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Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Nov 28, 2010 4:57 am
by SaiKar
I do quite like Guido's wording.

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 7:23 pm
by dr-spangle
Is that all decided, who is going on the admin team? shall we start deciding that stuff?

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 9:02 pm
by Guido Zambelis
I had a go at adding in some stuff about the purpose of the hub, and included some brief guidelines as to conduct, making it into more of a charter - see here: http://ninetyone.org/files/other/charter.pdf.

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 9:24 pm
by siriain
Looks pretty comprehensive to me. :)

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 9:26 pm
by dr-spangle
You like pdf files don't you? :P

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 9:42 pm
by Guido Zambelis
Edited to prohibit papelism - it's been so long since someone tried it on I almost forgot!

I do, it's my one contribution to the hobby :P

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 9:58 pm
by dr-spangle
Yeah... I'll try and convert it into a forum post now :D

-----
Charter of the hub.mn

Purpose
The purpose of the hub.mn is to provide an easy-accessible resource for micronationalists of all shapes and sizes, persuasions and backgrounds. The hub.mn provides services, such as the ForumList; hosting for intermicronational organisations and a discussion forum.

Status
The hub.mn is managed by the administration team. They are appointed by the community to manage the resources of the community. Although the specifics of web hosting mean that, ultimately, one person must be responsible for the webspace and domain name, this does not grant them any additional power, nor should it be taken to imply some form of superiority or seniority. No administrator will ever have the right to remove or restrict access to the hub.mn and its services otherwise than in accordance with this charter.

Community guidelines
The following are guidelines only. Conduct not specifically prohibited here may be subject to other restrictions in the interests of the community. This is not an exhaustive “rule book”.

>The following activities are unacceptable:
>>discriminating against any other member on the grounds of race, gender, age,sexual orientation or religion,
>>disruption to prove a point,
>>repeatedly or consistently posting comments or images that cause harassment or offence,
>>making repeated and deliberate personal attacks,
>>using large, annoying or confusing signatures,
>>using more than one account concurrently (“papelism”).
>Proper spelling and grammar are appreciated.
>Languages other than English are not to be used in posts, as they both prevent other members from participating and hinder the effective moderation of content. If English is not your first language, automatic translation is perfectly acceptable!

Where a member is in breach of these guidelines, staff members may take action (in accordance with the charter) as they see fit, including editing posts, locking threads or the imposition of temporary blocks or long-term bans.

The hub.mn is subject to the laws of the territory in which it is hosted, and consequently staff members may have to, from time to time, take action in addition to or outside these guidelines.

Staff members
It is the duty of staff members and all members of the community to act in a way that is conducive to the good of the community, and this is the overriding principle. Staff members are free to engage in posting and discussion as per any other member of the forum.
If a staff member knows they will be inactive for a long period of time, they are expected to resign their position. If a staff member is inactive for a period longer than thirty days, exhibits obvious bias in a ruling, or is guilty of gross misconduct and/or abuse of privileges, the community may, by consensus, decide that they shall be removed from their position.
There are two types of staff member, moderators and administrators.

Moderators
Role
Moderators exist to moderate debate – that is, the content of posts and the conduct of members. They keep the boards clean and well-ordered, and keep the peace (where necessary) between warring parties. They decide which content is appropriate and which is not.

Chosen
New moderators are chosen by the council of moderators. Any member of the council can veto the choice.

Duties
>To remove illegal content.
>To enforce the community guidelines.
>To impose sanctions on unruly members in accordance with guidelines.

Administrators
Role
Administrators exist to maintain the technical elements of the forum, to keep regular backups of the database in case of error, and to conduct maintenance where necessary. Administrators should never get involved with moderating activities, unless to assist with a technical issue or unless a member is in gross violation of the community guidelines and no moderator is available.

Chosen
New administrators are chosen by public consensus.

