Feedback on ResMod Program

Please post any constructive feedback, suggestions or comments you have about the ResMod program here!

I prefer an RMs initial postings in a thread be on topic with an attempt to refocus a derailed thread rather than just an anticeptic wrist slap. This was done with some success and should be encouraged.

Noting who is and is not an RM is very helpful.

After rough start, I didn't see a large dropoff from the pre-RM moderation, so I suppose that is positive.

Still some rough patches, but looking better. Will we go through the growing pains again with the new round of RMs? EDIT: OK, saw the other thread detailing the "next steps" and think it should help avoid an initial step back with the new RMs.

Construtive feedback: No resident governing.. drop the system.

I have to ditto Jonas on dropping the ResMod program. But to be constructive, here are some of my concerns:

Are you subject to diciplinary action due to the content of an Abuse Report?
It has always been generally accepted that residents can freely disclose necessary contextual information associated with an abuse report, such as transcripts and RL information. Linden Administrators have historically been trusted entities for this information.

Now that residents are reading these abuse reports, is it now possible for a resident who files a forum abuse report to become subject to diciplinary action because of the information disclosed in the abuse report? If so, should you include a warning of this fact before a resident submits the abuse report?


Privacy of the Abuse Reports still unsatisfactory
While removing the submitter's name from the abuse report is a move in the right direction, the context and nature of the abuse report body could still be harmful to the submitter. I cannot see ANYTHING that would discourage a Resident Moderator from posting historical Abuse Report information (even with the names removed) to a third party site. This is because:

a. Resident Moderators are under no legal obiligation (No signed NDA)

b Unlike the Lindens, Resident Moderators are under no career/financial obligations.

c. Linden Lab does not have jurisdiction over third party sites and therefore cannot punish the ResMod for this breach of trust. (If you decide you can INDEED punish a ResMod for posting this information on a third party site, I have a whole other discussion to start regarding what "no jurisdiction" means)



Currently no real consequences for poor ResMod behavior
At this time I cannot see anything that would prevent a Resident Moderator from abusing their privileges. If a ResMod, for example, repeatedly used creative interpretation of the TOS/CS to harass an enemy, it could result in the sullying of an otherwise prestine diciplinary record. This kind of abuse should result in the prolonged account suspension for that ResMod for betraying the public trust. Please realize that loss of ResMod status is not enough deterrent for ResMods who never asked for the job and were barely interested in it to begin with.



Oh Ya ... Why are you selecting uninterested Resident Moderators to start with?!
OK before you repeat once again that the selected resident moderators can opt out of the program...we KNOW! That has been the most annoying dodge of this basic question yet. We are not worried that you are forcing people into forum servitude Nobody ever thought that. You are answering a question that wasn't asked.

The question is basically...WHY would you pass up qualified, enthusiastic applicants with clean records in favor of residents who are unaware of the program, uninterested in the program, and in some cases absent from SL altogether?

It would seem this round you are not disclosing the name of the newly selected ResMods right away (possibly contacting them to confirm their acceptance.) I will be keenly interested in how many of them expressed any interest in the job before they were selected.



We should have peer review for Resident Moderators
In the first round, people were far too frightened to publically post links to a Resident Moderator's possibly disqualifying forum history. This kind of information sharing should be ENCOURAGED! Jeska should start a ResMod peer review thread! I personally would welcome such a review of my own participation, and any selected Resident Moderator should feel the same. The users should also have some recourse if a disqualifying forum history is discovered about a ResMod.


I hope you find my contribution constructive and helpful. Until these issues are addressed I'm going to have to maintain my position on the Resident Moderator program.

In its present form it is not acceptable.

Having had moderator experience on a large busy forum for another online game, I would be happy to sign up for the programme myself.

However.....

History tells me that disgruntled players who have been 'modded' will often seek out the moderator in game and take some form of revenge (usually using an untraceable alt or free account) - and, as it's a "disposable" account, who cares when it gets banned?

