KA Guardian system--improvements

I agree wholeheartedly with Legolas. I want to emphasize the scope of this issue.

1. This has been going on for years. I first criticized the lack of transparency from guardian actions in Jun 2016 (the comment that this links to has been hidden). This issue has only gotten worse, in part as KA has moved from volunteers to contracted moderators. This shift has negatively effected the KA CP section, if not the site as a whole.
2. The sheer number of prominent community users who have been banned. To be clear, these bans are in some cases warranted, but in all cases there is no official reason given. I do not wish for these users to be unbanned necessarily, merely that KA would unhide some programs, and show more discretion going forward.
   [I originally had a list of 13 banned users here. That was removed by KA. I didn't know that was not allowed. My apologies.]

Again, many of these users deserved to be banned, or have been unbanned. But they had a magnitude of popularity on Khan such that I think their programs should be restored and the reasons for their bans disclosed.

[Similarly, there was a comment here referencing a specific, important program I would like to see unhidden.]

Thank you, for recognizing the importance of communication in education,

Matthias

KA Computer Science Volunteer

I haven't been part of the community for very long, but learning the reasons for a couple recent bans gives me the impression I could be banned and have all my programs wiped for pretty much anything, regardless of harmless intentions or insignificance of the transgression. Without any warnings or second chances. That's not the kind of environment moderators should be creating in any community.

I know there's times when people do things to get banned on purpose by doing things that common sense should protect against. This happens frequently on throwaway accounts with nothing to their name. AKA trolls. Swift and righteous bans in those cases protect the community and make it a better place.

But when you ban people that have spent hundreds or thousands of hours contributing to a positive learning environment and happy community, and hide any evidence that they ever existed by hiding all their programs, simply because they posted a soundcloud link (for example), then that hurts the community far more than it helps, and usually leads to those users leaving the site forever. It would be far more responsible in cases like that to simply delete the post, or maybe hide the 1 offending program, and give the user a warning and/or mute.

I can only imagine how discouraging it would be to spend years on the site, building a huge portfolio of programs that would easily impress any interviewer, only to have it all taken away for some small, unintentionally harmful message. I know the reason often given for bans is something along the lines of "what would parents think if they saw that?" But a vast majority of KA users aren't parents, so we don't know what parents would think. It's inevitable that we'll do or say something harmless for our own age group without considering what parents of 8 year olds might think. In most cases, a simple message explaining the issue to the user would be enough to remind them to be more careful.

Uh, just adding a comment in case it helps to get the post noticed or something idk.

I don't really have anything to add, since I've only been warned once or twice. But I remember one warning message that was kind of vague, along the lines of "please delete the inappropriate comments". Like, I appreciate the gentle nudge but, I think if you really want those "inappropriate" messages gone you might have to be a little bit more specific. Just saying.

yeah get it together khan academy

Agreed wholeheartedly.

(can you get banned from the forum for talking about bans here? O.o)

I agree with these points - thanks for posting this, by the way, Legolas, and Willard and Matthias and KING for your in-depth comments - the Guardian system is great, but yes, there's room for improvement. Like, I've witnessed people get banned for some tiny detail, while others who are creepy and off-topic didn't get banned for their actions, despite multiple flags. It would be great if there was some sort of system to chat with a  Guardian and clarify what was done wrong :) And also, I think inappropriate or off-topic programs, or programs that clearly go against the Guidelines, should be hidden, but on the other hand, programs that are helpful and have been around longer s h o u l d  n o t  be hidden along with all the other projects the banned user has created. Bans should be limited to chat-banning, and possibly program-creating, depending on what the user has done.

I mean no offense to the KA team or anything like that - it's just that there's always room for improvement, and new ways to improve and grow and bring the KACS community closer together :D

thanks for reading all the way! have a great day ^_^ (ooh that rhymes)

I agree with Legolas Greenleaf, Willard, and William W. | 𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆

About 7 or 8 months ago, I was banned for an unknown reason. Tbh it stressed me out a lot, and I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what I had done wrong. Eventually, I figured out that I could submit an appeal, which I did immediately. Within a few weeks, Evan Lewis responded, told me I was likely banned on accident, and restored my previous "abilities" back to me. Although it doesn't seem like that big of a deal, I was a fairly new coder at that time, it shook me pretty hard, and I almost left KA permanently. It would have been nice if i could have been sent a message telling me why I was banned in the first place, instead of leaving me confused and shocked. 

