Moderation
 

Totally over the top. You can stop the threads and delete posts nearmiss, be as anal as you like about it, the forum is now next to useless and not worth a visit.

Osprey is right....

c'mon, its not that bad reading the OT post i nthe updates you end up learning some good stuff about the era and others.

at least that was a nice way to feel up 10 mins of my life per day.

big miss on this policy, nearmiss....

Damned if he does damned if he doesn't. There was a massive thread where everyone asked him to be more severe with the threads going off topic, soon as he does what people ask you start whining.

The update threads appear to have a useful life of about three days. I don't think Olegs pays much attention after that.

It would be nice to know if Oleg has a two or three day window in which he looks and answers. One of my frustrations has been that I don't even know if he's read my questions. If we knew he would not be looking/answering after, say, day four the moderators could be hard nosed up to that point then let the rest of the members get on with it. They die with the next update anyway.

I have learned the hard way that those threads fan out in all directions after a few days and 'Topic' becomes irrelevant. I'd just let them run after that as there purpose ages out very quickly.

going from 0 to full its not goign to work out, a balance is needed. Closing the thread after one day ? what do you expect people to tal kabout during 6 days :rolleyes:


Keep the abusive stuff out of the pot, kick people for a weeks, anyway, knowing the police here, i feel that myself will be taking a vacations due to finger-easy admin.

People asked for more moderation to make the update thread more useful. I don't see how locking the thread will accomplish that. I'm also wondering about the definition of "off topic" that is applied here when even comments on the update like this are unwanted. But apparently the policy changes daily now so who knows what we can post tomorrow...

I think it is a good decision, this also creates a more specific and more deeply discussion about a single issues which the thread starter pointed out, I think this leads to a more organised discussion, that is, when people stay mature.

I always felt the moderation level was about right till now. 24 hrs and locked, is weird for sure...maybe nearmiss has reached his breaking point, responding to the pressure of that poll.:grin:

Sometimes it takes harsh action once in a while to get people to tow the line. You all asked for moderation after he let everyone have a free hand in the threads for a long time, he does what you ask now your are all moaning. I have seen children with better manners.

Probably.

People should lay off of Nearmiss, he is just doing what the majority of the community asked for. It was self imposed in that sense. It sounds like he doesn't want to keep monitoring the thread for a whole week and has limited it to one day. I think for what has been asked of him (a near impossible, thankless, and time consuming task), that's fair.

Splitter

Lets wait for the next updates and see how it works, before we start another discussion about discussing discussions ;)

Well I didn't, and the people who did mostly asked for more moderation to make the thread useful, and not for locking it to make it useless. I understand people were frustrated with the direction some of those threads were taking, I also understand being a moderator is not an easy task, but I still have no clue what this latest approach is supposed to accomplish.

+1

nearmiss is most likely unable to devote a lot of time here. Baby sitting the up-date thread, I'm sure is a pain in the ass to him. Its a shame that it came to this, because a lot of ideas and answers are no longer possible. Except of course if Oleg responds in any of the new threads seaking information and thoughts on the up-date...but don't count on it:grin:

90% of what I've learned regarding il2 was through reading post some of which were off topic. Just recently MAT manager for example.:grin:

Pretty impossible task for Nearmiss. As said already - 'Damned if he does, damned if he doesn't'.

Moderators have lives too you know. A lot of off-topics in this week's update.

What do we want?

A free-for-all post anything policy pisses some people off.

The strategy of only allowing on-topic posts requires either:

1. That everyone exercises some thought before posting (post in a new thread if needed) and tries to make it work

or

2. The moderator stays tuned here 24/7 to mop up those who are too inconsiderate or lazy to comply with the requests.

Nearmiss obviously has better things to do than that.

So the last alternative - lock the thread.

We are going on two extremes.From total anarchy to repression.
Both attitudes are really bizarre for me,not because it doesn´t happen in forums,but cause this isn´t a normal forum.
Here we are able to be connected with the developer of a game that I suppose most of the forum users at least enjoy.What if Oleg see the damn mess over here?
People opening threads just to cuss him or TD,posts being labeled and threads being locked,trolls...

