A forum has rules. Then it has real rules. The written rules say “be respectful,” “stay on topic,” and “no harmful advice.” The real rules live somewhere else: in replies that keep getting answered, comments that survive moderation, tones that are silently rewarded, and phrases that make insiders nod while outsiders sound like they arrived by parachute. ...
Flame Tamed: Can LLMs Put Out the Internet’s Worst Fires? A comment thread rarely explodes in one clean motion. It starts with a correction. Then someone reads the correction as condescension. Then another person adds a historical grievance, a screenshot, three exclamation marks, and the kind of moral certainty normally reserved for courtrooms and family dinners. By the time a moderator arrives, the thread is no longer a conversation. It is archaeology with insults. ...
TL;DR for operators Moderation is usually measured after the mess has already happened. COSMOS changes the sequence: it lets researchers run a synthetic online conversation twice, once without moderation and once with a selected intervention, while keeping the simulated world otherwise constant.1 That is the useful idea. Not “LLMs can pretend to be angry internet users,” though they can, which is an achievement of sorts. The useful idea is controlled comparison. ...