You were expecting MetaJesus perhaps? While, according to Hunter, MetaJesus is the "personal MetaSavior of MetaDiaries on MetaKos", MetaMoses is the MetaProphet and MetaRule giver for the Israel Palestine threads. Which is why he has so many occasions to moan.
MetaMoses already has delivered the word from on high for behavior in the Orange Land. Those revered words apply just as much in the I/P threads as elsewhere on the site. The people's disregard for those basic community norms when MetaMoses was busy elsewhere made him so upset when he found out that he dropped a tablet (he was even more upset when the tablet hit his foot. MetaMoses no longer supposes his toeses are roses. He just has more reasons for moaning, not to mention saying some words that cannot appear in diary titles). So MetaMoses will summarize the most important of those norms here to make it easier (don't expect the Christian Right to get these posted in your local courthouse; you'll only find them here):
This is Daily Kos, Kos' Blog But you can have some other blogs besides this. Not only are you welcomed, nay encouraged, to list your favorite sites – including your own blog – in your blogroll, you are advised that the best place to pimp your blog is in your signature line.
Remember the purpose of this site
This is a Democratic blog, a partisan blog. One that recognizes that Democrats run from left to right on the ideological spectrum, and yet we're all still in this fight together. We happily embrace centrists like NDN's Simon Rosenberg and Howard Dean, conservatives like Martin Frost and Brad Carson, and liberals like John Kerry and Barack Obama. Liberal? Yeah, we're around here and we're proud. But it's not a liberal blog. It's a Democratic blog with one goal in mind: electoral victory. And since we haven't gotten any of that from the current crew, we're one more thing: a reform blog. The battle for the party is not an ideological battle. It's one between establishment and anti-establishment factions. And as I've said a million times, the status quo is untenable
and keep to it mostly,
This site is primarily a Democratic site, with a heavy emphasis on progressive politics. It is not intended for Republicans, or conservatives. It is not intended for third parties, either, although it happens that the goals of progressive third parties and progressive Democrats tend to align in mutually beneficial ways. The community, however, is currently self-selected to be a moderate-left, progressive, and almost exclusively Democratic site. That's who Kos tends to focus on; that's the kind of people he chooses as guest editorialists for his site; that's who the site caters to.
This is not a site to debate conservative talking points. There are other sites for that. This is not a site for conservatives and progressives to meet and discuss their differences. There are other sites for that, too. This is not a site for discussing how to create a third party. Knock yourself out bitching about the Democrats, but the stated goals of the site are trying to fix them, as a party, not dismantle them.
This is a site for progressive Democrats. Conservative debaters are not welcome simply because the efforts here are to define and build a progressive infrastructure, and conservatives can't help with that. There is, yes, the danger of the echo chamber, but a bigger danger is becoming simply a corner bar where everything is debated, nothing is decided, and the argument is considered the goal. The argument, however, is not the goal, here. This is an explicitly partisan site: the goal is an actual infrastructure, and actual results. Put simply, we aren't here as a fully representative slice of the world, we're here as a place for progressive Democrats to hang their hats and get things done.
Do not stealother people's words or work:
Copying and pasting complete copyrighted articles without permission from the copyright holder is absolutely prohibited by both this site's policies and copyright laws. Copyright infringement can expose both you and the site's owners to financial liability. Just don't do it. And if you see someone else doing it, please politely ask them to edit their diary accordingly. This is a bannable offense.
Limited copying within the bounds of the doctrine of "fair use" is permitted. A reasonable rule-of-thumb is that copying three paragraphs from a normal-length news article or editorial is acceptable. (This, however, is not a safe-harbor. If even three paragraphs seems like "too much," then copy less or nothing at all.) For more on fair use, please visit this site.
When you quote material that is not your own, please provide a link whenever possible. Also, use the blockquote tags to set off the copied material so that your writing is distinct from the material you are copying. For more on HTML tags, see the #Formatting section.
Do not make up your own rules for any images you’re cravin’(Since the site can only handle 2-D images currently, graven images are not an issue, much to MetaMoses' relief):
Another common thing to do is put an image into a diary or comment. Before you do this, please stop and think for a moment. Pictures require much more in the way of network resources than text. Big pictures make life difficult for people without fast net connections. Keep your pictures small, and only use them when it really adds something to the point you want to make. That said, there are three steps that need to be followed to insert a picture into a diary or comment:
Putting the image on the web
The first step is to put the image on an approved Web image hosting provider. This is required: you are not allowed to directly link to images from news media, personal sites, or others. This requirement prevents those sites from suffering large bandwidth fees if not being taken offline due to the enormous traffic Daily Kos can cause for them.