Where are we going to stop?

Maybe we have to see both sides to be able to find something in between?

Don't blame nearmiss for the policy, we asked for it and then voted for it.
If you'd like the OT stuff back, ask for it and post a poll, but don't blame nearmiss.

Actually anything relating to what's being done with the game was seen as on topic - you could ask anything about it and make suggestions of your own. What was runing the updates were posts (several from me) discussing random nonsense, like the ethics of chute shooting, and those posts don't belong in an update thread. And there are always posts telling others whether or not there post was ok, and we've been told that they don't belong in update threads either. I don't know what's so difficult to understand, discuss what's happening with the development of the game in update threads, and discuss everything else elsewhere.

I voted against a change in moderation thank you very much.

Moderation is a thankless job that I wouldn't be up for doing, I don't expect miracles of those that do do it.

Maybe you voted against (maybe I did too), but we (as a group) voted for. If for example all but one person voted for, it's not exactly reasonable that the one person has a go at the mod for doing what he was asked, simply because that one person voted against.

you should consider editing your initial post and turning down the offensive language/tone, surely there is more civilized way to communicate. no need to start flaming to get your point across.

with the phases this forum has gone through in the last years, the moderation from nearmiss here has usually been pretty good, and if anything it was considerably better then most other forums. having one thread closed a bit to early one day doesnt negate all his previous hard work (or his balanced management approach)

i'd agree the recent update thread was closed a bit early, most of the recently edited off topic posts in it were still related to the same discussion. but most of the same complainants here recently asked for stricter on topic moderation, so its largely a problem of your own creation. given how well balanced nearmiss's approach has been in the past, it is likely the pendulum will now swing back a bit closer to the middle, and threads will get trimmed of unrelated posts, but still let the discussion flow on more naturally.

even if many of the update threads continues on past the "useful feedback for oleg" point, with the more mature and restrained discussion tone in the last months by most regulars here ( other then the occasional new teen floating in with a case of trailerpark'itis), there is still lots of useful factual information that gets posted in them.

nearmiss has re-opened the Thread:

Well it seems members want the update threads open for postings, regardless of some Off Topic postings.

So be it...

Rules of the forums and prohibited content will still be enforced.

If members want responses from the developer you will either stay ON TOPIC, or let the threads run.

The developers are pressed for time, as are moderators. They will not take time to read the thread when Off Topic postings prevail.

If a posting is reported to moderators as "Off Topic" action will be taken.

Moderators do not have time to hang on the forums and read every post as it is made. "

He's right, we can't expect Oleg to trawl through a bucket full of dross to find actual opinions and questions.

Lets give the moderators a chance of succeeding by staying On Topic.

Democracy sucks if you are over-voted. :)

With the last 2 updates being all about the colour of flames coming from an engine I suddenly found myself looking forward to the off topic comments/pics, I thoroughly enjoyed Alphas pics of his diesel engine.

Come on Oleg give us a vid with a 100 + aircraft on it, no excuses about it being an old beta or on a crappy Pentium 111, lets see something special for once. :grin:

The problem is...

Read the latest update thread responses and look at the number of postings some of those off topic posters have made on these forums. Many of them are loyal members, members who have basically gotten off topic as discussion advanced.

When moderators ban loyal members for 7 days for off topic, it is just not a best way to deal with the problem. We all make mistakes, but we want to keep the integrity of the thread.

Reported postings will still be dealt with.

Guilty as charged :)

I was off topic and admitted it in the thread, but some people don't get the chance to see how some of us accumulate knowledge of "how things work" IRL.

I'm not trying to validate any comments I made a week earlier in the "flames thread" Its just sometimes I could bang my head in disbelief at the posts I see :)

Also

I considered the latest update thread a "dead one" as Oleg was simply showing results of the weeks previous request thread regarding exhaust flames, and was not asking for further help.

He had not responded and I don't think had any intention of either.

Nearmiss

Sorry for the off topic pics :)

KG26_Alpha

What good would it do to ban posters like yourself for 7 days for going with the flow of discussion. It is easy to get off topic we are all aware of it.

