The "too many moderators" myth.

Karl Hungus

First of all, I'm making this thread separate to any existing one, as this is not meant to be a reply to anyone in particular, but more of an informative post that I hope can clear up some misconceptions about boards. There does seem to be this idea of too many moderators, and I think people simply just don't realise what a moderator's role is and where their jurisdiction ends.

Lets take a look at how many moderators there are on a per-forum basis, and see exactly what their role is and if there is actually too many. We'll start with the busiest forums here, which are After Hours, Soccer, Motors, Poker and Personal Issues. On the bottom right of each of every single forum, there is a list that shows you exactly how many moderators are in charge of that forum and who they are.

So, for After Hours there are only 6 moderators, Soccer has 7, Motors only 4, Poker has 5, and Personal Issues has 7 moderators. Those are the busiest forums on boards, and there's only a small group of people in charge of each of them. If we take a look at just how busy After Hours is, we can put this in perspective, it has threads 30,891 with a whopping 1,075,301 posts, yet only six people look after it night and day. At any given time there may be hundreds of people posting, so a ratio of 6 moderators to that amount of normal users is hardly excessive. Taking a look at it like that, there's certainly not an overabundance of moderators.

Now, moderators are appointed when needed. A smaller forum will often have maybe two, sometimes three moderators looking after it. Lets take for example Anime & Manga or Mythology, smaller boards = less moderators. So again, it's certainly not a case of too many, you can see for yourself that they're appointed where needed and that's all there is to it.

The golden rule here is that moderators are regular users outside the forums that they moderate. It gets said plenty, but a lot of people don't seem to realise what this means. Lets say for example that I post on a thread in After Hours, I do not moderate that forum so I have no authority there, I cannot edit/delete any posts on After Hours, or ban anyone from there. I am also subject to the same rules as anyone else who posts there, and am expected to abide them, just like every other user who signs up.

Keep this in mind.

Now, this whole "Too many moderators" thing always comes up here on Feedback, so take a look at the bottom right of the Feedback page, you'll notice that there are only 8 moderators of Feedback. Anyone else who is posting here is not acting as a moderator of this forum, they are posting their opinions as users of this site. Anyone like Terry, Dudess, Mordeth, Myself, or any of the other mods are simply posting here as users, none of us are moderators of feedback, and we are entitled to our say too, just like any other user.

Hope this thread helps people understand more about moderators on boards.

Daithi McGee

Nice post.

So would it be Ok, if when you posted here, it didn't show you as being a mod? Just to help things along. Like a cop being off duty and not wearing the uniform, so to speak.

It would help greatly with your idealism.

Unless mods prefer that people know they are mods because the little links in their profiles make it handy and what have you not etc etc.

A cop in unifrom, Is always a cop.
In civies, sure he could be anyone.

:pac:

Karl Hungus

Daithi McGee wrote: »

Nice post.

So would it be Ok, if when you posted here, it didn't show you as being a mod? Just to help things along. Like a cop being off duty and not wearing the uniform, so to speak.

It would help greatly with your idealism.

Unless mods prefer that people know they are mods because the little links in their profiles make it handy and what have you not etc etc.

A cop in unifrom, Is always a cop.
In civies, sure he could be anyone.

:pac:

I've no control over the site showing the details of the forums I moderate, it's not a case of me (or any other mods here) preferring that people know I'm a mod, it's not a uniform I can slip in and out of at will. But if you want to use the cop analogy, I think it would be a more accurate description to say I'm a cop on holiday, so while I have jurisdiction in my own country/forum, I've none while visiting Spain.

Daithi McGee

Karl Hungus wrote: »

I've no control over the site showing the details of the forums I moderate, it's not a case of me (or any other mods here) preferring that people know I'm a mod, it's not a uniform I can slip in and out of at will. But if you want to use the cop analogy, I think it would be a more accurate description to say I'm a cop on holiday, so while I have jurisdiction in my own country/forum, I've none while visiting Spain.

I like your analogy.

Tell you what, take the debate to the mod board reference "it's not a case of me (or any other mods here) preferring that people know I'm a mod,"


See where it gets you.

I look forward to your reply, or lack of.

