or 20+ minutes late.

 

But I think it can be better

 

A bad part about the WAN Show is Twitch Chat.   Twitch chat unfortunately in most cases, across most channels is a shit show. It is consistent of people posting ASCII art of Hitler or genitalia and what not, or people spamming the same useless text or message over and over in some vain attempt to be noticed on the internet. A big part of why this happens is that these channels are have no moderation, or very little. 

That coupled with the fact that productive members of chat rarely get acknowledged on-air causes a reduction in those people participating in the chat and making it positive and useful.

 

As things currently stand it's not reasonable to expect Luke or Linus to do that because chat goes by so fast that it's barely worth reading for anyone that is an active part of the WAN Show's production, let alone other viewers in the chat.

 

Here's where actual moderation comes into play, and it does not take much at all.

 

This is an example for a channel I moderate (along with other moderators)  And I should say right now. I am not campaigning to be a mod on the WAN Show. I am not around often enough for that to be reasonable, I have not proven myself in any way shape or form in regards to the LTT Community, and in the end, anyone can do this;

 

1. use R9KBeta:

This command will prevent any user from posting a message containing the exact same text within 10 seconds of the same message being posted by themselves or anyone else.

For example

 

Bob notices that the WAN Show is late to start. So he says 'LinusLateTips'

Jeff either notices this too, or notices what Bob said and tries to post the exact same thing; Twitch chat tells his message is too similar to another one. Jeff gets annoyed for a few second and is forced to use his brain and actively participate.  

 

This process is fairly passive. Jeff is most likely going to wait a bit longer, thing of something similar to say,and possibly more relevant and the fact that he said something different will encourage other people to ether talk directly to him, or about the new topic he started.

 

For example, after Bob sends his message to chat, Jeff says 'I wonder why Linus is late so often, and why the intro sound is disabled, do they have a noise gate they don't know how to work?"

Then Jeff and other members of chat are involved in a discussion about noise gates and streaming tech as they wait for the show to start.

 

 

 

The majority of the arguments against R9KBeta are 'I can't say what I want to say'   and the response to that is that 'If someone said it 10 seconds before you did in the exact same text, then it's not worth hearing, because it was already heard.  Think it over and share a new perspective, be an active and mindful participant in the community.

 

 

 

 

2. Use Slow Mode

This one is self explanatory in what it does, but it's use is massively underestimated in it's effectiveness.

The channel I assist in moderating streams for an average of 7 hours on each stream 4 to 5 days every weak.  Sometimes those streams go on for 9 hours. It's a gaming related stream, and on most streams maximum viewership peaks at 10,000 viewers and there are usually still 6000 left when the stream ends (which i usually at 3AM PST).

 

It is often regarded as one of the most productive, welcoming and positive communities on all of Twitch and in the history of Twitch.  This was occurring long before I even started watching it, let alone become a mod of it.

 

The second biggest contributor to this is the usage of slow mode.  Keep in mind that this channel is partnered and can easily be put into subscriber mode (I'll go into that next).

All we do on most nights is do a quick judgement call based on how many people are present and how fast chat is moving and the basic guideline we follow is this:

 

Is chat moving too fast for the channel host to follow and engage with his community?  We watch him on screen and if we see his eyes darting back and forth between the game and chat, we can tell his trying to follow and having trouble so we slow it down without a word to or from him.  Most of the time we have slow mode set to 30 seconds.  Even with 10,000+ people present.  It is very impressive how much forcing a person to think about what their saying for 30 seconds will change the dynamic of a discussion, allow for host to community engagement, and overall have a positive impact on the community.

 

The usage of R9KBeta and Slow Mode set to a mere 30 seconds has an active group of ten thousand people in chat all having positive discussions among each other with almost no bickering or insulting occurring, and most of those are immediately resolved among the participants because the time they have to wait to talk again causes them to evaluate their words and the words of others. We as channel moderators rarely have to even say a word or lift a finger. The problem i solved in brief time it took for us to notice it.

