Animation Source Forums

It's been said numerous times, the mods are busy both in real life AND on this site. I know for a fact that ALL the mods work on mod work whenever possible when they are on this site--but there is A LOTTA LOT of work to do! It takes, say, a minute to treat a single report on a Source, and there's probably an average of 100 reports to go through at a time across the Sources. Combine that with having to activate art and images and fanfics and such, and it's a TON of work to do even between eight mods (a few of which are inactive anyway, but the other few of which devote NUMEROUS hours into this.)

Simply organizing mods together is not enough. This is a volunteer job, and almost all of the mods aren't even out of college yet--some aren't out of HIGH SCHOOL yet. Real life is more important than any fansite, and I give kudos to the mods who are in school and put that as the priority over this site.

We DO need more mods--everyone is agreed to that. The problem is the last time we had a lot of mods, they turned into trolls and caused this site more harm than good. I'm still of the opinion of quality over quantity, and I can't think of too many people who would disagree. Yes, it takes time to go through everything and make sure reports are treated and art is activated--but it's worth it as long as it DOES get done.

What we DO need is for steet not only to assign a few OLDER mods (and, in this case, I do mean older by age and, therefore, life experience) and ones which have not only never have been mods before, but never associated in any way (that can be accurately discerned) with the trolls you mentioned...on ANY level. I know that's difficult to quantify, but it must be done that way. It MUST be. I realize some people are going to hate me for saying this (and accuse me of age prejudice), but I do not believe that young teenagers are capable enough to make authoritative decisions as moderators. Nor do they have enough life experience. There should be a clearly delineated minimum age...and in my opinion, it should not be under 16. Not at all. In fact, were it MY choice, it would be at least 17...maybe 18.

There IS a way of tracking not only those who have been actual problems for the site (and not just for one or a few staffers who particularly didn't like those people, which is entirely different and, as far as I am concerned, not reason enough to shut someone out of consideration for a staff position). And it needs to be done. It's time for a new series of people in those positions, and for people who have clearly demonstrated not only a good and intelligent mindset, but I also think steet needs to step away from this idea of only bringing on "safe" people who have never, ever been in any sort of conflict (on whatever sort of level) simply because he believes that they'd be the best candidates, and ruffle the least feathers. Clearly that hasn't worked. Some of the presents mods aside.

And yes, we most definitely need MORE staff. If we are to be expected to accept that this is purely volunteer, and that they are entitled to get around to doing the job whenever they can, then we need more, and we need wider representation. By that, I mean staffing needs to be considered more strategically and intelligently...picking people who can cover odd hours of the day and night, given the vast stretch of space on this planet that this website covers. Not just Americans, Brits, Canadians and French. We need a few Asians maybe as well. Or Australians.

We also need people who are willing (since this IS volunteer work) to do the job, do it consistently, and not be so opaque and vague and evasive about it. We need transparency. We need to see the activity. We need to take a lot of the automation back out of the site (and the ridiculous spam filter on the shoutboxes) and put it back in human hands. We need a system in place for mods who violate those standards, OR who abuse their authority, to be removed promptly without excuse-making and fear of reprisals (fear either by the webmaster or other staff members).

Let's stop talking about and start DOING it. And if we wait for steet, I can only presume there will never be any changes. Someone officially needs to take the reins and run with it, and do it RIGHT, taking into account all I have mentioned.

Dude, I've been saying this for years. Most of the time, I've been labeled a "malcontent", "complainer" even a "troll" for saying it.

THAT'S what we've come to. Or maybe sunk to.

But as to moderators not doing their jobs? I don't know that I necessarily agree with that. I do think the staff is far too few, and this whole view of "when I can get around to it, because I'm just a volunteer" thing is bothersome to me. If you accept the job, you accept all of the stuff that goes with it. (And the existing ones DO need help, the lazy or non-present ones need to go, THE TROLLS or their friends who are on staff need to definitely go, and anyone who abuses their authority, and I have one on my radar right now, NEEDS to GO).

I wouldnt call us lazy, we are busy.

Balto Source and Lion King Source get the most attention because they are the most active. We dont check lesser sites as often, though we try to.

We will take this into account and start updating SS more often.

As far as I (and, it would appear, many others) am concerned, certain mods are. Period.

A few others fit the other descriptions I used.

Perhaps a few mods are, but not all, like Moss said.

Indeed, that depends on who "us" is referring to. Which are you referring to: "source sites" or "Spirit Source" by SS? I'm not sure.

