ZOMBIE FORUMS

Admin edit: Split off from here to help prevent one topic from drowning the other out.


i'll start discussions on the guidelines if no-one else is going to...

i'll start with user guidelines, and rip off SA with a few modifications.

GENERAL FORUM GUIDELINES FOR USERS.

WARN LIST

things that will get you warned, and if you persist, banned.

LOW CONTENT POSTS
what is considered low content will vary from forum to forum and thread to thread, but generally if you are adding nothing interesting, funny, or informative that is off topic, don't bother. "Hi i'm new here" topics are nto informative or funny or interesting. Besides, there's a thread for that. replying to something with "lol" isn't adding anything.

INAPPRORIATE CONTENT or INCORRECTLY TAGGED CONTENT
some forums are assumed not safe for work here on kyhm's. In forums will be threads and posts that will have content that will get you in trouble with your boss if he sees you looking at them. In the interest of our users not getting fired, even in NSFW threads, please use the NSFW tag/code to hide offensive material. see below;

[spoiler]we will have to make a NSFW tag/code. i assume this can be done.[/spoiler]

failing to use these tags will get you warned or banned, depending on the severity of the image, Mod's discretion.

posting NSFW content in forums that are do not allow any such content, regardless of whether you use the tag will get you warned or banned, depending on severity and the mod's discretion.

BREAKING THE FORUMS
this includes exploitative scripts, malicious links, and forum shenanigans like nested quotes. Too-large images will also get you a warning. If you see a post like this, report it so a mod can fix it, and if necesary, warn or ban the user.

Images larger than 600 pixels wide should be shrunk using the following code:

with this code, clicking on the image will take the user to a the fullsize version. smaller the filesize the better,

Breaking of this rule will result in a waning or ban, depending on persistence and severity.

FLAMING and BEING A DICK.
Here at Kyhms' we enjoy a good ribbing as much as the next swarthy dockworker, but sometimes a joke can go to far, or the other party may not take the joke well. If a remark offends you, don't start a flame war,but PM the person and state your case. If they persist in harassing or offending you directly, then bring it to the attention of a moderator. If you think their statements break the rules of the forums or a particular board, bring it to a mod's attention or report the post. make sure you include the reason why you are reporting the post. This said, don't be a pussy about a few internet insults. Shrug it off and have a laugh.

Frequent flaming in threads can get you warned, and if you persist, banned. This is up to the mod's discretion.

BAN LIST

Things that will get you immediately banned.

ILLEGAL IMAGES
posting illegal images, such as underage porn etc is an automatic ban.

PERSONAL INFO
Posting someone's personal informations such as real name, address, phone number, or information about their personal lives is an immediate ban.

THE PROCESS

How you report posts, how posts get fixed, and how users get warned/banned.

REPORTING POSTS
The moderators won't know when they need to fix something, or warn or ban a user for a post unless it's brought to their attention. To report a post, click on the icon in the top right of the offending post, and write a description of what needs fixing or why you thought the post needed a mod's attention. Don't be frivilous with reporting posts, or YOU might get the warning, for being a dick.

If the post doesn't get fixed, or a mod hasn't responded within 24 hours, PM the moderator for that forum with a link to the post. If nothing happens and the mod hasn't responded within another 24 hours, go to a forum admin so he can kick the mod's ass into gear.

APPEALING A MODERATOR'S DECISION.
If you think you have been dealthwith unfairly, or wish to appeal your case MAD DOESN'T HAVE A GOOD IDEA FOR THIS. DISCUSS.

GUIDELINES FOR MODERATORS.
Temperence is suggested when dealing with users. Be fair with first time rulebreakers, and if their infraction is only minor, go light. When you fix something, or take an action, make sure you state so either in a followup post or adding a line of text at the bottom of the post you edit. Let the users see you're working and not just watching porn.

GUIDELINES FOR ADMINISTRATORS.
mad doesn't have any ideas for this section yet, please discuss.

For appealing? Send it before the council of administrators. I would suggest the user have a well thought-out argument prepared for why his or her offense was unjust, and perhaps even a form could be created (20 minutes for someone with the know-how would be all you need to create such a thing) that a user could register his or her appeal with the adminstration. After a brief review, Admins could give their votes and majority wins.

