Why? Because your nitpicking bullshit turns all conversation in a thread about you. You are channeling Chez these days; not adding anything to a discussion just adding noise that makes it harder for people to discuss something.
2 Likes
This thread dying out a bit today is a good sign to me. I think it means weāve found a good equilibrium on this that doesnāt require further argument. Tomorrow afternoon per the RFC process quoted below, I will be requesting that an admin post polls in this thread to approve our final wording of Rule 1 and 2. I would request everyoneās support on approval of the wording and subsequent support in the binding rule vote.
If you are on the fence about your support, Iām asking you to give something new a shot. This is a system that will make sure that every member of the forum feels they have a voice in how the forum is run and will empower our mod team to do their duty for the best interest of the forum during their terms.
Here is the RFC process to approval:
After an RFC thread has been open for at least 3 full days , any user can request a Forum Administrator to create a poll within the RFC thread to approve the wording for the proposal. Upon receipt of such request, a Forum Administrator shall use the Administrative Account to create a public poll stating the proposed wording of the rule with the choices of āYesā or āNo.ā The poll shall remain open for a period of one week . If the poll receives support from a majority of voters , the proposal will proceed to a binding rule vote. Otherwise, debate on the proposal may continue and any user can again request a vote on wording within the RFC thread.
If a proposal proceeds to a binding rule vote, a Forum Administrator will create a new thread in the About Unstuck subforum with a public poll stating the proposed wording of the rule with the choices of āYesā or āNo.ā The poll shall remain open for a period of one week . The proposed rule will be adopted if it receives support from at least two thirds of all voters for moderator appointments or if it receives support from at least 60 percent of voters for all other rules .
3 Likes
Whatever the result Meb, you have done a great job here shepharding this through in a constructive way.
15 Likes
This thread has been open for the required 3 days, and I would like to request that we officially move forward with a poll to adopt the wording of two separate rules per the RFC process. Please post a poll for each rule separately. Thanks for your help in this process!
Note to all voters: a Yes vote on these does not equate to you approving these as a binding rule. It means you are approving the wording and with approval we can move forward to a binding rule vote. I would appreciate all of your votes in support of this. A majority yes vote is required to move forward. Thank you!
Rule 1: A stickied and locked thread shall be created in the About Unstuck forum listing all current moderators, the date they were appointed, and the date their term ends unless they choose to resign early.
Rule 2: Moderation Terms. The forum will be moderated by a rotating team of moderators, which is intended to promote consistent change and a spirit of community moderation. Moderators will serve for a term of approximately six months. Moderatorsā terms of service will be staggered such that moderator terms end on a āRotation Dateā. The first Rotation Date will be September 1, 2021, and future Rotation Date will occur every two months. On each Rotation Date, any moderator who has served in their current term for at least 6 months will rotate out as a moderator and take a mandatory break from serving on the moderation team until the next Rotation Date.
Nominations and Elections. Two weeks prior to each Rotation Date, a nomination thread will be created in the About Unstuck forum requesting volunteers to serve as a moderator. Anyone who volunteers in the thread and receives at least 10 likes to their post will be nominated. After the nomination thread has been open for 3 days, the nomination thread will be closed, and another thread will be posted in About Unstuck with an individual poll for each nominee, which will will remain open for 3 days. Any nominee who receives at least two-thirds approval will be added to the mod team immediately. This means they should be in place for roughly 1 week prior to the Rotation Date, and a moderatorās term will last approximately 6 months and 1 week. For the sake of clarity, if a moderatorās six-month term ends on a Rotation Date of July 1, then they would be eligible for nomination in the mod approval process that leads up to the next Rotation Date (September 1). This rule replaces and makes all prior rules regarding mod terms null and void.
2 Likes
@anon46587892 @spidercrab please see above post. Just posted to tag your normal names as I realized you might not check notifications on the admin accounts. Thanks!
Disregard
I was assuming the ānominations and electionsā section was included as part of rule 2 but meb can confirm.
1 Like
Oh I see. The bolded subheading confused me.
It doesnāt need a new thread at this point, just a post in this thread to determine if it proceeds to a forum-wide vote.
1 Like
Moderation Terms and Nominations and Elections is all part of rule 2.
As for what you need to post, Iām just trying to follow the RFC rules:
Upon receipt of such request, a Forum Administrator shall use the Administrative Account to create a public poll stating the proposed wording of the rule with the choices of āYesā or āNo.ā The poll shall remain open for a period of one week . If the poll receives support from a majority of voters , the proposal will proceed to a binding rule vote. Otherwise, debate on the proposal may continue and any user can again request a vote on wording within the RFC thread.
I think this is correct
Okay I will try again and let me know if Iām doing it right.
1 Like
Thanks for helping and sorry we have to drag you into this process.
