I agree in part with Mark. Why is this the first change we see? A thread notifying the board that mods now have more power? Probably not the best timing.
Why? Because people have been complaining that there exists this sort of "us vs. them" situation between the staff and the posters. What better way to lesson that situation than by removing one of the important things that makes staff and posters different? Seems to me everyone wants to have their cake and eat it too. Either staff are inherently different from posters, and therefore different rules must apply to them, OR staff are just posters with extra responsibilities. Can't have it both ways.
I'd think it would be just as obvious as if a moderator was handing out bad warnings over policy issues, the only difference is that if your reputation goes negative you don't get banned. It's just a toy and should be treated as such.
Wow, great. Then who cares? You rectified an us v. them issue that only negatively affected the mods. Great job. I feel closer to you already.
I don't know. Let's say poster A disagrees with a policy descsion quite vocally, and a few days later a group of mods led by mod S start rep waring against him, hitting every post but the policy ones. A thread is opened in A51 about it after poster A complains, but the mods say it's for a flame in the red room and has nothing whatsoever to do with his stance on policy. You wouldn't be able to prove otherwise, so you could never be sure and the membership could never be sure. That's a bad move, it looks bad, IMHO. It might, just might, stifle policy discussion by members who are afraid of that very kind of thing happening. And if it's just such a little toy, with no importance whatsoever, why is the Administraton clamouring for the mods to be allowed to rep war, and why is it the first order of business to be dealt with?
Because I've been on Elwood's case about it for nearly two years now? There is a method to the madness though. For some people, rep wars are fun, and if you are denying toys to certain people, it creates resentment, and that creates far worse situations. As for your hypothetical, you're just going to have to give the staff the benefit of the doubt, just as you do when someone gets warned. Very rarely do people ever get away with such activities.
I have no problem with the moderators being allowed to rep war. Outside of their forums, they're basically just regular posters.
Maybe because most of us aren't as petty with rep as you? If I saw any mod trying to organise a rep war in The Shelter I would join the counter-attack against them.
If we had only rules that could be applied mechanically, that would be one thing, but we don't. A prerequisite for being a moderator should be showing good judgment. Sort of required to do the job right. That means, among other things, not being a juvenile twat or encouraging others to be such--i.e. not engaging in rep war.
No shit, check the Shelter release, I can think of two mods always raising a fuss about mod actions/policy matters...
Speaking purely for myself, I wouldn't rep war someone for questioning policy. That's something I reserve for people who are being assholes and who are doing the equivalent of shitting on the Thanksgiving turkey or battering women. If Tasvir is being his usual self, why deprive a certain class of people the pleasure of beating the shit out of him and making him scream?
Repwar against someone like Tasvir only gives him exactly what he wants; he's looking for negative attention without risking a ban. Allowing Tasvir's antics is one thing, but mods should show better judgment than shown by encouraging Tasvir's antics.
I beg to differ. When Elwood and I were off staff temporarily, and Tasvir was out of line, there was nothing bannable or warnable about what he did. So we gathered some folks together and made him red, and he left of his own volition.
Dude, get over it already. And I am not the one arguing for rep war. It's so unimportant, that the mods needed it to be at the very top of the adgenda. Riiight. And again, how could you ever prove it was policy related?
What do you mean get over it? You're the one who is still bringing this up and complaining about it. Hell you asked for responses and then complain about them being given? I don't participate in rep wars because they are silly, but I would venture to guess that it was changed because it was an easy thing to quickly change as opposed to some larger rule change. Given that rep wars are retarded anyway, what does it matter what the reasoning behind them is?
Let's see, with all the things that have been going on, with members leaving, being banned, arguing all over the board, the first fix is a childish weapon that the mods have been clamouring to have for a while now? Because obviously some people (the mods) take it very seriously, and even though it's retarded, it has an effect on some, and if it were used to take revenge for dissent against policy...
Oh please, markb. They don't want it to take revenge against people bitching about policy. They want it to attack assholes. I don't think they should be doing it, obviously, but let's not make it more than it is. They're not going to use it to suppress discussion from normal posters, they're going after people like Tasvir and such.
Hey, I've agreed that out of all the things that coule be changed right now this probably wasn't the best time to do this, but if you really think it's some kind of conspiracy to give mods more power to negrep posters who are questioning the system then your tinfoil hat might just be on a bit too tightly. edit: markb, in one paragraph or less... Why should I have more restrictions put on me as a poster simply because I agreed to keep an eye on the videogame forum?
Where did I say that? I put it up as a scenario of what could happen. [/quote] Please see Demiurge's post on the subject, he has covered that issue better then I can.
markb: it appears you are advocating removing a privilege from moderators because they *might* misuse it. How is that different from banning someone because they "might" post personal info, which is why Goldeneye is no longer with us? One is no different than the other, IMHO. If you're going to be a defender of policy around here, then it's important you stay consistent. I was not comfortable with the idea of GE being found guilty before he'd actually did anything, and for the record I STILL think banning him like that was not Elwood's best decision ever. Similarly, Mark, I have objections to your argument for the same reason - you are assuming something is going to happen before it has.
Sorry if I see a pontentially darker side of this little toy. It's my way. Lord knows I don't want the job (it's a pita, IMHO), but if I were a mod, I would take it as a given that I could not engage in some normal poster activities for fear of altering the perception of being the dispassionet arbiter of board policy and rules for the membership. If I could not bring myself to do that, I would not become a mod. As a supervisor of a huge medical practice in RL, I have to do just that everyday.
