Moderated thread in Webmaster & Flash

The Corinthian

Can I know why and by whom this thread has essentailly had practically the entire discussion, that frankly was of value to the community, deleted?

Edit: Posted this in the wrong forum - meant to do so in Feedback.

aidan_walsh

Last time I saw it it was pretty much descending into an argument between yourself and the OP about previous arrangements. That seems like something the PM system was intended for. You could of course have mentioned that you had previous bad experience with the OP, but there seemed little reason to be drawn into airing dirty laundry in public.

The Corinthian

aidan_walsh wrote:

Last time I saw it it was pretty much descending into an argument between yourself and the OP about previous arrangements. That seems like something the PM system was intended for. You could of course have mentioned that you had previous bad experience with the OP, but there seemed little reason to be drawn into airing dirty laundry in public.

Except to warn others who may fall foul of the same scenario.

Nonetheless, by whom and why was it moderated thus? If the thread was that bad why wasn't it simply nuked rather than the selective deletion that took place?

CuLT

I think the poor spelling in the OP would ward off most cautious designers.

Seriously, "sinario"; the mind boggles.

miju

personally would agree with the corinth on this one

altough both didn't help by protracting the thread for longer than it should have it did serve as a nice warning the regulars of the webmaster forum

probably should have been locked ALOT earlier than it had of been as was obvious where thread was going and left at that , it had gone well past selective deleting

corinth , just post up a quick politely worded cautionary note in the thread again as it is very unfair for the selective deleting

The Corinthian

miju wrote:

corinth , just post up a quick politely worded cautionary note in the thread again as it is very unfair for the selective deleting

It would most likely be deleted again by whoever did so originally and presently keeping his motives to himself.

Beruthiel

There are only two Mods on that forum TC, why not drop them a PM.

Asok

The posts were deleted by Ph3n0m.

Rollo Tamasi

what is with the ye olde english in this thread by The Corinthian?

tis rather baffling

Asok

Rollo Tamasi wrote:

what is with the ye olde english in this thread by The Corinthian?

tis rather baffling

?

aidan_walsh

Asok wrote:

?

"whom", I presume. In these times of l33t speek and txt, "Ye Olde Englishe" is pretty much proper English.

Asok

I weep for humanity.

Ph3n0m

a) the original post by the OP was posted as he was looking for someone to work on a project for him, with him, whatever

b) I deleted everything else after that, becuase it had descended into a personal arguement between the OP and The Corinthian. Granted it started off as The Corinthian giving his experience with the OP, but unfortunately it descended into a "you're a liar, no you're a liar" scenario

Nothing more, nothing less, apologies for anyone who didnt realise why I would have deleted in the first place

The Corinthian

Ph3n0m wrote:

b) I deleted everything else after that, becuase it had descended into a personal arguement between the OP and The Corinthian. Granted it started off as The Corinthian giving his experience with the OP, but unfortunately it descended into a "you're a liar, no you're a liar" scenario

Why not delete the whole thing or even leave the experience I gave seeing you appear to have no objection to it? Bit one sided, no?

Ph3n0m

The Corinthian wrote:

Why not delete the whole thing or even leave the experience I gave seeing you appear to have no objection to it? Bit one sided, no?

I didnt delete the whole thing because the OP was simply looking for someone to work with him on a project.


Then you came along with your experiences with the OP - fair enough. However as previously stated it boiled down into "your're a liar" argument. Neither one of you backed yourself up with facts - like emails, pm's, etc.

And most of all the webmaster forum is not a place for airing of dirty laundry - I wont let people do it about their experiences with hosting companies, therefore I wont let it be done at all

I hope that answers your question(s)

The Corinthian

Ph3n0m wrote:

I hope that answers your question(s)

One more. Do you have any relationship, professional or otherwise, with the company in question?

Ph3n0m

The Corinthian wrote:

One more. Do you have any relationship, professional or otherwise, with the company in question?

Hah I cant believe I was even asked that....if I was in anyway inclined I would be extremely upset with you right now.

For the record, if indeed there is one - I have no assoication with the OP, that The Corinthian has issues with (then again what happens if I actually know him/her in real life and dont realise they post on boards.ie - it has happened before?). But no, that would be too much conspiracy at this hour of the morning.