In accordance with the RFC process, below are polls to adopt the wording of two separate rules. A Yes vote on these does not equate to you approving these as a binding rule. It means you are approving the wording and with approval we can move forward to a binding rule vote. A majority yes vote is required to move forward.
Rule 1: A stickied and locked thread shall be created in the About Unstuck forum listing all current moderators, the date they were appointed, and the date their term ends unless they choose to resign early.
Rule 1
- Yes
- No
0 voters
Rule 2: Moderation Terms. The forum will be moderated by a rotating team of moderators, which is intended to promote consistent change and a spirit of community moderation. Moderators will serve for a term of approximately six months. Moderatorsā terms of service will be staggered such that moderator terms end on a āRotation Dateā. The first Rotation Date will be September 1, 2021, and future Rotation Date will occur every two months. On each Rotation Date, any moderator who has served in their current term for at least 6 months will rotate out as a moderator and take a mandatory break from serving on the moderation team until the next Rotation Date.
Nominations and Elections. Two weeks prior to each Rotation Date, a nomination thread will be created in the About Unstuck forum requesting volunteers to serve as a moderator. Anyone who volunteers in the thread and receives at least 10 likes to their post will be nominated. After the nomination thread has been open for 3 days, the nomination thread will be closed, and another thread will be posted in About Unstuck with an individual poll for each nominee, which will will remain open for 3 days. Any nominee who receives at least two-thirds approval will be added to the mod team immediately. This means they should be in place for roughly 1 week prior to the Rotation Date, and a moderatorās term will last approximately 6 months and 1 week. For the sake of clarity, if a moderatorās six-month term ends on a Rotation Date of July 1, then they would be eligible for nomination in the mod approval process that leads up to the next Rotation Date (September 1). This rule replaces and makes all prior rules regarding mod terms null and void.
Rule 2
- Yes
- No
0 voters
3 Likes
Only voted no to #2 because I think 2 months is too short and would prefer 6 months on / 6 months off.
8 Likes
For future reference, this was good because I almost never access the admin account at all. Iām just a break glass in case of emergency admin.
2 Likes
Good shit we is legislating up in this mofo.
1 Like
When this comes up for an actual binding vote, Iād appreciate your support. I think that people will take longer breaks in practice once we get this up and running, and weāll also have more people participating as mods. Mandating longer breaks would likely scare off too many people for this to pass though.
2 Likes
We are a little over 1 day into the required 7 day voting period on the wording of our rules and so far voting looks strongly in favor of both. I want to use this time before we can officially vote on these as binding rules to begin the campaign for passage of these rules.
Letās start with the background of why Iām taking this on. Iāve never been banned, or as far as I know had a single mod action taken against me on this forum. So I would seem an unlikely person to take up this charge. However, the thing I value most about this forum is the community of intelligent people brought together here that give me great insight across the entire left spectrum on political topics, but also incredible information across a number of topics of interest to me. Keeping this community together is in my self-interest and without significant intervention we were speeding towards a point of no return for keeping this together.
So letās talk about the concept of an online community. In most cases forums take place on a website with an owner who has a business interest in the success of their forum and/or the website it is attached to. These forums, like many across the internet, are likely moderated by volunteers. If a user has an issue with the moderation of the forum though, there is a path to escalate the issue above the mod and potentially to the site owner or someone who will care about the business interests of the site. At that point they are able to make a decision as to whether the action of the moderator matches up with their business interests. In many cases they will back this mod up and in others they may reverse the decision and give guidance to steer the forum in a different direction.
As for Unstuck Politics, this site was created with an ideal of community ownership. When you hear that it sounds like everyone owns a piece of the site, but what it really means is there is no owner and there is no one who has any business or financial interest in the success of the site. In this setup the mods may still be volunteers, but especially when combined with a permanent position or implied permanence we have turned them into de facto owners of the site. Their only interest in how the site runs is to run it in a way that best suits them.
So how do we fix this? We create a system of moderation that prevents permanence and simultaneously encourages a changeover of duties amongst the community. This setup better instills a sense of duty to the community in the position. This also has the knock on effect of providing a healthy break to our mod team, and will hopefully draw in a larger group from the community willing to take a turn as a mod.
To this point, goofyballer correctly pointed out (paraphrasing here) that if I have such a great interest in fixing the forum and how mods should perform their duties that I should to some level back up my words by volunteering for mod duty. While I am unable to immediately serve in this duty, my commitment to the forum is that if rule 2 passes as written, I will volunteer to take my turn in the barrel with the mod rotation that starts January 1st 2022. If approved and the community approves of how I serve in the job, I will likely continue volunteering to serve a 6 month term starting January 1st of each year for as long as this community stays viable and interesting to me.
9 Likes
Your arguments are extremely unpersuasive (and Iāll be voting against the new rules) but this part is especially disappointing.
1 Like