The site is growing quite well, but we only have 5 mods and umm...when was the last time we had a new mod? I know Sanne used to be one, but she hasn't been one for a while now. Of course I don't know how high the mod work load is, but it might be good to get a new mod to cover a time zone not currently covered by the current staff.
I just know that when I look for a mod, often times I don't see one online. Not blaming the staff for they are absoulutly lovely, just merely pointing out that a new addition might be a good idea. Even if you don't believe you need any mods, it would be really good to hear from you!
I just know that when I look for a mod, often times I don't see one online. Not blaming the staff for they are absoulutly lovely, just merely pointing out that a new addition might be a good idea. Even if you don't believe you need any mods, it would be really good to hear from you!
Hey, Katia!
We are indeed a very small number of mods, compared to the size of the community. Howeve, we've never had trouble with workload, and in fact sometimes days pass without us having to deal with a single issue, no matter how small (save for Kim, who does all the technical stuff. She's always busy!). We keep an eye open all day - often I find that on waking up, I just barely missed some talk from our American moderators!
So what I'm trying to say is, speaking strictly as a mod, I haven't felt the need for an expanded team. Other mods or Kim might feel differently, of course!
What do you mean with "look for mods", though? Usually, the best way to contact us is by using the report button, or sending us a PM. Only a few of us use the "currently online" feature, so that's not a reliable way of telling if we're around or not!
I am really interested in following this thread, so please, nobody take what I say here as me stonewalling any discussion! I want to know the community's thoughts on our effectiveness and quickness to respond, and whether they think we should expand the team again or not. We want to do our jobs here as well as possible, after all!
We are indeed a very small number of mods, compared to the size of the community. Howeve, we've never had trouble with workload, and in fact sometimes days pass without us having to deal with a single issue, no matter how small (save for Kim, who does all the technical stuff. She's always busy!). We keep an eye open all day - often I find that on waking up, I just barely missed some talk from our American moderators!
So what I'm trying to say is, speaking strictly as a mod, I haven't felt the need for an expanded team. Other mods or Kim might feel differently, of course!
What do you mean with "look for mods", though? Usually, the best way to contact us is by using the report button, or sending us a PM. Only a few of us use the "currently online" feature, so that's not a reliable way of telling if we're around or not!
I am really interested in following this thread, so please, nobody take what I say here as me stonewalling any discussion! I want to know the community's thoughts on our effectiveness and quickness to respond, and whether they think we should expand the team again or not. We want to do our jobs here as well as possible, after all!
And just for the sake of facts, in late 2012 Loki and myself became moderators; right before Sanne left the team(I think that was in 2014?), we gained Ben.
So the team has roughly stayed around five moderators for over 6 years; when Loki and I joined, two more it already departed.
I too am going to follow this thread, because I'd like to know your opinions as well!
So the team has roughly stayed around five moderators for over 6 years; when Loki and I joined, two more it already departed.
I too am going to follow this thread, because I'd like to know your opinions as well!
As far as I have seen and been able to keep up with things, the moderation team of RPR has been on top of a lot of stuff, and has responded rather quickly to issues and tensions rising in certain threads and forums. I don't really believe that RPR is in desperate need of a new moderator, though I do believe that someone who was willing to donate time and the effort to assist Kim with coding would be nice just so she does not have as much to comb through and worry about -- however, I believe that would be a position of the utmost trust and familiarity.
Having been one of upwards to twenty moderators of Bulbagarden forums (the forums for Bulbapedia) from 2008 - 2012 and seeing the massive user base it has on a daily, I can safely say from my personal perspective that the mods RPR has, has been able to keep the site under control and dealt with when it pertains to the members' needs and desires.
If the thing that you were seeking a moderator out for was not enough to warrant a PM or a report button, then it can probably wait if it's a suggestion, comment, or inquiry. There is no dire need of more mods to respond to small things, and from what I have been able to see whilst lurking about, there generally isn't too much need to report things from other users -- the community on RPR is, honestly, surprisingly calm and tame for the most part.
Having been one of upwards to twenty moderators of Bulbagarden forums (the forums for Bulbapedia) from 2008 - 2012 and seeing the massive user base it has on a daily, I can safely say from my personal perspective that the mods RPR has, has been able to keep the site under control and dealt with when it pertains to the members' needs and desires.
