Forum Moderators: open
I'm totally on board with keeping the focus on "professional."
Keep up the great work!
The charters tend to morph is response to changes in the individual forums. To a large extent, since multiple admins and moderators work within any single forum, they provide a common touchstone for their reference. More importantly, we use them to show that our actions aren't arbitrarily determined, or that we are not singling out an individual. As the membership continues to grow at its double-digit pace, I expect the charters to become used even more as a sort of billboard communication system. (WebmasterWorld doesn't use those "sticky" threads that stay at the top of the forum, no one reads them either. The charters are an alternative to that ...or we have to resort to bumping Please Read threads like this one.)
>list what the actual changes are?
I added the sections on "Focus," "About the Moderating Process," and the title and first paragraph of "Google noise" last week. The "SPAM reporting issues" section was added some weeks ago by WebGuerrilla (I believe). Like I said, it continues to evolve.
If things don't get fixed soon instead of Google Newz it will be Google Noise Forum (apologies if someone made that joke already)
it ought to be split up into a few more topics
That's right. I'm guilty of that. Once or twice I posted in Google News because I needed a quick answer (sorry mods).
The traffic on the forum should be spread as evenly as possible between all the topics to avoid problems like this.
However, I do wish the forum 3 mods and admins all the luck in the cleanup process.
Chris
It had already become the Google Noise Forum. Even if something of interest did happen to make it into the threads, no one could find it nor could a member knowledgeable on the subject salvage the post and keep it in focus for further analysis --it was simply swept away.
It had already become the Google Noise Forum. Even if something of interest did happen to make it into the threads, no one could find it nor could a member knowledgeable on the subject salvage the post and keep it in focus for further analysis --it was simply swept away.
NFFC has been running a clean-up on existing threads as well. Threads make it past the initial gauntlet, but collect a lot of sidebar comments in them. He's trying to prune those down to fighting weight. I'm hoping that we can establish this as part of the routine for all admins & mods, as there's nothing worse than knowing that the gem is somewhere in a thread then having to read 400 posts to find it.
rcjordan: ...there's nothing worse than knowing that the gem is somewhere in a thread then having to read 400 posts to find it.
Just a thought, great work though! ;)
over 25,000 postings within six weeks
And half of them from Rfgdxm1 (just kidding).
how about limiting the number of times anyone can post to twice a day? Especially new users.
I think that wastes more time!
We're working on it.
ie, make sure people have read the charter, and all the posts in a thread, before they can post? or maybe that's a bit OTT. could cut down the mod's work though I think.
WebG & Alberts 'GoogleGuy said' thread was perfect - and solved the wheat & chaff problem for most of us.
Maybe thats the ongoing answer - a weekly distilled "GoogleGuy Said" forum - a locked thread with all his posts, edited with keywords in context. If you want to know more - follow the link to the original discussion thread and read all 983 posts.
Chris_D
When I first started reading here in early 2000, the first thing I noticed was that forum members were not shy about politely telling others to "use the search function;" and "read the archives," etc. which kept much of the noise down. Personally, I read the archives for several months before I ever posted a question.
So, I think that if some of the senior members/mods start taking a firmer stance with posters, it will be greatly appreciated by most forum members. And, while some newer people might feel put-off by it, in the long run they will learn a lot faster.
I looked at the Google News charter the other day when someone mentioned it and wondered if it had changed again. I didn't recognize any changes.
But a date might help folks realize it had been changed since they last checked.
If there is a date and I just missed it, please pardon this post.
Not a bad idea. I just looked at it and I can't tell if it is "new as of two weeks ago" or "New and Improved today". :)
Intentional to let surfers find it in the category listing for themselves and to let them know - hey, we do have other forums.
> all with hundreds of posts!
The final Dominic related threads was somewhere over 5k.
> I think I did a couple of things wrong
> that were on the list.
Thanks for noticing and being part of the solution.
> Keeping politics out of search engine
> technology is going to become increasingly hard.
Politics is getting into everything on the net. We've had a Tax related thread every month for the last year. In 99-01 we had zero.
>update posts or even the
"has the update started" threads.
>I just want those posts limited to those threads.
We'll do everything we can, but please keep in mind that last update was way out of normal time and space even for Google. That may be the case again this month. It left so many trying to figure out what was really going on.
It just goes to show you that you should not put all your traffic eggs into the same basket. There are alternatives [webmasterworld.com] out there that work just as well, but take just a little more effort than the easy-cheesy freebie se traffic does.
> A mod at WW isn't easy.
And hats off to the team who have been above and beyond lately dealing with the growth and the associated troubles it has brought. Best team on the net - bar none.
a WebmasterWorld Community Classic:
I was setting in a pub in London about 5k miles from home with a group of WebmasterWorld members last week. I couldn't get a Wifi connection because the isp needed a "UK credit card"...go figure.
So I yelled out, "who's got a UK credit card I can use"? Within a few seconds two came flying across the room without so much as a question.
> Hey, instead of calling it newbie section,
> how about Google Venting section?
For every action there is a opposing reaction. We've thought and thought on how to split the forum down further, but the topics all meld together under the G banner. There would be twice as much moderation needed to make it work.
>Google Algorithm
>Google Update Chat
>Google SERPS Quality
>Google Bugs
>etc.
Without a long explanation, it would take 3 mods per forum and atleast 5 for the main google forum to even come close. We have six admins and 3 google mods. That's 9 covering right now. Adding that many new forums where every post would have to be moved would put the work load way up there.
>The problem is, it drains admin/moderator resources
>and it just plain kills the pro attendance.
Ditto.
>but the 'regulars' already know and the
>new members will learn pretty quickly.
Big time. Todays newbie, is next years moderator. The rate at which some people learn is staggering. We have some mods that started out pretty green back in the days of old....
The whole goal with the changes is to get the mods off of policeman duty and back into being good posting members themselves again.
> looking-for-quick-answer-without-reading users will
> ignore the charter and some will even fail to read
> it after being asked to.
Trying a little experiment [webmasterworld.com] today.
>Paid membership anyone?
You know what the biggest stopper is? More people use Google and Fast to search the site than our own site search engine. So...
> I don't like whiny update posts,
> but what about all the butt
> kissing posts!
lol. There are a few of those. We try to strike the balance between them. ahem - we've been top heavy in the counter voice here lately. Not many *kiss* posts out there really.
Trying a little experiment today.
How did it go?
Judging from the last two posts in the Google Gap thread it appears that the need for pre-moderation is there. ;)
