• 0

    posted a message on A CHALLENGE TO THE MODS
    Thread Closed. Warning Issued for Flaming Spam.
    Posted in: General Off Topic
  • 0

    posted a message on Ban appeal tickets
    About the same as any other good member, I would say. Although, fair hint, the best way to become a moderator is not to want to be one. Honestly. And it sometimes goes so far as to say the best way to never be asked is if you ask to be one. ;-)

    I turned the Admins down twice, when they wanted me to join. Just being a good member is far more important than any inherent ability to run a website. That stuff you can learn.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Mod bias
    That is fair, and to the degree that we are able we try to keep things fair. Bias doesn't look good on anyone, and the perception of it doesn't help us at all. It doesn't always work, no, but that gets back into how much we're physically capable of keeping up with, given the size of our staff, and that's pointless back-and-forth.

    But I would ask, then, what sort of "punishment" would you suggest? Not for the expulsion-level actions, but the sort of mistakes you linked to in the OP?
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Ban appeal tickets
    Not really "scouting." But we know who we can rely on to be good members. Not really any "favorites," no.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Ban appeal tickets
    The million dollar question, eh?

    There's no specific answer I can give, like "x number of posts" or "x number of good reports." The best way is to just be a good member, be an upstanding member of the community, and obey not just the letter, but the spirit of the forum rules. Earning the respect of the moderators, helping them out (but not back-seat-moderating), and encouraging better behavior in the users around you helps to distinguish yourself as a user that can be counted on not only to not participate in flame/troll/spam-fests, but to be the voice of reason when things get heated.

    And then, when we start looking for the next round of moderators to add, that sort of user is at the top of the lists.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Mod bias
    That was very well done, Basic.

    Quote from Beltir »
    If a moderator continues biased treatment, will something be done about it to try to help fix it?


    Of course. We've taken action before, as needed and as appropriate, and will continue to do so.

    Quote from Beltir »
    I obviously wont catch every instance of someone not being taken care of, so would a mod in question be punished in some way for not being fair?


    You make it sound like you want something done publicly. Like a whipping. We're not going to do that any more than we would make a thread announcing every Warning and Ban we issue.

    Often all it takes is a word or two with the moderator in question, in private, and observation of their actions moving forward. Keep in mind that for every incorrect (and human) mistake made, they're handling hundreds and (in some cases) thousands of reports properly. The good they are doing far outweighs most minor mistakes, and we're not going to risk losing any of our small staff on a "public flogging" to repair someone's wounded pride. That's just silly.

    If it's a vicious attack sort of bias, obviously we would take more serious action, but ideally that person would never have been made a moderator in the first place. Those sorts of bias should be brought to the Admin's attention immediately .
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Ban appeal tickets
    Learn to trust Users, yes, before they are made Moderators.

    I wouldn't trust a gun to a person who's never had a class on it's use, and I wouldn't trust the banhammer to a user who hasn't proven capable of the responsibilities that comes with.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Spoilers don't work
    It's being implemented with IPB.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Ban appeal tickets
    Quote from KarkasmolenKlok »
    Why on earth would you have a system set up where only the people who would be too busy working on the technical issues of constructing a website be in charge of responding to tickets regarding bans they didn't make where they couldn't possibly be able to effectively do that job.

    It's stupid. For what possible reason would you keep such a clearly ineffective system in place when an obvious and simple solution is staring you right in the face and has, in fact, been offered bluntly to you time and time again? What conceivable benefit is there?

    Quote from msmit71 »
    We apologize for the problems.

    You act like we enjoy the problems that we have. We don't.

    I have neither said nor implied such a thing and I expect you to retract that statement immediately.

    I don't think you enjoy it, but I think that you have low-level moderators trying to apologize away massively incompetent unwillingness to solve basic issues which they have no control over because the chain of command is so long and distended that you don't even have the proper tools to deal with basic issues.

    Honestly, a moderator isn't even able to resolve warnings they set. Even basic tools like that are unavailable to the people who have to do this kind of work. And don't say "phpBB won't let us" because yes it will. You can manually set specific permissions within phpBB and have been able to since pre 2006, I'd know, I've run sites on phpBB.

