[Ilkidarios]

My only problem is that nothing seems to be being accomplished in this thread. Adam is the one who makes decisions regarding the moderators, and from what I've heard, he's said nothing so far. I just don't understand what more needs to be discussed right now.

You've seen the recent posts, Matt, they've been nothing but flames. I don't see what is gained by this thread remaining open.

[Lark]

Hmm. I read a lot more, lately.

Well, I can't help but stick by my guns on Matt not being good moderator material. The principle I'm trying to apply here (and it might not work right at all, but I'll give it a try) is that you can't really ask someone to judge a competition they participate in themselves. It doesn't make sense to be grunting it out on the tennis court during play, and then climbing back up into the chair to be a line judge.

That's not to say I think Matt's squared the moderator position away to suit his own private agenda. I'm just saying, in an ideal situation, the referee's always someone who doesn't really care who wins or loses.

Proposed solution? No idea. Maybe a dry coder-type who's more interested in discussing possibilities with strings than he is whether Matt's the Anti-Christ or not. But for now, like I said, he's putting in the hours and whatnot.

Hopefully in the near future Synozeer will put another 'Help Wanted' sign in the window, and that'll give some of the folks who want a shot a chance to apply.

[the_logos]

Who wins or loses what though? The moderator doesn't affect who 'wins' on TMS, as that's determined purely by how many votes one sends here.

--matt

[Lark]

(Little footnote here, mostly off-topic.

I wanted to thank Ilkidarios for thinking what I had to say was worth repeating.

But to the point, [replying to Anitra, I think it was? I won't quote, it seems a little rude to me, like pointing fingers or staring] I think open-mindedness to ideas is an absolute requirement for any sort of half-meaningful debate.

I wouldn't make a bet with someone I know would welsh on it the second I won, so why would I debate with someone who'd never allow themselves to be persuaded with a good argument?

And if I expect the other guy to hold up his end of the deal, then I have to flip that around and do the same for him. We both agree to be vulnerable in the spirit of fair play, and in the hopes that we're really the best man of the pair.)

(My kitten's attacking me, so I'll just go ahead and post. I hope this thing's halfway sensible.)

[Lark]

Oh, you snuck up on me there, Matt. If anyone cares to look at the time marks on these posts, you'll see one of the biggest reasons Matt's moderator...I'm not sure if he eats or just has an IV set up.

Well, I won't speculate, but I know one good reason would be to assuage people's suspicions. If Mother Teresa herself moderated these boards, she'd still be under a microscope (Iron Realms/Catholicism money bribes, something like that). The fact that you're running a successful business in addition to a mud gives you even more mad-tyrant potential.

So the big interest in replacing you would be to quiet down the yelling and get down to business on whatever this forum talks about besides these couple topics. Right now, there's a little server stuffed with hateful little ones and zeros from people who are all trying to express (in varying levels of articulation) their unhappiness with you as moderator.

I'm not making any judgements on your character: I don't know you nearly well enough to be comfortable taking a shot in the dark. And I appreciate the time out of your day it takes to keep the wheels turning.

I'm just saying if someone finally comes around who can fill your boots, Adam should just let him sit in the chair so you (and the rest of us) don't have to go through these big nasty threads where you're just trying to deflect accusations and insults. And you'll have more freedom to get in the trenches with them, too, and if the thread gets closed, it won't be a 'Matt did it to us' sort of deal.

I've gone on a bit. But like I said, you're here, someone needs to do it, so until someone else comes around...

[the_logos]

Actually, that's why Adam made me moderator. The Tavern of the Blue Hand was probably the worst section of the forums, and was constantly filled with people attacking <fill in the blank...Medievia, the free-to-play business model, etc> in threads where those attacks were off-topic It's unproductive, and nobody was moderating. The idea is that I will actually moderate this forum, and try to ensure it doesn't constantly devolve into the endless, tiresome "Medthievia" style attack threads.

Oh, I don't mind the most of the time, unless I'm stressed about something else. My attitude is that if someone doesn't like me, it's not my problem, unless that person can somehow affect my life (which isn't the case with the forum posters who like to attack me.)
--matt

[Drealoth]

Unless he's really good at hiding it, Matt hasn't used his moderator powers to benefit himself. There aren't any sticky 'Play Achaea' threads out there. Threads promoting other muds or criticizing Matt or his MUDs aren't deleted, so I don't see the problem.

