Regarding administration on MSB

[Sunny]

@ganymede

I am qualifying what I say with 'I feel' because this is clearly not a discussion about objectivity. I don't expect you to change how I feel. What I do expect is that you consider how I (and the others posting) are feeling, in addressing this. You are doing so, fantastic. If we do NOT say outright: this is how this is making me feel, you are thus assumed to be unaware of such, and therefore you cannot take our feels into consideration. Auspice's behavior is a problem. We hear that you are addressing it privately, but what you may also wish to do privately is contain the problem until it has been addressed. It is being made worse.

[faraday]

@tnp Haven't we seen how well (not) that works with staff alts?

[surreality]

I really can't watch this continue at this point.

If someone wants my opinion on anything until this is resolved in some form (doubtful), grab me on skype, the id there is muxfoo.

[Ghost]

With no disclosure of who is controlling sock puppet Staff bits.

I will note, though, that I have negative feelings as to why this would be effective, and they are not conducive to this conversation.

[Arkandel]

Many of the posts here are constructive. As @Ganymede pointed out a couple of times, we're in the middle of discussing how we can move forward to best address moderation on MSB, and wording the Rules of Engagement better so that it's more clear what is or is not permitted, and what the consequences of stepping out of bounds are.

And we are not perfect. We've all made mistakes - admins certainly have. I certainly have. Although administrating on MSB isn't the same as staffing a game, we do have to improve on how we handle ourselves which isn't as easy as it seems.

Conversely, some of the posters here are staff on various games, and I suspend they wouldn't have tolerated neither the tone or degree of criticism applied they are themselves showing. Nor is it easy to shrug off being told you are complete shit at what you do publicly, then come back and word a polite response back from that.

[Tempest]

Okay, in all seriousness here. Just from the past 3 pages of this thread.

@Auspice as a mod comes off pretty passive-aggressive frequently.

And @Ganymede as a mod is coming off as a defensive nazi. "OH WE MESSED UP? WELL FUCK YOU SHUT UP." (Specifically the exchange with @Kanye-Qwest.)

You guys are ALL being weirdly defensive when your 'mod decisions' get rightfully called into question.

And that does not bode well, at all.

[Wizz]

Or maybe, and this is just a suggestion, everyone should just chill for at least an hour and then come back to this discussion after a nap and a nice bath or something.

[Arkandel]

@wizz Hey, it's a Friday. I float like a butterfly.

[Sunny]

Blarg. This is super discouraging. I hope you guys manage to get this worked out.

[mietze]

Yeah I think I’m out. If your idea of good modding is calling people who request clarification and express genuine confusion children and implying they are stupid—I sure as hell wouldn’t stay on a game with staff like that.

Why would I stay here?

People who want to get in touch with me are free to, but having been part of this place since the beginning and WORA and SWOFA and all that stuff this is way too hard to see.

[Sparks]

@arkandel said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Conversely, some of the posters here are staff on various games, and I suspend they wouldn't have tolerated neither the tone or degree of criticism applied they are themselves showing. Nor is it easy to shrug off being told you are complete shit at what you do publicly, then come back and word a polite response back from that.

For whatever it's worth, I don't think the mods are "complete shit" at what you do. I do think you guys kind of dropped the ball on this one. That can be written off as growing pains, a misunderstanding compounded with ill-advised pre-coffee posting, but it was a dropped ball nonetheless.

However, we have a community here who are, to some degree, conditioned to descend like a pack of starving wolverines on any perceived bad staffing, who consider it a sacred mission to warn others about such incidents. Be it favoritism, turning a blind eye to the faults of fellow staffers, general injustice against players, or whatever.

You say there are staffers here who wouldn't shrug off this type of criticism, but I suspect almost every staffer on here has been chewed on by the wolverines at least a few times. And the community has not historically been terribly forgiving of replies to criticism there, either.

And staff will always fall short on occasion; people are human, they make mistakes, and so on. No one is perfect, and no one's going to make the right decision 100% of the time—be it as staff or otherwise.

This incident was, I think, a mistake rather than malice. But given the fact that this is a community seemingly founded in literal part to call out bad staffing, I feel like it probably shouldn't be any real surprise that when an incident viewed as bad staffing happens, there are suddenly wolverines trying to gnaw on your liver.

[saosmash]

I personally think the initial response was pretty mild; it's the continuous doubling down that has brought out the wolverines.

[Arkandel]

Well, let me put it this way then. What would make you feel this specific situation has been resolved?

What can we do - other than or on top of what we've already said we were doing - to remedy this?

[Caryatid]

@arkandel

@auspice could give an apology that does not shift the blame to people who rightfully went, "Wait what no." As @Sparks has said, this is a board which exists in part to hold those with staff powers accountable for their mistakes in the hopes they improve. That would show an effort being made to improve, instead of her blasting the non-mod posters for not reading her mind and the other mods circling the wagons around her.

