How important is independence in the technical press?

[BrightCandle]

Anandtech is a press site, its journalism focussed on technical product reviews. Up until the last few days I have few calls to be concerned about whether as a site it was trying to be impartial. There have been a few sponsorship campaigns that were potential conflicts of interest but the reviews seemed untouched.

Bit-tech.net pulled a stunt about 1 year ago where it had an editorial piece which was actually written by AMD. But when it went up it said nothing of the sort and people soon realised it was a "puff piece" and ripped the site apart for presenting it as their own content. They soon caved and marked it as a sponsored article. They paid dearly for that, their site has dropped in popularity quite dramatically.

I don't know when it happened but Anandtech's site but it recently gained an AMD centre link, prominently placed on the front page as the most obvious thing (due to its very bright red colour). A whole section of the anandtech site is now dedicated to AMD product reviews. These reviews are written by the Anandtech staff. There is however also an editorial on the future of SOCs from AMDs perspective and a driver announcement that don't appear on the front page, also by Anandtech staff. The page itself contains a clear link to AMD and says its presented by AMD, yet the editors names on the articles are Anandtech staff. Does that mean AMD has bought Anandtech? Is this some sort of undeclared sponsorship deal?

Adverts on the site is how they make money, the big manufacturers are going to advertise and we can't blame them for taking the money, gaming sites and everyone else has to do it to survive. But I personally draw a line at clearly dedicating a part of a site to AMDs interests because it attacks the very nature of being independent. Even if the bias isn't there that doesn't good. I don't know what to think, but this subsection of the site run by AMD is a concerning way to run an advertising compaign, it looks almost like AMD has bought Anandtech and is only part way through converting it.

What are peoples thoughts about this type of sponsorship deal? Is it inevitable and are you concerned about Anandtech's independence now that its coloured its website so obviously red? Should other sites shy away from this sort of advertising or is it OK and you think there is nothing to be concerned about?

 

[Murloc]

I'm not really sure it's a good idea but at least anandtech is doing the effort to keep the AMD content separated.

The question is: will the reviews of AMD products (that appear both in the subsite and on the main site) be influenced in any way?

I never read much about the AMD stuff so it's not a problem for me.

Also if someone is making an important decision, he's not going to rely completely on one website, so as long as there's plurality of information, it's not really a problem.

 

[PlanetJosh]

This got me to look at the main page for a change. Anyone else spend so much time in the forums that you neglect the main page? I noticed the red AMD button and also noticed the orange Trending Topics button. Looks like they purposely made a color transition from the red button to the black buttons. In other words without the orange button the contrast between the red AMD button and the black buttons would be too obvious I think.

I hope I'm not the only one thinking this. Anyway I like Radeon vid cards but I have used nVidia way back when I had a Riva TNT card.

 

[SolMiester]

Well, it just confirms for me there are unannounced posters using the forum for PR....and explains some strange modding efforts.

 

[Doppel]

The question is: will the reviews of AMD products (that appear both in the subsite and on the main site) be influenced in any way?

You have to assume it will.

There is a single and very important reason why Consumer Reports does not accept advertising of any kind. It knows that to do so will cause it to have bias in its product reviews. This is very essential part of psychology: give somebody something and they are inclined to look upon you favorably.

I agree with the OP. Unless I'm missing something here I could not possibly take an AMD vs Intel review seriously given the clear slant toward AMD products with their conspicuous link. One could easily argue Anandtech is shilling for AMD.

 

[tviceman]

I don't think it's a good move for the image of the site. I personally do not like it whether it be Intel, AMD, Nvidia, or Qualcomm.

 

[yllus]

Content marketing is all the rage in the media lately. Real, useful content that just happens to also focus on a particular brand is definitely a step up from pure marketing fluff, but it does raise this exact question: How much of the content is really real? Are the CPU/laptop combinations in this article really the best deal at each price point, or were some of those conclusions coloured by the need to make AMD look good?