In fact, I think it's good that most (all?) of the moderators on this board are admins at popular MUDs, as they know way more about MUDs and mudding than almost anyone else here. Like him or not, you have to admit that Matt knows what he's doing - he's managed to make a living off of serving up coloured ascii characters in the age of $500 video cards.

[Xerihae]

I have no idea if any other moderator has been abusing their powers, and at the end of the day that's for Adam to deal with it has been happening. I just wanted to post a few things after reading a couple of the points in this thread.

I moderate the Newbie Help and MUD Humour sections. I do read both regularly, and both are pretty quiet so I rarely have to do anything. Apart from moving a couple of topics I felt were in the wrong section the only three times I've had to take action during the 18 months or so I've been a moderator were the following:

1 - A topic in MUD Humour contained "jokes" insulting disabled people, which I felt was uncalled for, so I cut them out.

2 - A topic in Newbie Help started with a valid question, then a few of the respondents descended into thinly-veiled insults against each other. After a warning, I deleted the offending posts and left a message saying not to repeat the behaviour.

3 - A topic or two in Newbie Help dealt with ways to get around MUD rules on multi-playing, which I felt was against the spirit of the board and closed.

In all three cases I left behind a message saying why I took the action I did, and if it was an edited post I left a coloured snip message detailing why I edited it. Although I feel this is a good way of moderating, everyone has their preferred way of doing things and there is no right way.

I was a MUD player for at least 8 years before I lost interest, although I do still log in to one or two games occasionally. I also code, although not in an advanced enough way to moderate coding sections on the here. I consider myself pretty impartial since I have no friendships on this board outside of Adam, care nothing for the sniping that goes on between regulars, and will happily deal with problems that I see without worrying about annoying people. I don't post regularly enough to get drawn in to the arguments.

It is possible to have moderators that are mostly unbiased, but the issue here is that many of the sections of this forum deal with technical issues that require people familiar with the issues to moderate them successfully. I feel this is the reason the moderators of the technical sections have their positions, whether you agree with the appointment or not.

As far as Matt goes, as long as he moderates his sections correctly it shouldn't matter what position he holds outside the forum. If you feel he is not doing his moderation correctly, then last time I checked Adam was still happy to deal with any issues emailed him. I will admit I don't read other sections enough to notice any moderating going on unless it's blatantly obvious because I concern myself only with my sections, so it's up to you as users to report anything you think is inappropriate, but I would caution you to be sure you have a basis for your complaint and not just a general "I hate <moderators name>" cause of how he/she/it posts.

[DonathinFrye]

I think the event that spurred on this folder's creation (or at least, most of the poster's comments towards Matt in it) came from him freezing and locking a thread that was about promoting 100% Free, non pay-for-perk MUDs, because people were defending the accusations Matt had made in the same thread towards Aardwolf. That's all.

[the_logos]

In fact, what I did was state two indisputable facts about Aardwolf: They sell stuff in-game, and they are a DIKU mud. This was done in response to another poster inquiring specifically about Aardwolf. My reply, laying out the facts, was completely on-topic and in no way was it an attack (I even explicitly mentioned that I don't have a problem with Aardwolf selling things). Some people (mainly you) chose to use that as an opportunity to launch off-topic attacks attempting to make me the subject of the thread rather than the MUDs, at which point I stepped in as moderator.

--matt

[DonathinFrye]

Your condescension and underhanded accusations/insults towards other MUDs are visible to anyone who reads your posts, Matt - you can twist your own words to make it sound like you were just providing information for the "good of the thread", but you were actually using the subject of the thread to take a cheap shot at Aardwolf, in which case I stepped in and did two things in my posts:

1) Defended Aardwolf's licensing issue - explaining that they were seeking out to work with the DIKU team to clear their code with Hans as non-DIKU (which he did, infact, do). I did also chide you for becoming involved in such a negative way within a thread that had nothing to do with you.

2) Give a list of Top 20 MUDs that I knew to be 100% Free, as the thread asked, as well as ones that I knew were commercial in some way.


You deleted both parts of my posts - one being a direct response to your implied(do not even bother trying to say that you were not implying anything) attacks on Aardwolf, and the other involving the subject of the post itself. When other people besides myself stepped up and said "Not cool, Matt", you froze the thread (ironically, a thread promoting the best in 100% Free MUDs on this site; basically, IRE's competition).

Give me a break, Matt - all of the twisted words and excuses in the world cannot make up for what is evident to anyone who reads your posts.

