Forum Cleanup Proposals

[Anubis]

So, first day on the job and I think that its about time for me to post about several proposals I've been mulling over for a few weeks now aimed at cleaning out a few of the cobwebs hanging at strategic points around the forums.
Note that these are proposals, not set in stone. This is your chance to voice your comments, agreements or disagreements, and have your say in how we get rid of those cobwebs. None of these proposals will be acted upon for at least a week yet, so feel free to post your thoughts in the meantime.

1. Archival of Inactive Group Forums - We currently have several group forums which are and have been inactive for a relatively long period of time and do not seem likely to have a resurgence in popularity any time soon. As part of the effort to keep things looking fresh and active I'm planning to archive these, and potentially their group websites too (whilst the sites will remain on the server they will no longer be linked on the main page).
The forums I have in mind for this archival are: Anarchy Online, Conquer Online, Final Fantasy XI, and Warcraft 3.

2. Condensing of Archived Forums - The archiving of the group forums mentioned above would put us in a situation where we have, unnecessarily in my opinion, nearly as many archived forums than active ones. For this reason I feel that we should, where appropriate, compact the number of these archived forums.
I'm proposing that we merge the archived WoW EU Recruiting forum into the WoW EU General forum, and move the contents of the Tribes and Neveron forums to the Archive (less than 20 threads in each) before deleting the forums. Imo it isn't necessary to keep those forums there to hold less than 20 threads when the Archive can do the job just as well whilst taking up less space on the forums index, or to have WoW EU Recruitment taking up a second space on the forum index when the group general forum could hold the threads just as easily and appropriately.

3. Removal of 'Members Only' Forum - Originally created to share the WoW US Ventrillo information across their group, specifically I assume to those new members within the group, I do not feel that this forum has served its purpose.
As no new WoW US group members have been added to the Members usergroup in months, and the fact that each thread in there has less than 50 views, clearly the forum is neither being used nor necessary. I do not like the idea of keeping a 'Members Only' forum around when it is not being used, admittedly I don't like the idea of one being here period.
Hence, due to the fact that it seems to be serving no purpose, I propose we archive the two threads within it and delete the forum itself, returning us to a state where once more there are no 'private forums' on this site.

4. Moderator Rotation (On Hold, Consider this withdrawn for the timebeing) - Somewhere along the line we all seem to have forgotten about or dropped the idea of moderator rotation within groups. I feel this was a mistake as it keeps groups fresh, as well as preventing the organisation as a whole from becoming completely reliant on a select group of moderators.
I propose that, in a week's time at the end of the month, we bring this idea back to life and rotate the moderators for each group. The leader of the moderator usergroup will not be included in the rotation (usually the guy spearheading the group, though if the usergroup leader is inactive we may we put someone else in the place instead) so that they can oversee things and ensure they are working smoothly, that moderators are doing the job well, etc.
I am thinking that three months would be an appropriate period for moderators to hold the post before rotation, meaning that the next rotation point would be in January 2008.
The only group exempt from this rotation would be Tabula Rasa, simply because the group has not existed for three months yet and therefore the moderators, in my opinion, do not need rotating. However if people feel their group should be exempt then I'm perfectly happy to take that onboard should they provide a good enough reason.
Global Moderators will also not be rotated, simply because their purpose is to be that constant moderation presence and I see no need to change that at this time (though again, if people want them rotated then we can do so).

5. Sticky Cleanup - I'm not sure whether this point will be necessary having not fully checked each forum yet, but if necessary I propose that we clean out the Sticky/Announcement list of each forum to ensure that outdated threads are not remaining stickified and cluttering up the top of forums.

6. Account Sweep - Its about due for me to go through and cleanup any bot accounts that may have slipped through our defences again (if any), and I think that it might be beneficial for us to take the chance to sweep the forum memberlist (not the Members usergroup, the list of accounts registered) to make sure we don't have disused accounts cluttering up space.
I propose that any accounts created prior to the start of August who have never posted on any forum should be removed (note that only accounts with no posts would be cleaned, no others) in order to trim down our ever expanding memberlist, and keep it looking active.

And thats all. As I said above, all thoughts/comments are welcome. Most likely next weekend the comments left will be the decider in whether or not these proposals are carried out

[Inquisitor]

1) Sounds good.
2) Sounds good.
3) I'd check via PM with a WoW US mod just in case, otherwise sounds good.
4) We probably need to talk about this a little further, it didn't seem to scale for most groups, it may not make as much sense as we thought originally.
5) Sounds good.
6) Sounds good. I tended to look for users who registered, but had not posted in a year, and had fewer than 5 posts total as a good guideline, and see how many that clears out. Last time it cleared out quite a few. As for actual members, I think we asked that they post at least once a year, so that should cover them.

[M.Steiner]

I like the sound of all your proposals Anny, the overall forum cleanup should make the place look a whole lot tidier.
Having forums that have been mostly inactive for a long time mixed in with our active group forums looks a bit off putting, and if you're able to merge a few (like the WoW:EU General + Recruiting forum) that should help so we don't end up having more inactive forums than active ones too, which would also look off putting imo.