Duties
>To backup the database at least every two weeks and subsequently leave the confirmation message in the Database backup log.
>To check the forum status and repair any errors.
>To update the forum software when necessary.
-----

Gosh I hate PDF files. Anyways, other than the cosmetic change of "forum list" to "ForumList" (I like my camelcase.) I only have one question which would be:
How many administrators and moderators are there going to be?

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 10:04 pm
by Guido Zambelis
Corrected your cameltoe...case...what?

It guess it depends on how many people want to do it at any given time, I don't think it's something we should try and specify.

With regard to the moderators and administrators, should we specifically prohibit a person from holding both positions, or should we specifically allow it? I'm just not sure how many people would be willing to be moderators, which might mean administrators have to double-hat.

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 10:07 pm
by dr-spangle
Administrators, probably only need 1 to 3 or so... probably 2-3 actually... safety net.


Moderators, hmm... probably 3-7? I don't know...

Also, I'm going to need to make it so people can backup the database easily, aren't I? :P

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 10:14 pm
by Guido Zambelis
Sounds good to me.

Isn't is easy in phpbb?

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 10:17 pm
by dr-spangle
Never tried, I always backup via phpmyadmin :P


Also, how about fitting some numbers to my ranges? :P

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2010 2:23 am
by Orion
I think we're going to have to double-hat; but I can't imagine where that would really be a problem.

2-3 Admins sounds fine. The number of Mods would and probably should fluctuate with the demand for their services on the forum.

I do have some concerns with the charter guidelines:
>>disruption to prove a point,
This seems like a bit of a gray area to me. By virtue of proving a point, does one not disrupt a conversation regardless? I dunno, it just seems ambiguous to me.
>Proper spelling and grammar are appreciated.
I assume by virtue of having the word "appreciated" tacked on there you mean that people who can't spell for simple lack of ability will not be banned. We do occasionally get quite young people involved with the hobby (e.g. Jess).
>Languages other than English are not to be used in posts, as they both prevent other members from participating and hinder the effective moderation of content. If English is not your first language, automatic translation is perfectly acceptable!
Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but this seems to contradict the first article of the guidelines which cites ruling against discrimination. Personally I want to encourage more interaction from other sectors here, and if that means we have to set up a Dutch forum, or a Francophone forum, where that particular language can be spoken, then I really don't see a problem with that. Nor do I see a problem if a few users want to hold a conversation in another language. I'd like to know why you feel this is necessary in the guidelines.

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2010 11:53 am
by Guido Zambelis
Disruption to prove a point would be along the lines of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:POINT. Sorry if I wasn't clear enough - do you know how I could clarify it? Maybe "disrupting the normal operation of the forum to prove a point"?

Yeha, the "appreciated" bit was so as to not make us seem like grammar/spelling Nazis and also to allow for those for whom English isn't their first language,

I have absolutely no objection to wider participation by those from any background. If we set up separate forums for non-English discussions, we'd still have the moderation problem. In all honesty, I think the forums that the other language sectors already have are quite well used, and of those for whom English is not a first language, the ones who are willing to come to a forum outside their sector will probably have a good enough grasp of English to not need a language-specific board.

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2010 12:45 pm
by SaiKar
Banning languages other than English may be a form of discrimination, but not all discrimination is bad. The only parts that are bad are the ones based on things that should have no bearing or effect on the topic at hand. If we were to ban people over 60 from posting here, or all people from Asia, then that would be bad discrimination since neither of those factors should have any influence whatsoever on a person being a micronationalist. On the other hand, a non-English language WOULD be a significant, in many cases insurmountable, barrier towards communication. You say "encourage more interaction from other sectors" but, realistically, we wouldn't be able to understand a word each-other were saying, even if all our intentions were in the right places. Someone would have to translate. Making English the sole language used here is just deciding it's them rather than us. Since English is the primary language used by many of us here, that doesn't sound too unreasonable.

Re: [New forum] Structure of organisation

Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2010 1:16 pm
by Guido Zambelis
If we had reliable moderators who spoke the languages, and enough people willing to participate in those languages, then it'd be fine, but I don't think we have either right now!