That's because it's reserved for extreme cases and most users will never, ever have to worry about it. There's plenty of moderation procedure that isn't made common knowledge just through the virtue of the fact that it's unnecessary even for most mods to be aware of it at all times. The stuff that actually affects you guys is all out there.

I'm not entirely sure of the circumstances around you being added to that watch list (not the blacklist) but it really hasn't been an issue for a while now. Like jeff said, milestone bans for notable members are usually treated in a case-by-case basis either way.

Quote from Jutsu

Then my question is, why not? If it's so logical and justifiable what is there to fear about it being common knowledge?

Just the fact that users don't even know they can be put on such a list is a little bothersome, you know what I mean?

What I meant in my previous post is that moderators in general just don't talk about personal infractions publicly because usually it just isn't very polite.

I'm confused about what is being discussed. Infraction reasons aren't kept private right now by rule? You can ask any time but as Raptor said sometimes it might be sensitive and so the mods are generally cautious about it. Though part of my push for transparency and accountability will be making those publicly viewable without having to ask, and I think that's a good thing because keeping them private creates communication problems.

If the issue is what the qualifier for getting a permanent infraction is, then there is no specific answer, only a general one. As Exilement says it's such a rare occurrence that it's generally decided circumstantially. Generally, it's reserved for users who otherwise contribute normally but have recurring behavioral issues that they refuse to address. You can only issue the same "you're harassing people and we want you to stop" infraction so many times before it becomes clear that the infractee has no intention of changing what we are telling them is a problem for us. The time scale this occurs in is usually a larger one, otherwise if it happened too frequently the milestone bans would kick in, so the idea is that permanent infractions are the last attempt to send a clear message: This infraction isn't going away. If you keep this behavior up any longer it will result in you being banned, so it's up to that person if they want to continue ignoring the infractions or change their behavior. It's the same thing as sending a PM warning, but can be seen by all mods so they're on the same page. We don't always publicize rarely-used measures like this because it's not something people need to worry about unless they have a history of problems, and we don't want people to game the system because it just makes more mess to clean up. If it was a policy that affected everyone we would be transparent about it, we wouldn't expect everyone to follow rules they weren't privy to.

That's a good point and to add to it -

Quote from Jutsu

I'm saying that there might actually be situations where a ban is questionable upon accumulating enough infractions. Like if I hover nine infractions for a year which never expire and then the tenth one is just the one that broke the camels back and users feel like I didn't actually deserve to be banned over something so petty.

It might seem petty if you look at the final infraction and blame the ban on that entirely, but breaking rules consistently enough to get put onto a blacklist AND accumulating 10 further infractions in the next year is still an insane amount of rule breaking. I mean in 10 years I've never received a legitimate infraction. Once we're dealing with cases like these there's really no excuse for it. If someone saw your hypothetical situation as unfair then they don't really understand what it takes to get to that point in the first place.

Quote from Jeff

Oh I think I see. Do you mean like the more reports a post gets the more attention should be drawn to it for the mods?

Yes, more like this that way the handing out infractions is more so up to the community policing itself up rather than one person getting butt mad or leaving it up to the discretion of whichever moderator gets there first. A good example would be camila. She's known for letting her sympathy for others get in the way of how she moderates way more than others, so she would have some bias in infractions and when or for whom to give infractions out to. Then the whole scene could turn into a debate and have the mods and community taking sides and arguing and debating for days over something silly. This whole community policing itself up concept would help keep bias out if the process and allow the moderation team to use their time doing better things for the website.

edit: I was also thinking about setting it up on an automated system if that could potentially be a possibility. If ten people flag a post for spam, an automated infraction could be sent, and after two or three an automated ban could be put in place. The numbers of course are just generalizations.

things that i would like to see improved
-obviously, SP frontage, SP portal and more integration with the forum
-search function(needs al0t of work)
-front page of site and the forums(I feel like [forum's front page] needs to be more 'inviting', like a user feed or recommendation list)
-it would be pretty cool to see an rating system, like you could only up vote or down vote something once a day

It's been sort of mentioned a couple times I think, but the general section gets so much attention. For some reason, it's above whatever has to do with animation..like wtf?
There's a real problem with bringing the community together for things animation/art related, I think half of it has to do with the way this site looks

Quote from Alien

It's been sort of mentioned a couple times I think, but the general section gets so much attention. For some reason, it's above whatever has to do with animation..like wtf?
There's a real problem with bringing the community together for things animation/art related, I think half of it has to do with the way this site looks

Personally I grew out of animating stick figures a long time ago once I realized that I wasn't a part of the elite few that can actually have some sort of future doing such a thing. As it turns out a lot of other people grew out of it too, whatever their reasons are. Frankly stick figure animation isn't popular enough to take the spotlight over something like general discussion which is something anyone can participate in, animator or not.