DeVore

Its a question of matrixes. We are trying to cut DOWN the number of cross references the servers do when forming a thread (its most common act).

If we have to check each post to see if it comes from a mod, then check if that thread is CURRENTLY in a forum that that person mods or doesnt mod and then write or not write the mod link....



...and then do that for the 20 or whatever posts per page you have set in your prefences... all to make you happy? Are you for real?


Dumbest thing you have said in a while.

DeV.

ntlbell

what suprises me is the amount of people that have been posting here for a long time and haven't a f*cking clue about what goes on or how its run

what do they be doing...

Karl Hungus

Daithi McGee wrote: »

Tell you what, take the debate to the mod board reference "it's not a case of me (or any other mods here) preferring that people know I'm a mod,"


See where it gets you.

I look forward to your reply, or lack of.

Why bother? It's immaterial whether you can see my uniform or not if you have a basic understanding of how moderators work, but I'd imagine it'd get me somewhere along the lines of what DeVore just pointed out.

Otacon

ntlbell wrote: »

what suprises me is the amount of people that have been posting here for a long time and haven't a f*cking clue about what goes on or how its run

what do they be doing...

Its like LCD TVs. No idea how they are run, don't care much either cos I have no interest in building one.

Most of my friends on boards (kaimera, Petee, rmacm, sceptre, 440Hz) are mods. I have zero interest in being one, from talking to them. I respect what they do, but know I don't have the patience or will power to do it.

As for there being too many moderators, I really have to disagree. If it were up to me, there'd be more, especially in the high conflict areas like Politics and Soccer. I honestly cannot see the issue with having a large number of moderators, except if you believe that they get special treatment in the fora they don't moderate, which is crap. You may not see many mods banned, because usually to become a mod, you need to display some common sense and this lends itself to not acting the pr!ck most of the time. The same is true for people who have been here a while.

Zaph

What always amuses me about threads complaining of too many mods/over moderation, is that they're rarely from long-term, active posters. Take the two we have currently on the go. Started by two posters with less than 50 posts between them, with one having signed up in November and the other this month, although of course these people are always "long time readers". Yet given this relative newness to Boards they feel both qualified and compelled to tell people where the site is going wrong in terms of moderation, despite there being thousands of active members who are quite happy with the way things are.

I have no problem with people criticising Boards, everyone's entitled to their opinion and constructive criticism that leads to improvements can be beneficial to everyone. But criticising something that you haven't gotten properly involved in (being a long time reader isn't the same as participating) and therefore have little or no direct experience of, negates any argument you make imo. Become an active member for a while, interact with other posters and mods and then if you still feel the same way come back here and people may be inclined to take your criticism a bit more seriously.

Toto Wolfcastle

Daithi McGee wrote: »

Nice post.

So would it be Ok, if when you posted here, it didn't show you as being a mod? Just to help things along. Like a cop being off duty and not wearing the uniform, so to speak.

It would help greatly with your idealism.

Unless mods prefer that people know they are mods because the little links in their profiles make it handy and what have you not etc etc.

A cop in unifrom, Is always a cop.
In civies, sure he could be anyone.

:pac:

If people are too stupid to read the list of forums under a mod's name to see if they mod the forum they are posting in then they deserve the ridicule that they will most certainly be subjected to should they start a feedback thread about something stupid. (The current 2 threads for example.)

Cabaal

Well said Zaph, the over modded complaints come from relative newbie's in 98% of the cases either that or constant trouble makers in the other "% of cases.

I know alot of people on boards.ie for many many years and the biggest complaint I hear of is not about over modded its about some users often been less educated about things, these comments don't come from mods or people that used to be mods.

Personally my thoughts are no matter what site your on you;ll have trouble makers and those that can't follow the rules, don't believe me then look at sites like somethingawful.com, on their forum ALOT of things go without question but you'll still get a percentage of its users that bitch about the man telling them what to do.....bottom line is you can never please 100% of people

ntlbell

Otacon wrote: »

Its like LCD TVs. No idea how they are run, don't care much either cos I have no interest in building one.

that's nice.

but if we are to put that to the users they would buy the tv maybe fumble there way to turning it on and look at the remote stumped.

there's charters in all the forums who the moderators are is on the page and in every send thread that a mod posts in at some point you'll here "but i'm not mod of this forum"

you dont need a degree in computer science to figure it out

mike65

Maybe a flash animation filum in a welcome pack is needed, complete with a nice friendly female voice and lots of pastel colours.

