i didnt really have any immediate reason for making this thread but its a good discussion to have. how would people prefer the forums be moderated? personally i prefer a "hands nearly entirely off until a report is made" approach, which is almost how things are now. stuff like spam posts should reasonably be cleared out if they offend but otherwise letting things play out might not be an awful idea, should the community be mature enough to handle it. this would also likely relieve tensions and let people fully explain themselves in some situations without worrying about breaking rules. it also sometimes feels like some staff only make "important" posts, and lessening the workload could help give them more time to post normally.

My style personally is to just wait on a report, unless it's something that I think seems appropriate to take care of myself. Honestly, even if I get a report, that'll just make me look a little closer. I've probably got a less than 75% record of taking action on reports. Less than 40% probably if you don't count reports on bots. I feel like the users can handle the forums themselves pretty well. We've got a mature crowd.

I hand out warnings without a report when a rule is blatantly broken like flaming etc. On the other hand, I often dismiss reports without action when it's not really an offense or it's an issue that doesn't require moderation.

Stuff like this is situational. If a fight is breaking out about religion or some random flamewar etc then I'd reckon admins would have to step in, but if it's just a bit of mud slinging and sorts itself out like in this topic: https://phpbb.mfgg.net/viewtopic.php?f=65&t=19990 Then it's probably not worth worrying about too much. It also depends how many people are involved. Really, there's nowhere near as much moderating to be done as there was back in the day.

We don't issue many board warnings these days. When we do, it's usually because of a post that someone reported - but even then, a large percentage of reports require no action. It's very rare that I take action on posts that no one has reported - when I do, it's usually a pretty clear-cut flame I'm dealing with. (I'm not talking about banning spambots, since those aren't real people, and there's absolutely no controversy about us noping those.)

I've been doing a lot of thinking about this lately and I figured this would be a better place to put this than in its own thread. For reading purposes I'll be breaking my usual nonchalant typing style to make things easier to read as I've been told in the past that writing a bunch of paragraphs without proper articulation makes reading far more difficult. I've gone on and on about this before and I know to some this isn't really that serious a topic, but I think that if I've been meditating on this for as long as I have then it warrants attention being called. I would hope that for once I'm taken relatively seriously regarding this since I feel I'm usually not and I find that worrisome. I know I'm not the most popular user here, however something I've noticed lately (and have mentioned more than a few times in the past) is the overbearing feeling that the site is shifting towards a style of thinking that I personally think is very, very toxic when left alone for as long as it has been. As one of the admins on Hotel Delfino, even now I feel this is a problem as more and more of the people I find are applicable to what I'll soon describe are promoted to higher site roles for what I can only feel is personal preference and having your foot in the door because you're friends with the people already in power. I'll start relatively simple though, with what I think is the biggest of these issues. Too many people here that are higher up deem "things they find unfunny" as "spam that needs to be removed". I've brought this up a few times in the PPP thread because I think that it is a serious problem regarding how a PPP will be handled. I am not worried about newbies making meme threads that are unfunny to most, I'm worried about them getting locked and cut short because an admin finds them "not funny". The old [url=https://phpbb.mfgg.net/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=19654]Karnov Thread[/url] was very "decisive" to most, as it was prematurely locked by the now demoted Nite Shadow. For some, it was the straw that broke the camel's back, and it kickstarted most of the big changes MFGG's seen as of late, such as the creation of the suggestions board and many other MFGG3.0 plans that wouldn'tve been made otherwise. This also spurred the joint-effort aforementioned Hotel Delfino, which is still going strong as "the" MFGG IM chat, despite being unofficial. As I mentioned earlier, I know I am not the most popular user for more than a few people. Even though they may not say it I know they find that I can be elitist, and at some times hypocritical, but I cannot say I haven't changed a lot of my views based on personal criticism I've received lately. I recall the discourse between the Club Saturn and Jimmy T. Discord groups, and how a lot of bad blood between that (even between the now defunct new IRC as well as the final iteration of the Skype group) resulted from fear of the chatrooms becoming too clique-y, as well as talking about other users behind their backs. The irony behind all this, however, is that each of these groups participated in these activities, and usually ended up in both groups calling hypocrisy at each other. I think everyone who was in these groups can agree that both were guilty of both of these things, whether they've admitted it or not, and hopefully we can work on making current and future relations better by avoiding this. I do find that it is inevitable that the community will talk about the community, but it was at its worst in the past, and hopefully we can all strive to not get it to be that bad ever again. You may be wondering, "these are all off-site affairs, what the hell does this have to do with the forums?", and you're partially right. Far from 100% of the community participates in off-site chats, and they shouldn't and won't be criticized for what I have and will describe, however it's undeniable that many popular users, including forum admins, participate in these chats. I will preface this now that I won't name names, I won't use specific quotes, and I won't call for their removal for what they've said and done. They don't need to leave the chats. That's not the point of this post and I won't be calling what they find funny "spam" anytime soon, regardless of how I feel about it. The point is to come to a resolve and to hopefully improve internal site relations so future conflicts do not occur. There is a very good reason why I am worried about the PPP. I am worried that the clique-y attitude still continues, however I know that I am no longer a contributor to it. Past experiences have made me less judgmental towards the opinions of others both because doing this is not only a one way ticket to disaster, but also because don't have the capacity to worry about what other people enjoy or find funny because I have my own things I need to be doing. If I can change my mentality like this, then I seriously hope that the general tone and preferences of some admins will as well. I think that promoting based on preference is an extremely unfair thing to do, not only to other potential applicants, but to the community as a whole. I seriously hope this isn't reading like a revenge plot to get me into power, because I will do anything I need to to prove otherwise. With things like the PPP on the horizon, having a common mentality rather than getting a very diverse set of individuals to moderate and admin the forums will do nothing but harm future members as it will only make them feel excluded and could even potentially railroad them into a hazardous mindset. Regardless of what you find interesting, uninteresting, funny, unfunny, and no matter how vocal you are about this, you cannot let it dictate how you moderate. I will stress that this is not the entire staff, far from it, but regardless it is an obviously growing problem from the standpoint of someone who spends a lot of their time with most of the active community. What do I suggest doing? Not only should those I'm describing be more open minded, but there should also be general rules set in place to not allow them to do this in the future. I see things that are "unfunny" tend to be described as "pointless spam" and I would like this mindset to stop dictating so much, both on-site and off. Humor is not a competition. Rules that follow this trend should be replaced with more clear-cut and inarguable rules such as "no flooding" and "no flaming", as if anything has become clear to me these past few months, the word "spam" is something that's so exploited amongst certain individuals that it's becoming a major problem. I hope this reads coherently enough. This is something I feel extremely strongly about and going forward I want it to be addressed and rectified rather than left to rot and get worse. I would hope it's not just me that feels this way because I know what'll happen otherwise. Tl;dr- Grow a spine and just say you don't think it's funny. Don't treat users like freaks just because they don't think what you think is funny. Just because you don't think the joke is funny or don't get what's being discussed doesn't mean you need to put your foot down and ruin things for the people that do.

