Click here for full Community Standards and Participation Guidelines
Questions about the moderation team
Q: Who moderates content on this site?
A: The community team is responsible for moderation services on the World Justice News website. There is a small pool of dedicated moderators appointed by World Justice News, rotating duties and coverage across all community areas.
Q: How do I become a moderator?
A: When a Community Moderator position becomes available the appointments are made by invitation only. If you would like to be considered for a Moderator position on the World Justice News website, you can write to adminn@worldjusticenews.com giving reasons why you feel you would make a suitable Moderator and would make a good addition to the Moderation Team.
Q: Do you or would you appoint moderators who already belong to the World Justice News community?
A: We welcome applications from anyone with the relevant skills and experience. Itās definitely useful to have previous experience of participating in online communities & social media themselves, since that can help them to understand some of the motivations and social situations which can occur in online discussions.
Q: Do you appoint moderators with a specific political or religious bias?
A: No. Moderators are not appointed on the basis of any affiliation, and are required to enforce the community standards neutrally and consistently across the site, whatever their personal perspectives.
Although they sometimes need to make decisions which may be unpopular, their actions should not be interpreted as being revealing of pro- or anti- leanings apart from pro-[our community standards] and anti-[behaviour which goes against them].
Q: What hours do the moderators work?
A: We donāt publish specific hours of operation, but there is moderation coverage throughout the day and overnight, seven days a week. Obviously, some times are busier and some periods have more cover than others, so we ask community members to be understanding if we donāt always manage to deal with things straight away.
Q: Who moderates the moderators? Do moderators work for the editor of a particular blog or part of the site?
A: The majority of our moderators are part of the World Justice News website central Community Team. The team take part in regular discussions with Editorial and Administration staff to discuss any issues that have arisen.
Moderation decisions are sometimes taken after consulting with editors who have specialist knowledge about particular subject areas.
We ask all article authors to report potential problems in participation areas. A moderator will then make a decision based on the usual criteria. Authors donāt moderate their own content.
Q: I have a complaint about moderation, how do I escalate it?
A: Unfortunately, we canāt enter into correspondence regarding specific moderation activity, although all correspondence will be read. If you have suggestions or questions about any aspect of moderation and community participation on the World Justice News website, you can write to admin@worldjusticenews.com
Questions about editorial and community approach
Q: Why is it possible to comment on some articles but not others?
A: We welcome and encourage debate and interaction around content we publish, both on our site (via comments) and off it (via Twitter, etc). In general we want to open comments up on articles wherever possible.
Comments will generally not be open on content which is sensitive for legal reasons (e.g. where thereās a high risk of libel or contempt), or sometimes for editorial reasons (e.g. announcements of deaths, stories about particularly divisive or emotional issues). In addition, where a number of threads are already open on a specific topic or story, we will try to keep commenting to a single thread, to make it easier for people to find and follow the topic conversation.
There are always exceptions to both these generalisations, of course!
In short, where comments are likely to add value (for us and other readers) in terms of additional insight, perspective or knowledge, and where we have time and resource to be involved in the conversation, we try to ensure commenting is turned on.
Q: Is there anything that I canāt say in my comments?
A: We ask everyone interacting on the World Justice News website to abide by our community standards and participation guidelines. These set out clearly the main behavioural and social norms for the site, but in general we want this to continue to be a safe place for stimulating discussion about issues and we welcome community participation which supports and extends this. Contributions which are deliberately offensive, off-topic or otherwise troll-like are likely to be dealt with in line with these community guidelines. Please be careful about deciding to add personal information such as contact details to your comments: remember this is a public conversation.
Q: What do you count as āpersonal attacks (on authors, other users or any individual)ā?
A: Exactly what you might imagine. The main things we want to avoid are (but are not limited to) vicious or persistent name-calling or accusatory comments; comments which attack the individual rather than the argument or the position; abusive or defamatory phrases (epithets, especially those attached to religious, sexual, racial, gender or ethnic contexts); extreme or contextually-inappropriate profanity directed at an individual; and ad hominem arguments (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem).
In other words, comment on the content, not on the contributor.
Q: Why are comments on some articles closed after a few days?
