He is an edge case, but it's been an instructive one. One of our oldest, most followed users quit because he was harassing her. It led to the 'block' feature, but sadly, a day too late. His most recent vitriol led to filtering more from the community page. This motherfucker is a terrorist, making everyone who enjoys this site spend way too much time on him. It's useful though, because you hope that it gets easier the more shit you see. Suggestions to deal with this type of user are always welcome. Your idea about untagging is interesting, but how would it work?
I think the problem is the hubski bar analogy falls apart when people are pushing an agenda. He isnt here to participate, he never comments unless its to argue about his hate topics. The problem is, in a bar, everyone would notice that he's in a dark corner of the room, smelling a bit off, with no one talking to him. No one goes up to that guy. On hubski, it just looks like no one is commenting on his posts. Normal users don't see whats wrong with him until he has a toxic day, and even then they might miss it. So how do we show people his stink waves? It seems like there should be some way to let the community know "yes this person is talking, but our silence is not agreement". On way would be to show how many people have muted someone for a particular topic. I don't want to be hurtful though, or create a negative experience for controversial tags. Another way would be letting people untag his posts, kicking him out of the room so to speak. Either a hubwheel of "offensive" or "controversial" gives users a warning when viewing content, or deletes the tag entirely. Yes we can filter "spam" or "trolling", but I think it would be better if this was baked into the site itself. If a new users checks out hubski and sees a skull and crossbones next to a post, it sets expectations pretty effectively. It also lets normal users know "hey, this guy is a controversial figure, silence is not agreement". I feel a little weird proposing suggestions, I know I'm a hubski rookie. But I don't want to be negative and just whine about things I don't like without offering suggestions. So I'm very open to criticism or disagreement on this one.
My first idea as I read this thread further was the red hubwheel, but it came to me soon after that it can, too, be abused. Perhaps not as heavily, since I haven't noticed trolling in such quantities on Hubski, but still, it's the opportunity I'm uncomfortable with. Test run, perhaps, with saving the data if it proceeds to a feature state?a hubwheel of "offensive" or "controversial"
Throwin' ideas at the wall: If I click to remove a tag it will stay but if someone else does it independently then it will be removed. Add/remove people as you see fit. If I follow a tag give me the ability to correct mislabeled posts for that tag i.e. if something is posted under #feminism and #mensrights and I follow feminism then give me the ability to change that tag only, since I follow it. Make me give up a badge to remove a tag / all tags on a post regardless of anything else. Other topic: I'm still for even harsher functioning of the block function and think it should completely remove that person from my Hubski experience by additionally making it so I flat out don't see their comments on other peoples posts or anywhere else.
This is why I so strongly believe we need moderation/curation. But let's consider the problem from a different perspective: what if tags did not exist? If tags did not exist, we would only be able to find new content by following people. This is how real life has worked for millions of years, so our ingrained social rules will probably. Now, it's obviously implausible to directly follow everyone who might post content on a subject you're interested in, or even follow everyone who is close enough to share it. Which is where a degree of implicit trust comes in. Some magic formula (left as an exercise for the reader) takes into account indirect follow chains and (to a lesser degree) simple share/upvote chains. New users can still enter this ecosystem. As soon as someone upvotes one of their comments, they gain a little implicit trust so other people can see their post. Now the only question is: where do tags fit in? I'm sure everyone claims that they are useful, but how? Unlike subreddits, tags are not the primary way I discover content (for me at least). And most of the tags I do see in my feed I added because I saw people I follow posting in them. I think that tags are only useful as a way to filter posts that I'm already seeing for the sake of seeing a longer history. --- Yes, I am aware that this will lead to a bit of a walled garden effect. But, remember that it only removes the visibility of posts, not comments (unless you block them of course).
I'm going to be honest here (and please, this isn't anything personal against you) but I have no interest in a discussion about tags right now so I'm going to leave you with a history of tags and all that good stuff to provide some background information and other discussion. Also, if you look at previous discussions you might notice a bit of a difference in attitude and vibe going back compared to now.