[MatthTheGeek]

GenDisc and Gaming Disc are very different from the rest and you can always make it clear that standards of substance and conduct are higher there.

I can't overstate this. A lot of active modders around here would never think about approaching GD with a ten parsec footpole. I sure don't want and don't expect people to behave as ****tily in the main forums as they do in GenDerp.

On the other hand, I also don't expect that someone's bad behaviour in GD would make them unable to post on the main forum, especially if they're active modders (this has happened a few times to ttuta and this really sucked). You can tempban people from GD only, use that.

[Flipside]

I'm strongly beginning to suspect the very best thing this board could do for itself is to lose GD entirely and become a purely modding-focussed community, but that kind of decision is a major one and would have to be made not just by Admin, but by the forum as a whole.

[Phantom Hoover]

GenDisc and Gaming Disc are very different from the rest and you can always make it clear that standards of substance and conduct are higher there.

I can't overstate this. A lot of active modders around here would never think about approaching GD with a ten parsec footpole. I sure don't want and don't expect people to behave as ****tily in the main forums as they do in GenDerp.

On the other hand, I also don't expect that someone's bad behaviour in GD would make them unable to post on the main forum, especially if they're active modders (this has happened a few times to ttuta and this really sucked). You can tempban people from GD only, use that.

This is just your own complacent cynicism, trying to shut down any discussion. Sure, GD is often a ****hole; but that's not necessarily because it being a ****hole is a fundamental law of the universe that cannot be changed.

[Fury]

I'm strongly beginning to suspect the very best thing this board could do for itself is to lose GD entirely and become a purely modding-focussed community, but that kind of decision is a major one and would have to be made not just by Admin, but by the forum as a whole.

I wouldn't want this. We have intelligent people capable of discussing wide variety of subjects. The real problem lies with moderation. I for one am no longer involved with FS modding. Losing either or both of the GD boards would mean there'd be nothing left for me here. But perhaps that's what you're after, get rid of the people who are not involved with FS anymore.

[Flipside]

Well, that'd include me if it did.

We really need to decide what the difference is between moderating in there and moderating other forums. If it is to be allowed to become a 'bear-pit', that might please some people, but you'd soon find it was inhabited only by the small percentage of the user base who actually enjoy that kind of thing and would just be avoided by everyone else, and anyone reading the Forum first would probably not hang around.

If there IS to be a difference between how GD is moderated compared to other Forums that difference needs to be clear to both the people using it AND the people moderating it. There is no way on Earth that project mods would tolerate some of what goes on in GD on their own boards, and that's well and good, but everyone has the attitude that GD is somehow different, yet nobody ever really explains in what way.

[General Battuta]

Here are some substantive rules for a fairly functional politics/events discussion forum!

Do not whine about the debatability of a thread topic.

No cheerleading. No Parting shots. The easiest way to define cheerleading I suppose is acting like you're part of a team, cheering on your teammate or egging on the opponent. This also applies to comments along the lines of “oh, don’t bother arguing with

• , they’re crazy” and the like. It's a judgment call so if there are any questions, feel free to contact one of the mods.

Do not close your threads. It is not YOUR thread and you can't end the debate unilaterally just because you want to.

No low-content or no-content posts. Posts that add nothing to the thread will be probated. Humor is content, horrible attempts at humor probably aren't.

Report posts, don't derail threads, and don't play mod. If you are confused about a rule, pm, IM, or email one of the mods. Do not try to start a discussion about the rules in the middle of a forum thread

Racism: Racist or discriminatory posts will get you banned. Trying to abuse this rule to get other people banned may not go well for you.

Tone: D&D has no requirement you treat all posts and viewpoints as equal, or even legitimate, but you are expected to keep a civil tone to maintain the ability to debate even extremely contentious topics. Gratutitous flaming and the like will land you on probation. Posts that are nothing but gratuitous flaming will land you on probation for a while.

Catch-all: ****ty posts are always against the rules, even if they ever-so-carefully avoid breaking an explicit rule. Don't even try to rules-lawyer. If you find yourself typing "but what rule, exactly, did I violate", it's this one. You violated this one. Close the PM/IM immediately, without sending it.

Things that will get your thread gassed:

i. Do not post threads or make posts for the sole purpose of flaming one country, group, side or position.

ii. Don't try to write your own rules for a thread.

iii. Don't start a thread that someone has to watch a youtube movie or the like to understand: nobody will watch it. Either transcribe it or find some other text-based substitute.

iv. Humor threads and other politics/philosophy based threads are fine even if they're not really for 'debating' or 'discussing'.