"How to boards"

ntlbell

mike65 wrote: »

Maybe a flash animation filum in a welcome pack is needed, complete with a nice friendly female voice and lots of pastel colours.

"How to boards"

as long as it's not sent with the confirmation email at reg...

no one will ever get it

Otacon

ntlbell wrote: »

that's nice.

but if we are to put that to the users they would buy the tv maybe fumble there way to turning it on and look at the remote stumped.

there's charters in all the forums who the moderators are is on the page and in every send thread that a mod posts in at some point you'll here "but i'm not mod of this forum"

you dont need a degree in computer science to figure it out

Not saying I don't know the difference but I doubt many people think about the behind-the-scenes work on this site tbh.

When it works, people don't care, when it doesn't, people want it rectified. Just saying it is irrelevant to most people the workings of the site, as long as it works.

ntlbell

Otacon wrote: »

Not saying I don't know the difference but I doubt many people think about the behind-the-scenes work on this site tbh.

When it works, people don't care, when it doesn't, people want it rectified. Just saying it is irrelevant to most people the workings of the site, as long as it works.

But the moderation of it is not a technical issue.

it's clearly stated on the page how many there is on each forum.......

it's just a case of opening your eyes.....it's not _that_ difficult

Dudess

I don't think Otacon is referring to behind-the-scenes technical work. There are constant behind-the-scenes moderator discussions on how to deal with the various things that crop up.

ntlbell

Dudess wrote: »

I don't think Otacon is referring to behind-the-scenes technical work. There are constant behind-the-scenes moderator discussions on how to deal with the various things that crop up.

why would anyone need to know about them to work out how a run of the mill discussion board works?

I'm talking about the bare basics.

Forums.

Mods.

Threads...

They simplest of concepts on a forum seem to be very confusing to a lot of people

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

Dudess

ntlbell wrote: »

why would anyone need to know about them to work out how a run of the mill discussion board works?

I'm talking about the bare basics.

Forums.

Mods.

Threads...

They simplest of concepts on a forum seem to be very confusing to a lot of people

Wires have been crossed here obviously - I presumed what was being referred to was behind-the-scenes discussion between moderators on troublesome users etc.

Dub13

Good post.

Also alot of the mods down as forum moderates are Category mods and don't take a active role in the day to day running of the forum.

Take the Soccer forum as an example we have 7 mods but 2 are Category mods,so we have 5 mods who are responsible for the day to day running of the forum.KdjaCL is taken some time out at the moment so we really only have 4 mods,thats 4 mods for one of the busiest forums on the site.We have a good team and it worked out well with us all in different country's (me in Dublin,T4TF UK,GuanYin US & Xavi6 in Australia).So we have night and day covered.

Acacia

I think there's a good level of moderation here. God help us if this place turned into youtube or some such site, where there are no debates, just personal abuse.

Talliesin

Daithi McGee wrote: »

So would it be Ok, if when you posted here, it didn't show you as being a mod?

It doesn't. It says directly opposite the word "mod" which forums someone moderates.

I've never had much time for people who think the expression "mod: Gambling" must mean someone has a direct authority over the Jazz & Blues forum. Really, how do you even argue with someone who is drawing that sort of conclusion?

Now, there is a reasonable social argument for not displaying that someone is a moderator of gambling at all in the Jazz & Blues forum (to continue the two forums I picked completely at random before), but at a technical level vBulletin already deeply, deeply sucks at how much different sources of information it puts into processing each HTTP request, which is why it sucks so much at scalability, which means boards' techies already have to put a lot more work and hardware into keeping it going than they perhaps theoretically should. Making vBulletin less scalable is not a win.

