Board Moderators

[Ampere]

Moderator
The moderators (short singular form: "mod") are users (or employees) of the forum who are granted access to the posts and threads of all members for the purpose of moderating discussion (similar to arbitration) and also keeping the forum clean (neutralizing spam and spambots etc). Because they have access to all posts and threads in their area of responsibility, it is common for a friend of the site owner to be promoted to moderator for such a task. Moderators also answer users' concerns about the forum, general questions, as well as respond to specific complaints. They also can do anything to lend a helping hand to a user in need.[17] Moderators themselves may have ranks: some may be given mod privileges over only a particular topic or section, while others (called 'global' or 'super') may be allowed access anywhere. Common privileges of moderators include: deleting, merging, moving, and splitting of posts and threads, locking, renaming, stickying of threads, banning, suspending, unsuspending, unbanning, warning the members, or adding, editing, removing the polls of threads.[18]

Essentially, it is the duty of the moderator to manage the day-to-day affairs of a forum or board as it applies to the stream of user contributions and interactions. The relative effectiveness of this user management directly impacts the quality of a forum in general, its appeal, and its usefulness as a community of interrelated users.

Administrator
The administrators (short form: "admin") manage the technical details required for running the site. As such, they may promote (and demote) members to moderators, manage the rules, create sections and sub-sections, as well as perform any database operations (database backup etc). Administrators often also act as moderators. Administrators may also make forum-wide announcements, or change the appearance (known as the skin) of a forum.[18]

The term prune used extensively in administration panels is synonymous with delete or remove. The term comes from pruning, the practice of removing diseased, non-productive, or otherwise unwanted portions from a plant.

[mansa]

I'd let people edit other people's posts, to remove bad things.

and then comment what was done to the post.

here here!

[Cutthroat]

If it takes the load off of staff members, I don't see any problem with them taking people on just to moderate the public forums. Of course, one has to take favoritism and the like into consideration but I think it is possible to make something work.

[Synthesis]

There's too much locking and boo-hoo oversensitive crybabying going on lately, anyway.

The last thing we need is a bunch of new moderators looking to flex their powarz.

[RogueGunslinger]

I opine that people are being over-sensitive as well.

We already have moderators. They are the staff. And they have already locked threads.

[MarshallDFX]

There's too much locking going on lately, anyway.

Yes there is.  Although I'm a troll, so I'd think that wouldn't I?

But anyways, this is proposing we have board moderators seperate from game staff?  Seems staff rotate who's moderating, or I could just be imagining things.

[Ampere]

What we need is a group of players selected by, and accountable to the staff.  These players will be able to offer our forum the care it deserves, treating wounds before amputation becomes necessary.

[Synthesis]

What we need is a group of players selected by, and accountable to the staff.  These players will be able to offer our forum the care it deserves, treating wounds before amputation becomes necessary.

The care it deserves is to leave it the hell alone.

[Adhira]

The biggest problem with this is that we ask the players to be self-moderating, to show restraint and respect for each other and we don't see that. If we do moderate something then we get others that are upset and complain.  It's hard to put moderation in the hands of people who are actively disagreeing with each other and causing things to be locked.

[jstorrie]

I think the board is somewhat over-moderated as is. I vote no.

[Aaron Goulet]

It's hard to put moderation in the hands of people who are actively disagreeing with each other and causing things to be locked.

Thank you for saving me the trouble of writing this myself.

[Gimfalisette]

I do not think we need more moderation, rather we need moderation which is consistent, treats players equally, and which is firm without stifling discussion. Too often, moderation on the GDB is inconsistent, overpunishes certain players while underpunishing others, and/or is overly firm--bordering on discussion-stomping.

[Booshay]

Everything I might have said about this topic has been covered by Synthesis, RGS, and jstorrie. Less GDB-nannying, plz.

Also, locking threads with hundreds of pages of replies due to a couple of posters is fucking stupid overzealous. You have other options available to you ass staff members and moderators, and should employ locking an entire thread only as a last resort.

[deviant storm]

I just don't think it's possible for the community as it is to be moderators. As has been said before, we as a community aren't so good at self-moderation. Too many people want to try to be cute, or clever, or whatever. Too many people want to get their point across, to the point where they're willing to disrespect other people.  I'm tired of good threads being locked, and I don't blame the staff for doing the locking.

I've just given up. I'm going to stop reading the forum, other than the staff announcement part. It stopped being a place to exchange ideas a while back. Now it's just a place to one-up the other guy. It's truly disappointing.

[Ampere]

I find the locking of threads far more disruptive than a couple of edits and a warning pm.  I'm a little unclear as to why the current moderators would be reluctant to shed their load.  In regards to bias, well that's why mandates exist.  Everyone's biased, but if the job calls for it, most do their best to be fair.  Those that don't would be held accountable to the staff.

[flurry]

Probably it's 5% of the active posters whose behavior generates 95% of the moderation. It's too bad self-moderation only works for almost everybody.

[Riev]

I'll be honest, I think a lot of people would cry "Why not me?" if mod positions were given out, which would turn into staff favorites, and GDB favoritism would leak in game, and the world would end because someone edited your IC info.

[RogueGunslinger]

I do not think we need more moderation, rather we need moderation which is consistent, treats players equally, and which is firm without stifling discussion. Too often, moderation on the GDB is inconsistent, overpunishes certain players while underpunishing others, and/or is overly firm--bordering on discussion-stomping.

Truth.

Though seriously, evey few months there is a new player saying the GDB is full of jerks and trolls, and opinionated assholes. Our forum has always been like this, and so is the rest of the internet. People don't seem to realize that this kind thing comes in waves, like anything else. People on the GDB will all be kind one month, then the next they're arguing and bickering about meaningless shit.

My advice is to stop caring so much, enjoy the game for what it is, enjoy the GDB for what it is.

[X-D]

I'm in the camp of "GDB is overmoderated already".

Most Thread locking annoys me....ALOT, since most of it is not even for a reason that I can find in the rules but instead seems to be one person's opinion...usually a story teller at that.

I have posted before that I don't even think storytellers should have GDB admin privs outside of clans they staff.


So, the Idea of somebody not even on staff getting mod privs...Um..NO.

[Ghost]

I'll be honest, I think a lot of people would cry "Why not me?" if mod positions were given out, which would turn into staff favorites, and GDB favoritism would leak in game, and the world would end because someone edited your IC info.

That is not going to happen.  Because, it does not happen during staff applications.

I doubt it would happen in this case.

[jhunter]

There are too many cliques in this community to have non-staff moderators. I simply wouldn't trust any of them to be non-biased and fair.

[Cavaticus]

I'm a little unclear as to why the current moderators would be reluctant to shed their load.  

Don't worry - none of us feel overburdened by the task of moderating the forums.

And everyone is capable of reporting offensive posts.

[brytta.leofa]

.

[MarshallDFX]

I love the living supreme daylights out of Tzurahro, the locker of our Random Armageddon Thoughts megathread.  But...

Threads should be locked only when they're likely to devolve into game-related forbidden discussion.  Please don't lock threads when you should be twitting people.

This.

On Gimf's note about inconsistency, if staff rotates the "primary moderator", that would likely do it.

Though the worst for me is posts being deleted without it being noted.

[zanthalandreams]

There are too many cliques in this community to have non-staff moderators. I simply wouldn't trust any of them to be non-biased and fair.

I came to post this, found it said.   Just adding my agreement.