How to be a good D&D poster:
These are just a few things that help you get your point across well. Don't ****ing report people for violating these.

i. Do not post full articles unless you are the person that started the thread, unless they’re fairly short. Post the relevant quotes and a link as to not clutter up the thread.

ii. Always include a source for an article. If you're making some unusual or controverisal claim, try to find a source for it. Don't post a claim against somebody and walk away thinking that's enough - if you are challenged, back it up.

iii. Read the thread. If it shows that you just skipped to the end and jumped in, you're going to be sitting out.

iv. Don't be an idiot, or a pendantic idiot.

[haloboy100]

I'm strongly beginning to suspect the very best thing this board could do for itself is to lose GD entirely and become a purely modding-focussed community, but that kind of decision is a major one and would have to be made not just by Admin, but by the forum as a whole.

Sacrificing a culture-building foundation for productivity?

How deliciously communist. 

[NGTM-1R]

You're right, essentially - everything we do is discussion. But the problems people are worried about are primarily emerging as a result of discussions unrelated to modding, but the kind of heavy handed approach being advocated would see people banned from the entire forum, and like it or not, not being able to be part of HLP will inevitably decrease people's desire and ability to mod for FS. Which is exactly what we don't want to do.

But I think there's been this repeated miscommunication in which 'more proaction, harsher punishments' is taken as a call for more bans.

The whole ban tangent you launched into is...well see Battuta's post above your own for why it's not necessarily related at all.

I shouldn't have to do this to a moderator.

I really shouldn't.

Like, if I have cause to do this to a moderator, I will seriously question their fitness to moderate because they are charged with a careful and thorough reading of postings to arrive at what is best for the board, and the fact I can and have done this means they have not done so.

But I'm going to reply to you like I resorted to replying to Lorric in his Manic Pixie Dream Girl thread because you're doing what he's doing; you're talking about something that people have already addressed. I'm just going to quote Battuta at you because Battuta already said your interpretation is wrong. I'm going to quote myself at you because I pointed that out.

Now it's a couple page back, why should I do this?

Because it's illustrative of a pattern. People, particularly you and Karaj, are not listening to reasonable concerns presented a reasonable way by non-moderators. They appear to not be reading the posts in question thoroughly because they do not want to listen to them. And this is deeply frightening, because it suggests that change is impossible.

EDIT: And in case it wasn't clear, because the argument that "we're going to permaban so many people and it'll ruin the forums!" was dead two pages ago because nobody ever asked for it in the first place and it was rejected by both sides that far back.

[General Battuta]

Yeah, seriously. It's really dispiriting to see that misunderstanding pop up again directly after a post aimed at dispelling it.

[MP-Ryan]

Because it's illustrative of a pattern. People, particularly you and Karaj, are not listening to reasonable concerns presented a reasonable way by non-moderators. They appear to not be reading the posts in question thoroughly because they do not want to listen to them. And this is deeply frightening, because it suggests that change is impossible.

I don't know if that's particularly fair - the early pages of this discussion were pretty openly hostile, and I think BW and kara are still approaching it from a defensive stance.  They're reading our posts, I just don't know that they're approaching them as non-judgemental input (as they're intended) rather than an attack on the existing moderating team and the guidelines they've drafted (as they are not intended).

At any rate, most of the non-moderators (and some of the moderators) now giving input to this thread are saying essentially the same thing - fewer guidelines, a couple hard-and-fast rules, and earlier, softer, flexible intervention by the moderation staff is the right direction.  A strict crime-and-punishment regime is neither what this board needs nor what we are advocating.

[MP-Ryan]

Well, that'd include me if it did.

We really need to decide what the difference is between moderating in there and moderating other forums.

Indeed, and you can actually file all my input under the heading of "Off-Topic Moderation."

The off-topic forums ARE different beasts from the rest of the site, and should be moderated differently - although I'm not advocating the bear pit approach.

[NGTM-1R]

Having seen, and been a part of, some pretty vicious stuff breaking out in FS Modding and Upgrades, I'm not remotely convinced of that.

[karajorma]

Mr Rogers is actually quite famous for being a wonderfully nice guy. Even though I never saw his show, even I've heard of him. This Cracked article does a great job of explaining who he is.

But I agree we can use a better definition. I started to write one but ran out of time. I'll try again once I'm back from work.

Let's try this one.


1) Be nice.

This doesn't mean being polite (although that's certainly part of it). The games and mods here on HLP were made by people willing to give up massive amounts of their free time, often over the course of several years, in order to provide people with something to play. This can only happen when people are willing to be giving. Giving of their time to make games. Giving of the models, graphics and code they make. Giving of their expertise in teaching people how to do what they do. The worst community members just what they're given and then complain about what they were given for free. The best community members are the ones who are willing to give back. Even if you haven't got any game design skills you can still give back. You can still tell people what worked and what didn't. If you find a bug you can give up a few hours to help the person who spent years making the game you're playing ensure that the next person doesn't have the same problem.

