The State of Things

[brad.dude03]

Hello fellow Hive Workshop Users. Some of you may know, and some of you may not be aware, that recently, a boiling-over of sorts occurred. This thread was created for the purpose of spreading whatever suggestions you have for Ralle and the Staff in general without fear of retribution. You need not fear voicing your true opinions, as long as they lay within the rules. Let's all say what needs to be said in a calm manner, so that we can really make some changes here. If you want to post anonymously, you can PM me your suggestion, and I will respect your privacy by posting it here for you.

Now, we need to have some sense of order. We will go from one issue to another, this way, everyone can have their say about a topic, and a solution can (hopefully) be reached, before moving onto another. Please note that, however valuable your post may be, if you interrupt the present topic, it may be deleted. I recommend writing your post in a word processor first, and then saving a copy on your harddrive, that way, in the event that it is deleted, you will have a copy to post when the time is right. If you have any questions, feel free to send me a private message.

I'll be watching the thread closely to make sure that no one violates the rules. And with that, may the first poster take the floor.

 

[Ash]

As the first subject, I'd like to jump into the deep end somewhat and talk about Admins. These are people who run the Hive, the manage day to day tasks and, should, be well known within the userbase. Only, there are 3 problems with that last sentence.

1) Our admins don't run the hive, they dictate it,

2) Our admins don't manage day to day tasks,

3) Who are our admins?

The third point ties in with our Webmaster, Ralle, who has been seen less and less lately. These are major issues for the hive, as without a functioning admin team, then we fail at the most rudimentary of tasks.

All in all, I can say that I know one admin. Ghan. Now, I'm sure he'll be mentioned later on, Ghan is usually seen about every now and then, although he hardly ever talks to users, or does as many things as he used to when he was ranked lower within the site.

Because of this, I propose that we talk about the skills needed to be an admin, what is expected of an admin and, if possible, a new way to elect admins.

 

[Traxamillion]

It feels as if less work is done by the admins and alot more uneeded babysitting. Also it seems as if the admins and even Forum mods are banning people left and right for stupid reasons..or just because they can. Also i feel like some of the admins are hypocrites and say things like dont spam or be mature...when they themselves contribute in on the fun and such.

 

[Hawkwing]

I myself have never really seen the admins doing much. I don't mean offense, perhaps they are doing things that some of us are unaware of. (e.g. the people that aren't really involved, such as people who aren't on the staff.)

Just speaking of the staff in general now, not just admins, the rules aren't really being upheld in the forums. At least not as much as they should be. It seems the users are upholding them instead now. I find I, and many others, are telling people not to double-post or necropost a fair amount, recently.

 

[Samuraid]

perhaps they are doing things that some of us are unaware of

The work I do personally here...probably 75% of it never gets seen. That's just the nature of the job.

In fact, a few of the admins remain in contact numerous times per week with Ralle (via Skype) and nearly every day via email and instant messages.

This is not meant to say "wow, admins are perfect and any complaints against them are unfounded", but more to say "administrators are not reclusive pointless beings, we actually take care of a number of things and communicate behind the scenes a lot." Most of it goes by unseen.

 

[frostwhisper]

Okay, here are some thoughts... The major areas:

Admins - As Ash said, the admins pretty much just dictate their set of rules with one hand and wave away with the other. They don't really spend productive, meaningful and closer time with the userbase. Take the chat room for example. There to bring us closer, yet the admins rarely come and if they do, seeing them speak is as scarce as actually seeing them help anybody by anything other than giving out a link to a tut or using a used-up line like "google it". Now I'm a dirty bastard myself, I've pushed away the ones who need help on several occasions, but I doubt the admins should do that. Like Ash said, I'd like to see the admins around each day, posting, chatting, making new stuff, not as some random bots showing up randomly to close a thread or deliver punishment. An example is Ghan_04, who (in chat) is basically a silent image spam machine and a banhammer with no remorse, and (on the forums) appears only to close threads and cease discussions (as far as I have seen). This site is a community, and the admin-mod-user link is VITAL for the community to be a successful one.

Speaking of the chat... Here's the situation I see. And yes, I WILL point the finger this time. Overlooking the Rules when it comes to a staff member - You see staff? I see a rule breaker, cloaked under the protection of his title. I'm talking about Earth-Fury, who, as far as I recall isn't at all active around the forums, let alone someone who moderates... anything. So, here's another thing I see quite to often: Morning, small membership in the lobby (around 5-7 people), in comes a new guy. Asks a noob question. We send him away, E-F flames bitterly then disappears again. Comes in a smart new guy (in our case the user Draerlen), we start chatting, I see that he is a pretty awesome character, though new. In comes E-F RANDOMLY trolling Draerlen. Goes away. We continue on, I apologize to Draerlen for E-F's behavior via whisper. Minutes later, in he comes again randomly trolling and flaming and provoking the new user for each word he says without any justified reason! MIND YOU, HE'S WRONG EVEN! I know it, since the topic was software which I and Draerlen both understand better than him. The end? Werewulf bans Draerlen for telling EF that his trolling is "pathetic" - I receive that as flaming, frostwhisper - she says. - And is EF immune just because he's your friend? - ask. - Shut up. - she says. ... there you have it. An honest, good new user banned due to Earth-Fury's constant trolling, flaming, provoking and meaningless asshole-ish behavior. I do not condone this. I do not think that a user such as this should represent the Hive Workshop staff. To be, he deserves a strip of powers, and a good punishment. Let it be a ban/neg rep/infraction, you decide. I just want to see retribution for the sake of those newbies who are actually worth it. Like Draerlen.