 

In 2 months I have had to perma-ban one single person for posting a link to an adult website and timeout another person for spamming a name in caps (he wanted the streamer to play as a certain character).

 

Otherwise my actions have consisted of setting the amount of seconds applied to slow mode, enabling or disabling R9KBeta in certain cases, and preparing / posting straw polls in chat.

 

 

 

 

3. Straw Poll

Straw poll is used often on the WAN Show, however just as often viewers are asked to spam "1" or "2" to indicate a choice.  This is absolutely horrible and encourages bad behavior (spamming for example)

A host asking people to spam a number is a clear indicator that they cannot follow chat and therefore they have lost control of the chat.  If they are doing a live show and they lose control of their audience they have lost engagement.  Keep control at all times.  This is simply done by making people think about what their saying.  Always use a polling service when soliciting the opinions of your viewership. StrawPoll is often the best choice because either the hosts or moderators can set it up and share the link within seconds.

 

 

 

4. Subscriber Mode

The Wan Show does not have a subscriber button, however because it has all other partnered features it isn't exactly a hidden fact that this could be gained by Linus simply contacting Twitch, asking for it and immediately receiving it. If he asks for it, it will be given to him; that's a given. And if that happens that's great. It's extra revenue to provide higher quality videos more coverage, and if necessary, pay the salary of more staff, be they related to the WAN Show or any other facet of LTT/LMG.  

 

As to the usage of Subscriber Mode, using it sparingly is it's most effective use, and using it as a tool and not a thread or a method of disclusion (I made that word up) is it's most effective use.

 

For example the channel I assist in moderating rarely uses subscriber mode.  The only two times it is ever used is if the channel gets hosted and raided and we (as moderators) need to quickly re-establish control. In these cases because the existing community is so positive often all we have to do is turn it on for about 5 minutes and existing subsribers will continue talking and provide a few details for the newcomers who can't chat. Usually just forcing them to view the flow of discussion from current community participants is enough for them to get a handle on how conversation flows in the channel and they almost immediately become positive participants. Newcomers are frequently surprised by how orderly and positive discussion is in spite of so many people being present and sub mode being off most of the time.

 

The second occurrence it gets used in is if the channel owner is playing an anticipated game or a game with some sort of new content or anticipated update. This attracts more viewers however it attracts more trolls. When the stream starts he advises the community that we will start in subscriber mode and apologizes for it. Why does he apologize? Because as he puts it every single time; 'It stops a lot of you really awesome people from talking to me and everyone else, and maybe you just can't subscribe, but you come here every night and support us just be watching. So I hate cutting you off like this"  He then follows by reassures them that it is only temporary and the mods will be taking it out of slow mode multiple times to keep a handle on things and let more people talk as they (we) weed out the trolls.

 

 

 

 

While the flow of his 'shows are different he regularly manages to engage directly with his community in spite of having 10,000+ people present on most nights.

It is amazing how powerful it is to have someone mention you or another person watching the stream in a direct manner, and regularly.

This does happen on the wan show however due to the fact that chat is an uncontrolled mess there. It does not happen as often as it could, or should.  and this could easily change with two simple commands:

 

 

/r9kbeta

/slow 30

 

Usually after that you barely have to touch anything.

 

If anyone from LMG is interested in knowing what this mysterious channel I keep referring to is, send me a private message here.  I am intentionally not linking to it because I don't want to come across as advertising for him. If you find the time you can check out his stream when it's live and see how incredibly effective the moderation is, and how positive and engaged the community is in spite of it's size.

 

The WAN Show is awesome. but it can be be better, and it should be better, and this can be accomplished easily. As always, I am looking forward to the next show. LMG is awesome.

Thank you for all who took the time to read this incredibly long opinion.

