The Revolution of r/SteamDeck And How The Top Moderator Was Removed

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There have been a lot of developments in the Steam Deck space, but none have been as large and divisive as what has happened with the Steam Deck subreddit. r/SteamDeck is one of the largest communities for Steam Deck users and has increasingly grown since its launch in 2021, but in the last year or two, it has been marred with controversies surrounding its top mod. There was also a lot of controversy surrounding SteamDeckHQ and myself personally, as any links or mention of us was immediately removed and could result in a ban.

But, seemingly out of nowhere, the top mod was removed, giving access to other moderators who have tried to turn the sub around and back to its former glory. So far, the team has been very communicative and even brought me on to help moderate to both extend an olive branch and help improve the sub with feedback, which I accepted. I also even helped draft the new rules that were implemented, with a lot of my focus being on the new self-promotion rules (which I am also subjected to).

Now that I am a mod, I can also see some of what has happened as it took place via modmail. So, I wanted to go over exactly what happened and how we (SteamDeckHQ) became involved in it. One of the moderators, House_of_Suns, posted about their account of what happened on the subreddit, which goes a little more into the history of the sub and how it got to where it is now. I will briefly touch on some of these, so I recommend checking out the post if you want more information from the start of the sub.

I will also not be giving specific names as we don't want to promote directing any hate or harm to this individual.

The Beginning of the Issues

As House_of_Suns mentions in his post, the start of the issues dates back a bit further than a lot of us may know. There were three generations of moderators in total, with members of the third generation still a part of the team today. Both the first and second generations were instrumental in building up the subreddit to what it is today but were essentially purged completely with the top mod invoking their powers as "the founder and top-moderator of r/SteamDeck." According to accounts from both first- and second-generation moderators, these came after the top moderators did not communicate with the team and made decisions that were contrary to the rules of the sub.

I can confirm that both generations of mods tried to extend an olive branch and work with the top mod, inviting them to their own moderator discord to communicate more effectively and giving them the benefit of the doubt, but they were not responsive and denied invitations. The second generation of moderators got frustrated with the top mod's lack of responses and breaking their own rules, and collectively put together a message for them stating:

Several members of the moderation team are very concerned about your behavior. Between brashly nuking all of the dbrand posts without talking to anyone, and now your "F" post CLEARLY breaking our rules, then BANNING SOMEONE for calling you out, something's got to give. You refuse to join the discord the entire moderation team uses, which is fine. What isn't fine is your rash actions without talking to anyone…You keep making messes and expecting all of us to clean up after you. This is not okay. You also are very clearly breaking Reddit's Moderator code of conduct…

Collective statement from Third Generation of Moderators

And the top mod's response to what was:

Now whether you personally and/or the other moderators have an opinion on whether I am 'worthy' of the top mod position is largely irrelevant to our responsibility to the sub-reddit and it's members. You weren't brought on board to question that and that is NOT for you or any other mod to decide. Do it on Discord, within other subs you mod or in your personal life. But not here on the official channels through bad faith political attacks aimed at me just for holding the position. Lets get one thing clear: YOU do not speak for the mods. In one collective voice, that's my privilege & responsibility as top moderator. I speak for the mod positions and the entire r/steamdeck sub-reddit on all matters that require one voice. You occupy the role of moderator because I created it in the best interest of the sub. You may elect yourself to speak for fellow moderators on this particular subject about me. Fine. You've seemed to telegraph what you think that means for you. And frankly, the other moderators have their own individual voices are free to speak on this subject. The floor is open to them as well.

Ex-Top Moderator of r/SteamDeckHQ

This was followed up by another message from the second-generation moderators who wanted to work things out and find ways to communicate:

…we are willing and want to give you the chance to prove to us that you will work with us. If you agree to commit to the communication paths outlined above AND agree to correct your moderation in-line with our community rules, we will rescind the report made against you, and will be happy to try to work with you to improve. However, if you continue to be disconnected from team discussions, continue with disregard for our subreddits rules, or continue to try to flaunt your "top mod" spot to try to beat down opposition, we will find ourselves back here, with every channel available to us to have you removed as a moderator, in our hand.

Collective statement from Third Generation of Moderators

Unfortunately, this resulted in the entire second generation team being ousted, similar to what had happened with the first generation. A lot of these changes went largely unnoticed by the community, and it wasn't until suppression took place that others started to notice and be more vocal.

Suppressions and Bans

After the ousting of the last gen, the third generation of the mod team was instated and helped manage the server on a limited basis. The team had no access to anything other than the mod queue and was providing support. There was no access to anything like mod mail or crowd control. Only the top mod had clearance. For a while, they hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary, but towards the end of last year (November 2023), problems started to rear their head.