At the media organizations I've worked with, they recognize that if their neutrality is ever in question, their websites are as good as dead. That's more important than a five- or six-figure deal for content marketing with AMD, and Anand and his team know it. I don't think we have anything to worry about in the near future.

 

[videogames101]

Content marketing is all the rage in the media lately. Real, useful content that just happens to also focus on a particular brand is definitely a step up from pure marketing fluff, but it does raise this exact question: How much of the content is really real? Are the CPU/laptop combinations in this article really the best deal at each price point, or were some of those conclusions coloured by the need to make AMD look good?

At the media organizations I've worked with, they recognize that if their neutrality is ever in question, their websites are as good as dead. That's more important than a five- or six-figure deal for content marketing with AMD, and Anand and his team know it. I don't think we have anything to worry about in the near future.

This thread exists, therefore, anandtech.com's neutrality is in question. That being said I don't see the writers favoring amd, if anything there's a heavy intel bias on the site's main articles.

 

[SlitheryDee]

Pretty important. It kind of toes the line between government and commercial though. You want them to be independent from both ideally, but they have to get their money from somewhere.

 

[lxskllr]

Who here uses professional reviews to determine purchase? I don't. I look through catalogs to find hardware that looks like it may suit my purposes, then look through forums to see how it works in the field. Professional reviews are too limited, and don't tell as good a story as someone who uses the stuff for real work.

 

[BrightCandle]

The subsection has just been updated. In particular we now have a direct feed of AMD's twitter, a much more prominent push for the AMD puff pieces (a new addition to with the news of more Never settle deals) and even a direct link for their two ridiculous marketing videos.

Anandtech has openly added the ability (with that twitter feed) for AMD to say whatever it likes through Anandtech's website. I am beginning to think that AMD is designing that page and Anandtech web design has very little to do with it at all beyond providing the link. Its becoming increasing pure marketing and less Anandtech writer material, although its all still there with their names proudly displayed in amoungst the pieces that look like they are Anandtech written (potentially, no obvious distinction made) but must be provided by AMD. We are a few page copies away from Anandtech publishing pure AMD marketing as if it was their articles directly from and hosted within their site. I think that is coming pretty soon.

I too have already noticed the mods have changed tune and have been concerned for a few weeks now about the way in which they are controlling the threads that are allowed. I am at least glad to see a few people are concerned about this, its one thing for AMD to go after and recruit social media guys to do their bidding (lots of them in this forum) its a whole other game to be buying entire websites.

 

[Jodell88]

Until I see clear cut cases of bias towards AMD then I'm not concerned.

 

[effowe]

I'm never at the homepage, but just checked to see what was up. When you go to the "AMD Center" and hover over the "What is this?" at the top right of the screen you get..

You've landed on the AMD Portal on AnandTech. This section is sponsored by AMD. It features a collection of all of our independent AMD content, as well as Tweets & News from AMD directly. AMD will also be running a couple of huge giveaways here so check back for those.

So there you have it, they're not hiding it.

 

[jvroig]

I too have already noticed the mods have changed tune and have been concerned for a few weeks now about the way in which they are controlling the threads that are allowed.

I can't speak for the main site because I have nothing to do with them. And it's not just me - pretty much the entire mod crew is far removed from the main site - none of us are writers/contributors, none of us get paid (just volunteers), and pretty much none of us are pressured into "allocating" a minimum number of work hours per week or month or whatever duration.

