The more friendly topic about the forum in The Forum.

[Christopher]

My goal is to clean up Retro Gaming. The scum that have terrorised those threads had better watch out

[Denster]

Congrats buddy. Couldnt have happened to a nicer guy!

[Red Devil]

Congrats to the new mods. Hopefully things get better from here.

Just like to put my name in the hat for writing content if we have a front page.

[Parksey]

Right, here's a post I made in the Staff Room regarding the matter about forum-specific Mods. For the record, I'm against the idea, though I'd be willing to try it out regardless:

I'm against having enforced folder-specific Mods for various reasons, though this method seems like a handy half-way measure to appease myself and those who think it would really help the forum out.

I don't think it should be anything concrete, however. I think one of the main complaints about the Moderators has been the "respect and responsibility" issues and having global moderators does mean that we should all be held responsible for every decision we make.

If we restricted Mods solely to one section, there *could* be a danger of a split in the Mod team, whereby Moderator X gets his folder in order, at the expense of helping out across the whole forum. I also think we should be careful and not let ourselves think that, just because one Mod is more active in certain areas, it makes their opinion on that folder automatically a lot stronger than someone else's. We should still, ultimately, be a team of united voices.

Likewise, keeping Mods to just one folder could have an effect on that area - a "strong" Mod could improve it, a weak one could make it worse. It may also split our membership and the activity in a folder, with certain members avoiding an area patrolled by a Mod they dislike.

Saying that, I think it would be foolish to not acknowedge that certain Mods DO frequent certain folders more often than others. If we do what Garth suggests, then it would at least help make members aware where Moderators are likely to be.

So, it may be wise, if you have a specific query, to go for a Mod suggested in Garth's thingmy, thouh members should also be aware that if they want quick action, it's probably still going to be best if they go for the Mods who are online at that moment.

I'm going to post this in The Forum (with a few amendments), to let people like KP know our thoughts regarding the matter.

Again, Garth's "thingmy" I refer to is still in the planning stages, and nothing definite yet. It's basically a list of the Mods with our own "confessions" about where we are most likely to be.

So, for example, TAP and Suzz are going to be "self-confessed" GGC Moderators, though it won't be as concrete as limiting their powers just to that folder.

In my opinion, we're not a big enough forum to totally restrict Mods to just one or two forums. We're only really busy in GGC and OT, unlike rllmuk which has loads of different sections, each with a healthy amount of posts and members visiting.

[That]

Heya,

As Green Gecko proved rather thoroughly today ( ), it is possible to have someone listed on the index page as a Mod of a specific forum while they also still retain their powers across the board. If you guys did that then it would show at a glance which Moderators are focussing on where, while still enabling every Moderator to moderate every part of the forum.

It would also be very easy to change the forum template so that the Moderated by: listing isn't annoying as gooseberry fool, too. Something for The Technician I think!

Anyway, I think that if you did something like that it would be a more comprehensive solution than a topic in here saying "I'm Tiarny and I like GGC", though that's of course better than nothing! I would also say that Mods should be somewhat discouraged from acting in boards that aren't their home turf. Part of the point of defining Mod focus is that if you are in Off Topic, you aren't going to be unfairly moderated due to a misunderstanding arising from from being moderated by someone who does not visit Off Topic very often. It's about appropriate power. Should Tiarny have the power to lock blatant spam or, worse, a goatse post (or something) in Off Topic? Yes. Should he try to make calls on borderline threads? Better for him to PM KKLEIN or make a query in The Staff Room, IMO.

Cheers.

[Parksey]

Part of the point of defining Mod focus is that if you are in Off Topic, you aren't going to be unfairly moderated due to a misunderstanding arising from from being moderated by someone who does not visit Off Topic very often. It's about appropriate power. Should Tiarny have the power to lock blatant spam or, worse, a goatse post (or something) in Off Topic? Yes. Should he try to make calls on borderline threads? Better for him PM KKLEIN or make a query in The Staff Room, IMO.

Well, that's sort of what I was getting at - if someone PMs a Mod, then they could pick the one "assigned" to that section. However, as I said, people should also be aware that it is going to be quicker to notify whichever Mod is online at that moment. People shouldn't be reluctant to do that just because they haven't listed OT as "their" section.

To be honest, most of the Mods visit OT quite often, I'd wager. Like I said, we only really have two big sections and, while Mods maybe prefer one folder to another, I struggle to imagine a situation whereby one Mod is unsuited to a particular section - no one is really going to be out of the loop in Off Topic, for example.

Likewise, in the example you give, any borderline OT topics are unlikely to be handled by one Moderator alone anyway - the topic will probably get discussed by the whole team in the Staff Room anyway, to get a few more opinions on the matter. Would this be alright with you? That's not meant to be a condescending remark; I'm genuinely interested as to what people think about this (especially you, Karl, who are probably my polar opposite on this matter).

And, of course, it would naive to think that "misunderstandings" still won't occur if we have forum-specific Mods. If anything, aren't you going to even more reliant on the skills of one particular Moderator?

[That]

Heya, I hope you don't mind if I break this down into sections, it makes it easier for me to focus on the points at hand.