We have seen this script play out far too many times to accept it quietly.

Reason for edit: Typos, my fingers are cold.

[Wizz]

I personally think what would benefit everyone here, myself included, is to stop treating forum posts like a race. Go back two-three pages and look at the response times, people are firing off with a mounting sense of panic within minutes of each other and then the mods are trying to stomp down harder and harder to slow it down and everyone should...just...stop.

Like, this is a forum. There is literally no reason to post your first response to something you see, give yourself a minute to breath.

[bored]

@arkandel Fire the new mods.

You've admitted we're testing, the first test failed.

Next: Dial it back. Try again with a medium point of moderation between what you tried here and what existed before. I know you feel people 'wanted more,' but you've taken this as a mandate for sweeping reform that doesn't exist.

If you want an example that doesn't have to do with @Auspice and @Ganymede acting like tools, how about the fact that the current moderation regime/system/rules/whatever you want to call it seems to be incapable of supporting a thread that exemplifies MSB's purpose. At no point should we feel like our rules exist to protect the dishonest and abusive garbage-people that comprise UH's staff, and yet it seems like the rules have largely served their interests over ours, with a thread about legitimately terrible people being over-moderated, chopped up, etc.

There's a difference between personal attacks and calling legitimately vile people what they are, and you don't seem to be able to make the distinction in the current framework.

[Arkandel]

@caryatid You know I will never ask or expect anyone else to apologize for anything. I will say I'm sorry though - I didn't do nearly enough to pave the way for her and Gany coming in, and I was (and am) grateful that they stepped into this insanity at all to give me a hand, so I tried to make sure they didn't feel left to fend for themselves. In that way, and probably others too, I am more defensive than I should have been. @Meg pointed out the 'but you asked us!' clause was getting overused, so I cut that one out of the rotation as well.

[Caryatid]

@arkandel That's the thing. I trust both you and @Ganymede to give legitimate apologies, apologies which do not blame the people they're offered to, when you realize you've fucked up. People make mistakes and I have a lot of respect for those who know how to function after doing so. That is a huge component of being a reasonable adult and people who can and will constructively apologize automatically go high on my respect list.

It doesn't matter what the error was, if someone can approach me and apoligize like a grown-up, I will be willing to hear them out on whatever else. I think that's true of many people here because we do collectively have a lot of experience with being in this situation (both staffing and in fucking up).

I also think this situation makes it clear @auspice does not have that ability. She had several opportunities. She chose to use them in questionable fashion. But it's still salvagable if she puts the work in.

[Apos]

@arkandel said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Conversely, some of the posters here are staff on various games, and I suspend they wouldn't have tolerated neither the tone or degree of criticism applied they are themselves showing. Nor is it easy to shrug off being told you are complete shit at what you do publicly, then come back and word a polite response back from that.

I think most wouldn't have tolerated Tempest freaking out, but the rest...? I think that's selling the different staffers posting in this thread short. Yes, it's extremely difficult to be unfailingly polite when you feel insulted. I am pretty sure most of us get that. A lot of us also feel it's okay to speak in the same tone as you are spoken to, just we also feel it is a failing to be the first one to drop the tone lower and escalate things further. While it's great if someone can consistently be unfailingly polite and consistently try to always deescalate things, I don't think anyone expects mods or staff to be punching bags. That would be unreasonable. Just not to also be the first one to throw a punch either.

[Arkandel]

@apos A difference that complicates manners between staffing a MUSH and doing whatever it is we do here is that there's no part of a game - typically - where by design is a more or less designated free-for-all territory. Imagine if there was a channel or room on Arx people could say nearly whatever they wanted, and to whoever, and freely traveled back and forth between it and the rest of the MU*. Things would probably spill out of there sooner or later if you weren't 100% on the ball, and worse, behaviors would carry over.

I am not a traditionalist but the Hog Pit seems vital to some of MSB's functions and I'm very reluctant to mess with that (despite, perhaps, appearances to the contrary). And yet one of my actual concerns about the forum is leaving small groups of people chase others out. In fact that's why I was convinced having some moderation was perhaps necessary which went against my initial inclinations.

For to give an example, the damage that a clique can do to a MUSH is in some ways limited; they would require outside - commonly staff - factors to work in their favor, they often have natural rival factions others can go to avoid them, even the nature of rooms themselves can let you avoid someone you can't be around. MSB offers none of those protections; if you can't stand me then I can be in your face every day anyway. If I have friends they can do the same. The recourse you have in those cases is pretty limited.

That's what's currently troubling me more than anything else when it comes to the forum. The rest are growing pains and adjustments we can make, both internally and culturally. But I don't want MSB to harbor systemic harassment, either.

It's one if not the main reason I was telling @faraday earlier in this thread I would really like it if we as a community can step in more often to regulate each others' tone, because the other options are that administrators need to do so, which can obviously go terribly wrong, or worse to scratch that up as a necessary evil.