Excuse this long post! I've been typing it as I read through every post in the thread, so it covers things mentioned at the start through to the end. Anyway, here's my take on things.
SJS, regarding your post #126 - I would say that we do need visibly titled mods. People need to know who to contact when they want to raise an issue, if not through a reported post or email. It also allows people to better appreciate what people tell them to do. As a new member, they might think "You can't tell me what to do!" when someone says not to do something. If a moderator has a title then they can better appreciate that yes, we can tell them what to do (well, only to some extent, obviously). If you like, though, it could be an idea to have "Recognized members" - people who have been around for over a year, established themselves as 'respectable members of the community' or something so that people can aspire to post in similar fashions. But this can have downsides, too, as it can be seen as elitism and some could question as to whether that merely means that other members are 'not good enough', which would be a shame. Basically the general idea leads to more problems then it's probably worth. I would argue one thing, though, in line with what you're saying (or at least on a tangent)... if they are long-term members who are capable of taking that kind of responsibility on, why not just mod them?
For the rest of things brought up in the thread...
Off-topic posting should be dealt with case-by-case, as it can often lead to good things while still allowing an easy "back-on-topic" post to cut in whenever anyone wished without causing problems. As for actually warning people for off-topic posting, that should be down the moderator. It doesn't even need to be a harsh warning, merely a simple post by a moderator saying "Okay guys, enough of that, let's get back to the topic at hand and let some other people have their say." Alternatively "start a new topic or carry it on via visitor messages." There are a lot of ways to ease things back on track without stirring up anything.
I think there needs to be a lot more respect at CW for the moderators from the membership. I've seen people be told to stop posting about certain things or not to use a certain phrase and then people will continue posting about said thing or even use the certain phrase afterwards. It could be ignorance, arrogance or whatever that causes people to do this but it shouldn't happen. Admittedly, I would crack down on this sort of thing a lot heavier than most mods given the licence to do so without the members slating my decisions. Members should accept the decision of the moderator in the context of the thread. If they disagree, they should bring it up in the appropriate manner - this could be by IM'ing the mod, another mod, using the reported post feature or emailing the CW moderator email address... either way, there are a lot of ways to go about things, but it should be done the right way, not with a post simply saying "that's a load of crap" in the thread they were warned in.
Richard pointed out in this thread that the moderators post-2006 don't do a lot. I'll hold my hand up on this one. I've even accepted that I could be removed as a mod but noted to James and others that I am happy to stay on if they like in a 'consultant' role, which I've done for some time while doing some moderating spots very rarely when I saw it as required.
However, I've always been more than happy to rejoin in a full moderator role -
if I am actually allowed to moderate. This requires the backing of the membership, something I don't feel I received when I actively moderated, to the point that I decided to back off and let other mods take things on how they felt fit and 'watch and learn' from them. This lead to pretty much nothing happening after I backed off, hence my current lack of moderating. I am keen on moderating on a more significant level if the members are backing such a move - and, of course, if James also backs it.
The point of all of this is that, well, maybe the other mods are in a similar position. If everything they moderate causes them to get slated or if every time they say not to do something they are ignored, they will very quickly lose any sense of authority which is something that a mod needs in order to do their job. So, basically, if a mod tells you to shut up you should shut up and accept that what they say, goes. If you disagree, you can offer them some constructive feedback in private channels, but outright slating them for everything they do in public is something that should a) be cause for further warning or eventually a ban, and b) something that should be discouraged in a massive way.
There should be no racial requirements for a moderator. A good mod should never be biased towards his own race, in fact you'll find that on occasion a person might be so far unbiased to the point tha they feel they are against their own race just to be wary of racial discrimination - I've seen this happen! But yeah, it can't hurt to have some more from other locations if possible, but it should never be a case of feeling forced into hiring someone because they're from a specific country. I can completely understand looking for people in specific timezones, though, for time coverage reasons. One thing I will concede for race requirements is that racial knowledge can be key on occasion when identifying what is offensive and what is not, or 'translating' certain local phrases (eg. those used in the Windies are lost on me).
JBH001 mentioned that CW is never friendly. This is probably something we should actively look to do something about. Better moderation is part of it, but I wonder what else we could do to better the experience for someone new. Probably something for another thread, but oh well.
Richard - Technically I'm "ooop north" although I don't know how many would count me as a mod in my current 'status' if you like. But if time allows I'd be happy to kick in again, as mentioned before. Doubt I have the time to do it all myself, though, as reading through CC would be a chunk into my day.
Regarding postcounts - I post at a forum of similar-ish size to CW that has disabled postcounts entirely - the closest a regular member has to a postcount is searching for all of their posts and checking the number of results they get. It's a great forum - very friendly. Not sure if the postcount disabling has much to do with it, though... it only was done to stop people spamming to up their postcount. However, with some people around the place with such high postcounts I actually think it might be worth disabling them from the postbits at the least to ensure that people can forget about any idea of superiority they might get out of them - or inferiority, in the case of newer members. Jono's reasoning is great. GIMH's idea of making it a seperate thread is also great.
jeevan - It may reflect well to have posters with high post counts showing off that we keep our members, however that shouldn't matter once they see that there are a lot of members here posting as it is. They shouldn't need to know how long they've been around for, but if they do, there is the memberlist and the join date which would remain visible on the postbits.
Summary
- Mods should take more responsibility for ensuring any 'problem areas' are dealt to efficiently.
- Members should respect the decision and authority of moderators and their requests of the members.
- We should look into how we can make the forums in general more welcoming to members.
- We should look into the pros and cons of removing postcounts.
- We should look into our moderation team to see if it is capable of doing what is needed from them, including covering timezones.