Popularity doesn't dictate the forum order, though. Personally I'd prefer General on top but if they decide to restructure the forum to reflect their focus on animation that's a fair move. I've been to more than a couple of forums that have 'chit chat' discussion sections relegated to special interest sections at the bottom/middle of the page, it's not a big deal one way or the other really.

The new site with offer a lot more in the way of customization. I have plans to modify the way the main forum page is structured so that you can enable/disable sections you don't have any interest in. Same goes for the activity feed, you wont need things like Scarecrow's plugin in order to filter out countent you don't want to see.

EDIT: I'm heading home for the day. I'll try to keep up with any comments posted tonight, but if not I'll be back at work tomorrow.

The fact that the forum is still using VBulletin's default forum skin has always irritated me. It's so easy to add new skins, and there's already a style picker down at the bottom of each page. Anyone who wants to keep using the default skin can just pick it. It just makes the forum look neglected, I dunno. I remember how hard it was for me to force the admins to add signature/avatar picture overlap so that posts weren't gigantic, but that's before we had any admins who both used the forum and had the ability to change it.

I haven't read all the replies yet but I'll offer my 2 cents on Jeff's points:

Quote from Jeff

Better Mod System - I think there's a problem with Infractions from a fundamental level. I've always been trying to push for consistency with the mod team but that's difficult especially given that most of the time the infractions aren't in black and white. I want to work with the mods in order to brainstorm a revision or new system for maintaining the forum.

I always assumed that since the Infraction threads were open for public scrutiny (to the other Mods), that if my Infraction for example had no replies, it was acceptable. This was actually good for awhile, but since the transition to next-gen moderators (any changes after Camila went purple), this hasn't been addressed properly and has turned into an unknown unwritten rule. I think the problem here stems from a lack of Mod-interactivity. Of course I can't speak for for the situation as of present anymore, but Infraction threads used to have alot more activity and opinion-brewing. A Moderator without any direction is not just ineffective, but can also be grounds for exploitation if they ever turn to the Dark Side and they give "but nobody told me it was bad" as an excuse.

I know this personally, because I believe I've walked this path before. I know quite a few users who were quite sore with me who had finally found the courage to tell me off after I stepped down when at the time, I didn't really think what I did was wrong because no Mod called me out on it. But I have always maintained a clear line of communication and was generally confused. These PMs have stopped but the point is, yeah the system is flawed and I think it's because the Mods don't moderate themselves enough anymore. Zed, Sacred, Exilement, and Devour (when they were purple) kept things ship shape with their opinions on individual Infractions and new mod-rulings. We need more of that. I realize that half of the above are still in the Mod team but maybe their duties aren't as wide in scope anymore. It was why I pitched Rosie and Cami to be purple in the first place; because they have knowledge from the RHG/Stick stuff side of things.

By the way, I know that as a Mod you're suppose to know what's right. I don't claim that every one of my Infractions was because "nobody called me out on it" but there were times when I felt I just had to make a judgement call. There is a spectrum; there's knowing exactly how to deal with something and there's vague grey areas that no matter how long you've been around and how high your seniority is will lead you to question yourself. I've experienced this the most because I'm usually the only CoreMod online when everyone else is asleep. I've been raggin' on Naimad for ages, and I've always thought his posts were spammy and derivative of derailment. Post-stepdown, I am told that I was just rude to him if not always misunderstanding him. I don't wanna argue about this right now, but the point here is in my time with the colors, having seen his post-history, I really felt he was not contributing to the chats at all. And no other Mod questioned this in the Infraction threads so I always thought it was fine.

Quote from Jeff

Rules & Policies - Once we've settled on a direction for the new site we're going to revisit the rules and rework them to suit what we want to accomplish. This will include having clear descriptions for potentially ambiguous things like "harassment" and total transparency when a new rule is added.

