Again: How can we expedite supporting the mods and keeping them less frazzled and more content?

If one of the mods resigns, who does the replacing? (Milo has officially said he will not be available, under any circumstances.)

In terms of “who does the replacing” it will be a group decision among the mods.

Frodo stands ready to bite any miscreants at any time his services are needed.

Less activity means a lower probability of work for the mods, so I’ll endeavor to minimize my participation. ;-)

Not funny, @Brian1946.
:-(

From what I’ve read in other threads lately, flagging is our best tool to alert the moderators to content they need to look at, whether that content is a question or an answer. They cannot be in all places at all times. We have to be their eyes.

As was also mentioned elsewhere, I personally will pay particular attention to my own writing on this site. I will try my best to stay out of trouble, but I make no promises.

@gailcalled Would Milo agree to the title of His Most Excellent Supremacy? We could call him Excellency for short.

We pretty much will have the final call on what happens with the site, so it’s up to us to work to make it work. We can help the mods all we can and keep the site going or give up and it’ll most likely die. I prefer the former.

Why exactly are they frazzled? Maybe if we knew their specific complaints we could address how to help them better. I don’t mean to put them on the spot, but maybe one mod could list some complaints the group has and we can try to help.

Or maybe the mod can recruit more people?

I don’t consider myself a troublemaker so I will do what I have been since day 1: asking and answering in what I consider a polite tone, and trying my best to avoid typos, text speak and spelling errors.

@jca You’re one of the bad ones. There’s a price on your head.:)

@JLeslie – “Frazzled” is Gail’s choice of word; I am not sure what prompted her to use it.

It can get rather hectic when there are controversial topics being discussed, and especially when people carry over the controversy into different threads. As noted in other recent Meta threads, it is most helpful if Jellies flag things that seem out of line rather than to respond to them. Feeding the trolls, fanning the flame bait, and being snarky only perpetuate the ugly mess that needs to be modded, and when all is said and done, the thread winds up looking gutted by moderator activity.

Everyone might benefit from reviewing the Guidelines periodically. Fluther was created to be a Question and Answer site, not a social forum. If you look at the Facebook Page it says that Fluther is an Education Website – that page was set up by Ben and Andrew in 2007, so they chose that classification. Clearly, we evolved to have a more social aspect than they originally intended, and the community and site have been through some awkward growth spurts over the past 7 years.

We’re in an awkward phase right now as we make this transition; but again, where we go from here is up to the community. We do have a few new people signing up here and there – do you think that our currently active threads will attract the kind of people we hope to stick around this site? From what I’ve read about the other Q&A sites, we have a unique spot where we aren’t overrun with “how is babby formed” garbage, or with flaming and trolling the way more loosely-managed sites are; yet we’re not as arrogant and pretentious as some at the other extreme.

If you want to live in a neighborhood where everyone tends to their weeds and keeps an eye out for their neighbors and has a block party once in a while, you have to also tend to your weeds, keep an eye out for your neighbors, and let loose and have fun on occasion. It is up to us to cultivate the site to show our strengths that make this our favorite corner along the information superhighway.

Yeah, if we stick to our roots we should be okay.

@hearkat I agree we all need to mod ourselves in a sense. I have to say one of the reasons I loved fluther and got addicted pretty fast was because of the social aspect and how interesting jellies were/are. I’ve tried not to go off topic as much as I have in the past, I am guilty of that, but the meandering Q’s that lead to all sorts of information I didn’t expect have been some of my favorites. Some jellies who are no longer here were some of the most interesting, educated (some self educated) people I have known. They also tended to fly off the handle a little bit, some were kicked out. They had some interesting questions and answers though.

I’m not saying we should allow personal attacks and totally off topic posts, we can’t. I don’t know the solution.

I do think the site will pick up again as the Presidential election starts to heat up. I know I stopped watching politics for almost two years and now I am tuning in again. I come here to ask political questions, and I know I will have more coming up in the near future as we begin to learn who is going to run.

@hearkat: Your choice of “hectic” is much more accurate and appropriate than mine of “frazzled.” I was thinking of using “beleaguered” but rejected that also. This is the problem with adjectives. They are often a sloppy way of describing complicated situations, and I plead guilty to lazy prose, unlike your elegant disquisition.

I’m also too tired and busy to be misbehavin’ so count me as one less addition to the land of beleaguered mods.

I’m willing to crack heads if need be. Just gimme the word.

Hmm, wha? Oh… sorry.

Auggie tells me she don’t want the joint run that way, so, ah… I’ll just agree to be my usual polite self.

A good place to start would be to cease placing them on such a high pedestal.
Best course of action would certainly be to render their position untenable, behave ourselves & give them absolutely nothing to do.
I realise of course that’s probably aiming to high, but hey, one can but dream.

Isn’t marijuana already legalized up there?

I thought we were doing pretty good. I mean, I’ve seen much worse on the Internet. Maybe some things could improve, but I think that if we keep up how we’ve been, it should be cool. I mean things mess up sometimes, and get out of hand, but probably not nearly enough to say we have a real problem. I’m all ears though.