Have you ever been a moderator of a community?

[SolVanderlyn]

I have, and it's equal parts good and bad.

I loved:

-Keeping order
-Being an integral part of a community I was passionate for
-Feeling like I was contributing to a small part of society in my own way
-Becoming closer to the userbase

I hated:

-Sometimes seeming like the bad guy
-Having to comb through a lot of stupidity
-Unpaid responsibility
-The mental wear and tear I experienced shutting people down over and over again

Have you ever been a moderator of anything? Or even a community manager? Or the lead on a project?

How did you like it?

 

[WhySoDevious]

Yes, the IGN boards for a good number of years.

It was great under their old community manager, EvilHomer.

Then it went to shit after they fired him.

 

[Plywood]

I would destroy this place.

 

[BasilZero]

On a Internet forum?

One of the private servers of Ragnarok online - probably around 2008 or 2009. Just a community/forum moderator - not a GM.

It was...pretty hectic, would never want to do it again. Thankfully I was given a title of "retirement" after about 5-6 months than disappearing like others 😂

Would I be interested in doing it again? Fuck no.

 

[Deleted member 14377]

I moderate deez nuts

 

[Rag]

I was a moderator on Gamespot's General Games Discussion for years. I liked it fine, but I didn't care for all of the rules I had to enforce. In general, it was rewarding to be part of a strong community and to try and keep things running smoothly. Banning shitheads was always enjoyable, but trying to moderate a forum where swearing was allowed as long as you censored it like this, f***, but not this, f*ck, just got to be a little too much. We did a good job for a long time of providing a space to talk about games, and the admins had our backs, until they didn't. Once Jody left, and new people came in at the top, the main games discussion board started to devolve too much into System Wars stuff, and the community we'd worked for for so long kinda fell apart. I don't miss it, but I don't regret having done it.

 

[WedgeX]

Just on multiplayer game servers a long ways back - when dedicated servers were still a thing.

 

[Torpedo Vegas]

No, which is for the best. I'd go mad with power.

 

[Sanjuro]

Yes. It was fine until it wasn't.

 

[Vincent Alexander]

Yes, for over a year. But a small community that I don't even remember the name of anymore. It was fine. Took a shitload of time, but there were some great people on the team, and they made it all worth it.

 

[Ryan.]

I had moderator perms on a Halo community forum for a bit, but my main role was staff/writer so I typically stood back from moderating unless necessary.

 

[Guppeth]

Various times. I ran a couple of communities, years ago. I was also a moderator on a mental health forum for about a year. My own mental health was in bad shape and it was nice to contribute to keeping the place running smoothly.

I'm not sure I was good at it compared to some of the others, and it took a toll on my health after a while, but I'm also pretty sure I saved someone's life, so I don't regret doing it.

 

[real2]

It's not quite the same thing, but I was a god/admin for a MUD (for those boomers out there who know what that is) back in the day. I did that for ~1 year before I had enough as it's just a lot of work for very little return. After doing that, I have no desire in doing that ever again. I did that as a kid/teen and I have even less patience now than I did back then.

It's why I try not to be a shitlord on forums etc because the mods/admins are usually not paid and are doing it on their own free will.

 

[nsilvias]

if i was a mod id ban people from making more than one star wars, superheroe thread a day.

 

[jml]

I ran a wrestling forum for a few years. Never again. There's an initial honeymoon period where it's awesome but once that fades it gets really stressful and thankless.

 

[Android Sophia]

Yeah, I've been a moderator and a community leader more than a few times. I do enjoy it, because I naturally like working with people.

 

[Minthara]

Not only have a I modded a lot of communities (started at FFShrine way back when), I'm now responsible for creating and managing them! In total, I've been moderating communities of various shapes and sizes for about 15 years now.

Overall I've always had fun being a moderator and it's helped me springboard into where I am today. It's also nicely tied into my love of video games and marketing in general at various points in my life. Being able to identify and solve community problems is always fun and I've thought about doing some consulting work in the future since many organizations and groups miss the mark on running a healthy community.

 

[mxbison]

Yes, was moderator of the gaming section at a board with about 1000 active members.

Excitement fades real fast when you realize its actual work that you are doing for free. Didn't last long.

 

[Seirith]

Yes, I am moderator of a large Facebook group and have been for 2 years now.

I enjoy it and the other people I moderate with are great.I also enjoy helping/teaching other people in our group. It is a time commitment and the most innocent post can somehow set off a unexpected huge storm of people arguing but overall I like it.

