h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'm sure they will. However the current moderators are a bit random and overzealous currently.

We have to have volunteer mods, because otherwise we have no mods. We don't have cash to throw away. Maybe in the future if the site takes off in a big way and manages to make some money somehow, but right now, there is no other option.

Moderators will have to make the difficult decisions; that's a given. We just hope that people will, by and large, accept that they are a useful tool to keep h2g2 a pleasant place to be, rather then a nasty force that out to take away the fun.

We'll make wrong decisions along the way, because we're human and incredibly new to this, but I hope that most people will not even notice that we're around. Silent roadsweepers, picking up the advertising, porn links and other detritus that gets left on site.

In that case I would hope the new mods keep it quiet who they are, so they don't have people posting on their personal spaces etc.

I'd also hope that appeals/referrals have a different team to send on to? It's one of the problems I had to deal with when I moved to the message boards - the inhouse mods on some of the boards were dealing with their own appeals/referals which is completely pointless! Apparently they hated me for ages for stopping them doing that. Which they kindly told me years later when we were all much better friends and having our leaving do. I think I cried my eyes out as I thought I'd worked hard at building a good relationship with them. See? Once you start making the tough decisions, even other staff hate you.

If people start leaving abuse on volunteer mods' Spaces, I'd say that's unacceptable behaviour. If they're just trying to get info, it won't take long to develop a standard message that says 'We cannot discuss individual cases, please send and email to the central contact point at xxxxxxxxx'.

Those who take on the Community Editor roles will probably handle complaints and appeals - I agree that having them handled by the same people that made the original decision would be silly!

One of the critical things we have to get right is having fairness across the site. If we have fairness, most* people will see where the line is and not push against it.




*those few who enjoy pushing the line are of course what will cause the most headaches...

The biggest difference I see in our plans going forward is that the future moderators will be people familiar with this site. Currently, as I understand the situation, the moderators are outsourced and have no other connection to this site. They often remove posts and entries that the editorial or community staff later review and reinstate. The recent instances I've experienced it was clear to anyone connected with this site that the entry or post should never have been removed in the first place (for instance, my personal space was removed on the basis of use of other languages. The language I was using was a gibberish paragraph referencing Vogon poetry that had been on my space since 1999.) Having volunteer moderators from h2g2 will minimize the number of appeals as they will have some context with which to judge posts and entries.

Yep, abusing Mods on site for moderation decisions would certainly have to be against the House Rules. Abusing them off site would also be against the HR, but it is a slightly different thing.

While it *could* be known who the Mods are, it shouldn't ever be known which Mods did or said what. Collegiate accountability for decisions.

Some of us may be new to this, but it turns out that some of us aren't.

One of the big benefits that Noesis bring with them is experience of running thousands of volunteer mods supporting millions of users over the last 10 years or so. Plus we've got input from a couple of former BBC mods and, as it turns out, someone who's run one of the larger online dating sites.

We're getting a pretty broad spectrum of advice, both from fresh eyes and from old hands.

Ben

>I truly do hope that everyone in noohootoo shows the new volunteer moderators the respect that they deserve, instead of making life purposefully hard on them. <

Maybe not everyone...but yes that'll be the general attitude..that's what matters...will be that way.

There maybe hiccups. That's real life.

But I won't shut about it if I think people who are learning to be mods in the noohoo are being treated disrepectfully.

It's like there can be no football without the referees. They *are* the most important people.

It's our chance now to make the rules that the moderators will stick to. Don't waste it.

Shall I stop whinging then?

Well, Mina, you might want to suspend it while you're working on deciding what the new rules should be. Whether you resume after will depend largely on what rules you create.

Whatever.

Using any other name, other than Moderator, for the position of Moderator,a position found on and named Moderator on every other forum and internet board I've found, would seem to be very strange still to me.. Its a term people already know, new people as well as those here already, and the process teh moderators are doing, is moderation, afterall... It'd seem a bit change for changes sake, and asides anything there must be several thousand posts on h2g2 already mentioning the 'moderators', or the 'mods', which wouldn't make much sense suddenly if the name of the Moderators was, err something else

>>It's our chance now to make the rules that the moderators will stick to. Don't waste it.<< (Icy)

Pretty much as they are. I can't see any need to change the rules (except, maybe, for a tweak here & there).
Just 'cos Auntie seems to be a bit oversensitive in a time of stress doesn't mean we have to overturn the cart.

One thing we really ought to think about though is youngsters - do we want this to be a family show or an adult pastime?
Would we want to set a parent-controllable area? would any of us use it?

Moderators if we like them ,
Vogons when we don't

would not be appropriate as I've pointed out earlier, they obviously do not speak Vogon.

^^

What's wrong with the term moderator?It's a good word and does exactly what it says on the tin.

They help to moderate behaviour in a manner to allow good converse and debate whilst allowing conversations to flow.The only people to really dislike the term will dislike any other epithet because they dislike having to obey certain rules..

I want to see the younger brighter researchers return(under 16s) so I am quite willing to forgo the pleasure of swearing(giving them a playground won't work as they would lie about their age as I'm pretty sure most have all along).

Anyway I reserve my swearing for FB and other social networks.I think that at hootoo we can intellectually make our point without swearing.We have enough smileys that enable us to do so.

Exactly...

I've seen Incog's FB contributions!!!

>>Shall I stop whinging then?

Please don't Mina. I think your experience is useful. The more input we have from a variety of source the better I say.