UniLang

vijayjohn wrote:It's also possible to make different folders, just in case you didn't already know.

I didn't already know, so this information is extremely helpful. Thanks, Vijay! Looks like I've got some archiving to do!

linguoboy wrote:You mean the actual substantive part regarding the aid which I did or did not render unto you when asked? That's fair.

I don't really think dEhiN was singling you out there, but rather making a general statement that not many people seemed to be interested in the discussion. You actually did contribute to it.

We just wanted to involve the community and try to understand how they'd like our moderation style to be from now on, considering several people weren't happy with how things were. It's not about wanting users to do our job...


Regarding our inbox size,I don't know if other users are experiencing the same issues or not, but I guess it's possible to increase it a bit (after the database cleanup a couple of weeks ago, we should be able to afford it)

If I'm remembering that question correctly, it was about a specific user but left out the user's name, leaving us with very limited information about what the user actually did that was problematic. For this reason, I personally didn't feel that there was much I could say about how the admins should react to this user.

Luís wrote:

linguoboy wrote:You mean the actual substantive part regarding the aid which I did or did not render unto you when asked? That's fair.

I don't really think dEhiN was singling you out there, but rather making a general statement that not many people seemed to be interested in the discussion. You actually did contribute to it.

The following absolutely constitutes singling me out:

dEhiN wrote: I believe even you only asked some questions regarding what our purpose is and stuff, but gave no actual suggestions of recourses you think would be appropriate.

Moreover, what he says is provably false. Here's the post where I ask Luís leading questions and here's the one where I answer each of them with suggested courses of action[*]. At the risk of tooting my own horn, is it at all possible that the reason more people didn't reply is they thought this response was already detailed and comprehensive enough?

My question for the moderators who did and didn't take the time to respond here: Why do I have to be the one to point this out? We have an expression in the social justice movement: "Get your people". It means when someone in your community (however you define that) is out of line, you have a responsibility to call them out. That didn't happen here and it should have.

Luís wrote:Regarding our inbox size,I don't know if other users are experiencing the same issues or not, but I guess it's possible to increase it a bit (after the database cleanup a couple of weeks ago, we should be able to afford it)

Now that vijayjohn has revealed to me that the actual limit--if you use subfolders--is closer to 1000 messages than 100, I think I'm good. I'm curious what others have to say, though.

[*] As I recently said in another thread, don't rely on your fallible memory when the words I wrote are still right there for everyone to see.

vijayjohn wrote:

linguoboy wrote:[*] If someone can show me an easy method of archiving PMs offsite, I'd be chuffed.

Honestly, I pretty much end up copying them into a word processor and saving them on my hard drive, then immediately deleting the original copies from my inbox before it fills up to 100% capacity. (I have most of these PMs organized on my hard drive by the person I was having the exchange with).

There's also the "Export this view" function in the PM folders. The output formats aren't that nice for a human reader (though the XML isn't too bad) and it only exports the current page, but at least you can do a whole page of your inbox at once instead of copying message by message.

Huh, I didn't realize that. Thanks!

EDIT: I have six folders (in addition to the outbox). My inbox is 89% full, my sent folder is 92% full, another folder is 60% full, another is 88% full, another is 86% full, and the last is 80% full. This is after I archived messages from most (if not all) of these folders onto my hard drive. So yeah, I still have to archive messages outside of UniLang. (Yeah, I use PMs a lot).

linguoboy wrote:O HAI STEALTH EDIT!!1!

Johanna wrote:Now you're saying that you really should have been paid or recognized for something you gave up on?

Maybe it's because I was brought up with Usenet netiquette, but I was always taught that if you're going to add something to your post after someone has responded to it, you tag it (I prefer "ETA", an abbreviation for "Edited To Add") so that you don't make it look like they ignored something you had originally said. It would be awful nice if some version of this netiquette were observed here--particularly by those allowed to edit posts without generating an automatic message indicating that the post has, in fact, been edited ex post facto.

It's a willful misrepresentation of my comments to say that I said I really should have been paid. As I said, I contributed the labour freely. Moreover, I haven't abandoned it, as evidenced by the fact that I'm still here.

Again, I find myself moved to ask: What's your purpose here? I personally think dEhiN capable of defending his own comments himself if he so chooses.

I'm playing by the same rules that you do these days.

As long as no one else has posted an answer, it's possible to delete or edit a post. If someone has answered, however, there will be a note that says "last edited by [editor] at [time] when you edit it, and you can't delete it.