Zaph

donegalfella wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

I remember when you started posting and it was, by your own admission, an inauspicious start. So much so that when I saw you first appearing in The Ladies Lounge my mod senses went on high alert and I was waiting for the shít to start flying. However it quickly became apparent that you had learned a lesson from your previous ban and taken on board whatever criticisms had been levelled at you. You're now a good contributor to tLL, one who is able to argue your case well and provide references and facts to back them up. I only wish that more people who started off the same way as you here would follow a similar path and become useful contributors to the site rather than remaining the complete pains in the arse that they are.

Boston

Zaph wrote: »

What always amuses me about threads complaining of too many mods/over moderation, is that they're rarely from long-term, active posters. Take the two we have currently on the go. Started by two posters with less than 50 posts between them, with one having signed up in November and the other this month, although of course these people are always "long time readers". Yet given this relative newness to Boards they feel both qualified and compelled to tell people where the site is going wrong in terms of moderation, despite there being thousands of active members who are quite happy with the way things are.

There are too many moderators, forums and threads. I demand a reduction to approximately 20,000 users 50 forums and 100 moderators.

GoneShootin

The simplest solution is to make me the ONLY mod on boards.

I think it's viable.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

GuanYin

donegalfella wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

I've noticed too
Honestly, you are rare shining light I've taken from a feedback forum thread.

brendansmith

GoneShootin wrote: »

The simplest solution is to make me the ONLY mod on boards.

I think it's viable.

Very good point, I say this as i have never noticed you until I read this post.

Time Magazine

Zaph wrote: »

What always amuses me about threads complaining of too many mods/over moderation, is that they're rarely from long-term, active posters.

I agree with the general idea of your post, but there's a problem of selection bias with it imho. There are no complaints from long-term, active posters because they're not the ones who have been pissed off by a mod and never returned.

It's possible that there is a form of moderation that could work on the donegalfellas and also those who fled. Now I'm not suggesting that I know thE secret to this balance but the poor rep that Boards mods have seems we're not all that great. Maybe we are good, but simply noting that the people who haven't gone away doesn't shed much light on that.

There have been many improvements (automatic PMs when banning is a definite plus, well done CuLT) and I know we'll never be able to keep everyone happy. However I still reckon the modding on this site could be a bit better.

IMHO some mods are too quick with the ban-hammer. Yes, all these bans can be justified and no mod should be removed for them. But I wouldn't dismiss all claims of "get out more you stupid mods with your stupid power-trippin' hats and get a life" as being completely stupid. I will put my hands up here and admit openly that my favourite little forums are small and quiet and have intelligent posters so I might be biased here, but they both seem to tick along fine without much moderation at all. Usually telling people to cop and be civil does the trick. If they ignore that, I tend to send them a polite PM. Only if I'm convinced a thread has run its course or is bound to be a total trainwreck will I lock it. Nearly nobody gets banned. And, as I say, they seem to be grand.

Again, I'm not saying "my modding winz urs" or anything like that, but it might be something some mods should try out in their fields for a while.

Oh and I'd suggest a far less sympathetic ear from admins if/when mods completely muck up. Everyone makes mistakes and oversteps the mark, yes. But if somebody does something with even a hint of malice then I wouldn't hesitate to remove them. There are plenty of people happy to mod this site.

tbh

Talliesin wrote: »

I've never had much time for people who think the expression "mod: Gambling" must mean someone has a direct authority over the Jazz & Blues forum. Really, how do you even argue with someone who is drawing that sort of conclusion?

excellent point. however, it doesn't only apply to users, some mods are guilty of this as well. How many comments on the moderation of particular threads/forums have you seen from mods who've never read that particular thread/forum?

Boston

tbh wrote: »

excellent point. however, it doesn't only apply to users, some mods are guilty of this as well. How many comments on the moderation of particular threads/forums have you seen from mods who've never read that particular thread/forum?

I often do that... whats yer point?

Nevyn

tbh wrote: »

excellent point. however, it doesn't only apply to users, some mods are guilty of this as well. How many comments on the moderation of particular threads/forums have you seen from mods who've never read that particular thread/forum?

Ah but while forums and communities differ and the sytle of moderation
the basics too do not change.

tbh

Boston wrote: »

I often do that... whats yer point?

my point is that Talliesin said that "people who think the expression "mod: Gambling" must mean someone has a direct authority over the Jazz & Blues forum. Really, how do you even argue with someone who is drawing that sort of conclusion?"

