ArduPilot Discord Moderation

General Rants&Raves
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Hello ArduPilot community,

I’m writing this post to create a public record and voice concerns about how automated moderation and bans are being handled in the ArduPilot Discord server—and how that impacts developers and contributors who want to help advance the project.

Recently, I was automatically banned from the ArduPilot Discord server for including a MakerWorld link. There was no warning, no explanation, and no indication that I had done anything wrong. The message I posted was directly related to development work I hoped to contribute– the first step of which was understanding previous private efforts and identifying the best public path forward. To do this I included a link to my airframe design on MakerWorld. This airframe is unusual and currently unsupported by ArduPilot. Including that context was essential. MakerWorld, for clarity, only hosts free 3D printable files; there are no paid products or services on the site. To consider this “advertising” is inaccurate.

Bans in Discord are total– you’re cut off from context, conversation, discussion, and recourse. As someone who manages a public Discord server with many thousands of members– I take moderation seriously. I’ve only ever banned one user– and only after multiple clear warnings for repeated, willful disregard of the rules. Automation can be useful, but without transparency or recourse, it becomes arbitrary and damaging.

I believe your automated moderation tool is broken. It is causing harm to untold numbers of users, developers, and supporters. People who should be allies, builders, advocates, and friends– not frustrated excommunicated former members.

Since the ban, I’ve tried to engage with the moderators respectfully and directly. Instead of conversation, I’ve been met with silence or shifting, after-the-fact justifications that don’t align with what actually happened. My public messages were deleted, and my appeals were brushed aside. None of this reflects the open and collaborative spirit that I believe ArduPilot aspires to.

My intent remains clear: I’m developing open-source airframes that push the boundaries of what ArduPilot can do. I want ArduPilot to publicly support airframes that are currently only supported by private, closed-source efforts– and I’m willing to contribute software development work to help make that happen. I’m here to build, to share, and to move things forward for everyone.

Here’s what I ask:

Please do not allow bots to issue bans without some form of human review— or at least a clear and working warning system.
Please document all automated moderation triggers in the publicly posted rules.
Please ensure moderators engage constructively and respectfully with contributors, especially those trying to help.

I hope this is taken in the constructive spirit it’s offered. I believe in this project. I want to help make it better– not just through hardware and code, but through strong communities too.

Sincerely,
Tim O’Brien

3 Likes
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You’ve had a terrible experience here, and your suggestions there are noted. I’m particularly concerned by the “no recourse” problem - false-positive issues should be able to be fixed.

The moderators are discussing how to do better in the future.

Apparently the automatic flagging by automod happened three times before the ban was put in place; did that flagging not come with sufficient warning that Bad Things were about to happen? Apparently the automod was enforcing a “no advertising” rule… probably the MakerWorld link. Musings on the boundary between promotion and advertising go here.

My understanding is that the ban was lifted.

… your public messages were removed from a thread they shouldn’t have been posted in. IMO that should have been a request for you to do so first, but I’m pretty sure whatever spiral this situation is currently in would probably have been exacerbated by that request. “Rants&Raves” sounds very much like the right place for your missive here :slight_smile:

I came across your “AeroFold” the other day and pointed it out to the developer who worked on sequencing/scripting support for that style of frame in ArduPilot many years ago. Looked nice! PRs welcome adding support for the frame - it’s been done before in scripting so an applet would be great. PRs are a useful tool for this sort of thing because it gives people something technical to discuss and base their discussions on…

Peter

1 Like
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Hi Peter,

Thanks for your thoughtful reply — I really appreciate you taking the time to engage with this. I’m encouraged to hear that moderators are discussing how to improve things going forward.

To clarify a few points:

apparently the automatic flagging by automod happened three times before the ban…

That doesn’t match what I experienced. I only posted two messages with URLs— and the second resulted in an instant, unexplained ban. There were no warnings, no DMs, not even a visible “this message was flagged” notice. Just total disappearance and loss of access. That kind of moderation leaves no room for learning, clarification, or resolution. It was confusing and frustrating.

the ban was lifted

That’s news to me. Why wasn’t that communicated? The only mod I’ve heard from has only ever sent copy-pasted generic messages and ignored every reply.

your public messages were removed from a thread they shouldn’t have been posted in…

That may be the case, but I had no idea they’d been deleted until much later. I’d been linking people to that post for weeks, not realizing it was silently scrubbed. That’s hard to reconcile with the stated Code of Conduct about being welcoming, inclusive, and respectful. If the concern was thread placement, a simple message asking me to move it would have sufficed. Instead, it reinforces the feeling that criticism just gets quietly buried.

That said, I’m really glad you’ve seen my design work. The closed-source scripting work from years ago is exactly what I’m hoping to build on– just publicly and open-source this time. That’s where ArduPilot should shine. I’d love to develop my plan into actual PRs, but it’s been hard to feel safe or welcome even asking questions.

Thanks again for engaging with this. I’m still here because I believe in the project and what the community could be.

Tim

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Sadly discord moderation tools suck. The only tools of moderation are deleting messages, temporarily muting and bans. It has nowhere near granularity needed.