And yes, I freely admit that I forgot that last sentence and added it within a couple of minutes, something that is more of a typo to most people. But I guess that you have never ever ever ever corrected a small thing within a couple of minutes without going "Edit: typo..."?

Accusing someone of wanting payment/recognition for something they didn't do isn't a typo. Wtf.

Johanna wrote:If someone has answered, however, there will be a note that says "last edited by [editor] at [time] when you edit it, and you can't delete it.

Even if the poster is an admin?

Johanna wrote:And yes, I freely admit that I forgot that last sentence and added it within a couple of minutes, something that is more of a typo to most people. But I guess that you have never ever ever ever corrected a small thing within a couple of minutes without going "Edit: typo..."?

What Vijay said. This is anything but "a small thing".

I am so beyond tired of all the gaslighting that goes on here.

linguoboy wrote:I am so beyond tired of all the gaslighting that goes on here.

That makes two of us then.

Vijayjohn, I would like you to read these two quotes. What is, IYHO, the difference between them that leads to your very different reactions? Because I fail to see a difference that warrants such different treatment. Somebody says they don't get paid for the work they put into UL. Somebody else interprets that as if the first person was asking for payment. The first person reacts they don't want to get paid.

Consultants get paid thousands of dollars to do the kind of facilitation work that I've been willing to do here for free.

Now you're saying that you really should have been paid or recognized for something you gave up on?

It's a willful misrepresentation of my comments to say that I said I really should have been paid. As I said, I contributed the labour freely.

Us admins and global mods, on the other hand, do not get a single cent for all the volunteer labour and time we put into UniLang.

Irrelevant. You admins really like to emphasize that you're not paid (never mind that the rest of us aren't, either, and put a lot of volunteer labor in our own ways into UniLang, too (...)). What the hell do you want, you want us to pay you now, too?! It's not good enough for you that you have the authority to kill off the whole forum if you want?

Of course we don't want you to pay us!

Linguoboy, you (among others) have said repeatedly you want a change in how UL is moderated. So when we present a concrete case and ask what you think should be done, we are asking for what you think should be done. Not for you to present different options depending on what we want. Because that is what you reproach us for—that we don't take other users' opinion into account for deciding moderation issues.

Everybody else, I've addressed two people specifically in this post, but feel free to weigh in as well.

Aurinĭa wrote:That makes two of us then.

I don't think you have any idea what you're talking about.

What is, IYHO, the difference between them that leads to your very different reactions?

What "very different reactions"?

Linguoboy, you (among others) have said repeatedly you want a change in how UL is moderated. So when we present a concrete case and ask what you think should be done, we are asking for what you think should be done. Not for you to present different options depending on what we want.

Those aren't necessarily different things, and like I said, we had very little information to go off of anyway.

Aurinĭa wrote:Linguoboy, you (among others) have said repeatedly you want a change in how UL is moderated. So when we present a concrete case and ask what you think should be done, we are asking for what you think should be done. Not for you to present different options depending on what we want.

Luís is actually the one who posted asking for help. If he was asking on behalf of the entire team, he didn't make that clear. But when it came to providing different options, he was quite explicit:

Luís wrote:What would your suggested action be for each of the goals you mention?

So here you are again, showing your whole ass because you can't be bothered to follow my advice and look at what was actually written before criticising my actions.

Aurinĭa wrote:Because that is what you reproach us for—that we don't take other users' opinion into account for deciding moderation issues.

First of all, you all didn't give us all the details (and--for the record--shouldn't have, because there are valid privacy issues at stake). It's impossible for me to say definitely what should or shouldn't be done in a particular case if all I have to go on is a one-sided summary.

But, more importantly, my point in replying the way that I did is that you all still haven't defined the basic principles underlying your moderatorial style. I asked people how they viewed Unilang and what they wanted it to be until I got tired of asking. With few exceptions[*], y'all haven't wanted to talk about that. You prefer putting the cart before the horse and getting right to specifics. I tried to explain in this thread while that's not an ideal approach and got minimal response.

So it's a case of garbage in, garbage out. We've asked you for the necessary tools so that everyone can do a better job here. (Naava posed some very specific questions in response to Luís' request regarding how bans work here. Were they ever fully answered?) You all haven't shown much interest in providing them. But when it comes to slagging me (and others) for not doing enough with the inadequate resources we've been given, suddenly you're all on board.

ETA: [*] I don't mean to sell short the contributions of Car, Ashucky, Luís, and others who have responded to my more abstract questions in good faith. They aren't the ones criticising my efforts here.

linguoboy wrote:

Johanna wrote:From what I can remember, you were very adamant that you didn't even want the job years ago. Specifically because of some of the grievances being brought up here.