I don't know what the specifics are, nor am I calling out anyone in particular, but with all the sites we have now and the few unopened ones, how long do you think it will last? In a year or two if the sites start getting more popular (as I believe quite a few could with sequels to CGI movies being made and TV series and all that jazz), how can you keep up the pace if you are as you said "busy?" Skul had to mod all the sources at one time, he'll tell you, it's pretty darn hard.

I agree with Jersey on most of what he said, probably with the exception of the age part (I've seen that adult trolls can be even more trouble than childish trolls so *shrug* could end up going both ways here).

Well you know my thoughts on this anyway, Brown, but you should also know I certainly didn't mean all moderators. In fact, I did explain that in my recent posts.


Oh I know there are a few adult trolls who have plied the website recently, and in the past. Two hve been a recent pain in my nether regions, though I think, thankfully, one or two of the mods have gotten one of them off my back...at least for the current time. The other has been a pain regarding the historical stuff I have tried to help share with others on the Balto Source site and forums and, thankfully, appears to have been permabanned, and she offered nothing of value and instead did nothing but constant contradiction and flame baiting. There is a whole back story behind it, but it is not relevant to this topic.

Be that as it may, most of the trolls that have been an irritation to this site have either been teenagers or very young adults...college-aged or around that. Your peers, in other words. Regardless of their technical status as "adults", they act like bratty, socially-inept children. And, as Skulblaka_Shur'tugal has indicated on this particular board, SOME of them have repeatedly managed to manipulate staffing on this site, and even the admin and moderator panels...and force steet's hand (because steet won't devote the time and resources to properly protecting his freaking site, which continually befuddles and astounds most of us, given how often this site IS trolled and hacked). Some of them have even BEEN staffers.

Odd. Very odd. Steet spends so much time trying to get us all to understand how carefully he considers possible staff members, and yet he continually brings in people who end up doing harm to this site (and manipulating it to their advantage) and yet constantly overlooks or excludes people who could be a real asset to this site...and has removed those who have occasionally been there before and HAVE done good (I was one of them...not to put too fine a point on it, and not to sound like I am patting myself on the back. But really...)

That's the tough thing, some mods are starting to get real lives, I'm not implying that other mods don't, we just have more time on our hands. That's why Kirda left. She knew that she wouldn't be able to take care of the sites since she gets busy. Other mods that are like that need to admit that also.

You might call them lazy, but you don't know whats going on in their real lives.



To your first question, I was talking about Spirit Source, but it seems LATTS and Bambi Source seem to start getting a bit more active so I check every 3-5 days.

I have to say I don't quite agree with you. Many will stay inactive. Take Mulan Source for example, out of all of them, I think that might be the least active. Why? Because its human and people like animals. Even then, wolves are one of the most drawn and 'loved' animals. And it was one of the first, maybe others will get active but so far it seems like it wont happen. Mods right now take care (or try to) of all the sites, we know its hard and requires commitment.

Kirada left in part because she got very busy, yes. And in part because she became as frustrated with this place as many of us have been. She got tired of holding out hope when nothing good was forthcoming. And I hardly blame her. And she's not the only one. Many good people have left this site for those reasons (and many bad ones too, but as far as I am concerned they don't matter).

I am consistently bothered by the notion (no matter who says it)...whether it's intended as an implication or as a flat-out statement, that people who spend time on this site don't have "real lives". Visiting or spending time on a fan site does not ever imply or infer that a person does not have a life outside of it.

Again, if you (whomever you may be) have outside responsibilities or interests that are distracting you from doing a job you agreed to do, regardless of its voluntary nature (a volunteer position), then you have an obligation to resign from it...not hold onto it. The only reason someone would hold onto the position in the face of pressing outside responsibilities is because they enjoy what they seem to think is the "prestige" that comes with the position ( sarcastic ), or because they actually do enjoy the limited control the position gives them over other members, especially those they don't particularly happen to care for.

And that's a problem.

Agree to disagree then, because no one really can tell where the flow of "what's popular" (at least as far as the internet is concerned) will go. There's some reasoning behind it yes, but, I'm throwing ideas out there for the future. Balto Source has been around for quite sometime you know, these sources are fairly new. Just take YouTube for example. That site has come a long way since it was first made, I could mention others also, but I think you already know. There's more I could say on this, but I'm done.

Youtube has been crap for the past few months, honestly.

Maybe, however it's still the most used video uploading site on the web to date. But that's off topic anyway.