A: The main reason is that we want to ensure conversations are relevant and topical, which makes sense considering so much of what we publish on the site is related to or inspired by contemporaneous events. In order to keep conversations fresh, we generally close them after a couple of days, or whenever the conversation strays too wildly off topic. This also enables us to be more effectively involved in all current conversations, because weāre not spread so thinly.
Q: Will my comments be moderated?
A: All community interaction is subject to some level of moderation, in order to ensure the spirit of the community standards is upheld. In general, we post-moderate community interaction, which keeps the conversation lively. However, because of the sheer quantity involved this unfortunately means we canāt guarantee all comments live on the site are appropriate or in the spirit of the community standards.
While the World Justice News website staff try to keep an eye on all community activity, we rely on our users to report abusive, offensive or otherwise inappropriate comments when they appear by clicking on the āreport abuseā link which appears next to each comment. This alerts us to problems and areas of concern to the community, which means we can make the space better for everyone: weāre grateful for your help with this.
Q: Will authors reply to my comments?
A: We encourage authors to participate in the discussions sparked off by their articles, when feasible. Obviously, for various reasons, this isnāt always possible. But remember that the World Justice News website staff (including moderators) do regularly spend time in the community areas of the site and will ensure that any particularly interesting/funny/insightful comments are highlighted to the author.
Q: What control do authors have on comments?
A: None. Authors canāt moderate comments on their own (or anyone elseās) articles. If an author wants a particular comment removed, they need to make a complaint via the report link (as above) and it will be assessed by the moderation team in due course and dealt with accordingly. The moderators work closely with editorial staff to determine and maintain an appropriate, context-specific community environment, informed and supported by the sitewide community standards.
Q: Can I have multiple usernames?
A: No. Our terms of use clearly state that users should not maliciously create additional registration accounts for the purpose of abusing the functionality of the site, or other users, nor seek to pass themselves off as another user.
Setting up and using multiple usernames to try to fool people or subvert the moderation of the site will lead to a users account being banned completely.
Our moderators do keep an eye out for multiple usernames and will ban them when they spot them.
Q: Can I link to my own blog?
A: We encourage contributors to the World Justice News website to include links to content which is revealing, relevant, informative and/or provides more background or context about a particular perspective, situation or topic. That means itās OK to link to specific posts on your own blog when itās appropriate, given the guidelines above.
However, regular linking to any site without providing context or adding value to the conversation (e.g. at the end of every comment) will probably look a lot like spamming, and may cause comments to be deleted and may also lead to your account being banned completely.
Q: Who owns the copyright of comments I have posted?
A: This is covered in point (6) of the the World Justice News website Terms and Conditions which states that by posting any text on the site you are agreeing to āgrant us a non-exclusive, perpetual, royalty-free, worldwide licence to republish any material you submit to us in any format, including without limitation print and electronic formatā
Q: What is defined as off-topic?
A: Off-topic refers to contributions which are not related to the specific matter under discussion. Obviously, this is contextually-flexible; sometimes conversations are wide-ranging, and so more things can be perceived to be appropriate, topical and relevant. In other cases, off-topic relates to the general subject area of a particular series or section. While itās always possible to introduce new topics into a conversation, they should at least bear some relevance to the primary discussion. Contributions will be perceived as off-topic if they veer substantively and wildly from the current conversation topic, either as an attempt to derail the conversation or as completely irrelevant.
Questions about moderation process & activity
Q: Why do you have moderation on this site? Isnāt it in opposition to the idea of free speech? Donāt you see the hypocrisy in your censorship?
A: Of course it would be lovely if we didnāt need to have anyone looking out for the quality of conversation on the site. But the fact is we have a responsibility to maintain the quality of content which appears on our site and so we have a team to monitor and manage community participation.
The aim of moderation is not censorship, but ensuring that the community participation areas of the site remain appropriate, intelligent and lawful.
Q: Why donāt you allow discussion of moderation in comment threads?
A: Because then the conversation could be derailed into talking about moderation rather than the established or initial topic.
If you have suggestions or questions about any aspect of moderation and community participation on the World Justice News website, you can write to admin@worldjusticenews.com
We occasionally create threads specifically to discuss moderation, but even then, we wonāt discuss specific situations, cases or decisions in public, because we feel thatās inappropriate.
Q: Why was my comment removed?
A: Comments are removed by moderators if they go against the Community Standards & Participation Guidelines, which every participant on the site is bound by.