For about a month after then, I was careful to follow the guidelines to the letter, in order not to get banned again. Now, I'm less paranoid, but still careful not to give any reason for possible banishment (although I won't hesitate to state that I'm a Christian, whether it's off-topic or not).

I've also watched the same thing happen to other people; Matthias (Soli Deo gloria) named a few, but not all.  I've seen many [others] (I guess I shouldn't have posted names) banned, for which they were given no reason.

All in all, I agree with Legolas Greenleaf, and while I think that that would be a pretty large step for a non-profit website, I think that some changes are certainly necessary.

YES. THIS. This is exactly what I've been thinking. Thank you so much for writing this up Legolas :)

I completely agree. I've seen many people banned without any warnings or a reason (including me) and they only got their reason when they submitted a ban appeal form. Also, not all reasons are included in the guidelines, which makes it hard for users to even determine if they can do something or not. This negatively affects the entire community, too. I have also seen many plagiarizers and supposed-to-be child accounts gone unnoticed, which is what the moderators should be focusing on

I haven't been particularly aware of this, but i do agree with the stated points. I do think there should be a way to respond to guardian's messages; and it does make sense to be aware of what(if nessecary) actions sould be completed, and where(credit to Lin Gh.)

I completely agree with this post. I sympathize to him especially, because I too am a Christian and I too got a program hidden for it.

I live in the United States. Hiding religious content (programs included) is against our constitution! And not just christian programs, but for other religious programs as well. Making programs for your beliefs shouldn't be a reason to get banned or your program hidden. If you don't agree with the person, then just ignore it, but it shouldn't be on the list of reasons to flag.

Wow, there’s been a lot said here.

I’ve been active on KA for three years and have been on this account for one. I have a bit of a cringy past with newspapers but that also helped me to see the lesser side to the community in a lot of ways and it helped me see Guardians’ roles in a new light.

Guardians do need to be more aware of the community in some cases but in others, I think the current policy is the right one. If there’s one thing I’d ask for change in, it’s communication. Guardian messages should be used twenty times more than Hans and should ALWAYS accompany a ban.

I got banned when I first joined because the Guardians thought I was a fishy looking guy. I didn’t like it at the time, but I was a friend to a recently banned newspaper CEO and was saying that he had stepped down and made me the new CEO so... yeah, in retrospect, it was probably a good thing (except now the Guardians think I was actually banned for violating guidelines and it’s on my permanent record or whatever :/ ).

The Guardians shouldn’t be afraid of change. Especially not these goods ones.

@kคiຖคlน6

Khan Academy prefers not to bring religion and politics on here because of people who want to use this platform for promoting their views (I believe Christians call it evangelism?). Though I know that 99% of people here won't force their opinions, religion etc. down other people's throats, I think the guardians are afraid that allowing people to do that might be interpreted as allowing free discussion of controversial topics. To be clear, I'm not saying that the guardians should forbid us from saying "I'm Christian" or "I'm Muslim" etc. I simply mean that I suspect they are being extra-cautious with allowing such things. If that makes sense?

(also regarding your constitution comment — I'm not American or a lawyer but I don't know if that counts on an international platform lol)

Ruby Phoenix [inactive]

Personally, I don't "evangelize" people on Khan Academy. All I've done is sometimes mention the fact that I'm a Christian in a comment with another Christian, in my subpage, or maybe in my bio. In my experience, I don't think KA has a problem with that, but apparently @kคiຖคlน6 has. I think, while getting into discussions over faith is probably off-topic, just stating our beliefs should be fine.

Oh no that's not what I meant. Basically, I meant that no one does that but the guardians probably stop it because if they are afraid that if they allow a little bit like simply stating your religion or political views, it might get out of hand. Like, "I'm only telling people how awesome my religion is, you allow telling them my religion what's wrong with this?" And then later, "I'm only telling people they should convert to my religion, you allow telling people how awesome my religion is, what's wrong with this?" etc. If you get what I mean. 

Also personally I have never seen this happen on KA. I was not accusing Red Arrow ✝ or @kคiຖคlน6 of doing this. If you interpreted it that way, I'm so sorry, that was not my intention at all. 

No I wasn't saying you were accusing us, I was just saying that while getting into discussions over faith is probably off-topic, just stating our beliefs should be fine. Which, according to what I've seen so far, is true.

None of us can quite stress how much this impacts the community.


I too, was once banned-- but without a message, I was simply confused.
I thought to myself "Why can't I talk and why are my programs not visible to others".
My conclusions were:

1. I'm not good enough for people to even talk to me, OR
2. My account is broken

Those were my conclusions, because so far as I was aware-- I was being active in the math community helping to answer questions.