I feel like it's not so much as the Rule's vagueness but the fact that the Mods also need to Moderate threads and constantly remind them of the Golden Rule instead of resorting to Infractions all the time. What is initially a misunderstanding can easily be resolved with a post to 'cut it out' or to mediate potentially explosive situations or to just delete unwanted posts to assure that a thread flows smoother. A lack of this as of late is the reason why jokes about Azure being a robot exist (and I'm not just saying this because of the one controversial infraction he gave me; I am over that).

While I do not contest how it turned out, I feel like the mike situation could've been handled better. There was a clear miscommunication between users and mods most egregiously when Rosie, who had no understanding of recent events simply shutdown Arch-Angel's thread to plea for Mike's recent behavioral ban on the grounds of slandering a user when the thread was a cry for help for the Mods to listen and pay attention. This eventually sparked Drone to raise his torch and pitchfork and well you know the rest.

But even before all that, there was a chance for at least one Mod to PM Mike, let him know the score, and hand him an ultimatum; something I let harvie and guitarii have in my time. Now don't get me wrong, I know Exilement and Cami at least tried talking to this guy, but it appears they just gave up halfway because the frustration of not getting through to him was publicly posted in the chat thread. It just felt very unprofessional and should have been dealt with better imo. Sorry if there is something I'm not seeing but that's what I'm interpreting thus far.

I also think there should always been an opportunity to link the Rules to offenders even if they're old members. It's embarrassing everytime I infract say, Scarecrow or Cronos but Mods exist to parrot the rules and remind users that something just ain't right. Why do you think I created the RHG character rules thread separately from the RHG Battle Rules thread? So I can remind noobs that that place has rules by referring it to them whenever they minimod a potential threadlock or spam someone's RHG thread or make an RHG without a demo instead of just infracting them with "No Demo, Not an RHG. Pls remake." The best kind of user is those that help themselves.

Quote from Jeff

Staff Accountability - In the current system it's difficult to see why someone was banned or infracted. This seems to create a communication problem and often ends in assumptions being made which can further cause conflict. While we need to maintain some degree of privacy among staff discussion, I believe it's in everyone's best interest if bans and infractions are made public. There is immediate benefit for everyone in this: mods will need to be clear in their reasoning and users can see what's going on and object at any time.

I personally don't see the problem with the current system, but I do agree that it needs better understanding and tweaking. Ever since Devour's "Why is X banned?" thread showed up, I have been staunchly against it. I do not believe a public witch burning thread solves this issue. But it's not so much as keeping users in the dark, as the potential to abuse that privilege that's bothering me. I mean, I always thought that the reason mods don't reveal how many infractions does it take to get week/permabanned is to prevent exploitation of said system. And this has already happened before: 2D and Guitarii/harvie were shining examples of this; they knew exactly how many infractions it took to get permabanned, so they would rest for weeks upon weeks only to start right back at square one and keep racking up minor infractions. It was this very reason that the Blacklist* was created. You guys are still using that right?

However, on the other end of this spectrum, we have controversially significant users who are suddenly banned for no reason---at least in the public eye who mistake their offenses for their most popular one instead of of the proper one. An example of this is Travis. I know, it is a sore subject for me to bring up, but it is the best example I can remember. He was generally known for being an animation lover and had created several events and threads in the favor of this site, however the public was never privy to our background discussion of his behavior and thus when he was banned many assumed it was a hate crime instead of the apparent. And at that time, we felt it pertinent to not reveal it to the general public the true reasons behind his ban because by culture we expect that the community "trust us".

I remember one specific Stickpage-hatred-fuelled Flame and Rant thread at the Dojo, where butthurt permabanned graduates of SP were comlpaining about us and the unrealistic justifications they presented. In fact, it took Exilement to set one of them straight with the reveal of the true reason why they were perma'd.

In addition, I also don't see the point of noobs constantly asking why x is banned over an Infraction Overload. While it is the Mod's job to police the minor crimes, it is certainly the users jobs to know the rules inherently as well. So I find it really baffling that everyone keeps saying "Infraction Overload" when they should be saying "Multi-Posting" or "Offtopic Spamming". Because what the hell are future users going to do with "Infraction Overload". How will they know what to avoid in the future? If they were constantly reminded of the rules everytime an infraction happens, they wouldn't even be wondering. It's just come to a point where users/noobs have gone lazy and assume that x is banned for mysterious shadowy reasons and always expect someone to tell them "No, he just did something minor and we put em away." Every. Damn. Time. Whatever happened to "trust the mods"?

