Forum Change?

mmm4444bot

mmm4444bot

Super Moderator
Joined
Oct 6, 2005
Messages
10,962
Having a good time, traveling 'round Montana, southern California, and Washington State's Olympic Peninsula.

Have I missed a forum change, while away?

I note that other moderators are no longer moving threads to the appropriate board. For example, a moderator replies to a log-change-of-base question on the Arithmetic board, but doesn't move the thread to the Algebra board. Or, a moderator starts an algebraic solution to an elementary question regarding ratios, but leaves the thread on the Arithmetic board. Moderators have viewed dozens of threads not belonging to Arithmetic, Beginning Algebra, Advanced Math, etc., without taking 10 seconds to move 'em.

If we don't care about categories, anymore, I'd like to know because the time it took to move three dozen threads recently could have been spent goofing off, instead. :D
 
If anyone needs help understanding the forum software, please post a request on the Adminisrative Issues board. I will try to help. :cool:
 
I feel your pain. :)

At the sites I help admin, I sometimes get frustrated when I see a thread in the wrong forum (or has some other issue to be fixed), and then see one or more staff members has viewed the thread and left it as is. Not all staff do that, but enough to frustrate me.
 
It is my impression that there are very few moderators to do the work here. If that is correct, that may be the issue to address.
 
JeffM said:
It is my impression that there are very few moderators to do the work here.
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I'm willing to do the lion's share eating, erp, that is, handling spammers. Other projects (eg: reorganizing guidelines, updating notices, researching technical issues) I can handle as well, at my own pace. There's not much left to do, on a daily basis: approving new-member threads, moving threads, informing people we have guidelines, deleting duplicate threads. (Hope I haven't forgotten anything of major import.)

Let's see. We have four active moderators. However, stapel gets a pass, right now. I was away from the boards for awhile. That leaves Subhotosh and tkhunny. Roughly 36 threads could have been moved over 45 days. If each of two moderators could handle moving about four threads every ten days, that would about cover it. But, I certainly don't want to see anyone overworked, so maybe we do need additional moderators. (Have you considered joining the team?)

Alternatively, we can forget about categories, let threads fall where they may, and ignore the situation entirely. That's basically what happened over the last month. The sky didn't seem to fall. :cool:


PS: It takes about 10 seconds, to move a thread.
 
MarkFL said:
I feel your pain …
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Thanks, Mark, but there's no pain. I'm just curious whether I ought to stop moving threads. I don't own the forum. It's not my place to manage moderators. I'm happy to accommodate the majority view -- once I understand what it is. Cheers! :cool:
 
mmm4444bot said:
Thanks, Mark, but there's no pain. I'm just curious whether I ought to stop moving threads. I don't own the forum. It's not my place to manage moderators. I'm happy to accommodate the majority view -- once I understand what it is. Cheers! :cool:
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I think threads organized by category is beneficial to users who may be looking for a certain type of problem, and they will have a good way to narrow their search. It is true that users who find threads here via a search engine won't likely notice that it is posted in the correct category or not. But, suppose a user is already on the site, and wishes to find a particular type of problem, say on using the Law of Cosines. It would then be good if there is a Trigonometry forum that they can visit and search. Or say a user is just interested in seeing calculus problems in general, because that's where their interest lies. Then it is convenient for them if all the threads dealing with calculus are conveniently grouped or gathered together in one place. It's a level of organization that makes using the site easier and it just looks better, dagnabbit! :)
 
MarkFL said:
I think threads organized by category is beneficial …
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I completely agree! :D (I assumed this goes without saying.) On the other hand, perhaps concern over such issues is my problem. Thanks for your input. We'll need to wait, to discover the majority view of moderators. Historically, this type of information has been very hard to gather.

For a few months now, I've been pondering stepping down as moderator. It's been a fun run; however, I would like to start traveling a lot more (think monthly), before any more destination spots are ruined.

Or nuclear war breaks out. ;)

I'll probably make a decision by the end of the year. If I do step down, that would certainly solve all of my issues (spoken and unspoken) with the forum -- another attractive reason to consider it …
 
I will be stepping down as a moderator at this forum. I plan to do this in phases.

I have entered phase one. I'm no longer approving threads from new members, moving threads, asking members to read the guidelines, deleting duplicate threads, handling post reports, or responding to private messages from members expressing concerns about the forum (the majority of which have to do with rude, condescending behavior from long-time members). I am continuing to ban and report spammers and work to simplify the wording and layout of the complete forum guidelines.

Phase two will begin after I complete the guidelines overhaul (estimated as the end of January, 2019). During this phase, I will be dealing with spammers only.

Phase three (final phase) to be determined.

Cheers :cool:
 
mmm4444bot said:
I'm willing to do the lion's share eating, erp, that is, handling spammers. Other projects (eg: reorganizing guidelines, updating notices, researching technical issues) I can handle as well, at my own pace. There's not much left to do, on a daily basis: approving new-member threads, moving threads, informing people we have guidelines, deleting duplicate threads. (Hope I haven't forgotten anything of major import.)

Let's see. We have four active moderators. However, stapel gets a pass, right now. I was away from the boards for awhile. That leaves Subhotosh and tkhunny. Roughly 36 threads could have been moved over 45 days. If each of two moderators could handle moving about four threads every ten days, that would about cover it. But, I certainly don't want to see anyone overworked, so maybe we do need additional moderators. (Have you considered joining the team?)

Alternatively, we can forget about categories, let threads fall where they may, and ignore the situation entirely. That's basically what happened over the last month. The sky didn't seem to fall. :cool:


PS: It takes about 10 seconds, to move a thread.
Click to expand...
I believe I volunteered, long ago, to be a moderator. I never retracted the offer.
 
mmm4444bot said:
I will be stepping down as a moderator at this forum. I plan to do this in phases.

I have entered phase one. I'm no longer approving threads from new members, moving threads, asking members to read the guidelines, deleting duplicate threads, handling post reports, or responding to private messages from members expressing concerns about the forum (the majority of which have to do with rude, condescending behavior from long-time members). I am continuing to ban and report spammers and work to simplify the wording and layout of the complete forum guidelines.

Phase two will begin after I complete the guidelines overhaul (estimated as the end of January, 2019). During this phase, I will be dealing with spammers only.

Phase three (final phase) to be determined.

Cheers :cool:
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Sorry to hear about this. I was just getting to know how to really irritate you! :cry:

-Dan
 
mmm4444bot said:
You contacted Ted directly, to volunteer?

If not, you ought to email him directly. :cool:
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No. It was long ago. The spam level was absurd. I believe I made the suggestion back then, either on the admin board or in a report-spam message. Not sure I have ever talked to Ted.
 
JeffM said:
… I believe I made the suggestion … either on the admin board or in a report-spam message …
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From my perspective, Ted hasn't responded for years to anything on the boards or in a post-report. (We have at least two new members who've been waiting months for Ted to resend their confirmation link; Ted no longer responds to such email requests, either.)

As I've posted a number of times: It appears that Ted moved on to bigger and better things quite some time ago. This site no longer has active administration.

If you're still serious about joining the moderation team, I would encourage you to email Ted directly and keep trying until you get a response. :cool:
 
mmm4444bot said:
… Phase two will begin after I complete the guidelines overhaul (estimated as the end of January, 2019) …
Click to expand...
The beginning of phase two has been delayed. I've started reorganizing the forum guidelines, but that project is now on hold, pending the switch to new forum software.

I need to become familiar with the new forum, before I can determine which guideline-issues have become moot.

Phase three may not be necessary; I need to see how spammers use the new forum. I look forward to working with MarkFL! :cool:
 
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