The approved image hosting services are currently:
http://www.photobucket.com
http://www.imageshack.us
http://flickr.com
http://smugmug.com
http://webshots.com
http://picturetrail.com
http://mac.com
http://allyoucanupload.com
...
Linking the image
Once you have the image on the web, you need to link it into your diary or comment. There are two ways to do so; linking and hotlinking. Linking an image means that in the text of the diary/comment, the reader will see a URL; clicking on that URL will open the picture. Hotlinking, by contrast, will cause the image to show up alongside the text, without the reader needing to click on a hyperlink. Hotlinking can result in significant loads on whatever server is holding the image; pure linking is to be preferred whenever possible.
...
Formatting the image
The final step in image insertion is to format the picture. The most important formatting issue is the size of a picture; many pictures have a lot of pixels, and if they appear in a post at full size, they can fill the window and screw up the rest of the page's formatting. For large pictures, you can specify a "width" field when you are putting in an image.
...
Embedding YouTube Video
...
When embedding a video, it's a good idea to give at least a short recap or summary of what's in the clip; not everybody can easily play embedded video.
Do not enable falsehoods: this is the reality-based community (stick with the facts and be prepared to back 'em up)
Diarists are strongly encouraged to back up all assertions with facts (and preferably links to supporting materials) whenever possible. Use reputable sources whenever possible. If you can't find a reputable source that supports your position, then perhaps reconsider writing your diary.
As a corollary, diarists should always make it clear when they are expressing an opinion - please do not assert opinions as facts, as this tends to be needlessly inflammatory.
Diaries which engage in wild speculation without any proof are strongly discouraged. Repeatedly posting diaries consisting largely or entirely of wild speculation is an abuse of site policy. Bear in mind that that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
The rule for posting such diaries is "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". The more extreme the claim, the higher the burden of proof that commenters will demand. If you can't provide evidence to back up your claim, it is best not to post the diary. This guideline also applies to recommending extraordinary-claims diaries. If a diary makes an extreme claim with little or no evidence to back up that claim, it shouldn't be recommended, no matter what that claim is.
Do not smear (no character assassination of individuals or groups):
Diaries which contain hateful or defamatory writing are prohibited.
...
"Calling out" other site users by name in diary titles is prohibited. Diaries which "call out" another by name tend to needlessly inflame. If you feel compelled to address another user's comments or diaries in a diary of your own, please do so cautiously. Avoid ad hominems and stick with substantive, constructive criticism only.
Personal attacks are strongly discouraged. If you disagree with what someone is saying, express your disagreement, but don't go directly after the other person.
Do not use this blog’s space to inflame:
Diaries which are deliberately designed to inflame are prohibited.
Deliberately inflammatory titles, or titles which contain attacks, are prohibited. Also, while this site doesn't prohibit profanity, please think very carefully before using any curse words in a diary title. ...
Do not use ALL CAPS or exclamation marks !!! in diary titles.
Honor good comments with mojo
Any registered user can rate comments in a diary. Buttons to give these ratings are at the bottom of each comment. For regular users, comments can be recommended; trusted users can recommend or troll-rate comments. The number of ratings that your comments gather, and their average value, determines your comment mojo. Mojo is used primarily for determining whether a user has trusted user status. So, when is each rating appropriate? Much virtual ink has been wasted in arguments, but the following is generally accepted:
Troll rating: Comments whose only purpose is to disrupt the discussion. Do not troll-rate posts simply because you disagree with what the commenter is saying. Any given user can give out a maximum of five troll-ratings per day.
Recommend: Good comment. Also usually a shorthand for 'I agree', or also 'good job'. Most ratings given out tend to be recommends.
Note that there isn't a rating for 'I disagree'. If you disagree with something in a comment, post a reply saying so (and why).
If you wish to remove a rating that you gave to a comment, simply click the recommend or troll-rate button a second time.
Comments can be given ratings for 24 hours; after this point, ratings cannot be given or removed from the comment.