I'm assuming by "people" he means "users". I'm saying that some mods seem to take it upon themselves to explain moderating decisions or policies for issues or forums that they themselves have never read or contributed to. So, it's no surprise that some "users" have this attitude, because, in some cases, they are right.

I guess the nub of my point is that mods shouldn't be commenting on issues with moderation that they are not involved in. Maybe we could start a forum for this? We could call it "killdesk". or "Helpspace" or something like that.

tbh

Thaedydal wrote: »

Ah but while forums and communities differ and the sytle of moderation
the basics too do not change.

the only basics as I can see them are the mcd rule, the no posting porn rule, and the "if a mod tells you to do something and you don't do it, you'll be banned" rule. The semantics between forums are completely different, and generally come down to the mods attitude.

Nevyn

tbh wrote: »

the only basics as I can see them are the mcd rule, the no posting porn rule, and the "if a mod tells you to do something and you don't do it, you'll be banned" rule.

And yet we have feedback thread after feedback thread with posters who can even grasp those basics or just don't like'em.

--amadeus--

"Mods aren't Mods in Forums they don't Mod"

So if I am "just" a user in here why can't I post an opinion on a moderating decision?

tbh

--amadeus-- wrote: »

"Mods aren't Mods in Forums they don't Mod"

So if I am "just" a user in here why can't I post an opinion on a moderating decision?

you can, but it just might not have any value (say if I posted my opinion on moderation in marathon/triathlon, how much value would you give it?)

--amadeus--

tbh wrote: »

you can, but it just might not have any value (say if I posted my opinion on moderation in marathon/triathlon, how much value would you give it?)

Depends if you are agreeing with me or not :P

Unless you have a monumentally large ego you'd need to be pretty dim not to take all comments on your moderating on-board. Particularly if that commentary comes from someone impartial (and more so if they are an experienced Mod or User).

If someone feels teh need to comment on moderation or moderations styles then that's either because there has been a controversial decision or controversial content (you don't get threads complaining about mods deleting spammers, for example). And if someone ever got het up enough to post a feedback thread about a moderating decision I made then I would want to hear from other mods to see if I had made teh right decision or not. After all the content of the forums changes but people are people and it's the same problems in all forums, just different names.

watty

Some very quiet forums only have one Mod.

It says under the Mod's avatar what they mod. How hard is that?

Some people it ONLY says it there, as they have custom descriptions under their name

<

---

EXAMPLE of both


Simple Really, no change needed.

nesf

Otacon wrote: »

If it were up to me, there'd be more, especially in the high conflict areas like Politics and Soccer. I honestly cannot see the issue with having a large number of moderators, except if you believe that they get special treatment in the fora they don't moderate, which is crap.

Actually the key problem on a forum like Politics is that the mods don't agree with each other all the time. As is, we have to co-ordinate to a certain extent to make sure we aren't overruling each other in threads (which would only confuse people and make posters in the forum unsure over what is and what isn't ok to do and/or say). The more moderators you add the bigger a problem this becomes. Too many cooks spoil the broth etc.

GoneShootin

True - but a counter argument to that would be that if you have a good number of mods that are active then the combined opinion may be more fair and just over the voice of a single mod. Kinda "jury of peers" effect.

nesf

GoneShootin wrote: »

True - but a counter argument to that would be that if you have a good number of mods that are active then the combined opinion may be more fair and just over the voice of a single mod. Kinda "jury of peers" effect.

Considering the split second nature of moderating decisions it's less applicable I think. When discussing what should or should not be in the charter or general rules on behaviour discussion between moderators of varied opinions is very beneficial but if before locking any thread or sanctioning any user a moderator had to discuss it with all their peers then the system just wouldn't work.

Karl Hungus

The Economist wrote: »

There are no complaints from long-term, active posters because they're not the ones who have been pissed off by a mod and never returned.

I agree with some of your post, The Economist, but this little section here I take exception to. The problem with it, is that a lot of people who are pissed off with mods, either directly or indirectly, often do return... Again and again, under different guises, wielding a vendetta because they didn't like being told off, or being infracted, or for sheer mischief, who knows? But my point is, you see a lot of complaints, but often from the same group of people who have some daft vendetta.

