Moderator
From WikiFAQs
Moderators are staff at online communities charged with keeping the day-by-day operations running. Authority and duties vary per community, but pretty much always include the handling of rules violations and troublesome users. As such, it tends to be a thankless and often criticized job.
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On GameFAQs
On GameFAQs, moderators are volunteers, normal message board users who have applied and been accepted for a mod position.
Their major job is to deal with violations of the Terms of Service through a moderation queue. Tracking down violations is not part of their job, as the site is far too large for even a large team to be able to do so. The userbase simply marks the message in question, and moderators review it and take action.
Furthermore, their moderations may be disputed by users and in many cases appealed to the administration as well, and any user bannings are carried out by administrators only. Compared to many forum sites, GameFAQs moderators have fairly little authority. While many users compare the role of a Moderator to that of a police force, Moderators tend to regard themselves as site janitors due to their lack of authority.
The current moderator team was built up through eleven rounds of applications. The first round took place in February 2000, and the most recent was in January 2009. Currently, GameFAQs consists of over 70 moderators.
User Level
In the first few batches, all Moderators were given an arbitrary "Moderator" user level. With the appointment of the 6th batch in December 2002 (the largest group as of current), the Moderator levels were divided between Level 50 New Moderators, Level 51 General Moderators and Level 52 Specialist Moderators.
With the removal of specialist categories and the appointment of the 7th batch in August 2005, the moderator levels were changed again on November 29 2005. The Level 50 New Moderator rank is retained, but promoted Moderators are once again given the arbitrary Level 51 Moderator title. Moderators recruited in 2002 or earlier are distinguished by their Level 52 Veteran Moderator title.
Selection and Promotion
The appointment of Moderators is done through an application process, the frequency of which depends on current activity and demand. The last formal application period (seventh batch) took place in August 2005, with the previous applications (sixth batch) concluding in December 2002. Since then, new moderators have been chosen through the feedback system.
Requirements
The requirements had generally remained the same between applications, but since the running applications were introduced, the mandatory requires for submitting an application are:
- Be a member of the GameFAQs boards in good standing for a period of 1 or more years
- A minimum karma requirement of 350 karma
- You may not have any karma-loss violations on your account in the past 30 days
- No warnings, suspensions, or bans on any alternate accounts
- A login e-mail address that is different from your public email address
- The personal account sign-up information must be valid
If an account does not meet these requirements - or the additional requirements to check if the user has read the directions for applying - the feedback ticket will be rejected before ever being read by another human being. Should this happen, the user will not be able to apply for 45 days.
In addition to these official requirements, there are also several other factors that strongly influence selection, including:
- Manner and maturity
- Various skills, such as speaking multiple languages
- Familiarity with various board communities
- Good reputation
While not required, these factors are looked on favorably in the selection process. This also explains why contributors tend to have a higher success rate than regular users, as they have an established reputation and proven commitment.
Note that age is not a requirement (other than the minimum user age of 13), although older users tend to be preferred. Most successful applicants tend to be between 18 and 24. However, this is not always true, in particular with the 6th batch in December 2002, with a large proportion of successful applicants being in their mid-teens.
Also, despite popular belief users are not automatically disqualified from applying if making inquiries to becoming a Moderator. However, pestering the Moderators will earn a negative reputation, which will show poorly in the selection process or, in serious cases, be vetoed.
Application and Selection
Candidates are instructed to provide details of their location, preferred boards and most importantly an essay about why they should be selected as a Moderator. The essay has no word limit, although successful candidates tend to write 600-800 word essays. Prior to the selection of the eighth batch of moderators, applications were open for a limited amount of time. With the introduction of feedback tickets, however, users were allowed to send in a moderator application feedback ticket, which would be filed away to be looked over whenever new moderators were needed. This was done to make it easier for the administration to sort through applicants, as well as reduce the chaos that would occur during application periods, as users would flood MBH with questions regarding the topic. Applicants can only submit one application, and using multiple accounts to apply more than once will not only automatically disqualify the applicant, but may also lead to some form of punishment. However, if a user submits a second application on the same account, the initial application will be disregarded in favor of the new one.
