FORUM HAS TURNED INTO SELF-MODERATED!

[lucky_strike]

You don't create balance with censorship.
But i hope we will see Harmonie.

LS

[VLSroulette]

Believe me, I have thought long about the PRO's and CON's of:

a)   Letting the forum "run wild", no moderation, "freedom of speech" at its best. Everyone can say as they please on any thread irrespective of what the thread started meant it to be.
b)   Demanding 10 moderators to moderate near 3000 users and run all the complains to "poor moderation" on them.
c)   Allowing each person to set their own standards at their own threads and do the moderating themselves.

Where do you think a productive poster will choose to post:

-   A forum where he can control what is posted on his space and defend his own thread.
-   A forum where anyone can come disrupt his thread, hijack his topic, interrupt as much as they wish when he's elaborating, start flame wars on his threads, and he just has to stand and wait.

On the other hand, what would be the forum of choice for disruptors?

-   A forum where his disruptive posts are removed by the affected thread owner himself.
-   A forum where disruptive posts are kept and they can start flaming wars without any consequence whatsoever to his posts.

I believe it is pretty obvious.

Obviously by making our forum self-moderated we cater to productive posters' interests.

Considering the man-power required to moderate a whole forum goes beyond what the reduced moderating staff can provide, it will be insane to demand moderators to stay online most of the day just to moderate when it can be distributed among the members themselves, each caring and doing their own part, taking action instead of complaining of poor moderating.

By distributing moderation, we get benefits here: thread hijacking can be cut from its roots, flaming can be cut from its roots, and more importantly personal abuse can be cut before it escalates into a boiler... and productive posters are kept happy

From an administrative point of view, this is heaven, from productive posters' point of view, this is heavenly too.

As for the "freedom of speech", there IS freedom of speech at the forum, conditions are simple: don't hijack other people's threads, instead start your own thread where you can have ALL the freedom of speech you want to talk as much as you want about anything you want your own thread to be about; this in exchange of respecting other people's threads and obtaining the right to not having them mess up with yours. "tit for tat", that's the deal.

Of course, from a "freedom of speech" point, at a truly uncensored forum everything should be allowed and threads should be allowed to be let "run wild" and people allowed to name call as much as they wish (as that's their personal opinion on the other posters, their "protected speech"), but on its real application, it ends up degrading the threads awfully, to the point productive posters see their original topic ruined, and some may even choose to leave definitely, to the detriment of us ALL as a forum, as losing productive posters is a lose for ALL of us in here.

So, over here we choose a stand for productive posters over disruptive ones, and for this purpose, self-moderation is here to stay.

If someone wants to go to an uncensored forum, Gamblers' Glen is pretty "uncensored", that is a good alternative to see a forum pretty much run wild.

But once people get used to be given moderating rights to care for the well-being of their own published work and once they get used to not "take sh*t" on their threads, it will be hard to bait them to forums where people can do as they please and hijack threads and insult and abuse people as badly as they wish on them without consequences, and thread owner just has to sit and see how his topic is degraded.

There is a transition period for everything; today, this is our transition period to a self-moderated forum. In reality, we aren't cutting much: There is a start topic button for EACH AND EVERY poster to exercise as much "freedom of speech" at their own threads as they want, there is a "naysayer's lounge" to stand against everything people may want to stand against, there is an uncensored board to "vent"; plus removed posts aren't disappeared to a black hole, but rather go to the "Removed posts' haven" where each poster see his removed posts and can bring them back shall he/she wishes, with the advantage of gaining thread owner status once they are moved back from the haven... All being said, I do believe this model can work for the long run, in a self-sustainable fashion.

Regards,
Victor

[xman1970]

Hey Victor 

We all know you are ALWAYS trying to do the best for the forum 

& I sure the decision to go "Self-Moderated" was NOT an easy one

Will it work? I don't know......

From past experiences I expect a lot of Americans to see this as censorship, they are very passionate about "freedom of speech" 

With the nay-seyers possibly banned from a thread, a "flawed" way of play maybe shown. Without a large enough volume of testing (10,000 bets placed is the mantra) also in place, I'm worried that Newbies will go with it & well money will be lost.....

Here's hoping I wrong.....  

[TicTacToe]

Ken


One thing you can do, if you think a system is really bad and the moderator  ( creator ) of that system bumped your comments .....  Your comments will now be in a new thread which you decide what to do with it .... so just keep bringing that thread back to the top so EVERYBODY can see it .... thus warning newbees of any potential BAD experience.

I know it's lots of trouble but at least it's a way out ....


TTT

[Homeito]

Hello,

Victor...

Having seen this "Thread Owner Moderating" thing in work I really think that what I suggested a while ago is more important now than ever:

*** Removed posts should automatically be replaced by a post that says:
a) Who wrote the post and when.
b) Who removed it.
c) Where did it go.

For example this post:

Post by Homeito at May 27, 2009, 04:07:15 am was removed by Thread owner to the Post Resolution Board

The way it works now does not work...
One minute you read a post but when you return for a second look or to reply it is gone without explanation.
And sometimes there is a reply also... A reply to a question that is gone

TIA


Best regards,
Homeito Bemek

[VLSroulette]

Homeito,

Giving Thread moderation to users was the next logical step to do if we want to continue existing sustainably.

Global Moderators should only moderate spammers and rogue threads and not everyone's threads.

I'm thinking more in the lines of an inter-post message which is 1-line long. This should be a must to keep order in reading and knowing who replied what.

Currently I'm working to bring our forum to the state it was before server move. Once I accomplish that, then I must categorize required features in an importancy scale and give the most important more priority. This is one of those important ones, so more likely to be among the first to be implemented after we regain our previous level.

Regards, and keep the good posts and fine ideas coming.
Victor

[Homeito]

Currently I'm working to bring our forum to the state it was before server move. Once I accomplish that, then I must categorize required features in an importancy scale and give the most important more priority. This is one of those important ones, so more likely to be among the first to be implemented after we regain our previous level.

Priorities priorities priorities...



Thank you for your fast reply.

HB

[VLSroulette]

Yeah mate, my coding time is limited.

I ALWAYS have to choose, i.e.:

- Code a new similies selector with pretty faces.
- Code what Homeito suggested to make self-moderation work better.

Thankfully, that's a no brainer!
Victor

[gingermolloy]

I for one think this is a great move Victor, I will be posting more from now on!

ginger

[gingermolloy]

-