So I'm going to skip the question of how the Anandtech-AMD relationship goes with the new AMD Portal, and instead try to answer or reply to the "mods have changed tune" part of your post. If you already have it in your mind that I (as a mod) am complicit with some unethical/biased relationship with AMD, then of course you won't believe anything I say, but I'd rather have it said and then not believed, rather than it not being said at all just because I assume you won't believe it anyway. So, stating it for the record: the main site goes about its business and we are never informed about such changes. In fact, as we (and me specifically, being the one who made the mod actions) were dealing with the AMD rep Warsam's illegal thread, we (and again, me specifically) were surprised to find that an AMD Center page suddenly exists in the main site, whereas I was sure that it was not there 24hrs before. I was personally a bit concerned because I thought my mod action against the AMD Rep poster would then have to be reversed and I'd be a bit embarassed for being "too overzealous". Thankfully, nothing of the sort happened. Nobody from the main site came knocking on our door to reprimand me or give me a fresh set of marching orders to allow behavior from the AMD rep that we already previously disallowed.

How does the main site's new AMD Portal section affect us (the forums and the mods)? My paygrade is pretty low, so to speak, so I can't and won't speak about what happens at the very top of the mod kingdom here. But as far as a grunt like me can see, it has had absolutely zero effect. For example, the forum directors and admins haven't sent me any marching orders telling me to give Warsam special privileges or let him off the hook, I haven't been told to stifle pro-Intel agendas. In our own private mod forums (where we discuss policy, issues, nominate members for elite or (sadly) nominate members for permaban when they've been through multiple vacations but refuse to break their bad behavior) I also see zero effect from this AMD Center thing. There are no threads regarding changes of policy due to it or to accompany it.

I know one thread you are referring to when you mention "controlling threads that are allowed", you are referring to the VC&G thread that was prematurely closed, about Tom's, I believe. Alas, this is actually more of a "new mod finding his rhythm and his own style" rather than any malice on our part. I am not saying the mod in question was flat out wrong to pre-emptively close it when he thought there was going to be trouble even though my personal belief is that I agree with you and it shouldn't have been closed. In an ideal setting, perhaps I should say it was flat-out wrong, if I approach it as a "well, these are the rules, soldiers should follow them strictly". But it's not quite as easy as that for us (mod crew). For one thing, I am not his boss. For another, he's not being paid. It would be completely out of line for me, for example, to jump on his throat because he isn't perfect and made an action in good conscience that he thought would save more time (nipping it in the bud before a shitstorm happens). That was his judgement, and since he was practically the ONLY regularly active mod for the most rowdy technical subforum we have (VC&G), he gets to make such a decision. His decision tree was such:
1.) Let the shitstorm happen and deal with it later, necessitating several infractions
2.) Deal with it now, nip it in the bud to try to prevent a shitstorm in the first place.

He chose #2. Since he's also the one who'd be doing up the cleaning, by himself, if #1 did happen (that is, he's also the one who will be inconvenienced), then yeah, he gets to make that choice, even though I personally would have chosen #2. And when he did it again in a memory type thread in VC&G, he was under the same decision tree - shitstorm later, or nip in the bud now. He chose to nip it in the bud. I probably wouldn't have done that myself, but since he's modding the place regularly solo, then he gets to make those calls, and if some of his calls are less than perfect, he is new and garnering more experience and any mistakes he is making is part of his growth as a mod. We cannot ask more from him and won't go out of our way to overturn his calls (unless he actually makes egregious errors like banning innocent people summarily and skipping the process we have). I know that sounds like a crazy, non-efficient way to handle a huge forum like ATF, but that's pretty much the best that can be done when the budget for forum crew is $0.

