Comment or notification on posts silently edited or deleted by mods

1st Official Post

    I'm sorry to bring negativity in here, and maybe I just get overreactive with these kinds of things, but can the mods here please consider making it a policy to at least add a comment line or notification when they go editing or deleting users' posts? I have had several of my posts silently edited by mods, or outright deleted, and when my words are redacted with no notification to me or reason given for why it was done, it's honestly pretty irritating. One of these was the thread on creating terrain heightmaps which clearly turned out to be quite popular. The most recent case was a Dropbox link I gave out with the FSET source code to help the crew who is working on new tools for scenery geoconversion, which also got ninja-edited.

    If I had at least been notified or knew who the mod was that did this, then I could ask them why they edited the post, and I'd probably find out they thought I was giving out something I wasn't supposed to--in which case I could explain that the code was given freely and unconditionally by the original author for this very purpose. But since posts get edited here and nothing even shows it was done, I can't do anything about it.

    Also, there is something that really bothers me on a visceral level about having a post with my name on it, with my words, and then having those words partially deleted or changed, again without so much as a note on the post visible to other users that it was edited by a mod.

    I understand having rules in place and wanting to keep certain things out of your forums, but silent ninja-edits to our posts or outright deletions without any indication that it has happened starts to feel like blatant censorship. At the very least, this forum should have a visible notice that appears on posts that have been mod-edited like pretty much every other forum on the web.

    Agreed. Deletions I have learned to live with, annoying as they are, but silent edits are an absolute no go imho. That's really bad.

    I can understand that IPACS is trying to keep a positive vibe on this forum but there are limits.

    It's a pity the Aerofly FS 2 subforum on AVSIM isn't very alive: over there you can at least say what's on your mind without fear of wasting your time.

    To revise my post above and be more fair: I think there are visible notifications given when an entire thread or a post within the thread has been deleted. However, I don't recall ever seeing anything on those indicating why it was done, when done by a mod. Showing something was removed is good, but it sure would be nice if a few seconds were taken to at least say why it was done with a short comment line.

    However, when posts are ninja-edited by mods, it shows nothing... except that the post has been locked for further editing by you if you were the original author.

    Quote from qwerty42

    I think there are visible notifications given when an entire thread or a post within the thread has been deleted.

    That's not so. Last week a new topic of mine was removed (again), including at least one reply, and there was no notification, no personal message, no trace, no nothing. It was simply gone. You only see a visible notification if you edit or delete a post yourself. I asked about it on this forum and Jet-Pack, who btw wasn't the one who removed the topic, was so kind to tell me what could have been one of the reasons (it probably was because I mentioned Prepar3D). Obviously that topic has also been deleted without a notification.

    Of course IPACS has the right to do whatever it wants on their own forum. They want to keep it clean from negativity so possible new customers won't change their mind about Aerofly when they come here. It's understandable. You shouldn't regard this forum as a user forum: it's a company forum that is meant to advertise Aerofly FS 2 and to offer support. If you want to talk freely about Aerofly FS 2 you need to go elsewhere.

    Quote from J van E

    That's not so. Last week a new topic of mine was removed (again), including at least one reply, and there was no notification, no personal message, no trace, no nothing. It was simply gone.

    In that case I retract my attempt to be more fair... maybe they can ninja-edit a redaction into my post above for me :D In all seriousness though, I understand it's a company tool and promotional forum for them. And in general I think it's moderated well by a small team that already has better things to be doing. But, it's also by far the most active and best resource right now for this sim and any user development happening around it. Few things can sour an online community faster than iron-fist modding or not being transparent about it, and this one needs to thrive until other alternatives grow big enough to be useful. I don't think transparency via mod-comments on any deleted or edited posts is too much to ask, and every other good forum out there does this already.

    • Official Post

    We hardly delete any postings in this forum and very rarely we do modify them.

    If we do this, we have a reason for this and please understand we can't justify it all the time.

    The forum should be a good place for users to discuss things around Aerofly and to get help or feedback and as such we sometimes remove content to keep the forum readable to other users.