And you may live long and prosper in Orange Land:
If a user gathers enough comment mojo, they become a Trusted User. The exact amount of mojo required, and any other requirements, are not publicly known to prevent people from gaming the system. Trusted Users have a few additional privileges compared to regular users. A regular user can recommend comments; a TU can also give troll ratings. If a comment gets enough troll ratings, it becomes hidden to regular users (also see the trolls section below). TUs can, if they wish, see the hidden comments. TUs thus have the responsibility of deciding whether comments should be hidden or not. In addition, TUs can edit and remove tags from diaries; regular users can only add new tags. There are two easy ways to tell if you are a TU. First is to look at the Tools sidebar; if there is an entry reading 'Hidden Comments', you are a TU. The other way is to try to rate a comment; if there is a 'Troll' button next to the 'Recommend' button, you are a TU.
One of the factors that goes into determination of TU status is time. If a user stops commenting, or their comments stops getting recommends, eventually that user will lose TU status. This can be easily remedied, by posting more comments that meet with the approval of the readership community.
Do not be trollish (Don't let blog-wreckers adulterate the site's purpose and community)
Trolling is a sad reality of internet life. Most trolls tend to be blatant, posting comments or diaries that are clearly intended to provoke an angry response. Other trollish messages are posted simply to disrupt the conversation in a diary. Directly replying to the content of a trollish message is usually a waste of time; trolls tend not to be interested in actual debate. There are two methods in wide use to help keep the community as troll-free as possible. The first is troll-rating comments. Trusted Users (see above) can give comments a rating of troll. If a comment has been rated by two or more users, and there are more troll ratings than recommends, then that comment (and all replies to it) are automatically hidden. Hidden comments and their responses can only be seen by Trusted Users. Unfortunately, there is no similar mechanism for hiding trollish diaries. Instead of writing detailed rebuttals of whatever claims or argument the troll is making, the standard response to a troll diary is to post comments containing recipes for tasty dishes. Plenty of examples can be found in the Troll Diary tag. An entire cookbook of recipes has been collected and is being sold as a fundraiser.
...
Some posters create accounts at dkos strictly for the purpose of causing disruption. It is considered acceptable to troll rate all of the posts made by such people, even the ones that are not in and of themselves trollish. It should be emphasized, however, that this should not be done lightly. Before rating comments en-masse, you should be very very sure that the author is really a troll, and not just a regular poster who is having a bad day. If there is any shadow of a doubt as to whether a person is a dedicated troll, you should refrain from mass-troll-rating their comments.
Trolling, defined, is not simply disagreeing with your opinion or the collective site opinion. It is engaging in behavior which is directly contrary to the stated goals of the site -- furthering the progressive Democratic agenda. There are a number of things which very clearly constitute "trolling", and which should be troll rated (and therefore deleted from the conversation) quite legitimately.
"Democrates suk" or any of the other derivations of true trolling by those of enfeebled brain. Don't argue, just zap them. More on this in a bit.
Advertisements or other thread spamming. Zero them out. Especially if a user is posting the same comment to multiple threads. The cause may be just; the behavior isn't.
Off-topic posts. There's entire threads devoted to being off-topic: the Open Threads. In other conversations, it is rude to interrupt a diary or story conversation with your own unrelated "threadjacking".
Proven-false information, conspiracy theories, or debunked talking points.
Personal attacks on other site users, including following them from thread to thread.
Attempting to "out" the personal information of other site users. This isn't just trolling, but is expressly forbidden and will almost certainly result in immediate banning.
What all these things have in common is that they represent content that is irrelevant to the thread, or intentionally disruptive of the goals of the conversation, or seek to poison the atmosphere in which conversation can take place at all. That is trolling.
Of course, the line between passionate disagreement and trolling isn't always that easy to see, of course, and the grief lies in the details. Here's some additional guidelines for those wide gray areas.
Don't judge a poster based solely on how long they've been here. Conversely, though, if you've only been here a short time and insist on making your very first conversations hostile, contrary and insulting, don't expect people to be generous enough with their time to "get to know" you. They'll just rightly conclude you're an ass.
Language is not generally policed here, in terms of "shit", "fuck", or any of those other terribly uncivil words. There are times when a little creative incivility is much needed. Sexist or racist language, however, is not welcome. (And, I hate to sound like a politically-correct obsessed liberal, but as a general rule, ableism, classism, homophobia, transphobia, and other such mindsets, are generally seen as not too cool as well.)