So, we've got the absence of admins and the inappropriate behavior of some staff members which goes unnoticed. That alone is worthy of complaining about. But nah... there's more. Much more. The Jury of Awesomness - Now this... organization, social group, whatever you wish to call it, has been the source of many fires recently, which are all fueled by the admins whose general behavior gives them the wrong impression of US. Let me make a few points about the Jury: 1. We are a gathering of those of us who are well educated in terms of this internet site and known how to obey it's rules, enforce them and even prove those irrational ones wrong. On many occasions we have debated with moderators over punishments, proving ourselves correct, but are loathed instead of thanked and believed as power seeking trolls. 2. We are elitist. We have proven ourselves to the community of being more productive intellectually than the general mass of the "peons". We help those who need it, but will not hesitate to persecute you if you break rules while the admin is (excuse my French) picking his nose up in his nest without paying attention. That doesn't mean we're flamers. If rule-enforcing flamers were a threat to the community than the site would have been much better one Mechon short. But it's not in reality. The site needs people like Mecheon, but it also needs responsible users who are not on the staff working on other things (or supposed to be doing that anyway). 3. We have been gathered through the filter of an experienced modding and forum veteran, so our quality can be ensured, thank you very much. 4. Our out-of-site activities are nothing hostile, Hive. We come in peace! We just have a sense of humor that's apparently not to your liking. Bare with us. I can assure you our wiki articles will improve but promise us that you won't censor, ban and hang us for writing funny literature pieces and calling someone fat (as a joke). Besides, most of our sarcasm is VERY deserved. 5. We too, are sometimes cruel. But usually when cruelty is deserved. We're only human. That being said, my plead is for the administration to co-operate and have more tolerance towards the Jury, because you know, that as a whole our organization is incredibly strong and always has a sober judgment. Objection: I, however openly protest that Earth-Fury is on the Jury, because of the reasons I stated above. I believe that a user such as this should not represent the Jury in any way, for he will do exactly what I fear: give you the wrong impression of us. [r] So... admins away, crooked mods flaming unpunished, us enforcers being chased with torches and sticks so that several of us have actually resigned their positions on the staff or even left the site... I think we've got a serious problem.

Some minor things I've found disturbing: - Dr Super Good's position on the staff: I feel that neither is he global moderating anything at all, nor is he a decent rule enforcer, usually causing more arguments than stopping any. - The swift employment of may new users into the staff: I gotta tell you, you had one good hit. And that's Ash. People like MasterHaosis and Septimus however, who have approved a crapload of maps far beyond the minimum quality requirements and award them with great grades, and cannot take any civilized criticism without turning it into a flame war are not mod-material to me. - Lack of activity in the Arena: Ya know, I approached Rui 6 times (2 in his profile and 4 via chat) to open up the long overdue Terrain Contest #3, without any answer. Complete ignore. It wasn't until Gilles came back form his vacation that someone started the competition. I really think some mods should get in shape and do their jobs at answering the users' needs (similar to the admins). - Lack of good moderation in chat... yeah said it already, I'll add it again though. Admins come and ban, people like Fury flame without punishment. You do the math and tell me if I'm wrong or is this just not right.

Kay, now to some nifty suggestions I think I'd make (some inspired by other users' ideas): - Long term users/users with certain amount of rep using grunt icon as a symbol to their tribute to the site. - Possibly give those users the ability to read threads in the mod-only forum. Read. Not write in. - Give option for color in chat for exceptional users who are very active. - Allow users known to be responsible to the rules a trial of seven days with chat powers, which will be monitored and judged until it is decided either that the person can keep them, or that he cannot retain them due to irresponsibility. Seriously, more moderation from responsible and tough members is needed.

Basically that's all I came up with now, but mind you, I haven't slept in a long time. Now, where's my beer...

 

[Hawkwing]

The work I do personally here...probably 75% of it never gets seen. That's just the nature of the job.

In fact, a few of the admins remain in contact numerous times per week with Ralle (via Skype) and nearly every day via email and instant messages.

This is not meant to say "wow, admins are perfect and any complaints against them are unfounded", but more to say "administrators are not reclusive pointless beings, we actually take care of a number of things and communicate behind the scenes a lot." Most of it goes by unseen.

Yes. That's exactly what I had expected. My point being you should make it a bit more evident of what you're doing. Aside from major site updates, of course.

 

[Traxamillion]

frsotwhisper is right on the money....everything he said is completely true and unbias

 

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

Everything is pretty deep in shit really. I smell anarchy.

 

[frostwhisper]

In this site anarchy cannot be the answer. A good admin-mod-user connection with lots of communication and team effort can make things change.

 

[Instant Ramen]

In this site anarchy cannot be the answer. A good admin-mod-user connection with lots of communication and team effort can make things change.

I would just say staff-user connection, but yeah.

 

[Samuraid]

Yes. That's exactly what I had expected. My point being you should make it a bit more evident of what you're doing. Aside from major site updates, of course.

Well, I'm sorry to disappoint, but I'm not going to volunteer more time just for the sake of being more visible. Besides, it would end up being a very boring set of updates for most anyone...

 

[Hawkwing]

Well, I'm sorry to disappoint, but I'm not going to volunteer more time just for the sake of being more visible.

I'm not saying you have to. Im just saying you guys, as a team, should make it more obvious that you are doing work. You don't have to upright tell them or anything.

 

[MySpaceBarBroke]

About the Jury: I'm just going to come out and say it: The Jury of Awesomeness is nothing more than a gathering for smartasses. Being awesome, witty, or clever has nothing to do with it. All you need to do is live a trollish, sarcastic lifestyle and get on Griffen's good side. Don't take this as an insult, though. Out of the 72 custom user groups I am currently in, the Jury is one of the select few that actually mean something to me. It's a badge of honor. A bit rusty and made with cheap metal, but a badge of honor nonetheless, and, to be quite honest, at the highest point of productivity any custom user group can ever hope to amount to.

