After 30-years active participation on a combination of Usenet and web forums, I support the general principle that forum moderation is essential. It's important to foster and - when needed - enforce a welcoming, open and helpful environment.
What does that mean? I believe it means that we should openly discourage and - when needed - shut down personal disputes being played out in public. What would that look like? Suppose I'm involved in a thread topic discussing which camera is best for wildlife photography. I'm advocating for the Nikon Z9 as the best camera. Another person is advocating for the Sony A1. A third is making the case for the Canon R3. Disagreement amongst the three people active in the thread isn't a problem. Disagreement is good. It represents a diversity of opinion and an opportunity for others following the discussion to weigh and consider a range of relevant facts and perspectives. However, we should strive to create a space where members disagree without being disagreeable.
What do I mean by, "being disagreeable"? I mean redirecting comments from being directed at the topic of discussion to being directed at a participant. I'll use myself as an example. If I respond to a comment by writing, "That's a foolish opinion. It takes a naive person to believe that," I've not focused my comments on the topic. I've crossed a line and am now criticizing the person. I've called them foolish and naive. Those are personal attacks.
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That's the kind of discourse I'd like to see discouraged and - when needed - blocked in the forums. Criticizing, insulting, bullying, or verbally assaulting another member isn't acceptable and shouldn't be tolerated. If exchanges get personal, nudge those involved back on the path of focusing on and discussing the topic. If an exchange continues down the path of tossing ad hominem insults, lock the thread. If a member persists in being a catalyst for taking discussions down a path of becoming personal attacks, ban the member.
A related issue is so-called "third rail" topics of disucssion. When I was an active member of the "Cloudy Nights" astronomy forum, there was a policy that banned all discussion of politics and religion. While it's not impossible to have reasoned, dispassionate exchanges on those topics, in my experience it's not very likely to happen in a public forum. I would support an open policy of banning all political and religious debate. That is, ban debate where those topics are at the center of the disagreement. If two photographers want to discuss the technical challenges of photographing weddings, christenings, bar mitzvahs, etc., that's another matter. If the religious element is a context within which a discussion of photography is taking place, I'd be inclined to not moderate such an exchange.
Banning discussion of a limited number of third-rail topics would be a measure preventing discussions from shifting toward a focus on the people involved; their beliefs and values. If a person, their beliefs or values are being targeted in an exchange, that's not appropriate. If the participants in the discussion disagree but that difference of opinion remains focused on a topic relevant to photography, let it play out.
I would also suggest the admins consider putting in a limiter to help keep exchanges from escalating into personal conflict. One of the tell-tale indicators that a flame war is active, is a long string of posts in which comments are being made every few minutes by the same two people. Typically, one of two things is happening. It's possible the exchange has become personal and friendly. Two members are sharing stories about a common experience. In that case, they should consider taking the exchange off an open, public thread to email or IM. It's also possible the exchange has become personal and unfriendly. In the heat of the moment, the members are hurling personal insults back-and-forth.
One way of preventing negative exchanges is to limit the number of posts a member can make in a single thread in a 24-hour period. I'll suggest that number be set at 10. Once a person has made 10 posts in any one thread in a given day, they should be blocked from posting in that same thread until the next day starts. Please, note, this isn't a limit of making no more than 10 posts in all threads in a single day. It's a limit of making no more than 10 posts in any given thread in a day. The person who wants to be active and comment in 20 threads could potentially make 200 posts (10 in each of those 20 threads) in a single day. And once the clock strikes midnight, they can start all over again and make another 200 posts the next day.
It's a policy that would help prevent discussions becoming heated exchanges by imposing a brief cooling off period. It wouldn't inappropriately limit a person's ability to be active on the site or to express themselves. In addition to helping prevent blowups, it's a policy that would also create space for others to participate in active threads. It's less likely that one or two people would dominate the discussion. And it wouldn't require moderator intervention. I recommend this limit only if it can be built into the site design, only if enforcement can be automated. If the software can't automate this kind of limit, I would not want to burden volunteer moderators with the task of enforcing it.
Another issue that should be discussed, is the potential for discussions to be derailed by posts containing false information. This is a complex issue that does not, in my opinion, have an easy or obvious solution. People make unintentional errors in written communication all the time. Typos and grammatical errors, as unfortunate as they are, should not be treated as the kind of "factual error" needing moderation. Nor should an honest misunderstanding of the facts necessitate moderation. That's something that often gets worked out amongst members. If I make a post saying, "The faster your shutter speed, the more motion blur, you'll get in your photos," and other members respond to correct me by explaining that faster shutter speeds do a better job of freezing movement and eliminating motion blur, there's no need for a moderator to become involved. I posted wrong information. Other members corrected the error. As long as I don't persist in pushing the misinformed view that faster shutter speeds lead to increased motion blur, there isn't an issue.
I also don't believe it appropriate to expect volunteer moderators to "fact check" every post. That's a lot of responsibility and burden to put on a person who 1) is volunteering their time, 2) should be able to participate in discussions just as any other member does and 3) should only have to put on the moderator hat and intervene on the rare occasion a member is crossing a red line.
All that said, there is value in forums that cater to the needs and interests of the novice photographer in ensuring that questions of fact are being responded to with accurate information. A diversity of opinion is not just something to be tolerated; that is something to be encouraged. However, questions about how cameras work and how the various settings directly affect the photograph being made are largely questions of fact. As such, they deserve factually accurate responses. One of the biggest disappointments I've had in recent years on DP Review, is the surprising number of threads in the "Beginners Questions" forum in which a question about what f-stop, shutter speed, and ISO settings do is accurately answered within a few hours only to have a forum member chime in to promote the so-called "exposure triangle" as the learning tool that explains all things photographic.
So, how do we create an environment in which basic questions about how cameras and their primary settings work are accurately answered? Perhaps, we do tht by creating an environment in which factually accurate answers stand apart from those that promote misinformation. Perhaps, we should empower moderators to flag a post as being particularly informative or helpful in answering the author's question. Even if 10 responses out of 11 contain misinformation, if the moderator can flag the one accurate response so it stands out from the crowd, maybe that's the best way to foster an environment that's helpful toward novices.
Thank you for considering this input and for the work being done to help make this forum one where all photographers feel welcome, where all photographic genres are celebrated, where the choices people make in the equipment they use is respected and where questions about how to get the most from our cameras and lenses find informed, thoughtful, empowering answers.
