Mod and Admin Roles

[ithaca]

Moderators

Primary Responsibility - taking care of their forums.

Moderators are responsible for their forums. As such, they are required to check their forum at least once a day, preferably twice, and to deal with any situations that develop there. This may involve taking immediate action, or consulting the Admod Team and following their lead, at the Moderator's discretion. They may make polls in the Admod Forum to measure team feelings, but if new information comes up halfway through then it is, in the end, the Moderator's choice how to proceed.

Moderator duties include:

• Moving threads to appropriate forums
• Splitting posts from threads if necessary when a thread goes off topic
• Moving spam in their forum to the Troll Graveyard
• Issuing official notices to members for events that occur in their forum(s)
• Participating in discussions and decision making in the Admod forum

No single Administrator has the power to overrule a Moderator in their own forum, but collectively they hold final authority. Moderators should recognize that any unilateral action they take may be challenged or undone by the Administrator Team, if they find it necessary. This may not always involve disciplinary actions, as we recognize that some innocent mistakes are always going to happen. However, if the Administrator Team find a Moderator to be irresponsible or otherwise inappropriate, that Moderator may be given the opportunity to resign gracefully, be forcibly de-modded, or even given a warning. If they are forcibly de-modded, they are not eligible to run for another six months. And receiving an official warning also forcibly de-mods them, and brings them one step closer to being banned. If they resign (for reasons other than being found irresponsible, etc.), they are eligible to run for any Admod election except for the one to replace them.

Moderators can pass jurisdiction of certain matters off to others if necessary. If an incident unfolds while a Moderator is away, it is the responsibility of the person who finds it. Additionally, Moderators are highly recommended to pass off jurisdiction of matters on which they aren't, or would be perceived to not be, objective (either for or against). In either of these cases, the Admod who assumes responsibility should be treated just like the Moderator would have been for the purpose of that issue.

Sometimes, moderating positions are rearranged by the Admods if one would like to moderate a different forum. If a forum needs two moderators, someone from the current pool of Admods can volunteer for the position.

How to become a Moderator?

When new moderators are needed, there will be an announcement posted, and members are able to run for the position by posting in that thread. To run, a person must have been a member for at least 6 months, and have at least 100 posts that are not in the Just For Fun or Welcome Area forums. You also cannot run with an active, current warning. After a period of time, there is a poll in which members are able to vote for a candidate. The person who receives the most votes wins that moderating position.

For more details, check these threads "What a Mod actually does" and "Elections 101"

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Administrators

Administrators are responsible for the board at large. Each Administrator has specific areas of responsibility, but in an emergency Administrators can always cover for each other. Just because an Administrator has responsibility for something, that doesn't mean it necessarily must be them that does it. However, it is still their responsibility to make sure that it happens. This can happen through personal action, through a poll of the team, through delegating the matter to someone qualified, or through any other method they find appropriate. What matters is that the Administrator ensures that the issue has an eventual successful resolution

Administrator duties include:

• Moving spam threads to the Troll Graveyard
• Banning members
• Deleting spam and spam accounts
• Issuing official notices to members for events that occur across forums

Responsibilities can also be officially shuffled between the Administrators from time to time, just as Moderators shuffle forums. Administrators can even switch their entire roles with other Administrators when necessary. Care should be taken to distribute the load evenly, and avoid putting too much power in any one pair of hands.

All Administrators are required to fill in for Mods when they're gone. When covering for a Moderator in a particular forum, they have the same authority and responsibility there as the Moderator they're covering for.

Administrators are elected by the current Admods.

• Chat/PM Administrator: currently unfilled

 

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Pulling Chat logs when needed
• Handing out warnings/nudges for breach of ToS/inappropriate behaviour in chat
• Handing out warnings for breach of ToS/inappropriate behaviour in PMs
• Maintaining "Rules of Engagement" and similar chat policy issues

• Email Admin currently Amcan

 

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Daily checking the admods e-mail.
• Answering e-mail queries relating to account issues/joining the forums.
• Dealing with account issues and replying as appropriate.
• Deactivating/deleting accounts according to requests.
• Forwarding e-mails onto appropriate other parties eg PT.
• Sending e-mails regarding account actions to correct member eg banning/warning notices.
• Receiving e-mails from members regarding warning/banning appeals and bringing before admods as required.
• Promoting e-mail as a communication method.

• Projects Administrator: currently Tanwen

 

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Responsible of the projects subforum in Admods Only
• Takes care of new and old projects, making sure they keep running and are dealt with, and that some results are accomplished. Can create specific smaller teams of volunteers for projects.
• Responsible to organize monthly meeting with the admins and the team as a whole to keep everyone on the loop and improve communication
• Responsible for organizing and posting monthly the Admod Bulletin

• Account & Election Administrator: currently Kelly

 

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Running elections and making sure forums shuffle is done before
• Catching and banning bots
• Catching and warning/banning sockpuppets
• Making sure everything accounts-related is dealt with

• Reports Administrator: currently daveb

 

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Checks that reports and nudges/warnings are discussed and dealt with in a reasonable time.
• Makes sure everything report-related is recorded appropriately in Admods Only.
• Makes sure that increasing and decreasing of warn statuses is dealt with

• Leave of Absence (LOA) Admin: currently daveb

Spoiler

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Make sure that all leaves of absence (LOAs) are kept track of
• Help find people to cover LOAs so that someone is covering the work. These can be any admod who is comfortable with the work needing covering.
• Reminding volunteers when they are about to be covering someone, so it doesn't get forgotten

• Policy Administrator: currently Janus the Fox

Spoiler

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Direct policy discussions to a resolution.
• Manage the discussions so that they are completed in a timely fashion.
• Creating new discussions to explore ideas further, if needed.
• See to it that resolutions are actioned, if required.
• Ensure that changes in policy are communicated to the relevant bodies (i.e. organizing the Policy Discussion thread, and updating and announcing changes in ToS)

 

Acknowledgements:

Thanks to sonofzeal for compiling this and to Amcan for this.

