where is the consistancy?

[Clarkey]

Posted by Clarkey himself ( )

viewtopic.php?f=71&t=151593

Where is 24hrs mentioned?
I give people, if i pm them, about an hour or so AFTER a pm is read to deal with it, or if been read when i log in, it's dealt with then. 24 hours is the max time if you want to put one on it, that a sig would be allowed to remain without us editing it.

Hasty modding? -_- it was over 90 minutes

I think you will find that majority of mods that have PM'd users about sigs give 24 hrs notice and state they have 24hrs. Tetrismonkey in his PM to me gave me 24hrs notice.

And ok 24hrs notice is not included in that rule but neither is a fixed forum being used when judging a sig.

Yes hasty modding.... 90 minutes? 90 minutes is poo. You can't go enforcing sigs after posting publically just 90 minutes later.

[Rocky]

you have to make sure she read and understood it, 24h is standard procedure therefore...

the punishment is there so that people who refuse to change their sigs are punished not so that you can catch someone out and have a laugh

[Mordack]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the 'time period to change' essentially a courtesy extended at the discretion of whichever moderator is dealing with the situation?

When I was a mod I sent a PM, then I checked my sent box to see if the user had read the PM. If they read it, but didn't bother to do anything within a few hours, then I went all textbook on them and issued warnings etc. I don't remember ever being told, however, that a notice period was ever obligatory. It was courteous, and the right thing to do imo, but never a requirement. It was only 'standard procedure' because it's what most mods did, but the process was never forced upon us.

The bottom line is that if you post here then it's YOUR responsibility to know the rules of the forums. As we have often been told by more hardline members of staff over the years; ignorance is no excuse. Although a somewhat bastardly approach, they are perfectly within their rights to warn you without first holding your hand and politely explaining that you've been naughty.

[Rocky]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the 'time period to change' essentially a courtesy extended at the discretion of whichever moderator is dealing with the situation?

When I was a mod I sent a PM, then I checked my sent box to see if the user had read the PM. If they read it, but didn't bother to do anything within a few hours, then I went all textbook on them and issued warnings etc. I don't remember ever being told, however, that a notice period was ever obligatory. It was courteous, and the right thing to do imo, but never a requirement. It was only 'standard procedure' because it's what most mods did, but the process was never forced upon us.

The bottom line is that if you post here then it's YOUR responsibility to know the rules of the forums. As we have often been told by more hardline members of staff over the years; ignorance is no excuse. Although a somewhat bastardly approach, they are perfectly within their rights to warn you without first holding your hand and politely explaining that you've been naughty.

I agree, there is a reason why it has become standard procedure though.
Are we in a military training base or a forum community??

[Clarkey]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the 'time period to change' essentially a courtesy extended at the discretion of whichever moderator is dealing with the situation?

When I was a mod I sent a PM, then I checked my sent box to see if the user had read the PM. If they read it, but didn't bother to do anything within a few hours, then I went all textbook on them and issued warnings etc. I don't remember ever being told, however, that a notice period was ever obligatory. It was courteous, and the right thing to do imo, but never a requirement. It was only 'standard procedure' because it's what most mods did, but the process was never forced upon us.

No PM was sent to Femme, and therefore unlike checking whether a PM has moved from Outbox to Sent Items there was no way for Earendil to confirm that his pretty poor warning was read within the 90 minutes.

In fact 90 minutes which Earendil stated was not even when Femme posted in that thread after creating the topic. Sig violation, in regards to sig height, is not such an issue that would require action to be taken so quickly. 24hrs is plenty of time.

Ii have never seen a mod not give 24hrs notice. yes they may chose to give 24 hrs notice, but that just goes to show that they have a certain amount of respect.

Earendil publicly posting a verbal warning and then after 90 minutes assumed femme had read and ignored the warning is shocking. Where is Earendil's proof that the verbal warning was read??

[Thriller]

I beleive your missing the point of the thread mordack.

which is consistency.

judges look at past descisions when making their own judgments, Politicians look at track records when making policy descisions.

without a consistent interpretation and application of the rules, all you get is chaos.

understandably this might upset people.

[Rocky]

I beleive your missing the point of the thread mordack.

which is consistency.

judges look at past descisions when making their own judgments, Politicians look at track records when making policy descisions.

without a consistent interpretation and application of the rules, all you get is chaos.

understandably this might upset people.

you have in a different way summed up my argument there, very nicely

[Thriller]

Constistancy is overrated IMO. You all beg and plea for it, but in reality, its very difficult to administir unless the admins are 100% all the time. We all have different ways of handling situations, and interpreting the rules. Sure, we can all get on the same page, and get all crazy with the rules and most of you get banned within the first few hours.