I think there should be seperate, recognisable, names available for mods so that they can carry on their legitimate work without fear of retribution. A special surname was created for the Suicide Girls.... Is there any reason why we can't have Dave ResMod and Betty ResMod on the forums (first names obviously of their own choosing.... Lewis ResMod, Aimee ResMod or Cocoanut ResMod might be pretty obvious who they are)? This need not equate to an actual free game login account although I can see possible benefits for in-game meetings such as those held by other volunteer groups in game - which can, of course, be switched on or off as they participate - or not - in the program.

Lewis

Why did you start this thread Jeska? You obviously have a multi-month plan in place and are sticking to it, as you have already posted what most of that plan is here.

The resounding voice was against this ill-conceived ResMod program and you ignored it. You will ignore anything in this thread, too.

There is nothing constructive to be said about the ResMod program. Nothing. It's ill-conceived and in my opinion, exists solely to lessen the Linden workload.

ditto

I'm getting the same feeling Aaron.

I'm sure if a co-ordinated effort was made to voice opposition to some small facet of the ResMod program, changes could be added to their efforts to "Tweak" things. But I haven't seen a hint that a rollback is on the table. I think the Linden master plan right now is to ride the storm until users just get used to ResMods, or get tired of complaining about them.

...or ignore them.

I'm normally not one to bash another companies policy, unless it is illegal or hurts the employees or customers. But this is really not a good direction LL is taking with this program. Scaring your residents into not posting into even slightly touchy topics removes the free expression and creativity of this world. Which is what SL is all about.

When I joined SL, I didn't join to be subject to the ruling of anyone except Linden Lab, especially not another paying customer. It has been stated by many Lindens that governments in SL would always be non compulsory. The forums are directly linked to SL in many many ways, therefor there should be a non compulsory government here (Group Forums) but absolutely no compulsory government of any kind, with the exception of Linden Lab. To be completely honest, I have also felt that the avatar who has moderated the script library for quite a while should also have had no moderator powers, but I didn't fuss too much, because it was only one small sub form.

Linden Lab should really listen to the advice of it's community and end the ResMod program, very soon. Personally I will be teiring down to basic later this week in protest. I will also begin suggesting to others that they should teir down in protest as well.

I seiously hope a ResMod who loses their Mod Privliages does not try to file suit against Linden Lab for using them as an unpaid employee, especially if it was a ResMod who did not volunteer for the position. Good Luck for now LL, and keep your ears to the ground.

~Cid

HEH. Well, no we won't be ignored. We can expect some symbolic gesture from the Lindens in the form of a post indicating that our opinions really matter and that they are being discussed at their meetings and will be used to help tweak things in the utterly inevitable phase III.

If worded carefully, this Linden post will both congratulate and celebrate our enthusiastic interest in the forums WHILE positively encouraging us to give the ResMod program a chance to bloom. I can even write this post for them if they would like to pay me a small fee.

Let's not let it die, I plan to keep bringing it up in world and in the forums when I can. Tyranny should not be ignored just because "it has been this way as long as i remember".

I heard you were chosen to do it by Linden Lab for free, but you can opt out .

We can spent hours giving advice, constructive comments, and the like. I just don't see the point of doing so, when it falls on deaf ears.

Sorry if that seems negative to anyone, its just my honest observation of this.

Ppl have been at odds in these forums since day one. This time however the majority agreed. It didn't make a difference. Please don't ask my opinon if your not willing to hear it.

Have a nice day.

Cat

Jeska,

I hope 'constructive' feedback doesn't translate to 'favourable' feedback.

I think the idea of resident moderators is very dangerous. It is the first step towards the idea of resident policing, and once you reach that point you are lost. And I know whereof I speak.

Speaking not about these specific moderators, but in general terms, the problem with appointing residents who have contributed in any way to the forums, is that we will have seen first hand the biases that some of them have. Expecting even-handedness from all of them is a ridiculously optimistic hope. Some will not be even-handed. Some, indeed, will use their position to 'get at' those whom they consider their enemies.