[Anubis]

4) We probably need to talk about this a little further, it didn't seem to scale for most groups, it may not make as much sense as we thought originally.

Perhaps then we could limit it a bit. I like the idea of moderators rotating, it provides a freshness that you can't get if you keep the same people in charge all the time. I'm quite keen to try and keep the idea going if we can.

If rotating all moderators didn't achieve what we hoped it would, perhaps we should consider trying it more slowly. Rotating half of the moderation team at each rotation point, so that if it doesn't work out as effectively as hoped then at least we will still half people in place to take care of things until new moderators can be appointed to replace those ineffective ones.


As for your comment on point 3, that is a good point. Provided there are no objections over this week I will contact a WoW US mod to clarify it is indeed not being used before I take any actions.

[Zephir]

Rotating moderators can be a bit of a problem.

First. You need a pool of people WILLING to do the job, not everyone wants to. Just appointing someone will result in moderators that never do the job. Along the same lines the pool of available mods needs the support and respect of their group to do the job effectively.

Second. We need some continuity in our forum moderation, and enough experienced hands to guide those new to forum moderation. If we go ahead with moderator rotation you only want to rotate a small proportion of the moderators for any given group, not all except the group 'leader'.



Zeph.

[Messiah]

So I guess the plans for world domination will have to wait? Or are these proposals simply a smokescreen for the use of subliminal mind control techniques that will be inserted across the site?

hmmmmmmmm

[Anubis]

It's best for my long term interests to only establish total domination after the forum is left as fresh and active as it can be. Expect subliminal messages, regulated usage of cattleprods, and down to earth slavery at around the end of next month

[Messiah]

Ok, for a moment I was beginning to think you had gone soft. Democracy can do that to people.

[Syro]

1. Archival of Inactive Group Forums - Please do.

2. Condensing of Archived Forums - Please do.

3. Removal of 'Members Only' Forum - No opinion.

4. Moderator Rotation - Not sure this is necessary or helpful on the LOTRO group, but I will ask for volunteers to moderate.

5. Sticky Cleanup - Please do not touch the LOTRO sticky / announcements. They are all for current use.

6. Account Sweep - Please do.

Thanks, friend!!

[Anubis]

I am thinking that I'll have to mull over the Moderator Rotation point before going any further with it, since it seems to be the general consensus that the idea may need modifying or limiting before we bring it back.

Consider that idea on hold at present (I'll update the original post to reflect that). I will probably come back with an updated draft proposal or a debate thread over the idea in a couple of weeks or so, once those ideas that are ok'd are dealt with. That way we can collectively try to work out a way that we could make it work, if indeed we can.

[SSX-Killjoy]

I would like to put in my .02 cents and say that if you keep the initial mod (ie the person who is most likely to stay with the group through the course of it's run) and just allow them to rotate the other mods. Kind of gives strength back to the idea of founders... But the principle should work well.

[Inquisitor]

Lets chat about it realtime, its easy than asynch like this.

And to Syro's point, I'd suggest a quick PM to any forums mods if you intend to "clean" their stickies

[Anubis]

Realtime is good. Either that or a discussion thread, just some way that we can all chat about it and see if we can make it work.
As for sticky cleaning, of course I'd yell before I started de-stickifying stuff. Like I said, not even sure whether it will be necessary in most forums yet so don't assume I'm going to go in with my evil hand and sweep your stickies away

[esd]

Account Sweep: I'd limit that to only pruning those with less than 2 posts, full stop (no bot gets beyond that, and removing accounts for just being inactive seems wrong to me)

What's really needed is a pruning of the membership list.

Mod Rotation? Go for it, but I'd suggest only do it on those groups with more than 15 active members, otherwise leave it to whoever is currently Group Moderator to do.

Removing the hidden forum? Definitely. I don't like it.

[Anubis]

Ok, since we've had no objections I'll be carrying these ideas out this weekend (Moderator Rotation aside). I'll be leaving the Removal of the Members Only forum for last, as I am awaiting a reply from the WoW US mod I PMed over it, but expect to the others carried out fairly soon.

[Anubis]

To note, I'm also bringing the WC3 forum under the 'Condensing of Archived Forums' banner, since having just archived it I've noticed it only has 13 threads in it (actually even less than Tribes/Neveron had). Again, bit of a waste of space on the index when the Archive can hold those 13 threads comfortably.

Also, whilst removing links to inactive group's websites from the main site I have noted the EVE Online and XBox Live groups do not currently have links from the main page. Do people want me to add them to the main site or leave it as it is?

Edit - Looking at just how many accounts there are that have 0 posts attributed to them I am going to simply remove those with either 0 or 1 posts for the timebeing. I am thinking that this will knock enough inactive accounts off from looking at how many there are. If it doesn't however I will probably be applying the below 5 posts idea that Ed suggested

[Anubis]

To update, all points save the Moderator Rotation are now done. When I get round to thinking about how Rotation could work again, probably at the end of the week, there will be more news on that. Until then, consider this complete

[Syro]

Nice work, Anubis! Much appreciated.