Thanks for raising this Jordan. It seems to be something that happens in cycles, but it is good for people to highlight it happening. If anyone has any specific problems though, it would be better to send a PM to one of the moderators than post it on the forum.
Years ago I felt that it was necessary to read all the new posts in order to do the job of moderating properly. In the beginning, this was possible, and indeed we had a lot more need to police threads. We had lots of spammers, as well as con artists, frauds, liars, bigots, agitators and TEOTWAWKI enthusiasts, all posting. Some came purely to stir, others to profit from (or take advantage of) our members. New filters and a lot of bans later things have calmed down substantially. Threads are usually pretty tame, we have more posts per day and fewer moderators spending all day keeping an eye on things. It isn't possible to read all the threads and posts. For instance, I have never even looked at the Gift it on thread. I thought "how contentious can that really get?!?". This being the case, we rely upon members self moderating, and reporting posts using the "report post" icon.
Problems arise when people take "Self moderating" as a reason for taking a pop at someone who they find annoying, or whose posts they do not agree with. This is not what was intended, and is not how things should happen. Such comments often carry an emotional charge which comes through, sometimes louder than the poster intended. It is excellent advice not to post replies when irritated. Easy advice to offer, but a lot harder to follow. This is something that makes the job of moderator difficult, it can be really hard not to get annoyed with members who are causing you trouble and using your time. The best treatment is not replying too quickly, leave it overnight, for instance.
People attempting to moderate others who annoy them gives rise to bad feelings and really messy threads. When a Moderator does look in on a thread where people have been throwing mud and cross quoting back and forth, they are presented with a tangled mess that can take a lot of time to untangle, time that they may not have. What to do? Leave the thread alone, if the participants haven't really broken any of the rules, or sweep through deleting posts and locking the thread? We catch flak for either approach, but generally we have had less flak for leaving threads to run than we did when we jumped in and shut things down.
Years ago I felt that it was necessary to read all the new posts in order to do the job of moderating properly. In the beginning, this was possible, and indeed we had a lot more need to police threads. We had lots of spammers, as well as con artists, frauds, liars, bigots, agitators and TEOTWAWKI enthusiasts, all posting. Some came purely to stir, others to profit from (or take advantage of) our members. New filters and a lot of bans later things have calmed down substantially. Threads are usually pretty tame, we have more posts per day and fewer moderators spending all day keeping an eye on things. It isn't possible to read all the threads and posts. For instance, I have never even looked at the Gift it on thread. I thought "how contentious can that really get?!?". This being the case, we rely upon members self moderating, and reporting posts using the "report post" icon.
Problems arise when people take "Self moderating" as a reason for taking a pop at someone who they find annoying, or whose posts they do not agree with. This is not what was intended, and is not how things should happen. Such comments often carry an emotional charge which comes through, sometimes louder than the poster intended. It is excellent advice not to post replies when irritated. Easy advice to offer, but a lot harder to follow. This is something that makes the job of moderator difficult, it can be really hard not to get annoyed with members who are causing you trouble and using your time. The best treatment is not replying too quickly, leave it overnight, for instance.
People attempting to moderate others who annoy them gives rise to bad feelings and really messy threads. When a Moderator does look in on a thread where people have been throwing mud and cross quoting back and forth, they are presented with a tangled mess that can take a lot of time to untangle, time that they may not have. What to do? Leave the thread alone, if the participants haven't really broken any of the rules, or sweep through deleting posts and locking the thread? We catch flak for either approach, but generally we have had less flak for leaving threads to run than we did when we jumped in and shut things down.
Not funny, miserable to Mod, and they left a lot of long lasting ill feeling. At the end of the day too many people trying to make money from a limited pool of interested people. I'm not saying that those folks weren't able or capable teachers, etc., just that there wasn't enough business to go around. I think that it needs more than one string to a bow to make a living from the outdoor/bushcraft scene.