Administrator guidelines should be fairly easy. In the spirit of information, all action taken as an administrator should be recorded in the post/thread/forum that it is taken, so that no one does anything "behind another admins back". In the same way, I do believe their should be a private area where admins could discuss decisions made. If an admin disagrees, that, too, should be looked at by the admin council. If the decision is favored, then it stands, if it is not, then the admins have a chance to make reparations.

The form sounds like a good idea.

The discussions could just as easily be ppublic and held in the bulletin board for more transparency, and so that users can also comment on the proceedings, but not neccesarily vote. (would depend on the action)

True. I could do the form, if it pleases the adminstrator overlords.

There goes a fair amount of current posting activity. How about something more like high numbers of low content posts in a short timeframe (say a day or two), and that to get a warning, it has to be reported by users (and briefly investigate by a moderator for confirm/deny).


NSFW has been a consistent feature of these forums for as long as I've been here, and probably as long as they've existed. I'd like to keep the in your face NSFWness, at least for unrelated, just add something like "By browsing this website, you hereby give up all rights to a worksafe environment." to the user agreement that everybody ignores when they first sign up for an account. I'd say that NSFWness should be an issue left up to individual forums and their moderators and then those moderators can actively police it. Make the NSFW/spoiler tag available tho.


Agreed, stuff that makes the forums unreadable isn't fun. Tho I'd like to reintroduce the ability to embed music cos that was more amusing than arwing using <iframe> to embed stuff and break the reply page. I'd probably go softer on the general forum shennanigans, and as for large images, I recommend a fuzzy line of 800-900, cos there's probably few people who still view in 800x600 and a little bit of side scroll isn't too much of a problem generally.


That works for me, make it something that needs to be reported by the users and then the moderator investigates both parties.


Except in instances where such information has previously been made public on the forums or explicit permission has been granted to make such information available. I don't want to get b& for copy pasta'ing actor's address from the christmas card thread.

[quoute]REPORTING POSTS[/quote]
Should change the icon to Report post/user.


Admins as the line of appeal. Going from admin to admin until a suitable decision is made would be a bad idea tho. Perhaps make the line something like, moderator -> admin -> admins in council. Mebbe give the admins in council a right to turf out appeals.


Looks good to me.


I'd like to point out my suggestions back in my original post again. Admins as an oversight body, little/no authority to do moderating themselves, essentially acting as a high court with the power to back or revoke moderator decisions, not to mention the forumwide banhammer available to them.

looks good Vass.

perhaps change low content to irritating spamming. Basically, if you get reported for crappy posts too much you get a warning.

Mod's discretion, of course.

i knew going in that the NSFW topic was going to need the most discussion. It's going to determine our userbase pretty heavily.

perhaps this will work for a system; each forum has a NSFW tolerance level that the moderators decide upon.

Anything Goes means that NSFW content doesn't have to be flagged or tagged, enter at your own risk.

Tags could mean that you are required to use the tags and codes to hide it.

Do Not Post would basically mean what it says, no NSFW content allowed.

as for the appeal process, we need to establish how the user gets in contact with the admins if he's been banned. A form would be good, but possibly exploitable (spam etc) an email address may not be central enough. my knowledge of how admins do things is too shaky here.

I've helped build a forum for a friend and we use a form for appeals. We haven't gotten any spam forms to date and of the three administrators there, the forms are a useful way for everyone to be informed of the incident.

When a user submits the form, it's open only to administrators to read and the administrative or moderative action is recorded in the forum and copied into the form (i know forum, form, they are two different things, it's hard to distinguish when reading quickly). The admin or mod in question adds his or her comments to the end of the form, and the other admins take a look and make a decision. The decision is PM'd to all admins/mods and the user appealing. No one on the forum knows what goes on unless the user spills the beans, and problems are typically taken care of quietly. With majority rule and a blind ballot, it keeps admins from in-fighting too.

Nasty pictures and forum shenanigans are two of my most favorite things.
As much as I love it when someone is clever enough to ruin the boards, I'm uncomfortable not knowing how to fix it. Therefore harsh penalties.
Should there be mention of a possible probationary banning thing, so the kids won't freak out and cry immediately when they can't get in.

