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Volunteer moderators (mods) play significant roles in developing moderation standards and dealing with harmful content in their micro-communities. However, little work explores how volunteer mods work as a team. In line with prior work about understanding volunteer moderation, we interview 40 volunteer mods on Twitch — a leading live streaming platform. We identify how mods collaborate on tasks (off-streaming coordination and preparation, in-stream real-time collaboration, and relationship building both off-stream and in-stream to reinforce collaboration) and how mods contribute to moderation standards (collaboratively working on the community rulebook and individually shaping community norms). We uncover how volunteer mods work as an effective team. We also discuss how the affordances of multi-modal communication and informality of volunteer moderation contribute to task collaboration, standards development, and mod’s roles and responsibilities.
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Understanding Moderators’ Conflict and Conflict Management Strategies with Streamers in Live Streaming Communities
As each micro community centered around the streamer attempts to set its own guidelines in live streaming communities, it is common for volunteer moderators (mods) and the streamer to disagree on how to handle various situations. In this study, we conducted an online survey (N=240) with live streaming mods to explore their commitment to the streamer to grow the micro community and the different styles in which they handle conflicts with the streamer. We found that 1) mods apply more active and cooperative styles than passive and assertive styles to manage conflicts, but they might be forced to do so, and 2) mods with strong commitments to the streamer would like to apply styles showing either high concerns for the streamer or low concerns for themselves. We reflect on how these results can affect micro community development and recommend designs to mitigate conflict and strengthen commitment.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1928627
- PAR ID:
- 10466933
- Publisher / Repository:
- ACM
- Date Published:
- ISBN:
- 9781450394215
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 1 to 12
- Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
- Conflict Conflict Management Commitment Live Streaming Moderator Content Moderation Streamer-Moderator Relationship Twitch Moderation Human-computer interaction
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Location:
- Hamburg Germany
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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