Questions tagged [moderator-faq]
Frequently Asked Questions relating to Stack Exchange moderators' roles and responsibilities.
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A guide to moderating chat
Chat is an offshoot of the main site, and using it is a privilege users earn early on during their time here. Chat is our place for:
Real-time collaboration
Meeting fellow members of the ...
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As a moderator, how do I handle a potentially inappropriate profile picture?
There are already at least a couple of questions (1, 2) about how to handle potentially inappropriate profile pictures, but the answer given in both cases (and other duplicates of those) essentially ...
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A guide to moderating comments
Commenting is one of the unsung heroes of Stack Exchange. The help center suggestions that you should submit a comment if you want to:
Request clarification from the author;
Leave constructive ...
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Why are there automatic moderator flags (autoflags) from the Community User, and what are they for?
Occasionally as a moderator I've noticed flags from the Community user. I've got a few questions:
Why do they exist?
What events trigger them?
How might moderators act on them?
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How do moderators update custom off-topic reasons for their site?
Now that the on-hold/close chane is live, how do site moderators update their off-topic reasons? Our list is rather sparse, and we are starting to get complaints questions about which to use.
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What should I do if a user posts sensitive information as part of a question or answer?
I've observed several incidents where users inadvertently posted detailed, sensitive information. For example, a Server Fault user who posted a question with working login credentials to his actual ...
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As a mod when should I vote to close content that is not flagged?
I know mods are supposed to step in to quickly close seriously problematic posts and otherwise allow the community to vote to close a post.
But what about when there are four close votes on a ...
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What does the "very low quality" flag mean in regard to answers?
What does it mean when an answer is flagged as "very low quality", and what are the common actions a moderator may take when handling this flag?
Return to FAQ Index
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Moderator Cheat Sheet
As an alternative to the other FAQ format being fleshed out here on Meta Stack Exchange, I'd like to propose something far more terse that covers the bare essential mechanics of being a moderator.
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How do I contact a user privately, as a moderator?
As a moderator, I sometimes need to contact a user about his behavior on the site or about other site-related issues.
How can I contact a user privately, as a moderator? What are the possibilities ...
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How do I handle off-topic comments (as a moderator)?
The actual problems that I am facing is: a user (let's call him bob) has left several off-topic comments on a post, on a site where I am a moderator.
I would like to delete these comments, and also ...
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Stack Exchange Moderator FAQ
As per the FAQ for Stack Exchange sites, this FAQ will serve the following purposes:
To be the canonical reference for moderators across the Stack Exchange sites for things that are beyond question (...
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Full list of Moderators
While having a little chat tonight with studiohack over at Super User, he made a comment about how we have around 150-200 moderators on SE total. I thought about this for a moment, and realized that ...
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What does the "Current event" post notice mean?
The recently introduced "Current event" post notice feels incomplete:
At the very least, it needs a period at the end to complete the sentence.
Aside from that, what is a future visitor of ...
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Should merged questions be closed as exact duplicate instead of just locking?
Currently when merging questions, the stub is auto-locked.
But merge questions are exact duplicates, they should auto-closed as exact duplicate of target question too.
And may be locking is not ...
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Why does one of the moderator's history stats show up red?
I was just looking at the moderator history page on RPG, and noticed that one of the moderator's stats are red? Is that because they haven't done anything recently, or is there some other meaning to ...
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I'm a moderator dealing with a user asking a question in an answer, what do I do?
In the moderator queue I see a lot of not an answer flags. Mostly, these are users (mostly new ones) writing questions as answers. How can I best handle this when it's a good question?
I want to ...
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How to best handle the "Possible vandalism of own posts" flag?
I got a moderator flag saying, "Possible vandalism of own posts; multiple deletions in a short time"; the user is one of my stronger users.
The deleted answers are all over a month old. The flag ...
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How should sockpuppets be handled on Stack Exchange?
A high-reputation, highly-active user has already been dinged once for a sockpuppet, and I just dinged them again. They probably have another sockpuppet as well.
What are the guidelines for handling ...
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Rules for Profiles
Are there any rules concerning what I can put in my profile?
Return to Stack Exchange Moderator FAQ
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What are the moderation tools available to 10,000+ reputation users?
The site FAQ refers to moderation tools, available to users who've earned more than 10,000 reputation:
10,000 Delete closed questions, access to moderation tools
What are these tools ...