MLK Community Team

[Azdgari]

Super duper late on this announcement... I've been dropping the ball all over the place lately. WHICH is part of the reason why having a team will be nice! I'm happy to announce that Regulus and DGFone will be helping out as members of the MLK Community Team. We've already been brainstorming a bit on ideas for MLK, but we'll get our rears in gear soon so you all start seeing some results. These two choices should surprise absolutely nobody, as they're both great guys and their MLK cred is pretty much beyond reproach.

A quick note for clarity: The Community Team's responsibilities on MLK are first and foremost to promote the growth and wellbeing of the community, secondly to help keep spammers out, and very far thirdly, to handle people who are behaving maliciously.

Additionally, for the time being, this position is the 'only' position on the MLK staff. Mods and admins were kinda hierarchical in a way that doesn't make sense given our current division of labor, etc... so, essentially, we flattened it. DG, Regulus, and I all have equal say in decisions (and of course, very rarely should something happen without the input and approval of the members).

Moka will remain in the administrator group as he is "hardwired" in PhPBB as the root account, although he will remain uninvolved in community management for the foreseeable future.

Names are green for now, but there'll be a little badge indicator too, eventually maybe, that'll help new members identify staff.

Go team.

[Panda-chan]

Cool, glad we were given the opportunity to have any input on this important community decision. /s

[SimbasMate]

[quote="Panda-chan"]Cool, glad we were given the opportunity to have any input on this important community decision. /s[/quote]

^ This. From what I remember, DG was against the whole idea.. and now suddenly he's for it?

[WildSimba]

Yeah, not like I suggested this positions existence out of genuine care for the forum. Not at all. :|

If the point was to make this not feel like a hierarchical decision, you've definitely not succeeded, sorry dude.

[Tora]

Welcome to My Writing Contest Forum guys.

[Regulus]

I'd add more, but Az already summarized everything pretty succinctly.

[quote]Cool, glad we were given the opportunity to have any input on this important community decision. /s[/quote]

You're welcome to provide all the feedback you like.

Edit: considering the number of new posts that just went up in the past 10 minutes, I'd say this announcement is doing a wonderful job at sparking activity.

[quote]Yeah, not like I suggested this positions existence out of genuine care for the forum. Not at all. :|

If the point was to make this not feel like a hierarchical decision, you've definitely not succeeded, sorry dude.[/quote]

Az chose to implement your suggestion, and your idea will be the model for the site going forward. You make that sound like it's a bad thing.

[DGFone]

[quote="SimbasMate"]
^ This. From what I remember, DG was against the whole idea.. and now suddenly he's for it? [/quote]
I was going to type out a response when I realized that I can just quote myself from the feedback topic about the community team:
[quote="DGFone"]
It's not that I am against the idea - I just don't see the point of this. My understanding of the idea is to give limited mod powers to members who are seen as community leaders. Just that my take on one main responsibility of a mod is to be a community leader in the first place, and to swing the banhammer around last, making this community leader position simply redundant.


So in a nutshell, if it's very easy to implement, since the general consensus is positive towards the idea - go for it![/quote]

Since there is no more Moderator/Admin team on MLK, now replaced by the Community team, there really isn't a redundancy issue that was my main 'gripe', if you want to call it, with the idea. TL/DR: I was never against the idea, just didn't see the point of it.

As I was always willing to help out MLK, when Az asked me if I wanted to be part of the community team, I said sure.

...Speaking of community, this means I now need to get on with it and post the next writing contest, doesn't it?

[SimbasMate]

[quote="DGFone"][quote="SimbasMate"]
^ This. From what I remember, DG was against the whole idea.. and now suddenly he's for it? [/quote]
I was going to type out a response when I realized that I can just quote myself from the feedback topic about the community team:
[quote="DGFone"]
It's not that I am against the idea - I just don't see the point of this. My understanding of the idea is to give limited mod powers to members who are seen as community leaders. Just that my take on one main responsibility of a mod is to be a community leader in the first place, and to swing the banhammer around last, making this community leader position simply redundant.


So in a nutshell, if it's very easy to implement, since the general consensus is positive towards the idea - go for it![/quote]

Since there is no more Moderator/Admin team on MLK, now replaced by the Community team, there really isn't a redundancy issue that was my main 'gripe', if you want to call it, with the idea. TL/DR: I was never against the idea, just didn't see the point of it.

As I was always willing to help out MLK, when Az asked me if I wanted to be part of the community team, I said sure.

...Speaking of community, this means I now need to get on with it and post the next writing contest, doesn't it?[/quote]

Well if you don't mind me putting in my two cents, you came off as pretty adamant about not having it implemented. I mean you were open minded but it seems like you didn't care one way or the other TBH. Also, where is the MLK veteran member? There are lots of MLK members here who I know would like to help the forum move forward to perhaps even what it used to be. I don't see someone on the team who has been here longer than the said members I am talking about.

[Panda-chan]

[quote="Regulus"]Edit: considering the number of new posts that just went up in the past 10 minutes, I'd say this announcement is doing a wonderful job at sparking activity. [/quote]
Only because this thread is stirring up controversy/drama. If you count that as activity then sure, we're getting tons of that right now lol.

[quote="Regulus"]Az chose to implement your suggestion, and your idea will be the model for the site going forward. You make that sound like it's a bad thing.[/quote]
Dude, don't act like you wouldn't be mad if you made a good suggestion for the forum and then have it get implemented while being totally ignored by the staff. And this has actually happened to WildSimba multiple times in the past, so it feels kind of unfair tbh.

[quote="DGFone"]As I was always willing to help out MLK, when Az asked me if I wanted to be part of the community team, I said sure.[/quote]
That's a pretty condescending thing to say. I think a lot of us have always been willing to help out MLK.

[quote="SimbasMate"]Also, where is the MLK veteran member? There are lots of MLK members here who I know would like to help the forum move forward to perhaps even what it used to be. I don't see someone on the team who has been here longer than the said members I am talking about.[/quote]
^

[DGFone]

[quote="Panda-chan"]
Only because this thread is stirring up controversy/drama. If you count that as activity then sure, we're getting tons of that right now lol.[/quote]
Hey, nothing better than showing the new peeps what MyDramaKing is all about, am I right?

[quote="Panda-chan"]
That's a pretty condescending thing to say. I think a lot of us have always been willing to help out MLK.
[/quote]
I'm actually going to give you that one.

Look, I am not sure if there is a better way to say it, but I was never "against" the idea. I am sure that 95% of the active members on MLK would love to help out as well, but giving most of the active remaining population moderation powers is just asking for trouble. Even if I was asked to become a simple moderator rather than part of the new "community team", I would have still said yes. In what can also come off as a very cynical sort of way, but MLK has known to feel the wrath of more than one moderator abusing their power, so for a long time a part of me always wanted to show the moderator team that they need to be community members first and foremost, rather than second.

To quote Simba from the movie [quote="Simba"]Look, I'm still the same guy![/quote]
Just one that can also clean up them bots if needed be. So yes, I will still be that jerk who spams the chatbox about the writing contest. That's not going away anytime soon.