Earth-Fury sounds like a spell on Warcraft III that lets out vines resembling tentacle monsters: That being said, I have no opinion on EF, because he's an asshole that won't let me on his friend's list I don't socialize with him often, but

Morning, small membership in the lobby (around 5-7 people), in comes a new guy. Asks a noob question. We send him away, E-F flames bitterly then disappears again. Comes in a smart new guy (in our case the user Draerlen), we start chatting, I see that he is a pretty awesome character, though new. In comes E-F RANDOMLY trolling Draerlen. Goes away. We continue on, I apologize to Draerlen for E-F's behavior via whisper. Minutes later, in he comes again randomly trolling and flaming and provoking the new user for each word he says without any justified reason! MIND YOU, HE'S WRONG EVEN! I know it, since the topic was software which I and Draerlen both understand better than him.

Can you be any more vague?

I don't know what it is in his hormones that inspires your utter rage and gnaws away at a huge chunk of you users' dignities, drastically degrading my opinion of you, but in my eyes, EF is just another smartass casual acquaintance in the sea of smartass casual acquaintances I find on the Hive (contrasting with the ocean of idiots).

Honestly, I've found people harder to get along with. Where do you get all this butthurt?

Dr Sticky Goo: He's that guy that sits at your table, but you don't want to hang out with at lunch. That being said, he got demoted to Global Mod, and, in my opinion, there's no reason for any of the higher-ups to take further action against him as long as he's not breaking any rules.

Admins: All the admins that are fun to talk with in chat and Ghan are pretty cool people. Ghan seems to contribute a lot to the site and, in return, we tolerate the pictures he posts on chat. As for the other admins, I'm not really sure what they do, but it's probably something really important like making sure the site works properly and saving pandas from extinction.

Hakeem: He's a fun guy.

Welp, that's all I have to get off my chest for now.

 

[Gausslander]

Well, I'm actually quite fine with the administrators and moderators. The administrators are abnormally kind to those that show kindness and progress, so they're not my key issue here.

My key issue, really, is the:

Arena:
The arena has become quite the mockery. It's contests are limited, and from those to choose you need certain talents and knowledge, yet for your current talents and knowledge there is mostly (if not practically always) never a contest that suits you correctly. Maybe you're a terrainer and you don't like ultimate terraining map, or maybe you like to edit models (or only know how to edit models) and can not make them from scratch, maybe you like ramen noodles and they're only serving spaghetti. Who knows. But I would like to see some general improvements in the rapidness, fun, and originality of the contests.

That said, I agree with FrostWhisper. Earth-Fury is a nuisance on chat.

 

[Hakeem]

I propose that we talk about the skills needed to be an admin,

I would not say it requires any special "skills" to be an admin, or a moderator for that matter. In my opinion, it takes good old fashioned trust.

what is expected of an admin

I think it's not a matter of what we should tell them to do, but what we can allow them to do. This varies from person to person. Some people can be trusted of some things, and others other things.

and, if possible, a new way to elect admins.

First and foremost, Ralle made a site. Second, he wants users on his site. More on this later.

Overlooking the Rules when it comes to a staff member

The way I see it, we're all users. Only difference is the staff has powers. Removing those powers in not a punishment either.

Long term users/users with certain amount of rep using grunt icon as a symbol to their tribute to the site.

Well the icons are another matter, but such a thing does seem like it might be worth recognizing.

Possibly give those users the ability to read threads in the mod-only forum. Read. Not write in.

Hehe, there sure are some people who would like that.

---

Now the more I mentioned earlier.

he wants users on his site.

It's one thing to have a site, this opens up a whole new can of worms. We'll call those worms "posts".

Okay, so not only does he want to have users on his site, he wants them to be able to upload their Warcraft III resources. What's more, he wants to place reasonable limits on posts and resources. This leaves us with a bunch of posts and resources.

Step 1 would obviously be to tell the users his guidelines for posts and resources. Easier said than done, as the user may not read the rules. No need to panic, just because they didn't read them doesn't mean they wont follow them anyway.

On the flip side, just because the user does read the rules, does not mean they will follow them.

Step 2, enforce the rules. Edit or delete posts and resources. Inform misbehaving users of the rules. What's that? You told them the rules directly and they still insist on disobeying them? Well, maybe we would be better off without this user period.
That was easy.

Okay, so, we have thousands of users. Not so easy anymore. Ralle cannot handle it all himself.

Step 3, pass the buck. Get other people to help you do the work of enforcing the rules. Well it's just been Ralle so far, so there was no question of whether or not the rules were being enforced correctly or not. So now you need to wait until, somehow, you end up meeting a person who you know will enforce your rules correctly.

Well it might be hard to find someone a lot like you, so you may have to settle for someone who can be trusted with some things, but not with others. For example, you might find someone who you can trust to approve or reject resources, but they would also use their power for the wrong reasons. They might ban someone just because they dislike them.

Realistically, you will find very few people who can be trusted to enforce all of your rules as you yourself would. You will have to end up giving people power in one area, but not in another. What powers a user can be trusted with vary from one person to the next.

---

If everything were to stay within these bounds, then a user would either be content, or they can GTFO because they directly disagree with Ralle's rules.

Of course, Ralle can change these rules at any time. One reason might be so that users that disagree with Ralle's rules would not leave. Another reason has to do with the storage method of resources and posts. Anyone can access posts and resource to view their contents.

You see, there are people that would be willing to cause unpleasant happenings to Ralle. These people might come should one of the resources or posts violate some claims that someone might have relating to their content. Since there are so many of these people, it would be wise for Ralle to change his rules to disallow such content, so as to not be held criminally liable.