If the thing that you were seeking a moderator out for was not enough to warrant a PM or a report button, then it can probably wait if it's a suggestion, comment, or inquiry. There is no dire need of more mods to respond to small things, and from what I have been able to see whilst lurking about, there generally isn't too much need to report things from other users -- the community on RPR is, honestly, surprisingly calm and tame for the most part.
i'd assume the speed of the response would depend on the urgency, as FJF says, but even when i've poked mods with suggestions i've always been pleasantly surprised to get a reply within a couple days. reports of concerning behavior have consistently been tackled within the same day, in my experience, so i always encourage other users to take an issue straight to PM instead of waiting for a mod to appear online or in the chat - no question will ever be too silly or problem too trivial for a response, so there's no reason to be nervous!
in terms of maintaining a safe environment as the site grows, if that might be your concern, i've always felt the userbase itself to be quite adept at self-moderating, with plenty eyes to cover areas the mods might miss, and a shared eagerness to point new users in the right direction. there might come a time in the future where more mods are needed, but for now i feel the community is pretty stable.
edit: i've had a think about this more deeply, and if there was a point for me where i would start to see an extra mod on the team being beneficial, it would be if a serious issue like harassment was left without mod attention for more than a day. i think you guys are doing a fantastic job of keeping on top of everything right now though, and i'm really proud to be part of such a positive community!
in terms of maintaining a safe environment as the site grows, if that might be your concern, i've always felt the userbase itself to be quite adept at self-moderating, with plenty eyes to cover areas the mods might miss, and a shared eagerness to point new users in the right direction. there might come a time in the future where more mods are needed, but for now i feel the community is pretty stable.
edit: i've had a think about this more deeply, and if there was a point for me where i would start to see an extra mod on the team being beneficial, it would be if a serious issue like harassment was left without mod attention for more than a day. i think you guys are doing a fantastic job of keeping on top of everything right now though, and i'm really proud to be part of such a positive community!
Thank you for this suggestion! If you're feeling unsafe or not heard about a specific issue, I want to hear that for sure.
The work load has definitely grown as the userbase has, especially over the last year. We did consider taking on a new mod as we saw that happening. What I ended up doing first was to aggressively upgrade the tools available to the moderators. They can both spot problems and accomplish the job of fixing those problems more easily than ever before (and I'm still working to add and upgrade mod tools!)
For example, this included things like an approval queue for kudos, uploaded gallery images, and character/player icons -- meaning that instead of having to comb blindly through random pages looking for problems, everything uploaded appears on a single page for a moderator to hit "approve" on, or take immediate action to add warning flags or request edits as necessary. In this way, we are catching and fixing more issues than EVER before, almost always within 24 hours of the thing being uploaded, and often within minutes. This is just one example of the many improved tools the mods are working with this year. There are many more!
For things like forums, written content on character profiles, or PMs, I also added new "report" buttons all over the place, and upgraded the existing report buttons to allow for including your reasons for concern. The week I put those in, we saw a remarkable difference in the speed with which we were able to see and address problems, thanks very much to our amazing and thoughtful userbase.
These have let members faster and more accurately direct a moderator's attention to things that concern them, and are vastly more effective than PMs for urgent issues -- if you PM a mod and they happen to have just gotten offline or are otherwise busy, your PM can sit unnoticed while the problem gets worse. But using the report button sends up a flag that all of the moderators can see, so there's no need for a "hand off" to occur should the one mod who was told not be able to deal right then.
And boy, I am SUPER GLAD that I did make those upgrades this year, because after they went in two of our mods simultaneously experienced major life changes, including things like moving to new countries, buying a house, changing schools, getting married, etc., so for a few months there we were unusually short handed, and if one of the remaining mods got sick, individual mods would have to take on responsibility for monitoring more things. So with those two mods coming back to work within the last few weeks, I actually feel like the team is bigger than ever!
My assessment at the end of this year, with all the changes the site and userbase has been through, is that the existing team is reacting faster and catching more stuff than ever before.
All that said, we are on a trajectory of growth that will require the moderation team to expand. I try to touch base with the mods at regular intervals about whether they are at the point of needing more help.
