Oh Joy, SL Taps Users to be Forum Mods — and we know how well THAT works.
by Alphaville Herald on 26/01/06 at 7:44 pm
The last time we saw users as forum mods. (Just a stroll down memory lane…).
Yes, it’s true folks, dipping again into that inexhaustable well of users that will fluff for peanuts, the Lindens have enlisted a group of SL residents to moderate the SL Forums — or so reports Jeska Linen. Actually we like all the people that are going to be mods (well, the ones we know) and we hope they have fun and all, but man, this path leads to sorrow. (List of mods below the fold.)
Adam Zaius
Alan Kiesler
Catherine Omega
Cybin Monde
Damien Fate
Jeffrey Gomez
Juro Kothari
Lash Xevious
Launa Fauna
Maxx Monde
Merwan Marker
MJ Hathor
Pendari Lorentz
Satchmo Prototype
Siobhan Taylor
One Song
Jan 26th, 2006
Great so they handed over control of their fucking piss of shit forums to the fucking FIC. Forgive my language, but I thought it was appropiate. Way to go Linden Lab.
Prokofy Neva
Jan 26th, 2006
Oh, you posted that *just* as I was filing my (futile) letter of protest to Jeska. Well, at least you can see the people she picks — the FIC — when she goes about the task of hand-picking the resmods. Geez, you should at least be a *little more* coy when FICizing stuff.
And no, Uri, “we” don’t like some of these people? I just wrote an exhaustive list of all the bad things that some of them have done.
Snarky comments, bullying newbies, outing my RL, libeling me with the WRONG real life, calling me a “fucking wanker” — the list is endless for at least six of these mods here.
It’s handing the asylum to the inmates…
Next step…not allowing any links to third-party sites which “denigrate” LL or…now get this! its residents.
You will remember my words.
Brace
Jan 26th, 2006
What’s really funny is why yall so surprised.
There is a saying that goes something like this: Those that want or sign up for positions of power are exactly the ones who shouldn’t be in those positions.
Tho its cute to see Mer up there – mebbe he’s out of his bitterish phase now? That concerned me a lot.
Then again I don’t really care since I gave up trying to have normal human discourse on General long ago.
Have fun kiddies: your world your whatever
Certainly isnt mine anymore. *smooches!*
Avah (Fallen Hasp)
Jan 26th, 2006
Brace knows.
whatever
Jan 27th, 2006
Why did they even ask for so called volunteers for this lame ass excuse for a ‘way to bring the forums together and keep things in line’? Apparently over HALF of the people chosen were picked by LL themselves. They chose people who PURPOSELY did NOT sign up for this, people who didn’t even know about this, and people who don’t even care enough to pay attention or go to the forums. I actually thought LL was trying to be fair and prove that there was no favoritism involved. There were people chosen who have been complete assholes at one time or another over people that volunteered and seem more worthy of doing mod work.
Way to go LL, way to keep the FIC kiss ass brown nosers alive and kickin.
Alphasim72
Jan 27th, 2006
Hehe remember that fondly!
Cocoanut
Jan 27th, 2006
There is more than one person on that list who has treated me like a human being during my time on the game, always being pleasant and nice and reasonable to me, just as any other resident would be. Just as nearly everyone everywhere has always been to me, throughout my life.
But there is also more than one person on that list who has gratuitously attacked – not my ideas, particularly – but my personality, my character, and my integrity, and made it clear to all reading that I was to be regarded as utter pond scum. Who have called me names and impugned my character repeatedly and regularly in ways that would never have been allowed on the TSO forums (or anywhere reasonably decent).
What I have been unable to ascertain is what powers these mods will eventually have.
All that has been said to date is something to the effect that, “For now, reported posts will go to Jeska for review.”
I do know that the mods are able to sequester entire threads for that review, and will receive the abuse reports.
To what degree will they be able to act on them? How much influence will they have? When will they be given even more power? They have a forum to talk about these things among themselves. They work under Jeska.
For now, they will at least be the ones to bring things to Jeska’s attention (not us), and be able to tell Jeska who and which posts they think should be ditched, and which abuse reports should be acted on, etc.
In other words, they are the authority now that stands between us and Jeska and the other Lindens.
That doesn’t auger very well for me, considering that there are those on the roster who would like to shut me up permanently and haven’t been shy about saying so.
And already, we have seen my thread about res-mods (where I announced we could no longer rate threads as of that morning) moved to “off-topic,” where it belonged, said Jeska, because it was a “meta-conversation” or some such.
Yet the other five or six threads about the new mod system were allowed to stay and are STILL in General. I objected; Cristiano objected; but there has been no retraction or explanation for any of it.
