Glad to see that things are a little more calm this morning and pleased to see that the procedure and the discussion have been separated (though a bit disturbed at how it was achieved - I can see that time was important but even so...).

I've been pleased to see Ollie (and possibly others that I've missed...) laying out his 'manifesto' and I would cautiously like to suggest that this is something that other candidates might like to consider.

In terms of duplicate accounts, I can see why they have arisen but have more problems understanding why they are still 'with us'. If one of the rules of the community is that there be only one username to each poster, shouldn't there be some very clear guidelines to describe how this should be enforced?

You could say that I'm obsessed with procedures and that we should be much more flexible in these things, but I'm of the opinion that a little bit of work now will pay off in the future. It also increases the transparency of action taken by moderators, which I think is something that would make their lives easier and a happier board as a whole.

Just a thought (or two). Hope you're all having a nice afternoon.

Thanks hh,

Whoever takes on mod duties and takes actions they will always be accused by someone of taking action without consultation  if the consultation process drags on then we get chaotic threads. It IS only a music-fun board, I've tried to keep it that way. I reckon a lot of members log in and see all these 'consultation' threads and log off again. They never stay long enough to give us their thoughts  There is a lot to say for apathy, just think how peacefuul their lives are!


If you find the rules I believe it says members can hold duplicate accounts as long as they don't use them to abuse/disrupt the forum. Only Anna fell foul of that one.


Does 'transparency' mean you SEE what they are doing? If their actions are transparent then surely you WON'T see what their doing 

John W

I don't really have anything to add that I didn't cover here. As far as I'm concerned all this is about letting the views of members be heard and acted upon, rather than about setting out a particular "vision" for how moderation should be done in the hope of having the "power" to implement it. All these questions which have been arising about "what would you do if... " are to my mind distractions. If I offer to give someone a lift in my car I wouldn't expect (from most people!) to first undergo a series of questions as to what I'd do if certain circumstances arose. It's understood that the driver is trusted by his/her passengers to conduct them to their destination safely. All of the candidates for moderators are sufficiently well-known to most members for the latter to have a fair idea whether they're going to be the victims of dangerous driving.

Some clearly don't regard it as "fun" if their posts or whole threads are removed. Sufficient people took exception to this for a poll to be set up. I believe that if the result of this poll had been acted upon the current situation wouldn't have arisen. Most people seem to think that was an example of insensitive moderation and an indication that the moderator in question ought to back down or step down in the interests of preserving the convivial atmosphere which normally prevails here. I may be mistaken about all those things, but that's what I think.

But the fact that they have at least passed a driving test, and been examined on the Highway Code (or whatever the equivalent is elsewhere) is part of the process by which one can have some degree of faith in such driving? And that Highway Code is precisely about lots of 'what would you do if....' issues.

I don't think treating serious questions about future problems that might arise with moderation is a 'distraction', on the contrary, it may be because these were not addressed earlier that we are in this situation now.

hh,

That is quite hurtful, I do take it personal. I am not one, for example, who has encouraged people to remove messages. I have locked one troublesome thread, archived others then made them viewable again. I think you are taking things too seriously on here hh.

It is clear to me, as someone who constantly moinitors this place, that when there are no consultation or squabble threads at the 'top' then we DO get more people contributing and we DO get new members joining.

John W

I think what hh is saying is more akin to casting doubt over whether a candidate at an election should also be the returning officer.

Well, I wouldn't trust someone to drive me if they hadn't even passed a driving test, except in a real emergency.

That's by no means necessarily true, and certainly some of the more occasional posters might be far from having 'clear opinions' towards those who are members of an inner clique.

Ad hoc moderation, without there being some reasonably clear set of principles which guide such moderation, has been one of the biggest problems in the past, and will continue to be in the future if not considered properly. If moderators are going to be in a position to do such things as remove posts or posters, there needs to be some framework which defines what are legitimate grounds for such decisions. This all sounds like a customary attempt to impose closure on something because it gets too difficult, another thing which I think has blighted the boards. If we followed this proposed shutting-out of all 'what would happen if....' issues in a wider election, then we might as well forbid any campaign. It was actually very informative to me to see Ollie's thoughts on various ideas, changing my opinion on how he would be as a moderator; I have no faith whatsoever in one who tries to dismiss debate on moderation, something we've seen all too much of recently from other quarters.