If you are going to use resident moderators, then you should have set up a system of scrutiny. Have the scrutiny carried out by a resident, or group of residents, who have never contributed to the forums. Then they will be able to examine the work of the moderators objectively.

If I understand the incident correctly we have already seen a resident moderator make a comment about a thread by means of using his position in a way not open to the rest of us (the episode with the stars). If I am right about what happened, this is the first incidence of corruption (whether you recognise it as such or not), and it took place almost immediately this group was appointed.

I said I know whereof I speak. Before joining Second Life in 2003, I came from a virtual world which had in place a founder, who was basically a dictator - although not quite as benevolent as Linden Labs, and, under him, a council and a security force, all made up of residents.

The security force became corrupt, and was finally exposed when a row between individual officers culminated in the URL of a secret security website being released to the general populace. There residents were able to read pages of abuse and vicious jokes written by security people about individual residents, together with crowing about the 'enemies' they had permabanned. The council was equally corrupt and residents were permabanned regularly - they had a similar policy to Linden Labs in that when a resident was banned, no one was informed about it (and the resident was never informed why they had been banned), so prominent citizens used to regularly disappear without trace.

There were public offices supposedly of some power and influence, and residents were elected to these. At the time I left the place these had been implemented for about nine months. The 'wrong' person, from the council's point of view, won the election, a very popular candidate. Subsequently her life was made very difficult. She was engaged in a constant battle with the council, and after a few months in office suffered a heart attack in real, and had to retire. Her deputy was removed shortly afterwards. An appointment was made by the council of someone the council claimed had come second in last year's election, although strangely enough the residents remembered one of the other candidates coming in second place. But anyway, by the time I left the council was in the stranglehold of a small residents' mafia.

There were websites set up outside this world by citizens who had been banned. The ISPs were threatened with legal action. And if you look up this world on Google for any critical sites, you won't find them, because the owners also threatened legal action if you used the name of the virtual world, so people had to use euphemisms, like '3D World'.

The forums? They were quite good too. If ever you posted anything in any way critical (constructive or otherwise) of the council, your posting would be removed within minutes. And sometimes resident moderators would go through the forum deleting postings by the score, just for fun.

That is why, when I came to Second Life, I loved the place so much. It was like breathing fresh air. That is why I am so worried about proposals like this, which might seem harmless on the surface - providing you have never experienced the kind of thing they might ultimately lead to.

The Lindens have made a lot of rather dubious decisions recently, and I feel this is another one of those. If you are going to involve residents in any kind of authoritarian role, you must set up a system of scrutiny. Otherwise you will be inviting corruption.

And believe me, you will get it.

Most of ya have already broken the thread's rules




Therefore, all complaints will be ignored

So go tell a resmod eh?

Afraid I have to agree on dropping the ResMod program.

Other residents rating my posts, judging them for merit and TOS issues is not acceptable. I pay to deal with Linden Labs and their policies, not to deal with anonymous resident with unknown issues and agenda.

If I can keep current on the forums daily, then an employee could do the same. If LL wants to avoid paying salary + benefits, then how about hiring a couple of p/t people who can work remotely. Or just cut the forums back to announcements only. Something I would hate to see happening, but the ResMod program is not the answer.

Not that I expect anything I say to make a difference.

neener neener neeeeeeener

Cancelled posting. :-0

Watches the Earth shake as the majority of the Forum Community beat their heads against a brick wall over this entire issue.

The discontent over this has been widespread, for a variety of reasons. But it seems to be falling on deaf ears.

I don't think they want to hear us say "scrap the resmod system", instead they want suggestions on refining and honing it.

I hope I'm wrong, and they listen.