That should send a pretty clear message to the entire resmod staff that there is actually more than one set of rules, because the rules actually depend on who you are talking about. It is okay to move Coco’s thread while leaving the others there, because, after all, it was Coco who wrote it.
Some residents simply are . . . less of residents than others. And that’s okay.
Or maybe it’s just, “Well that person has 3 people who just ar’d him, so he must get on their nerves, so go ahead and move him.”
Here’s what’s particularly dire about the whole thing:
In TSO, the rule that getting banned from the forums would get you banned from the game was abandoned before the volunteer mods came on board.
In TSO, if those mods got you banned from the forums, you at least still had your game.
In SL, getting suspended or banned from the forums means you are suspended or banned from the game itself. Which is already deadly to free exchange of ideas, even just in Linden hands.
Now we have other residents making those judgments – including residents who have made it quite clear to everyone exactly who they dislike and think the game would be better off without. (Sincerely, they believe this – “for the good of the game.”)
The resmods have been given a position to judge other residents officially, to act on abuse reports, to sequester threads, to see who ar’d who, and to make recommendations to Jeska, and apparently will be given more automony in the future.
They have been givien at least some hand in taking away their game from them and confiscating all their goods, and are likely to be given more such power in the future.
These are residents just like me. Yet they hold this power over me, and some have voluntarily made their feelings more than clear about me, and about other residents. I’m not the only one who doesn’t like it.
coco
Brace
Jan 27th, 2006
What it comes down to is this.
Once again LL got people working for them for free. Instead of spending the bucks to outsource and hire a forum mod – a person who’s only job is to handle the forums – they chose to go this route.
Its so very professional and really looks great in that international and world wide arena LL is striving to be amongst.
fuck I really shouldn’t type until I’ve woken up. oh well.
Cocoanut
Jan 28th, 2006
Definitely they should put paid employees in the position of modding the forums.
It doesn’t make as much difference in TSO – where the forums have been offloaded to Stratics, and the volunteer mods there are unable to do anything *to* another player except boot him from the forums.
(Which is bad enough, as classifieds and whatnot are there, too. But – I know of only one case where this happened to a regular player, who objected. Not to say there aren’t more, regular players who didn’t object.)
Update on this situation:
. Forum regulars are unhappy with the fact that the new resmods can see who reported what. I suspect many were already plenty unhappy, but the unhappiness has focused on this detail.
. A couple of comparatively innocuous threads were spirited away last night. Turns out a mod thought they might be “in the wrong place” (which they were not) and sequestered them for later review by Jeska.
. A poll has been started about whether or not these resmods are a good idea. So far (it’s early, though) most think it is terrible and should go.
. Most disturbingly, at least one of the resmods believes that how many people are “disturbed” by someone’s thread is an important consideration in whether to act on that thread/poster or not, as well as “who” reported the thread to begin with.
Needless to say, this is the sort of thinking that has been in evidence since long before the resmods were put into place.
It is this sort of thinking which has already damaged me and other residents.
coco
Prokofy Neva
Jan 28th, 2006
Yeah, this is the Pendari Principle: “Most disturbingly, at least one of the resmods believes that how many people are “disturbed” by someone’s thread is an important consideration in whether to act on that thread/poster or not, as well as “who” reported the thread to begin with.”
It’s definitely stupid, vicious, and evil. It is at the heart of the attack and the ultimate permabannig on me. You can even trace it from the Pahoa Jade thread, where Pendari first came on to set me straight and tell me that even if I were right, my critique (which was *self-defense against a screeching drama queen putting in a thread only about me, about a specious inworld incident about water and builds) would not hold up merely because I was taking on someone ‘beloved by the community” blah blah. Uri seized on that precise issue of “wrongdoing is defined not by the rule of law but by what the little clique says it is” when he wrote the “Avatar of the Year” editorial about me and the saga of my sojourn on the forums.
I’ve blogged on this in detail today, http://secondthoughts.typepad.com
It goes to the HEART of what is wrong with the forums, and if we can get the Lindens not only to see this gaping problem but REPUDIATE AND END IT, we might be getting somewhere.
For the first time in the history of the forums, the residents are getting to see what runs the forums: slews of fanboyz and irate idiots deluging mods with specious abuse reports.
Suddenly, those vicious abuse-reporters, now exposed in front of their peers whom they cannot trust to run to third-party sites with this information, are getting all shirty and touchy about “privacy” and the sanctity of the anonymous abuse report.
I say publicize away, and I hope one of those resmods will indeed publicize the slew of wrongful and specious AR’s that come in over hatred and viciousness, and not real violations of the law.
Already Aimee Weber and others who must have engaged in specious ARs are announcing that they will stop ARing under this system because “their privacy can’t be protected”.