The update threads are probably pretty well done as far as feedback to the developer after the first day.

It is not worth all the scrutiny of dealing with Off topic posters when the developers are no longer following the thread. Sometimes the developers will pop in later in the week, but it is rare.

Reported postings will be dealt with.

The first day responses on the update threads should always have viable content for discussion, after the first day Laissez-faire.

The problem is that both strategies -- the old and the new one -- are not clearly outlined and feel sometimes erratic and confusing, even to older members. (There is also clearly a need for more moderators, but that is so since a long time.)

Back to the strategy: IF you want update threads that stay on topic (I say IF) you need to establish some very simple rules. For example, the simplest one could be to allow only questions and comments on the update directed only to Oleg. The rest is deleted, but people are welcome to open their own discussion thread if they don't agree with each other on something.
That would be a way, but it's also the harshest one.

If not you have to establish some other rules and stick to it. Or you say that everything is ok, except personal attacks between members or/and impolite talk to Oleg or 1C members. (which has occurred in the past often enough and stayed there unmoderated for days and weeks).

But to moderate the update threads with the guideline "to stay on topic" is probably the hardest one to do, and very hard to realize. Where does "on topic" end and "off topic" start? This will only create frustrations. I think it's easier to moderate on the base of personal attitude and behavior instead.


And again, one active moderator just isn't enough for this forum. It's way to emotional and busy for that.

Questions and comments on the update directed only to Oleg, would be fine except there are discussions between members that work out issues developers are interested to read.

Reported postings or PM messages are sent directly to moderators via email. Moderators are volunteers, this is a 24/7 international website where people are using the forums around the clock.

It is easy to make discussion points, and many sound viable until they are put into practice.

There are so many instances where intent, and communication is unclear. Following the logic of some people requires "psycho" skills many of us don't have. LOL

Formulating strategy has drawbacks, because humans just don't all fit the mold.

We have tried numerous things, and all had merit to some degree.

It can't be a best way when we have to ban loyal members.

Moderators don't want to read every posting, just as members don't read or respond to every posting. Moderators are volunteers, and only want to preserve peace, sanity, and sensible discourse on the forums.

Reported postings will be dealt with

Is it possible to move the OT posts and create a new thread out of them? Just an idea...

It is easier to just delete or edit them.

A separate thread Off topic would just be a random mess

out of interest, has Oleg ever asked people to stay on topic? Sometimes the O/T stuff is interesting, it's the abuse that some members dish out which is just intolerable.

I have not been here long, but I do visit many forums. Personally I would make an "Off topic" thread and sticky it. I would take any off topic posts and put them there. I would also get Nearmiss some help by adding a assistant moderator. Preferably someone who works differant hours and can check up on the forums a couple times a day when Nearmiss is not able to.
Being a moderator is not a fun job. This forum seems to be more mature and well behaved than most some getting him some help may work well.
Just my .02, take for what its worth...........;)

What needs to be drawn is a line on what kind of posts are off topic. For example, my post notifying Oleg that the codes were wrong was deleted for being O/T. But surely that is within the context of the update? IMHO that really should not have been deleted. If every post like that had been deleted in every update, then there would be a number of features in SoW which would never have been edited to suit reailty.

That's actually my take on things as well. That being said, i realize it's a time consuming task, so nearmiss does the best he can to find a middle ground between enforcing something we voted for and not having to spend the entirety of his time doing it.

From where i'm standing, what we have now is not the best case scenario but it's one of the only two possible scenarios:
1) Let it run wild like before
2) Be strict within the limited time confines of real life, which ends up in the moderator (notice the lack of plural there, this is the issue and it's not the fault of nearmiss) having to take shorcuts to prevent it from taking up all his time.

The solution is simple:
3) The forums needs a few more moderators, preferrably on different time zones.

This way the rules we ourselves asked for would be enforced, while also giving moderators enough time to pause and think:
"Hmm okay, this is not 100% on topic but it's useful, i'll let it slide and check back up on it at night before i go to bed. If it devolves into a debate about the moral implications of war i'll tell them to take it to another thread, or even cut and paste their posts into one myself".