From my observation the Admin staff of today, and a few past now, have had a relaxed approach on giving mods the power to judge a situation for themselves and handle it the best way they can. Sure there are simple rules like be curtiousy, and perfessional when handling situations as a mod, but from there on, its up to the mods.

Now I ask the community this, would you all rather us be consistant and Nazis with the rules, or perhaps keep the system that has been working just fine intact.

Sure, theres a few of us that enjoy being biased against certain users, but what do you expect, some users just deserve the "abuse".

False dichotomy

I would rather you were no longer a mod and have mordack rewrite the forum guidelines.

[Empy]

Well he's right... we can't be 100% the same all the time. We're all different people and as we say all the time we're not machines. Clarkey does a good job in giving specific examples when making complaints, but sometimes fails to outline possible solutions and instead repeatedly complains. An example is in this topic, if the forum skin changes the height of signatures, how should we measure them if not on the skin we have set?

Someone tell me what I can do to make you all happy... if anything.

[Thriller]

I really don't think anyone expects you guys to be 100% all the time(no one has said that at least.)

Acknowledge when you guys mess up instead of this point, blame, excuse nonsense.

And make a better attempt to due the modding in an impartial, practical and most importantly respectful way.

I would try to eliminate;
deleting posts for fun.
overmodding users because you don't get along with them.
taking sides on disputes when their is no need to do so.
As well the overly caustic attitudes some mods take when dealing with criticism.

Working on any of these things i think would go a long way. Especially the first one.

[Empy]

deleting posts for fun.

That's up to Solus (or the Admins) since it only happens in the Temple (and they're moved/edited, to be precise).

overmodding users because you don't get along with them.

Agreed, and personally it's something I try not to do but in my history as a Moderator have failed to not do. I of course can't speak for anyone else..

taking sides on disputes when their is no need to do so.

Agreed again...

As well the overly caustic attitudes some mods take when dealing with criticism.

I don't think I do this, but perhaps other Moderators can take it in to consideration when reviewing how they are as a Mod.

That was a good example of a polite and helpful post, others should learn from it .

[Clarkey]

Ok, so constructful posts? I'll give it a shot.....

I agree with those that have said you cannot expect Mods and Admins all to be 100% alike in their modding. But there are clear instances where the inconsistency is so enormous that it is shocking.. and this particular sig issue is one of those.

Now, femme started this thread to point out what she "believed" to be an inconsistency. After reading here opening post I don't see any rudeness at all. She may already have come to her conclusion on the situation before knowing all the facts, but there was no rudeness.

So i feel that Mods and Admins should refrain from such responses as this:

How about this. You don't post things that you have no idea about? Please and thank you.

That is rude and unhelpful. How does that response actually help or answer any concerns that the OP may have?

I feel that Mods and Admins should behave more like this:

I dealt with the masking about 20 or 30 minutes ago, Earendil just dealt with Thaltek about 5 to 10 minutes ago. All before you posted this. Although your intentions may be admirable, you need more patience I believe..

It gives an explanation and therefore provides the user with a better understanding and can then decide from there how and where to proceed if necessary. I saw no rudeness or unhelpfulness in Empy's response.

I also feel Admins and Mods should not make accusations to justify their actions. An example of this is when Earendil accused me of abusing report system. Fact is I did not. i reported one thing that I genuinely felt broke rules when thaltek was attempting to bully me.

If admins accuse a user of something then it is only courteous of them to provide an explanation if asked by the user. I did ask, and it was ignored, by two admins Zeratul and Earendil.

If admins are going to point such things like this during a discussion about modding:

Posted by Clarkey himself ( )

viewtopic.php?f=71&t=151593

Where is 24hrs mentioned?

where the Admin is clearly being smug that the 24hr issue (which is part of the inconsistency issue) is not mentioned in he rules and therefore can be ignored they should not suddenly start saying the same rule is based on the default fixed width skin which is also not in the rule itself. They have claimed the same thing as me, yet I acknowledged in this thread that the 24hr thing is not set in the rule but they fail to acknolwedge the same.

Mods and Admins need to acknowledge and accept when they have done wrong. Instead of just keeping silent and ignoring the fact.

