Before I begin on this tirade, I'm going to once again thank all the folks keeping this place in the air for providing a space to enjoy the couple of good forums here. What you will read below is my pent up frustration with the lack of focus on what is and is not acceptable to tribe.net as an on-going concern. And thank you, anonymous "Tribe.net Help S" employee for bringing this to my attention for further consideration. I don't bear anyone ill-will who is honestly trying to make things easier for everyone. And I apologize in advance if what I'm going to say falls far of the mark but...

>We will probably start developing a voting module soon, and try to implement on the current platform since this seems to be an ongoing issue for many tribes.

Crikey. Um, how does this gibe with what is posted by TOU Guy in the FAQ tribe?

Yeah, seriously, I thought moderators were going to get almost unlimited backing from tribe.net if they were abiding by the CoC and TOU...has this changed now for tribes above a certain size/importance to tribe.net's bottom line? The problem here, really, is the fact that there isn't enough policing of bad behavior here on tribe, and little clear direction on what is and is not acceptable to tribe management. Seriously, can you point me to an uptodate page that officially lists tribe's policies with regard to moderators and the actual working understanding of what the TOU and Code of Conduct are? Post a link to it here please! The few times that I've complained about creepy stuff on tribe, I've gotten a "we're a kumbaya free speech man, hands off approach kind of place" response and limited if any follow up on the on-going patterns of some obvious alt generating personalities...whom, I hasten to add, are making a profession out of disrupting several larger tribes on this social network. WTF is putting up a voting module going to do in that regard? It saves you time right, but does it actually solve the underlying problem of disruptions and animosity being generated on this social network? How about working on an ignore feature by profile so we don't have to read the threaded posts from profiles we're not interested in hearing from again and again instead? That would put a damper on a lot of this crap...instead of pretending that moderators really do have carte-blanche to run their tribes as they see fit...when really, it appears to just be a vote from the commons on who is and who is not in charge...on what, a daily basis?...a dicey proposition if there is no real accountability and policing at the profile generation level. If that's the issue then give us a way to block having to read posts from profiles we don't want to hear from. Seriously. That would be a better solution in the long term than working on a voting module IMO!

I'm sorry but the fact is that a lot of people have left tribe out of frustration. And the fact that you guys aren't policing things well is starting to wear very thin. I'm not planning on leaving or anything but I do know a lot of folks aren't coming back here anytime soon, not because there is no easy way to elect someone to be in charge of a forum...but because there seems to be an inability to not run into an annoying situation where ever one goes on the site. And, frankly, while man-power might be a source of some of the technical issues that one encounters here, it is an unclear use and purposing of resources that is really causing folks to bail. Again, where is the clear cut policy of what is and is not acceptable behaviour on tribe.net?! And who is actually following that policy when administering and planning resource use for this social networking site? What is cause for removal of a moderator? Can you list all of the reasons or at least provide some general guidelines in that direction? Because there are all sorts of whiners, real and imaginary, here on tribe.net and they aren't going to go away with a new voting module system. Will such a module lead to better policing and elimination of trolling? Because that's what moderators are supposed to do in forums that are not for trolling. Is this some attempt to let the users decide the direction of a forum? I thought that was what moderators were supposed to do--set the tone for a forum.

Again, how long does a moderator have to be absent before an election can be held. What does a moderator have to have done or do before holding an election through this proposed module will occur? I can see that it would be a handy tool for those moderators who honestly want to let "majority rule" when they decide to step down...but I'm having a damned hard time seeing how this module will make stability on tribe.net in big forums any easier...without clear cut guidelines on what is and is not expected of moderators for those forums...and that is where the real problem lies, it lays at the feet of the statue of "free speech--anything goes...as long as it's legal!", the real root of the problem is there.

I do not want to belittle the obvious hard work you guys are doing to help straighten out all the messes here...but what are the REAL policies with regard to moderators and the duties they need to perform if they take over a large tribe that brings a lot of people back to tribe.net on a regular basis? And what kind of support can those moderators, officially what kind of support, the moderators that are taking on those responsibilities to important, larger tribes here can expect from tribe management?

