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threeplusfireI received a call from SixApart this afternoon. They have a new consumer support division, and their manager was returning one of my phone messages. I have to say, I do appreciate someone doing that. I know I would be scared as hell to call back upset customers in a situation like this. Gods only know what kind of verbal abuse might get unloaded on you.
She was very willing to discuss concerns with me. There was no answer to the question as why LJ Abuse said the offending image was deleted due to lack of artistic merit and LJ biz said it was kiddie porn. There was also no answer to the question about how it could be considered child porn if it was an illustration of a story in which the younger character was 22 years old. I tried a couple times, but couldn't get her to say something direct.
The most interesting thing she mentioned was that corporate has a fear that posting explicit standards wouold encourage people to post borderline child pornography. WTF? I totally don't get this. I replied that I felt users would be comfortable with exact standards and that a large part of the issue was vagueness and fear that images might or might not get people banned. Can anyone explain to me how posting standards of content will encourage people to post child porn? I don't know.
She did take full responsibility for the lack of communication of staff. That was a brave thing to do, and I appreciated that. She explained that she felt her staff had been working so much and having long hours on the issue beforehand, so she didn't want anyone to do anything without sleep and more information. She said she did have a big new collection of cat macros from reading comment pages all weekend. They do intend to have a better response time, and not leave users adrift for long periods in the future, which I think is a good step. We talked about the need for a degree of transparency in the practice. She did state that the group evaluting information does include several different types of people with different experience, which was good to know. It does include a couple volunteer workers.
The funniest part of the call was when she stated she wanted to reach out to leaders in fandom. I was thinking to myself "Oops, I am so totally a non-entity in fandom!" But maybe she was talking about my friends, who are much more awesome in fandom than me. Hah. But she talked a lot about wanting to make it clear that the team would not target populations, that they could only refer to the law as their guideline, etc.
So. I'm not completely satisfied. I still think there are huge, worrisome issues. I'm concerned we may never have stark, clear standards. I'm concerned that corporate interests may trump ours in the end. But I am appreciative that this employee did take thirty minutes to talk to me today. Since one of my big complaints was a total lack of customer service, that was a huge improvement. For someone who has to toe the corporate line, she did do a very good job of answering to the best of her ability and being sincere on the phone. One can only hope it is the first of more.
She was very willing to discuss concerns with me. There was no answer to the question as why LJ Abuse said the offending image was deleted due to lack of artistic merit and LJ biz said it was kiddie porn. There was also no answer to the question about how it could be considered child porn if it was an illustration of a story in which the younger character was 22 years old. I tried a couple times, but couldn't get her to say something direct.
The most interesting thing she mentioned was that corporate has a fear that posting explicit standards wouold encourage people to post borderline child pornography. WTF? I totally don't get this. I replied that I felt users would be comfortable with exact standards and that a large part of the issue was vagueness and fear that images might or might not get people banned. Can anyone explain to me how posting standards of content will encourage people to post child porn? I don't know.
She did take full responsibility for the lack of communication of staff. That was a brave thing to do, and I appreciated that. She explained that she felt her staff had been working so much and having long hours on the issue beforehand, so she didn't want anyone to do anything without sleep and more information. She said she did have a big new collection of cat macros from reading comment pages all weekend. They do intend to have a better response time, and not leave users adrift for long periods in the future, which I think is a good step. We talked about the need for a degree of transparency in the practice. She did state that the group evaluting information does include several different types of people with different experience, which was good to know. It does include a couple volunteer workers.
The funniest part of the call was when she stated she wanted to reach out to leaders in fandom. I was thinking to myself "Oops, I am so totally a non-entity in fandom!" But maybe she was talking about my friends, who are much more awesome in fandom than me. Hah. But she talked a lot about wanting to make it clear that the team would not target populations, that they could only refer to the law as their guideline, etc.
So. I'm not completely satisfied. I still think there are huge, worrisome issues. I'm concerned we may never have stark, clear standards. I'm concerned that corporate interests may trump ours in the end. But I am appreciative that this employee did take thirty minutes to talk to me today. Since one of my big complaints was a total lack of customer service, that was a huge improvement. For someone who has to toe the corporate line, she did do a very good job of answering to the best of her ability and being sincere on the phone. One can only hope it is the first of more.
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no subject
Date: 2007-08-08 09:15 pm (UTC)I believe it's a fear that posting precisely what's forbidden will encourage people to skate as close to the defined edge as they can possibly get away with, as opposed to their practicing a "When in doubt..." policy of erring on caution's side and not posting anything they fear might violate the standards. I'm not saying I applaud this thinking, I've just seen it before in other similar contexts.
no subject
Date: 2007-08-08 09:16 pm (UTC)Any sense of what the gender and sexual orientation make-up is of the evaluating group? And if they have an interest in having a fan representative who can help them translate things they don't understand (i.e., anime conventions that might cause characters to look young to non-anime fans)?
no subject
Date: 2007-08-08 09:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-08 10:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-08 10:04 pm (UTC)I'm confident there are a lot of very hard working, sincere employees at LJ/6A who are doing their best to follow the law, provide a safe environment for everyone, and keep it inclusive and respectful. Unfortunately, it's often hard to see them through corporate policies that make things complicated and difficult.
