I wanted to suggest a small but potentially impactful UI/UX feature for Summit related to how moderator comments are displayed.
On Lemmy, moderator comments are often visually distinguished by default, even when the moderator is just participating casually rather than speaking in an official moderation capacity.
While this transparency has value, it can sometimes unintentionally shift the tone of a discussion or discourage open conversation when a mod is simply engaging as a regular community member.
After discussing this in lemmy_support@lemmy.ml, it was pointed out that this isn’t really an API limitation, but rather a frontend/app decision — which is why I thought Summit might be a good place to experiment with it.
https://lemmy.world/post/41994121
Feature idea:
An optional, opt-in distinction system for mod comments/posts, similar in spirit to Reddit’s “distinguish” feature:
- By default, moderators’ comments (and posts) appear as regular user comments/posts
- Mods can explicitly mark a comment as “mod voice” when speaking in an official capacity
- Summit could optionally provide a toggle or setting for users to:
- Always show mod badges
- Only show mod badges on distinguished comments
- Or keep the current always-visible behavior
This would preserve transparency while giving communities more flexibility in how authority is visually communicated — potentially improving trust, discussion flow, and community health without changing Lemmy’s underlying model.