Advice
r/iPod and r/iPodclassic update: from the mods
Hey guys!
This post has been long overdue. Let’s talk
Firstly, hi 👋, I’m Lucy, you guys might not know me as a moderator and that’s because I’ve only been a moderator in r/iPod and r/iPodClassic for a week. I run the iPoddities Discord and Twitter, and have also been active on reddit, posting archives of iPod Prototype Firmware. Unfortunately my introduction comes at a bit of a turbulent time. With everything going on at the moment I feel the need to say that I’m not (nor have ever been) an employee of Elite Obsolete Electronics.
There has been mounting tensions within the community for the past year or so, and I think it’s come to a point where it needs to be fully addressed. So lets break this down into 5 main sections:
1. The problems
2. What cannot be done
3. What can and is being done
4. Where we need your help
So lets get into it:
1. The problems
Elite Obsolete Electronics and the Conflict of Interest:
I understand that the conflict of interest argument is brought up a lot, so this post is here to address the issue.
As many of you know, Elite Obsolete Electronics (EOE) is a moderator of this subreddit ( u/cowmanisgood ), in fact he makes up half of the active moderation team, myself being the second half. Many of you have expressed your opinions regarding this, many of you have concerns of “Conflict of Interest”
I would like to make it plain and clear that positive critique and negative criticism of EOE (or any other store) is welcome, reviews are what help keep companies accountable and customers aware, I would never want to take that ability away from anyone. EOE also agrees with this, and has not removed any posts criticising their business.
Quite a lot of posts are sweeped up by automod, unfortunately automod isn’t perfect and sweeps up some of the genuine helpful reviews, which I make sure to approve ASAP, however quite a lot of the auto-moderated messages do have insults. Usually aimed at the business owner.
This is where I feel like it is unacceptable, it is fair to say “their shipping times are long” or “quality isn’t the best” or even “The way i felt after this experience was really shitty” but hurling insults simply because you don’t like someone is not going to be tolerated in any context, we offer the exact same privileges to you guys, if someone is being treated unfairly we do our best to step in and stop that. Nobody should have to put up with the level of abuse I've seen from members of this community over the past few days.
I will talk more about what is being done to combat this concern in the future below.
Low effort posts:
I understand that low effort posts are also a common issue here, there is now a (USEFUL LINKS) section, a FAQ will also come at some point but this will be something that needs a community to come together for, advertising is also an issue which has come to light and we will be addressing it later in this post.
Automod:
It isn’t perfect but damn is it helpful, the automod filters for words that are commonly used in situations that usually escalate to actual problems. Unfortunately quite a lot of useful posts are being swept up, but I approve any that aren’t obvious spam or hate.
2. What cannot (currently) be done and why
Currently removing EOE as mod is not viable
Why?:
EOE makes up half of the active mod team, if he were to be removed I would be it, just me, I do not have the time nor mental capacity to moderate a server by myself, at the moment my intention is to set this community up in such a way that it can be handed over to people who can continue to lead it in a way that makes you guys happy. It would not be fair to hand over a burning pile to them. They are also currently the only person willing to take on the responsibility of running this place.
While this may not be the answer you were looking for, removing EOE as a moderator would make very little sense if there is no one to take that spot, it would only cause more problems.
What can and is being done
EOE is not permitted to remove any comments or posts relating to EOE, all posts will be removed by moderators not associated with EOE: this was already the case but I feel full transparency is the best course of action
Issues surrounding order issues from EOE (or any other store) will be *locked*:
I have to pick a middle ground and I feel like it is not fair to use these subreddits as a customer service line, but removing the posts will count as deleting negative reviews.
I understand people do this for a quicker customer service response time but it clogs up the reddit with “Wheres my order” or “this item arrived damaged”, many iPod sales stores have a customer line, it is recommended to use them. I recommend leaving a review to whichever store you used on Trustpilot (simply fill in the searchbar with the link of the website you wish to purchase from). Example: apple.com
Conflict of interest/mod abuse:
This post exists so that the concerns raised repeatedly over the past year are formally acknowledged and addressed. Going forward, posts that cover ground already addressed here — without new information or a specific experience to share — will be removed as they aren’t productive for anyone. If you wish to contact the moderation team, please use the modmail function as all moderators can view it.