Admins should allow their Mods to primarily do the modding as that's what they are employed to do (using the term "employed" loosely as they don't get paid). Blue mods should primarily handle reports and modding of their respective sections as that is what their role on the forums is all about. If in particular cases where no blue mods are on the forum or available and the report/modding is of a rather important nature then the Global Mod of that section should carry out the modding. Global Mods should primarily stick to their section that they are appointed and only mod outside their section if no mods in that section are available and the issue at hand is of a somewhat important nature. Admins should really mod if not many mods are available at the time and that it is of some urgency to carry out the modding. If an Admin checks the MCP and see's a report about something considered low-level then they should let the Mods handle it. i'm not saying Admins should never Mod, but they have Blue and Green Mods for that.

These are my opinions. I'm not telling people how to do something, just how I think certain things should be done or could be better done.

[Clarkey]

@Clarkey

Seriously, if you want people to actually respect a word that comes out of your mouth, or even consider your "advice", you should have first not deleted accounts and a section. You should stop crying about every little infraction and exploiting it to bash the mod team. You should stop bickering and defending every user that gets a warning as though they did not deserve it. And above all, JUST STOP COMPLAINING.

You want us to hear you, but the sad fact is, your the only one complaining. If you want to change something, get some other people to agree with you, find a SIMPLE solution, or the BEST solution, and ask the Admins for feedback and about implimenting it.

So Mods such as Empy think we should be giving more constructive and thought-out posts when discussing these issues. I believe i did that and immediately i get a reaction such as yours from a Mod.

Do i need to remind you of your abuse of powers to publically bully me? I'm pretty sure that lost you some respect. I still have a right to give my opinions and concerns on this forum thank you.

I am the only one complaining? I am not the only one in this thread.

I should stop defending every user? I'm pretty sure you cannot point out that i have defended "every" user.

So your answer to all this is stop complaining? I do believe once upon a time that when you were just a user that you repeatedly complained about staff such as Jack. You were pretty much being an ass yourself, Admins and Mods told you to stop yet you continued. You complained all the time. Now you feel you can speak like you do to me when you were just the same?

A mod suggested we give more constructive thoughts here in this thread and that's what i did.

So thank you for your unhelpful and disrespectful response.

[Clarkey]

So Monkey you don't see any problems with inconsistency to the extent that it is completely unfair?

You don't see a problem with the fact that Ear apparently gave femme 90 minutes to change her sig yet he had no, and cannot, prove that she had read the verbal warning? He also did not give her a time frame.

Where is the proof the verbal warning was read in those 90 minutes?

My recommendation is to implement the 24 hr notice to the rule and make it so that the user committing the sig violation is PM'd stating they have 24hrs to correct their sig or they receive the appropriate punishment.

IF the user logs in, reads the PM and does not reply, which the Mod in question can tell if the PM has been read or not, then 24hrs later is still the same situation then punishment is issued.

IF the user logs in, reads the PM and discusses it with the Mod in question like I did with you and the Mod or Admin sticks to their ground and the sig is still not changed after 24hrs from the point the PM was sent, then punishment should be issued.

IF the user does not log in to see the PM and it has been 24hrs since the PM was sent then the Mod (or should I say Admin) should remove the rule violating sig, however, not issue the sig o' shame and not take away sig rights. If that user returns and puts their sig back then punishment is handled.

That is constructive suggestions, and if you choose to ignore, disregard, or whatever, what I suggest just because it is me suggesting it then that shows how bad you are.

That's my suggestion, feel free to give feedback on it. Don't come on here and bring up something that happened 1 year ago.

[Zeratul]

So Monkey you don't see any problems with inconsistency to the extent that it is completely unfair?

Well, here's a shocker for ya... Life is unfair. And it’s not fair that life is unfair.



The 24 hours part is, as has been said, a courtesy... In fact, it is far from always used. Is that inconsistent? Yes.
If 100% consistency had been inspected, AdminJason would have gotten hold of a computer program to mod the forums, not living creatures like humans.

Only administrators work on the signatures, and thus the time to mod them is severely limited when compared to any other forum issue. The Administrators on these forums have lives outside the forums, so they cannot be sure to be on the same hours each day. Some days, administrators are on 12+ hours, other days just a couple of hours.
Remember that on most forums on the internet, you would loose signatures permanently if you were to break signature rules, if not get banned. Here the most you will (under normal circumstances) get is a warning and loose signature for a short time period.

Oh, and most of those suggestions of yours are already usually used. It depends on the case and the time available to the administrators how much they are used...

Oh, and about how bad we are? The forum staff is Evil. We do not deny it. We do not hide it. We make it obvious to all. Live with it, or die of it.