Forum Moderators: open
What this means is I have created a site in which users can post their greivances and get help. As you all may have already experienced... The internet is not a very forgiving place. Many times admins and moderators seem to be power-hungry and uncaring. It is the hope of this union to fix those problems.
I would like to know what you think of the practicality of forming an internet union. The pitfalls, the logistical issues, etc.
Currently I believe it is possible and much needed on forums where user liberties are hampered. I imagine it to be user-run democratic system where users can vote and select their own laws and moderators. A place where we can work together for a common good.
Looking forward to your advice, -whyo6-
<snip>
[edited by: lawman at 6:14 am (utc) on Oct. 10, 2007]
[edit reason] No Private Emails Please [/edit]
Many times admins and moderators seem to be power-hungry and uncaring.
Not my experience.
I would like to know what you think of the practicality of forming an internet union.
Explain again how the collective bargaining works?
I think all you would get is a forum for the bitchers and whiners!
Hmmmm...maybe I will join after all...KF :o)
I am foriming an internet union
gosh I thought we were already united :)
See I don't think a big thing is where (not I, but we) would get our power from. There are plenty of angry users out there that wouldn't mine causing trouble...
Ny first and primary concern is to make sure that I get it right the first time!
My Plan:
1. Any and all changes in rules will ce decided on by mass polling.
(since this is the internet it allows a much more democratic society where users can have a near 1:1 relation to decisions made and what is done)
2. As for the problem with whiners. Well that all depends on the kind of whiner.... A user's sentence will be determined by the site of the problem, and it is easy to tell how others felt about that member. But on the rare occassion where a user is banned or punished unfairly I simply want to offer them with a system to appeal. By "appeal" I do not mean appear with the ruling bodies of said site, but by a council of users. If they find he has been mistreated by the ruling bodies the council can call to the adminastrators to revoke the punishment. If the users are not able to effectively find a solution they can call up to a higher body of the union with more power... And so on and so on....
On a final note I should say that I find the term "whinners" while sometimes carries a deragotory name. If a user feels that something is not right he/she should have the option to speak out about it without feeling publicly humiliated.
For instance:
Say a long time user of a forum gets "set-up" into taking the ax by a rival Moderator. And users speak out about a possible set-up and upon their "whining" find out that certain forum rules are unwritten or contradictory. I have seen many situation in which those users are given the "suck it up" treatment.
Don't get me wrong there are certainly trolls in every site, but sometimes good users get mixed up in much controversy simply for speaking up. Rules should be made to protect those users. And simply because a Moderator or admin may just be following pre-established rules may end up taking actioned deemed to severe or for the problem at hand"
On a personal note:
Once I was banned for a period of two weeks by a moderator known as "<snip>". I was speaking out, but I was banned, by a contradictory rule wich stated that "Moderators can not moderate in a thread the are participating in, but can when there is a direct violation of forum rules." I posted after said Moderator deemed it off-subgect to talk anymore about the incensitiveness of a user's post. When I came back after a couple of weeks and finally realized how exactly I was banned I tried to make a statement on it, but to no avail I was considered a whinner. And sure you might question my truthfulness except for the fact 20 some other users were banned permanently in similar situations. A few of which who were good friends of mine. After every last friend of mine had been banned and my own existence hanging by a thread I decided to do something about it and go out forums of the world to find users with similar problems. The problem at said site has grew so bad because of one corrupt moderator that several of my freinds have stayed behind the build a force to combat that site. Which I might add has already gathered some 50 members in less than a year. I decided to to other forums to speak about my mission, because I realized that if this is a problem in one forum it is a problem in other forums as well this way other users can support without having to spend the time and the effort that I am right now trying to gather support for their cause. So that maybe one day when you or someon you know faces a similar problem they can have the option of a second option...
As to answer your question:
You wouldn't have any bargaining clout. How are you going to get a millionThere was one method used way back in the pre-american revolution period. A method called "Power of the purse". The first option would be to boycott. This is only possible if users are organized.
webmasters to get up and walk away from their monitors for a month?
The second might be rebel. An interesteing rebellion was the Digg rebellion... So many users disobeyed the admins commands that the banning of so many users would shut down the website. So they did the only thing they new how...agreed to the users terms.
The third option. Would be Coporate takeover. In which users would forcibly bye the site. and it would be hosted by the union. From then on the said forum would be ran and controlled by the users.
-why06-
[edited by: engine at 10:36 am (utc) on Oct. 16, 2007]
[edit reason] No specifics [/edit]
think all you would get is a forum for the bitchers and whiners!
Many times admins and moderators seem to be power-hungry and uncaring. It is the hope of this union to fix those problems.
Moderators start out in the larvae stage as caring, compassionate users. After 3 years of listening to repetitive bitching, moaning, and the most asinine complaints over and over again and they mutate into hardasses. It's like one day you're 20 years old and liberal, next thing you know you're fat, sixty and voting republican. Happens to all of us.
LOL! :D
There are plenty of angry users out there that wouldn't mine causing trouble...
There are two classes of angry users, or even not angry users - those who can, and those who cannot. In the group of those who can, your union isn't needed. They know how to address problem solving. Among the group who can't, many of their problems arise because they cannot, so they most likely won't be able to find your union, or if they can, it needs to be made very simple for them or they won't derive any benefit.
so they most likely won't be able to find your union,
If they also have a secret handshake then I definitely want in.
<edit reason>Sorry-didn't mean to come off as condescending. I'd recommend focusing on the positive benefits of membership, as opposed the negative reasons for its founding.</edit reason>
Currently I believe it is possible and much needed on forums where user liberties are hampered.
People will congregate where they feel comfortable and they have absolute freedom of choice to go where they choose. And plenty to choose from. It's a self-balancing system, to which a "Union" would add no value.
TJ
I don't see how it would work. Where are you going to get any power to really do anything?
The union could boycott sour grapes.
They could narrow the meaning of "internet" to specifically mean only what are now known as forums on websites on the internet.
They could sell t-shirts and bumper stickers telling people to boycott sour grapes.
They could get everyone in the Northern Hemisphere to jump up at exactly the same time, thereby pushing the Earth a little bit more out of the sun's direct light and helping to stave off Global Warming.
They could have annual conventions in exotic places like Nacogdoches, TX causing everyone to fly there from all parts of the planet, thereby increasing the use of jet fuel and expediting Global Warming.
The possibilities seem almost endless.
If one workman lays down his tools then the management can kick him out and replace him. If all the workmen lay down their tools simultaneously the management doesn't have a company. That's how collective bargaining works.
Managers of large corporations all too often kid themselves that workers are easily replaceable and only when they are faced with mass industrial action is the point rammed home that managers need production-labourers just as much (perhaps more in an era when it is much easier to start one's own enterprise?) as workers need people who can provide employment opportunities for them.
How does any of this relate to forums, forum administrators and forum contributors? I suggest you are drawing a wildly incorrect analogy.