In the past, I've been vocal about my hesitations to add features that would require moderators to view more "channels" of things, and I'm not sure that adding another mod, or even several more mods, would necessarily alleviate that concern for me.
The work load has definitely grown as the userbase has, especially over the last year. We did consider taking on a new mod as we saw that happening. What I ended up doing first was to aggressively upgrade the tools available to the moderators. They can both spot problems and accomplish the job of fixing those problems more easily than ever before (and I'm still working to add and upgrade mod tools!)
For example, this included things like an approval queue for kudos, uploaded gallery images, and character/player icons -- meaning that instead of having to comb blindly through random pages looking for problems, everything uploaded appears on a single page for a moderator to hit "approve" on, or take immediate action to add warning flags or request edits as necessary. In this way, we are catching and fixing more issues than EVER before, almost always within 24 hours of the thing being uploaded, and often within minutes. This is just one example of the many improved tools the mods are working with this year. There are many more!
For things like forums, written content on character profiles, or PMs, I also added new "report" buttons all over the place, and upgraded the existing report buttons to allow for including your reasons for concern. The week I put those in, we saw a remarkable difference in the speed with which we were able to see and address problems, thanks very much to our amazing and thoughtful userbase.
These have let members faster and more accurately direct a moderator's attention to things that concern them, and are vastly more effective than PMs for urgent issues -- if you PM a mod and they happen to have just gotten offline or are otherwise busy, your PM can sit unnoticed while the problem gets worse. But using the report button sends up a flag that all of the moderators can see, so there's no need for a "hand off" to occur should the one mod who was told not be able to deal right then.
And boy, I am SUPER GLAD that I did make those upgrades this year, because after they went in two of our mods simultaneously experienced major life changes, including things like moving to new countries, buying a house, changing schools, getting married, etc., so for a few months there we were unusually short handed, and if one of the remaining mods got sick, individual mods would have to take on responsibility for monitoring more things. So with those two mods coming back to work within the last few weeks, I actually feel like the team is bigger than ever!
My assessment at the end of this year, with all the changes the site and userbase has been through, is that the existing team is reacting faster and catching more stuff than ever before.
All that said, we are on a trajectory of growth that will require the moderation team to expand. I try to touch base with the mods at regular intervals about whether they are at the point of needing more help.
In the past, I've been vocal about my hesitations to add features that would require moderators to view more "channels" of things, and I'm not sure that adding another mod, or even several more mods, would necessarily alleviate that concern for me.
I am just popping in to say that one of our greatest assets is you lot.
Seriously. We rely on the site membership for a great number of things, not the least of which is maintaining the type of community in which more aggressive moderation is very rarely needed. You do a WONDERFUL job of community building.
And those report buttons that Kim mentioned are amazing tools. Don't be shy about hitting them, even if you're not sure. We love reports. Adore them. Even if no moderation ends up being required.
Seriously. We rely on the site membership for a great number of things, not the least of which is maintaining the type of community in which more aggressive moderation is very rarely needed. You do a WONDERFUL job of community building.
And those report buttons that Kim mentioned are amazing tools. Don't be shy about hitting them, even if you're not sure. We love reports. Adore them. Even if no moderation ends up being required.
Ben wrote:
I am just popping in to say that one of our greatest assets is you lot.
Seriously. We rely on the site membership for a great number of things, not the least of which is maintaining the type of community in which more aggressive moderation is very rarely needed. You do a WONDERFUL job of community building.
And those report buttons that Kim mentioned are amazing tools. Don't be shy about hitting them, even if you're not sure. We love reports. Adore them. Even if no moderation ends up being required.
Seriously. We rely on the site membership for a great number of things, not the least of which is maintaining the type of community in which more aggressive moderation is very rarely needed. You do a WONDERFUL job of community building.
And those report buttons that Kim mentioned are amazing tools. Don't be shy about hitting them, even if you're not sure. We love reports. Adore them. Even if no moderation ends up being required.
Feeling our lack of a like button right here.
The thing was that I got the RPR report button mixed up with another site's which had a broken report button. 
I do feel safe in our lovely community, but I just felt a little concerned by the fact that we had only 5 mods, but I guess there was nothing to worry about.
I do feel safe in our lovely community, but I just felt a little concerned by the fact that we had only 5 mods, but I guess there was nothing to worry about.
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