Jubbergun wrote:
In light of recent events I suggest the following:
1) We add a rule about purposely abusing posting features in any way that screws with the forums. This should include posting content that breaks the formatting in some way (though I would not add over-sized pictures to this) and/or (as someone recently did) chain-posting the same post over-and-over again.
I thought that this would be included in the common sense clause, but I suppose it wouldn't hurt to elaborate.
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2) Since I think rules need to be specific and objective, if we encounter a situation not specifically covered by the rules, the mods as a group should be empowered to lock/edit/remove questionable material, with the caveat that upon doing so a thread is created in the Meta Discussion Forum allowing a community vote on the action(s) taken and whether or not to abridge the rules to cover the content in question.
I'd be ok with this if people didn't have a heart attack every time a thread is locked or someone's banned. Besides the idea that it would take forever to get anything done, I feel it would just become a massive shitfest. Granted, it becomes one already, but at least with the status quo, we actually get shit done.
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3) Not sure if we have an escalating penalties clause (since I'm not LOLGOOGLING our rules), but if we don't, we should. A person's first offense on the boards should not result in more than a three hour suspension. Stiffer penalties should ensue appropriately after a first offense.
Paddywhack's ban is stipulated that he just needs to start acting like an adult. He could've simply made a thread apologizing and owning up to his mistakes and posting would've been granted within the hour, but he decided to go on a tempertantrum instead.
Currently, bans are given out in accordance to how serious the offense is. Someone that is acting like an idiot will get a 1-hour ban tops. However, people that do stuff like post porn on the actual board probably won't be coming back anytime soon.
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4) I was under the impression that mod duties were going to be rotating periodically. If I am mistaken, then we should make it so that mod positions are rotating. While it is necessary for any number of reasons for Mayo to retain head mod status in perpetuity, we have had the same mods pretty much since Bucket was kind enough to let us start using them. In order to prevent the mods from becoming cliquish, but to avoid moderation moving from one extreme to another, I'd suggest replacing at least one mod every quarter (three months). I'd also suggest that given the number of posters we have (not many) that we limit the number of mods to Mayo+four. We should probably make the term for mods six months, and require at least a three month break before running for/assuming mod duties again in the future (with reasonable exceptions). Not only will this keep the boards fresh, it will give some people an opportunity to deal with the same bullshit that the current mods deal with now...there's generally less crying when you have to wear the shoe that's been on the other foot.
A couple things here:
1) Myself, Weena, and Tuhl will always be mods, mainly because this is my baby and Weena/Tuhl are exceptionally level-headed people that I trust with key decisions.
2) When we ran the elections, participation was so piss poor that I said "fuck it". People like bitching as opposed to actually contributing to the site.
3) It really isn't a "clique". The only person I talk to that's a mod on a regular basis is Tuhl and there's little to no serious modding going on. This site is something like seven months old and this is our second ban that's been longer than 24 hours (and this is only due to the fact that Paddy won't apologize). This coupled with the extreme apathy from the user base gives me the impression that we don't really need frequent elections.
If you guys think that elections would make you feel better, then I'm certainly fine with it. However, I only got like 4 serious applications last time and something like 10 people voted.
You're free to run if you want, it really isn't a job that's all that exciting. Just be ready to get cussed out whenever you follow the rules.