So closing threads or "controlling" them is not the norm and isn't some sort of marching orders for us - sometimes, from lack of time, it just becomes the call because it's either that or risk letting the thing go unattended and out of control because you (hypothetical mod in hypothetical scenario) won't be back for a day or more, or because your experience and judgment tells you it will only devolve into those train-wreck threads where you'll end up having to read through 100 posts and issue 20 infractions (that takes a lot of time) and part of the collateral damage would be normally upstanding members who you know will get goaded into personal attacks because emotions would run very high by then. Again, ideally the call should be (and I believe in this) to let it play out and sort it out later, although a mod post as a reminder might be a good way to tell people to relax a bit. And if I were paying the mods to do this "job", then I would certainly demand that everyone stop closing the goddam threads, stop being lazy-asses, and do their goddam jobs of moderating posts instead of closing down an entire goddam thread. But that brings us back to reality - I am not their boss, and no one is getting paid to do this job, and every mod action done is something that is done using that volunteer's personal free time. How can I, or the people in the mod crew actually more senior like admins and directors, act all bossy and demanding, when a volunteer is already doing his best to control chaos for free in his spare time, just because it isn't something I personally would have done myself? Most mods make individual calls that may not be the first choice of other mods, but that's how it is, and until a mod makes a truly egregious decision that is flat-out unacceptable or an abuse of his status as mod, individual calls are respected (although, time and again, it's not unheard of to receive friendly advice like "hey, that's cool, although personally maybe I woudn't have been that harsh, and instead I would have done this...").

Going back to the VC&G thread, new mod is finding his rhythm, he's doing great work but of course also making less than perfect calls every now and then (and with $0 budget, he also pretty much didn't get any training on how to mod - I just sent him long walls of text containing the traditions of moderation here, then told him to start. That's it, no actual training. I've pretty much been a lousy unofficial mentor for him, and if you perceive any failings in him, then those failings are mine). And we allow him to make those mistakes and make experiments in his moderating style, and everything is peachy. He is a stand-up guy, and he's trying his best - for free - to deal with the chaos of members who don't play nice with each other. At one point, he thought nipping things in the bud was a good candidate in dealing with things. Now I think he's seen it's not actually helping turn members into more reasonable, civil debaters, so he might be reconsidering it (he told me something to that effect, but I didn't bother to drill him more about it; as long as I know that his motivations are in the right place, I don't tell him how to do a job that he does for free). And who am I to speak about perfect, ideal modding, anyway - I barely have time to actually do any significant mod work in the past several months. In the last two weeks, I think the time I was able to allot for mod work was maybe 2-3 hours total, no infractions made, just banned a few spammers and contributed my thoughts to on-going mod discussions, that AMD rep thing with Warsam, etc. If 3 hours in 2 weeks is all the time I can afford to contribute, who the hell am I to question the efforts of our new mod who is turning in more hours in a day than I did in 2 weeks? Again, yeah, it's a crazy inefficient way to run a forum, but that's what you get when you don't actually have paid staff running a forum. We're all doing the best we can with the resources at our disposal. We don't have any budget at our disposal to hire interns or something to that effect just to ensure there is always enough moderation manpower round-the-clock.

I'm sorry this is pretty long, but it's a complicated scenario because the mod crew here is complicated (simple would be all mods are paid - therefore actual AT staff - hired solely to mod the forums, and can therefore all be held to a much higher, stricter standard and more uniform moderation style across the board). But that's the slightly complicated reason behind the moderating events that you didn't agree with. It has nothing to do with the AMD Center in the main site as far as I can see and have elucidated to you.

 

[Jodell88]

Holy wall of text Batman!

A good post none the less. :thumbsup:

 

[BrightCandle]

I never complained about the Toms thread, the mods reopened it after realising the mistake (presumably a number of posters complained). I started complaining about other peoples threads being closed once I saw a pattern of thread closure that showed a clear agenda, which came just weeks before an expected AMD release. Then an AMD centre link appears on the homepage. Its a lot of coincidences all within a small period of time that looks mighty suspicious and calls into question the integrity of not just the website and its owners but the people who work for them down in the pits of the forum as well. That doesn't mean you are actively doing anything wrong, but in journalism if people can't trust you anymore you are done.

However I want to draw your attention to something Idontcare said to me about my complaint about bias thread closure and the focus on closing threads and not dealing with poor individual behaviour. I think this is really important because I think its fundamentally scary as a concept in light of the AMD centre link, in many ways it contradicts much of what has been said by yourself as to controlling influences:

This forum belongs to Anand. It is moderated to Anand's liking and at his discretion.