 

 

[evilarceus]

There's honestly no point of the chat because people often won't see your message or people are posting the same message over and over again (firepole)

[GlassBomb]

IMO. The Twitch chat isn't there as a means of communications. It's more for them to share links, polls, and it's a quick way for them to see when sh*t hits the fan.

 

It's impossible to moderate a chat that has almost 10k viewers. Trust me.

[BuckGup]

Really... really? When has Twitch chat ever been useful/helpful. Not in 1000 years could twitch chat be helpful. If you only had 60 people then maybe but you will still be flooded with spam and garbage.

[manikyath]

its nice you're offering help, but LTTGhost is IMO doing an excellent job of managing the 90% troll community the WAN show twitch chat is.

 

R9K and slowmode are both *somewhat* in place, but in a more extreme sense, when typing ascii art, repeating something, or spamming "LinusBotTips" will grant you a permaban.

 

strawpoll is very much already the preferred method on WAN show, mostly because they can also display results on screen for the archive.

--

that said, the chat isnt meant to be any form of communication other than the usual "echo" or "no sound" spam, and the topic links (which are duplicated by bottips) as well as strawpoll links.

[Arty]

1. ithink the bot should ban  all the retards.

to much random usless junk

[Alpha17x]

IMO. The Twitch chat isn't there as a means of communications. It's more for them to share links, polls, and it's a quick way for them to see when sh*t hits the fan.

 

It's impossible to moderate a chat that has almost 10k viewers. Trust me.

I don't trust you on it because I am regularly involved in doing it and succeeding in it. 4 to 5 nights per week, for 7 to 9 hours at a time.

As I've clearly laidd out not only is it possible, it's deceptively easy.

It's accomplished with these incredibly simple summarized steps.

 

Leave R9K on unless there is a specific reason to turn it off, enable slow mode and set the speed based on how well the host(s) can keep track of it, Engage with positive members of the chat and mention them by name, disable link posting from on-subscribers, and issue timeouts for people who attempt to get around this; "www(.)website(.)com" for example and permanent bans for individuals who attempt to link to adult content.

 

While I've only been a mod on the channel I mentioned for 2 months, I've been following it for a year, and it's been active since mid 2013.  And they've had that success since the absolute beginning of it.

 

 

It can be accomplished by a handful of moderators.   We usually have 10 moderators keeping order amongst 7k to 10k people with ease.  

 

For a chat like the WAN Show has, it'll take a few shows to get people up to speed on being positive participants but once it happens they will naturally spread that attitude like a virus.  Negative and trolling people will naturally be shunned away and with a bit of time, moderators will barely have to lift a finger.

 

I experience this undeniable fact on a nearly daily basis.

[Alpha17x]

its nice you're offering help, but LTTGhost is IMO doing an excellent job of managing the 90% troll community the WAN show twitch chat is.

 

R9K and slowmode are both *somewhat* in place, but in a more extreme sense, when typing ascii art, repeating something, or spamming "LinusBotTips" will grant you a permaban.

 

strawpoll is very much already the preferred method on WAN show, mostly because they can also display results on screen for the archive.

--

that said, the chat isnt meant to be any form of communication other than the usual "echo" or "no sound" spam, and the topic links (which are duplicated by bottips) as well as strawpoll links.

I"m not offering to help. I'm offering suggestions, but I'm pretty sure you got that already.  It's not reasonable for me to step forward in that regard. I am an unproven person with around 80 posts to his name. There are far more engaged people on this community than I am, have been, or likely ever will be who would be far better choices.

 

As for what you said about chat only being meant for link communication; that is a very negative view.  In many cases it would be considered dangerous. Especially in the case of a live show. A live show where even just a single bit of direct engagement with it's active community/viewership occurs can go a very long way towards bringing in more viewers, and thus more revenue, and more opportunity.

 

Here are two scenarios for you to consider.