Well really most topics that are locked are simply locked because they don't fit in the General Chat or whatever, this won't be an issue in a PPP type of situation, you're thinking too hard I feel.

[quote="Kritter"]Well really most topics that are locked are simply locked because they don't fit in the General Chat or whatever, this won't be an issue in a PPP type of situation, you're thinking too hard I feel.[/quote] i'd agree in most cases, though there's been a handful of pseudo-pushes to get the GC to be a bit more laid back. some threads stay up while others go down, and while that may just be an issue of mods not paying attention, its a wonder why [url=https://phpbb.mfgg.net/viewtopic.php?p=449321#p449321]this thread[/url] amassed so many pages while other threads that are more self-contained and don't hijack someone elses' thread go down fairly quickly.

[quote="Mit"]I recall the discourse between the Club Saturn and Jimmy T. Discord groups, and how a lot of bad blood between that (even between the now defunct new IRC as well as the final iteration of the Skype group) resulted from fear of the chatrooms becoming too clique-y, as well as talking about other users behind their backs. The irony behind all this, however, is that each of these groups participated in these activities, and usually ended up in both groups calling hypocrisy at each other. I think everyone who was in these groups can agree that both were guilty of both of these things, whether they've admitted it or not, and hopefully we can work on making current and future relations better by avoiding this.[/quote] I've been in all of these groups (give or take the IRC), and I can confirm that each one has been guilty of these things. I think we're past the worst of it.

