A Modest Proposal

I would change it to “…a majority of the moderators…”

I’m not a fan of the proposal.

In the sense that the really necessary situations where an immediate ban is required because someone is being spamming, trolling and/or being exceptionally abusive, etc. will not change, correct? This would only be amended to deal with situations pertaining to situations with members of the site there are different issues with?

As for #2, believe me, I’d love to have there be much less meta around here, but what would this potential rule involve? Warnings? Strikes? Bans? It’s could be very difficult to enforce a rule like that, especially if it comes to the running of AN itself and there’s a valid reason to have a discussion about it. Things have always been fairly open here as far as that part goes.

And, unbanning mikev, which should be separate from the proposal – yes.

There is a history of stuffed ballots on the site, from the time we voted on prospects to many other examples.

I´d do it myself, but I gained unfair ground on Dan in recs department, so I propose he makes 4 comments.

In favor of 1 (with clarification of how many mods have to support such action)
Opposed to 1 (with clarification of how many mods have to support such action)
In favor of 2
Opposed to 2

I don´t feel comfortable at all having these two proposals tied together. It´s a bit of “This place could a bit less of a dictatorship if we increase censorship”.

Dan, could you please make those comments and everybody else, make your opinion heard.

P.S. Nico, I think you should listen to Soaker´s proposal above. I personally believe that going back to posting only would be a better thing for you and for AN

And get a better sense of where people stand. Instead of one package. We “vote” on things individually. Is there a better way to begin to reconcile via that?

As I’ve said, I can see both sides of this. I like Nico and I like mikev. But I also like baseball and I like the Oakland A’s, and I like talking about that and crazy Angels-trade proposals and how bad our roster will be and whether or not Sonny Gray starts in July. THAT, is what I mean by let’s move on. This is an important issue to address, let’s work towards fixing it and separate the items for a line-item vote.

Such as “random poster #1 was auto banned for sending threatening emails to the mods.” This would eliminate a lot of the secrecy which sparked the mikeV situation.

1. I approve of this. I think the ability to just go in and banhammer is useful for obvious trollers and spammers and abuse that is at the point where the server is breaking from the entirety of AN using the flag function at once. But when it’s not a Win Button, must-happen-this-moment situation? I’m a big supporter of using the mods as a resource to make banning decisions and not have it be… like this. There’s a good team of people with their name at the bottom, the more the merrier and all that when it comes to making a decision that’s for the best of the site.

2. I do not approve of this. Meta happens. It’s always going to happen in a community this size, with this many people who want what’s best for the site. People are always going to have different ideas on what that “best” is. As much as meta sucks and causes hurt feelings, I think it’s better to have it in the open. Rip off the band-aid, get the issues out there, don’t try and hide them in a corner.

People WILL meta, especially during the offseason. We do this every year, and trying to stop it seems like trying to stop a flood with a plastic spoon and a rubber band — unless you’re MacGyver, it ain’t gonna succeed. Making it an offense just seems like it’s gonna be resulting in one GIANT pile of bannings at some point, and an incredible amount of hurt feelings and behind-the-scenes gossips and rage. More than the usual, I mean. ;)

And sometimes the meta is just silly and ridiculous about personal preferences for the site. We fight, we yell, we kick, we get it done and move on. Sometimes it’s a genuine issue like this, about the workings of the site. And it’s setting off so many alarm bells in my head that this kind of thing should be kicked under the carpet. It happens. Sometimes it’s just a pain in the ass. Sometimes it can even make things better, in the end.

And oh my god, I do NOT want meta in the lounge. You’ve already banished the fun to the overflow section, don’t narc our party, man.