At first, I tried really hard to improve my coding skills to no avail (I still didn't know I was banned and it had been almost 3 months) releasing programs left and right-- trying to comment on popular programs, but never getting a response...
I was tired of it.
I thought-- maybe people don't like this account, or maybe it's broken.

So I did exactly what would be expected-- and I made a new account.
As I had hoped, people began to talk to me, and look up to my work-- finally a payout from all the learning-- finally I felt like I was becoming the one to inspire, rather then to be inspired.
It was good.
But-- not knowing what had happened to my old account, I had created a new account-- therefore considered "ban evasion", and my ban was extended silently. (the new account was also banned)

At this point, I was wondering if it was a problem with my computer-- why did my accounts keep suddenly not being replied to?!
So I sighed, and thought 'maybe this time it will work', and I created another account.

This time, I received a guardian message, it was along the lines of "We've noticed that you're using another account while banned, this is called ban evastion. We've extended your ban to January. (Your other account(s) have also been banned)"

I thought to myself, what?!
I had no idea I was banned, but now my 'ban' is extended longer?!
I sent in a ban appeal, and discovered the issue.

I had sent some off topic posts, and (months before the silent ban, might I add) I had received a warning.
They asked me to delete the off-topic posts, but due to a site error, I could not.
I could also not explain this to the guardian who sent the message, because guardian messages are one-way.
I had shrugged it off, thinking that they'd know that I was unable to delete all but the most recent ones (I thought that was the sites design).

Now, after almost 3/4 of a year and two alts, I finally knew I was banned.
That's pretty bad...
I had no guidance, not from my parents, not from online, and most certainly not from others on khan.

I sighed, knowing that I'd still have to wait about three months before I was banned...
But I got to work-- when I came out of this, I'd be an exceptional programmer-- I'm never answering math questions again. (and I have not since the ban)

But I wasn't so lucky.

Apparently, the connection between my first alt, and my main account was not discovered at the time of the 2nd alt-- so I was again, warned, and the ban extended to nearly march.
I nearly left khan, I was mad, frustrated, confused, and perhaps even somewhat depressed.

I had broken the rules according to one guardian.
They warned me.
I tried to fix it.
They silently banned me.
I tried to grow.
They extended the ban.
I tried harder.
They extended it again.
But I didn't give up.
...
But... it was too long... nothing...
I left khan.

After almost half a year, I came back. Finally my ban was over.
I joined a group so I could learn to code...
that group was banned.

We saw our faults and founded a group dedicated to teaching code.
I became the leader.
We worked hard.
We worked harder.
We finally released our first project.
...
We lost communication with the staff, as both the staff page, and our first project, though dedicated to helping others learn, was hidden.
And once more, we fell apart.

I give up.

I quit doing groups.

I'm going to work alone. I'll pretend to have fun...
but I never wanted to work alone.
But... I don't even know how anymore...

I'll let this need to finish something... this hope within me that I'm not a failure, keep me going... as all those that inspired me to become what I am... are slowly... and silently... banned.

----------

I became great because those people pushed me up.
A friend wants to support me by showing their friends my project?
You ban them, and hide my year long hard work.
Why?

I'm sure there's good that comes of moderation...
But I've seen nothing but misunderstandings and pain.
I think the moderation group needs a complete redo.

I'm tired of my friends becoming all they hoped, but then being cut down silently because of one mistake.
They don't usually stick around.
It's lucky I did.

I hate to criticize the moderators, but this is an issue. Just my personal story should be enough to show that.
But it keeps happening. Someone I know even almost killed themselves because of this silent ban.

Take us seriously. We're not criminals, we've been banned for minor or unavoidable mistakes, and perhaps have made worse mistakes, not knowing that we were banned in the first place.

If I am to be punished for this critique, so be it.
Even with all those that look up to me, I won't stick around this time.

----------

Thank you for understanding that we've been understating to be polite.
I've wanted to get this burden off my back, so thank you for that.
Please-- consider all that I said, even if it is harsh.
I don't want to hurt anyone, I just want to make sure nobody else has to go through what I did.

Since then, I've become all I hoped-- even being compared (occasionally as better) to many whom I looked up to. I am now confident that I can be an inspiration. To inspire others to reach the highs that some of us who have been here for a long time.

Thank you, for like the students of the site you moderate, you also-- aim to improve.

Please do what you can,
- Ender Haven, previous leader of GMK, known programmer on Khan Academy

I agree completely with @Willard @William Wang @Red Arrow and @Legolas Greenleaf, and @Quinn Hardbrook. I have never been personally banned myself (yet) but I know several of my friends have been banned (one of them more than once), and they never know why. 