Well, that's sort of what I was getting at - if someone PMs a Mod, then they could pick the one "assigned" to that section. However, as I said, people should also be aware that it is going to be quicker to notify whichever Mod is online at that moment. People shouldn't be reluctant to do that just because they haven't listed OT as "their" section.

To be honest, most of the Mods visit OT quite often, I'd wager. Like I said, we only really have two big sections and, while Mods maybe prefer one folder to another, I struggle to imagine a situation whereby one Mod is unsuited to a particular section - no one is really going to be out of the loop in Off Topic, for example.

Well I think consistency is paramount, and in a lot of cases more important than a quick response. There are more not so clear cut issues on a day to day basis around here than there are he-posted-goatse-get-him ones, and when you're in a period of transition like we are now, I do think that Mods should avoid making those calls in the sections they're perhaps less comfortable in.

Of course it's important for when a really quick response is needed that everyone knows that all Mods can moderate any board, but the group name is "Global Moderators" and their name would be green throughout the different boards anyway; what I'm saying is that there are visual cues as well as presumably the announcement explaining it, whereas if you choose to not have the names listed explicitly underneath the forum names, there are no obvious cues for which Moderators 'go' where.

It's very important, in my opinion, for users to know, even if they don't read the announcement, which Mods are the 'biggies' for the board they're posting in. Not only does it help harbour consistency, but it also helps with the tone-setting abilities of those moderators, because you know which to look out for.

You will probably say that users should respect all Moderators equally, but there will be of course subtle differences across the board -- OT is more relaxed than GGC and it will be even when we're matching EDGE in terms of self-seriousness -- and for especially newer users, knowing who to follow cues from over who else is a useful tool.

I'd just like to err on the side of Moderators being and appearing to be locked into their boards, even though that wouldn't really be the case whichever way you slice it. Garth's plan should probably go ahead either way, though, the announcement would make lots of things explicit and hopefully most people would read them.

Sorry if that's a load of points and not much explanation, but it's a lot of little things that make, IMO, having the names on the index a better choice than not having them on the index (which is essentially what this boils down to).

Likewise, in the example you give, any borderline OT topics are unlikely to be handled by one Moderator alone anyway - the topic will probably get discussed by the whole team in the Staff Room anyway, to get a few more opinions on the matter. Would this be alright with you? That's not meant to be a condescending remark; I'm genuinely interested as to what people think about this (especially you, Karl, who are probably my polar opposite on this matter).

I think that discussion on a hard call is always a good thing, especially if it helps the outcome of that call be as fair and as consistent with the rules, the community goals, and past decisions (see caveat) as possible. However you mentioned that you don't think a 'home' Mod should have more clout in the Mod room than an 'away' Mod -- why is this? I think it's natural and healthy that the Mods that spend more of their time on a board and know the board best get a bigger say. Of course you should be working together to bring the whole forum towards whatever you want to achieve with it -- still not confirmed that we're shooting for Gaf-lite, y'know -- but if 9 Mods respond to a call discussion, 5 say Lock and 4 say Don't Lock, and 3 of those 4 are that forum's home Mods ... well, in your unified voice scenario, Lock would win, yet the three who in theory know that forum best and are setting the tone of that board with their everyday decisions have essentially been vetoed.

Caveat: in this time of transition I wouldn't worry about being consistent with decisions you made a month or even 2 weeks ago; but remaining day-to-day consistent insofar as possible is fairly key.

There is also a point to be made about tone. One thing I really do think happens on every online community is the ability of the management to set the tone of pretty much everything. The tone-setting powers of a focused group of 3 Mods who are very similar and consistent would be greater than the tone-setting powers of a slice of 9 Mods who are more thinly spread and more varied in their thought processes. That's real important, again, in a period of transition especially.

And, of course, it would naive to think that "misunderstandings" still won't occur if we have forum-specific Mods. If anything, aren't you going to even more reliant on the skills of one particular Moderator?

You make a decent point about misunderstandings still occuring, but I honestly do think that they would be minimised and a more consistent output of decisions would be achieved if the moderating of any particular board was down to 3 people and not 9. There's less room for a situation in which you get a range of possible responses to a borderline problem, especially if those 3 people are all 'board-native' and thus on the same wavelength.

Oh, and yes, a weak or otherwise poor Moderator could impact a board more with a more focused regime, but should weak or poor Moderators retain their position anyway? If they're not contributing as much as they perhaps should be then, well... *shrug*

[Oh Teh Noes]

tl;dr

summarise it

[That]

tl;dr

summarise it

eat piss

[chalkitdown]

Go to bed.

[Prototype]

tl;dr

short version: Karlprof for mod

[Winckle]

tl;dr

short version: Karlprof for mod

As Karlprofs alt, I endorse this message.

[Thongings]

Ooh. I missed all this.

Great choices for the new mods. Couldn't have chosen better people, imo, so congrats. Also, kudos to Garth for taking all this on board and making changes. I look forward to this new era of hope and prosperity.

[Abs]

tl;dr

short version: Karlprof for mod

dear god no