 

1. The Wan show as it is now; Linus and Luke are going through topics, and they ask the viewers what they think about a certain issue or topic. They put up a straw poll, and link to it 12+ times in a row to make sure it covers an entire page because chat is moving too fast for anyone to reasonably see it posted once.  At the same time one person in chat posts an ascii art of 'dickbutt' and another does hitler. The bot takes a few seconds to catch and delete this and by the time it does, the natural and uncontrolled flow of chat already has it spammed off of the screen anyway. So they spam the link even more.  This whole process takes place wordlessly within the space of about 5 seconds and no thought is given to the fact that it happened because it is accepted as the norm.  The poll does get votes, and is addressed within a few minutes, the show goes on.  but the chat room is still the equivalent of the /b/ board on 4chan.

 

2. The Wan Show as it could be; Linus and Luke are again going through topics, since slow mode is set to, oh lets say 30 seconds, and R9K is off, The straw poll link is shared once. and is on the screen long enough for active participants to see it and click on it. Perhaps they may have to briefly scroll chat back to it, but they saw it long enough to know it's there and know what it is.  If necessary chat could be slowed even more, say 45 seconds, briefly and then changed back if necessary.  People vote and the results are shared as before, however due to chat being actively controlled something else happens.  Linus and Luke can actually see and follow chat. 

Due to the fact that people are forced to consider their words for at least 30 seconds at a time, they are putting more thought into what they say. A viewer has an interesting perspective that isn't on the poll.  Luke or Linus see it because the flow of chat is controlled, They think this person has an interesting point, so they say so on air.  "here are the results of the poll. it's interesting that people see things that way, bla bla bla"  "Another thing to consider is what AwesomeGirl335 pointed out in the chat which is..."

 

Other people in the chat see that AwesomeGirl335 said something relevant that required brain cells to think of. And because chat was moving at a controlled pace it was noticed, and because she had something useful to say and it was of interest she was acknowledged on air.  The thought of being a positive, thoughtful and active participant is drilled into the subconscious of other people watching and chatting. This coupled with the average human desire to be noticed  naturally causes the environment to become more positive. And while this event may only occur once per show or even every few shows, people who watch the archive later notice the engagement and it encourages them to watch the WAN Show. it encourages them to check out the sponsors, and if they weren't aware of the youtube/vessel channels, it encourages them to give those a look as well. Because perhaps they found out about LTT/LMG view the WAN Show and not the other way around.

 

I cannot say that LTTGhost is doing a good or bad job.  If LTTGhost is the only active human moderator present during the show I can say that it is a very bad thing. Ideally there should be 3 to 5 active human moderators present for the duration of the show based on it's average viewership and how fast the chat moves and they should be silently controlling the flow of chat.

 

 For example; giving someone a verbal warning causes an opportunity for confrontation, while giving them a 10 minutes timeout because they decided to say something ridiculous about hitler sends the message that what they said is not welcome and there will be no discussion on it ever. They realize this and start to become more positive, or they leave and a negative influence is removed. As well, if the chat is moving slow enough, people can see the notices like 'user X was timed out' or 'user Z was banned"  They would likely have seen what that user posted. And they will then fully understand what if they're going to spam a name or brand name, they need to take a few minutes to calm down, and that if they post Patrick's Dick, they are not welcome to come back. This will prevent others who were thinking of doing it, from even trying. While some still will, their numbers will naturally dwindle, leaving only the positive members of the community in place.

 

These same positive community members are the same people who are more likely to visit sponsor pages, and use affiliate codes and links and be natural directors for the flow of the chat room and the community as a whole. Some of these people will bridge over to and/or from the forums (which are great) and the community will grow in a positive manner. and yet again, more viewers, will mean more sponsors and more opportunities for LMG.  all because they decided to guide and occasionally engage with a live audience.

 

Likewise chat speed is maintained on the fly based on how many people and how many messages are coming through to ensure that the average person can naturally read it while still watching the show

[Alpha17x]

Really... really? When has Twitch chat ever been useful/helpful. Not in 1000 years could twitch chat be helpful. If you only had 60 people then maybe but you will still be flooded with spam and garbage.