When a programmer gets banned for an unknown reason and they get a message saying "You might have been banned by accident" that creates uncertainty for the programmers never knowing whether or not they will get banned and never knowing why. And not being able to know why, makes it impossible for them to fix their error, if there ever was an error to begin with. Also, it makes some users riot when great programmers are banned.

I have read/played [another user]'s program that got banned. It has hints about God but, to my knowledge, it never even metions His name. I am a Christian and the fact that [the user's] program got hidden pernmatly makes me very disturbed and angry. Banning great users who do things on accident or not at all oftentimes makes them leave. It makes them say "What is the use of being on this site if I make things for others too see and they get removed?"

It makes the whole thing seem rather pointless. Many of these users are very kind and helpful and are instrumental in helping newer coders to make good code. And, be respectful to the site, and their fellow users. Making them leave hurts KAPC more than whatever the user did, hurts them.

I believe that if a user comments and inapproate comment, then they should get banned, or the comment automatically removed. But I do not think their projects should get hidden! Only if the project is truly inapproaite should it get hidden. Also I dislike the fact that gurdians can delete a user's account.

Do not get me wrong, I love Khan Academy and it has helped me a lot during COVID-19 too stay positive and encouraged. But the gurdians are really cracking down on users for the silliest reasons. People have even been banned for what we are doing right now.

This is my contribution.

As far as religion goes, I don’t think that Khan Academy is the place to discuss it. It simply adds a whole new level for the Guardians to maintain. To allow it even on a minor level would take the Guardians’ attention away from more important issues on this site such as plagiarism, intentional off topic conversation, and children on public accounts.

That being said, I don’t think like the way that programs with slight religious content are being handled right now. If you make a program about fat Thor from Endgame, you won’t get banned, but if you make one about a Muslim holiday are an Easter Sunday graphic, chances are it’ll be hidden or banned. When you think about it, the program about Thor is actually mocking an ancient religion (Norse mythology) while the other ones are respectfully sharing culture.

Maybe religious programs should be hidden. It’s not my place, as a biased person, to decide that. But, whatever the decision of moderators and the Khan Academy leaders, the programs should be hidden, not the authors banned (exceptions may be made for multiple offenses when Guardian messages have already been sent) and all religious programs should be treated with the same criteria.

I completely agree with Legolas's post. I was banned on Khan Academy with no prior warning or explanation. It was only after I was unbanned that I received a vague explanation. I won't go into the details here, but from my experience, the moderation team on Khan Academy is out of touch with its userbase. For example, there is no easy way to message guardians to request clarification about warnings or bans. There is also no guarantee a user will receive an explanation at all. 

My best projects were hidden, so I can no longer share them publicly with my peers. Personally this has been a major discouragement from learning and creating on Khan Academy, and I can imagine many others feel the same. If I had received more information about by infraction beforehand, I could have avoided having my projects hidden from the site.

I think some positive changes Khan Academy could implement are:

• Require guardian messages when a user is banned
• Allow recently banned users to reply to guardian messages (The help center is locked to banned accounts)
• Ability to bring back all hidden projects once the user is unbanned. Given that projects can be hidden and individual projects unhidden, it should technically be possible to unhide them.

Ruby Phoenix

I might be wrong in this case. But some programmers have left because of bans.

I'd just like to add a couple more quick notes on the conversations I'm seeing.

1. Since there are so many people banned for so many reasons, and since they don't know what happened and have no way to contact the support community, they'll probably end up deleting their account and creating a new one (thus, "ban evading"), or just leave Khan Academy.

2. If there was a way that banned users can reply to guardian messages, that would increase work for volunteers a ridiculous amount, and there's no way KA would be willing to pressure Guardians into answering tens of replies from so many banned members -- that would be way to much. Perhaps there could be a way that contracted moderators could see that ban reason and be the ones to reply to a banned user who could only ask one question every 36 hours?

After reading everything here, I have decided that I've agreed with most of the points stated. I've been banned once, as a result of two warnings, both for off-topic chatting. The second warning, wasn't exactly fair in my opinion, seeing that the situation of another user spamming users who had commented on a project on the HL, with a google doc link about communism. I told him off and look at me, getting a warning for an "off-topic" conversation. Months later, I had an argument that I regret starting in the first place, which led to my 4-week ban. The ban was frustrating, a few of the programs I had and accumulated a decent amount of votes on were hidden, not to mention the comments on it, and I had to wait a month to be able to chat again. And last but not least, I, like everyone else, was not notified by a Guardian about my ban. It seemed as if everyone was ignoring me, and then after a week or so, I eventually submitted an appeal, which I had gotten a response for a week after. I was guilty of ban evasion somewhat, using my sister's account to let another user know I was banned. Off-topic chatting, if nothing else is changed, I wish the rule was more transparent. It's not clear in any sense of the word, one may do it and not be chastised, while the other is eventually banned and/or warned.