Don't post recipes or pictures or other retaliatory humor if it's going to disrupt an otherwise informative thread. If it's a bona fide troll diary, knock yourself out, otherwise, it's best to ignore the attempt to derail the thread, not assist the effort.
Don't have long off-topic conversations accusing someone of being a troll. If it's not patently obvious to most comers, then they are NOT trolls. And if you're following the rules and rating the posts and not the poster, the question of whether someone is or is not a "real" troll shouldn't come up. Judge them based on their actions -- don't disrupt entire threads worrying about whether or not they might disrupt threads themselves. I mean, geez...
If you're the only one troll rating something, and most other people aren't, you might have your calibration off. If you're troll rating a user who has been here since the early days of Internet cavemen, you might also have your calibration off.
If you find everything you say being troll rated in a certain thread -- and it's more than one person doing it -- stop commenting. You're only digging your hole deeper, people aren't suddenly going to start treating you better the more inflammatory you get. Take it as a very direct sign that you need to step back and reevaluate how you're talking to people.
If someone has clearly been unfairly troll rated, you can use a 'recommend' to unhide a troll rated thread: but think about it before you do it. It takes only one "recommend" to unhide a comment hidden by three troll ratings, and you're essentially vouching on your honor that you think the comment is not trollworthy. If you thwart responsible troll raters by rating threads up that quite clearly should be hidden according to the guidelines of the site, e.g. consistently act as an accomplice for a true troll, you may find your own ratings abilities removed.
Annoyingly, there's been an accepted practice of returning a retaliatory troll rating on someone in an argument who is very, very clearly abusing the ratings rules themselves. In that this is a nice Darwinian pressure that tends to remove overactive troll raters from the Trusted User pool themselves, I... can't see fit to argue with it. If the troll rater is quite clearly breaking the rules as laid out themselves, it is generally accepted practice. But breaking the rules to punish someone for breaking the rules is a dangerous game, and one likely to backfire on you. Be warned.
Once it gets into an all-out ratings war on a thread, most of us simply stop reading the thread; it's ruined, as far as useful information goes. But I and other frontpagers certainly tend to keep aware of who gets into these arguments most often.
Retaliatory troll-ratings -- troll rating someone simply because they troll rated you -- is forbidden. Period. Do it with frequency and you stand the chance of getting your rating ability taken away.
Autoban
If enough of a user's comments are hidden, the site will automatically ban that user. Banning means that a user can no longer post diaries or comments, or give out recommends. The exact algorithm for determining how many comments are enough to trigger autoban is not publicly known. Kos has, however, stated that the determining factor is the number of comments that are troll-rated, not the number of troll-rates that each individual comment receives. In other words, once a comment has entered the Hidden Comments section, additional troll-rates have no effect. Since Trusted Users are limited in the number of troll-rates they can issue per day, it is recommended that they refrain from "piling on" additional troll-rates to an already-hidden comment.
Do not come back -- neither as Blue Sky Cop, nor as shergald, nor as a sockpuppet for any other banned user.
A sock puppet is an additional account of an existing member pretending to be a separate user. This may be used to mimic community support in an argument or for acting without consequence to one's 'main' account. It is considered dishonest, trollish behavior.
At The Daily Kos the term 'sock puppet' is also commonly applied to non-authorized accounts of previously banned users.
Identifying a Sock Puppet
Typically, the user has more knowledge than would be expected of a newcomer regarding the site's methods, rules, and community members; takes part in similar discussions and has mostly same opinions as the user's main account; and sometimes has an account name similar to those of other suspected sock puppets.
Penalties for Sock Puppetry
Though there is no officially articulated penalty for 'Sock Puppetry', there are many recorded instances of banning for the offense.
If you are banned as a user for any reason, the only court of appeal is Markos himself. Banned users posting using an account not authorized by Markos are subject to repeated, continued banning. It is the user, not the account, that is being penalized.
Banned Users. Here's one more important tip. When someone is banned from the site, they've been banned for a reason. In 90% of the cases, it's because of behavior: they've proven to be so disruptive in conversations that it's just not worth whatever contribution they think they're making to the site. Banning people is a decision that rests entirely with Kos, although the frontpagers will frequently give their own opinions or bring particular disruptive posters to his attention.