So TC, no I dont know the OP

The Corinthian

No offence intended. Thank you for your responses.

Ph3n0m

No problem. Hope that clears everything up

The Corinthian

Looks like you're in with a chance of a nixer after your even handed moderation though...

Ph3n0m

The Corinthian wrote:

Looks like you're in with a chance of a nixer after your even handed moderation though...

eh? what nixer? TC, I think its about time you dropped this and stop bitching at me over someone else you have a problem with.

The Op's last line is directed to anyone who has submitted a pm about this current project and he suggested they also let him know if they want to be considered for future projects - so exactly what that has to do with me?

The Corinthian

Ph3n0m wrote:

The Op's last line is directed to anyone who has submitted a pm about this current project and he suggested they also let him know if they want to be considered for future projects - so exactly what that has to do with me?

Well he wanted to thank you for your fair and balanced moderation, so it seemed like a good opertunity for you.

Ph3n0m

The Corinthian wrote:

Well he wanted to thank you for your fair and balanced moderation, so it seemed like a good opertunity for you.

You know, thats the problem with assumptions

The Corinthian

Ph3n0m wrote:

You know, thats the problem with assumptions

Assumptions are easy to come by when someone else has questionable bias to enspire them.

ecksor

Ph3n0m wrote:

a) the original post by the OP was posted as he was looking for someone to work on a project for him, with him, whatever

Here's my take on it:

paulthelegend is using boards as a recruitment service. He is not paying boards.ie any money for this, but he claims that he has had a very satisfactory experience in the past when looking for people to work for him on that forum. Now, for that arrangement to continue, you have to figure out why you are letting him continue to post his advertisements on your forum.

Basically, boards.ie has to be getting something out of this. In this case, as far as I can tell, there should be some benefit to the users of your forum by allowing him to advertise in this manner. If someone with claims of a bad experience gets their "testimonial" deleted, then what exactly is the overall benefit to our users? If someone is going to leverage a boards.ie community for their own benefit then they shouldn't be protected from actually interacting with that community. Relationships will need to be somewhat open or else it's just an advertising service.

Ph3n0m

The Corinthian wrote:

Assumptions are easy to come by when someone else has questionable bias to enspire them.

You know I had a half page written, blasting you TC - then I realised I am not leaving boards.ie over you and your lousy insinuations about me.

paulthelegend is using boards as a recruitment service. He is not paying boards.ie any money for this, but he claims that he has had a very satisfactory experience in the past when looking for people to work for him on that forum. Now, for that arrangement to continue, you have to figure out why you are letting him continue to post his advertisements on your forum.

therefore I have now changed the charter, deleted the original post. I deleted all those previous posts (when I allowed advertising) because

a) it had descended into a bitch fest between the OP and TC
b) and because of the accusation of lying been thrown by either side - neither one offered any proof whatsoever. And the last headache I wanted to cause DeVore, etc was another smartmedia incident

case closed

Oh next time TC, keep your damn assumptions about me to yourself

ecksor

For the record, if you do feel that your users are getting benefit from such posts then I see no problem with allowing them in some form in principle. It merely comes down to whether the community derives benefit from it in some way, but it's not clear how they are at present if feedback is deleted (i.e, there needs to be some advantage to boards users of getting work through our board rather than going to some other specialised forum or even the adverts.ie job board).

Ph3n0m

ecksor wrote:

For the record, if you do feel that your users are getting benefit from such posts then I see no problem with allowing them in some form in principle. It merely comes down to whether the community derives benefit from it in some way, but it's not clear how they are at present if feedback is deleted (i.e, there needs to be some advantage to boards users of getting work through our board rather than going to some other specialised forum or even the adverts.ie job board).

I cannot comment on all cases - because this is the first time that a poster has been hauled up and a bitch fest has ensued

That said, I believe it was only a very, very small number of people that advertised like that. Most of the advertisments would have been for actual full time roles - related to the webmaster forum

The Corinthian

Ph3n0m wrote:

and because of the accusation of lying been thrown by either side - neither one offered any proof whatsoever.

Then you should have deleted those portions. The facts of the vast majority of the argument were not challenged. Indeed, when the OP first claimed that I should have emailed him and I pointed out that I did, he didn’t deny this.