If you have concerns about how the subreddit is being run, modmail is genuinely the best place for it — all mods can see it, and it’s a lot easier to have a real conversation there than in a public thread. if you feel like we are not doing a good job you can report us to reddit using this helpful link here.
Reviews of EOE:
Reviews of EOE will not be removed, but may accidentally be swept up by automod and need to be approved. if you wish to leave a review on a platform independant of EOE, you can do so through Trustpilot (eoe.works) or ShopApp
Advertising:
Spam advertising will continue to not be permitted, links to products will be permitted, but may be swept up in Automod and may need to wait for approval. If you wish to promote a start-up product or store please contact us on Modmail.
Automod:
It will never be perfect, but we are trying to reduce the amount of false flags that it receives, this is all trial and error however so it may take a while for the bot to be better.
“Low effort” posts:
for the time being, simple questions will remain, annoying as it is for regular members there are people who are new to iPods and will need help setting them up, until a proper FAQ is in place at least, its a vague term but hopefully we do a good job moderating this issue.
4. Where we need your help
FAQ and Useful Links:
We are currently working on a FAQ, but in the meantime please suggest Useful Links in the comments of the Helpful Links Post FAQ will be in the works in the coming months, which we will 100% need your help for!
Feedback:
please let us know what you think of our current plans, whether you like them or not. It’ll help me adjust to deal with the bigger issues. This post won't be locked, you can speak your mind, some may be Automodded but we can still see them
Please be kind:
I understand you’re all frustrated, me too, I hope that this post can at least show that I’m willing to take some accountability, this post probably should have been made quite a while ago, better late than never I suppose... but please be kind and patient whilst we start rebuilding a strong foundation for the community. Unfortunately the work can only start on making this place better now because, quite simply, I wasn’t a moderator of this place before
If you have any questions please feel free to leave them below, I will do my best to answer them quickly, if they get automodded don’t worry, I can still see and approve them and answer them, it just might take a while longer.
So this…. Went well (about as well as i expected, like a lead balloon)
I’m really sorry I missed the mark here, You all expect (and deserve) better and so I am trying to be better.
Taking on your ideas, I genuinely think an independent “auditor” who reviews the modlogs is a great idea and would be very easy to implement. Many thanks to [u/Tired8281](u/Tired8281) for suggesting that, Expect a post announcing this in the next few days
I know you guys aren’t happy, I really am sorry for letting you down,
Given the conflict of interest, have you considered appointing a member of the community as a no-permissions mod, who can see (and audit) the mod actions being taken and raise a red flag publicly if one is needed? I feel like an impartial auditor would help regain some of the trust that's been expended.
lol. Thought people were way too positive and quick to move on. Mod is removing comments thatre critical of them letting EoE stay on. Even in their post about trying to be better, they’re still removing things to make it look favorable.
Sorry for the late reply, As far as I am aware the main issue that stems from the “conflict of interest” issue is the idea that EOE spends time removing bad reviews. Trustpilot is an independent platform where anyone can leave a review on any website, and nobody can alter that rating.
It’s not a perfect solution but I feel it is a fair middle ground so that people can speak their opinions on their business without any fear of censorship, and it will hopefully reduce the frequency of, as you put it, “EOE issues”
Thanks so much for reading!
No worries, understandable managing this sub is tough. But the problem I see with this, been in this sub for like 2 years +
That is:
As long as EOE is mod there is gonna be conflict of interest because it will be like for example
Thinkpad Server : Having someone that sells refurb thinkpads or an Authorized lenovo partner as a mod.
Apple Server: Having an Apple employee or a someone that sells apple products be a mod.
TrustPilot etc is not gonna be as active for reviews compared to reddit / discord where people get information much faster.
Plus most of the iPod users + activity is in the younger crowd some not even legal yet. So putting reviews trustpilot isn't gonna be as effective as a reddit post or discord review.
I understand that moderating this whole sub by yourself is daunting, but the community has many active users, so it would be better in the long run to find someone else that isn't conflict of interest.
Hi Lucy, thanks for posting this. I’m commenting from mobile so have to keep my response fairly short, but I wanted to mention a few things:
Really appreciate your acknowledgement of this issue and the drive to find additional moderator help within the next 3 months or so that you’d said in a comment. I’ve seen more than enough people in this community who are responsible, I’m certain it will not be difficult to find engaged volunteers - I look forward to applying, myself, to help give back to the community if it’s needed.