In addition, there is one more thing that allows users to change the content of this site. It can be found here. The user generated content found therein, is different from resources and posts. You see, it is strictly temporary. This information can only be proven to originate from The Hive Workshop within about 15 seconds after its submission. Because of this, the latter reason Ralle might change the rules, mentioned above, does not reasonably apply to this area.

---

It appears to me that it is not Ralle's rules that many people are having a problem with. The problem seems to be coming when step 3 is not followed. People are given power that they cannot be trusted with. The people that cannot be trusted to carry out Ralle's rules have power, and the people that feel the abuse are inevitably the users.

The solution to this problem is simple:
Undo the incorrect action. Remove the previously given powers that a user cannot be trusted with. There should be no complaints on any party of this action, because the only ones who complain, would be the ones losing the power, or people who do not agree with Ralle's rules.
The ones losing power should not complain, because, honestly, being a simple peon is not a bad thing.
The ones who disagree with Ralle's rules should, again, GTFO.







HEY! You!
Yeah you. Don't think I didn't see you trying to scroll past my post. You scroll right back to the top and read it the whole way through.

 

[Steel_Stallion]

Alright, heres what i see here. Instead of trying to take off the few bad seeds in the lemon, the Mods and Admins have been squeezing it forcefully.

Sure it gets rid of the bad seeds, but they're dropping out everything else. Loosen your grip, and try nit picking the bad seeds out instead.

What i mean is, instead of choking us all to death, choke the rule breakers only.

Oh and, something about negative rep. I just think the way mods give out Negative rep-

Shit let me re-phrase that, the way ANYONE gives out Rep is completly unfair and bias. Most of it is either un-deserving or completly random. Stop for a moment and look through the reputation stats of people.

"Shit steel, arent you the guy who was boasting about not caring for Reputation?"

Hell to the yes. But, the straight fact is in an in-direct way i DO care about reputation. Why? Because reputation seems to have power here.

See, its either a HUGE coincedence that the rules are enforced so harshly on people with lower rep, or its true that Rep infact has power. What ever a moderator says otherwise is false. If any of you Moderators tell me you do not look down on users because they have less reputation You are fucking bullshitting me.

Because it IS infact true, you DO judge people by the amount of reputation they have/dont have.

This is all fine and dandy, i'm sure this reason is because the Reputation system is a fair and completly un bias circle of judgement?

Haha..

To summerize what i said. If you are going to judge people by their reputation or because they are your friends. Please remove Reputation.

I am so fucking sick of seeing the little people of this site get pushed around, because other people are getting respected for Rep Parties and saying stupid things and having more friends on this site than anyone else.


And no matter what you say

"lol u liek mudkipz" Is not a reason to gain reputation.

"You are an Idiot" Is not a reason to lose reputation.

"LOLOLOL LMFAO UR FUNI" Is not a reason to gain reputation.

Smarten the fuck up and learn to use the system.

 

[Ash]

Just a little add-in from my end before I talk about other things in a later post.

The arena is, pretty much, dead. I've edited a pre-existing system that could, possibly, revive the arena (along with adding new features) but it's still being looked at by the admins.

http://hiveleague.exofire.net/ - That's the demo that I've set up for people to view.

 

[Rui]

As the first subject, I'd like to jump into the deep end somewhat and talk about Admins. These are people who run the Hive, the manage day to day tasks and, should, be well known within the userbase. Only, there are 3 problems with that last sentence.

1) Our admins don't run the hive, they dictate it,

2) Our admins don't manage day to day tasks,

3) Who are our admins?

The third point ties in with our Webmaster, Ralle, who has been seen less and less lately. These are major issues for the hive, as without a functioning admin team, then we fail at the most rudimentary of tasks.

All in all, I can say that I know one admin. Ghan. Now, I'm sure he'll be mentioned later on, Ghan is usually seen about every now and then, although he hardly ever talks to users, or does as many things as he used to when he was ranked lower within the site.

Because of this, I propose that we talk about the skills needed to be an admin, what is expected of an admin and, if possible, a new way to elect admins.

There are only 3 of our administrators who deserve to be there, or, let's rather say, are actually good enough to be there. I had already mentioned this in another topic, but I'll say it again:

1. Samuraid: He's the ONLY one who really deserves this position. Why? Because he is the only one capable of helping on the technical part.
   I reported a bug with Reparse, and the next day, it was fixed. Could any other administrator do this? No.
2. Archian: Inactivity WARNING, yes, but he's capable of leading the site, he has the right character to do so. Pity he's inactive.
3. Bob27: He knows well what he can do as an administrator, he knows when to ask for Ralle's opinion and when he doesn't need to do so. He is fast. What else needs to be said? Oh yes, he's inactive. But let me tell you one thing: I prefer having a not-so-active administration than having this silly alternative.

And now you might question, why not Wolverabid? Hell, he was promoted so fast I got the feeling he only wanted power. If he ever reads this and gets disappointed with me, I'm sorry, but that's the feeling I got, I'd be an hypocrite if I denied. I won't mind if he comes back though, even with this impression, I cannot deny that Wolverabid has been the administrator that has been most friendly with the users.

As for Ghan. So far he has done nothing as administrator that he could not do as a global moderator, so why the promotion? That's all I have to say. He fits well as a staff member... but administrator? He is the exact counterpart of Bob.

(...)
- Lack of activity in the Arena: Ya know, I approached Rui 6 times (2 in his profile and 4 via chat) to open up the long overdue Terrain Contest #3, without any answer. Complete ignore. It wasn't until Gilles came back form his vacation that someone started the competition. I really think some mods should get in shape and do their jobs at answering the users' needs (similar to the admins).
(...)

Sorry, but where did you contact me? So this is what you were talking about when you said that I was "ignoring the users"? Well, that sure is a nice way to remind me of things.

