All Right, Time to Talk

As a couple of you already know, I am selling the board soon. After approaching several candidates and being turned down for various reasons, I wound up negotiating with Ancalagon. Probably sometime next month he will become the new board owner. Nick has been working with him to set up a new version of Wordforge with upgraded software and stuff.

I wanted to do this last year but there were no takers. The plain fact of the matter is that my heart has not been in this since my wife died. Being bitched at constantly didn't help. My goals while I owned Wordforge were simple: keep it alive, keep it free of advertising, try to bring in new members. First two we did, third one not so much. Anc will have a different take on it and he will get a taste of what it's like to be the one catching every particle of shit that launches.

I've given him shelter access so that he can talk to y'all himself. This news is NOT YET for public release. Okay?

Oh, and this probably means you'll get the White Room back, so there's that.

Kneel.

Personally, I can't wait to see El Chup's reaction to this.

I kid, I kid.

So yeah... that's happening.

What this means for you:
Not a whole lot initially. Almost all staff are welcome to stay, and by welcome I mean 'Please don't go!' The biggest change will be new help coming in. While I am the 'owner' of the board in that Lanz approached me and I have been having all the dealings with him, and I will be the 'owner' on all the accounts and to the rest of the board, the reality is that all costs are being split equally between me, evenflow, tex, and gul (some of you might have noticed the four horsemen Avs), so we'll all be admins. Decisions will ultimately be made among the four of us, with the current 'owner' (this first year that would be me) winning any 2-2 split.

So yeah, don't fear the tyranny of Anc.

Aside from us, there will also be some additional staff members joining you to help relieve some of the burdens that will come with the hordes of new members we'll bring. So if any of you are burned out but have been hanging on for the good of the board, thank you for your service and soon enough you'll get to take a break. No hard feelings at all towards anyone that resigns.

What this means for the board:
Well, the big one is of course the upgrade. Nick got a test forum set up earlier today. Please check it out and send all complaints to him. I hope Scorp will be able to help set up some skins and help WFize the place.
http://testingforge.net/index

Beyond that, not a whole lot of solid plans. We'd like to try bringing back forum mods, but have them be more hosts than mods. Basically want them to try and generate discussion and when possible content.

There are some other things we'd like to try to generate membership but those won't really effect the members or you guys.

Any questions, comments, bitches, gripes, complaints?

Muad.

Nope, after we do this I want no more staff duties. Just be regular old Lanzman, another random poster.

I hope that you'll accept shelter access, your advice will be appreciated. We'd also like to grant Elwood access as well.

Sure, I'll kibbitz if you want. Elwood does that now, so probably not a stretch for him either.

Sounds good man.

I like a lot of the things you said, will post a deeper response later.

I won't even attempt to pre-judge what we haven't seen yet.

I just think you better be very prepared for the vocal and angry group of posters who don't want change to be very far up your ass every move you make. You might be surprised how quickly some people turn on you the moment they think you are an "authority" and want to alter their comfy nest.

Also, "moderator hosts" didn't work the first time it was done and it may not work now. This is not a group of people who want to feel "led" well, ever.

I'll support whatever you guys want, I always do with new owners, but it's only fair to warn you how nasty and ugly it can become when the rabble feel threatened.

I'm already here. Actually, I even retained full admin power. Obviously I don't exercise it much. That was part of my agreement with Lanzman. I'm simply part of a "hidden" user group that doesn't show the admin "pips."

I would like to retain that, but you're obviously not bound by any agreements between myself and Lanzman. Whatever you choose is fine by me.

I look forward to the change.

Thanks for the warning.

By hosts what I really mean are content generators. What I mean by that is someone who does more than just post links and give a few lines of comment. It's kind of hard to explain, but basically this is my idea of a perfect 'content post':
http://www.wordforge.net/showthread.php?t=74428
Paladin's Blue Ray Reviews, X's Anime Reviews, Dan Leach's Photo thread, shootERs BBQ thread, those are all 'content' posts. Unlike assholes arguing about current issues (which can be found anywhere) they are something created at WF that can only be found at WF. Some of the 'other stuff not effecting membership' is to try and figure out ways to help 'pimp' our content.

A moderator/host would be asked to post something like that at least every two weeks. Also by giving them a since of 'ownership' over the forum it will hopefully encourage them to just post more and try and keep discussions going.

Who knows, might work, might not. Worth a try.

Aside from the software upgrade (which no one seemed to really care about when we posted the IPB software test thread) those are really the only two changes we have planned.

Don't worry, we realize how conservative the posters here are (and by conservative I mean 'change is a necessary evil') and don't want to cause a civil war or anything.

Okay....that's significantly different than the past attempt...maybe it will work..certainly can't hurt to try.

I like trying new stuff...it costs nothing in the attempt and it's easy to undo when it fails.

Indeed.

The White Room, bitches!!!!!!!

Okay, had to get that off my chest! My dreams of becoming a porn impresario are nearing realization.