Take the someone like Polmki for example, someone who just keeps on coming again and again, under many different names, for the sole reason of ****ing with the site. Why? Who knows, but the point is, there is a lot of times when someone who's claiming they've been wronged, try to kick up a sh*tstorm, and it's someone who's been banned constantly before, and keeps coming back just to troll and to get attention. Not sure why people would keep returning to a place they're not welcome, but they do, probably because they thrive on the negative attention.

That said, it's a two headed dog of an issue, and a lot of newer users are put under suspicion and scrutiny. Of course, it's vastly unfair to genuinely new users, but it's also a necessity on the part of mods and admins who all too often see the same people constantly create new accounts and troll. People like that are a problem for boards, and they also seem to have the most "complaints" so it's clear why people can be put under scrutiny on feedback, even if it isn't fair to new users. It's a Catch 22 really, and it does put mods in a hard position.

Time Magazine

Karl Hungus wrote: »

I agree with some of your post, The Economist, but this little section here I take exception to. The problem with it, is that a lot of people who are pissed off with mods, either directly or indirectly, often do return... Again and again, under different guises, wielding a vendetta because they didn't like being told off, or being infracted, or for sheer mischief, who knows? But my point is, you see a lot of complaints, but often from the same group of people who have some daft vendetta.

That's a very good point that I completely overlooked.

However, there are probably what.... about twelve polmkis? As far as I am concerned these are the twelve saddest people in all of Ireland. Polmki/merc/bubbles/whoever are twelve not so much out of the 150,000 members, but closer to out of the 4 million population. You're always going to get them. Pain in the arse as they are to deal with, just be happy you're not them tbh.

I think most of my original point still stands though: there are undoubtedly normal people who have been scared off from Boards that would have been good contributors. I don't think we're talking about 12 people either, I'd say we're talking several hundred. I have no cogent, factual evidence of this; it's just a bit of an inclination based on what I think the general populace thinks of Boards. There's certainly a feeling of "that place is over-moderated" when I talk to people about it casually. Boards has come up in conversation with quite a few people who know me in real life but don't know I post here and, well, let's just say I've never heard anyone say "that place needs tougher mods."

So what am I yapping on about? Am I saying we do a bad job? No. Am I saying that we might improve if we experiment a bit and try taking it easy for a while? Yes. Finally my main point is that when evaluating how well we're serving the community, we should consider those invisibles who may have left rather than simply patting ourselves on the back for "converting" donegalfella. I think that could help our focus a good bit in helping Boards along.

Nevyn

See I don't think boards is for everyone, people either get the ethos of the site and figure it out or it rubs them up the wrong way. I don't think it should be watered down to be palatable for everyone.

Catari Jaguar

*throws 2 cents*

Some mods manage to rack up about 20,000 posts each.. hmm
I don't think it's that there are too MANY moderators. I think that maybe some mods have more clout.

And if it's so busy modding say, just AH or PI, why give the same mod another 2 or 3 forums to moderate?

*Well they mod and their post count is high and their join date is earliest therefore they know more about the interweb than everyone else...* :rolleyes:

That's how it appears to be.

But what do I know really.

Dudess

Lil Kitten wrote: »

*Well they mod and their post count is high and their join date is earliest therefore they know more about the interweb than everyone else...* :rolleyes:

It's nothing to do with their post-count - why do people always bring that up? And if I'm an example to go by, it's certainly nothing to do with their internet knowledge.
Length of time - not essential. WindSock, for instance, wasn't here long at all when she became moderator of the Ladies' Lounge. However, it helps, as someone who's been a member a while will get a sense of the site's ethos and the other mods/admins will get to know a bit what they're like.

Often, members who aren't known at all sitewide become moderators - e.g. in the Photography forum. They proved themselves, pretty much only on the Photography forum, as posters who seemed capable of moderating.

Dub13

RE post count,I think there have been a couple of cases over the years of people 'been made' mod with less than 500 posts.

eVeNtInE

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javaboy

eVeNtInE wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Sure that Vexorg fella hasn't even got 700 posts and they made him an admin. Must be some kind of fasttrack scheme or something.