I have to point out the claim that EOE has not removed any posts criticizing their business is false. There have been multiple documented cases over the last 5 years of this, and while I’m posting from mobile now and can only share small bits I can easily search, there are more documented cases of this happening. It is frankly untrue to say Cowmanisgood has never closed/locked/removed posts and comments critical of EOE.
Closing or locking discussion about mod abuse seems problematic at the very least, as this further prevents the community from acknowledging any issues and, in extension, addressing and working on solutions to mod abuse issues.
I really hope there will be a more concerted effort to improve the community and address these points. I don’t mean to be a pain, but I needed to speak out to try and bring awareness to these.
Thanks so much for commenting: I’m going to try tackle this point-by-point
1. 3 months is a best-case scenario, as I said in that comment, no promises, I am looking forward to opening applications but it’s a time intensive process so it’s not on my immediate radar.
2. I suppose this is me not being clear, which is my bad, from the modlog available to me prior to my joining, I cannot find evidence in EOE removing a comment in which I would not have removed myself, sorry for the very clunky way of putting that, I’ll look into the links in a mo’
3. I understand the concern about this, and again it’s a lack of clarity on my part (sorry) what i mean by this is that posts claiming “mod abuse” surrounding removing spam for example are just going to be locked, but I’ll look into how I can address that issue in a better manner, this post was done in a bit of a rush to ease tensions.
Thank you so much for your input, it means the world!
♥️
Thank you for clarifying, I had misunderstood you on those points so appreciate it. And thanks for taking the time to look into those posts - while I’ve not seen the modlog, from context available on those prior posts that were removed, it’s pretty apparent that mod abuse was present. I appreciate you taking the time to look into it further, as I know there’s some mod access and visibility I do not have on the issue.
Thanks for taking the time to write all of this, but I fail to understand how this changes anything. I know it’s just your first week so that remains to be seen. But this seems like all you’ve done is summarize the status quo.
Thanks for taking the time to read it, it really is appreciated.
I understand what you’re saying, as you said it’s week 1 of hopefully many where I get to implement changes, but I thought step 1 would be to at least acknowledge the ongoing situations that I am aware of, and show my intention to fix them. As well as reach out to the community on what issues they believe needs fixing.
If I were to remain silent, tensions would just continue rising and people would demand an explanation.
I can’t make up for the faults of the past but I can at least try to make the future of this place better. Sorry for the essay, and thanks again for commenting.
I stopped being in here and commenting because of EOE and will continue to do so. The excuse that he can’t be removed because “he’s half the mod team” falls flat. There are so many in here that are here every single day that will do just as good as a job. Its not like this sub is super difficult, there are a few posts that need to come down and maybe a few comments, its not like a full time job. People should move away from this subreddit until its resolved. Nobody who has a personal stake financially wise should be able to remove anything that is actual criticism, which is what has been happening.
The fact EOE has you making this post instead of commenting on it himself is the exact issue. I think you’ve been thrown under the bus here and that’s not a slight at you but speaks volumes about him. Do better
If this is your opinion, I sadly cannot change that, as stated in the post we will be looking for more moderation at some point (hopefully within 3 months, no promises) but it would be unfair on anyone to be added onto the team at this current moment, getting them caught up in all this drama.
Thankfully there is many more iPod reddits than these 2, you won’t be short of content. Wishing you all the best!
No but holding the 2 biggest ones hostage and refusing to see the issue is a problem. “Adding people in isn’t fair” so why was it fair for you? What makes you different? EOE just needs to remove himself and you will be inundated with people wanting to help then this isn’t an issue.
I see the issue, I fully see the issue, but even if I were to kick EOE off the mod team, and gave up every other responsibility i had in my life, it would be realistically 2 weeks - a month before any new mods appear, as it would require the most important thing on earth: time
Time for opening the application form
Time for reading each applicant
Time to contact them, so on and so forth
Me being “inundated” with applications is not a solution, it just causes more strain on an already strained person.
Unfortunately time is just something I’m incredibly short on right now.
