Clearing the air...

[romanaa]

Hi Keith,

I am happy you started on a friendly note... I agree with you and I am happy to hear that there is some goodwill on the site's side. I hope there is a chance to invite some lost members back. I consider the community life on TE the same important as the fact that TE provides a place for posting.

I agree that many things can be solved by mail better, but as the latest events went quite far in stopping members' communication by erasing their reactions I reckon that it is high time to speak openly which Vivian started and I highly appreciate that.

[Porteplume]

Originally Posted by Vato_Law

I posted a thread where I aborded this issue and where I questioned if this was the most correct way of dealing with it - no insultes, no accusations, nothing of that just wanted to raise a question which was afecting the normal functioning of the site and was leading to the exit some of the oldest members of the site. One reply was made by fellow member Angshuman and in 10 minutes the thread was closed.

My humble question to you - why? i was not insulting anyone, offending anyone... was this attitude - i was raising a question because i cared about this site and it was sad to me to see members leaving for an issue, or for a misunderstanding.

Answer to your first question:

Maybe the mod who inactivated was following the basic rules too strictly: "Discussion of moderator decisions, including post deletions and member discipline, is not allowed, and is to be removed. If a member has a question about a moderator action, he should address his request to [email protected]"

Réponse a cette première question:

Peut-etre que le modérateur qui a inactivé cette discussion a suivi les règles de modération trop strictement:
"Les discussions concernant les décisions des modérateurs, inactivations d'images et sanctions incluses, ne doivent pas paraitre sur les forums mais être adressées directement vers [email protected]"

Will be followed...

[iainsp]

Greetings all,

and thank you to Keith and Viviane for putting their heads above the parapet on behalf of the moderators.

I am little disappointed in the way this thread is progressing. It seemed to start off very positively with:

"I also will answer ordinary questions in this present thread as long as the request keeps being polite and if I can do that without trespassing the rules of moderating we have to follow."

But them seems to have moved to:

"I'll try to answer BY MAIL as soon as possible"

and

"As a general rule it is better to raise concerns directly with the mods via PM than in open forums."

This does seem to have been quite an exceptional weekend - so irrespective of what is normally better, an open discussion seems fair and appropriate at the moment.

For example, I too would like to know why Paolo's (Vato-Law's) thread was closed. One possibility is that it was a mistake on the part of the moderator concerned: moderators can only make themselves more human if they admit that they too make the occasional mistake. Alternatively, within the 'rules of moderation' there was a reason for which that thread needed to be closed. Could I suggest if this is so, you use it as a case study to show the processes the moderators go through when closing/locking a thread. Given that Paolo had no problems going public on a list of issues, I suspect he will have no problems having his thread discussed as a case study.

I may be a little old fashioned, but I truly believe that it is generally better to raise concerns in open forums (e.g. on the floor of a House of Commons, a National Assembly, a Senate - I believe it is called democracy) rather than through PM.

Regards, and thanks for keeping this conversation open.

Iain

[iainsp]

Greetings again,

OK - typing up simultaneously with Viviane, who has nicely answered some of my issues.

Thank you for that.

[Porteplume]

Sorry Iain, sometimes it takes aaaaaages for me to type an answer and after having clicked on "Post" I often see many other posts having been sent in the meanwhile...

[Porteplume]

Paulo:
After this I posted a photo and I was not very happy with this attitude from the Moderators - and I did not write any extensive note but I clearly mention where it was taken; i'm not going to be a lyer and I'm going to mention that I also write two statements regarding the issue of my thread being removed - but nothing directed to anyone.
Result - the photo was removed with an automatic response being sent to my mail with a note that it was removed due to an unaceptable note. I have more than 300 photos on TE never had one removed due to this or anything else this one was; this right after having removed the thread in the forums.

I agree with you, this was a wrong decision, I'll reactive your picture right away.

Vous avez raison et je vais réactiver cette photo le plus vite possible.

What frustrates me the most is that I always kept here with the site even when the first wave of exits took place and I always took the defence of the site and I keep on saying that for having a good discussion about photography this might still be the better one, but I cannot stay under this climate that we are leaving these days and so I prefer to move on.

I have another question to you which might be important to those who will stay: why this sudden change in the moderation, sometimes so quiet and silent and suddendly so active and accurate?

There are seven moderators in the team and we don't all see things in the same way. Mostly we need a consensus of 4 out 7 but this weekend we had an especially small team active. It just can happen...