But let's get to the point. I don't read my private messages that often, sometimes there's a period when I read them more (when I send out private messages and await for answers, that is), and sometimes I don't look at the window at all. But I eventually get to read them. Instead of posting in my profile, which is just another spambase, why didn't you send a private message?

And as for the contest, Gilles is the host, I don't think I should touch his work.
But besides that, I don't know the UTM as much as I thought I did, thus no Terraining Challenge 2008/2009. And there's Gilles's Terrain Contest, so why bother?

Additionally, you have to understand that I moderate an entire category of forums, I spend my life reviewing the threads on the Help Zone because I have to tag the threads, and these users just won't stop double-posting.
I suggested to Ralle that users be somehow allowed to tag their thread as [Solved], but as I foresaw, he won't bother -- either because it messes with vB or it's just too complicated scripting. I accept both reasons nonetheless, he didn't reply because he thinks I will accept neither.
Right now I've stopped moderating Maps due to the Pending Map cleanup announcement. To be honest, however, I rarely moderate maps. You can often see melee maps moderated by me, but I get tired of those too.
This is not your fault. Frankly it's my state of spirit's fault. I'm tired, and to know that holidays are over in a month (more or less) gives me the creeps and gets me off the mood completely. I know, you have nothing to do with this and you don't give a damn, but with this I am asking you only to have a bit of comprehension and patience when it comes to waitings.

The same goes for CMarket's cinematic contest plea. I don't know the [contest] Rules, and I do not feel like moderating cinematic contests either.

 

[frostwhisper]

Point is, people tried to look up to you as an alternative while Gilles was away, and didn't get an answer. Even a "no" would be better than no answer, because that's where you lose the user-mod relations and weaken the site...

Oh and to let you know, I'm not trying to point the finger at you, I was just giving this as an example, I'm sure the scenario has repeated throughout the site with others.

 

[Captain Griffen]

Main problem - poor moderation.

Main cause - poor moral, poor communication, and some awful moderators.

Moderators need to be level headed, competant at English to a sufficient degree to communicate, at least reasonably knowledgeable in their field, and able to deal with stuff sensible.

A good moderator can spot and avoid a flame war developing from a few days out normally (unless you have two people active and online at the same time, in which case things can turn very bad, very fast).

In order to do that, they need three main features:
- Respect.
- Level-headed-ness.
- Consistency.

Quite a few mods lack one or both. Let's be honest, most people don't respect Werewulf or MH, and neither can stay level-headed. They are both also totally inconsistent. This also applies to quite a few other mods - particularly on the inconsistency.

Moderation on THW is totally inconsistent. Sometimes you get nothing, sometimes you get a week ban, etc.. The result of all this? A chronic breakdown in order and, most importantly, the collapse of trust between staff and member.

Consistency is vital for trust. It doesn't exist in the staff-member relationship. What's the solution? Well, really it's in two parts:

- Better moderators.
- Admin leadership.

Better moderators just comes down to picking respectable and competant individuals. That means get rid of people like DSG, MH, etc.. In terms of admin leadership, you need some admins out there, leading by example, TALKING to staff. Mods and admins need to be able to communicate as equals.

If you don't trust someone, don't make them a mod. Mods here seem to constantly look over their shoulders at the admins in the sky for approval. You can have some admins dealing with the technical side in the background, but some admins need to be out there, in the forums and the chat.

And mods need to be trusted. I cannot overstate the importance of this. The moderation at WC3C works because every mod is trusted to deal with stuff in a sensible way, and can talk to the admins when they need support or advice.

THW lacks that strong moderation team, which may perhaps add to the admin team's lack of trust in them (I wouldn't trust a large part of the THW mod team), but you need to actually let the mods get on with their jobs without micromanaging. I'm not sure if you do micromanage, but the impression from the staff is that they have very little power.

Finally, the staff need to have respect from the user base. You don't. This is in a large part due to bad moderators and large amounts of inconsistency. This provides a major problem, as a large proportion of the quality people on THW now wouldn't touch staff positions with a barge pole.

My suggestion? Purge the moderators, and demote map reviewers from staff positions (really, you CANNOT have enough trusted people to review all those maps). Get in an active admin who's got respect and is sensible. I'd strongly suggest Ash.

 

[Dr00d]

Main problem - poor moderation.
My suggestion? Purge the moderators, and demote map reviewers from staff positions (really, you CANNOT have enough trusted people to review all those maps). Get in an active admin who's got respect and is sensible. I'd strongly suggest Ash.

Agreed, second, and QFT.

 

[frostwhisper]

Last time I saw a post by VGSatomy was months ago...

And don't worry, this is not a freaking revolution, it's an attempt to work together for the good of the site.

 

[Captain Griffen]

Oh god, I almost laughed here. Sorry for the irony, and sorry for the question I'm about to make, but is this an attempt to get Ash to administrator position? Let's demote VGsatomi, Mecheon and General Frank, shall we? I awesomely lol'ed.

Ash is the right man for the job. Frank's awesome and Mecheon's okay, but not really as far as I can tell what you need for an admin, particularly not right now.

Choosing admins should be based on who's best for the job.

 

[Earth-Fury]

frost's example is invalidated by the fact that wulf has banned me more than any one else.

As for this whole concept of Ash for admin... I just have to fucking laugh. His actions over the past while speak volumes for why we should ban him, not why we should make him an admin. He's recently tried to lie to the staff, for one. (Does that fit in with ANYONE's idea for an ideal hive? >_>) But really, this isn't about flaming Ash, so I'll leave it at that.

 

[Ash]

Oh god, I almost laughed here. Sorry for the irony, and sorry for the question I'm about to make, but is this an attempt to get Ash to administrator position? Let's demote VGsatomi, Mecheon and General Frank, shall we? I awesomely lol'ed.