What’s to protect? The fact that they can and do file specious and wrongful abuse-reports on other people that they hate, whose criticism they can’t stand, for their bad practices on the forums itself, first and foremost?
This is a really important moment. Either the Lindens will suddenly hide the identity of the abuse-reporters again, meaning that resmods will be dealing with the same kind of wierd and frustrating report sanitized of identifiers that we all get if we happen to get chose to be on a “resident panel” to review someone’s expulsion from SL.
OR they will trust their own pets, and put the fear of God into them never to reveal the identity of the abuse-reporters.
But…someone is sure to break ranks (and we hope they do!) and reveal the fact that the forums are run in fact by a cowardly little click of fanboyz and fangirlz with their hands permanently weighted on the AR buttons against anybody they don’t like.
We knew that…the new system is about to generate the proof of it.
Seeing how readily the fanboyz are to sequester threads that have nothing wrong with them, we can see how awful the system is. Then the question is, will the “professionals” like Jeska say, hmm, this system is no good.
Enabran is quick to say “this is a bad idea still squishy soft on the inside, put it back in the oven” — meaning the idea of having the identity of abuse reporters become the knowledge of resmods.
That’s just because he seeks continued impunity for wrongful abuse-reporters.
Given the Pendari Principle, and the refusal of the Lindens to refute the Pendari Principle, we have to worry, and have to go on figuring they accept and act on specious abuse reports, either unwilling, or unable to research the specifics.
They do this because for all the wrong reasons, they trust the people making the reports.
Simon Lameth
Jan 28th, 2006
W00T! I can’t wait untill we can’t have free speech in the forums. And everything we post is monitored by Big Brother Lindens. I work as a mod for a website that uses Vbulletin, the exact program LL uses. When you report a post in VB ALL the mods recieve this:
–
Blank Blank ( mailto: BlankBlank@domain.com ) has reported this post:
http://forums.worldsims.org/showthread.php?p=91510#post91510
This is part of this thread:
The Sims 2: “Officially” Open for Business! – By Tim LeTourneau
http://forums.worldsims.org/showthread.php?t=7340
This is the reason that the user gave:
i cant find any of thouse pigy tales on my game of sims2.!!!!
This message has been sent to all moderators of this forum, or all
administrators if there are no moderators.
Please respond to this post as applicable.
–
I would not be suprised to have this information that is sent to the ResMods sold in-game.
P.S. I was just in the Mod Control Panel. I forgot that you can also see every option, email address, Ect. that you set in Control Panel. Even if you say “Hide my Email Address”, ResMods most likely have the ability to check ANYONE’s Email AND IP Address.
Mr. F
Jan 31st, 2006
I could really give a shit who mods my post. The SL forums are so lame, your either in with the “Cool Kids” post whores or you’re not. If go against the grain of the Cool Kids all hell breaks loose. I had one of those retards threaten to file abuse because I said the “shit” word.
What a bunch of fucking tards. I wish people would stand up and call the shit for what it is. Not just the Res Mods but the cry babies that are seething because they were not picked. I have never seen a forum where people are bullied so bad as they are there.
TowelieTSO
Feb 1st, 2006
Ha, Still talking about Moderators for The Sims Online, who have completely ruined the game by thinking they own it. How could I forget these special people, who give nothing back to the game or community except to waste their life away on the boards. I will start appreciating them when:
A. They drop a few levels, and realize they are human, and that other posters are human.
B. They give something back to the community.
C. Start making objects/updates for the game
D. Start playing the game – half if not most Mods don’t even play the damn game anymore.
Anyway, Stratics is flawed, we have Mr E, who doesn’t answer/reply to emails, and doesn’t even play the game. Hmm, thats like Steve Jobs never touching or seeing an iPod. Does that make any sense?
Trish / Mr E / Young / Aster / Most Other Mods – Are Singular, and don’t have a mind of their own. One person says something, and they all agree. Just what we need, a bunch of mindless zombies repeating everything they see and hear.
Anyway, best of luck to the SL players and the Mods. Hopefully, you will have people who are human, and dumb as bricks. Plus, they may even play the game!
Back to TSO – Towelie
TowelieTSO
Feb 2nd, 2006
I meant to say on the last line “and NOT dumb as bricks”
Cocoanut
Feb 2nd, 2006
Towelie! Why don’t you come play SL with me! It’s free!
Mr. F – I just wish YOU would stand up for stuff like that on the forums like you did here (if you haven’t already, under another name).
I wish everyone who ever IM’s me to sympathize with me about what happens to me on the forums or would speak up about it ON the forums. Not just in IM’s, though it’s nice to hear.