I don't know what time you're thinking of here. I'm thinking of the time when we needed a new language moderator for the Celtic languages.

BTW, this is another banner opportunity for increased transparency: Who gets asked to be a moderator and why? What are the qualifications and disqualifications? How is the final decision arrived at?

If this were all more clear, there'd be nothing at all for Johanna I and to dispute here.

Personally, the only ways I've ever heard of people becoming moderators here are:

1. by PMing the admins (and global mods, when they existed) and saying, "Can I be a moderator of X forum?" and
2. because the admins happened to notice them expressing interest in moderating a given forum X.

Of course, I don't know whether the process used to be different or not before I joined, though.

While I don't want to get enveloped by the battle that is brewing, I will say I think it used to largely be restricted to native speakers that were willing to mod.

Since we are lacking them in a lot of areas, things have gotten a lot more lax.

EDIT: Fixed a few spelling errors.

Thanks, księżycowy!

I'll also leave this (i.e. this post) here in case it's useful:

Aurinĭa wrote:

atalarikt wrote:Some admins may also look for mods by themselves. That's how admins Luís chose me as the Indonesian/Malaysian subforum mod and Aurinĭa chose me as the AAPL subforum mod.

Language mods are chosen by consensus, so while an individual language mod may be suggested by a specific admin, they're not chosen by any single person, but by all admins. The admin who asks you whether you'd be interested or tells you your candidacy has been accepted may not be the one to originally suggest you, that's just a matter of who has he time to sort that out at that moment. I'd have to check who first suggested you, but that doesn't matter, as everyone agreed with your nomination.

But yes, a PM to the admins is the way to go.

vijayjohn wrote:Personally, the only ways I've ever heard of people becoming moderators here are:

1. by PMing the admins (and global mods, when they existed) and saying, "Can I be a moderator of X forum?" and
2. because the admins happened to notice them expressing interest in moderating a given forum X.

Of course, I don't know whether the process used to be different or not before I joined, though.

And there's 3. We need a mod for a forum, come up with some users we think would be suitable, come to a consensus, ask the users. If they turn it down, we then consider other options.

Car wrote:

vijayjohn wrote:Personally, the only ways I've ever heard of people becoming moderators here are:

1. by PMing the admins (and global mods, when they existed) and saying, "Can I be a moderator of X forum?" and
2. because the admins happened to notice them expressing interest in moderating a given forum X.

Of course, I don't know whether the process used to be different or not before I joined, though.

And there's 3. We need a mod for a forum, come up with some users we think would be suitable, come to a consensus, ask the users. If they turn it down, we then consider other options.

Is there a reason why you all have never considered putting out a general call? Yes, the active user community is small, but that doesn't mean you've necessarily thought of everyone suitable.

Car wrote:

vijayjohn wrote:Personally, the only ways I've ever heard of people becoming moderators here are:

1. by PMing the admins (and global mods, when they existed) and saying, "Can I be a moderator of X forum?" and
2. because the admins happened to notice them expressing interest in moderating a given forum X.

Of course, I don't know whether the process used to be different or not before I joined, though.

And there's 3. We need a mod for a forum, come up with some users we think would be suitable, come to a consensus, ask the users. If they turn it down, we then consider other options.

There's still another option that happens a lot: a user recommends another person (e.g. a language moderator who is stepping down suggests another user they think would be a good replacement)

Back in December when we did the "Moderator Check-up" and sent PMs to all language moderators, we also asked them for recommendations (particularly for the forums that didn't have any mods back then)

linguoboy wrote:

linguoboy wrote:I don't know what time you're thinking of here. I'm thinking of the time when we needed a new language moderator for the Celtic languages.

BTW, this is another banner opportunity for increased transparency: Who gets asked to be a moderator and why? What are the qualifications and disqualifications? How is the final decision arrived at?

vijayjohn wrote:Personally, the only ways I've ever heard of people becoming moderators here are:

1. by PMing the admins (and global mods, when they existed) and saying, "Can I be a moderator of X forum?" and
2. because the admins happened to notice them expressing interest in moderating a given forum X.

Because the context is the Celtic subforum, I want to clarify that I'm not aware of ever having expressed interest in moderating any forum without being asked, let alone PMed admins to ask them to give my moderator rights. I was asked, and agreed with reservations because my knowledge of the Celtic languages as a whole is rather limited, but could see it an improvement over an unmoderated forum (and the forum didn't have a moderator for a long time). The moment someone else who the admins trust is willing to moderate the forum, I'll happily give up that responsibility.