Q: Why donāt moderators just remove the bit of a comment which is objectionable, rather than deleting the whole thing? It seems a bit heavy handed!
A: Because moderators arenāt editors. Participants should bear in mind that even if only one little bit (or line, or paragraph) of a comment is problematic, the whole comment will be removed. This is partly to avoid moderators editing your contribution to remove the offending bit (which might inadvertently change the meaning) but also to encourage contributors to think carefully before posting.
Q: My comment didnāt break any rules ā why was it removed?
A: In some cases, comments may have to be removed if they quote from or refer explicitly to an earlier comment which fell foul of the Community Standards.
For example, a comment which says āI canāt believe you said XXXXXX. I completely disagree!ā where XXXXXX is an offensive, legally problematic or otherwise abusive statement, means that this comment just repeats it and so also needs to be removed.
Please try and avoid perpetuating issues by referring to them!
Q: How would I know if a comment was removed?
A: Comments deleted from our interactive chat are logged but you will not be informed unless we feel it necessary. When comments are removed by moderators from articles, we will try to leave a marker to say that something has been removed.
Q: Why are comments being removed with no marker left in place?
A: Exceptions to the marker rule occur when moderators remove duplicate posts, spam, or sometimes, when a comment or post is removed, it has been necessary to delete subsequent messages which refer to explicitly or quote from the original (removed) comment, in order to preserve some notion of conversational thread. In such cases not every deletion will be marked individually, as this then clutters the comments.
If your comment has disappeared with no marker left, itās generally because it was referring to an earlier comment that has been moderated.
Comments about moderation will usually be treated in this manner, as they usually refer to moderation thatās taken place up thread.
Q: Why donāt you give a public reason for removing a comment? It would at least give a clue to why something had been deleted.
A: Unfortunately we donāt have the facility or resources to do this at the moment. In most cases, a comment author should be able to easily determine what the problem might have been by consulting the Community Standards.
Q: How do moderators decide what stays and what goes?
A: Moderators use the Community Standards as the basis for any moderation decision, combined with the context of the conversation, as well as reports and complaints from the community. In cases which are open to interpretation or arenāt clear-cut, we may err on the side of caution but we try not to be heavy-handed.
Naturally, with any human-powered system, mistakes can be made. Having a clear policy and regularly reviewing moderation processes helps to keep these to a minimum, but there will inevitably be some that slip through. Weāre sorry if this happens: we are working to improve the consistency of moderation across the whole site.
Itās worth noting that this isnāt the same as differences of interpretation, which are an universal side-effect of any text-based communication, but something that everyone – moderators, authors and users – have to contend with. The vast majority of decisions made by the moderation team are sound and therefore we ask our community to support the authority of these decisions, even if you donāt necessarily agree with every single one of them.
Q: Do you pre or post-moderate comment threads?
A: We reactively or post-moderate nearly all comment threads, which means that comments generally appear on the site before theyāve been seen by the moderation team. This is different from other community sites you may be used to, and can have the effect that comments appear on the site which may later be removed.
The only exceptions to this are certain special series or articles which may contain extremely sensitive content. In these cases, all comments are pre-moderated before appearing on the site.
Itās important to bear in mind that the ability to post a comment doesnāt mean itās automatically OK: we reserve the right to remove comments at any time which do not appear to be in the spirit of our community standards & participation guidelines.
Q: When I post a comment, it says that my comments are being pre-moderated ā what does that mean? Does that apply to everyone in the conversation?
A: There is a further exception to the overall reactive-moderation approach adopted by the World Justice News website: in isolated situations, a particular user may be identified as a risk, based on a pattern of behaviour (e.g. spam, trolling, repeated/frequent borderline abuse), so a temporary filter can be applied to anything they post, which means that their comments will need to be pre-moderated before appearing on the site.
This is a temporary measure applied by moderators to a very small handful of people based entirely on patterns of actual behaviour, and should result relatively quickly in either their posting ability being suspended completely if no improvement is shown, or the filter being removed. The decision to do either of these things would, again, be based on that userās behaviour and activity during the pre-moderation period.
Q: How do I know my account has been placed on pre-mod or Iāve been banned?
A: If your account has been placed in pre-moderation, any comments you post wonāt appear on the site immediately, but will be reviewed by a moderator first. When you post a comment, a message will indicate that your comment is awaiting moderation.