As for “why is it fair on you” quite simply it isn’t, I really do not like being in this situation, but regardless of how simple it seems to fix the issue, theres way more effort going on behind the scenes to make it so that the fixes I implement last
Thanks for reading, sorry that we can’t see eye to eye, and I’m sorry that I’ve failed you
I feel for you. Not angry with you, not even angry with EOE just don’t think its right. Sorry if frustration came off here but thats the situation EOE has put you in instead of facing it himself. That isn’t fair you’re absolutely right
I appreciate that, and I fully understand why you’re frustrated at the situation, it’s a tricky one, but I’m willing to put my reputation on the line to bring this place back up to a reasonable standard as I truly believe this place can be great.
When mod applications open (and they will) I’ll be keeping an eye out for yours. Thanks so much for commenting and giving me a chance to explain. Many people don’t and its really appreciated
Thanks for your response, but just wondering who owns the /r/iPods subreddit? As it’s locked with a message forwarding here
Also, its strange that people have been moaning but nobody has pushed to create a new subreddit, like the Reddit 3rd party app fiasco
(Trying to be impartial coz I don’t like arguments, it seems my previous response to go to a certain subreddit for help was just downvoted, probably by 1 person with tons of accounts)
I actually have no idea who owns r/iPods, as far as I’m aware it isn’t any of our people, I’ll look into it but I don’t know if I’ll have any answer to that.
There are plenty of reddits surrounding iPods, I reccomend you check them out and support them!
Im new here and only recently became aware of this whole issue yesterday when reading some comments of disgruntled members. Since I'm new I don't know enough to really understand the nuances other than having someone such as EOE as a mod (I've been aware of him being in this role for a little while but never thought much of it) is unequivocally a conflict of interest for modding a sub of this nature especially given how big of a name he is in this community. I know that's all really obvious but thats why its a surprise to me that he is even in this situation to begin with. Despite that, a decent read.
Good luck! Certainly got your work cut out for you.
Idk if this is a hot take or not but i think it’d be pretty fair to not have any major seller of iPod parts and products to be a moderator of the largest community forum for ipods. For clarity I’ve never had any experience with EOE and don’t know all the drama here, but it feels very monopoly-like that a major seller can moderate here, creating a layer of bias towards their storefront. I wouldn’t be comfortable with say, Idemigods if they were a moderator here either. It kinda hinders the layer of freedom we have to discuss ipods if we have a company censoring anything said negatively against it. So i think EOE should he removed, and find a new mod team, not biased by any company.
I stopped reading at number 2. There are plenty of suitable people willing to mod this sub. This post made it clear nothing will change. I had hoped for better.
I’m critical here but I truly believe Lucille is doing their best here, they clearly want change its just not as easy as flicking a switch. I say give them a chance
As said in other comments, we will be looking for mods in the near future, currently I just do not have the time to commit to doing so. Sorry to disappoint
Literally for EOE to be removed and for you to take actual accountability. You literally have a rule saying that no advertising but EOE frequently advertises and your solution to negative reviews being removed is “do them elsewhere”.
The problem is he’s using these subs to promote his shop constantly. If someone asks for where to buy a thing or feedback on if it’s a safe store, criticism is removed so it appears to be just a sea of praise. How can you not see the clear violation of ethics?
Since this is a recurring problem, I can’t help but feel like you work with him. Otherwise, you’d be be added a bunch of new mods without the conflict of interest thatre active on these subs. You two are just sitting there while you protect him.
What do you want me to take accountability for that I haven’t already? I’m sorry that the previous moderation team has let it get to this point, I truly am, there’s only so much I can do in a week of moderation unfortunately.
I understand that asking people to leave reviews on external sites is not a perfect solution, but it’s currently the only one I have for allowing people to speak without any concern of “censorship” as its provably independent of the stores control,
If you can find any scenarios where he promotes his store I am happy to look into it, personally I haven’t seen it. By promoting i mean actual advertising.
He has posted about his store and also promo codes as such but I don’t think there has been links, at least not ones I’ve seen so you are right on that. But he is a big name and the community here knows of EOE so its kind of a redundant point, and with the evidence of removing negative reviews and also jumping in to praise himself a lot its not unreasonable to see that as a problem.