There were a lot of spikes in the mod queue, all more combative, and the top moderator's name was mentioned directly. This is also when the word "Mod" would result in an auto-removal, and the possible ban would apply to anyone saying the word. While this is common across Reddit, the Steam Deck is a moddable device, so a lot of people were upset that they couldn't talk about modifying their device.

I also noticed that any SteamDeckHQ links I posted on the subreddit would be taken down, and while I did follow the self-promo rule, I hadn't thought much of it yet.

This all came to a head even further when someone posted about having their Steam Deck with them while awaiting surgery, and while the mod team had spent a lot of time getting rid of transphobic and bigoted comments, the post was still approved for the sub. However, the top moderator removed the post, which made a lot of the community very upset.

The backlash of all of this resulted in one of the mods leaving while making note of the top moderator's inability to communicate:

Sorry I'm resigning my position as a mod here. [Top Moderator], I feel like you need to do a better job of communicating with the mods. Oftentimes, it seems to take forever to receive a response here, despite you making frequent mod actions. Also, I feel kind of powerless when I see user complaints about our moderation- since I feel like I can't have a dialog to change our rules, or respond to modmails. Many users complain about the amount of megathreads, which isn't being addressed. (Personally, I never use megathreads, so I can see why many people are overwhelmed by the types of posts gated behind them.) I'm posting my reasonings here instead of in a DM, because I'm not trying to call you out (or any other mods)- I think there should be a better dialog between the mods in the future. I hope that my leaving spurs some constructive discussion. Also on a personal note, dealing with users is stressful for me, so that does factor in to my decision of leaving. Thanks for the opportunity and good luck everyone.

Ex-moderator of r/SteamDeckHQ

It didn't get better from here.

At the start of this year (March 2024), a bunch of posts started calling out the top moderators for their conduct, which would restrict people from talking about modifying their Steam Decks and repressing any criticism. The rest of the mod team had no idea but could only see that there was some issue people were having with how the sub was being run.

To figure out the issues and get community input, House_of_Suns created a stickied post aimed at getting the input to hear about the issues. This got a fantastic amount of engagement with tons of comments, with users venting about the rules, wanting fewer Steam Deck picture posts, and about the top mods' conduct. This led Hosue_of_Suns to try addressing the problems brought up with the top moderator, wanting to bring in more community engagement and needing more access to tools like mod mail to really help the mod team do their jobs. Unfortunately, instead of responding, the top moderator unstickied and removed the post, which brought in another wave of users being pissed off at management.

House_of_Suns did tell the top moderator this was a very poor decision since they were actively losing the trust of the community, and they responded by saying that this was some coordinated attack/hate campaign and they just want to keep the current course while banning all users who criticize:

Noted. Stand fast. My opinion is the sub is not imploding. The VAST majority of the sub is doing what they do sans the coordinated attack campaign. I am very much aware of the sentiment. Even more, I am very much aware of the abuse aimed at me. Placating the hostility from this campaign (even in an effort to isolate it within a thread) is giving them a voice to further amplifty the rhetoric. The strategy in the immediate time (as in right now this moment) is to let them burn their fuel. Rather, yeet their shit and allow the community to continue what they are currently doing: Discussing Steam Deck. I will NOT give into pressure campaigns. I won't tolerate the abuse or threats aimed at me personally or at you, any mods or the community. Neither will the Reddit Admins. There's nothing more important than to remove those toxifying the sub with this hate campaign right now. The toxicity, the abuse has crossed the line. It would be futile to host a lucid discussion about improvements to the sub while a campaign like this is in affect

Ex-Top Moderator of r/SteamDeckHQ

This was the rhetoric that the top moderator would continue to push moving forward while also justifying the restricted access that the other moderators got. They even mentioned that Reddit Admins were somehow involved, which was news to the rest of the team.

Around this time, I started to notice SteamDeckHQ being banned and myself being targeted. Any links to the website were taken down, while any posts I made were immediately removed, even if they had no mention of the website. I really felt slighted when my post from PAX East this year, (March 2024), was taken down. It was a picture of a Steam Deck playing New Blood's Fallen Aces before it had been publicly released. There was no mention of the website on the post, yet it was still taken down. This is when I started to double down and create our own subreddit, r/SteamDeckHQ, as I started to feel that these repressive actions were happening too often and for unjustified reasons.

In September, there were a couple of developments, but ultimately, House_of_Suns expressed some concerns for the top moderator's personal health, the subreddit, and the r/SteamDeckHQ sub getting endorsed from r/Linux_gaming, which ended up replacing r/SteamDeck. In response, the top moderator decided to audit the sub due to "brigading" and revoked all mod privileges. This meant all the mods had no access to anything and were essentially mods in name only.

