Now that I've posted, sorry about the novel that you have to read. Once I start typing, it just kind of goes.
We're not trying to make an unfair generalization, but it's statistically undeniable that as age decreases, the chances of a person from a random sample being mature decreases. I assert that the correlation between age and maturity for a random sample of people would be an inverse cubic function. In other words, from ages zero to thirty the number of mature people in the sample would slowly increase, from ages thirty to sixty the maturity percentage would increase at a rapid rate and from ages sixty to one hundred the number of mature people would continue to increase but at a slower rate as it asymptotically approached one hundred percent. It's probably common sense to most people, but this is why it's typically astonishing when people find a person who exhibits particularly mature and intellectual traits to actually be quite young. It's just a matter of unfavourable probability.
I don't usually approve of things like this, but when I do, I make sure they have a point with the community its been suggested for.
No, there's no need for a complicated vetting process; it could be as simple as mods seeing a "sensible" person and giving them the right. And if there is any problem, take it away, with a quick note on their file saying why. Easy, simple, no big deal. It's about degrees of trust. You might trust a gardener with the keys to your garden shed, but not to your house. If they mow your lawn regularly, and return the mower, you might eventually give them a house key. Approx 99% of the time, there is no mod on SMP9. Approx 80% of the time, there is no mod on any server. If necessary, I could get logs to back that up. Nah; we're talking about people SHOUTING/spamming/generally being a pain-in-the-chat. The evidence is apparent from the chat log. I do that, typically 10 times per day; it's very rare that anything happens about it. Sure, the report gets looked at eventually, but it'd be much more effective if they were quickly/briefly kicked (after their warning). Yes, exactly! Great! That's the idea - to massively reduce the nonsense. If they stop doing it (because there's more people watching) - excellent! I do exactly that, every day, many times. I very politely remind them of the rules. If they keep doing it, I report them. The problem is with the last part - there's no mods to kick 'em. Yes, it's good insight... but I'm still seeing no downside to this. At the very least, can't we give it a try?
Most young people are immature, most older people act in a more mature way. Not all, but most. It's surprising to meet a mature, responsible, sensible young person. It's surprising to meet an idiotically immature 30-year-old. It happens, but it's rarer, so more surprising. Is all.
I have to say I love these debates Makes the work day go much faster. This is all in reply to you herbrin3. It's going to become a mess to quote all the quotes quoting quotes. From the top going down in your post, start at 1 for the first one and down to 8 at the bottom. I think that will keep it organized. 1. There still has to be a vetting process to determine a "sensible person". If anything, it would pay to have a more intense vetting process than having to manage chat mods actions. The option to get around this is to add them slowly so that they can be trained individually like full moderators [which as the new guy I can say everyone is really helpful at - Thanks other mods ]. 2. It's a good analogy. I more or less believe the level of possible damage from a chat mod is great enough to have the same process as a full mod more or less. The possibility to ban everyone they touch for a day is enough to make it not something to be taken lightly in my opinion. I feel like its leaving someone with the keys to your house right off the bat. 3. A moderator on the server does not equal a moderator online. I'm online on square from 8-5 CST each day, but I'm not actually on a server during any of those times. I'm sure many of the other mods are the same way. 4.That's kind of a convenient place to end the quote of mine. The jist is that if they are doing any of those things enough to cause issues, and you've warned them, report them. 5. You do, I've seen you do so. And you're right that not every one has action taken on it from the server side. What I can tell you is that there's action taken on the square side. When a report comes in, we might not necessarily kick / ban them, but they are generally warned by us and notes go into their profile. If these notes start painting a picture of the person's rulebreaking, the punishments escalate. 6. To have someone online all the time goes back to the training issue. Unless we're going to dedicate current staff to be chat mod mods and keep up with them, its going to have to be a gradual process. 7. See number 3 and kind of number 5. 8. That's really ICC's call whether to try it or not. Like I said, I know its been done before, and the reasons I'm giving are my estimate of why it didn't go well. I'm not opposed to trying it from my end, but with some changes.