Please consider all this before spending time on that module. I know some of you here are the choir and some of you here may just be following orders...but sheesh, get the policies lined up and written down and disseminated for discussion further before doing this sort of work. And, if there are real, on the ground, current, working policies in this regard, concrete instructions on how moderators of large tribes are supposed to police forums, please post a link here so we can all read them and hopefully abide by whatever they say. Because, really, "it's legal so we're not going to step in and police other folks 'free speech'" is not cutting it...not when it is obviously a bottom-line issue and not when resources are being spent in that direction in what appear to be a willy-nilly fashion. Idealism is one thing but working on a voting module when there is no clear cut policy to see and follow is a waste of time.

Here's an example of what I'd like to see the policy be:

. If you have over [jkl] members in a tribe, tribe.net will step in and back the moderator if things are going well otherwise.
. Otherwise, tribe.net will step in and appoint a temporary moderator and then hold an election. (And personally, I don't see where just starting a thread calling for the election to take place in the thread is not working here--why a module? If tribe.net admin steps in and posts a thread, that's the same as having to review an upcoming election module, right? Or is there some aspect of this module that would include private commentary so public threads are passe?)
. Tribe.net will not tolerate anti-social behavior in forums that effect it's bottom line. That means that "free speech" is not an excuse to disrupt tribe.net or forums that tribe.net feels are important to its livelihood and continued existence.
. Tribe.net may appoint someone, at tribe.net's discretion, to run any forum. Ideally we would like to hold elections and will try to do so if we have time.
. If members of a forum feel that behavior in a forum is effecting tribe.net's bottom line, we would like to hear about it and will take action to limit anti-social behavior that is effecting our bottom line.
. If you have any questions about these rules, please join [one, single, official, well run, tribe name here, instead of the half dozen or so tribes that seem to cross into the CoC-TOU discussions these days] as we are open to discussing these issues with anyone who is not interested in disrupting the tribe.net social network.

With those criteria, you would be able to make some plans and face them and us, your users and community, honestly. Right now--and I hate to say it as I love tribe.net and am sentimental--I see some decisions being made for reasons that are not clear and are not clearly expressed to the participants in this social network...in a clear and consistent enough fashion...in one place that can be trusted to have some validity other than what someone thought when they got up in the morning last *cough*theFAQforum*cough* Tuesday after a weekend partying in...[a crazy place in the desert]! Seriously, for this place to function well, all the folks working here on policing need to be on board with the policy and that policy needs to be public and official, not adhoc and randomly expressed.

<Yep, done. We will probably start developing a voting module soon, and try to implement on the current platform since this seems to be an ongoing issue for many tribes.>

Wow. Fantastic. THIS is why I love Tribe.

Even though Tribe's been down (a lot) recently, there really is no question that the BEST platform for discussion is what we're using now. Hell, I wish that Tribe would license this tech to other sites, since the very design of many otherwise valuable discussion forums really prohibits any ease in discussion/debate/screaming matches...

And, having the three-Mod system will help a great deal. Thanks.

<I'm sorry but the fact is that a lot of people have left tribe out of frustration.>

Yes, but in my experience, the frustration is with the outages and not as much on Tribe HQ's hand's-off method of controlling the groups. Personally, I don't mind their lack of control, since EACH TIME this issue is raised (such as in the Politics tribe), it would take a firm knowledge of the real story to adjudicate the reality of the situation, and do you really expect Tribe HQ to go through that? No, of course not. It only really becomes relevant when it's become such an issue that they are forced to act, as they thankfully did recently.

And, the problem with a voting module is that all someone has to do is create X-number of alts to throw off the numbers... And, this WILL happen, no question about it.

No, the three-mod system is probably the best, although - it'll be more difficult I suppose to get rid of THREE bad mods than just one...

Hmm.