Shaping The Future of PAL - My Proposal

[Jeremy]

Hey guys,

I have been in the office for about an hour so far today, and had the opportunity to get caught up on most of the drama that unfolded over the weekend. As mentioned in the other thread I was not online this weekend. Typically weekends are my family time and I enjoy the peace and quiet of not being around. Nonetheless I wish I would have gotten involved earlier.

Anyhow, the way I see it, there were indeed mistakes made in respect to moderation. Likewise there are a lot of emotions involved, and many people that were put on tilt, and justifiably tilted on both sides. At the end of the day however, I own the site, so the buck stops with me. I take full responsibility for the good and the bad.

So where do we go from here? Well, we could jump on the drama lama and let the arguments and threads run on and on. Quite honestly though, I would rather take the shoe laces out of my shoes and hang myself then deal with drama.

So I propose, together as a community we make new forums rules, guidelines, code of conduct. Whatever you want to call it. And this is to include rules for both members, as well as mods, and even me. There should be just as much accountability in the community for an admin or owner as there is for a brand new mod.

If anyone is going to be de-modded or made into a mod, from here on out I would like there to be a process where the community makes the decision and not me. Likewise we should have specific rules about deleting of threads, and actually no thread should ever be 100% deleted, just moved to an invisible forum.

Anyhow, feel free to carry on in the other threads. I am not going to lock them, and if they get nasty so be it. It's a cruel world out there kids. I would ask for you to participate in this thread however with ideas, debate, and thoughts on the new forum rules moving forward.

If nothing else good comes out of the whole thing, it made me realize (after a year) that it's probably time to get more formal rules here. Unfortunately we can't hit a rewind button to Friday and change the past. One thing we can do though is work together to keep the community a positive resource and valuable asset to the poker affiliate industry.

[PTC]

def. guidelines for certain things like disputes with mods. is a great idea. Fine to lay out guidelines for the community as well because then you can point to it and say this is why your thread was deleted etc. I would just caution that many people don't read the community guideline stickies in forums anymore, so it won't do much to prevent poor conduct by some people still if this is the purpose. Should be focused on how to deal with these things, because you can't really stop them from coming up.

[superiorword]

Likewise we should have specific rules about deleting of threads, and actually no thread should ever be 100% deleted, just moved to an invisible forum.

+1

[MewsicLovr]

I'm pretty sure it's possible to restrict it so that no one can delete threads. Spam threads can be moved to a hidden trash area. It wouldn't prevent one from editing posts/threads, but maybe it would help?

[Newjabber]

Likewise we should have specific rules about deleting of threads, and actually no thread should ever be 100% deleted, just moved to an invisible forum.

+1

Frustrating spending time expressing your opinion only to see a thread get deleted.
In rare cases it may be needed, but that just wasent the case here imo

[tagmug]

How about before doing anything else you bring the deleted threads back. They had information that members deserve to know.

[pokerprop]

If it gets personal send it to the Zoo - members only forum or w/e.

I don't see need for rules. Just don't delete threads or edit thread.

However I would like to see Randy change his attitude in a few areas a little. For example stop with the attacks, better than you criticism and stuff that drives away or turns people off from the site. I'd also like for him to stop deleting his own posts (this is separate issue from thread) everytime he starts to loose and argument). I've seen him delete a post, respond to someones response to him which no longer looks like a response to him and then lighten it up with LOL. dude if you post something live by it. You edit posts after the fact more than any I've seen on any forum.

As far as banning goes: This is just plane stupid. Ban spammers, frauds etc. there's no need to start banning people. I've seen this occur from PokerNations back in past and Randy at times, thankfully they were unbanned quickly.

Also i hate this attitude from friends of mine who all of sudden need to act professional and add an "as a mod i can't" or "as a mod i must". Funny thing is 3 people are going to read this today and think I'm talking just about them. I got the same tone from each of you yesterday. Dudes you're all the same people you were the day b4 you became a mod. This has never been some moderated forum to the open eye ever b4.

One other thing I don't like here is that there are a TON of mods. There seems to be so little need. Here we have this ladder isolation system. Yes this is how it comes off. I joined PAW in late 2005 well after many of you where here. I remember thinking wow what is it with this click. Everyone of them are mods and they all know each other etc. It lightened up a bit but it was overwhelming in the beginning.

PAL is boring a little because we've rehashed this stuff many found success and we don't have as many people progressing through the stages of the funnel as we had before. There are those ones (we know them) who are going to struggle no matter what till they get over their own blocks holding them back. I'm not talking about that. We have less MJ's is what I'm saying. PAL had a lot of them.. Hazo might fit into that category too. People that came in her with a winning attitude started from scratch and progressed there way through. jdwalkchan (sp?) he's tougher to get a read on, he has early day MJ like rants but also some over the top stuff maybe from age, maybe just personality and i read it wrong, but he certainly seems to be someone that popped up is posting, is learning and also sharing.. has some humor and offends some people along the way and maybe is on his way to next five figure monthly affiliate. Oh Doodve (sp?) Dave is certainly another one too motivated. We need more of these people here.

We need more individuals like that coming through PAL to keep this fresh. People graduate and move on. Those of us who really like helping people stick around, but some of us also tire, because were dealing now with mostly people in that mental block category i mentioned.

An environment that is more inviting to these people, lets them come through the funnel, help them progress. some will die and be the people that drain us but also we can get more that build it up as well.

What are all the mods needed for here. Have many people that have ability to delete spam makes sense (there name doesn't need to be green), and then a few others who can move, organize and arrange threads.

Were also going to of course have the people who are here for there own benefit solely. That's fine that makes total sense many are graduated as well from the process. Notice though the mass # of people that did it without any sort of forum etc. The people were turning away are not ones that need us, there are ones that will make it one way or another. We can isolate them and later be solely in competition with them or we can help them along make it easier for them and have them as part of our network for a long time where we can do business together in other ways - trading sites, future partnerships, investment deals, link exchanges.. w/e else.

Anyways I think were capable of doing this without formal rules. When your buddy is being an asshole forget the group think, forget what earns you forum bonus points and just PM or messenger him and say "dude you're being an asshole". If we do that think we get by fine.

[Newjabber]

How about before doing anything else you bring the deleted threads back. They had information that members deserve to know.

+1 on that one too

[Jeremy]

I'll remove all the mods if you guys want, and just give people who volunteer the ability to remove spam posts. The mods actually do a hell of a lot to keep this place cleaned up, posts in the right forum, spam erased promptly, etc.

I can see where you are coming from in terms of a click or isolation, especially for a new member. Should we remove different colors on the names, with the exception of A.M.'s of course. This way no one is green, red, etc. We're all in the same boat.

I appreciate your guys feedback and opinions on this. One of the reasons PAL is so successful is because we all make the decisions for the community. Bumps in the road like this happen in any large community. What a great opportunity however for all of us to decide on changes that should be implemented.

You should never be afraid to speak your mind here or share advice on how you think PAL should be managed. In regards to bringing back the deleted thread, I am OK with that if it's possible. I may have to have Eric querry the database though, the post was #8155.

[tagmug]

Thanks for bringing the threads back, thats certainly move to the right direction. Also if Hazo, OzPoker or other members were banned due to those threads they should certainly be unbanned, because they did nothing to deserve the bans.