Yeah, I've often been called a masterdebater. Or something like that, anyway I disagree, because then the whole thing becomes a "big deal", you see? If it's a trivial little thing, there's no need for fuss. Really, you're not giving 'em super-powers, you're only letting 'em kick people and maybe ban 'em for a short time. If it's no big deal to give them that right, then it's no big deal to remove it. Once you introduce paperwork and complex vetting, it all quickly becomes bureaucratic, and I believe in the "KISS" priciple (Keep It Simple, Stupid! - No offence intended, just one of those "corporate design principles", kinda thing). If we over-think this, it may never happen. If EMC mods picked 10 people that they think are mostly-sane, and made them chat-mods, then maybe we could see if the idea worked... and maybe add another 10 in a couple of weeks. The chances of someone that a couple of mods think is "mostly sane" going rogue and banning loads of users are very slim. And if that rare thing did happen, would it be the end of the world? Not really. I'm sure mods would notice quickly, remove the chat-mod, remove the bans they placed and maybe spam out an apology to the ones they banned. I emphasize, that's a "worst-case scenario" and I feel it's unlikely. Or, maybe just limit it so they can only ban 10 players in 24 hours, max? But still, KISS... I think you're being a bit over-protective of your powers; mod isn't a massive deal; chat-mod would be a lot less so. I'm sure you can think of a few players off the top of your head who you personally would trust to make sensible kicks and short bans. I realise that, but I meant no mods on any SMP, and none in "staff" on the website. Partly the reason I see that so often is because I live on the wrong side of the Atlantic, but still, that just emphasizes the need for a few more eyes - preferably some in a few different time-zones - to kick out stupid people who ignore polite warnings. I know. But a timely kick can be much more effective, preventing weeks of trouble-making and extra work for our over-worked mods. Really, there are dozens of people, right here, who are sensible enough to know what is/isn't OK in town chat; to know that people need one or two warnings before a kick, and to know that, when a kick doesn't get the message across, that a short ban is appropriate. There's no training required.
Sorry. Sure enough I say that I'm at the computer and then servers start fussing. Same system as before, to stop the quotes of quotes of quotes (1 at the top and working down). 1. I appreciate that you keep it organized and cool through debates. 2. Agreed that the rights aren't particularly powerful, but they are still going to require us looking at a player to see how they act. Why not go the extra distance to make them a full mod? As far as KISS is concerned, I understand that, but KISS is very subjective. I can say KISS and refer to having just full moderators and regular players (keep the chat mods out), and it does the same thing. Still - simplicity is key. 3 and 4. I agree that it's unlikely, but it can happen. Once again, it goes back to the whole trust thing. There are players that I would trust to do exactly that, but if I trust them, I'd trust them to be a full moderator too. There's not a gray area in the trust spectrum in my case. I either trust the person or don't. It could be a stage in becoming a moderator, like a trainee-mod, but as a recent mod, I feel like the training system in place worked fine. 5. That's true that many of the mods are on this side of the Atlantic so there's absent time at night (we've also got a couple mod's on vacation). If no one is on the forums as well, that's a case where a full moderator might be needed, not necessarily a chat mod. 6. I don't disagree (double negative - so I agree) that it would help out having more mods online, and it may stop people ahead from causing more problems. 7. There's some nuances behind the scenes that go into place. The biggest issue I see for the training wise problems with a chat mod is how do you handle kicks and bans in relation to full moderators? Like I said earlier, we log what happens on an account, so if someone curses, they might get off with a warning or kick, but someone with a history might get a ban. The only way for chat mod's to see that history would be to let them into square, and once again, at that point they might as well be full moderators (much of the power and responsibility come from square). If someone is doing /report, once again that ends up in square, so a chat moderator without permissions to it wouldn't see it. Like I said earlier, I don't see it as a bad idea, I'm just pointing out this side of it, and why I think it was ended.
I bet ICC is looking at this, finding the negatives and positives Ignora, you make some very good points - however; I believe that chat mods don't have to be a big deal. Make them simple, as Herb said and stuff should start clicking into place for everyone. If stuff doesn't work out, ICC and Justin can easily remove the system again. This is what most people what, I think we have to trust it.
just like the new shop system- Add it, if it doesnt work out alter or remove it. ICC's words. Not exactly
Sounds like Crazy1080 before he became Mod so I think this is already in play well it was at one point (there is probably one or two flaws I dunno :/)
If they had nothing to do, they would all leave and no one would be on... hey! that sounds a lot like SMP3 to me!