    Instead of making this a martyrdom issue, a big mean "karkasmolen is criticizing us so unfairly" issue, consider that I have offered specific criticism of specific faults in specific policies, not said "citricsquid has a boob for a head and is a good-for-nothing headboob".


    It may sound stupid, but the system was set up (as far as I know, I'm the newbie Admin) on the premise that moderators are just doing their jobs when they issue Warnings and Bans. A reversal of that job's actions would need to come from higher up. We rarely repeal Warnings, unless the Warning was just not called for at all, but we repeal and lessen Bans all the time, based on the circumstances surrounding individual cases. That's not the sort of decision that we put on the Moderators, and that was a choice made when these forums were started, not a failure of phpBB

    Think of it like a traffic ticket: Once you're issued a ticket, and it's in the system, you can't go to the cop that issued it to get it reversed. You have to go to traffic court (or whatever appeals process is set up) to do that.

    But Admins can (and do) reverse actions, it's just that the Support Tickets are handled by the Administrative Staff only.

    As for why the system, ineffective as it is, is in place....well it wouldn't be ineffective if we didn't explode in size as we did, and if the new website wasn't being constantly worked on. If we had experienced more linear growth, and if we weren't in the middle of a [long] transition, the three Administrative Staff would probably be sufficient to handle the Ticket system. But we ARE experiencing growing pains, and it would help a lot if some users accepted that until things get ironed out this place won't run as smoothly as they might want.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on To the forum admins
    We have the Fan Art and Arts & Creativity Forums. Threads for banners and requests can be made there.

    We do not want too many subforums around here. it just muddies things up, and people are already confused enough about where to post.

    In the end, this is a Minecraft forum, not a banners forum. We have no problem providing general subforums as are seen in Off-Topic, but we're not going to be getting so specific on things like a whole subforum just for banners.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on mods, could you answer some questions for me ?
    Fake mod edits are a very recent development. We don't like updating the rules for every little thing, since it then becomes an unreliable document. If we changed it at a drop of a hat, people could argue that at the time they read them the rules didn't say they couldn't do X. That's why we have the disclaimer, to catch the new and annoying ways people try to break the SPIRIT of the Rules, which is "Don't be a ****."

    Besides, with the IPB switch so near on the horizon, we'll be doing a full update to the Rules at that time.

    But, you need a rule to tell you that fake mod edits is wrong?

    As for videos, do you mean people posting Minecraft videos everywhere, or replying to posts with nothing but a video? Both are considered spam.

    EDIT: There are users around here that feel that they should be allowed to misbehave unless the Rules clearly tell them otherwise. Those users are the ones we can do without around here.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Fake Mod Edits
    Quote from spiney »
    A simple way to stop this happening would be to have the edit text in a different spot than the actual post. Usually it's in a little subscript section under the post and above the signature to actually signify that a mod edited that post.


    If I'm not mistaken, this will happen with IPB. Same with whether a Warning was issued for the post.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on Admins
    Trolling a troll is still trolling.

    I really wish users would realize, "Hey instead of getting upset that I was Warned for breaking the Rules, maybe I should just....not break the Rules?"

    Is that really so hard?
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on The search button???
    viewtopic.php?f=7&t=231350

    Thread Closed.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • 0

    posted a message on mods, could you answer some questions for me ?
    While that is 100% correct, let me clarify:

    They are opinions grounded in the trust that have been placed in the moderators to do what is right and bolstered by guidelines laid out for the moderators to follow.

    The moderators are relied upon to use their own judgement, which we trust. If we tried to make rules that didn't rely on judgement,
    1) The rules would resemble a Terms of Service contract, 50 pages long to cover any and all circumstances, and be too long to read, maintain, or enforce
    2) The ability for Staff to adapt to loopholes in the Rules would be hindered.
    3) Users would find loopholes anyways just to be dicks.
    Posted in: Forum Discussion & Info
  • To post a comment, please .