This is reality. It isn't up for debate. It is neither a matter of debate amongst the members nor a matter of debate amongst the moderators.

As moderators our decision is simple - either enforce moderation per Anand's desires (as effected by his Forum Directors), or don't be a moderator of Anand's forums.

.....

When I look at that in the context of the AMD centre and the types of closures we are talking about I think its prudent to raise a concern about overt and covert bias and corrupting influences, especially when they have become so incredibly obvious but with no official statement. What IDC said looks bad in light of the link and actively goes against what you have just told us, critically Anand is in charge of the moderation here, that is the reality that you the mods gave me just a few days ago. Now I don't think that is massively relevent to the link and the advertising on site but you guys seem to think its intrinsically linked and so do others so I should at least mention that this concerns me, it raises doubts.

I am personally inclined to believe you, I don't believe the mods have been given instruction to shutdown anti AMD or pro Intel or pro Nvidia threads as an explicit message. But, just like when a president is appointed he chooses supreme court judges with leanings in the way he wants, I too believe a new mod with strongly innate bias has been introduced and needs some strong guidance to avoid such links between the owners potential bias and the forum moderation being seen again. But while it remains true that Anand is ultimately in control of moderation decisions it does seem that any potential bias on the website has the potential to put doubt in our minds about the moderators and what marching orders they actually do have. I would hope some of you would quit than be corrupted in that way, I do hope we don't soon find out.

 

[jvroig]

I understand your concern and am in no way stating or implying that you raising this concern here is wrong or unwarranted. That is why I bothered to reply to the parts of it that I could.

As for that portion of Idontcare's post that you quoted and linked to the AMD Center thing, I think the scariness of it to you is a result of you understandably not knowing how much direct involvement Anand has in the day to day running of the forums, and how the forums are actually managed.

The short and sweet answer is that his direct personal involvement in the forums is incredibly minimal (I have only ever seen him post in our area about twice in a few years). It's not like the other forums around where the owner is actively participating in the forums (like Kyle of H). How do we know what Anand wants? The Forum Directors act in his stead. The only guideline that I know of that actually came directly from Anand (and which the FD's ask us to maintain) is for us to practice "kinder/gentler moderation", which is why it takes very very long for us to actually ban people, for example, and why we generally don't want to act like bullies (but of course, given the huge variation in mod styles as I explained in my earlier post, YMMV with different mods). That's it. The specific rules of the game, like how exactly moderation activities should be executed, which things are infractable, which aren't, what is spamming and what isn't, which deserves only a warning, etc? The mod crew hashes it out, not Anand. Sometimes, there are issues that we think needs to be run by Anand or his people first (like how to deal with official company reps). The FD's contact Anand in that case, but mostly the result is just Anand telling the forum directors something like "Yeah ok, just do what you think is best for the forums". And so the mod crew then just hashes out a game plan that we think should apply.

The new mod in question that you say has strongly innate bias? Anand didn't choose him (and as far as I know, Anand's never been involved in choosing which members to make moderators). I am, in fact, the one who chose this new mod, simply because in his long stay here, he has not gotten a single infraction, and he frequently participates in the practice of reporting posts, and all his contributions that I reviewed seem to be rather emotionless and no-nonsense. He has no rap sheet, his contributions are not problematic at all, and his regular reporting of posts struck me as willingness to be "employed for free" by the forums. So with approval from my peers, I PM'd him, asked him if he'd be interested in being a moderator for the most unruly tech subforum we have, then upon his acceptance threw him to the wolves with barely a proper training and some motivational inspirational speeches.

