That would be spending time and resources to create a solution that per default wouldn't help AT ALL. The purpose of such functionality would be to punish people who create new accounts to troll. What do you think these people did before they created these new accounts, sit quietly and read and thinking 'this is not yet a forum i want to be a part of, not until i find a good way to troll it'?

Moderation is done in oh so many different ways in different communities, but to set a "this account is less usable than what you get if you create a new account instead" flag on accounts, only has one forseeable effect.

I personally think that the problem goes both ways on this forum. There are those who post fake threads and negativity just for the sake of it and then there are those who dump all over people with legitimate queries/complaints/questions.

All too often I've seen perfectly reasonable posters asking perfectly reasonable questions only to be labelled as troll and a backlash start up against them - which generates erroneous posting and excessively long threads.

I'm frankly put off from asking things or airing my views about Nokia or the N900 due to the sort of response I've seen others get. I'm sick to death of seeing the words "troll" or "whining" being slapped on people which is just as bad for the community as the supposed "troll" may have been in the first place. The other really awful thing I keep seeing is people who clearly don't speak English as well as others being pounced on and insulted and trashed over a simple matter of wording, or even the different ways in which people use English in different parts of the world. There is a sad lack of tolerance and understanding in this community and it is the poorer for it. As for the infernal snarky "let me google that for you" links that people post... good grief! It IS still easier to post nothing than to post those!!!!!

How about an extension to the thanks system to make it meaningful and useful in a moderation system. Instead of just thanks, have:

• Thumbs Up (same as current thanks)
• Thumbs Down (simply an inverse of thanks, but as its own measure, not just a deduction from thanks)
• Off Topic (to report just that)
• Abusive or SPAM (again, to report just that)

The first two measures could allow people to gauge whether someone is a nuisance poster. They in combination with the last two could be used with a bit of simple maths to automatically alert moderators to problem posts, users and threads. It's hardly a new idea but I've seen it work well in other places and it could help the community to moderate itself here too.

why has everyone been thanked on this thread????

Report should open a sub menu with Spam, Flaming, Trolling in it, then you'd choose the closest match (for example, off topic would go under spam). I like the thumbs up/down idea, but only if thumbs down doesn't hide the post

Some of the forum avoidance is due to juvenile behavior here, sure, but some is due to MeeGo and uncertainty around Maemo.

As for your proposed handling methods... that's a little severe for simple "noise" threads and posts. Nuking should be reserved for outright spam and trolling IMO. I do agree there should be a very visible warning-to-banning escalation process though.

I think moving 'Off Topic' from the active topics is a very good idea,

less noise more productivity...

BTW. I like Trolls, they keep people of my bridge.

It definitely shouldn't hide the post, unless a moderator chooses to do so for whatever reason. I've seen this done in various ways and indeed implemented it for clients' sites - my favoured approach is to use some sort of gradient in colour/saturation/lightness/opacity so that the more a thread/post gets marked as thumbs down/off topic/whatever, the less distinct it becomes on the page (whilst maintaining readability even at the the highest/lowest extremes). It can be very useful to have that sort of visual cue to indicate the quality of the post / poster and works against "troll" catchers as well as the "trolls" themselves!

indeed, Randy.
I've relativated my proposal afterwards. It was too drastic.
I've seen that kind of moderation in another forum, but that was a community with just some "leaders" and many, many lurkers (actually a warez forum).
This kind of moderation wouldn't be suitable for our community because here nearly everyone have something useful to say.
But here are so many awesome ideas. I personally like the "fade-out" idea. I'm sure it would provide easier focus on relevant posts.
Also the fact, that everyone can vote (and therefore moderate) helps greatly the work of the moderators.