Spent 3-1/2 hours reading a thread and then finally posting a really long reply to it on WrongPlanet.
OMG, what thread over there takes three and a half hours to read? I thought most of them petered out after about thirty to fifty pages for the very longest ones.
Shows what I know, haven't been there much lately. I peeked in a couple of weeks ago following a link, but didn't stay long.
(BTW, be sure to clean out the tracking cookies from your browser ... 
)
Something in the WrongPlanet.net Discussion forum about trolls and bigots that turned into a melee between moderators and members. Quite entertaining. I spent 2-1/2 reading the whole thing and getting everything in context, then another hour typing up my response in MSWord and finally posting it.
Cute.
Moderators are allowed to have normal memberships over there, still, right?
A decent moderator no longer interacts directly with the public. There has to be a specific directive of division between public and "business." Sites successfully moderated that I have seen are moderated by the "Finger Of God" approach. There is no discussion, no remorse, no rethinking, no reversals, no appeals and, most especially, a clear cut set of rules to follow. Moderating then becomes possible. When the "best interests" of the site and its supportive function is kept in hand, there are NOT that many gray areas and there is no need for any judgment call to be made or extenuating circumstances to be taken into account for each and every conflict that occurs.
They do their jobs and STFU!
These poor wankers in charge of moderating WP have absolutely no chance for credibility as long as they continue to interact on a buddy/buddy level with the rest of the membership.