It's also come to a point where noobs just goto that thread to know the Rules. Like, they're no longer concerned with what they shouldn't be doing, but with which rule led to that particular ban. Whatever happened to "Read the Rules and we won't have any trouble"? It just feels like the thread has sensationalized banning. People just LOVE seeing someone get banned like its on America's Funniest Videos and so they tune in every week to see which idiot fucked up this time. Banning via minor infractions used to be a way to curve behavior. Like falling off a bike when riding it without training wheels for the first time. They were never meant to be shown for all the world to see. In fact, the initial purpose of that thread was suppose to be only for the special cases and permabans, as I recall.

I feel the solution to this needs some kind of middle ground. We would require:
- Public knowledge of how Infractions work. In general...
- ...without the potential to be exploited.
- And with the constant caveat that special cases are to be treated with integrity.

*Glossary time: the Blacklist is a Batcave-only thread invented by Rosie where Minor Repeat Offenders (as opposed to notoriously toxic users) are noted and discussed for grounds to receive permanent infractions and insta-bans. It mostly led to permabans and the two were often interchangeable.

Quote from Jeff

Appeals - Right now we don't have clear recourse for banned users or infractions. I always say that you can contact me about anything and as long as you're not being a dick I'll do my best to help, but it's not advertised anywhere and I can't expect people to just know that. Additionally, how are users supposed to contact us when they're banned? The second account rule is a grey area that seems easily abused. I am designing a better system for filing appeals directly against infractions and bans, which may or may not also be publicly visible.

Well. And I admit I am guilty of this one; to my knowledge, aren't Mods suppose to remind users that they can make an 2nd/3rd account to talk to Mods for appeal? You can imagine my noob-Mod self pissed when I found out Guitarii found this "loophole" and started talking to me about it. But seeing it now, this system of appeal is really flawed.

I suggest that there be another status between permabanned and infracted, something akin to Shadowbanning on Reddit. Basically, your a ghost; you won't be able to post or your posts won't be able to be seen and the only privilege you get is PM-ing. For all intents and purposes they are permabanned, but they will have 10 days or something to try and appeal it. Then if the probationary period goes sour, you can ban em for real.

I read that entire post but I'm genuinely confused at this point, perhaps it's too many issues being brought up at once. Halfway through you summarized the Mike situation without offering anything resembling a solution. Are you aware of the hours upon hours I spent PMing him behind the scenes educating him on basic forum etiquette only for him to lie to my face repeatedly about something as ridiculous as him being in the Marines? after I repeatedly requested evidence of his claims he sent me a low-resolution cell phone photograph of him wearing a marines baseball cap, dogtags and sunglasses, all of which were on the front page of the Marine's online gift shop. I couldn't make this shit up if I tried.

my first run as a moderator was in 2007, hand picked from Zulu through a discussion on AIM that eventually led to the creation of the NTF, something that 99% of the current userbase doesn't even remember. in 8 years of on-off activity as a moderator I've never invested as much time as I've invested into Mike, but you bring it up just to remind us that we failed to deal with the situation properly without offering any kind of real solution or meaningful insight. did you know that he tried to get jeff in trouble through IRC by lying to adelais's customer service about the way he was being treated? behind the scenes the entire situation is a clusterfuck on a level that you've never dealt with as a moderator, and I can say that with confidence since I was active during your entire run. maybe it's a problem of communication but you could've asked about it, you know? instead of these assumptions which you're all very prone to clinging to. it's not like we're unavailable, I'm always here if you guys want to know what's going on. I very rarely get PMs from anyone regarding current events.

so the rest of your post is polluted by the same lack of perspective. you're not a mod anymore. things have changed fairly radically. to be honest, our duties as mods have dwindled in the last half year or so. discussions are minimal at best, infractions are relatively straightforward and we only deal with major problems every couple of weeks or so, if that. I don't mean to dismiss most of your points because you make quite a few good ones, I'm pressed for time right now, but try to keep in mind that if you've been harboring frustrations it's not our fault for not being aware of it. in the last decade of stickpage's history the mod and admin team has never been so accessible to one-on-one communication with individual users. I don't see many people taking advantage of it.

Quote from Exilement

I read that entire post but I'm genuinely confused at this point, perhaps it's too many issues being brought up at once. Halfway through you summarized the Mike situation without offering anything resembling a solution. Are you aware of the hours upon hours I spent PMing him behind the scenes educating him on basic forum etiquette only for him to lie to my face repeatedly about something as ridiculous as him being in the Marines? after I repeatedly requested evidence of his claims he sent me a low-resolution cell phone photograph of him wearing a marines baseball cap, dogtags and sunglasses, all of which were on the front page of the Marine's online gift shop. I couldn't make this shit up if I tried.