Now that you know more facts about how the forum moderation actually works and how much involvement Anand actually has here, I hope you can now see Idontcare's post from a different perspective. He replied as he did in your Mod Disc thread because you made a statement about how there should be a discussion about what is the better moderating style because you disagreed with how several mod actions were done. And Idontcare and one of the forum directors replied to you about it with the same answer, using different words: there will be no such discussion and no such thread will be made to propose better moderating styles. And that's simply what Idontcare was trying to tell you, and it's unfortunate that you somehow connected it to the AMD Center. He and esquared were telling you no such discussion will take place so no thread will be allowed to debate about what is proper moderation, and as a member, your choices are to accept the moderation being done, or leave. It is the AnandTech Forums, after all, not the BrightCandle forums. This is a speech we have occasionally told some troublesome members who insisted we change our style (mostly because they kept getting infractions and they adamantly refuse to acknowledge that they were at fault, or that they could possibly be imperfect), and it was rather unfortunate it had to be told to you because you aren't a troublemaker. But what other reply could they give you when your statement (being just written and in the internet) comes across as a demand like hey, this style of moderation is annoying and I don't like it, please change it, otherwise the next thread will have to be about discussing better moderating styles? Naturally they'd tell you that that's not going to happen, and that's exactly what happened. This is the AnandTech forums, and we all play by the rules of the establishment, not some rules that one or more members may feel is more "right", and the rules of the establishment say that only the mod crew has the right to hash out policy, and members may politely suggest things but possess no legal right to demand changes of any sort.

Occasionally, there are instances where mods may publicly request the community to help hash out rules, such as how to properly title threads by citing the source, which came about from a public poll years back, but again, that's because it was started by the mod crew. If the mod crew elects to ask the community's help in hashing out some policy, that's fine. If they don't elect to do so, that's also fine. It's all the call of the mod crew. There is simply no democracy here, it's not like you (the constituents) voted who should be the directors and the admins and the super mods and the mods. And Idontcare was telling you that exactly - this isn't a democracy, you don't get a vote here or demand to change the moderating styles. You put up with it or you leave for the countless other forums.

FWIW, you are no troublemaker and I personally would not want you out. And I think that whole miscommunication in your Mod Disc thread could have been avoided if only you worded your response better, so that it didn't come across as a threat or a demand that we must change how we do things to conform better to your own preferences. That's really the key there. Sometimes it's not really the message itself that derails what could have been a more productive discussion, but simply how the message was phrased. And if you think it's lousy customer service, because customer reps should cater to the customers no matter if the customer is angry or pleasant, well, you are right, customer reps should. But again that leads us back to the reality that none of us are actually valid customer reps because we aren't paid, and I understand why forum directors and admins, while usually very patient people, may at times be irked when a member seems to barge in and demand something, seeing as to how everyone (directors, admins, mods) is just working for free.

I hope I'm making sense to you. Nothing was wrong with your message per se, and I also understand your frustration with threads being locked rather than moderated. But when you made the statement which esquared and Idontcare replied to, which honestly is really very very easily interpreted as a strong demand or threat or something, you pretty much crossed a line that the mod crew doesn't like.

I also hope you don't misinterpret, I'm not trying to win you over or convince you to stop believing what you believe. I simply saw that you formed some beliefs based on lack of facts on your end (e.g., you naturally have no info about how moderation happens, or how we recruit mods, or how involved or not involved Anand is, etc), and I gave you those facts. If they cause you to re-evaluate some of your earlier conclusions or beliefs or suspicions, then good. If not, then also ok. Either way, at least you (and those with the intestinal fortitude to survive my walls of text) will have a better understanding of how moderation is being handled as it relates to this thread's topic.

 

[rcpratt]

Interesting...marked.

 

[BrightCandle]

One thing that occurs to me is that to believe everything you say requires trust. In light of current discussion do you think you have that trust or are you worried that has been impacted? Are you worried that the trust is eroded by something you have no control over? I am not saying I don't trust this response (I actually do) but a paranoid person realises none of it can be validated, Anand himself could have written that post in an attempt to quell unrest. We could never verify it one way or the other. Trust matters for this site, a lot, its a commodity that once used up never comes back.