Nah, Mit. I think you came across as pretty coherent. [i]Preface: I'm relatively new to this community and don't have in-depth knowledge about many users and inter-site relations.[/i] To me, it sounds like there's a disparity between the moderators and users of the site. The average MFGGer is fairly young compared to most sites. They haven't had a lot of online interactions so they're still learning how to communicate with others in an appropriate way. For these people, places like MFGG and the PPP are ways for them to get their "sea legs". They have an opportunity to go try things out, get all the LOL RANDOM out of their system and become more mature internet users in the end. For me, Minecraft Classic served the same purpose (and thank God none of that was public). By contrast, former admins like Nite Shadow are much older. They have gotten past this awkward stage and have far less patience for the LOL RANDOM of younger users. Threads like Karnov, while silly, seem ultimately harmless to me. As I look through the pages and only see the posts of well-known users remaining, I can kind of understand what Nite Shadow must have done. It was not a smart decision on his part and by neutering the thread, he sent out the message that this is not a place for these younger users. Except it [i]is[/i]! And many of the now-mature users were like that one day! Just look at any given page of the MFGG wiki! When you nip these users in the bud they don't have the opportunity to grow into the forum flowers you see today. Concerning the off-site chat issues, I can't say much about that. It seems like a personal problem between you and other users. But if we wanted to solve the issue where "far from 100% of the community participates in off-site chats" I think we could do that. Pin the Discord at the top of the forum! Pin a thread explaining what it is! Open up a thread where people can share silly Discord quotes to make it feel more inviting! The more we show, the more people will join and more lively the Discord will become. As someone who joined Discord just this week I gotta say: I had a hard time finding the MFGG server. I had to Google it and look through several threads to figure out which one is the "official" MFGG Discord. And even then, Hotel Delfino isn't the "official" MFGG Discord. It's all very confusing for newcomers and kind of a turn-off to what I've now found to be a pretty nice server. As for the condescending attitude towards LOL RANDOM people, I agree people should stop that. Remember, people...these are kids we're working with. If you're treating someone like a freak because they made a funny joke, they can interpret that as a personal attack. Just be blunt and say the joke isn't funny. It might make them flare up and be even more angry, but at least they'll concretely understand what they're doing wrong and instead of just thinking "wow, all of the people in this community really don't like me". TL;DR: Same as Mit, but remember these "spammy" users are kids. Let's also feature the Discord more prominently!

Lets not feature the Discord more prominently. Off-site chat issues are [i]why [/i]MFGG doesn't have an "official" chat. And i'd say the reason topics in General Chat are closed or left open is basically because there aren't any specific rules laid out for what's appropriate to post. The ruleset is pretty basic in the General Chat when it comes to what constitutes "spam" and really it's left up to moderator discretion. Nobody knows what's safe and what isn't if it hasn't been defined and there's no real precedent. I'd believe there would be more understanding if there were a PPP because the idea of what that forum is for would be more clear, and topics that were lock-worthy would simply be moved accordingly instead. Really, just remember you have humans behind the wheel here, working for free, who will make what some people call mistakes and others will call the right choice, it's all left up to personal discretion and there's usually no pleasing everybody. Every change or decision here is met with criticism from one party and praise from another.

the problem i have though is what's described as spam. you can have the most elaborate joke thread possible but if the staff doesn't think it's funny then it's spam. this should not be the case and this degree of personal preference shouldn't dictate what goes on in joke threads.

Well that's my point, there's no clear rules on that. Some mods see a topic as spam, and others see it as a relaxed chat. Who's right? The answer is that, as there are no clear understandings on the subject, both are correct! But you know what, this will happen in any incarnation of the PPP too to be honest, a topic will get a bit out of hand and end up locked and one party will say "Oh come on, we were just having fun!" and another will say "That's what you call fun? Glad it was locked!". Different strokes for different folks, even with hard set rules you can still call out someone as a buzzkill if they don't agree with your sense of humour.

that's why there should be a broader group of personalities dictating what gets locked. it's not fair for only a select group of people to have fun. it's being hypocritical to praise one sense of humor while devaluing another. i'm not saying they absolutely have to find everything funny. i'm saying that if a thread does not explicitly break any rules, then there's no reason for it to be locked. if i were mod, and someone made a thread that i didn't find funny, should i lock it? no, because that's obviously not fair. different strokes would be if there were two threads co-existing that both favored different senses of humor. what we have is one of the threads is cut short a page or two in with no warning or report while the other goes on and on because the mods think it's funny.

You talk like all the admins have one sense of humour and everyone else has another. It starts to read like "make me admin because I'm different" What if I were to disagree with that broader group? Would that then make me wrong? Or would I be right but just have a different sense of humour? I remember back in the day there was a topic by a former mod called Jeff that was a DIRECT insult on me personally and I requested it locked but it stayed open and ended up archived for the world to see simply because those involved said I had a bad sense of humour and the mods at the time thought it was funny. Who was right in that instance? People had fun at my expense but I was obviously hurt by that. Should I have been lenient and let it go? Should the topic have been locked because it was essentially attacking another member? Lets be clear that there was a [b]broad [/b]group who thought I was wrong back then and they sure dictated what should and shouldn't happen. Personally, I think the forums work better when it IS a smaller group. There's accountibility for one rather than a pack mindset influencing decisions. Soon as a popular admin gets a gaggle of cronies behind him pulling strings it's all over for that admin's integrity.

