The off-topic category creates a disproportionately heavy load in terms of moderation, given that it is both prolific, where most flags come from, and of least relevance to SAFE.
Moderation is a valuable finite resource, and needs to ensure that this forum meets the needs of SAFE related stuff first, and anything else second or not at all.
I am willing to pay attention to off-topic, but can’t give it a priority, so given we don’t have many active mods at the moment, I shall from now on pay little attention to moderating Off-topic.
I request that flags be limited to stuff that is either:
in categories relevant to SAFE (i.e. everything except Off-topic)
in Off-topic but of a serious nature. Threats, reputational damage to the community, swearing etc.
Where there are other concerns in Off-topic, try to resolve them directly first, through posts or PMs with those whose posts you deem problematic, and of course bring in a mod regardless of policy if you want advice or assistance.
I’m not trying to create a no-mod zone, just reduce the time spent moderating stuff that is not our highest priority.
I agree, perhaps almost mod free, unless there are extreme views/pictures etc. Be best if it did not even show up for the public I suppose as I think it takes away form the really good info on the forum for dev/app devs and users of SAFE. There is some good stuff though, but it gets overrun very quickly
So the off-topic section is now the playground…lol. Something needed doing, the main point being if it’s not automatically displayed to the public, then any people with malignant intent will have no audience and therefore will lose interest. This will be good for the forum in a number of ways, if it encroaches onto the main topics, then something can be done about it early, by referring back to previous off-topic history.
Win win…yeah
Yeah, I definitely suggest everyone mute Off-Topic. It makes the forum a lot more palatable. Although I’ll admit, I’ll peek in there every so often if I want to raise my anxiety level.
I know that the off-topics will host significant issues working out; And there will be where Ideas could be borne from, assessed, and assembled into solutions in code or system elaboration/creation.;
Therefore; strategies could have roots from the off-topic section; development ideas; and also projects.
The Meta Category is like a tech support place for the current forum;
If I undersrtand what you’re saying, I agree, every section could eventually turn into an actual development idea. But when they do, the discussion can graduate/move to the appropriate forum.
If you have to reverse a moderator more than a couple times on moving relevant properly labeled stuff to the “off topic,” please revoke that person’s mod status.
Here is is a recent PM conversation (other party wasn’t a mod or newly added mod):
If the “other party” above person were to become a mod anything they disagree with even items that are relevant and properly posted under main topics might quickly get removed to off topic with a warning to the poster that they are making too many posts that have to be moved and will be banned etc. They were already acting as self appointed mod. Hey Warren looks like you’ve got some sunk cost in this site I am going to use my anonymity to come and try to intimidate you… Its natural that there is forum feed back from the community to people who could benefit but the self-appointed mod role complicates moderation.