I along with others, have started raising concerns about comments made by your team, the contents of the website and how the moderation is occurring, and that link makes everything harder for you guys. Every time you shut down an Intel/Nvidia thread now you are going to get blasted and that wasn't me that did, it wont be me doing it but the cause will be the website. Every time a moderation is called into question bias is now immediately assumed. Interestingly I never raised a bias concern when talking about threads that were shut down but you did think that. I don't think the concerns I raised about the style of moderation has much to do with this topic actually. What that link did was colour how I viewed the events and the comments made and also coloured how you viewed it as well. In essence all I had to do was concur with some one else who was concerned about bias and boom big defence of actions and a lot of transparency immediately.

This subsection is a grave concern for the integrity of everything you guys do and you are finding yourself answering for things and explaining your actions in a way 2 days ago you said you would never do. That is the power this little subsection and its discussion holds over everyone discussing it. The threat of bias, its overt declaration or just the hint of it is enormously damaging to this particular site. The site trades almost entirely on people believing it is independent. The forums are only busy because the site is popular. I don't think I have ever seen a mod explain how this works, nor do I feel that would have happened unless this link had been placed.

I started this thread about a link on Anands site. It has nothing to do with the moderation, my suspicions about the bias involved in those closings I didn't even raise with your team, I simply questioned the method and once told I had no right to change or discuss it did absolutely nothing in your forums at all. To me has thread had nothing to do with the moderation question I raised. I guess you thought that your actions could be construed as problematic or that this maybe this was me lashing out, I don't know entirely why it brought this out but the damage had already been done. The very discussion of the potential for bias on the website and then in the moderators team brings a need to defend and explain, a lot of details we have never before seen.

I suspect Anandtech is going to have to explain how it separates AMD, how it maintains its independence and likely change its future advertising strategy. This problem wont be constrained to questioning the moderation and this discussion. I suspect you'll see it in the comments on the articles pretty soon, it'll be one or two people initially and then it'll explode. Overt and questionable bias like this always changes things. One potential consequence is that the AMD advocate program supporters in the VC&G might now believe the website, the moderators etc are behind them. That might make them even more aggressive in their attacks of "nvidiots". The subversive influence it has presumably AMD bets will help their brand, but it hurts it as well and it potentially hurts Anandtech and its forums (well it already has clearly).

I find it interesting how powerful questioning bias can be. If you have the chance you might want to express this to the powers at be, because I am certain that while I am telling you honestly how it raises suspicions, colours entire conversations and impacts the forums you can bet a thousand people coming onto the site and read the forums and never tell you there is a problem with it or even recognise its changed their perspective.

Unfortunately a moderation discussion has derailed a thread about the website and a subsection link although I see how and why we got there. I find this explanation enlightening, but I also know only a serious problem brought it out. I don't think I have ever seen a moderator derail so convincing before!

 

[crashtestdummy]

I don't think it changes much of anything. You have to presume with any free site (or indeed anything that's free) that you're not the customer, you're the product. Your satisfaction is only important insofar as it keeps you viewing the ads on the site. Any concerns you might have had over Anand's editorial bias should have already been in place because the site accepts advertisements at all and he relies on being supplied review samples and insider access for his stories. All that's changed with this AMD thing is the size and visual intrusiveness of the advertising contract.

The only way for a review site or magazine to be truly unbiased is to take on the Consumer Reports model of not accepting advertising and buying everything yourself, as Doppel said. There are precious few outlets that do this (Consumer Reports and Cooks Illustrated are the only ones I can think of), and it's a much harder business model to succeed in. I take with a grain of salt the reviews by anyone who doesn't follow this model (Anandtech included), no matter how well-intentioned the authors are.

 

[jvroig]

I don't think I have ever seen a moderator derail so convincing before!

I'm not sure how to react with you calling it a "moderator derail", seeing as to how I directly replied to a statement you made in this thread (your statement that I quoted when I began my participation here, which specifically mentioned moderation action).