Okay two separate issues. First, Jeff is asking for an opinion/feedback on the way things have been running. So that's what I'm doing: offering my opinion on the state of things. I wasn't aware that I had to inherently offer a solution to each and every observation I made (isn't that the Mod/Admin's job?) nor was I aware that these are all realistic glaring issues that everyone agrees with. I am giving this community some food for thought using what I collectively know and I'm sorry if a fraction of that was peppered with "dated ex-mod knowledge" but that's who I am. I mean, won't Zed sometimes add what he 'used to do in his day' if it was relevant, even though you won't be using that method anyway? I just thought a unique insight from the both worlds could help reveal new things about what we've been experiencing.

I am not complaining or nagging about anything. The fact that Jeff has left the floor open means he is inviting critical opinion. If I really wanted to bust everyone's balls or care about it on a personal level, I would have made a thread about it myself and just ranted. The way the forums right now is just fine and you guys are doing a stellar job. I mean ultimately whatever Jeff decides goes anyway, but if he is intentionally asking for an open forum, why can't I put a few cents in. Btw, that one post I made about the Porn thread being locked was just that: an opinion. I know that you know that I know how it could have been dealt in terms of mod experience, and I mostly agreed with it which is why I never replied back. But the way the chat was going at the time gave an opening for me to discuss it in the same way that Jeff is now giving an opening for me to discuss this. So chill.

Secondly, I have no doubt that you tried your darndest to PM Mike with a straight face and I'm sorry if my observation meant to imply anything. I already made the disclaimer that I am simply reporting what I know and not criticizing any action in the slightest. My question is though is if he did all that shit, why wasn't he just perma'd on the spot? I am asking NOT because that's what I would've done, but because leaving him alone without perma-ing seem to have escalated the situation further. I just want to know, if that is okay to share.

Quote from Exilement

my first run as a moderator was in 2007, hand picked from Zulu through a discussion on AIM that eventually led to the creation of the NTF, something that 99% of the current userbase doesn't even remember. in 8 years of on-off activity as a moderator

I know this. You've mentioned this at times and I'm always aware of your experience with this place. There was never any question.

Quote from Exilement

I've never invested as much time as I've invested into Mike, but you bring it up just to remind us that we failed to deal with the situation properly without offering any kind of real solution or meaningful insight.

Whoa whoa, hold up. I never intended or implied that I was blaming mods. You know that I know that half the stuff that happens here is never really revealed to the public for the best of reasons. If Mike did in fact do all those things behind all our backs and you guys were on top of the situation, then I can accept that hearing that now. But that's the point: I didn't hear about it then and no one did. I'm simply pointing things out from a perspective of a non-mod with regards to that incident. Really the only conclusion we ever got was that Mike hung himself after awhile so knowing only that without so much as a public notice just led me to believe that he couldn't handle the pressure and just quit. You didn't even have to explain the whole adelais thing in detail. There could've just been some vague added justification that Mike did something malicious and left it at that.

EDIT: And this is a question I'd like to pose to Jeff: If things like the SP Ban thread exist, why weren't we informed about the extra-malicious things Mike did? How much should the public know about the inner machinations of how Mods work? This constantly returning question is the reason behind my doubts for this threads existence. If the mods dealt with Mike privately and with more than what we know now as Exilement has elaborated, which is the better stance: that it be kept in the dark or that the people have a right to know? Either way is fine for us. I just expect some kind of consistency with how policy is dealt with.

Quote from Exilement

so the rest of your post is polluted by the same lack of perspective. you're not a mod anymore. things have changed fairly radically. to be honest, our duties as mods have dwindled in the last half year or so. discussions are minimal at best, infractions are relatively straightforward and we only deal with major problems every couple of weeks or so, if that. I don't mean to dismiss most of your points because you make quite a few good ones, I'm pressed for time right now, but try to keep in mind that if you've been harboring frustrations it's not our fault for not being aware of it. in the last decade of stickpage's history the mod and admin team has never been so accessible to one-on-one communication with individual users. I don't see many people taking advantage of it.