Edited February 27 by daveb
updated

[ithaca]

**updated new admins' roles**

Old roles:

Account Administrator: Kelly

The Account Administrator is our first line of defense against attacks from outside, and deals primarily with issues of information-gathering and user accounts. They can also take action against board-wide trolls, but only in situations where the behaviour is spread across several forums. Otherwise, jurisdiction belongs to the Moderator of the forum where the trolling occurred.

Primary Responsibilities
- Running Elections
- Catching and banning bots
- Catching and warning sockpuppets
- Manually activating accounts that have trouble
- Making any necessary changes to user accounts

Required traits: web savvy, strong sleuthing skills

Chat/PM Administrator: ...but there are sounds

The Chat/PM Administrator is in many ways more of a Moderator for the most part, taking care of Chat and PM matters the way a Mod takes care of their forum, but with the added responsibility of being a part of Admin Team decisions. They are not required to watch Chat constantly, but if a report is made then it is their responsibility to make sure that the chat logs are pulled and that the relevant comments are found and highlighted for the team.

Primary Responsibilities
- Pulling Chat logs when needed
- Handing out warnings for breach of ToS in chat
- Handing out nudges for questionable behaviour in chat
- Handing out warnings for breach of ToS in PMs
- Handing out nudges for inappropriate behaviour in PMs
- Maintaining "Rules of Engagement" and similar chat policy issues

Required traits: able to search through extensive chat logs

Policy Administrator: NigelFt

The Policy Administrator has responsibility for forward progress on policy changes. Policy can (and should) still be discussed and drafted by the Admod Team in general, but it is the Policy Administrator who should take responsibility for guiding the discussion, and moving towards implementation when appropriate. Too many good policy changes get good responses from the team but never officially implemented; it's the Policy Administrator's responsibility to make sure these things don't fall by the wayside.

Primary Responsibilities
- Providing wordings for proposed policies
- Finalizing and implementing proposed policies
- Keeping track of Admod history and precedence

Required traits: good with words and logic, able to see potential implications of a proposed policy

Admod Forum Administrator: Amcan

Like the Chat/PM Administrator, the Admod Forum Administrator is in many ways more of a Moderator, but for the Admod Forum itself. This is not to be confused with total authority, but merely the responsibility to keep order within Admods. It is the Admod Forum Administrator who should take responsibility for deciding if a conversation is getting too heated and should be locked, or "nudge" angry Admods in the way that a Moderator nudges users in their forum. If another admod wishes to do either of these things, they are encouraged to work through the Admod Forum Administrator. The Admod Forum Administrator should also take responsibility for disciplinary actions against Moderators, consulting with the rest of the Administrators in the way that Moderators consult the rest of the Admod Team.

Primary Responsibilities
- Maintaining order within the Admods forum
- Disciplinary actions within the team

Required traits: has the respect and trust of the rest of the team, able to be impartial

Information Administrator: Bipolar Bear

The Information Administrator has responsibility for major interactions between the Admod Team and the general userbase. A list of specific examples is given below, but others may come up in the course of affairs. Other members of the Admod Team can certainly explain decisions to the public, but it is the Information Administrator who has official say over what information can be released without a "breach".

Primary Responsibilities
- Announcing policy changes publicly
- Updating the banner
- Declassifying threads
- Clearing information for the public
- Keeping the general userbase informed of admod actions

Required traits: good with words, patient

Former Admod Forum section:

Admod Forum (piece of old Terms of Service. Outdated things are into brackets)


[Threads in the Admod forum are generally declassified after 1 month - names and thread links are edited out for privacy.

Unmoveable Threads: Any threads which cannot be satisfactorily edited in order to give the member privacy are deemed unmoveable but are periodically reviewed.]

There are regular roll calls in the Admod forum, especially when media events are coming up. Admods have three days to respond- if they do not, they are demodded, unless they are away and have posted this in the AWOL thread.

There is a running list of personal contact information for emergencies in the Admod forum for all of the Admods. This is a not a declassifiable thread because of the personal information in the thread. When a member of the Admod Team leaves, their information is deleted from the thread.

There is also an AWOL thread for Admods to inform others if they will be away for some length of time. This is done so that other admods will check the absent Admod's forum while away. Posts made in this thread are declassified after a longer period of time due to privacy and security concerns.

[Lady Girl]

Code of Conduct found here.

[Heart]

Updated to add LOA admin:

 

Quote

 

• Leave of Absence (LOA) Admin: Currently Heart

Spoiler

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Make sure that all leaves of absence (LOAs) are kept track of
• Help find people to cover LOAs so that someone is covering the work. These can be any admod who is comfortable with the work needing covering.
• Reminding volunteers when they are about to be covering someone, so it doesn't get forgotten

 

 

 

[Qutenkuddly]

On 5/12/2012 at 4:08 AM, ithaca said:

Chat/PM Administrator: currently Qutenkuddly

Changed to:

 

On 5/12/2012 at 4:08 AM, ithaca said:

Chat/PM Administrator: currently FaerieFate

 

Added:

 

• Policy Administrator: currently Qutenkuddly

Spoiler

Specific primary responsibilities:

• Direct policy discussions to a resolution.
• Manage the discussions so that they are completed in a timely fashion.
• Creating new discussions to explore ideas further, if needed.
• See to it that resolutions are actioned, if required.
• Ensure that changes in policy are communicated to the relevant bodies (i.e. organizing the Policy Discussion thread, and updating and announcing changes in ToS)