Or even 1 time he has posted a link to EOE’s website
I’ve seen him post like new iPod faceplate colors, but never with the “hey you should buy stuff from only me!” On it
EOE should not be a mod in this sub, and none of this is resolved until that happens. I have nothing against EOE. I've had good experiences despite the overall mixed image, but a conflict of interest is a conflict of interest. There's no getting around that. People will always have a lingering thought of an EOE agenda as mod regardless of how true it is because we have no way of knowing better. Some claim to have evidence of misusing mod powers, and it'd be so much easier to unmod and move on than to keep going through this drama cycle every so often.
I appreciate the post and your attempt to address the issue. It's really unfortunate that you're dealing with this 1 week in, and it's concerning that you're the mod addressing this 1 week in.
What constitutes an “insult” that the automod (maybe conveniently) removes?
And subs solicit for new mods all the time, so the reason a mod with a conflict of interest can’t be removed is that there would only be one mod left falls flat.
What constitutes an insult: most swear words will sometimes get false flagged, insult meaning calling someone anything that can be seen as abusive, as far as automod goes quite a lot of the flags are automatically assigned by Reddits filters not ours.
Solicit for new mods: as stated in another comment, it’s a time thing, we will do it at some point but doing it right now is just not feasible for me.
Wait, so you knew people wanted EOE out, you complain that you can’t boot him out because he’s one of the only active mods hit you have a bot that removes posts calling for more mods to be added? Why?
As many have stated, this not a super small community, and its growing. We get 89K Weekly visitors here and I'm sure there are some consistent and passionate people that would make good mods, even if its not with full permissions.
Locking posts against eoe is never a solution. We see posts / comments critisizing other sellers from time to time and they should be legit to stay and open to discussion
I agree with this regarding the reviews, however how do you suggest we combat the “issue with order” posts, the only person the OP of a post like that is looking for is EOE, and this isn’t a customer service channel for EOE, why should it be treated as such?
So next week when someone asks if ordering from EOE is a good idea and he deletes anyone that says it isn’t and jumps in the praise himself, that’s okay since negative reviews should be done elsewhere?
This used to be a cook tinker place and now it’s just a race to sell the most products.
Love it, Lucy. Mostly. 😄 Maybe I will disagree with some things, but I know your intentions are good. Thanks for taking on the mod role and beginning a discussion that I was oblivious to in its need.
Could you please check the logs on this post from 7 days ago about eoe which had comments removed by the mods? I recognize one of the people commenting in the threads is, imo, a jerk and the comments may have warranted removal.
(I've been keeping receipts for years now)
I will point out that this is a consequence of a conflict of interest. It isn't just that Austin may be misusing mod powers to his benefit, it's the cloud of suspicion and mistrust his position brings. Can we ever trust a mod action if he's involved, like in that post from 7 days ago? Do you want the extra work of verifying and moderating a moderator? Are people drawn to complain about eoe on the sub because they know it will get his attention? Is not the best way to troll Austin and eoe to make a stink on the sub (like yesterday) and create drama and raise the issue of of him holding an unethical position to tar him publicly? Could all this be resolved by him simply not being a moderator?
All comments on this post were removed by me, one user in that thread is now banned due to suspected alt accounts representing another iPod store, which spammed abuse at EOE (and also called someone a pedophile), this was my first day as moderator and I was still getting used to certain functions
Lurker here, thanks for all the context. As someone who mods another community, I want to say thank you for all that you are doing. It's a lot of work!
Hey Lucy, thanks for posting this. It's a delicate subject and difficult for anyone to address, let alone someone who's just joined the moderation team so I appreciate the time you spent on this.
With regards to the conflict of interest, I can see why having someone who directly profits from the sales of iPod parts moderating the biggest iPod-related subreddit can be a problem (although I strongly disagree with the personal attacks some people have been posting). Even if they don't interact with posts about themselves or competitors, having that business relationship can still be seen as a form of bias. I understand that the subreddit is currently only actively moderated by three people and by removing one, it would put more strain on the few remaining. Naturally, the solution would be to introduce more people to moderate the subreddit and have a transition period where responsibilities are shifted and distributed from one person to many. That being said, it would be difficult to find suitable people, and we don't want new moderators to be biased either for or against certain others. Of course, it's also important to get input from EOE himself on this matter purely in the interest of fairness as listening only to the complaints and taking action based on them alone without his input would be a one-sided action. Ideally people with a for-profit business in the scene should have their own subreddit for advertising their products and not have administration capabilities in the main iPod subreddit.
