Why yes actually, I do have a problem thank you for asking; however, I do not feel like getting over it I would rather see it fixed.
Actually yes I have read the guidelines and they are pretty clear
Oh but what about this part… well this is refers to people who are angry at the site QCDN like this thread and not really towards people who are angry at people who use QCDN… Hence my comment
If you want to know the problems with the way that masta is running the boards let me list them for you.
1. Locking threads on the flame board for no good reason (thinking that a flame has run its course is not a good reason)
http://www.qcdn.org/ffxi/showpost.php?p=947513&postcount=350
It is the flameboard when we are done with a flame it will fall of the front page in a natural death. The only valid reason for locking a thread should be if someone necros.
No, actually. There are some topics that are ultimately beaten to death. Both sides will have been given, and then it's just people re-posting the same thing over and over again. Those topics are really considered to be dealt with and over with.
2. Locking threads with no reason given even though it has been stated that one should be.
http://www.qcdn.org/ffxi/showthread.php?t=59792&page=7
Apparently a policy has been put in place so this wont happen in the future however the explanation needs to be fucking added when the thread is locked because if it is a good thread there are most likely a few people who are in the process of typing responses to it like I was on the princemercury thread. When I hit post it said thread was locked and there was no explanation. I hit refresh a few times and there was still no explanation so I made a post in the QCDN Support, Feedback and Announcements section which is the correct course of action to take when you have a comment about something that is going on, on the board.
Not only was that thread locked before I felt that it was resolved but Miros also felt the need to edit my original post and change the title of my thread… Why?
The "editing" of your original post was simply to change the title. People were more apt to view it if I put up that title instead of the title beforehand. The post I had at the end to lock it did have something to do with the flame and your OP. That is why I edited it.
Most posts that are locked do deserve an explanation. If there are some that have not gotten them within a reasonable amount of time (Just FYI - I consider 1/2 hour a reasonable amount of time) then feel free to PM one of the mods and we'll do what we can to figure out why it was locked.
3. Deleting or locking threads because they are controversial
Well shit I cant exactly post a link for this kind of occasion because the have been deleted. What is wrong with a little controversy? The thread that both Enlenne and Princemercury posted were both interesting to read and in no way warranted having the threads locked. Same thing applies to the gay pride thread and any religion threads.
The threads themselves were interesting because it was usual drama. Quite frankly, I am tired of this site just viewed as the drama site. We are going to be doing our best to bring it more FFXI orientated and bring a wealth of knowledge here instead of useless drama. This may upset some, but what can I say? While some people may view FFXI as dead, I personally don't. And one way I believe we can bring in the demograph of new players is by showing knowledge instead of drama.
And like I said in the other controversial threads...I have no problem against them until they become ugly. The minors + adults one got ugly. I had three choices in my opinion. I could have let the flame go on with a bunch of "I hope you get hit by a bus you disgusting pervert" and break my general rule about what's said in RSI...stays in RSI. Or, I could have closed the flame and cleaned up the Minors + Adults one which would have angered people and I
guarantee would cause people to start making assumptions that I agree with pedophilia. After debating what to do, I decided that ridding both the flame and the original post would have been the ideal thing to do. The original post was up for a long time and I believe that anything that should have been said...was said. They are both gone so that we can focus on the future instead of waiting for another blow up.
If controversial topics are something that you would like to see, then you should do your best to convince your friends who use QCDN posts to intellectual debate. (Please don't take this as Princemercury is your friend. I don't know and it's not relevant, I'm just saying spread the word to those you talk to on QCDN and off perhaps.)
4. Miros response to the flame
There is only one group that should be concerned with the content that is being posted on this board and they are the community members. I don’t give a fuck who the hell you have coming to the site that you think that you need to clean it up to your standards. We are the members of this forum and if we decide to enter into a conversation about the dating of a 12 year old girl (ewww btw) then we should be allowed to have that conversation. The members of the site should be allowed to decide the content of the site… if no one wanted to talk about it then it wouldn’t have been addressed in the first place.
You may not care about the growth of QCDN, but I do. I do not enjoy giving out everything I am doing for this site, because surprises are good sometimes, so I am going to leave my comment at that.
To Miros...
If the people that you have visiting the site are going to think less of you or us because of what they read us conversing about I have a question for you. Who the fuck cares? If you are trying to use this site to get a job… Then they should understand that we are people and you don’t have any control over what is posted… well shouldn’t. If you are just showing this site to your friends then what the hell is the problem and if you are showing this to someone else for some other reason… Who fucking cares what they think about the members of this forum for whatever reason.