The thing about it is this: banning is permanent. You don't get to come back under a different name. Many people try, and are surprised when their accounts are again yanked pretty much as soon as someone bothers to look for them. If you've been banned, go to a different site and contribute there instead.
We are all guests here (each other's guests, if you want to think of it like that), and behaving respectfully towards other posters is not optional. Arguing is fine, even verbal slapfights are fine, but at the end of the day, if a poster is doing nothing but fighting, they're wasting their time, and your time, and my time, and distracting from the efforts to contribute things of actual substance and value here. Kos has made it quite clear, over the years, that babysitting incessant whiners is not among his top priorities for the site.
As they say, the rest is commentary. However, because of the nature of conflicts within I/P diaries, they need a few extra guidelines. Most of these guidelines are derived from information in supplementary Meta diaries.
MetaMoshe is tired of plunging into the moshpit to break up fights. Last time he went in there someone mashed his foot --it's a sensitive subject. So MetaMoses is proposing some strong MetaSuggestions:
I. It’s not all about you. It’s not all about Armando (if it ever was). It’s not even all about Kos (well, that’s what he claims at least). It’s about a community with a common goal of Democratic reform and electoral success. While there is plenty of room for individuality (you really are not required to wear rabid lamb suits), some basic respect for the rest of the community is expected. Diva attitude, like "You Suck. Now Read Me, Bitches!" makes MetaJesus cry:
Truly, nothing is more endearing than spending entire posts on your own website decrying how much DailyKos sucks, and how nobody should ever go to DailyKos, then crossposting everything else you write at DailyKos...
There's nothing wrong with criticizing DailyKos, mind you. It's a huge community, with many members that personally suck -- don't try to hide it. I know. But if you're going to spend time on your site specifically telling people to not come to our site, then post a continual stream of crossposts on our site linking people to your site, MetaJesus reserves the right to wonder if your brain is on straight. ...
II. This is not your bulletin board. You are more than welcome to cross-post entries from your own blog or the writings of others (with permission). But don’t rush away. At worst, you might be accused of drive-by trolling.. At minimum, you could miss some great conversation
... [B]e around to respond to commenters in your diary. Unless you have a good reason to be absent (and it's good form to inform your readers then), it is the right thing to reply to at least some of the comments in the thread, especially direct questions, and to uprate the more thoughful posters. As a bonus, replying to the early comments improves the appearance of "dynamism" of your thread in the diary list (a diary with lots of comments must be interesting).
III. Don’t be repetitive. Folks on I/P threads can have long memories. Check out not only the recent diaries list for the topic of the last 20 diaries, but the Israel and Palestine tags for the topics of the past few days. If there was a 700+ comment diary on that subject a few days ago, consider whether your diary brings anything new to the conversation. If someone wrote an in depth analysis of the subject yesterday, don’t post a BREAKING diary today. If you already posted what you consider the definitive word on the subject three months ago, don’t repost the exact same diary today, even if it is relevant to current events.
IV. Watch your sources. Some sources, like Wayne Madsen, Capitol Hill Blue, Jason Leopold, or Lyndon LaRouche, have been designated as out of bounds for the reality-based community. Beyond those sources, in the I/P diaries care needs to be taken to avoid sources originating from conspiracy sites, neo-nazi sites or right-wing organizations. Some news sources, like Ha’aretz or the BBC, are considered generally reliable by all sides at Daily Kos. Other sites or organizations may be considered biased by one side or the other; the diarist who uses these sources should be prepared to justify them. However, the poster only should be expected to defend the source itself, not six-degrees of separation from it. Since a large portion of the flame wars are over the legitimacy of sources, coming to some consensus over which ones are acceptable and which are out of bounds can reduce the heat in I/P threads.
V. Isolate various flamewars. Don’t let flamewars spread from one diary topic into others. Posters who attempt to turn other clearly unrelated diaries into I/P diaries are being trollish. Likewise, some other topics which have created flaming bunny diaries in the past are unwelcome in I/P threads. For example, the I/P threads have enough challenges in negotiating the differences between various faiths in the region; so please don’t bring in the atheist/theist flamewars.