There are two kinds of people on the Hive, the ones that suggest things and try to make improvements, and the ones who are constantly knocking things down, not making suggestions and are generally pessimistic or don't even know when issues are arising.

For a start, you're certainly in the latter category at the moment.

I'd also like to pick up on a point you stated earlier, too:

Additionally, you have to understand that I moderate an entire category of forums, I spend my life reviewing the threads on the Help Zone because I have to tag the threads, and these users just won't stop double-posting.

Right now I've stopped moderating Maps due to the Pending Map cleanup announcement. To be honest, however, I rarely moderate maps. You can often see melee maps moderated by me, but I get tired of those too.

Some mods are extremely over stretched in their duties, due to others not being active etc, and maybe you should take the map moderating position into serious consideration, as after the pending maps are removed there will be lots of work to do, if you don't have the time and/or don't want to put the effort into it, should you not relinquish that position to someone who does?

EDIT: @EF, etc, I lied to the staff because you all disliked the concept that I have my own freedom to make a satrical website. I moved the servers in an attempt to stop you all crying about it, as I can't see why the site should be brought down.

That aside, this thread is hitting a shitstorm when the rest of the moderation team came out to play. I hope that you're all happy in your attempts of ruining this thread, something in which has been a long time coming and, if your actions (speech etc) remain the same, will continue to be.

 

[PurplePoot]

- Possibly give those users the ability to read threads in the mod-only forum. Read. Not write in.

In all honesty, what goes on there doesn't concern non-mods for more than one or two threads.

In those one or two threads, being unable to post in them would defeat the purpose of seeing them at all.

That said, I agree with FrostWhisper. Earth-Fury is a nuisance on chat.

Just out of curiosity, why are you giving opinions on the chat when you've been banned for it as long as I can remember?

As for the old Earth Fury thing, I don't really follow it, but why is no one providing chat logs if they so dearly hate what he's doing?

If any of you Moderators tell me you do not look down on users because they have less reputation You are fucking bullshitting me.

Oh, damn, you got me. Without knowing at all what I do, what I say behind the scenes, how I judge rulebreakers, and my frequency of giving out positive/negative rep, you know everything about me.

I am so fucking sick of seeing the little people of this site get pushed around, because other people are getting respected for Rep Parties and saying stupid things and having more friends on this site than anyone else.

Reputation is a means for such people, not the means.

Smarten the fuck up and learn to use the system.

One of the main problems people have with it is that there's no clear way to use the system.

I suggested to Ralle that users be somehow allowed to tag their thread as [Solved]

Judging by how the system works, I get the impression that they'd need full power over the WEHZ, or at the very least tagging power over every thread, to be able to do that.

Ash is the right man for the job.

Ash has pretty icy relations with a lot of the staff recently (including admins)... I imagine that wouldn't go down so well.

---

I find the biggest problem recently (at least in dealing with Spell moderation promotions, etc), to be finding people who are both suitable for the job and will take it.

There are rather too few of those right now.

---

The person I find I'm agreeing here most with is Hakeem, and then Captain Griffen.

 

[Pyritie]

Ash for admin suddenly? And yet one of our problems is moderators being promoted too quickly.

EDIT:

As for the old Earth Fury thing, I don't really follow it, but why is no one providing chat logs if they so dearly hate what he's doing?

I did. I sent them to Mecheon, and then EF got his chat powers removed.

 

[Captain Griffen]

While we're on the subject of staff not being trusted, the whole 'you must be a mini-mod first' thing is totally messed up, on several levels.

- It tells staff you don't trust them.
- It discourages people who want to moderate for the right reasons becoming mods.
- The best people to moderate are not the best people to resource mod.

 

[PurplePoot]

The good thing about the mini-mod thing is that it does give you some method of testing out people you're not exactly sure on, without giving them too much power in one go.

Though, admittedly, it would be better to just restore the resource mod distinction.

 

[FamousPker49]

frost's example is invalidated by the fact that wulf has banned me more than any one else.

So then tell me this, have you been banned for the right reasons by her, or the wrong reasons?

Because if it for the right reasons, then why should someone that gets banned so much, be in the chat, and have chat powers?

Then if it is for the wrong reasons, you are thus helping to validate his example.

It seems like everyone is getting way too defensive here, and that rather than worrying about keeping your rights to be a mod, or trying to become a mod, that we should worry about what is for the good of the site, and not our own single petty differences we have with each other. This thread is meant for us to come together to help come up with a solution, not create more problems. Nobody wants a revolution here, just some simple changes so that the site run smoother, and continue to run rather than collapse.

So lets work together people. Dam.

 

[PurplePoot]

The problem with this whole 'defensive' argument is that it's an easy to use, prepackaged 'your argument is invalid' catch phrase.

It's really hard to find who thinks that way versus who just plain out disagrees with you.

For example, with the Ash thing (which is what most of you are arguing about right now), it wouldn't affect any resource mods or forum mods, and yet those are the people I see speaking out against it.

 

[Captain Griffen]

The good thing about the mini-mod thing is that it does give you some method of testing out people you're not exactly sure on, without giving them too much power in one go.

That the admins feel they have to do that is a major problem.

 

[PurplePoot]

The main problems I see with promoting new positions, though, are;

• It's often hard to tell whether someone should indeed be promoted.
• We lack an abundance of users who are both willing and qualified to be a staff member in most positions (though this continues to be reacted with with under-moderation, which is perhaps the best solution).
• Also, as I said, with the lack of a resource mod rank now (which really needs to be reverted), they're getting far too much power in one jump. There were even some rather volatile consequences when the categories were first merged, and these were people who had been supposedly 'up to it' for a while.