If your account has been banned from participating in the community areas of the site, you will not be able to post a comment at all: the functionality is removed from the page altogether.
Q: Iāve spotted a bad comment. Why hasnāt it been removed?
Q: Iāve spotted a problem – how do I report something as abusive?
Q: Why hasnāt [user name] been banned for what he/she said?
Q: How come [one comment] was removed, while [another one] is still on the site?
A: Our moderators work in two main ways: keeping an eye on conversations across the site in a general fashion and responding to abuse reports made by community members and other visitors to the site.
Weād like to do more of the former, but at any moment there can be many active conversations taking place and needing to be monitored on the site. So unfortunately, we donāt see every problematic comment or abusive user straight away, and in some cases we might not spot such issues for a while.
Because of this, we also rely on our users to report abusive, offensive or otherwise inappropriate comments when they spot them, by clicking on the āreport abuseā link which appears next to each comment. These abuse reports then go into a notification queue to be dealt with by the duty moderators.
Donāt rely on someone else to tell us about an issue if you spot one: it only takes a moment to send a report.
Q: If you click on āReport Abuseā is the comment automatically deleted?
A: No. When you click on āReport Abuseā the comment goes into a report queue to be viewed by a duty moderator, who will then judge whether it contravenes the community standards.
We never remove a comment just because itās been reported, even if itās been reported dozens of times. However, itās worth noting that the more abuse reports something gets, the higher it appears in the report priority queue, and so weāll probably get to see it sooner.
Q: It seems like youāre asking users to do your job for you by reporting problems. Why should we?
A: We believe that when all those involved in a community – hosts and members, creators and contributors – feel and take responsibility for maintaining an appropriate and stimulating environment, the debate itself is improved and all those involved benefit. We work hard to make and keep the environment constructive and convivial but we need your help to do so.
Q: Why donāt you leave bad comments up and let the community decide whether they were bad or not?
A: We actually only take down a very small percentage of comments left by users and of those, there may be a variety of reasons for removal.
In some cases, items are removed for legal reasons, so it wouldnāt make sense to leave them up in public. In most other cases, when comments have been removed because they are offensive, abusive or threatening, we feel that the overall community and editorial experience would suffer (not to mention flame-wars would be prolonged even further) if they were left up.
For that reason, if a comment is perceived to be in violation of our community standards, we remove it from the site entirely.
Q: Why donāt you just take down comments that pose legal problems, and let the community deal with everything else? If we could all see when people are being nonsensical or otherwise troublesome, that would help us argue against their positions from an informed perspective.
A: While itās easy to imagine that the majority of contributors to the World Justice News website conversations would give short shrift to anyone coming to the site in order to troll authors, abuse other commenters, post racist, sexist or homophobic remarks, or otherwise āact outā, unfortunately, experience has demonstrated that disruptive commenters can derail, negatively impact or wreck conversations despite everyoneās best efforts.
An important part of the moderatorsā work on the World Justice News website is to strive to make the community a welcoming forum for enlightened debate, and at times this will involve removing comments, but these removals will always be in line with the community standards.
Q: Can you tell me why my comment was deleted?
Q: Can you tell me why another posterās comment was deleted?
A: The answer is probably that something you posted was perceived to contravene the Community Standards, which govern the activity of everyone who contributes to this site.
Sorry, but lack of available resource means weāre not in a position to discuss specific moderator actions or queries about deletions.
Q: Why am I unable to comment on this article?
A: You need to be logged in to post comments, so that could be it, though you are usually prompted to log in if for some reason youāve been signed out.
We also close comment threads automatically after a particular period (this time limit is dependent on the section of the site: some conversations go on longer than others).
If the comment thread is still open and you are logged in, but still cannot post, you may have been barred from participating because of acting against the community standards.
Q: Why do you close comment threads? Why not just leave them open?
A: Closing comment threads after theyāve been open for a while (depending on section of site: see above) means that the conversations are kept relatively fresh and contemporaneous. It also makes it easier for our staff (both article authors and moderators) to keep an eye on conversations, which means theyāre more likely to be able to participate, answer questions or effectively deal with any issues which may arise, depending on their role.