This is because chat is not guided nor is it engaged or acknowledged. The channel I help moderate for example once wordlessly raised 2k for a charity.  It started when someone asked the channel owner; "What do you do with the donations you get?"  he said, he shared it with people who helped him on camera (usually his friends helping make things more lively and talking directly do members of chat repeatedly) and he mentioned as well that he likes to send some to charities. He then stressed the importance of researching a charity to make sure it the bulk goes to charities that actually send the bulk to support their cause and not to administrative costs.  This very quickly resulted in a few people in chat linking to charities in the chat room complete with some research details on them, and a few thousand dollars being raised for entirely random charities, on a whim because the chat room there is so naturally positive.  ANd like I've kept saying; This is a chat room that has 7k to 10k people regularly.

 

Twitch chat on a bulk of channels is not useful because absolutely no effort is made to guide it. And like I've said as well, guiding it does not take much. Regular usage of a few simple tools will cause it to naturally fall into place.

[Alpha17x]

There's honestly no point of the chat because people often won't see your message or people are posting the same message over and over again (firepole)

With R9K and slow mode enabled this would for the would be heavily reduced and possibly stop all together due to the fact that that people doing it would have to change their wording every single time, and wait X seconds between each statement they send.  Some people would be forced to reconsider their actions while more still would simple not bother anymore due to the extra, yet minimal amount of effort required to do it again.

 

If you can just copy and paste 'firepole' over and over, that's easy, mindless and immediate,  If you have to post something different with, or about a firepole each time, and you have to wait 30 seconds more or less to do that, you have to keep track of the timing to get the most out of your spamming which makes it a job that requires effort and it becomes undesirable.

 

When twitch chat is controlled and directed through subtle moderation methods it becomes an amazing place.  Just as amazing as these forums are.

 

For example; this discussion that we're having here would probably cause a flame war on twitch chat. and indeed on many other forums. But here we all are, mainly disagreeing on the issue, yet still having a positive and engaging discussion.  It's unlikely that we're going to agree on it at all, but we can clearly see each other's points as we continue the discussion. As amazing as it sounds, twitch chat can be just like this.

[,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,]

This stuff is just annoying. I could see it coming into play for a company like ASUS, but LMG isn't overly professional.

[Alpha17x]

This stuff is just annoying. I could see it coming into play for a company like ASUS, but LMG isn't overly professional.

It doesn't need to be professional,at all,  It would literally be a handful of moderators saying between themselves; "Okay, Luke just posted a strawpoll and chat is moving this fast, so we should slow chat down to 45 seconds for a few minutes."  This is done pretty much instantly, seamlessly and organically.  

 

An analogy for it would be, your playing  racing game, the corner is coming up, you can slow down and make the corner, or you can fly into the ocean. So you just slow down for a few seconds. You don't think about it, you don't make a spreadsheet, you just do it as an instant yet educated choice..  After you make the corner, you speed up again.

 

I"m making it sound complicated because of the detail i'm giving.  

 

Imagine this, you, Reece Leu, Digital Ganster of BC are a moderator for the WAN Show.  You're chilling out in chat, and you think 'chat is moving too fast for me to read, so it must be too fast for Linus and Luke to read. I'll slow it down a  bit.   so you type /slow 30 .  You think to yourself 30 isn't too low that it has no effect but not too high that people stop talking all together. Throughout the show you lower that amount if chat seems to be going too slow, or raise it if it's going too fast.  During the show people start saying 'firepole' over and over again. so you think 'That's not really adding to the discussion' so you type /r9kbeta  the majority of the firepole spam ends in an instant.

 

You probably have to use r9kbeta once. and change the degree of slow mode a few times during the show.  The bot catches all of the ascii spam so you don't have to touch that and the only extra moderation you need to do is anything the bot can't spot. like people flaming each other, or disguised insults/trolling because the bot has no concept of discussion context.