VI. Write about what matters to you (and don’t demand that others write about it instead of what they are writing). Hearing "Issue X is a Distraction From Issue Y, Damnit!" makes MetaJesus cry:
It is inevitable that, for any given issue, there will be a large percentage of the population that is convinced that the issue was planned and executed in advance in order to sneakily divert attention from the real issue, which is slinking by on the righthand portion of your monitor that is just out of view of human vision.
...
The point is that if Issue Y is your most important issue, and you think people are spending too much time on Issue X, MetaJesus commands you to write compelling articles about Issue Y yourself, because clearly everyone else is an idiot who managed to get their fingers stuck between their keyboard keys, and are frantically dialing 9-1-1 with their tongues.
Come to think of it, if nobody else is writing about the same topic you are, on any given day, it probably means they're trapped by their keyboards, so you should probably call 911. Or call upon MetaJesus, who, if He has finished his Diet Pepsi, will free them.
VII. Don't lead an underaged diary (under 21) astray. The commentary in I/P diaries can go on for days and days; there usually is plenty of time to ask the diarist other questions. Since the last 20 diaries that have been posted are shown on the recent diaries list on the front page, if a diary is taken off-topic while it can still be seen by casual visitors to the site, it should be considered threadjacked.
VIII. Don’t abuse the ratings. The site standards have been set out clearly. It is already troll-ratable to smear other users (likudnik, Israel-hater). It is already troll-ratable to make unsubstantiated allegations (CAMERA plant, IDF shill) . It is already troll-ratable to make racist remarks (Arabs only understand force, The Jews control the government). Apply them consistently:
My one argument with the Troll Hunters is that it really shouldn't be about "hunting" trolls, it should be about enforcing basic site standards: see the above general definitions of trolling. If you do that, the trolls will be quite apparent without making a scene about it. So stop calling it Troll Hunting, for starters.
My one argument with the anti-Troll Hunter crowd is that determining the cutoff point beyond which a stated post or opinion is so offensive as to be unworthy of the site is a delegated responsibility of the users of this site. It just is, and it is sometimes a very difficult judgment. You can argue that people are doing it to aggressively, but don't argue that it shouldn't be done. We have certain community standards here, and we require those standards to be enforced, and it requires personal judgments.
As any thread about certain topics can attest, we are in no current danger of becoming an echo chamber. Nor are we in danger of being overrun by anyone. So leave the venom out of it.
IX. Don’t whine. Some issues should be taken directly to the admins and to them alone. For example, it is inappropriate for users to allege that random new diarists are sockpuppets and that anyone who gives them mojo is engaging in ratings abuse; such accusations only confuse other newbies and lurkers and hijack the diary’s comments sections with arguments over whether the diarist is really a sockpuppet and whether random users have the authority to make that judgement. Only admins have the authority to declare a user a sockpuppet. Other bannable offenses, like Tag Abuse, also should be taken directly to the admins. Most other issues should be taken to admins only after a sincere effort has been made to settle differences among users.
X. Say what you mean and mean what you say: no hyperbole, insinuation, mocking or humor in I/P diaries. If what you say can be misinterpreted, assume that it will. MetaMusa is not amused; some might suggest that he is aged and brutally humorless.
Finally, MetaMoses makes a request. Rather than making the I/P threads hostile and confusing for lurkers, could regulars try to make the basics of these conversations more accessible for newbies? Specifically could some I/P regulars from different perspectives actually cooperate to improve the dkosopedia entry on Israel? We need to write clearly about those subjects on which we agree, classic anti-Semitism and legitimate and illegitimate sources, and subjects on which we cannot agree -- standards and other sources whose merits we should be prepared to defend. In addition, a glossary of some of the standard vocabulary and shorthand on the I/P threads is needed. The dKosopedia should be a more useful resource on basic vocabulary and sources in I/P threads so that newbies can at least follow the conversations, if not join in.
MetaMoses is tired of dropping tablets lately -- the kind of tablets that go plop, plop, fizz, fizz. All of this worrying is giving him an ulcer, which is another reason to moan. Can't a MetaProphet get any rest already! Meta Moses is going to go put his feet up.
Disclaimer: Yea, verily, these decrees from MetaMoses are not to be confused with the Ten MetaCommandments which have been set forth by MetaJesus; even though there was a proviso that the Ten MetaCommandments are subject to change.