Yet you chose to delete only the argument and the caveat emptor that may have benefited the community, in favour of an advertisement by a commercial interest.

Oh next time TC, keep your damn assumptions about me to yourself

You made what was at best a bad call in my and apparently others’ opinions that ultimately failed to serve the community and only served the commercial interests of one member. If it causes me to raise an eyebrow - and that’s all it’s doing - then you’ve only yourself to blame. Spare us your indignantcy.

So if you or anyone else gives such cause again I won’t keep my “damn assumptions” to myself any more than I would expect others to do so were I to screw up like you have on this occasion.

Nevyn

Why is this here and not in the mods forum ?

The Corinthian

Thaedydal wrote:

Why is this here and not in the mods forum ?

I posted it here originally as I didn't think it would escalate to this level, TBH.

Blaster99

Who moderates the moderators?

Faith

The admins.

ecksor

Blaster99 wrote:

Who moderates the moderators?

That depends. What point are you getting at?

paulthelegend

Holy god, even when its deleted TC still cant let it go ... its all over not getting a reply from an email.

I said thanks to who ever deleted the threads, I didn't know who did it or even how to find out but it was obviously a good decision as it was ridiculous and childish and that is on both parts ... i include myself on the rediculous part for letting it go on for so long and for bringing myself down to the level to reply to some of the posts, but it is hard when your personally being attacked and your name is trying to be dragged through the mud for absolutely no reason or proof.

As for using it as a recruitment agency ... i didn't know I was doing wrong by offering work to other boards members, and this really has gotten way out of hand and fuelled by one person only. But if what i done was wrong then i'll make sure never to do it again. I really didn't see how putting work to boards members was a bad thing I actually thought it was a good thing.

and ecksor, do you really feel TC's post could in any way be called feedback ... would you want people posting that sort of stuff as feedback to anything on this site? (I supose thats rhetorical because i don't want to encourage people to post any more on this kiddys sandbox that we have going on here)

In 4-5 of my posts i tried to close the argument but not once in his posts did he try to close it. It was a completely one sided attack on me personally for what ever reason he had in his head but quiet frankly I don't care what someone like TC thinks about anything because even look at this two pages of whinging because his hijacked thread was deleted.

It's ridiculous and if the tables were turned and some joe soap like myself with 300 posts and not a moderator spoiled one of his threads then id be banned without any notice, never mind cleaning up the thread and then allowing me to spoil it again and still not be banned… If one of the mods can pm me telling me if they agree with that or not it would be great (don’t reply on this thread cause I really don’t want to encourage bitchin about nothing on threads)

So if TC drops this ... then everyone else on boards would drop it as well cause no one cares! So come on lets grow up TC just forget move on and everyone will do the same and get this section back onto web related topics only.

The Corinthian

paulthelegend wrote:

it is hard when your personally being attacked and your name is trying to be dragged through the mud for absolutely no reason or proof.

Your name and that of your company has never been mentioned. I would not mention any details like that or expect you to do likewise - although you seemed to have no problem announcing the rate I quoted.

As for proof you actually verified the vast majority of what I accused in the thread, so it is present.

and this really has gotten way out of hand and fuelled by one person only.

No as others concurred with what I was saying.

In 4-5 of my posts i tried to close the argument but not once in his posts did he try to close it.

Of course you were continually trying to close the argument - you were being criticised and closing the argument was an obvious exercise in damage limitation.

My opinion of you and, by extension, your company has not changed and it was fair comment to give that opinion to those who may have dealings with you. Get over it and try to be more professional in your future dealings and this sort of thing will not reoccur.

ecksor

paulthelegend wrote:

As for using it as a recruitment agency ... i didn't know I was doing wrong by offering work to other boards members, and this really has gotten way out of hand and fuelled by one person only. But if what i done was wrong then i'll make sure never to do it again. I really didn't see how putting work to boards members was a bad thing I actually thought it was a good thing.

Have I said it's a bad thing? Go back and read what I've written again.

The point I'm making here is that you're using community interaction for your benefit. Up to now it appears to have been mutually beneficial with you finding people to work with that you are happy with and presumably there are people who have been happy to work with you. However, when there was some negative feedback with someone detailing a poor experience, you keep on trying to close the discussion and you think that removing the discussion from the public eye is a good thing.