Okay it seems that I may have struck a chord here. Would you be happier if I wasn't the one saying these things and was another user altogether? Did I inadvertently imply that the current administration is not doing its job? That was not my intention. I am not harshly criticizing the system but I am still criticizing it no less. You guys are doing a great job. But when things like Mikegate happen, and topics about vague rules and how user-infractions are dealt with come up, how do you expect me to not to put two and two together? My lack of perspective is obviously because yes, I am no longer one of you; thank you for pointing that out. So then, if that were the case, why bother having this thread here in the first place? Opinions btw that Jeff is asking for. Opinions btw that concern Modly things like Infractions and the Rules. Just put the thread in the Batcave or make it a closed invite-only thread and just stop all opinions from "the common people" from coming in. If there is a conference concerning a company and the public is entitled to make suggestions, can't a retired consultant make insights about the Security of his former employer (with discretion to certain things of course) because he too is one of the public now?

My lack of perspective is directly proportional to your defensiveness on integrity. Chill out bro, we're having a discussion about the forums and that's all there is to it. Stop trying to assume that I'm wearing my Mod goggles as I type these things. I hung those up ages ago.

Quote from Hewitt

I always assumed that since the Infraction threads were open for public scrutiny (to the other Mods), that if my Infraction for example had no replies, it was acceptable. This was actually good for awhile, but since the transition to next-gen moderators (any changes after Camila went purple), this hasn't been addressed properly and has turned into an unknown unwritten rule. I think the problem here stems from a lack of Mod-interactivity. Of course I can't speak for for the situation as of present anymore, but Infraction threads used to have alot more activity and opinion-brewing. A Moderator without any direction is not just ineffective, but can also be grounds for exploitation if they ever turn to the Dark Side and they give "but nobody told me it was bad" as an excuse.

I know this personally, because I believe I've walked this path before. I know quite a few users who were quite sore with me who had finally found the courage to tell me off after I stepped down when at the time, I didn't really think what I did was wrong because no Mod called me out on it. But I have always maintained a clear line of communication and was generally confused. These PMs have stopped but the point is, yeah the system is flawed and I think it's because the Mods don't moderate themselves enough anymore. Zed, Sacred, Exilement, and Devour (when they were purple) kept things ship shape with their opinions on individual Infractions and new mod-rulings. We need more of that. I realize that half of the above are still in the Mod team but maybe their duties aren't as wide in scope anymore. It was why I pitched Rosie and Cami to be purple in the first place; because they have knowledge from the RHG/Stick stuff side of things.

By the way, I know that as a Mod you're suppose to know what's right. But there is a spectrum; there's knowing exactly how to deal with something and there's vague grey areas that no matter how long you've been around and how high your seniority is will lead you to question yourself. I've experienced this the most because I'm usually the only CoreMod online when everyone else is asleep. I've been raggin' on Naimad for ages, and I've always thought his posts were spammy and derivative of derailment. Post-stepdown, I am told that I was just rude to him if not always misunderstanding him. I don't wanna argue about this right now, but the point here is in my time with the colors, having seen his post-history, I really felt he was not contributing to the chats at all. And no other Mod questioned this in the Infraction threads so I always thought it was fine.

You're making a lot of assumptions here, especially because you haven't been actively involved in anything behind the scenes for a while. There are two flaws I want to point out, because you seem to be pushing forward with points that don't really have a solid base.

First, you assumed that since infraction threads were open to other mods that meant that if your infraction had no comments it was fine, but that's flawed reasoning. You should know as well as anyone else that it's impossible to keep up with every post in the forum let alone every infraction coming in. It was never expected nor standard practice for mods to police each other. It's certainly encouraged so that we can keep each other in check, but so much goes on that I feel it would be asking too much to also then ask the mods to review and fact check every infraction that comes in. There's no precedent for it, so claiming it hasn't been "properly addressed" (despite not knowing what exactly happens back stage) doesn't really mean anything when it was never required. I can go back into the section that lists all infractions and see that the majority of threads only ever had 1 view, and while it's true that sometimes mods would browse through and call out bullshit if they saw it, I don't think it ever happened enough to set a precedent. You were likely the only person who believed that they were in the clear so long as no one complained, but that's kind of a lazy approach to moderation.