Seems like lots of people see what is going on, you wouldn’t know it from what is said on the forums. There, it’s like I’m the only one saying these obvious things, and of course, the counter from the pack of wolves constantly on my back for doing so is that I’m a “martyr” who “has to be a victim.” I mean, gag me with a SPOON.
Thing is, it’s not just me it happens to. And it really doesn’t matter to me that it IS me that it happens to most. That’s only cause I keep on talking instead of piping down and slinking away. Point is, it shouldn’t be happening to anyone. Mr. F told it ike it is.
I’ve got to figure that nobody says anything cause they don’t want the same thing happening to them. After all, it happened to me precisely because I went to bat for two other players they were ganging up on (when I first joined SL), and because I’m psychologically incapable of pretending things aren’t happening when they are, as I see them, so I keep saying so.
Interestingly, some of the resmods apparently see it, too, because some of them have IM’d me about it. So I’ve come to a screeching halt in my anti-resmod tracks. Cause if that’s the case – if there really are people wanting to improve this, but it is easier for them to do it under the veil of the resmod system – well then, hey, I say, the resmod system could be a hell of a lot better than what we used to have.
coco
Prokofy Neva
Feb 2nd, 2006
Coco, do not be dissuaded by this clever tactical move by the forums jackals and their lackeys. It’s all a ploy. It’s evil, through and through, and you know it!
Cocoanut
Feb 2nd, 2006
Well, you have no idea how desperate I am there. And I’ve been desperate for a very, very long time. Course all is not rosy; my thread about the resmods – alone among all of the resmod threads – still sits off by its wittle self in Off-Topic.
Let’s wait and SEE if some of the jackals ever get shut up, or if they are allowed to pile on as usual.
You know what’s interesting? It – living with it this way for a year now – it has made me have basically zero respect for SL, or any expectation or hope for its future. That is what it has accomplished. Neat, huh?
coco
TowelieTSO
Feb 3rd, 2006
Join SL… Towelie Jarrico
Cocoanut
Feb 3rd, 2006
How so frickin bloody right you are AGAIN, Prok!
It actually PAINS ME to have you be right so much of the time.
I get up this morning to find that my resmod thread – which protested the fact that only resmods can rate the threads now – had been moved back by one resmod.
That resmod noticed that Jeska had officially ruled (after she had moved my thread) that threads about forum moderation were NOT “metadiscussions” after all, and DID belong in the general forum.
She actually did this a few days ago, but left my thread in Off-Topic nonetheless. Hmmm.
So this one resmod moves it back to General because this he believes in being fair, and he sees that Jeska has made this statement.
SO WHAT HAPPENS? The FRICKIN RESMODS rate it a TWO. For “bad.” They DARED to STAMP MY OPINION “BAD”.
Two of them did. Either two of them rated it a two, or one of them rated it a one (“terrible”) and another rated it a four (out of five, and I can’t even REMEMBER what the dang numbers stand for anymore, since we can’t use them, so we can’t even SEE their meanings), but in any case, two ratings, average of 2.0.
At least I hope it was the resmods. I certainly hope it wasn’t Jeska and/or Pathfinder, though I have to tell you, at this point, I definitely wonder.
I liked to think it was just incredible naivete on their parts to think that allowing only the resmods to rate threads was actually a good, tenable idea. Stupid, yes, but maybe just naive and idealistic.
But maybe it isn’t naivete. Maybe it is corruption from the top-down that even the resmods can’t affect positively.
Maybe, Prok, it is the Lindens themselves mistreating their own residents – you, and, for the past year, me, because I’m vocally your friend, and/or maybe just on my own merit, which would be a compliment – because I’m vocal and make too much sense.
If so, it truly is hopeless. Let’s hope not. But even if it isn’t corruption, it’s bungling of the highest order, and I’m tired of people being singled out and victimized because of it. And you weren’t the first, and I won’t be the last, until if and when they ever put a stop to it.
coco
Mr. F
Feb 4th, 2006
Hi coco,
I have been fairly vocal about calling shit like I see it on the SL forums. I use a another handle over there.
About Prok. Prok is the perfect example of going against the “cool kids” in SL. Ran out of town as a result.
Prok tends to be a bit long winded for my taste, however, most of his post tend to be spot on.
Mr. F
Feb 4th, 2006
Quick comment,coco, sorry if I haven’t jumped into help on the SL forums. I usually hit the New Post button and work my way down. I’m sure I’m missing most of the content. I’ll keep an eye out for your stuff.
RB
Feb 4th, 2006
Classic picture right there. Ah the comical memories.
I find it odd that such rubbish continues to this day, but EA can afford the megre loss. So prolly doesn’t even register to them.
Anywho, back to the crusade.
- RB.