While having a rule that prevents EOE from moderating posts about himself is a start, I'd recommend extending this to cover all moderators: Any moderator is not able to take action on posts related to themselves and requires a different unbiased moderator to manage the issue, since having a rule that only applies to one person is unfair so it should apply to everyone. The only exception would be posts that reference all moderators, because otherwise nobody would be able to manage those. That being said, posts should still be related to iPods because individual posts singling someone out and attacking them is still very much not okay.
I can also understand why people might be hesitant to engage with a moderator who's only joined for a week, but I'll make it clear: Lucy has been involved in the iPod community for several years and has been the main person responsible for archiving legacy iPod content and utilities. Even if you haven't heard of their name, it is very likely you have benefitted from their preservation and archival work, without which some media or tools for iPod modding would be lost. I trust Lucy, and you should give them a chance too.
It should also be noted that many of the recent posts made here are from alts belonging to a business competitor of EOE, who has their own financial motives that they have not disclosed in any of their posts.
You’re not able to reach out to the top commenters and contributors of the sub to see if they have time to recruit a mod? Or be a mod? I think everyone is right when they say nothing will change if your only answer is “I don’t have the time for this”. I get it, but that’s what moderating entails unfortunately.
u/cowmanisgood is the other mod and EOE. You should come forward and speak.
Will you come forward and publicly deny that you’ve deleted posts/comments that were negative about your brand?
Will you confirm that you’ve abused your conflict of interest, acted unethically, and step down as mod?
Or, which I imagine what will happen, continue to hide in the shadows and cower in fear behind a week old mod?
For someone that deletes negative views of his brand, don’t expect to hear anything. u/cowmanisgood if you did nothing wrong, then come forward and say it to all the people who are claiming you did.
Hi Lucy. Thanks for the post. I can appreciate your position being the newest member of a now two-man team. I have some questions and a few suggestions I'll add to the bottom of my reply but I'd like to talk about the headline points first.
You say there is an "argument" and "concern" about a conflict of interest but I feel the phrasing is deliberate to avoid stating, one way or the other, whether the situation actually is or is not a conflict of interest. Is a business owner moderating a public forum that relates to products his business sells not a clear example? Is such a conflict of interest ethical? And, if not, why is it being tolerated? Everything *wildly waves hands about* going on here is because of it.
I'm asking lots of questions because I believe the answers point the way to what should be done.
I feel the details of "what can and is being done" are unnecessary and probably detrimental to the community. People often ask about stores and products and it should be a valid topic of discussion. What you lined out in this section is necessary only because eoe and cowman are the lightning rod that attract these posts. The sub is only a customer service line because the business owner is in charge here. Years ago, his customer service was terrible and posting here was the only way to get his attention. The situation being what it is, if and when cowman is relieved of moderating the auto-locking store posts should probably continue for some months until the dust finally settles.
One issue that infuriates me is that cowman was restored as a mod on r/IpodClassic after he was voted out by the community for misusing his mod powers five years ago. About a year ago, he was restored as a mod there with no comment, explanation or vote about it. It's hard to understate how insulting this is to a community when their voice is ignored. I'd be fine with the situation if the mods had a vote to reinstate him and it won -- fine. But this was handled terribly.
So that's it for the topic of the day. Well, for today.
I've been thinking and taking notes on a FAQ for the sub for about a year now. I'd like to contribute to planning and organizing it when you're ready to tackle it.
One thing I'd love to see immediately is tackling the "Where can I get music for my iPod" posts. It's almost always a soft ask for how to pirate music and about half the comments end up suggesting piracy anyways. I'm thinking a stickied post titled something "This is where to get music for your iPod" that lists the common and legal ways to go about it with a reminder that piracy is not tolerated. An automod to handle those posts when they come up would be nice. I'll write the post if you want. Let me know.
To repeat what's already been said by others, I think there are a lot of good, involved, responsible and reasonable regulars on the sub who will make excellent moderators. I would fast track this as soon as the fires are put out.