 

[Pyritie]

Also, as I said, with the lack of a resource mod rank now (which really needs to be reverted), they're getting far too much power in one jump. There were even some rather volatile consequences when the categories were first merged, and these were people who had been supposedly 'up to it' for a while.

And since then, our powers have been reverted to what it was before the merge. So if anything, all we got was an unneeded change in rank image.

 

[Rui]

There are two kinds of people on the Hive, the ones that suggest things and try to make improvements, and the ones who are constantly knocking things down, not making suggestions and are generally pessimistic or don't even know when issues are arising.

For a start, you're certainly in the latter category at the moment.

Okay, should I say "You for administrator" then? The moderators are decently positioned as they are.
What I said was not meant to attack you, if it was unclear.

(...)

Additionally, you have to understand that I moderate an entire category of forums, I spend my life reviewing the threads on the Help Zone because I have to tag the threads, and these users just won't stop double-posting.
(...)
Right now I've stopped moderating Maps due to the Pending Map cleanup announcement. To be honest, however, I rarely moderate maps. You can often see melee maps moderated by me, but I get tired of those too.

Some mods are extremely over stretched in their duties, due to others not being active etc, and maybe you should take the map moderating position into serious consideration, as after the pending maps are removed there will be lots of work to do, if you don't have the time and/or don't want to put the effort into it, should you not relinquish that position to someone who does?

When I said "entire life", it was an expression. I spend a lot of time, more than the amount I would like to spend, that is what I meant.
I have time to moderate maps and will do: you, Griffen and other people know that well; I have even been trying to lure people on chat to make tests with me.
So far, meeting up with some people from the Map Reviewers group has had better results, and the Chat is becoming rather spammy, so I stopped using it.

You seem, however, to be suggesting that I should resign from moderation. That is... calculative, cynical. Those are not exactly the words, but you know what I mean.

 

[Squiggy]

I'm really sorry for not joining your discussion but since i'm surely not in the position to judge about the situation because it would end up badly for me if i told my thoughts, but i have a suggestion - it may be a heavy one but in my opinion and after some years of expierience in different forums around the internet, the best.

Rearrange the staff.
Demote all of them, then choose new ones properly.
If anyone of you wants my moderator suggestions, he or she shall tell me.

Anyhow, i know, that most of you will either flame me for this posting, give me -rep or just ignore me because i'm not a so-called veteran user and only few users will interpret my suggestion right but that's the way it goes..

Regards,
Squiggy

 

[Ash]

No, I said you should resign from the map moderation position in order to focus more on the WEHF, and let someone who has the time to review a lot take over, possibly someone from your Reviewer group?

I didn't see the other thing as an 'attack' as per say, more so as a insult to the whole hive; everyone is saying points they don't like and the best the staff could come up with is 'I R SRY, I FUKIN LOLD AT DAT'. That goes for EF, too.

 

[Firelord213]

My opinions about the administrators.

Administrators

Wolverabid: Wolverabid is what I'd call a real administrator, He helps when ever he got the possibility to help, And I've never seen him troll/flame or being annoying , Nor have I seen him break any rules.We need him to come back. Bob27: The only thing that I've seen him do for The Hive Workshop is creating the section General Gaming, And constantly joining cinematic projects & other projects.This means he wont be able to have enough time to administrate The Hive Workshop, And he has been very inactive lately.If I'm right Bob27 helped The Hive Workshop a lot and is a friend to Ralle.I'd guess that the reason to why he's still an administrator would be: • He's a Friend to Ralle. • He has done a lot for The Hive Workshop • He used to be active. Demoting a friend to an user or something else isn't a easy thing to do, It could easily ruin the ''friendship'' and make Bob27 ''Emo Quit''. I know it's not an easy task but he needs to be replaced ASAP. Archian: I don't know much about him ''I'm just afraid of getting demoted if I'd say my true opinions D:'', I've heard that he's doing his job but needs to be more active. Ghan_04: Ghan_04 seems to do his job, I think he's a bit of a mini-Wolverabid but that's only good because we need more mini-wolverabid's. He got promoted quite fast, In my opinion a bit too quick. I'd guess that he was promoted that quick because of that Wolverabid isn't here and we need a new one. Samuraid: I have nothing to complain about Samuraid, He does his job well and is ''user friendly''.He takes care of the ''Technical stuff'' In The Hive Workshop. Totally earned his rank.

We need new administrators, They need to be familiar with The Hive Workshop and must be user-friendly & never break rules. Example would be PurplePoot, He's a nice guy who always helps you out if he has the possibility to do so. PurplePoot is the only one I can recommend, Can't find anyone else to recommend.

That's my opinions about the administration.

 

[PurplePoot]

I'm just saying that you've been banned for long enough that I doubt you have any idea what even goes on there these days.

In other news, I'll defend EF until someone posts evidence of him randomly trolling/flaming, because every single time I see someone whine about him they fail to provide evidence to back up their claims, and I'm not active enough in the chat to actually see what goes on with him myself.

 

[Rui]

(...)
In other news, I'll defend EF until someone posts evidence of him randomly trolling/flaming, because every single time I see someone whine about him they fail to provide evidence to back up their claims, and I'm not active enough in the chat to actually see what goes on with him myself.

I agree. I have never seen EF doing such a thing. He also contributed significantly to the new Map Rules, I cannot imagine him doing things you mentioned here.

 

[Eleandor]

Judging by how the system works, I get the impression that they'd need full power over the WEHZ, or at the very least tagging power over every thread, to be able to do that.

Maybe... that wouldn't be such a bad idea. I mean not full admin powers, but giving users with a certain minimum reputation the ability to make modifications to a thread would be helpful.
To avoid abuses, you could:
- Make it wikipedia-ish, where mods could "undo" changes.
- Add a requirement where a suggested change must be approved by at least 4 other users; like there's a "suggestion" button at a thread where you can read suggestions and approve them.