The selection process itself is secretive, although it does involve SBAllen, and CJayC before him, going through the applications to single out possible successful candidates. The applications are then open to the moderator crew to assess and comment. A moderator can also veto candidates who they believe are undesirable for any reason, provided that the reason is justified and accepted by the moderators and administrators.
Applicants can also request to be made a Secret Moderator. If they are accepted, they create a new account with the moderation powers.
After the consultation state is complete, the administration selects the successful applicants and informs them through email of their appointment. The promotion to Level 50 New Moderator is made a few days later and announced on Message Board Announcements. Traditionally, the names of the successful applicants are not announced, leaving the New Moderators to either announce themselves or allow the users to discover them personally. Recently, there has been no official announcement whatsoever, but the general population usually discovers the new moderators shortly after they're promoted.
Promotion
There is no set criteria for New Moderators to be promoted to regular moderators. Generally, New Moderators are promoted after showing signs of consistent activity and fulfillment of moderator responsibilities. New Moderators can be promoted as quickly as several months after their application, or take as long as many months. Some inactive moderators are not promoted at all, although stricter standards are now in place to ensure that all Moderators perform their duties fairly.
The current Moderator levels are:
- New Moderator (50)
- Moderator (51)
- Veteran Moderator (52)
- Lead Moderator (53)
Veteran Moderators are upgraded in level after a specific amount of time, and possess no additional abilities. Lead Moderators are selected by SBAllen when required, and possess more administrative abilities, such as responding to appeals and making Sticky Topics.
Demotion
More commonly known as "demodding", a moderator can have their position revoked. While rare, such circumstances where demotion occurs include:
- Getting hacked
- Unbelievable amounts of power abuse
- Near complete inactivity, not even logging in to the site for months at a time
Additionally, moderators can voluntarily step down. Most "retirements" are permanent, although many Moderators have elected to return to their moderating duties after some leave.
Moderator Responsibilities
Moderators have only one obligation: to handle marked messages. Despite what many users believe, moderators are not obligated to act as public relation officials, and are not assigned to any specific board.
However, a fair number of moderators choose to act as "resident" Moderators on certain boards. For example, Site Suggestions is watched over by Scottie theNerd, while Message Board Help is the rallying point of moderators such as BlitzBoy, Zhuge Liang and many others. Additionally, moderators tend to maintain their regular user activities on their own frequent boards, allowing them to keep the boards in check if necessary.
Being volunteer users, moderators are not employees of CNET and are not affiliated with them in any form.
GameSpot Moderators
After the GameSpot Merger, compromises had to be made in order to accomodate both Moderator teams. The initial system was arranged so that the experienced GameFAQs team handled marked messages for both GameFAQs and GameSpot users, while GameSpot Moderators could only handle GameSpot messages. This appeased many disgruntled users, who demanded to be dealt with by their own.
As efforts to merge the two Moderator teams progressed, GameSpot were given standalone ability, reducing GameFAQs moderators to GameFAQs users. This created problems in quick-response scenarios in various forms. Generally, GameFAQs moderators had better time coverage than their GameSpot counterparts and picked up serious violations much quicker. However, their inability to act on GameSpot users presented problems for chronic violaters. Several notorious users, such as Gavirulax, shoooter, and Kingpin, exploited this flaw by making violations on GameSpot accounts. This practice earned these users up to hundreds of banned accounts, and the practice peaked in 2004. As an interim solution, a few GameFAQs moderators were given Moderator accounts on GameSpot.
As of current, GameSpot moderators can only handle GameSpot users while GameFAQs Moderators can handle both GameFAQs and GameSpot users, as with the initial system. Several GameSpot moderators were given GameFAQs moderator accounts, although some have been demodded in the recent past.
External Links
| GameFAQs Moderations | |
|---|---|
| Regular Moderations | No Action | Topic Lock | No Karma Loss | Notification | Warning | Suspension |
| Special Cases | Ban | Purgatory | Profile Wipe | Usermap Axe | Kill On Sight |
| Disputes | Dispute | Accept Moderation | Uphold | Relaxation | Overturn |
| Misc. | Account Suicide | Generated Message | Mark | Marked Message Accuracy | Message Detail | Meta-Mod | Moderator | Terms of Use | Undocumented Violations | Ask the Mods |