I don't mind if they think less of me, it's the site that primarily concerns me. My resume isn't too shabby so I don't actually need to add this site to it however.
Conclusion
So Audino you ask if I have a problem… and my answer is yes I have a huge fucking problem and it happens to be everyone who has the button that allows them to edit, delete or lock anyone else’s thoughts out of the conversation because they do not like them even though they have not directly broken any rules.
http://www.qcdn.org/ffxi/showpost.php?p=946841&postcount=61
I have posted my feelings on the subject in the past and they went largely ignored so masta (and yes I will call you masta for now on seeing as it appears to annoy you) I feel as if our discussion can now get started.
You have to realize again...some flames just will make lots of people uncomfortable. We do have a large audience that doesn't exactly post on the boards and we are trying to think of them when we close some posts. And not to mention, the flameboard is in the FFXI section so flames should be going back towards FFXI. I apologize if you feel any different, but like I have said earlier, I have no problem with intellectual debates in their specific forums. There's no reason to have to call anybody anything to try to get your point across. Also, with the edit button, we keep it out so people can't retract what they have said.
The flame board will turn into whatever the community wants it to turn into if we want to see more pictures of Kefka or popcorn then that’s what will be posted… the people who don’t like what is posted can stop reading at any time.. I don’t believe this is the only page your internet window allows you to view.
Rules on the flameboard beyond the security of sensitive information are extremely useless the only thing that it will cause is the death of the site… if that’s what you are going for have a fucking ball because your doing a bang up job. And if you don’t like masta Audino I can always start calling you Sculli… but even I think that that is a bit below the belt. For the most part we are adults... so treat us like one and stop editing our content whatever that may be.
The death of this site will not come from flameboard rules being a little harsher. Sculli took the flameboard away and the site was still up and running. I understand you may think the rules are a bit more stricter, but all they are doing is cutting out certain items. Now it should be easier to keep up with flames without having to read through useless posts of people getting out popcorn or posting pictures of a breast and a kitten with a slogan. We do not usually edit content. Your post had the title edited and I wouldn't consider that as content.
I hope this clears up some issues for you.
First off, Audino I love you, and this has nothing to do with you, thought I should mention.
I agree with my dearest friend DJ, people with the control to lock and edit other peoples post, for no apparent reason, or out of sure bias. Like when Mikeman posted the "truth" about Mikeman thread and later someone just edited everyone of his entire postings. What he posted may have been Bullshit, but hey its a forum and this forum especially is 99% pure unadulterated bullshit, and damn it, I wanted to read it.
If someone is trolling or necro posting on a thread, there are understandable instances to lock or edit post. Editing and locking threads because "You" don't agree? People post bullshit and I want to read it. Welcome to QCDN.
I like to think that we aren't doing it out of pure bias. We should be giving a reason for every locked post. And like I said earlier, if there is not a reason after a reasonable amount of time, then just PM the mod or admin that is on and ask why. The Mikeman incident is indeed a difficult one to explain. The easiest way to say it was the post was made and edited
outside of the flameboard. After we viewed it to be a viable flame, it was moved to this forum. The posts were
not edited within the flameboard and
not edited by a mod except to put a note in as to why it was edited...
First thing is, you're calling him "masta" over his actions as moderator on an internet forum? Really? You do need to step back and think. This site isn't going to hell because they're trying to clean up the useless garbage that clutters up so many threads on the flameboard. I can see your reacting this way if they start clipping things that are important to an argument or could settle an issue in the public view, but you're getting all worked up because they're editing out trash that has nothing to do with the subject at hand?
While I do agree that controversial topics like religion and the like shouldn't be deleted from QCDN in general because I think they generate a lot of very interesting and thought provoking discussion, in the end it is to their discretion, not ours as the community, that determine the content of this site. You'd like to think they will take our thoughts on changes into consideration but the bottom line is, if they wanted to wipe out everything non-FFXI there's not a damn thing anyone could do about it. I don't think they would, but I also don't think they'll take someone turning blue and stomping their feet over what they want very seriously either. History has shown that tactic doesn't work too well, and I'm not sure how you think being rude to Audino by resorting to name-calling is going to somehow make your opinion more valuable or likely to make changes.
The "ifs" come in a little bit there. I'd like to think the staff has come a long way since last year even. We do take into consideration what the people of this site want. I can point out the QCDN Support, Feedback, and Announcements forum to prove my point. Some items I may not be up for debating, but they are usually items that are primarily concerned with staffing.