Something something everybody gets funny names haha

could do probationary bans where you're banned for a day or a week or whatever, and then give that user the custom title ON PROBATION for a certain period of time, say 2 weeks or a month. it would be a bit more of a pain for the mods, but custom titles with dates for the probation's ending might be a good idea too.



something like that. if we can make it red like stalker/fag alert that would be rad.

Custom titles are easy peasy i think.
Just watch I will make your title into something funny hah.


I would like appeals to be actually written out, becasue it seems more human and friendly that way, but that may be becasue I find it easier to judge people on their ability to express themselves with words. Am I a bad person?

well, the forums are driven by words.

i believe carrot's form allows the user to make a case for himself which is then PM'd to the admins. They can then start a thread in Meta to discuss it, and take action within a reasonably period (48 hours seems more than ample time for a cutoff)

That or a thread in bulletin board for announcing and listing all probationary bans. Each post would list the user banned, the reason for their ban, what sort of ban it is, and the time/date (if any) that it expires. A neater system to display bans would be SA's banlist, but that would require some heavy modification of phpbb I think. Probationary bans and suchforth are a good idea as punishments available to moderators tho. For example, bans and probationary periods of up to a week available to moderators with only those over 48 hours subject to appeal.

Nothing to onerous. It's pretty much a combination of this mod and a function to generate a table from all of these. The only major part not addressed is which admin did the banning, but it doesn't seem like that's going to be a problem if we impliment the blind vote for ban.

Would your embedded music start automatically or upon clicking? I can see automatic being a big pain in the ass.

getting the mods to edit posts to add the NSFW tags is fine, but the user should also be told that they made a mistake, and how they can avboid making it in the future. Unrelated/anything goes, and any other forum that opts to be fully NSFW would not require the tags. If a user persisted in not using the tags in forums where they were meant to, or posting NSFW material in safe for work boards, that's akin to trolling, and should be a warnable, probationable, and eventually banable offence, other wise themods would spend all day editing posts to add tags or remove content.


600 was really extreme, when i posed the question there was much contention over what the standard browser width is. I say go for a minimum width of 800 or 900. luddites will only have to scroll a small amount, and the forums should still look neat for everyone else.

Warnings, probations, and bannings would not be lightly given out. this is for repeat offenders who consistently break tables and use malicious code/links.



I guess this is where we need to establish what is a moderator's responsibility, and what is an admin's. i'm guessing it would be something like:

USERS' RESPOSIBILITIES:

• be interesting
• report posts. without the users reporting posts that need fixing/ mod attention, nothing will happen. This way, it's the user's responsibility to police the content they want to see.
• worship mad. he has all the pineapples.

MODS' RESPOSIBILITIES:

• fixing day-to-day posts that have been reported, adding tags, shrinking images, getting rid of forum breaking scripts, keeping the forums looking nice and functioning on a post level. (mods can, of course, report posts themselves.)
• Informing users on how to follow the rules via edited posts, posting in theads, and PM. Warning repeat or serious offenders of minor infractions, and giving them a "warned" custom title or signature "warned by Kest for posting porn in a SFW board."
• giving warned users probational temporary bans for repeated or serious rule infraction, and giving the a custom title or sig to this effect. "Probational ban by kest for continually spamming porn in a SFW board. probation ends 13/8/07"
• and finally, nominate users for perma-banning for STILL breaking these rules, or for the major bannable rules.
• answering users questions and solving technical problems where they can. mods should be first point of contact where possible.

ADMINS' RESPONSIBILITIES:

• keep the forums running. any standard day to day database maintenance. i imagine this is minimal, but real admins will be better equipped to answer this question than me.
• implement new features. add extra functionality to the boards, add extra boards as needed/requested.
• discuss and vote on perma-bans and then banning the offenders, and giving them their custom title/signature to that effect. "was nominated by kest for posting underage porn. Voted Banned 4-1. we don't want to see your pimply snatch. get out."

now, if the offender in my example had been posting her nude pics in unrelated, she wouldn't have recieved any warnings or edits or probations, but if she got reported, probably still would have been banned for being underage. This is more likely if she was annoying, or fat.

are there any other duties/responsibilities that need to be added? do some of them need to be moved to a different group? do we need to get rid of some? DISCUSS.

But I already post on SA.

ah, but you're not an admin on SA.