 

All of the moderation you do are quick yet educated judgement calls that occur within seconds.  You didn't agonize over them or make a statistical graph. You saw that User A was making racist remarks about user  B so you timed him out or you banned him because the bot was not capable of understanding the discussion. It took you  a few seconds to make and act on the choice.  About the same amount of thought it takes to decide whether you wanted PB&J on your sandwich or lunch meat.

[.:MARK:.]

Start your own show, you seem to know everything about anything.

[Blade of Grass]

I do believe that all of what R9K offers has been implemented by the bot.

 

@Ghost

[Lays]

How to watch twitch and ignore twitch chat step by step:

 

 

#1

 

Fullscreen

 

#2

 

watch stream

 

#3

 

profit

[Alpha17x]

Start your own show, you seem to know everything about anything.

So what you've just done is like telling someone to start their own country when they try to suggest ways of improving the one they live in. This makes you no different than the negative people in twitch chat. If you can be better why not do so? Share in the discussion

 

Also I do have my own 'show' It has small viewership, and I won't advertise it (because that's lame)

[Alpha17x]

I do believe that all of what R9K offers has been implemented by the bot.

 

@Ghost

While a bot could theoretically do that by deleting messages it would not prevent the spam. what people would see is a list of <Message Deleted> from the same user.  When R9K is in effect The user gets a message telling them they have to wait, and the rest of chat sees nothing.

[Alpha17x]

How to watch twitch and ignore twitch chat step by step:

 

 

#1

 

Fullscreen

 

#2

 

watch stream

 

#3

 

profit

If you want to sweep a problem under the rug and let it grow into a disaster and throw away an opportunity to make new connections, and meet new people, yeah; you could do that.

[Trik'Stari]

Simple solution: A private chat for contributors.

[Lays]

If you want to sweep a problem under the rug and let it grow into a disaster and throw away an opportunity to make new connections, and meet new people, yeah; you could do that.

 

If you want conversation and to meet new people & make connections, twitch chat sure as F isn't the place to do it lol.

 

The only places that don't have terrible twitch chats are twitch streams with small viewer counts. Once you get more than 50 it goes to shit and becomes a spam & troll fest.  

 

 

If you want to make actual connections and meet new people, join the LTT teamspeak servers or meet people on here or on other forums.

[Lays]

Simple solution: A private chat for contributors.

 

 

Because nobody on twitch contributes money to the stream to troll people or the streamer...

 

lol

[Blade of Grass]

While a bot could theoretically do that by deleting messages it would not prevent the spam. what people would see is a list of <Message Deleted> from the same user.  When R9K is in effect The user gets a message telling them they have to wait, and the rest of chat sees nothing.

The bot doesn't just remove messages, it also suspends and bans people.

[Trik'Stari]

Because nobody on twitch contributes money to the stream to troll people or the streamer...

 

lol

I mean for the people who are contributors on the LTT forums.

[Glenwing]

Who knew someone could be so passionate about having a clean twitch chat...

The twitch chat is there to get poll results when Linus needs them, and as a quick check for whether audio/video issues are present. It isn't and no one expects it to be a place for legitimate discussion, not with the amount of viewers present.

Rather than having a bot filter out a bunch of spam, in addition to turning on R9K, and slow mode, and subscriber mode, you might as well just minimize the chat instead. It wouldn't be much different than not allowing anyone to say anything.

Really there's no point in putting in the effort to wage a war against the chat spammers and trolls on a battlefield no one cares to pay attention to in the first place.

[Lays]

I mean for the people who are contributors on the LTT forums.

 

You can already make sub-chats inside twitch chat on channels, as well as "whisper" to people in the chat, I mean there are ways of getting around the stupid 12 year olds, it just takes a bit of effort.

 

To be fair it would be nice to get rid of all the idiots spamming turnip and shit, but that's part of what makes twitch chat twitch chat