This community lives or dies on ability of its members to be nice to each other, and for this reason, this is the number one rule on HLP.

God, what an incredibly depressing thing to read. After all this discussion, all these clear, coherent statements pointing in the same direction, this is what you've taken away?

Let me point to your last post as a great example of this. For 3 pages you've all complained about why prescriptive guidelines are a bad idea. And how the guidelines shouldn't be a series of bad behaviours. And for the most part I've understood your point and agreed with it.

And then you've posted a list of prescriptive guidelines, many of which are the same as the ones on the HLP list and everyone seemed to think they were fine. WTF!


But what I think you're forgetting is that this thread is not a representative sample of HLP users. With the exception of Lorric, probably everyone on this thread has been in the community for years. I don't see much thought being given to newbies to the community, especially those who aren't members of other forums.

[General Battuta]

Those are clearly labeled as a set of rules for a discussion subforum like GD. What's more, one of them reads 'don't play rules lawyer'. It's completely in line with everything else I've said. WTF indeed.

[karajorma]

So prescriptive guidelines are okay for Gen Dis then?

I'm honestly completely confused by your last posts. They run completely counter to everything that has been said before. And do the other people who have been against them also agree with you? No one has said anything either way.

Are prescriptive guidelines okay if there are other guidelines too?

[mjn.mixael]

But what I think you're forgetting is that this thread is not a representative sample of HLP users. With the exception of Lorric, probably everyone on this thread has been in the community for years. I don't see much thought being given to newbies to the community, especially those who aren't members of other forums.

I'm sorry... I'm trying not to be a complete negative Nancy... But this is just so ironic given how the rules were come up with in the first place... How can that even be an argument in the circumstance?

[Phantom Hoover]

OK, hang on, I'm kind of confused here: aren't the rules Battuta et al. proposing the prescriptive ones? That is, they prescribe what you should be doing on the forums rather than proscribing all the things you shouldn't be, like the proposed rules?

[MP-Ryan]

OK, hang on, I'm kind of confused here: aren't the rules Battuta et al. proposing the prescriptive ones? That is, they prescribe what you should be doing on the forums rather than proscribing all the things you shouldn't be, like the proposed rules?

Batts' rules are what I would call prescriptive, as are the current guidelines.  Typically they tell you how you should behave, versus how you shouldn't.

I prefer short prohibitive rules (the current guidelines have some features of prohibitive rules as well as prescriptive, but are IMHO way too long) to make it clear absolutely what is not tolerated, and then leave the rest to combined informal community moderation and formal admin moderation.

The focus on newbies probably isn't worthwhile anyway, and this is the primary reason I say short prohibitive rules are the better route:  most newbies to any forum DO NOT READ THE GUIDELINES.  You decrease the odds of them reading all the guidelines if they are long.  I say this as someone who had never actually bothered to read the complete guideline set until very recently, so I have some experience in this matter

[karajorma]

I'm sorry... I'm trying not to be a complete negative Nancy... But this is just so ironic given how the rules were come up with in the first place... How can that even be an argument in the circumstance?

The difference is that when we came up with the rules, we were trying to think of newbies as well as the regulars. Battuta is saying that because everyone who posted on this thread is saying one thing, that's the view of the community. He's also assuming that's why Black Wolf and I are saying it's virtually impossible to do what the community want.

Instead it should be pretty obvious that it's actually the view of the small subset willing to post of the small cross section who bothered to read this thread and there's a very good possibility it doesn't represent the wider community.

The focus on newbies probably isn't worthwhile anyway, and this is the primary reason I say short prohibitive rules are the better route:  most newbies to any forum DO NOT READ THE GUIDELINES.  You decrease the odds of them reading all the guidelines if they are long.  I say this as someone who had never actually bothered to read the complete guideline set until very recently, so I have some experience in this matter

Virtually no one reads the guidelines of their own volition. I could probably replace the guidelines with a post saying "I'll give $1000 to the first person with less than 10 posts who sends me a PM quoting this post" and never have to pay out.

The reason I mentioned newbies is that if someone gets into trouble it's nice to have something to point them at to keep them out of trouble. And that's where I feel a proscriptive list (admittedly with a more proactive start than the one we have) is useful.

[The E]

Oh for tucks sake.

Are you really pulling the "this discussion is not done by a representative sample of the population, therefore we can discard the results" card?

What chance for an actually constructive dialogue about this is there if that's your stance?

Sure, it's a minuscule minority of the board that has spoken up here. But that's not a good reason to pull the plug on the discussion, given that the only reason we're having it in the first place is that an even smaller subset of the forum population had a discussion about the rules.