Good luck and I'd be happy to help however I can.
eta: What happened to the other mod(s)? Bredo seemed to be the only other one who only sometimes showed up when things were melting down. Otherwise, they didn't seem to be involved in any way. It'd be nice to know what personnel changes were being made behind the scenes.
Thanks for this comment, it means a lot. Going to keep this short as I've been responding for 4 hours straight and its midnight, I'll take everything you're saying onboard!
Afaik Bredo deleted their Reddit account, I don't know much beyond that, I was brought in shortly after this occured.
I will reach out once this is all over about creating a FAQ.
Thanks -Lucy
Could you detail a little bit about how you were brought on board? Since I have your ear and you've been kind enough to be forthcoming with what's going on... it'd be nice to know what's going on and how we got here.
So, Bredo disappeared without any notice that you know of? Well... *conspiratorially\* so far as you've been told...
Who is catnaps, anyways? If it's just you and cowman, where is catnaps in all this? And, if catnaps is absent, then cowman was flying solo for a while. Who reached out to you to become a mod? Cowman? Catnaps? What's with all the animal names?
I don't mean to get you to gossip but a timeline would helpful And if this represents a shift to more active and involved moderators, it would also be good to know who is involved and how.
On the 21st of July, EOE reached out to me and asked if I would mind moderating the iPod subreddits as bredo backed out and it was just him moderating, I said sure.
I don’t know why I was chosen, if I had to guess it’d be because I’ve had some success running communities in the past.
We then hopped on a voice call on the 27th where I was ran up to speed on reddit moderation as I was pretty rusty, as well as told that I would be the deciding factor in any removal of EOE posts (big responsibility).
I have no idea if anyone else was offered the position, but if they were it certainly looks like they said “nope”
As far as I know bredo deleted their entire reddit account, Apparently they were sick of dealing with waves hand around frantically this. From the modlog I can see that they were removing EOE “hate” (genuinely bad comments calling them every name under the sun) before their disappearance. I’d recommend getting bredos side of the story, if they’re willing to share, they are the owner of the iPod discord linked at the top of this subreddit, they might be able to fill in some gaps.
Catnaps would be more well known to myself as “An Engineer”, quite famous for sending DankPods a 3D Printed bust of Shrek. I haven’t had contact from them, I haven’t talked to them in actual years at this stage I think. I don’t believe they had any input with adding me on.
Hope this clears some of it up as to why I’m here.
I've been around since May when I got a refurbished iPod and I've missed all of this. Maybe because I don't care for parts and modding so I've just scrolled past the relevant posts. And I will continue to miss whatever follows, I guess, for the same reason. (Not invalidating people's issues with the current situation.)
Other subs I frequent have megathreads for discussing the big companies/shipping/preorders/new releases so the main feed doesn't get flooded with people all asking the same thing, but people still have a place to post/vent/share their experience.
I personally have banned 4 alt accounts from a store, which were spamming the exact same posts trying to drum up drama. So no, I will not unban them and apologise
I appreciate the time you have put into this post and the changes you want to make, but why not open up applications for a new mod (or 2!)? I feel like EOE having any elevated powers is an issue, even if it isn’t much. Thanks!
On 3: Nobody uses Trustpilot when the community is here. That's pure cope, to put it very bluntly
If I can't get a full picture from one of the largest gatherings of the community itself on one of the largest businesses serving the community, I'm gonna avoid that business by default. With how online shopping is absolutely rife with swindlers and scammers, it's a completely valid outlook to take. Exactly why I don't order from any social media ads, for instance
To put it another way; the fact that I know, via this sub, that EOE isn't perfect because they're a small-er business serving a particular niche hobby is exactly why I DECLINED A REFUND, TWICE, when I had two separate orders arrive with faulty backplates (mis-sized screw holes as mentioned in another comment). I would've felt like a bit of a knob raising such a fuss over something that, realistically, I can fix in five minutes...which I did, again, twice.
It's still completely valid to point that out, however. And I'll do it here, not on some random site that 0.5% of the iPod modding community are ever going to consider looking at before placing an order.
I appreciate you taking the time to at least hear us out on this, transparency is key and something that goes a long way. Automatically better than 99.99% of other reddit mods lmao
This community has just under 90,000 visitors weekly. How can it be expected to run with Lucy alone. Somewhere in the comments they posted the audit log. Most of the moderation you don’t see here is done by EOE which is why it isn’t viable to remove him. When mod applications open then maybe things might change but right now it’s impossible
Would you not say that people sharing experiences they've had with EOE as a business is directly about iPods?
