Believe it or not, I've been thinking up ways to make this process more transparent for a while.

So today especially, a day when transparency has been a buzz word, I'm ecstatic to announce we have our list of candidates for site mod. As well as the process on how selection will go down. Normally this would be the end of the announcement, more or less, but I wanted this to be different. This will be the second time we've asked for general interest from the Guild community. No one has to nominate you, no moderator has to know who you are.

Last time I asked a few questions of each candidate, I looked at alts, and post histories. I even bugged Mahz about it, and yes, he got back to me about it very quickly. Still it was a slow process and it took longer than I would have liked, and those who applied last time told me that the process was frustrating because they had no idea what was going on behind the scenes.

This time I want that to change that.

We have 16 candidates. That's the most I've ever heard of for a mod position. Site staff has decided it would be best if we kept that list private. I do not mind if you let it be known that you're on the list if you want, but please understand this is not a popularity contest. If you don't want it known you're on that list...more than fair. Personally I probably wouldn't want people knowing if I was on it. I'm shy, though. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

(If you want to make sure we put you on there and you sent us a DM/PM before the cut off, please reach out to me or any other site staffer. We're happy to triple check.)

The site mods will assist me in reaching out to each candidate and trying to pick their brain a little bit. To that end we've been thinking up some questions to ask these candidates. What a great way to take advantage of making this process more transparent?

Soooo...if you have a question you think would be good to ask a site mod candidate let us have it. Reply here (if this seems 'locked' someone tell me--there's a bug that bit one of my earlier threads and there's an easy fix but it helps to know), or send a site staffer (admin or site mod) the question in PM/DM. Either way. We may not catch it in the status bar, so at your own risk status bar peeps. (Don't use this ask for assistance as a chance to shitpost/troll us or the candidates please.)

You got until Friday night in the US.

After we get the list of questions finalized site mods and I will begin to survey and evaluate the candidates. (This will likely take the longest amount of time out of the whole process.)

Once that is finalized each site mod and admin will get their chance to give their opinions on each candidate and/or push for a few they liked best for the role. After that we'll vote until a majority is reached. Then we will let that person and announce it.

That is the plan, and the process created for it. I will update this thread on when we're on the next phase of the process.

Our list of questions is still a WIP, but here it is:

What general time zone do you live in?

How do you think site mods should be selected?

Do you currently roleplay, and if so, do you anticipate your role on staff to impact that in any way, negatively or positively?

What are some of your favorite parts about the Guild community? What parts would you look forward to spending some time and energy on as a site mod?

Hypothetical: User posted, someone memed and it was a tad insulting, user started up an argument. How do you address each member?

I think good general questions would be

What in your opinion are the mods doing right
What in your opinion are the mods doing wrong
How in your opinion can those things be fixed

And some scenario based questions, based on actual or hypothetical problems the mods have faced before or are likely to face in the future.

What can we do to improve transparency
What can we do to improve the three key aspects of Fairness, Firmness, and Consistency

Based on what little I know and what I read earlier on another thread, I think that this topic is definitely a push in the right direction. Sixteen candidates sounds like quite a lot and I feel for the folks that will have to sort through all those applications (I suppose that's the current staff though; best of luck to you all). With that in mind, here's some possible question suggestions:

• How is your activity?
• Do you have any (reasonable) changes that you envision for the site? If so, what are they?
• Do you have any experience past experience with moderation (ex: other sites, Discord, etc)? Tell us about it.

Best of luck to everyone involved!

I think good general questions would be

What in your opinion are the mods doing right
What in your opinion are the mods doing wrong
How in your opinion can those things be fixed

And some scenario based questions, based on actual or hypothetical problems the mods have faced before or are likely to face in the future.

What can we do to improve transparency
What can we do to improve the three key aspects of Fairness, Firmness, and Consistency

These are questions for prospective mods, not current mods. Transparency has, is, and will be brought up again, but this is solely on how new mods would handle certain situations rather than overarching opinionated questions on current staff.

In the 1x1 section, a poster has listed a in-depth bulleted list of kinks. No one has reported it but it's simply just there, what do you do?

Yes, and my suggested question is for prospective mods and is that they consider how that issue, transparency, might be solved. Has nothing to do with current staff or "overarching opinionated questions about current staff"

@DeadDrop

I assume you mean that they stumble across the thread in their own time, correct?

Not as a joke, but just confirming that you don't expect staff to do something about a thread they don't know exists.

I'll be upfront right now and say I hadn't looked into the application process for being a mod and what you might have already put forward to get your 16 canadits, but I did have some general ideas because I've run mod-selection for a group I was a mod for before I left that site.

Some of the things we've done were a lot of hypotheticals. Like:

A user is being confrontational with you over (insert reason.) How would you handle the situation: A) if it is being done in public, B) if it is being done via PM/DM?

A user has raised a complaint about another user over (insert reason.) What do you believe the proper course of action should be?

(@Hyde already nailed the "previous experience" question. lol.)
But, to build on that, perhaps just a more generalized: Do you have any experience in de-escalating arguments/problems, or enforcing rules/policies?
(It's complicated to address this question, but people that have experience working as customer service reps, or management positions, or even as parents and teachers would have experience there that they may not attribute to having been a modorator elsewhere.)

(Original post was deleted and moved to a different thread by me)

Actually, are the news mod going to be divided by sections of which site or are they just going to be roaming around?

• How often are you on the Guild?
• What is your availability?
• Are you comfortable getting contacted by people via PM or on Discord?
• What is the best way to resolve a conflict between two people on the guild?
• What do you think is the best way to resolve drama?

Just a few that came to mind that weren't repeated in the thread unless I missed something

(Original post was deleted and moved to a different thread by me)

Actually, are the news mod going to be divided by sections of which site or are they just going to be roaming around?

I assume you mean new, not news?

We don't really have section mods here aside from the persistent world section, which are more GMs. That's mostly due to how some matters can span across multiple sections from roleplays scenarios, to spambot attacks, to name changes, and even resolving reports that come through. I've seen what you're referring to before on other forums with something like an "off topic mod" of sorts, but that's not really how the guild operates.

Potential questions

• What is your go to approach when dealing with someone difficult or argumentative?
• Tell me about a time you had to reprimand/discipline someone who you got along with (can be in work, a team sport, DnD whatever)
• What skills can you bring to the Mod team that they don't already have
• Will you crush the enemies of RPG with the righteous fury of a thousand suns?

That's the deadline for questions.

Thanks!

Now we make a list of questions and begin to contact candidates.

2/17 so far.

5/17

9/16

14/16