As for the trust and having to believe everything that I just said, that's exactly what I meant by you can take it as you like, with how I prefaced my message in the first place. Read and it disregard it, or believe it, or only read 1/10th of it, or conclude it is nothing more than a pile of horse crap. It's really up to you, I'm not trying to convince you of anything; right off the bat, I was quite frank that I don't expect you to believe it, but I would rather have it said for the record and then not believed, rather than not bothering to say it just because I expect you to not believe it.

From my end, from my perspective, this issue I'm tackling (the question of whether mod action is related to AMD Center, which you yourself posed) is pretty straightforward - you thought moderator actions you observed is somehow connected to the AMD Center. Being an insider, I know that to be untrue. So I told you how it was from my end.

you are finding yourself answering for things and explaining your actions in a way 2 days ago you said you would never do

Don't misintepret what I'm doing here to mean that. This is me, posting as a member, giving you a look behind the curtain because I think it is harmless to do so. My posts aren't mod posts, this isn't moderator discussions, I am not acting in an official capacity, and my posts aren't the establishment's way of making an announcement or explanation for their actions.

If you were a problem poster, I would have left you alone and let you continue wondering and dreaming how it (AMD Center, Anandtech-AMD relations) affects the moderation. But I don't think you are a problem poster, and from my perspective you simply were led to that conclusion because you had to assume many things (how moderation is run, how we elect new mods, how we determine rules, how much Anand is involved here, etc), and your assumptions led you to connect things somewhow to the new-fangled AMD Center. And so I tried to remove those assumptions by giving you the facts as I know them.

I suspect Anandtech is going to have to explain how it separates AMD, how it maintains its independence and likely change its future advertising strategy. This problem wont be constrained to questioning the moderation and this discussion. I suspect you'll see it in the comments on the articles pretty soon, it'll be one or two people initially and then it'll explode

I do agree with that. And that's their problem. For all intents and purposes, the main site and the forums are separate entities - the people running and managing the main site, and the people running and managing the forums are completely different. The only thing we have in common is that the ultimate boss/owner is Anand, and that we have "AnandTech" in the name. So whatever the main site has to answer for, that's really their problem. I tried to tell you exactly that right when I started here, which is why I went to the trouble to give you the facts as I know it about our day to day operations here.

They (main site) made the deal, if they have anything to answer for, that's their problem. I don't know and I don't care how or when they'll answer whatever it is they have to answer or explain. All I can guarantee is that what happens there, doesn't affect the forums and has not affected the forums, which is why everything I've been dealing with here is simply the mod issue, which you raised yourself in this thread and which I quoted, the supposed "change" in moderation that you observed that links to AMD Center.

The other issues in this thread - like ethics of it, independence of the press, trust, credibility of the main site - I can't answer because we aren't part of the main site, we're not part of the decision making, we aren't privy to the details of whatever the deal was. I only have as much info as you do about the details of the deal. We (mods) don't know, and as far as moderation duties are concerned, we also don't really care.


I also want to make a little note about this:

Every time you shut down an Intel/Nvidia thread now you are going to get blasted and that wasn't me that did, it wont be me doing it but the cause will be the website. Every time a moderation is called into question bias is now immediately assumed.

Hehe, no, this won't be new. Every time we infract a pro-AMD member, or a pro-Intel member, or a pro-NV member, or an anti-AMD/NV/Intel member ("haterz"), we generally get abuse back, accusing us of being shills for company X (whatever their hated company is). I, personally, have been accused several times of being an AMD shill, NV shill, and Intel shill, multiple times on separate occasions. Not just me, most of us, every time an infraction is awarded. So this AMD Center thing pretty much changes nothing as far as how members react to mod actions they don't like. They'll still complain about it and accuse us of being unfair. It's been happening before AMD Center, it will continue happening while this AMD Center exists, and it will continue happening long after the AMD Center deal expires.