Second, every mod still does this anyway. Again, as you said you don't know what's going on back there so it's weird to see you making this statement as if it's factual. I see it probably more than ever in recent times especially since the mod team is less of a hive mind than it once was, we all have pretty different opinions and approaches to things. There are often pages long debates over certain issues and a lot gets said. Sometimes tempers can run hot but in the end I think it's what makes us a little more effective in making tough decisions. Drone is fairly new and has made some questionable decisions because of that but we're quick to tell him as such and now he's a much better mod because of it and I haven't had any problems with him lately. He's also not afraid to challenge me and asks some pretty tough questions when it comes to wanting no-bullshit answers and I'm happy to engage in that discussion. It's not perfect by far, but I don't think mod interactivity is the issue.

The issues you're raising are better solved by public accountability, but I'll get more into that later.

Quote from Hewitt

I feel like it's not so much as the Rule's vagueness but the fact that the Mods also need to Moderate threads and constantly remind them of the Golden Rule instead of resorting to Infractions all the time. What is initially a misunderstanding can easily be resolved with a post to 'cut it out' or to mediate potentially explosive situations or to just delete unwanted posts to assure that a thread flows smoother. A lack of this as of late is the reason why jokes about Azure being a robot exist (and I'm not just saying this because of the one controversial infraction he gave me; I am over that).

I don't agree with this. I see people saying this a lot - "you need to actually MODERATE instead of just handing out infractions" - but what does that even mean? You say moderate like we're supposed to understand what that entails to you. I don't think semantics should matter here, in the context of this forum we go by the standard definition for internet moderators which has historically been someone who helps manage and control the forum. I don't know any other place that treats it differently, and we've done it this way for years. A moderator doesn't mean mediator in this case, even if moderators should have that skill. Handing out infractions IS moderating. Not handing out infractions isn't a solution - that just completely disorganizes us. How are we supposed to keep track of what's going on? Where is the record for new mods to see a user's history? If we had mods just post "cut it out" and do nothing else, those users could keep doing it over and over again with different mods. It's also not like the mods don't step in and make posts when it's necessary anyway, I see mods making posts in a thread asking people to stop or get back on track enough. Other situations wouldn't warrant that. Are you expecting mods to just post "don't double post" every time someone breaks that rule?

Quote from Hewitt

While I do not contest how it turned out, I feel like the mike situation could've been handled better. There was a clear miscommunication between users and mods most egregiously when Rosie, who had no understanding of recent events simply shutdown Arch-Angel's thread to plea for Mike's recent behavioral ban on the grounds of slandering a user when the thread was a cry for help for the Mods to listen and pay attention. This eventually sparked Drone to raise his torch and pitchfork and well you know the rest.

But even before all that, there was a chance for at least one Mod to PM Mike, let him know the score, and hand him an ultimatum; something I let harvie and guitarii have in my time. Now don't get me wrong, I know Exilement and Cami at least tried talking to this guy, but it appears they just gave up halfway because the frustration of not getting through to him was publicly posted in the chat thread. It just felt very unprofessional and should have been dealt with better imo. Sorry if there is something I'm not seeing but that's what I'm interpreting thus far.

I think this is a poor example, because from my perspective the cry for help came from an unruly mob that was bullying another member and wanted mods to validate their shitty behaviour by banning a member who - at the time - did not deserve the ban or the treatment he was getting. He definitely ended up doing some really shitty things, but the catalyst for that whole fracas was how regular members were treating him from the start. You're referencing it from a perspective I do not share so your point is lost on me. Clearer rules would have allows us to put a stop to that bullshit before it even got to that point, and the only reason the ban happened at all is because someone manipulated him into it. That incident nearly caused quite a few people to be banned because the behaviour was actually deplorable and caused me to completely lose faith in and respect for that part of the community. The only reason Mike is still banned is because of things he did after that whole thing played out. The mods were busy doing damage control and debating the merits of the arguments against him, but just because you disagree with what we ended up advocating doesn't mean it was handled poorly.

Quote from Hewitt

I also think there should always been an opportunity to link the Rules to offenders even if they're old members. It's embarrassing everytime I infract say, Scarecrow or Cronos but Mods exist to parrot the rules and remind users that something just ain't right. Why do you think I created the RHG character rules thread separately from the RHG Battle Rules thread? So I can remind noobs that that place has rules by referring it to them whenever they minimod a potential threadlock or spam someone's RHG thread or make an RHG without a demo instead of just infracting them with "No Demo, Not an RHG. Pls remake." The best kind of user is those that help themselves.

