To be perfectly honest stanley, I really don't care.
I am a very busy person - I run this forum in my spare time (what little I have of it) because I love doing so, not because I get paid to do it or anything like that.
I indulged this thread because I felt enough time had passed since the last time we had this topic in the Help and Feedback forum and it was worth spelling it out again (believe me, the moderation topic has come up several times before with exactly the same content, and exactly the same complaints).
At the end of the day, we have to make decisions about what stays and what goes. In the nearly 2 years I've been administering the forum and 4 years I've been contributing, I've come to a good understanding of what works and what doesn't, and so have the other moderators, some of whom have been here longer than I have (Les was one of the original forum members - here from almost day 1).
We have chosen to run this forum with a more hands-on approach than most internet discussion forums are, and we get much praise and a bit of criticism about it as a result.
At times I have spent literally hours agonising over how to split a thread to the best benefit to extract the useful information while dealing with the trolls or the inflamatory posts and such. I take great pride in what I do, but I do have to draw a line somewhere.
The measuring stick I tend to use is to simply look at the very first post in the thread. This is the most important part of the thread - and sets the topic and the tone. All responses should, as much as possible, be responses to that topic. Some deviation is allowed and expected, but significant deviation from that topic, or a degradation in the tone of the posts will require action.
Significant deviation where we just got onto another topic can be dealt with by splitting the thread in two so they can both have their own "life". Degradation of the thread requires that selective posts be deleted, or entire segments of the thread be "pruned".
In this case, it was an old subject, with rapidly degrading tone, which rings all the alarm bells. Sure, I could have tried to extract the more useful posts there, but when I looked back at what started it all (superted's original post and asy's overzealous reponse), I realised it was just going to be easier to mass prune. It's either that or spend an hour or so carefully considering each post and perhaps even editing posts to remove references to deleted posts for the sake of continuity.
I have done this more time-intensive form of moderation before, and would do so again if I felt it deserved it, but there are some topics which are "red flag" topics, and we take a less lenient approach with.
For the record, some topics which generally receive harsh treatment from moderators are Jenman, Henry Kaye, "Agent Bashing", Spam, and non-compliant advertising. This is not a definitve list, just the topics which are forefront of my mind at the moment. There are differing reasons for the treatment of these topics, and they are not all considered in the same light. Just for example, we are forbidden from saying certain things about Jenman because his lawyers told us so. Understand ?
I'm not going to invest any more time in trying to justify my actions or the actions of the other moderators. We act because we think that is the right thing to do. We discuss it between ourselves, and we have a mechanism in place to reverse decisions that were made if necessary.
Regardless or whether we act, or don't act, we will always have some people who are upset by it. We cannot please everyone and so we don't try. It is mostly a case of looking after the "greater good" in preference to the feelings of a few. Again, if you don't like that, I'm sorry, but that's the way it is.
If you simply can't cope with the way we moderate this forum, I suggest you go find one of the many other forums out there which are much less hands-on in their moderation, we really don't mind, and we wish you well in your investing.
I hope I make myself clear here.
It comes down to, you start paying me money, I'll start spending hours carefully editing troublesome threads.
If you pay me enough money, I'll even run your own forum for you where you can set the rules completely.
That all being said, we do appreciate your feedback and we do take it on board.
Perhaps the post was chopped because Asy felt quite embarrassed about her impulsive comments and this was the easiest solution?
Once again, for the record (I thought I've already played this record)... asy asked me to look at her response immediately after she posted it, I did, and didn't take any action. She did not ask me to do anything with it after that point, I discussed with other moderators and made a decision to act. And yes, I took the easiest solution, as I mentioned earlier. I make no apologies for that.