Basically what I AM saying is that you should either take the good with the bad, or you should take nothing at all.

paulthelegend wrote:

and ecksor, do you really feel TC's post could in any way be called feedback ...

You don't specify which post you mean, but yes, I do think he has been offering feedback, both to you and now to boards.

paulthelegend wrote:

would you want people posting that sort of stuff as feedback to anything on this site?

What does what you or I want have anything to do with what constitutes valid feedback?

paulthelegend

TC one person tried to defend your actions by saying you were just annoyed you didn’t get an email back and that you should have gotten one ... i took them comments onboard ... then 3-4 people posted asking you to shut up but you still went on so i'm afraid to say that you do not have the backing that you thought you did, people will make up there own minds.

And your "proof" was i verified cause there was nothing behind it and then I clarified your "proof"... I gave dates of pm's and what was in them, i clarified why you did not get a reply and even went into a lot more detail about contracts etc then i should have publicly. And ask for stating your rate it was the only way of backing up my main reason for not picking you which was grossly overpricing for the approach that was stated in your proposal that lost you the gig. In a normal circumstance i wouldn't quote rates but this has been far from normal.

And ecksor I’m just trying to point out that if you had 20 TC's giving that type of feedback you'd want to clear your weekends to sort out the disputes caused every week.

So the only reply id like is that if the roles were reversed and the honourable moderator TC had a thread which i came along and posted 7-8 posts to spoil it and i just constantly whinge and ruin the whole thread then an actual fair moderator notices that it has turned into a childish argument and is not helping anyone so clears the thread. Then I come along and starts over and over again even when 3 people ask me to stop and they say that the only thing this has proven is not to deal with me but that TC hasnt reached there bad books ... but i still go on .... would i be banned?

I think the answer is that i wouldn't even get a second chance to spoil it again, when it was cleared up id say i would have gotten a warning at least. I've been reading threads before where people get 2 week bans for alot less.

So just like it was asked before, who does moderate the moderators? Did TC act in a way that a moderator should? Or can they get away with more then normal boards members? Is there a conflict of interests between any moderator posting here and TC? He seems to be accusing other mod’s of having a conflict of interest with me even though there's a huge chance that its the other way around, so I’m not assuming or accusing I’m just asking.

monkey tennis

paulthelegend wrote:

Did TC act in a way that a moderator should?

News to me that TC is a moderator of Webmaster & Flash.

paulthelegend

He isn't, not that I know of, He is a mod of a few other sections of boards.ie ... But I’m guessing mod's should act of a certain standard in all sections You cant moderate someone for spoiling threads in your section then spoil threads yourself in another section.

and just checking his buddy list there and guess what ... ecksor is on his 50% buddy list which only has 6 people (good mates ehh?)... I'm not sure is ecksor a mod or not and don't really care I’m just pointing out that I don’t really expect his good friends to look at the situation with an open mind. But thank god there seems to be a good few mod's that are just looking at this as it is and not bios at all, if it was up to his mates id probably be banned for sticking up for myself when being attacked.

The Corinthian

paulthelegend wrote:

TC one person tried to defend your actions

3 - I’m sure the mods of Webmaster / admins could verify if they’re arsed.

then 3-4 people posted asking you to shut up

2 - I’m sure the mods of Webmaster / admins could verify if they’re arsed.

And your "proof" was i verified cause there was nothing behind it and then I clarified your "proof"...

You began with one story and when corrected (which you did not deny) on the facts changed it. Pretty damming TBH.

I gave dates of pm's and what was in them

You didn’t give a single date.

And ecksor I’m just trying to point out that if you had 20 TC's giving that type of feedback you'd want to clear your weekends to sort out the disputes caused every week.

You generally wouldn’t, indeed I wouldn’t. Normally how it works is someone will ask me if I would recommend someone or a company, or they might mention them in conversation and I’ll privately comment.

I would never and have never publicly criticise a company in this manner as this would be inappropriate. However here you’re simply a private individual, like me, without any public association to a company, so I decided that I would raise the issue on this occasion.

Why? In part because I could and you’d pissed me off. In part because other members of the community have a right to know that you’re likely to screw them around and in part because if you’re held up as an example, other companies looking to outsource will be less likely to screw people around because they’ll know that they may get a similar reception.