We occasionally close comment threads earlier than usual, due to scheduled tech work – a warning will be posted in advance, when possible. In some areas, we regularly have no option but to close threads earlier than anticipated when the conversation has ranged far off topic or descended into a messy flame war. Whenever possible, weāll post a warning of early closure in these circumstances. We realise that this is not ideal (and we donāt like doing it) but weāre working towards a future in which this wonāt be necessary. In the meantime, we appreciate your patience when this does happen.
Q: Iāve been banned from the site! Why?
Q: Why has [username] been banned?
A: We donāt like removing peopleās ability to comment on our content, but in some cases when a pattern of abusive, trolling or offensive behaviour is demonstrated, certain users can be banned from using the site.
We hope this doesnāt seem heavy-handed, but we sometimes have to make decisions to block some users in order to improve the overall experience for everyone else.
Q: If Iāve been banned, can I come back if I say Iām sorry?
A: A user can be reinstated if the moderation team are confident that he or she understands the cause of their suspension, agrees to abide by the siteās community standards and will be able to contribute reasonably and sociably to the conversation in future. In such cases, itās normal for the user to have a short trial period with limited functionality, before being returned to full user privileges.
Q: Why donāt you remove comments containing bad language?
A: We do remove some particularly strong uses of bad language, but on the whole we allow swearing in comments since we donāt want to impose a double standard on commenters: our writers are permitted to swear in articles. We will remove swearing when it is directed towards other community members in an abusive fashion, or if it is gratuitously offensive.
Q: How do I know if my comment is legally risky?
A: Legal issues that apply to editorial content on the World Justice News website will also often apply to comments posted in discussions. These may include libel and defamation, privacy and breach of confidence, contempt of court and copyright violations, among other things. If you want to read up on media law, you might start here or here.
It is not safe to assume that you are avoiding legal risk because you are quoting material already published elsewhere, are only linking to problematic material rather than quoting it, or are hedging claims by saying āallegedlyā. Remember to think carefully about how you present claims you make, and whether they are supported by reliable and reputable sources. Generally it is better to express things as your own personal opinion and avoid statements of fact. But please also bear in mind that moderators may have to take a precautionary approach to comments that appear risky: we canāt test every comment in a court of law.
Questions about community functionality:
Q: How do I add my own comments to an article?
A: At the bottom of most current pages on which commenting is enabled, there is a text-entry field above a button labelled āPost your commentā.
There is a limit to how much you can say, so choose your words carefully. Note: you will need to have javascript turned on in your browser to be able to post and read community comments.
Q: Can I refer World Justice News website content to social platforms like Facebook and Twitter, or bookmarking sites such as Digg, Delicious or Reddit?
A: Absolutely! At the top and bottom of every article youāll find a suite of other icons which enable you to do various things to the article, including print, email, share and clip it. Using the āshareā icon, you can submit the article to a range of popular social bookmarking sites, while the āclipā icon pops the article in your personal World Justice News website clippings file. Facebook and Twitter links (with number of shares) are at the top of each article.
Q: Can I edit my comments?
A:Itās not possible to edit comments left on other areas of the site, which is why we ask you to think carefully before you post.
Annoying as it may be to submit a carefully thought-out comment only to notice a glaring typo moments later, the problems with allowing comments to be edited would greatly outweigh the benefits.
Q: What HTML can be used?
A: In some interactive bits of the site (commenting articles), it is possible to use limited HTML within comment fields. At present, these are:
Link: <a href=”website address”>Link text</a>
Bold: <b></b>
Italic: <i></i>
Blockquote: <blockquote></blockquote>
In all these examples, text should be inserted between the tags. For example: <b>this</b> will produce this result on the page.
Formatting buttons are provided above the comment entry field to help.
Q: What is a user profile?
A: A user profile is where you can add some basic personal information, like location or interests, to help people understand the wider context of your contributions. If you are under 16, we recommend that you do not add personal data.
Q: Can I make my profile private?
A:You canāt make your profile private, but you can, of course, choose not to fill in any of the personal details there.
Q: Why do you ask for a real name on the profile?
A: We want to promote a culture of trust within our community interaction areas, and sometimes usernames can be a bit anonymous or mysterious and difficult to properly engage with.
Sometimes being anonymous is a good thing (and of course you still have that option) but if you want to add a name to your profile (might be first name, real name or what you might like to be known as) it can help others to treat you as a real person, and not just a weird username.