It makes me feel better to know someone called to at least try to address your concerns.
Skating in from somewhere I don't remember where...
Date: 2007-08-08 10:20 pm (UTC)It's nice to hear this person was willing to talk to you though. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-08-08 10:37 pm (UTC)I went hunting for cat macros in the posts, but 2.5 hours of reading comments, and I didn't find any :( ME=FAIL
no subject
Date: 2007-08-09 03:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-09 01:15 am (UTC)Wow.
Real customer service.
no subject
Date: 2007-08-09 02:01 am (UTC)http://community.livejournal.com/cat_macros/2466876.html
I'm not sure if this was one of the posted ones.
no subject
Date: 2007-08-09 04:07 am (UTC)I still think that they need to learn a lot about how the user base reacts: the spamming was kind of fun but it could have been almost completely avoided if they'd just posted a short message on Saturday saying, "look folks, we are reading, we are listening, but everyone is exhausted right now and we want to be awake enough to deal with your issues properly so we're going to post a response on X day". Most people would respect that, I think and they should really have known that after Strikethrough.
They seem to have a bit of a perfectionism problem too, with a whole lot of 'we were waiting until we knew exactly what to say' after the fact, when a far better response would be a timely, 'we're trying to work it out, please be patient because this is a big and complex issue'.
A lot of the anger is about this constant lack of communication and repeated breaking of promises; if you say you're going to post at X time then you really need to post at X time even if it's just another holding post. I believe that most people would be sympathetic, I for one can certainly see that this is a huge, contentious minefield for all concerned.
I also think it would be smart if they had informed people ahead of time with something along the lines of 'look, due to the political climate we're coming under increasing pressure and we're worried that we're going to get shut down completely so there are going to have to be some changes and here's what they're going to be." I can see why they might not want to give exact guidelines since being vague might give them a bit more protection under the law but there must be a way to balance individual and group needs. I think if they'd done this ahead of time, people would have been supportive and rallied round and the anger would have been focused where it really belongs, on those political groups who are trying to make things more repressive. They really need to be better at getting the users on their side.
I just don't know how many times they need to learn this lesson about communication before it sinks in but it's encouraging to hear that there's a new communications division since that suggests that they've been listening to all the calls for better customer support and PR.
I strongly suspect that there's a real internal problem going on, with branches of 6A/LJ not listening to each other or even actively overriding another. It's probably a really horrible place to work right now and I do feel sorry for the low level people who are probably copping most of the shit. I suspect that what's happening is that they're being hobbled from above or something similar. There does seem to be a huge amount of confusion, if the contradictory comments from various staff members are anything to go by.
"She said she did have a big new collection of cat macros from reading comment pages all weekend."
Ha, that made me laugh, I'm glad that someone at LJ got something useful out of it!
no subject
Date: 2007-08-09 05:46 am (UTC)Speaking as a customer service professional of (holy crap, it really is) two decades of experience, if the person you are speaking with is unable or unwilling to give sufficient answers to direct questions, thank them politely for their assistance and ask for their superior. Lather, rinse, repeat if the superior is equally incapable of addressing the question.
While I applaud this person at 6A for giving good phone, leaving customer questions unanswered is insufficient IMAO.
Hi everyone...
Date: 2007-08-10 06:54 am (UTC)It was scary. And I certainly feel like I'm in the spotlight, but I believe in nuttin’ up and well, here I am.
We do NOT take into consideration the sexual orientation of the people/characters in question. In fact I've NEVER been in/heard a conversation where that was a factor.
As far as the team that reviews content… it’s 50/50 male/female ratio.
Without getting into too much of my personal life (because really, who cares) I do have MANY (yes I'm 'old') years of experience in support, product management, etc. And I know first and foremost customer support means knowing your customer. And that's what I'm trying to do. I've been with Six Apart for two years, and while I've worn many hats, managing the LiveJournal Support/Abuse teams is a relatively new gig for me... and people it was by choice! gasp.
Anyway, I am listening to the comments and feedback. And I want to do the right thing for us as a company (we do have laws we have to abide by) but I'm also working on something that will hopefully make it fair for everyone. Just know that if we truly didn't want fandom I wouldn't be here.
I take full responsibility for the lack of response last weekend. I was scared of saying something that wasn't completely thought out and having to come back and say something different. But we all read every comment/thread almost real time over the entire weekend… so while you couldn’t see or hear us, we were there.
People, you're scary to talk to! LOL
I do want to reach out to community leaders. If it's not 'you' per se but maybe you have a spokesperson you want to throw my way... please do!
Let's work together. I think that's what we all want isn't it? Have a sandbox that's safe, fun and diverse.
Thanks for your time.
Rachel
Re: Hi everyone...
Date: 2007-08-10 01:41 pm (UTC)Sending email, but it may take a long time to compose.
Re: Hi everyone...
Date: 2007-08-10 02:08 pm (UTC)I look forward to it.
Re: Hi everyone...
Date: 2007-08-10 02:32 pm (UTC)