This community grew far more than I expected. That's great, but a single mod for such an active comm is a liability, plus I want to nurture a few other comms. As such, I'm recruiting new mods.
Does anyone volunteer? Potential new mods should:
- be already active members of this community;
- have spare time to browse, comment, and post in this community fairly often;
- have decent reading comprehension;
- be able to dialogue with other members of the community, in a respectful and cooperative way;
- not be moderators of a large number of other communities.
Further details and guidelines, on what you're expected to do:
- This community does not "belong" to you or me, it belongs to the people who participate in it. Always keep this in mind.
- If there's a report, you must read it and address it to the best of your capabilities. Sometimes you do nothing, sometimes you just talk with the user.
- Folks here are well-behaved, so milder interventions are preferable over harsher ones. A "please, don't do this, because [reason]" goes a long way; by default, expect users to be reasonable.
- Banhammer is only to be used on extreme cases, towards users who are clearly making this community worse for the other users. So far I didn't have to ban anyone here.
- A mod should actively look for on-topic content to post, and participate in posts shared by other users. This is doubly true in slow days - if you feel that the community is too slow, go look for something to post here.
- A mod should browse the posts and read the comments of the comm, addressing issues that might appear. Don't rely just on reports.
- You don't know what other users think, believe, or their intentions; don't enforce rules based on those things. Instead, enforce rules based on what the other users say and how they behave.
- Be sure to distinguish when you're speaking officially, as a mod of this community.
- Don't go too hard on the enforcement of rule #2 (keep it on-topic); it's fine to let users chitchat in the comments, that's fun. Watch out however for specially divisive off-topic, and for off-topic posts.
- I've worded rule #4 in a cheeky way, but it is an actual rule. It boils down to "don't let users ruin the community for other users, regardless of their claimed intentions".
- Rule #5 should apply to the mods too.
[EDIT] Two important details:
- You do not need previous experience as a moderator!
- I'll still be actively moderating this community, alongside any newcomer. Don't worry, I'm not abandoning it; I'm just future-proofing it.