OSDev.org

Because that's where the people in question interacted. It could've happened elsewhere just as well given a little disagreement to set it off.

@Love4Boobies,

Thank you for all your consideration.

if I had not posted the subject Esoteric Programming Languages, the Brendan would be banned?

It's really not your responsibility. A forum cannot function if people have to worry about how others might misuse threads they start.

More to the point, if Brendan hadn't behaved like a spoilt child he wouldn't have been banned.

@iansjack,

Thank you for your replie.

Thank you very much.

I want everyone to be comfortable to express their opinion about whether or not the ban was the correct course of action. Compare that to earlier in the thread where people are literally asking to not be banned for stating their opinion. At this point I'm not even going to discuss this particular ban with the mods, we've need to work establishing the right environment here which includes evaluating other bans, mods, and general board etiquette.

To answer some questions.

Yes, I'm the only admin now. That was a failed experiment on my part and I'm sorry for the issues caused by it.

On the subject of having conversations like these moved to a mod only forum. We do have an area for that and it is used but in this case I don't believe the conversation would have been balanced since a discussion about mod abuse shouldn't be limited to mods especially when dissenting mods have become the minority. And some of those mod-only conversations got moderated in the past as Combuster mentioned. Apparently mods shouldn't be able moderate the mod-only forum, go figure...

The ban had nothing to do with playing chicken. Removing mod permissions would only fix part of the problem. Honestly it might have even made it worse in some ways. A vocal person that can abuse mod permissions to short-circuit a conversation does actually limit the duration of some of the toxic conversations. But at the core, the purpose of a temporary ban is to let someone know that their behavior is not in the best interest of the community and they need to address the issue. Temporary bans are not the only way to to let someone know that, in this case multiple people had directly pointed it out over a period of years. It should have been addressed by me sooner.

Chase, I'm glad you made the decision you. Also, I think you're doing a great job in general, both the forum and the wiki are both useful and friendly, I figured this was as good a time as any to tell you that.

I'll accept that endorsement.

However, there is the whole PonyOS problem.

At least it shows the ability to create an OS, even if the judgement is a little questionable.

But, I'm a little confused. Is there a need for yet another moderator? I don't see any indication from Chase that this is the case, only a kiss of death from Brendan. Looking at the lists of moderators there seem to be more than enough already.

Edit: OK, I see that Chase did comment on the subject. But I think it would be better to rationalise the list of moderators, keeping only those who are happy to continue doing the work, before expanding it further. 13 moderators seems to be quite a lot.

I'm pretty certain most of them are inactive.

As I PM'ed all of them with a link to this very thread, I can say that -- while many of them haven't been active around here recently -- all but three of them logged in and read their PM within 24 hours. kmcguire, Owen and carbonBased seem to be the only "truly" absent ones at this point of time.

Time for a clearout, then.

Hi,

I have been much less active recently than in my university years - when I had all of that free time

There was a time when helping this community meant a lot before life got in the way. My technical knowledge is a little outdated but I will endeavour to be a bit more proactive again.

Cheers,
Adam

for me (I can't speak for others...) although I rarely post, making it look like I am absent, I read every post, and perform what mod actions I believe to be necessary regularly -- I don't believe I have been absent more than a month or two at a time (usually due to family vacations) since I first came (iirc that was ~2002)

actually, I often spend hours crafting, previewing, editing, posts... and then close the browser without posting it!