For context, brigading is a form of online harassment that includes a coordinated campaign to slander and besmirch a person or actions to make them seem less popular than they actually are. From what I could tell, people were calling out behavior that was backed up by proof, and the auto-mod removed relevant information while approving rule-breaking posts. Based on this, I would say there was no actual brigading taking place.

Around this time, I noticed our links were being banned from being posted altogether. I had reached out privately and got muted from messaging. Others in the community saw this and tried making posts asking why, and it would result in a ban. Once I learned about this, I asked people not to post or ask since it would result in a ban, but the damage was already done. Talking about any community other than r/SteamDeck, mentioning the word "mod," and mentioning something that could be construed as criticism towards the moderating team would result in a near-immediate ban.

Again, the mod team had no idea what was happening and had no permission to see it. It was only the top moderator.

The Big Removal

After this audit announcement, the team waited about a month to see if anything would change, but there was nothing. They couldn't perform any of their duties since they had no permissions, and there was no response when asking for any updates from the top moderator. This led House_of_Suns and moderator Sweatycat to independently report the situation to the Reddit Admins, who took action quickly and opened a modmail to the mod team to investigate. However, the mod team couldn't see it since they had no permission, and after it happened, the top moderator completely removed the mod team, similar to the first and second generations.

But this time was different. The admins restored the mod team and gave them ALL the permissions possible to ensure they couldn't be de-modded while this investigation was underway.

Through the investigation, the top moderator tried to spin a tale that the moderators were colluding with brigaders and they were the only ones trying to defend the community, which from all the actions I have seen them take, is completely false. The top mod even tried to post about needing a new mod team while this was happening, showing that they thought it would go in their favor and they could eliminate people disagreeing with them.

Then, the Admins made their decision. The top moderator was removed from the subreddit due to violating the Moderator Code of Conduct: Rule 1.

This leads us to where we are now. The new mod team has been spending tons of time cleaning up the mess that was left. They have unbanned tons of people, clearing out years of mod mail and trying to mend what was broken. I can attest to this as well. House_of_Suns reached out personally to let us know of the change and apologized for the past behavior. This ended up with us discussing how we could collaborate and work together, which resulted in me joining the mod team to help build it back up.

I am proud to be on this mod team, and it has left me with a lot of optimism. Each member seems to be on the same page, making the sub better and returning it to its former glory. The implementation of the new rules is the first step. All of us have been working hard on it, but I want to give a special thank you to moderator NKkrisz, who has been working overtime to draft and implement these new rules. All the mods are fantastic now, and they have shown this. They truly want to fix the subreddit.

SteamDeckHQ Was A Tipping Point

As a mod, I have been able to see some of the history behind what had transpired, and a lot of this seemed to correlate with our discovery of SteamDeckHQ being banned. There were tons of bans during September when we discovered that our links were banned from being posted, with even some people getting a ban reason stating that they were "brigaiding for SDHQ" or "brigaiding (in support) of SDHQ." Both of these reasons are, however, ridiculous.

We have never once asked anyone else to post about this happening, but the amount of people doing it touched our hearts. Again, I want to thank everyone who made the decision to take the risk of ban and support us in that time, it truly means so much to us.

From what I could tell, it seems like we were a big reason that the top moderator used to defend their actions. They mention us multiple times for "brigading" and mention me directly as participating as well. They linked to a comment I made about creating the SteamDeckHQ subreddit and welcoming people without shutting them out, but I don't see how that would justify as brigading since I do not mention r/SteamDeck or another moderator. They even mentioned they would have congratulated us for our growth if it didn't correlate to this "pro-SDHQ campaign," however, their actions show otherwise since they would shut down any mention of alternate subs and disabled cross-posting to r/SteamDeck.

They even went on to list some of our activity, including the post I made where r/Linux_Gaming replaced the sub with our own. They mentioned I was advocating for this replacement, but I never once asked to replace r/SteamDeck and only asked to be added to the sidebar. Other users made the suggestion, and we had no contact with them at all.

They note that their investigation determined the point of origin of these attacks to be r/SteamDeckHQ, which makes no sense, considering none of us ever advocated for taking action against r/SteamDeck. We invited people who were already displeased with the top moderator's actions and reassured them it wouldn't be the case here. We never attacked them directly, nor did we mention their name, but the impact we were having clearly caused them distress.

It is a bit interesting to see just how much of an impact our decisions had, and while they weren't exactly why the conversation with the Reddit Admins started, we were the main point the top mod was making to try defending their actions, which clearly was not enough.

Either way, I am very pleased with the direction the mods are taking the sub now, and very honored to be a part of the team. As for the top moderator, I truly hope they are doing okay and are reflecting on this period. There is no ill-will anymore, and I can't wait to see how r/SteamDeck grows from this.

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