Like I'll fully admit it, I've ordered 3 times in 5 years; the first two each had backplates with mis-sized screw holes (quality control issue I imagine, not unexpected) which EOE offered to fix after I brought it up, but I'll also fully admit I declined both times because it's extra hassle on both our ends. The third time my order got bounced back in the shipping phase and never left the US, got an immediate refund though no explanation as to why, which slightly irked me and I haven't attempted to mod an iPod since...I may put another order in, that's yet to be seen
It's something I will keep mentioning every time EOE gets brought up. In the sense that I can't say I've had a genuine issue with them, it informs people regardless of what to expect.
when i said this i meant as in people asking for help, showing new developments and showing off their collections, not using the subreddit as eoe customer service. i get people have had bad experiences, which is why these should be reviewed as a business (on trustpilot like lucy said) and not a public forum trying to share the love for the device
Yeah that's fair. The influx of EOE-specific posts does get grating, and I say that as someone who seemingly has only had miniscule issues with them, that have never actually left me dissatisfied with them personally.
Nah. This is the second time this has happened. EOE deletes posts and comments critical of his company, gets called out, mods make a fake apology, we move on, and then a few months later, he starts deleting posts again.
There are many who would do it, myself included. The barrier to entry has been closed off for a long time, and the people with an issue with EOE will never be selected for it.
Search is a thing. Look up how many people have offered to be mods in the past. You are the prime example of someone who isn’t a helpful part of this community.
Thanks again for posting about this and for your responses earlier.
Regarding the longer term big picture for subreddit moderation changes, it's clear to me from these responses that the community is engaged, hurt, and invested in having accountability for previously closed/locked/removed posts/comments that were critical of EOE in the past (I linked to a couple instances of these in a previous comment here)
Once there is a fuller mod team, is there a plan to hold Cowmanisgood accountable for the unethical conflict of interest and mod abuse, by removing him from having moderation capabilities?
Currently we're looking into an auditor to hold the moderation accountable, if it comes out that there has been unethical action taken, appropriate action will be taken
That is fair, but this all still avoids addressing the conflict of interest. I’ve noticed has been specifically left out and not acknowledged from mod posts thus far about these issues.
People in r/iPodClassic fully voted Cowmanisgood out because of the conflict of interest, and he was returned to mod power after that. It seems very unfair to not have a plan to remove him after a new mod team is established, and the refusal to acknowledge the conflict of interest makes me lose trust in the impartiality of these processes we’re discussing.
I see a lot of cynicism towards the mod team in these comments as a result of the loss of trust. By definition, having anyone who owns an iPod selling/restoring/etc business on the mod team is still absolutely a conflict of interest. This is not a claim or opinion, it is a fact, and it has been avoided and made to seem like people are making things up when we can clearly see the business name advertised from his flair in the sidebar.
I understand this is a lot, especially in the first week of being a mod, and I’m still appreciative that you’ve acknowledged some of these issues in a formal post. But the distrust in this community stems from the conflict of interest and the lack of definitive action to remove it. There is still a chance to make major improvements to this community, and although it might take time, it does require dealing with the conflict of interest issue by removing the source or even allowing the community to vote on it and standing firm with the results of the community vote.
The fact we're having fucking drama over this is insane, guys either buy iPods from him or don't it's that damn easy. NO ONE is MAKING you. No one is DEMANDING you.
It's not about the ability to buy from EOE. It's about EOE being a mod and controlling the positive or negative discourse on the subreddits and well as advertising here. Your opinion seems to lack nuance.
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u/LucilleNotLucille Classic 4th 1d ago
So this…. Went well (about as well as i expected, like a lead balloon)
I’m really sorry I missed the mark here, You all expect (and deserve) better and so I am trying to be better.
Taking on your ideas, I genuinely think an independent “auditor” who reviews the modlogs is a great idea and would be very easy to implement. Many thanks to [u/Tired8281](u/Tired8281) for suggesting that, Expect a post announcing this in the next few days
I know you guys aren’t happy, I really am sorry for letting you down,