I don't see a point in linking rules to people who know they exist already. There are circumstances that warrant it - when MoD came back recently he was breaking a few rules but I recognize that he also hasn't been around for a while and probably doesn't even know he's doing it. So I just let him know what was up and where he could read about the rules and that was the end of it, it was a very reasonable experience. But that's completely different to someone who's been active enough to know of the rules. Generally if an older member is breaking the rules they either have a reason for doing it (which may not warrant an infraction so none would be issues), did it intentionally, or it was a mistake. There's no reason in any of those situations to hold their hand like that. Most older members don't even care about getting an infraction anyway, it seems like the last few times I've had to do it the person just went, "Shit I didn't realize I did that." Or, "Understood." And I either reversed the infraction or it expired because they're good members.

Other than that our policy for a while has been to warn newer members first and direct them to the rules so they know what they did wrong and what else they should be careful of and it seems to go fine.

Quote from Hewitt

I personally don't see the problem with the current system, but I do agree that it needs better understanding and tweaking. Ever since Devour's "Why is X banned?" thread showed up, I have been staunchly against it. I do not believe a public witch burning thread solves this issue. But it's not so much as keeping users in the dark, as the potential to abuse that privilege that's bothering me. I mean, I always thought that the reason mods don't reveal how many infractions does it take to get week/permabanned is to prevent exploitation of said system. And this has already happened before: 2D and Guitarii/harvie were shining examples of this; they knew exactly how many infractions it took to get permabanned, so they would rest for weeks upon weeks only to start right back at square one and keep racking up minor infractions. It was this very reason that the Blacklist* was created. You guys are still using that right?

However, on the other end of this spectrum, we have controversially significant users who are suddenly banned for no reason---at least in the public eye who mistake their offenses for their most popular one instead of of the proper one. An example of this is Travis. I know, it is a sore subject for me to bring up, but it is the best example I can remember. He was generally known for being an animation lover and had created several events and threads in the favor of this site, however the public was never privy to our background discussion of his behavior and thus when he was banned many assumed it was a hate crime instead of the apparent. And at that time, we felt it pertinent to not reveal it to the general public the true reasons behind his ban because by culture we expect that the community "trust us".

I remember one specific Stickpage-hatred-fuelled Flame and Rant thread at the Dojo, where butthurt permabanned graduates of SP were comlpaining about us and the unrealistic justifications they presented. In fact, it took Exilement to set one of them straight with the reveal of the true reason why they were perma'd.

In addition, I also don't see the point of noobs constantly asking why x is banned over an Infraction Overload. While it is the Mod's job to police the minor crimes, it is certainly the users jobs to know the rules inherently as well. So I find it really baffling that everyone keeps saying "Infraction Overload" when they should be saying "Multi-Posting" or "Offtopic Spamming". Because what the hell are future users going to do with "Infraction Overload". How will they know what to avoid in the future? If they were constantly reminded of the rules everytime an infraction happens, they wouldn't even be wondering. It's just come to a point where users/noobs have gone lazy and assume that x is banned for mysterious shadowy reasons and always expect someone to tell them "No, he just did something minor and we put em away." Every. Damn. Time. Whatever happened to "trust the mods"?

It's also come to a point where noobs just goto that thread to know the Rules. Like, they're no longer concerned with what they shouldn't be doing, but with which rule led to that particular ban. Whatever happened to "Read the Rules and we won't have any trouble"?

I feel the solution to this needs some kind of middle ground. We would require:
- Public knowledge of how Infractions work. In general...
- ...without the potential to be exploited.
- And with the constant caveat that special cases are to be treated with integrity.

*Glossary time: the Blacklist is a Batcave-only thread invented by Rosie where Minor Repeat Offenders (as opposed to notoriously toxic users) are noted and discussed for grounds to receive permanent infractions and insta-bans. It mostly led to permabans and the two were often interchangeable.

I also cannot agree with this assessment either. All of the issues you've brought up in your entire post can be resolved best with accountability and transparency. This covers communication issues as well. While I do want to avoid letting people game the system, the publicizing of this information couldn't possibly allow them to do that more than they already can. We only need to make public the most relevant information, which would be done in an automated way. The only reason I don't like the ban registrar is because it creates overhead for the mods, if we had a system where mods were required to give a slightly more detailed explanation for an infraction or a ban we could simply make those logs public for anyone to view. This means that instead of speculating why someone was banned or having that user spread lies about why they were banned, anyone can go to the banned's profile and see that message

THIS USER IS BANNED BY Drone ON 08/10/2015 FOR THE FOLLOWING REASON:

Spammed links to their YouTube video in dozens of threads; told the