The mods here really could care less. They're far from adult. A lot of them suffer from the same guiding forces behind kids on the playground that "Take their ball and go home" when they lose. They change the rules constantly to fit their needs... If you piss them off they willl just make rules specific to you and only you. This forum is getting to the point to where people are flat out afraid to post because they'll get banned because they're not in the 'in crowd', or berated because they have a legitimate question or theory that doesn't fit the /bg/ modus...
I completely disagree with the statement that the mods here really could care a less. I cannot begin to tell you how many hours I spend speaking with some team members and attempt to find ways to brings users to this place, or stop certain poor things from happening. I don't really think we've changed the rules all that much. We are doing what should have been done in the first place. I would like some examples of the "rules specific to you and only you" as well. Let's look at August's crime and punishment. Two issues were from abuse of the reported post feature. There is a note when you report someone's post saying "Please do not abuse the report feature." One was a sockpuppet. Three were from inappropriate material. Those rules that we used were set in place back when Cmdrfly was head administrator, so at least for the month of August we did not use any biased to ban any member.
I don't see a reason why people are afraid either. In fact, sometimes it seems that people don't talk to me much since I'm the admin...so there aren't many people that can be considered the "in" crowd.
But in all seriousness, people should not be afraid to post at all. That is unless they are going to the good times section and going to rip in a member and explain to them why they suck. Even then, unless they have enough infractions built up it won't constitute a ban. So even that section seems a little...2 years ago.
Realistically, this is just like any other forum. It wouldnt' exist if it wasn't for the readership. And that's been declining for a while. Some days I poke around here and look at threads and see that it's got more Mods than Readers. It's growing into the admin's other failed project Shinracorp or whatever that shithole's called. If you look at the history of the admin he's got another forum he's ground into the earth, and this one is headed in the exact same direction. It's turning into the slowest Instant Messenger in the FFXI world for an exclusive group of people.
I beg to differ actually...according to the statistics, and I just pulled a random date out. August 7, 2007 had only 60 more visitors then it did this year. However, the difference in new posts was 301 in favor of 2008. Looking at the new posts statistics, one could see that the side is actually growing. However, it may be growing in areas that you don't visit.
I don't exactly appreciate the jab towards Reeve here either. The reason I say that is because I believe him and I have a good understanding. You should know that a good deal of the decisions go through myself and the staff that we have. So basically...by saying that Reeve is running this forum into the ground, you are saying that I am running the forum into the ground and I will have to disagree again with you on that topic. Reeve has been a great mentor for me when I returned as admin. He has helped me with a lot and I hope we can continue to have the same relationship we do now.
To the mods:
Ease up on the rules. You're just making rules for the sake of making rules now.
Grow a pair, 3/4 of you just say "It was a staff decision, I'm just enforcing it" if that's true, then it was your decision, and you're not "just enforcing it".
To the previous statement, either man up and take responsibility for your decisions and stop hiding behind that bullshit, or stand up for your conviction and actually have a voice when these decisions are made.
I guess maybe I'm confused with those whole section. I don't think we're trying to hide behind a staff decision and make us look like heros? Do you have an example of this? If you are referring to the video game forums...well...the mod who was in charge of them
did have the balls to do what he had to get them back.
If you're going to mod, just mod. Don't be the cop that pulls over people then follows them to where they hang out and annouce what a douche people are for speeding... You're in a way enabling that behaviour. Be impartial. If you're going to be a member of the community, be more prepared for the reaction of those who will enevitably see the favoratism and biases you have. Lashing out to "Defend yourself" only makes it worse...
Again, I would really like to see examples on the board for this.
No, just because you have Mod status doesn't make you smarter or more mature than the group you govern; it just means you were on someone's good side, and they decided to include you in their hobby.
Quite the contrary actually...Make joined the team without myself even really knowing who he was. We usually look for people with clean histories who present themselves well. Either that, or people who express interest in certain areas. Audino was somebody I had never spoken to until he expressed interest in being the dynamis forum moderator. He was upped to global mod because I believed he could bring a good opinion to the table and have the ability to tell me "No, that idea would suck" instead of being a yes man.
To Reeve:
Shinra failed, it's over. If the square wheel doesnt' roll, stop making square wheels... Move on and up, because you constantly looking into the past is affecting the future of this forum.
Once again...it's mostly me whose the one doing the admin with Arc, so a jab at Reeve may fall upon deaf ears.
Also, just so people know...I would prefer to have private messages to be
private. I was debating on closing this, but I think I'll keep it open for the time being so people can respond to my post.
Hate to run right now but I have the computer geek here right now to help me with one of my computers.