[the_logos]

This is why I am moderating this forum, frankly. When a simple statement of facts in response to a plain question by the thread starter is used as a platform for attacks, it's time for moderation.

--matt

[Lark]

Well, hey now, I kinda think of myself as halfway-sorta-almost neutral, and I chimed in on the 'not cool' side of the street. If I didn't before, then I am now, I guess.

The thing was, it brought to mind that sort of sit-com, at the dinner table sort of situation.

Parent: "How's school going, kids?"
(Which muds are pay-for-perks?)

Child 1: "Good. I finally found the 'F' book in our encyclopedia set. It must've slipped under my bed when I was doing that report on France."
(Aardwolf says something about themselves)

Child 2: "Speaking of 'F's', [Child 1's name] is flunking math!"
(Matt kinda jumps in here with information not exactly necessary to the subject at hand)

Parent: (gasps)
(gasp)


So I can't help but feel the cool moderator deal was compromised a good bit here. The information was true (kinda...we didn't get to see Donathin's explanations), but it didn't come out as a direct result of the line of questioning.

Words sort of fail me here, it's a bit of a 'feel' thing, but it seems that a moderator could've just as easily kept something like that under his hat, or addressed it over a PM, at least, rather than blurt it out and give the party in question a black mark, before all the technicalities and such were sorted out.

That and the deliberate "Iron Realms Sucks!" thread weigh in a bit on my mind, and I'm having a hard time defending it. It doesn't seem like that one would do anything for the whole 'cooling off the flames' deal.

So that's it, just what I've been thinking about. I'm thirsty.

[the_logos]

If you have any reason to believe that what I said wasn't absolutely factually true in that case (and thus was at least a partial excuse for an attack) please let me know what you're basing it on. I stated two things: Aardwolf sells stuff. Aardwolf is a DIKU. They are indisputably true. Aardwolf itself proclaims it sells stuff, and all one has to do to see that Aardwolf is a DIKU is connect. Says right on the front screen that it's ROM, which means it is DIKU.

The original poster had asked if Aardwolf sold things. Another poster said it couldn't because it was DIKU. I pointed out that it does sell things and it is DIKU. *shrug* I don't see how that can possibly be construed as an attack.

--matt

[Soleil]

[Ilkidarios]

The majority of people on this forum would not be accepted as moderators.  For instance, I don't know if Adam would appoint you as a moderator if you wanted to be one, Soleil.

[Fifi]

I certainly wasn't volunteering. If I were moderator I'd just relocate all the flames to the flames thread, and then it would be the only thread with posts. Until I got really board with moving every post to the flames thread and stopped paying any attention at all.

[Lark]

Since I'm the last one who posted, and everyone else is probably out doing things, I'll assume that I'm the one bitching. Probably me or Donathin.

As far as applying myself, ma'am, I haven't really considered it because I don't meet my own criteria. I'd ask the moderator to be unbiased (I try), not enjoy arguing (I do--still trying), and, if possible, be a very rare poster themselves (becoming less qualified every day).

Writing to Adam...hmm, I don't have much excuse, there. But it's hard to express in text how vehement you are over one particular or another, and in the case of replacing Matt, I'm not nearly as zealous as some. Not much at all, really. I haven't been here very long, and I just stated my opinion based on what I've seen. I didn't have the perception to realize others didn't feel the same.

My attitude in this situation is kinda like a friend of mine rolled up to me in his car, and I notice one of his tires has gone flat and been replaced with a donut. Noting my dismay, he explains he drove over some glass and the tire popped, thus the donut.

What brings about my dismay is, I say, "But you're going to get it fixed, right? When you get a chance. It's really not a permanent solution" and said friend replies that he likes the donut, it seems to be working out all right now and he doesn't see any reason to replace it.

Um, so, in conclusion, Matt's a donut, to me. He's serviceable, reliable enough to do his job for the time being, but he's not built to be a permanent fixture in his present occupation. He has my thanks for taking time out of his day to deal with whatever duties I don't know about.

But yeah. So that's mostly it. The Medievia stuff died down, but enough controversy to replace it has popped up from Matt, and whether it's all unfounded or not, I don't really know enough to say. I respect Matt's business saavy and the success of his muds, but I just don't really think he's moderator stock.

[Lark]

Sneaky bastards.

[the_logos]

Lark wrote:
Interesting. That is definitely the first time I have been termed a donut. I hope I'm a custard-filled or apple fritter donut.
--matt