Q: Iām worried about identity theft. Doesnāt a World Justice News website profile create a risk?
A: No. The personal information posted on your profile isnāt very personal – every field is optional, and you can be as vague as you like (e.g. Location could be āUKā rather than āKingās Cross, Londonā). If you put your birth date in, it isnāt ever revealed on the site, but your age is calculated from this information and displayed. There is no requirement to enter your real birthdate – in fact, some community members might welcome the opportunity to knock a few years off…
Q: Is it possible to send a message privately to another user?
A: The interactive chat does have a personal message (pm) facility. However, settings can be made not to receive messages from anonymous people. Some people who comment on articles may not have registered for the interactive chat facility. We will never pass on your email address or other details to a third party nor will we act as a 3rd party in contacting someone on your behalf or in them responding to you.
Q: Is it possible to search for user content?
A: No.
Q: What does the āshareā link do?
A: āShareā allows you to send content objects – comments, stories, galleries and so on – to friends, or to a social bookmarking and recommendation application like Digg, del.icio.us or Reddit.
Q: Why do you have avatars?
A: We think itās useful for people to be able to represent themselves visually as well as verbally online. We also hope that being able to see a bit of the person behind the comment will help users to treat each other more considerately.
Q: Can I change my avatar?
A: You can pick an avatar (and enter or edit details on your profile) by clicking on the āedit profileā link from your profile page. There is a list of standard avatars to choose from or you can upload your own image to be used for your avatar.
Q: How do I upload an avatar picture
A: Click on your username in any conversation youāve participated in, or on the āyour profileā link at the top of every page on the World Justice News website. On the left hand side of the page, underneath your name, there should be a square avatar picture (it may be the default grey one) followed by a link which says āEdit my profileā. When you click on this link, youāll be able to select from a range of colourful avatar designs, or upload your own: just follow the instructions on the page. Donāt forget to save your profile afterwards.
Q: What are the technical specifications of the avatar file?
A: When you upload your image, itās automatically transformed to the different sizes which are used on the website. The main size used is 60×60 pixels square. With this in mind, we suggest that you that you use a JPG, GIF, BMP or PNG image less than 700k or 500×500 pixels in size. Smaller/larger dimensions are OK, but they may not look very good on the site when theyāve been cropped and shrunk to the appropriate size. That means that if you upload an image thatās smaller than 60×60 pixels, it will probably look weird. We donāt process transparancy in a GIF or a PNG so itās best to stick to JPGs.
Q: When will my new avatar show up?
A: Your avatar should show up immediately a page is refreshed.
Q: What happens if my new avatar is rejected?
A: If an image is considered unsuitable or contains what is considered to be spam, your avatar will be reset to the default (grey) image. You can always try using a different image.
Q: What kind of image should I use for an avatar?
A: We hope that avatars reflect the real people who make up the community of users on the World Justice News website, so using a picture of yourself is an obvious start. Some people may choose an image which represents but doesnāt directly depict them (e.g. a cropped picture of their eyes), or which says something about their background, perspective, values or interests (for example, a particular colour or symbol like a leaf, flag or a team crest).
We ask users to be respectful of copyright when selecting an image to use as an avatar (most images on the web are subject to copyright restrictions), and to ensure they have permission to use the image they choose – for both those reasons, itās much better/easier to use one of your own images, where possible. We wonāt accept any images which depict children or appear to be imitating another individual, or which otherwise fall foul of our existing community standards governing taste and decency, violence or illegal acts, and incitement or intent to cause offence.
Q: Can I use an animated gif for my avatar?
A: No. Theyāre too distracting on the page.
Q: How do I complain about someone elseās avatar?
A: If you see an avatar which you think infringes copyright or is otherwise unsuitable, but which may have slipped through, you can alert the moderation team by clicking the āreport abuseā link on each userās profile (which you can get to by clicking on their username link). Just tell us what you think the problem is (the more specific the better) and weāll take a look.
Q: Why are avatars so big?
A: The design of the avatars and comment layout is always being reviewed, but for launch, we wanted to make user avatars the same size as the author profile pic at the top of an article page – 60×60 pixels. In addition, weāve been slightly constrained by the system weāve used to implement this change, and the alternative was having avatar images so small you couldnāt tell what was on them. We decided slightly bigger was slightly better, overall.