I can hear some of you saying it'll put even more stress on mods, although I disagree. First, you'd need a certain amount of users to have the same point of view on something, which decreases the chance that a moderator has to "fix" things. If they DO need to fix something, they could still "easily" reverse a thread, if you're making it wikipedia alike.
Secondly, it could work as a flawless reputation system. You wouldn't "get" any reputation (nor would it be displayed), but moderators will be able to see your suggestions and base their judgement on this in case they might consider making you a moderator yourself.

On the other points I agree with Hakeem.

 

[Rui]

That is too much scripting, I fear, Eleandor. Your suggestion is interesting, but Ralle will never do that.

 

[Eleandor]

That is too much scripting, I fear, Elenai. Your suggestion is interesting, but Ralle will never do that.

That's what I thought too. But I can always say it, and at least going off the current topic a bit probably prevented a flamewar here


(oh and I'm not Elenai. I'm NOT)

 

[Earth-Fury]

... and have chat powers?

I don't anymore. For perfectly valid reasons.

In other news, I'll defend EF until someone posts evidence of him randomly trolling/flaming, because every single time I see someone whine about him they fail to provide evidence to back up their claims, and I'm not active enough in the chat to actually see what goes on with him myself.

I agree. I have never seen EF doing such a thing. He also contributed significantly to the new Map Rules, I cannot imagine him doing things you mentioned here.

It's actually kind of funny. I must admit, I'm guilty of a lot of shit. I try my best to improve and surpass my own stupidities, but that is actually quite a difficult feat. However, the funny part is that people are constantly accusing me of all sorts of crap; and yet, people barely ever, if ever at all, kick my ass when I'm actually in the wrong. People seem to choose random things to try and accuse me with.

 

[Steel_Stallion]

Oh, damn, you got me. Without knowing at all what I do, what I say behind the scenes, how I judge rulebreakers, and my frequency of giving out positive/negative rep, you know everything about me.

You dont understand, i am not judging one person. I cannot judge one person, i am accounting the entire moderation team as a whole. Yes, because that is what it is. No, that is what it is SUPPOSED to be.

Reputation is a means for such people, not the means.

Obviously, it is also the most common mean. Which is just wrong.

One of the main problems people have with it is that there's no clear way to use the system.

Then screw the system! If you cant use it, lose it.



People, the problem here is obvious. You're all blaming different moderation staff, single people. There is no single person ruining the functionallity of this site it is the entire staff as a whole that is flawed. Do not understand this in correctly, i'm not saying get rid of the entire staff. I am saying that the problem cannot be with one person, unless it is throughout. The problem is the entire staff as a whole.

It's a job of teamwork and communication, between users but even more so between fellow staff members. This is something a viable moderator must understand to do his job correctly. Obviously there is a huge conflict between people that needs to be resolved if this site is ever going to straighten up

Dont give me any bullshit about one person because one person isnt at fault. If theres a problem, the entire staff is to blame. What? You think you get powers without responsiblity? (Before you quote something on this, i do appreciate and realize the hard work you guys do so. But dont use that as an excuse.)

If there is a problem, the entire staff is to blame.

 

[PurplePoot]

You dont understand, i am not judging one person. I cannot judge one person, i am accounting the entire moderation team as a whole. Yes, because that is what it is. No, that is what it is SUPPOSED to be.

The entire moderation team is a group of individuals with varying opinions.

Then screw the system! If you cant use it, lose it.

It would do more harm than good. I just personally ignore it, excepting as a comment system.

As I said, removing it would just cause trouble, and then said people would just find another way to discriminate.

However, that's off-topic.

Steel, in general, the reason people aren't blaming the entire staff is because it's completely and utterly unproductive.

How are we supposed to get anywhere if you say "You're all at fault, I don't know why, but you are, now go fix it." when we are indeed in the process of attempting to fix it right now?

 

[Dr Super Good]

Earth-Fury, I thought you had your stealth ability restored, which is more chat powers than I have lol.

I was promoted straight to trigger section moderator if I remember correctly. Only after that was I given the ability to moderate recources for obvious reasons (the sections did not used to support it).

I also used to be an admin, but really my tital was not diserved since I was pretty much a global moderator with the ability to modify user accounts to fix problems. I was demoted (if you can call it that as all I lost was the ability to edit user accounts) because I acted like a total idiot with my chatroom bot. I did not realise I was doing something wrong since there was no fixed regulations about bots and chatroom powers but really, now if I look at it, I acted like a total idiot with them and not like an admin (although some of the admins do spam a bit). The main reason I was demoted was because I lied to Ralle, I am not even sure how but I understand that he probably could not trust me with such powers that would make me be a true admin and thus its better to be a full global moderator rather than a semi-admin (which I basicaly was).

This site does not need more admins, but instead needs more people to just do normal moderation of recources.

 

[Instant Ramen]

This site does not need more admins,

Well, you're right there, it needs admins that not only work behind the scenes, but ones willing to connect to the user database on the same level as users.

but instead needs more people to just do normal moderation of recources.

I do believe we've been over this solution before.

 

[Gilles]

With regards to rapid promotions and new moderators, I think the Admins lack of activity with it's members is the key. When Wolverabid was here, he usually took care of the Staff hiring, and he (in my case) took his time. Admin lately (maybe just Ralle?) have been accepting people far too quickly.

I purpose that we appoint an Administrator to solely take care of staff positions. Obviously that doesn't seem like a lot of work, but their job would be to know people well enough to appoint them. So they would be the human relations for the Admin. They should know what's going on in the site, and who to trust with power.