Discourse moderation and privacy

Discourse overview

Moderation

There are moderators but by default moderation will be off for new posts and replies in all categories (except Announcements).

On Discourse there aren't separate moderators for each forum; instead there is just one set of moderators.

Note: in addition to Moderators, there are higher-powered Admin users who can change all site settings. "Admin" and "Moderators" are called "Staff" in Discourse parlance.

Behind the scenes, Discourse also has 5 trust levels; we're not really using those. By default all users are on level 1 and post messages and replies. In exceptional circumstances, a user can be put onto level 0 by moderators, which means any posts must be approved. This might happen if the user's account has been hacked for example.

Contacting the moderators

There is a private discussion category for the Discourse Moderators.

Anyone can send messages to the moderators by emailing discoursereplies + discoursemods @ ilovefreegle.org (squish). Moderator replies on the topic do NOT go to the sender, so they must contact the sender separately to answer.

Note that Discourse admins can see all messages in the "Discourse Mods" category.

Currently there is also a private "Staff" category for admins and moderators, but this may not be needed.

Privacy

The Discourse discussions forums will only be visible to Freegle volunteers with a ModTools account. This will be quite a few people, so please don't share anything confidential.

Please try not to share personal details of Freegle users on the forums - for example use their numeric user id rather than email address to identify them. Do not share personal details outside of the forum.

Your email address and the groups you moderate will be visible in Discourse to other volunteers.

Private messages could be enabled; however admins would be able to see all these messages; to avoid confusion, private messages are therefore disabled. Categories and groups for particular users or sub-groups could also be set up; however these are best avoided as any admin users would be able to see messages.

In accordance with our general Terms and Volunteer Agreement we will not pass on your email to anyone else.

Freegle will not use adverts on Discourse.

Special Notice Announcements

The central mods can send out a special notice by posting a topic to the Announcements category. If you are in Mailing List Mode or watching this category then you will be notified. You cannot reply to these messages. You can switch off these notifications in your Preferences.

Note that there is only one Announcements category, so there aren't per-category special notices.