lets all calm down

[Guest]

Agree!!! This site does take some beating, never denied that fact. But have to say it could be a hell of a lot better if long standing issues (as Dovescot states) had been resolved, but as of now they are still rumbling on and on. It only takes a few bad apples to spoil the bunch.

[Tony C]

Does harmony exist? If it does is it a better or duller place :-/

[THE FIFER]

I do not normally get involved in threads such as this but as reply 22 is not just saying the moderation of the site is not in with his thinking but the webmaster is the same, then yes I agree something needs to be done, so I will be locking this thread until it is looked into by the admin.

[Webmaster]

I'd just like to thank everyone for your input in this topic and the other recent moderation topic. I think that it has ran more or less as far as it can constructively, so after this post will be locked. If you want to further discuss anything contained please throw me a PM or email.

 

A little about 'problem' members

 

Many of the posts assume that where problems have arisen actions have not been taken, however to the conterary actions very often have been taken (where warrented and required) but simply not made public.

 

It isnt our policy to publish, or necessarily let anyone know about the details of a repremand that any member is given. This we feel is the correct and most professional method of running our forum, but we do realise that this may lead to a belief by some people that nothing has been done. This isn't the case.

 

A little about 'banter'

 

I think that our recent stance on 'banter' was taken the wrong way. We fully believe that banter has a good and valid place in any community, however there are situations and circumstances where it is inappropriate.

 

This is a pigeon forum and pigeon topics must prevail. Having a laugh and participating in banter is a byproduct of being part of the community, and the reason for being a part of this community is to participate in pigeon related discussion.

 

Moderating banter is definately a subjective task and as such an undercurrent thought may be that the selection of topics to moderate is unfair. While so people may assume correlations I can assure everyone that we strive for that not to be the case.

 

For example currently in a typical day we can have in the region of 400 to 800 posts posted. Of this number each moderator will only read a subset - usually topics of interest to them. Now if this reading pattern correlates with another members reading pattern, and the moderator (where necessary) moderates these topics it is understandable that a correlation may be noticed. But the point is that this correlation is most probably not the for the reasons assumed. If you strongly believe otherwise, throw an administrator a PM or email and we'll look into it

 

A little about moderators

 

I'd like to clarify a couple of points. Moderators are members and opperate under all of the same rules as everyone else, in fact there are an additional set of rules and guidelines that moderators are required to adhere to.

 

I've noted a couple of allegations of innappropriate moderator conduct, however 99.9% of the time this is the first I have heard of this. I cannot emphasise enough that if anyone has an problem, question or complaint to contact myself or The Fifer.

 

Notify us of problem posts or pms

 

The forum has come to a stage where there are too many posts for each moderator to read everything every day. Therefore it is vital that when you spot something bad you hit the 'Report to Moderator' button or forward a problem PM to us. Now I should mention that there is no automatic way of notifying the member who reports something, to tell them that we've looked at it or done anything about it. Its not impossible, and in some instances you'll receive a PM, but in all honesty this isn't very often and shouldn't be expected - we just dont have time to reply to every report.

 

Back to reporting offending posts and pms... Without being notified of incidents and provided with evidence or links to posts we cannot;

- dicipline the members involved

- eradicate the problem

- verify that some of these claims are not fabricated

 

by not reporting an offense we can only assume that you have condoned that members action. It only takes a minute to hit the report button, fill in a brief reason and fire it off to us

 

To conclude

 

This is a great place, and a great resource; there are thousands of fanciers from all over the country and beyond, with different backgrounds, knowledge and stories to tell. I think sometimes we all just need the reassurance that we're all singing from the same song sheet. There will always be one or two that join and try their luck, thats the same in a community be it online or in your neighbourhood, but together all pushing in the same direction we can discourage these people and ultimately lean, debate, and enjoy ourselves.