@William Wow, you're the only one who thought of the issue from the guardians side. O.o We should have thought of that. Anyway, maybe the guardians should have to mention the reason of ban when banning. Then the user can get a message saying that they've been banned, along with ban duration and the aforementioned reason of ban. Just a thought, I guess.

I agree with Ruby Phoenix.

I think that if the user has made a minor infraction, then the guardian should give them a warning instead of automatically banning them. This does happen in some cases, but it's not standard. However, some users on throwaway accounts who go around posting trash deserve to be automatically banned, without a warning message. Also, if someone is banned, then a message (maybe just even a sentence or 2!) should be sent to them explaining why. This would give them the chance to correct their mistake and submit an appeal.

This way, the guardians wouldn't have to do too much extra work, but it would take care or many of the problems going on now.

 - Red Arrow

Wait, but the first idea you stated is already in place. From what I see... 2 warnings = one ban. And with an appeal, we can get a basic idea of why one was banned. 

Actually, many people including myself have been banned without a warning. And yes, you're right, but many people don't know how to appeal (read the first part of @EnderHaven's comment, where he had no idea what was going on. This happens to a lot of people.)

Even with an appeal the reason is sometimes vague. For instance, there was a certain newspaper team was banned multiple times and finally permanently banned without ever knowing what they had done that the Guardians considered “off topic”.

Hello everyone!

We see and appreciate the thoughtful conversation about our Guardian program.

We value your passion for the Programming Community (and the Khan Academy community as a whole!), and appreciate the feedback about the Guardian program, but I want to reiterate that our Community Guidelines prohibit posting private information to the Community. Several posts in the thread mention specific users names' and profiles in connection with banning actions taken on their accounts, which violates our Community Guidelines. For this reason, we'll be removing those references from the posts in the thread.

Please remember that our primary goal in the Support Community, and everywhere on Khan Academy, is to provide a safe space for everyone to learn, and respecting all of our users’ privacy is key to creating a safe space. If you have concerns about specific moderation decisions involving yourself or another user, please reach out privately to our Support team rather than posting publicly in the Support Community. 

We encourage all our users to have constructive discussions in the Support Community about ways they think Khan Academy can be improved, but it's important that you keep discussions like these general, on-topic, and respectful of everyone in our community.

We really do appreciate your thoughts, and we are reading all of your responses, so please know you are being heard and we’re actively considering how we can incorporate your feedback.

Edited to add: My apologies, I realized I hadn't added a link to information about our Ban Appeal form, so doing that now!

Kindly,

Faile Lundberg

Wow. 

I'm so delighted to see this many people are putting so much time to agree with, and reinforce what Legolas started...and in so little time. 

So let me throw in my 2 cents worth. 

There are multiple occurrences I am aware of where users were banned selectively, while others who had done the identical thing were never noticed or dealt with. For example: (Certain user who was the only banned SA). He was an extremely active Support Advocate, and programmer. He was permanently banned for the "energy point" glitch(which, even before his ban, he publicly said he was sorry for doing. He even hid his EP count so as to not promote the glitch, too...). Meanwhile there were 20 other people on leaderboards who had done exactly the same thing-for twice and thrice the number of points. Of course, only he was banned. He and I talk regularly on Discord, and he never got a response to any of his Ban Appeals. It's been years. He's still not gotten a response.

So yeah: your system of "you can talk to us privately so no one's information is compromised"...actually looks like you're just stepping away from taking any action on this(Because you're not answering banned users). And he's just one of many, MANY more. 

There are people who make mistakes(purposely or accidentally) who learn from those mistakes. Since when is giving people a second chance so unfair? 

And for goodness sakes...at least have the decency to respond to people when you take action like bans. Better yet: figure out what is actually worthy of a ban, and what is not. And even better: don't be selective in your moderation. The example I listed above is an unacceptable precedent that has been continued to this day.

All that to say...people do care about this, all you Khan Academy Staff. You've gotten this level of a response in less than a day. There IS a problem here...so it's time to analyze the situation, and figure out a way to improve it.