Being a Mod 102 - Why mods should have a personality
OK, yesterday I beat to death the fact that
You are first and always a community member, second a player, and distant third, a moderator..
Bedub1, one our wonderful chat mods (for those of you who dont know)
asked the question “Is that really true?” pointing out that
| Quote: |
| With great power comes greater responsibility. I see that I myself now represent CC to some degree |
Well, here is my answer, in a roundabout way (and perhaps a more controversial stance on Community Management):
Being a mod 102 - Why mods should have a personality
You are first and always a community member, second a player, and distant third, a moderator. <–This is how you should see yourself
You are a part of “the powers that be” <–This is how most people, especially newbies, will see you - no matter what I, or anyone else, tells them
You are a tool <–This is how your most problematic people will see you 
You will be seen by others as a representative of the site for which
you work, which you are. But this is something which, for your sanity
and enjoyment, I want to change a little bit.
<Harsh reality check warning>: mods
have influence over the site, they are privy to information others are
not, but they are not admins (and there are distinct up-sides to this
fact, like the fact that you can pass the responsibility buck up to
admins). Mods do not make business altering decisions for the most
part, they do not set official policy and no mod will ever get rich doing what they do (believe me, I have tried several times)</end warning>
But community members don’t realize this and hold you to admin standards
and that puts a lot of pressure on you to try to live up to those
standards. So you generally get screwed from both fronts. (BTW, at CC
we do try to give all staff a much much much larger degree of influence
than most sites you might end up working for will, in everything from
community policies to coding direction. If we ever stop listening to
you, or if you ever feel ignored, please please please, do tell me or
Lack because that’s just not fair)
If you then become power hungry and trigger-happy with your mod
tools, people will see you simply as someone out to “cut down on free
speech” and an enforcer of the rules (there will be an entire “Being a mod” on this one later)
So, let’s recap: See yourself as a member first but you need to be aware that people will see you as an admin and or robot tool of the guideline monster.
So why is personality important:
You are human. And you are allowed to be. As a “Member first” I fully expect you to keep being who you are.
Mod powers do not come on a stick which needs to be surgically implanted in your rear end (mine were, but I got a special edition that wicked (one of our mods) will tell you all about, I’m sure).
The danger is that people see ONLY the mod-stick-up-the-ass because you
do become drier, more “the rules say” and more “higher than thou” then
you will just be re-enforcing the opinion that You are a tool because, well, at that point you are.
If you look human, you feel human, you taste human and smell human, you probably are human. And that is a good thing.
Be seen to have a sense
of humour. Give as good as you get[see footnote 1 below]. Play around
with people just like other members do. Stick to what you know and do
that. If I picked you (or if I get to train you) for the mod squad,
chances are you weren’t too offensive in the first place, so just keep
being who you are. If you get too offensive, I will let you
know…believe me I will
When you lock posts, do it with a sense of humour. If you are
chastising someone, make people laugh (at you, not the person, that
only makes enemies).
If you think that someone is flaming on the general forum flame them back but in a kosher way:
Go f*ck yourself mod azzholes
could be responded to in several ways:
Dont: This violates rule number 27.1 of paragraph 94 of rule book 3. <—tool
Dont: How dare you tell me to
f*ck myself you insignificant piece of sh1t <—you take the bait,
they win and will come back for more
Dont:… <—that would be you ignoring the problem and it will come back
Do: What was that? you like to
play with little boys’ rear ends? Thread locked before DatelineNBC
catches up with you. Phew, glad we saved you from that.
Do: Awwww, was someone not
hugged enough as a child? Why don’t I go ahead and hug you with a nice
big fat thread lock and point you towards the Flame Wars board where
there are plenty of nice people to hug you.
Do: I would, but i had trouble
doing that because there was a big old thread lock stuck up there. Let
me go ahead and pull that out and put it on this thread for you so I
can try again. Flame wars over there please.
(can you tell I come from a much less troll-flame background )
When you answer a question, dont just answer it with
| Quote: |
| in FAQ section number 34 it says <quote>I’m a robot who can’t be bothered to answer you like a human being</quote> |
consider being more personal about it:
| Quote: |
| It’s all answered for you in the <url=link to FAQ>the FAQ</url> but let me summarize: there is a witty quote about how your options after you have started the game are to win or lose, but we suggest winning. There are several threads in the suggestion forum debating this if you think it should change, try searching in there for it if you want to add to the debate. Have a great day, may it be FAQ’d. |
By being
the non-standard mod (i.e. one with a personality) it will often catch
people off guard, especially if they are coming from a corporate game
site where the mods ARE robots, and make them do a double take on you,
and perhaps see you as a little more human, the mod squad as a little
cooler and the site as a more accepting place.
Be careful what personality you pick though….some can get you into a
lot more hassle than they are worth. If people stop respecting you, you
are in serious trouble.
OK, that was a bit longer than I wanted, I will try to keep them shorter next time.
I will leave all BaM (Being a Mod) stickied for 2 days, BaM 101 will come down tomorrow.
[footnote 1] Give as good as you get within the boundaries of the
guidelines. Even more so than any rules will do, mods set the
boundaries of what is acceptable when they themselves push them. “If a
mod does it, it means I can”. Sadly this does not work the other way
(”if a mod doesnt do it, I cant”) and so it is very hard to recover
from. This means that I will hold ALL staff members who carry a CC
title to the guidelines as rules
and I will be anal about this - If you are promoting the breaking of
the guidelines, dont expect to stay on the staff. They are VERY basic
guidelines, they are almost a
joke as far as a “don’t do this” but they are VERY far from being
something you can ignore. They dont stop you being who you are (unless
you are a homophobic anti-semite who hates all black people and
kittens) so please, pay attention to them and dont be dragged down to
the level of the people we are trying to drag up.
This is perhaps the one thing that I will be strict about. I will
warn you if you start straying into no-no land and work with you to
change it, but if you continue to push the boundaries I will “ask” you to step down.