10 rules for being a bad moderator

[phreakwars]

Hi everyone, first post...

But I'd like to take a stab at that last question.

has anyone had a moderator get offended by these rules ?

I think that really depends on what you want out of your board.

While these rules may seem like a guideline of what "NOT " to do, there are times when doing these things increases your popularity.

Your Mod team needs to be coordinated together enough to know that what you are building is a community suited to your boards theme.

On our board, we get enough traffic coming in that we can cater to VISITORS with our off beat antics and moderating style. Yet we try to make it clear to people, that the board is there for them to basically enjoy themselves and rant on any way they want.

One of the things we have discovered, is people LOVE it when you can torture their ethic principals a bit, but in a very sarcastic humorous way.

So we actually have moderators that just blend in with everybody, but then have fun watching people request we annoy others or think of ways to provoke intelectual conversation out of "problem" members without ever really banning them. Our methods keep members coming back for more.

It is all about technique, but then you need to always stay true to the boards theme.

 

[Renae]

That was funny. I like it, I posted it in my mod forum for them to get a kick out of....(maybe also help them see what isn't a good idea, in case they didn't already know).

 

[Chy]

Excellant, sharing it with my mod team to! *LOL*

 

[MOODYGIRL]

Oh, some mods on other sites are very rude. Just due to they are mods they think they can talk to you any way they can. Yet the owner does nothing.

 

[Mac Viper]

The worst part of reading this topic for me was recognising that I have been guilty of one or two of those "Mod Sins"...

Its not easy for me to own up to this, but there is a fellow Mod with whom there is such mutual loathing that occasionally I fall for his baiting and post back replies which do no justice to myself or the forum. I'm working on ignoring them at the moment, but there's still that element of vanity or pride that makes it difficult to let him publicly goad me.

I am thinking of taking a lot of the Mod guidelines from these forums and putting them into our Mod forum. Admin is rarely around and hasn't slapped any of our wrists yet.

Hey, if I never manage to get my own Forum off the ground, at least you guys will have made the other one a more pleasant place!

Neil Mac

 

[MOODYGIRL]

When I'm on other forums I'm evil but when it comes to my forum I'm like a puppy to my members. I'm not evil on all forum. Just to let ya know.

 

[phreakwars]

I think me and the rest of our Mod team could all rewrite the book on how to be a bad MOD, but then, us MODS being bad, is part of our site appeal.


.
.

__________________
WPYO, the best damn debate forum and hardcore rant site on the internet.

 

[Chris2]

This is my favorite one -

If a user makes a dupe thread in the forum don't be nice, it's the users’ fault not to know the 40+ pages that the forum has in search of a similar thread. And never ever give him a link to the content he is searching for.

I am a member at a forum where they go crazy if you can't find a thread, or you start a thread and there is another thread with the same or similar topic. I should post this there and see what I get for a reaction.

 

[MOODYGIRL]

All of them should be posted at http://www.chaosgfx.com/ they done them all. I put them on my site also.

 

[TheRoost]

I shared it with my team

 

[Camplowe]

Funny ****!

 

[ipodman]

I think should give a copy to all my forum mods see what they think! imo

 

[Brollachan]

I've posted sections of this thread (the 'moderator', 'senior member', and 'users') in the moderator section of a site I moderate. Some of the points for how not to be a senior member are very true for the site I moderate for.

 

[ipodman]

sound goos to me!

 

[fut]

I have to agree with most of those points.

 

[intheZone]

I modded it up a bit for our semi-busy forum.

This how I worded it:

**************************
These are far from being a set of rules but rather some guidelines that I found on another admininstrator's forum site. We all know how important the success of www.MakeupTalk.com is and what our users mean to us. They don't cover every topic and is only a basic approach of what not-to-do as a moderator.

"How to be an Unacceptable Moderator"
​

1. Don't visit the site often. Once a week is enough. Nobody cares.
2. Don't visit the forums you are moderating often. Once a week is enough. Nobody cares.
3. Don't visit the ADMIN'S CORNER often. Once a week is enough. Nobody cares.
4. Don't start new threads at your forum. You think that's the users' responsibility. You are only there for editing and deleting threads.
5. Argue with users as much as you can. You don't have anything to lose since you are the moderator.
6. Always bring personal/problem matters to private messages to cause problems. And remember that your opinion is the only one that counts.
7. Don't respect the other members, make fun of them. If they make spelling errors then criticize them, if they have a poor or unargumented opinion destroy them with words. If they ask for help about using the forum don't help them.
8. If nobody answers a thread don't answer yourself, the user didn't wanted an answer anyway.
9. If a user makes a dupe thread in the forum don't be nice, it's the users’ fault not to know the 40+ pages that the forum has in search of a similar thread. And never ever give him a link to the content he is searching for.
10. Don't edit the bad-drama causing words in posts. Fights and drama is fun!
11. If a user is misbehaving ban them immediately, don't try sending him a private message or a warning, it's useless.
12. Close all the threads you want. Users love to see closed threads.
13. A way to be cool is to talk about the private forum threads in the public forum. Administrators love the fact that you tell all the users about the content of the private threads.
14. If you have a falling out with a registered member, your primary responsibility now is to do everything you can to make that member and their friends feel like crap. Start baiting them to argue with you in public threads. After doing this for a while, call a truce and act like everything is okay. Then when the drama seems over, start again, only up it a little: Start deleting their posts or at least disagree with every post they make even if they're making indisputably good points.

Thanks for Being a Moderator

 

[Brollachan]

I think I'm going to end up posting some of these. The senior memebers is certaining ringing a bell at the moment.

 

[KarlH]

HAHA I love these, they went straight in the 'ole staff forum, nice one!

 

[Reggie Villachez]

This is great! Please send it to the Opera and Pale Moon "Moderators." They're incapable of "destroying" anybody with words as they're just not that original and there's always a way to put them on blast, but they certainly try hard. Epic fails are their style.

This is great! Please send a copy of this to the moderators at Opera and Pale Moon. They're incapable of "destroying" anyone with words as they're quite unoriginal and there's always a way to put THEM on blast. But they still need to be reminded that users don't deserve to be abused and insulted because they asked a question, made a harmless suggestion or expressed an opinion about the sites layout. You'd think you were insulting one of their mothers or something. They get angry over petty things that the average moderator doesn't care about. I don't mean rudeness, I mean harmless, non abrasive opinions.