F
The flagging system wouldn't cause any action to be taken, it would just alert a human admin about certain words and phrases. The admin then uses their judgement to decide whether any action needs to be taken.
There isn't anything automated here except telling the human admin there *might* be a problem.
For example if someone is using words or phrases that are usually used as slurs, they would be flagged up and the admin would look at the context to see if it's abusive.
Reports are never visible to the author, they just go to the admins and moderators who then decide if there is a problem or not.
As far as I know flags would work the same way as reports, the author of the post would never know about them, only the admins and moderators.
I've edited my post to make it clearer 
No. Proactive would mean if someone posts abuse the admin potentially sees it straight away and can immediately take action without waiting for the victim to see it and report it.
At the moment Mastodon is only reactive, so the only way an admin knows about abuse is if someone else reports it, by which time it may have already been seen by the victim and the damage is done.
p.s. The reason I mentioned the two Github issues above was because they have come up in discussions by people who feel unsafe on here due to bigotry and abuse.
There were people specifically mentioning they wanted reply controls so they could pre-emptively prevent abusers replying to their posts.
There was also concern about Mastodon's "reactive" moderation where admins have to wait for reports. A flagging system would be "proactive", allowing admins to act without waiting for reports.
Thanks, that's probably closer to what was being requested so I've replaced the issue in the post with that one.
Agreed, diversity is needed in deciding priorities.
Just to be clear, I'm not saying "white people vote on what should happen", that wasn't the intention.
The two features listed in my post were specifically ones that had been requested in various discussions by victims of bigotry, that was the only reason I included them in this list. For example there were people saying they felt safer on platforms with reply controls, and there was concern about Mastodon's reactive moderation.
Ah yeah, that would be great!
PeerTube did something like that a while ago: https://ideas.joinpeertube.org
Some suggestions for fighting bigotry on the Fediverse:
- Challenge and report bigotry even if you're not the target, don't leave it to victims
- Listen to victims, don't question their honesty or demand a solution from them
- Don't remain neutral, take a stand
- If you're an admin, defederate servers that knowingly tolerate bigotry
- If you're comfortable using Microsoft Github, give thumbs up for reply controls (https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/14762) & keyword flagging (https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/21306) on Mastodon
There is already a system on Mastodon that does auto-detect your language.
If you use the website interface and type in the wrong language, the language indicator lights up and clicking it suggests which setting you should be using.
The problem with autodetection is that it's unreliable for very short messages, which are very common on microblogging platforms like Mastodon. That's why Mastodon doesn't just have autodetection overruling the user's settings.
p.p.s. Thank you so much for all the supportive replies! 
It is very motivating if these guides are helping you 
Also, thank you to people who disagree with what I write but do so without personal remarks or accusations. Very grateful for you taking the time to make suggestions or corrections or alternative viewpoints.
Let's keep it chilled out and friendly?
Tim is disagreeing with me but he's not making personal remarks or saying anything rude, so there's no need to be personal or rude about him either?
"Automatic language detection seems to be an ubiquitous feature on many websites. It should be quite easy to perform in a #Fediverse app or on the PC as well, IMO."
There has been automatic language detection on here for many years, it lights up the language button if it thinks you are using the wrong language.
The problem is this is a microblogging platform so the posts tend to be very short. At very short lengths the detector is unreliable.
You can set the language to a default for your most common language, and then manually change if you use other languages as well.
You can change the language setting by editing if you forget on a particular post 
I realise most people probably don't know this, but just in case someone reading this does want to make sure they have the right language setting, they can set their default posting language through the website and this should carry through to the clients.
This is a fair point and you're not technically wrong.
I've tried to cover this in the guide itself, tl:dr the dictionary definitions of technical things are often veered away from by real world use. If they are different, I err on the side of real world common use as the site is aimed at non-technical people.
Another example I give in the guide is "computer", it technically includes smartphones but that's not what most people mean if they say "computer".
Oh wow! 
Thank you so much! You didn't have to but it is very greatly appreciated!
That's very kind and generous of you, it helps a lot with keeping the accounts and sites going!
It is by the dictionary definition, it isn't by common usage. What the dictionary says on technical matters often diverges from common usage.
Maybe the clearest example is "computer": Most people use that word to mean a laptop or desktop PC/Mac and not a smartphone. But going by the dictionary definition of "computer", the smartphone ought to be called a computer too.
I'm trying to use common usage as I'm mainly aiming my guides at new and non-technical people.
p.s. Good grief. I'm trying to help people use this place and just got accused of "disinformation" and "causing harm" because they didn't like the way I used the word algorithm in the guide.
Can we please chill out and be a bit more friendly? The Fedi relies on volunteers helping each other and making suggestions in a constructive way.
If I've done something wrong it is brilliant if you point it out, most of the guides rely on people correcting me. But there is no need for personal attacks.