So just like it was asked before, who does moderate the moderators? Did TC act in a way that a moderator should? Or can they get away with more then normal boards members?

I’m not a moderator of the Webmaster board. I’d have banned you for trying to use it for advertising purposes a long time ago if I were.

Is there a conflict of interests between any moderator posting here and TC? He seems to be accusing other mod’s of having a conflict of interest with me even though there's a huge chance that its the other way around, so I’m not assuming or accusing I’m just asking.

Conflict of interests? What would that be? Seriously?

edanto

paulthelegend wrote:

I'm not sure is ecksor a mod or not and don't really care I’m just pointing out that I don’t really expect his good friends to look at the situation with an open mind.

Well, if you're looking for the opinions of people that are just watching this and don't know any of you... I'm one of them. Hell, I've had big differences of opinion with TC over on another forum.

I didn't see the original thread, only saw it after the batch of posts were deleted and even from that it was clear (just before it got zapped) that TC had a bad experience dealing with you in some way and wanted to alert other people in the forum about that.

ecksor hasn't come across as supporting the facts of what TC is saying - he's just saying that the nature of boards allows criticism of you as easily as it allows you to look for collaborators.

Suck it up. Do better next time.

oscarBravo

paulthelegend wrote:

I’m guessing mod's should act of a certain standard in all sections You cant moderate someone for spoiling threads in your section then spoil threads yourself in another section.

Not true. Moderators are normal users on boards they don't moderate. Moderators get banned from other boards (I've done this).

paulthelegend wrote:

I'm not sure is ecksor a mod or not and don't really care...

Can I respectfully suggest that you establish some facts before you go much further?

miju

paulthelegend wrote:

and just checking his buddy list there and guess what ... ecksor is on his 50% buddy list which only has 6 people (good mates ehh?)... I'm not sure is ecksor a mod or not and don't really care I’m just pointing out that I don’t really expect his good friends to look at the situation with an open mind. But thank god there seems to be a good few mod's that are just looking at this as it is and not bios at all, if it was up to his mates id probably be banned for sticking up for myself when being attacked.

mods are normal users outside of their respective forums and as such are subject to bans etc just like everyone else (most mods including myself have more than likely been banned from forums a few times such is life on boards)

i've had a run in with TC a couple of times , though with that said the opinions that TC voiced about me at the time were well founded and were taken on board and since then i've not had one single complaint from any dealings with anyone on boards (and there's been a hell of alot), so in otherwords i wouldn't exactly be TC's "pal" but i do think he was right in his actions / explanations

as ecksor said , if you expect to utilise boards.ie as a resource or recruiting ground then your going to have to expect to get feedback (both positive and negative if it's warranted) , such is the boards community spirit

you live by the sword etc, etc

ecksor

paulthelegend wrote:

And ecksor I’m just trying to point out that if you had 20 TC's giving that type of feedback you'd want to clear your weekends to sort out the disputes caused every week.

That is still irrelevant to what constitutes valid feedback.

So the only reply id like is that if the roles were reversed and the honourable moderator TC had a thread which i came along and posted 7-8 posts to spoil it and i just constantly whinge and ruin the whole thread then an actual fair moderator notices that it has turned into a childish argument and is not helping anyone so clears the thread. Then I come along and starts over and over again even when 3 people ask me to stop and they say that the only thing this has proven is not to deal with me but that TC hasnt reached there bad books ... but i still go on .... would i be banned?

Can you rephrase that in a non-loaded manner?

So just like it was asked before, who does moderate the moderators? Did TC act in a way that a moderator should? Or can they get away with more then normal boards members?

That's a matter for the admins, but TC is not a moderator of the forum that you were posting on.

What's the exact accusation here? TC got moderated on that thread, which doesn't exactly appear as if he had favouritism shown towards him by the mod there. Therefore I can only conclude that you have a problem with my input on this thread? Can you specify which input you think is unsuitably partial?

Is there a conflict of interests between any moderator posting here and TC? He seems to be accusing other mod’s of having a conflict of interest with me even though there's a huge chance that its the other way around, so I’m not assuming or accusing I’m just asking.

Well, in the interests of openness, TC is my uncle and consigliere.