I was a member of another very active forum for several years and had dealings with many of its members. There were problems from time to time, and from my perspective the moderator was as fair as humanly possible. However, the problems escalated to the point that it bacame expedient to ban certain individuals, which, of course, prompted heated accusations of unfair treatment. The situation continued to worsen. The forum finally became such a headache for the moderator that it was shut down (without warning) this past December, right before Christmas. Of course, this action caused considerable hard feelings, but the owner of the forum had a perfect right to do so, and it was undeniably in his best interest.
I think it’s easy to forget that this forum is not our “right.” Somebody, and as I understand it that somebody is Rich, actually pays for it with real money. And while we were in withdrawal over Thanksgiving weekend when the board was down, somebody, and as I understand it that somebody is Rich (okay, maybe Rich & the interns) had to spend real time and effort away from his weekend to get the thing up and running again. He “hosts” this board; we are guests. That’s the way I see it.
Carol
I say, get to know the “Delete Post” button.
I use it 2/3 of the time that I compose messages. “Do I really need to say this?” is the question I ask myself.
I have used it a lot more in the last two days. Most people have covered what needs to be said.
This whole dust-up started because of ultra-fast conversational reactions in posts. Wouldn’t it be easier to think a bit about a one-line answer rather than have to back-pedal on its meaning later?
Sounds so ridiculously basic, but Think Before You Post.
On 2003-02-10 11:41, The Weekenders wrote:
I say, get to know the “Delete Post” button.
I use it 2/3 of the time that I compose messages. “Do I really need to say this?” is the question I ask myself.I have used it a lot more in the last two days. Most people have covered what needs to be said.
This whole dust-up started because of ultra-fast conversational reactions in posts. Wouldn’t it be easier to think a bit about a one-line answer rather than have to back-pedal on its meaning later?
Sounds so ridiculously basic, but Think Before You Post.
I agree entirely. Another thing to think of (which I often tell my daughter), is listen to HOW you say things. It is possible to be frank without being unkind, but it takes effort, and a willingness to rephrase things if offense is taken.
I love the “edit” and “delete” functions at this forum. Most of the forums I participate on don’t have them, or only allow you to edit a post within a limited time window.
Redwolf
Carol you hit it right on the head. Well put. I have also taken up walking in circels in my kitchen playing a whistle which usually keeps me from reacting in my usual reactionary way.
Of course it helps that I LOVE YOU ALL !
Tom
Of course it helps that I LOVE YOU ALL !
Unfair.
If you have The Grace, then it’s too easy 
Paul
struggling to have it when being an atheist.
Just try it before you comment.
On the other hand, it’s also often tempting for moderators to go too far. I’m on a bicycling forum where the moderator locks threads as soon as things become anything less than “sticky sweet lets all hug each other.”
That’s his right, of course, but it sure gets annoying when you’re interested in a thread and he locks up the whole thread because somewhere one person was less than loving to another. And we’re not even talking profanity or really strong name calling, mostly just a touch of sarcasm.
What makes it even worse is there’s one clown on the board who is just so annoying that he almost always draws some sarcasm from somebody and then click, the moderator locks the thread and sometimes threatens to ban the people who were mildly sarcastic to the idiot. It would be better all around if he’d just ban the idiot, but I understand that the idiot has a half-dozen or more “personalities” on a number of boards and would probably just log on under another psuedonym.
For all that I dislike how contentious the board has become in the last year or so, I think I’d rather have the contention than an over-moderated board. I can simply choose not to read contentious threads, or even individual contentious posts within a thread, but when a moderator locks or deletes a thread its “everybody out of the pool.”
John
On 2003-02-10 16:18, OutOfBreath wrote:
For all that I dislike how contentious the board has become in the last year or so, I think I’d rather have the contention than an over-moderated board. I can simply choose not to read contentious threads, or even individual contentious posts within a thread, but when a moderator locks or deletes a thread its “everybody out of the pool.”John
We choose to hang out on one board rather than another in part because of area of interest and in part because of moderating policy. I too like the relatively relaxed approach around here.
But let’s not pretend that moderators are at our democratic beck and call—there to do our bidding. They invest significant amounts of money and time into their roles and take significant legal risks. What are the rewards? The very existence of forum moderators must be deeply puzzling to economists. The more relaxed their approach, the greater the risks. If a moderator is too vigilant, he or she will end up with a sterile board or no board at all.
We do get a democratic choice at one point actually; we can always choose to stay or leave.
If I read Rich correctly in another thread, he will surface to make a comment or lock a thread on the basis of e-mailed complaints.
Therefore, it seems that if a member bothers enough people who are willing to say, “Hey, Ref!” then he’ll respond. There is quite a lot of room for variation if that’s your standard. But I don’t see how anyone could keep track of every single topic on this board–Lord knows I don’t even try.
So it’s possible that Member A irritated X number of people and 50% e-mailed Rich while Member B irritated Y number of people but 75% complained. This might give Rich the impression that Member B is a bigger problem than Member A, although A may have annoyed more people.
And I’ve said before that I enjoy discussion but not argument and I appreciate the occasional intervention of Dale and Rich when things sometimes become too heated to be fun or informative.
M