neither group is wrong. what you described was a personal attack. that should've been locked without question, not because of the joke, but because it was a personal attack. i'm not advocating for jokes at the expense of others nor will i ever do so. if i was gonna be perfectly honest the mindset i'm describing is no stranger to underhanded jokes on occasion which i'm obviously not fond of, but it's basically never on the forums anyway so for the most part it's irrelevant to this. i think we're mostly on the same page here but you're misinterpreting what i'm saying. i, again, don't want there to be jokes that are at the cost of the integrity of others, and i don't want one group of people to just stop all together. i want the current admins that this applies to to take a step back, let people have their fun, so long as it's not anything done to deliberately get on the nerves of someone else. and if you suspect this is the case (and it's not blatantly obvious like the situation you described), there should be evidence to support locking the thread in question and subsequently handing out warns.

I get what you want and I agree that there are plenty of topics that I personally would not have locked, but that's just me and my own interpretation of how the rules of this place work. Really what you should be doing is not being all cloak and dagger about it. Find the topics you think should've stayed open or any examples, make your case and let people discuss both it and the decisions the mods or admins made so everyone gets on the same page. This suggestion forum is perfect for getting things like that out in the open. Let everyone have a say and let the admins make their own case on the subject.

fair enough! as mentioned in my initial post about this, [url=https://phpbb.mfgg.net/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=19654]the Karnov Thread[/url] was the biggest example of this being an issue for most- its lock was seen as jumping the gun (i recall nite himself even admitting to this) and for a lot of us was the straw that broke the camel's back. it got locked at originally about 2 or 3 pages, then was reopened because a good amount of people pointed out that it was unfair. even then when it was reopened a decent amount of posts got removed. the butt of the joke stemmed from karnov being a vaguely obscure game with a funny premise and exploiting that. this was pretty obvious from the get-go and a good chunk of the posts made were solid. on the contrary, [url=https://phpbb.mfgg.net/viewtopic.php?p=449321#p449321]a little help?[/url] was left open for 9 pages, only being locked by nite after the joke had long passed. for better or worse the thread shortly turned into a joke at the expense of Mariofan1122, who hasn't posted since july of 2015 for one reason or another. this thread also contains some key examples of admin maturity such as [url=https://phpbb.mfgg.net/viewtopic.php?p=449476#p449476]here[/url] and [url=https://phpbb.mfgg.net/viewtopic.php?p=449612#p449612]here[/url]. for better or worse this is also a PPP-worthy thread, but it's obvious that the OP was fairly young (possibly not old enough to be ready to use a message board) and this kind of thing should be expected. there's also many instances of those who are now admins and site staff (not all, i can venture to guess those who apply will know that i'm talking about them) who tend to make jokes at the expense of others, criticize other users for their senses of humor, even despite being not only asked to lay off on several occasion, but have also had the hypocrisy pointed out to them clear as day. some people can vouch that the now defunct club saturn aimed to have an "MFGG" tone by enacting similar forum rules, but also using the previously described "spam" as an excuse to halt and sway conversations that some key players couldn't/didn't want to participate in. part of the problem there was the passive aggressive attitude that was bred there, as, again, rather than just saying "this isn't funny", things had to be underhanded and swayed in favor of people who wanted the conversation to be different. there's more than a few people who can vouch for this which is honestly optimal rather than sifting through chatlogs. i can name names if desired but i'd rather address the problem as a mentality than an individual problem. i think it's a matter of ego and tolerance more than anything else and rather than seeing people demoted i'd rather staff be more well balanced to have input from as many sides of the spectrum as possible. i may add more to this list later but my memory's fuzzy and i get more frequently reminded of this problem over chat than over the forums anyway.

I find this really interesting, that our viewpoints have both done a 180, from the "A Little Help" topic. [quote="DJ Coco"]This is the reason we need some kind of PPP I won't be the one to lock this topic I'm in favor of the toilet adventure[/quote] [quote="Kritter"]No we don't.[/quote] Honestly this topic and the PPP topic in suggestions go hand in hand, I feel like the issues you've brought up wouldn't exist if the topics in question were in a more casual posting environment. More serious topics have their place and the General Chat will always accommodate that, topics that are MEANT to be serious that get out of hand will still be locked or have posts removed, but other topics that are meant to be a bit less serious would at least have a place.

With all due respect, I'm a bit puzzled by why you guys are still bringing up the Nite situation. I mean, when I brought up my thoughts on the situation in that one thread about his resignation, Mors suggested that I shouldn't bring up old drama. While I understand why you're discussing it due to your views on how you'd handle site moderation, I was under the impression that you had a similar stance as Mors on leaving it in the past.