[Archived] Request to members

[Guest Wen Y Hu]

I've just spent an inordinate amount of time dealing with abuse of other members and of the messageboard guidelines. I would rather have spent that time working towards the updating of the site for the benefit of all. Since this is the most widely read forum and the one most affected, I am putting this notice here.

I have issued temporary "posting bans" to a number of members, although I would rather these were viewed as a chance to take time off and reflect on posting habits. For software reasons, 30-day bans were issued to some, but I will review them in a couple of weeks. In particular, I have to say the abuse of chaddyrovers is galling. For his own sake, I have also given chaddy himself a couple of weeks off. Note that I just don't have time to reply to individuals at the moment. I'm really sorry, but if you have posting restrictions, just take it and let us get on with serving the community at large.

Also, it's only to be expected that people get exasperated by poor team performances and some of the nonsense that continues to come out of the club. Members have considerable freedom to express your ideas on this forum, but that freedom does not extend to abusing others for having a differing opinion nor does it extend to the use of foul language, which is against the forum guidelines.

The ideal is for the forums to be self-moderated by the community on one level and by members themselves on another level. With this in mind I'd like to ask members a couple of favours not only to help out the mods but ultimately to benefit the community as a whole.

1) If a post is abusive or objectionable and is clearly against forum guidelines, either point this out to the poster and ask that the objectionable content be removed or, if you think it more appropriate, simply report the post using the Report function. Do not resort to abuse yourself when responding and bear in mind that we do not delete posts or edit out the objectionable content, but rather we remove them from public view using the Hide function. One of the toughest tasks when moderating is when a poster has quoted an unacceptable post and then written a good contribution at length, perhaps on something completely unrelated to the quoted post. This makes it a very difficult decision as to whether to remove the post or not.

2) I'd like members to go back through their recent posts and edit out any bad language, any attempts to bypass the swear word filter, and of course any abuse of other members or, for example, threats of violence. Instead of pointing the finger at other posters, take responsibility for yourself and let's clean up the forums. No-one is asking for great prose, just that it is civilised.

The site provides us all with a voice and a means to connect with other Rovers around the world. It does so for free and that is facilitated by a number of unbelievably dedicated, talented and good people who all give up their time and energy for the benefit of all.

As many of you will be aware, we are in the middle of a difficult and lengthy transition and our priority is very much focussed on sorting out backend, server-side issues to ensure that the site can continue to deliver a high-quality service. Once that is done, we can move onto other areas of the site that need attention and we can start to respond to member needs and requests to improve the site. In the meantime, we really, really would appreciate the support of the community.

Yours, as a fellow Rover,

Wen Y Hu

[Guest Wen Y Hu]

Comments on the above can be made over in the Ask Admin thread where I have just opened a topic here.