Post by account_disabled on Dec 30, 2017 8:39:09 GMT
Hi,
A vase containing two red gerberas sits on the window sill of Dawn Kitchener's home office. Behind the half-open slatted blinds, in the streets of Shepperton, south-west London, it's a cold, still morning. But on the laptop in front of us, an animated bulletin board discussion about dangerous dogs is rising to the boil.
"Michelle you are speaking a load of crap excuse the language!!" one poster writes. "I have a staff and she is the most lovable dog I know! By suggesting staffies need to be seized will only heighten illegal dog breeding … Grow up woman, and think about what you write!" Another poster adds: "All I wanna say is that it's not the dogs it's their bloody owners look at these gangs just have dogs 2 attack people and they just hav [sic] a fine instead of going 2 prison." The laptop chimes soothingly as more and more comments appear on screen.
Kitchener observes this robust exchange of views, hosted on the website of the ITV1 programme This Morning, with a mild detachment, knowing that before long she will leave an indelible mark on the discussion, even if none of her opinions will be on view.
"This one that says 'crap'," she explains, matter-of-factly, "I know I'll just delete that straight away."
As a moderator, it is Kitchener's job to sanitise internet discussion threads on topics ranging from car dealerships to current affairs. Her employer, a company called eModeration, offers this service to some of the world's best-known brands, all of whom wish to join in with the social media revolution without exposing themselves to unwanted reputational damage.
It is a role she has been in for around five years, taking her neatly from the early days of social media use to the current proliferation of online networking, a world in which Facebook and Twitter collectively reach 1.1 billion users. Not so long ago, most of Kitchener's work would have involved intercepting comments on internet messageboards or forums before they could be seen publicly. "The nub of what I'm doing is making sure nothing libellous is said or illegal is posted," she explains, "So obviously from that point of view, premoderated forums were much better. You could keep them quite safe, quite clean. And they would develop into real communities."
Yet as she points out, sounding a little regretful, the social media explosion has moved things on. Comments now go up instantaneously and it is her job to remove anything contentious as quickly as possible. "Now people want responses straight away, don't they?" she reflects. "Part of what I do is about managing that for clients."
We peer at Kitchener's special moderator's view of comments, in which sensitive words are highlighted in red, such as "crap", "teenage" and even "hun" – an abbreviation of "honey", I'm relieved to note, rather than a reference to wartime Germany.
Quickly it becomes apparent that, in the squeaky clean corporate world, anything contentious gets removed without a second thought. Only occasionally does Kitchener need to exercise judgment. "Maybe the word 'drugs' has been highlighted and it might be fine," she says. "But it might be that someone's said, 'Oh, one of the presenters looks like they're on drugs today.'" Momentarily I find it difficult to shake this image. "Obviously we'd have to remove that," she says firmly.
While most of her work is taken up with weeding out mild offence, there are also times, especially on a topical discussion show like This Morning, when the conversation can take a darker turn.
"It really depends on the news," she says. "If something happens and gets featured on the programme, you might get lots of racist comments coming in, for example."
Immediately I think of the recent Stephen Lawrence murder trial. In relation to that, was it necessary to censor many comments on racist grounds? "I don't know if you'd say a lot," she says picking her words carefully. "For something like the Lawrence case we'd probably have around 1,000 comments during the time it was being discussed on the TV, and you'd get maybe a couple of hundred that contained something unacceptable. But you'd get loads of arguing as well, someone sticking their neck out and saying something and then getting loads of support for it."
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A vase containing two red gerberas sits on the window sill of Dawn Kitchener's home office. Behind the half-open slatted blinds, in the streets of Shepperton, south-west London, it's a cold, still morning. But on the laptop in front of us, an animated bulletin board discussion about dangerous dogs is rising to the boil.
"Michelle you are speaking a load of crap excuse the language!!" one poster writes. "I have a staff and she is the most lovable dog I know! By suggesting staffies need to be seized will only heighten illegal dog breeding … Grow up woman, and think about what you write!" Another poster adds: "All I wanna say is that it's not the dogs it's their bloody owners look at these gangs just have dogs 2 attack people and they just hav [sic] a fine instead of going 2 prison." The laptop chimes soothingly as more and more comments appear on screen.
Kitchener observes this robust exchange of views, hosted on the website of the ITV1 programme This Morning, with a mild detachment, knowing that before long she will leave an indelible mark on the discussion, even if none of her opinions will be on view.
"This one that says 'crap'," she explains, matter-of-factly, "I know I'll just delete that straight away."
As a moderator, it is Kitchener's job to sanitise internet discussion threads on topics ranging from car dealerships to current affairs. Her employer, a company called eModeration, offers this service to some of the world's best-known brands, all of whom wish to join in with the social media revolution without exposing themselves to unwanted reputational damage.
It is a role she has been in for around five years, taking her neatly from the early days of social media use to the current proliferation of online networking, a world in which Facebook and Twitter collectively reach 1.1 billion users. Not so long ago, most of Kitchener's work would have involved intercepting comments on internet messageboards or forums before they could be seen publicly. "The nub of what I'm doing is making sure nothing libellous is said or illegal is posted," she explains, "So obviously from that point of view, premoderated forums were much better. You could keep them quite safe, quite clean. And they would develop into real communities."
Yet as she points out, sounding a little regretful, the social media explosion has moved things on. Comments now go up instantaneously and it is her job to remove anything contentious as quickly as possible. "Now people want responses straight away, don't they?" she reflects. "Part of what I do is about managing that for clients."
We peer at Kitchener's special moderator's view of comments, in which sensitive words are highlighted in red, such as "crap", "teenage" and even "hun" – an abbreviation of "honey", I'm relieved to note, rather than a reference to wartime Germany.
Quickly it becomes apparent that, in the squeaky clean corporate world, anything contentious gets removed without a second thought. Only occasionally does Kitchener need to exercise judgment. "Maybe the word 'drugs' has been highlighted and it might be fine," she says. "But it might be that someone's said, 'Oh, one of the presenters looks like they're on drugs today.'" Momentarily I find it difficult to shake this image. "Obviously we'd have to remove that," she says firmly.
While most of her work is taken up with weeding out mild offence, there are also times, especially on a topical discussion show like This Morning, when the conversation can take a darker turn.
"It really depends on the news," she says. "If something happens and gets featured on the programme, you might get lots of racist comments coming in, for example."
Immediately I think of the recent Stephen Lawrence murder trial. In relation to that, was it necessary to censor many comments on racist grounds? "I don't know if you'd say a lot," she says picking her words carefully. "For something like the Lawrence case we'd probably have around 1,000 comments during the time it was being discussed on the TV, and you'd get maybe a couple of hundred that contained something unacceptable. But you'd get loads of arguing as well, someone sticking their neck out and saying something and then getting loads of support for it."
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