Moderation

[Chairman_Tiel]

Spoiler:

I'm pretty sure people are upset with my new mod

User was banned for this post.

Well that's the stupidest ban I've seen in a while. God forbid anyone have a bit of non-rulebreaking fun, I guess.

People told me the BL forums were bad, didn't quite realize the extent..

User was banned for this post.

You just failed the Blockland voight-kampff test. Intentionally being an asshole is not acceptable behavior in any circumstance. There does not need to be a specific rule against it. You will not be missed.

To apply some context: IDs in blockland scale up from 1; the lower you are the longer you're assumed to have been playing, from 2005 to current time. Discrimination is rampant based on that - people assume high IDs are noobs incapable of playing and may even kick based on it. But the second someone turns around and inverts the whole scheme for shits and giggles, bam, ban. And if you protest the decision? Well screw you too guy.

The reason I bring this incident up is because it reminded me how broken the system this forum is currently operating on can be when there's an arse at the helm - not something that's really crossed my mind since the old forum, really. And the way I see it, something similar is pretty much destined to occur if we continue with appointed moderators. I know we talked about establishing criteria for eligibility to attain the mod rank via election...perhaps it's time to go ahead and figure out what that's going to be so things can return to normal?

P.S Sorry jedi, you could've done a lot worse.

[Iv121]

Well as of now it is not as bad as it could be but yea its more about future-proofing the community.

Personally I suggest having an age limit on moderation access, something around 16-18.
Second I suggest that the proposed member has no serious violations made in the past.

As for other criteria here it becomes subjective, which is why I suggest making guidelines from here on instead of obligatory requirements.

[Ivan2006]

I think we have agreed on a minimum age of 16.
We did that,right?

[Iv121]

No as far as I remember Tau just put it in, perhaps based on his age ?

Just kidding it is actually around the suitable age though I would still lean towards 17: 16 is the obvious minimal requirement from my personal experience while 18 is the common age for taking responsibilities such as this and is in fact quite close to the actual maturing age which is slightly higher. That is why when I have doubt I just take the average.

[CMA]

It's 16 because excluding our sysop from being a mod seems like a bad idea Ignore that, I keep forgetting how old Tau is. I wouldn't mind raising it to 17, as long as we leave in that exception. Also, I agree with Tiel in that democracy is a bad idea for this, we should take into account what people want, but by no means should it be the sole or even main deciding factor.

[Keon]

I think we can all determine our maturity without age. For example, I really don't need mod powers, but some other youngsters might deserve it.

[҉]

I agree that putting a specific number on it is a totally pointless exercise. Anyone who wants to be a moderator will say "Yes, forum, I am over 16", and I know plenty of people who actually are over 16 who are still immature assholes. Everyone here knows who's mature and who's not.

[cats]

Just a little interjection, can we not lock every single thread that's been derailed/killed/served its original purpose?

[Iv121]

Not rly, you can tell how old a person is by his behavior and yes mate there is a reason why there are age limits on stuff, as a 18 years old man I can confirm that even at the age of 18 you barely start to mature, not even talking about the ages of 15-14 where your testosterone is boiling. Yes 18 years old and 15 years old wont have the same judgment. I can see it on myself who actual was an exception and got his mod powers early (at least in other places), yes I was quite serious all the time even back then yet I wasn't nearly as level-headed as I am now. Good thing most of my work was as the media team supervisor so I actually didn’t touch the moderator panel as much as I touched photoshop .

[CMA]

I agree with Iv, I'm sure you can all see the difference between myself at 17(now) and how I was at 15/16. Also, what Mercury said.

[҉]

I agree with Iv, I'm sure you can all see the difference between myself at 17(now) and how I was at 15/16.

Not really. You're still nuts.

[CMA]

I agree with Iv, I'm sure you can all see the difference between myself at 17(now) and how I was at 15/16.

Not really. You're still nuts.

Yes and no, but I'm more polite, aren't I?

[҉]

I agree with Iv, I'm sure you can all see the difference between myself at 17(now) and how I was at 15/16.

Not really. You're still nuts.

Yes and no, but I'm more polite, aren't I?

Certainly not very much.

[Iv121]

Oh quit it LJS already, that is impolite either, besides we hold a mental hospital here after all

[Chairman_Tiel]

Just a little interjection, can we not lock every single thread that's been derailed/killed/served its original purpose?

Then there wouldn't be a stigma associated with what you do at all. We can't have that

No, what could work is if the permissions for normal users to lock threads they've created is re-enabled in the ACP. So if someone's okay with their topic turning into a trashheap, they can do it, but otherwise just can lock it once it's beyond recovery and move on. As it stands we don't even have a rule against offtopic, actually..

I agree with Tiel in that democracy is a bad idea for this, we should take into account what people want, but by no means should it be the sole or even main deciding factor.

My stance on the whole thing is that any kind of democratic system on the internet is fundamentally broken because at the end of the day someone's paying out of their pocket to make it all happen, and have what amounts to irrevocable power because of it regardless of any standing or existing rank. Right now you could force Tau to give up his sysadmin rank, but his ability to access the very backbone of the site means nothing's really changed and you'd just be kidding yourself. This is why most forums operate on a system in which owner = admin, so that element never has a chance to enter into the equation. On the old-new forum the entire thing was a bloody kingmaker scenario...

I want to see a nice hybrid of the necessary reality of power being given to who's handling the backend with an appointment system, myself. We get a sysadmin and 1-2 elected mods. Mods have someone to answer to and a motivation to not screw up to get in next time, sysadmin gets recognition and the ability to manipulate ACP. Voting can take place biyearly, and only candidates who fit the criteria would be considered. I do agree that age shouldn't be a factor...I'd like to think that maybe the requirements for even being valid would prevent some of the...mistakes that happened last time around.