Well it's not going to be easy. Right now the announcement of different phases provides us the necessary impetus to renew the debate (if you want to call this a debate ... I have never seen so much unity in the forums!). The Lindens know if they can just weather the storm until the ResMod program becomes established, ResMods could be silently rotated in and out without ceremony and the opposition will be reduced to occasional snide comments.

If the Lindens are not going to negotiate with us in any meaningful way about ResMods ("Yes we know everybody hates ResMods... we will keep that in mind when we TWEAK! Give it a chance! Have a cookie! Yay It's Phase III now! " perhaps this thread could be better used to determine how forum users can best encourage Linden Lab to reconsider.

This is already done every time someone uses the Bad Post icon and it is still up to LL to make a decision.

I do agree that they should be able to moderate without resident help by using existing staff or by adding admin staff.

One thing I will never change my opinion on.

It is a huge mistake to allow anyone but a LL employee, to decide or contribute to any decision that may cause a resident to lose all their IW assets, IW or RL income, and IW status.

Cat

i agree that ResMods should be held accountable for their actions.. and ever since the program was introduced, there has been such a clause in place. although it's not very specific. maybe we need something more detailed?

from the ResMod guidelines: "Any disciplinary problems within the forum moderation community will be dealt with swiftly and any misuse of moderation abilities will result in a loss of volunteer status and possible Second Life disciplinary actions. You are of course, always able to leave the volunteer group at any time."
(emphasis mine)




this was one of the main concerns expressed by the community at large when the first list came out and yes, you are right, it is being addressed as suggested this time around. contacting potential ResMods first and confirming said list before being published to the community. definitely a good step, in my opinion.




i remember when this was brought up in other ResMod threads in General and i'll say the same thing now as i did then, it's a good idea. sure, it could end up with a lot of ResMod bashing and such, but i think you're right that it would provide a good source for Lindens to review and apply as seen fit.
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agreed. personally, i try to do just that. sometimes it's not easy and still other times it's easier to just give the "slap on the wrist" than to try to post something constructive, especially if it's a topic i'm not involved with or other similar reasons. not to mention, there have been some SLers who have said they don't appreciate such an attempt and see it more as a snide remark than a positive post. it's easy to see both sides of the arguement, but sometimes it's hard to act appropriately on said information.

i also agree that easily noting who's a ResMod would be of a great help. currently, the options are basically to either include that info in one's sig or as a custom title. (see my title for an example) however, having an easily identifiable icon or something would be a great help!
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Selador, you have made some wonderful points about corruption and scrutiny. it sure would be easy to say, "oh, that would never happen here", but as you've pointed out.. it could and somewhere down the line quite possibly would. as stated above, i think some sort of scrutiny/critiquing/criticism forum would go to great lengths to keep the ResMod program in order.
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Surreal, i'd be more than happy to be hired.. full time.. without benefits. as long as i could get a paycheck.. i would be here even more often than i am now.

if that's possible. lol..
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having read the updated version of this thread before i post, i was reminded me of the stars "feature". i have to say this doesn't seem to be working quite as planned. there are only two threads in the first 5 pages of the General forums that have a star rating at all. unless this can be encouraged to become a commonplace tool of ResMods, i would have to say we should either let everyone rate again, or just do away with stars altogether.

also, i believe the option to do away with the ResMod program is just that. an option. yet, it's not one to be taken lightly. it will need to be given time to see if the kinks can be worked out and if the community can come to a mutual point of agreement on it's function.
i would imagine that if doesn't work out in a couple months, we could very well see it's repeal. LL has historically listened to SLers, even if it's a long term situation. how many features have come and gone? what about P2P? there was a huge period of time when that didn't exist, yet it ended up coming back.

i only ask that we give it a chance to succeed and judging it on the first round of ResMods after 2 weeks of trying to learn and do their job AND trying to function postiviely within a community that largely disagrees with their existance is hardly a fair trial.
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Edit: Martin, ResMods don't have the power to do ANY disciplinary actions. they can not effect IW assets, IW/RL income, or IW status any more than any other SLer. that is not part of their power.