Il y a 7 moderateurs sur TE et nous ne partageons pas toujours le même avis. Une décision est prise avec 4 contre 3 mais ce w-e il nous manquait du monde. Ce sont comme partout, des choses qui arrivent et qui peuvent provoquer des erreurs...

[Porteplume]

Why the moderation seems to avoid these questions issued in the forums (forgive me if I'm wrong) if hey seem to be important to the good functioning of the site? don't you think it's better to face a problem and discuss it even if the discussion gets a bit harsher (not unpolite) than having these attitude which to us look like a "silent snipper" shooting to anything that moves and faces "the system" ?

I'm sorry Paulo but WE also have rules and one says to avoid discussing about sanctions, I really can't think of any other reasons...

Désolée, Paulo, mais nous aussi devons suivre certaines règles comme celle qui nous demande d'éviter les discussions au sujet des sanctions prises par les mods, je ne sais pas quelle autre réponse vous donner...

I'm being the most honest and clear minded I can and I know that sometimes your (the moderators) task is not easy but I think that in this case you (all) didn't abord the subject the better way (forgive me once again if I'm being too honest) - I think this wave of contestation was crying, demanding for someone, like you are doing now, to show up and clear things out - as the result is catastrophic if you take some minutes and browse thru the main gallery and check how many members left since yesterday, myself included.

And still I think lot of the members have acted too fast w/o thinking or waiting a bit more. That "quite little accident" with Marine was a mouse becoming an elephant and partly because of the members giving each other wrong infos.

Je pense pourtant que si certains membres avaient réfléchi un peu plus ils n'auraient pas détruit leur travail. Cet incident plutôt bénin entre Marine et le Mod Team c'est une souris devenue éléphant à cause, en partie, d'échanges d'informations sans fondement.

[Vato_Law]

Hello Viviane,
First I want to thank you for loading back my photo and as a sign of good will I cut back the uninformative part of my note too.
About your replies to my questions it would take sometime to get a resume of all that you said, and I thank you for that, so I kindly want to say taht I'll reply to all of it tomorrow night as it's almost 1:00 am and tomorrow I have to get up early to work.

Nevertheless I want to thank you and Keith for the time you spent giving me and the others taking part on this thread some explanations.

Wishing both of you a good night I will get back this tomorrow.

Paulo

[Angshu]

Hello Viviane, Iain & Paulo

I am glad that there’s a healthy dialogue going on to address the issues which as Iain rightly put was an exceptional weekend. An open discussion rather than mails would go a long way in clearing the air!

Like Paulo when the first wave of exits took place couple or so years back, I still defended this site, encouraging members to post & give constructive critics stating that this site was one where there still can be a good discussion about photography.

I am having doubts about my assertion of the past given the events of the last weekend, but I do hope I am proven wrong now!

I did not quite understand the ‘Marine” issue which according to Viviane was " a mouse becoming an elephant and partly because of the members giving each other wrong infos.”. If this be the case, I think its even more fair that the things come out in the open so that the ‘correct’ perspective is represented! What was the wrong infos which were flowing between the members, which resulted in their decision to leave the site?

One disturbing thought for me was, apart from banning a member, deletion of posts, we seem to have instances of modification of members’ critiques (example : Thread of member 'Ricx') ! I don’t remember such things happen in the past…don’t you think this tantamount to ‘Suppression of Freedom of Speech’?

Last but not the least, I am glad that this communication channel is open for a healthy discussion….

Angshuman

[Dashab]

Hello everyone,
Thank you all for this constructive tone, and Angshu in particular for trying to cool people's heads all weekend (including in other fora :-) ).
Given the proportions which this matter has assumed, I am very much in favour of an open explanation and discussion. Perhaps this might even necessitate a change in the rules that the moderators have to follow, to prevent that any such events in the future. This site functions as a community, which is one of the reasons we are drawn to it, but this fact has to be taken into account in the rules that govern it / the administration of it. In this case, I am afraid, answering the questions of individual members by e-mail will not suffice to put things on the right track. A public explanation of the issues that Anghsu named, as to why critiques were altered, threads deleted etc., is needed to calm heated tempers and bring in fresh air.
The whole matter was like an avalanche starting with a small, seemingly innocent noise, but it has roared down the valley and swept many of our friends with it. Please let us all endeavour in good faith to rescue as many of them as possible and try to bring them back by showing them that the things that bothered them are being worked on.
Wishing everyone a nice day!
Dasha