Anyway, not to go too far down the path of reiterating Ancalagon's post, I want to join him in expressing our hope that most of you stick around. We have some ideas about engaging more of the community, and part of this will eventually involve moving people on and off the staff over time, but to a much larger extent, it will be an effort to make all members feel a sense of unity and ownership. You all can be a huge help with this.

The vast majority who post here do so because we love the place and people that make it. I want to leverage this by encouraging greater involvement as some sort of strange community. A big part of this task initially will involve convincing the change averse that it's okay. We survived shifting through previous ownerships, we'll survive shifting through future ownerships. The key message is that the board belongs to the posters more than any one individual or group.

That said, there are going to be some quick and dirty changes. More staff, new software, it's going to be a big challenge for some to log on to something that looks very different. Over time, we are all going to discover the many cool features of the new software, like being able to call somebody out via @username, etc. There really are a ton of community building elements baked right in. But until we all get down to exploring, we won't know exactly what works for the forge, what's broken, and the like. So here's the link again, get to testing!

http://www.testingforge.net

PS: Mrs. Albert, the smilie situation? Holy crap, it's going to be bad! 9 years of accumulated awesomeness isn't going to transfer

You guys are gonna find out that rule-by-committee isn't the best idea. But hey, I'll be out from under so there's that. Somebody else can pay the bills and get bitched at for a while.

No worries, the committee is just a front for the real owner, a most nefarious character indeed!

Just be aware that I'm going to point an laugh an awful lot.

In a way it's already sort of rule by committee.

Only cuz I've not been as active as I should have been. Been letting Tamar and $corp run things.

Even when it was under Elwood it was, he had the final say, but we all put our opinions forth and they were taken under advisement.

My role here is pretty much just financial. I may vote on some "major" issues, such as the switch to a new look and software upgrade, but I'm really just helping pay the bills for the most part. Ancalagon is the front man, the other three of us are really just a fail safe to keep the absolute power from corrupting him.

Oh trust me. As someone who is civically involved in Seattle (board member of 2 c4s and a c3, two of which I cofounded) I am well aware of the limitations that come with process and committees (The Seattle Process even has it's own wikipedia page), I am well aware of the dangers. However, like everything it has it strengths and not just weaknesses.

Strengths:

Burden Sharing: Less likely for a single individual to get burned out, and if one does he/she can take a break for a bit and others easily pick up slack.

Blame Sharing: When decisions are made as a group no one person can get singled out by people upset with decision

Larger Pool of Ideas: Each of us have our own ideas about helping WF grow.

Larger Pool of Talents: Each of us has our own unique talents.

Weaknesses:

Blame Sharing: A fuck up by one reflects on everyone

Slow Response Time: The need to get everyone on the same page can slow up decision making and response time.

Now it is our belief that the weakness can be mitigated by a couple factors:

Trust. We all know each other. And I don't just mean we've posted on the same message boards for 12+ years. But we've hung out. We've done shots in bars together, we've been asked to leave bars together. We've cooked breakfast for each other after.... well... enough of that. Anyway, we're friends and we trust each other not to fuck shit up for the others.

Speed is not really an issue. How many split second decisions have had to be made over the years by the owner? Unless there are some hidden archives, not that many. Most important 'Owner Decisions' are mulled over for days if not weeks (or even years). So for 90% of the issues where the board owner needs to make a decision there will be time to get ahold of each other (again with the knowing each other, we've got emails, FB, twitter, phone numbers, et al for everyone). And IF for some reason a split second decision is needed, then we've agreed any of us can make it. And if one of us isn't online, there are four possible 'owners' that can be contacted in an emergency.

And lastly, we do have an official owner, or point man. As such I will be handling most small stuff myself. The group is really just for big stuff (hiring/firing, policy changes, etc). A check if you will.

So yeah, there will be challenges, but I think we've set up a decent system to deal with them. And if it doesn't work, we've only committed to this arraignment for one year. We can assess and adapt then.

Yeah...the one thing Wordforgers have been clamoring for is more staff.

All this corporate experiment stuff...when you presented it in the help desk, it wasn't popular. Only a small group of people agreed with you...mainly those supporting you now.

No one wants to community build and make a village. They want to insult each other and shoot the shit and I think you best prepare for a possible mass exodus and hope all your experiments refill the tanks, so to speak. But either way, you are changing WF and it may possibly be the end of it. Oh, it may become something new, but it won't be the same and if you are wrong it may be EFCL or Terran or TK all over again.

People have been complaining about the ossification of staff for a while.

What changes do you see causing a mass exodus?

I dunno.

Back in the day we had things like the writing competitions which did really well. Rooms like the Iron Room were low but consistent traffic and did have that more community feel.

This doesn't have to be controlling. If I'm understanding Anc properly (and correct me if I'm wrong) it's about getting a few people to do stuff leading by example, rather than telling everyone YOU POST LIKE THIS NOW.

That is exactly what we want to happen and of course we aren't going to force anyone to do anything.

I'm honestly not sure where Tamar is getting this stuff from.