I've been in various forums over the years and this was the best method i've seen, pruning the threads and moving off topic but possibly useful stuff into their own thread. The downside is that it's not doable if you only have one guy. Under the current circumstances nearmiss can not be blamed for the outcome and neither can the community.

I think these are just steps in the right direction to get us where we need to go. Reading this thread i see that members have come up with suggestions of their own and nearmiss has a level headed attitude towards it all which further helps things along.

What i would do if i was an octopus with 3 brains and 3 different accounts running on separate PCs (:grin:) would be to monitor the following:

1) Relevance of the posts to the update. Spin-off discussions would be allowed on an "evaluate it as it comes" basis and judged on how many "layers" detached they are from the original topic.

For example, posting a reference to back up a correction to something that's wrong in the screenshot would be okay. If not directly related to what the developer wants us to focus on it would still be ok to mention it but not to steer the main discussion away from the originally intented theme.
Knowledge is knowledge and if someone has it, let them share it with the developers as long as the new off-shoot theme doesn't end up totally dominating the rest of the thread. Bit tough to balance, so let's see it in detail.

A discussion on the internal workings of a piston engine would be fine, IF the update was about piston engine related features, like exhaust flames.
Posting the same discussion about the effect of mixture on exhaust flames would be off topic however, if the update was about showing off the AI's routines at work in a short video. It would still be ok to post that "i just spotted what could be a mistake on the exhaust flame effect" but refrain from going any further than that, as an in-depth analysis of it would totally sidetrack the original topic about the AI. So, we could have:

--->main topic: Self explanatory, this stays in
------>1st layer: Feedback and possible oversights concerning EVERYTHING that has to do with the game or the update content, even if it's not directly related to the main topic. These are just comments/statements.
References and in-depth discussion are ok, as long as they concern the main theme of the update only. This is done in order to minimize clutter, however valuable or interesting it might be. So what do we do with it in order not to miss potentially useful information? Move it to layer 2.
--------->2nd layer: More in-depth discussion and references about things that concern the update and the simulator, but do not directly pertain to the main topic and intented content of the update. Essentially, this contains all the stuff that's worthy of discussion game-wise, but doesn't specifically focus on what the developer wants to show us this week.
This is most of the times useful information and spreads the knowledge among the members of the community, but also has the potential to totally pull a thread off-topic. It's still valid information, but it needs to be a thread of its own. The solution?
A moderator can move it or the users could display some common courtesy and go "i spotted this and this and i have XYZ references, i'm opening this thread here [link] so we can discuss this more without messing with the originally intented theme of this thread".

2) Manners, regardless of the content of the post. No matter if people present valuable feedback, some modicum of respect should be maintained. I could have the best references in the world and copies of the libraries of all the world's aviation museums in my book case, if i present it by telling people to "shut the f**k up, you know nothing", then i should be given a warning to rephrase the useful part of my post in a non-insulting manner and failing that, whatever kind of ban-hammer punishment is in place for personal attacks. A bit of irony and humor could slide, as long as it stayed civil, but not much more than that.

Like i already said, it's not complicated at all to see how this would benefit everyone. What's complicated is trying to enforce it with one volunteer in the moderator seat, because it entails actually reading through most of the thread.
If we had like 1-2 persons for US, EU and Russian or Asian timezones to do this in turns however, it would be much easier to do. What could happen is that i could post a blank "marker" post mid-way through the update (eg, write "marker" with big bold letters and nothing else) to let the other moderators know how far along i am moderating the thread. Then, they would just have to search for my latest posts, click on the one that's in the weekly update thread and continue monitoring from there, add a marker of their own when they are done to let the next guy in line know where to pick it up from and so on.

Hopefully, SoW will be released before long and while i suspect that various updates will keep pouring on (future expansions, patches and so on), people will have sufficiently satisfied their curiosity about what SoW is, know what is and isn't possible by comparing their previous wishlists with the end product and as such, will tend to keep in focus more.

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The following sentence is from the forum rules Any kind of discussion concerning moderators' or administrators' actions is prohibited.

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