What do we do when resident moderators abuse power?

You raised some legitimate questions. What are the checks and balances, and what is the appropriate way to address concerns?

I could be wrong, Sarah, but I THINK that you're misunderstanding what happened.

Here's how I see the events:

1. Resident abuses forum privileges by cross posting and ranting (and, I might add, gets slapped down by a number of Residents who said in effect, "yawn...this is news?"

2. Moderator locks offending threads as a first step.

3. Cross postings and rants continue. Moderator deletes offending threads.

4. Sarah files AR objecting to moderator's action.

5. Moderator realizes that she may have acted too hastily, and submits AR to management to get their call. I believe she's asking "Was I right or wrong to kill this thread, Boss?"

I've been a moderator on other forums from time to time, and this is just the sort of escalation I would expect of a conscientious mod.

I was a little upset when a thread was closed by a resident moderator because of "ranting" which I thought was absolutely ridiculous reason because thats 99.9% of the forum content. The thread was complaining about special treatment being given to sl users that pay higher tier fees. Seeing as I thought the reason for the forum close was ridiculous, I sent an ar via forums thinking that maybe a linden would see. Something to the effect of, What do we do when we feel that a resident moderator is out of control and simply abuses the little bit of power that they have just because they can?
I have made it no secret in the past that I dislike resident moderators. I think they just block free speech and think some of them (not all) are just power hungry control freaks who have been given a little power so they feel almighty and tend to abuse this power just because they can. Like small town policemen we see in movies. So shortly after sending the AR, the same resident moderator posts a new message stating it was sent for Linden review, which to me seems like a higher level of control freak power hungry type behavior.
So when we send an ar via the forums are they seen by the resident moderators?, and if we disagree with the moderators, who do we contact or who keeps them in check, because right now I don't like the god like complex some of them have developed.

These forums do have their place, although they are very stuffy and up-tight! I don't like the closing of threads. Not even a little. The threads that I've seen closed, were closed because they went "off topic", but in my opinion they had veered into either another great conversation or a few good laughs.

What these forums are good for is getting answers and ideas from other residents on some of your SL pursuits. The other thing they are good for is generating traffic to any website you may have.

Other than that, if you want to have a good time or speak with out censorship find other SL related forums that aren't run by LL. There are plenty out there.

I can't speak for the other forums, as to rather or not they silence posters voices, but I would never do so on my forums. Of course, if you are doing nothing but being a nuisance I'm probably going to shut you down. Having a differing opinion or point of view from me will never be frowned on.

I reported the post you're talking about, Sarah, because it was spam and ranting. I have a lot of experience with that poster in-world and have no doubt that her secret source was one of the many voices in her head.

Regardless of if you agree with me on doing that and Strife then merging/locking her threads, I really don't think you can fault him for sending his own action to LL for review once you reported him. That sounds like exactly what he should have done.

I have to disagree with you here Sarah. The perception a few people might have about someone does not constititute "well known for". That person cross posted his/her silly post in several forums here, and spammed Linden Town Hall Questions in-world with the same rubbish. Regardless of how lenient the moderators have been in the forums lately, the rules still exist as to what the forums are and are not to be used for, and how they are to be used.

It should be noted that it would appear that after you ARd the moderator, he sent the thread on to Linden Review. This doesn't look like the handy work of someone who abuses his power, but rather someone who is simply doing his job.

Figure everything Strife has done in these forums as a volunteer, much of which alot of folks never see (LSL Wiki, for example). Walk a mile in his shoes before accusing him of abusing his "power" as moderator.