I'd say the con is having to read through stuff that doesn't really interest me to ensure that no one is being rude to someone else.

 

[ElectricBlanketFire]

Just once.

 

[Deleted member 6056]

Yeah. I had a bishoptl rep over at Test Your Might on the Injustice boards when that game hit. There was a LOT of shouting because mk9 was a block button breaker based ga.e with very different annotations for its inputs and Injustice was coming and it was back to block, traditional annotations and not breaker heavy. It was a lot of warring preferences for nrs classic vs mainstream.
Did a lot of infracting, and work there. Got severe that the site had a policy of no leak footage or info at that time. Felt like I held down half of YouTube and it was constant hour on the hour reviewing of posts to hold it down. Had a sherriff rep for sure. I feel like I helped many grow from hot take culture to methodical debate though. Doombawkz went from tech junkie with hot takes, to community leader to now bein an actual brand ambassador of a fighting game for mobile. Really proud seeing how he grew and took some of what I told him from infractions to heart.
Always offer guidance not just an infraction with an angry comment or you'll make folka pissy and even more defensive.

God I loved those folks. One of the best communities I'd ever seen at tym and I'm glad I was a part of helping that at one point. Got to be too much work and stuff though once.my career and own projects took off, but it was a big part of me for years.

 

[SolVanderlyn]

Yes, I am moderator of a large Facebook group.

I enjoy it and the other people I moderate with are great.I also enjoy helping/teaching other people in our group. It is a time commitment and the most innocent post can somehow set off a unexpected huge storm of people arguing but overall I like it.

Click to shrink...

I feel this is appropriate.

 

[Jer]

I was a moderator of the Sophitia character sub forum of the old soulcalibur.com forums right before Soul Calibur 3 came out in 2006. I did very little. I think I deleted a couple posts when Jinmaster and some other guy started spewing profanities at each other. I didn't particularly enjoy it, it felt like work, so I drifted away and had my powers taken for inactivity a couple years later. Then a year after that, they purged the whole board without backing it up, and permanently lost years of knowledge, including my meager mod history, in a true disaster.

So, uh, I contributed to society?

 

[SgtCobra]

I used to be a moderatorof a forum with something like 30,000 members. There was lots of drama and cleaning up involved. Gotta admit that the behind the scenes stuff was quite spicy.

 

[djplaeskool]

Former moderator of FFXIOnline.com here.
Interesting memories of early 2000s forum management.

 

[Gareth]

Yes, 5 forums and 2 Facebook groups over a total of 18 years.

 

[echoshifting]

Yes it sucked

 

[Deleted member 8166]

Health insurance company community moderation. 500k users.

 

[Deadly Cyclone]

I did it in an official capacity a few times:

1. Moderator for Microsoft on Xbox.com
2. Moderator for THQ and Volition for Saint's Row
3. Moderator for THQ and KAOS for Homefront

It was fun, but a ton of work. Luckily for Volition it was a part-time job that paid. For KAOS we got to visit their NYC HQ back in the day as well.

 

[aidan]

I was a "Super Moderator" on a terrible, drama-filled Final Fantasy message board (that I loved dearly) about 20 years ago called Final Fantasy Alpha. It was... more drama than it was worth, in hindsight.

 

[Toma]

Yes, right now in fact as Community Manager for local startup and business networks/events, but also as moderator and eventually community manager back in the day for a browser game of 400k players. Good old times.

 

[Ripcord]

I wouldn't say I liked it, but also don't hate it. I'm the type that only takes lead when nobody else can, so it's not something I'm really interested in. Sometimes you just have to get shit done.

 

[Admiral Woofington]

No fuck that. I have enough to deal with at work with the people I'm managing and tasks plus long hours to also try to squeeze in managing a forum or something else lmao.

 

[Ultimate Bear Cub]

I was offered a role once and turned it down. I'm very shy about the whole leadership/authority thing.

I respect those that do because it looks emotionally draining exposing yourself actively to the community. The users whether they admit or not, respect that authority, even while whining about it.

It is a hard responsibility because you have to set an example sometimes, which is another reason why I declined.

 

[Deleted member 39374]

Always wondered if the dopamine rush from banning someone gets addictive

 

[Van Bur3n]

No, the pole up my ass is not long enough to commit to such a role.

 

[SolVanderlyn]

I was a "Super Moderator" on a terrible, drama-filled Final Fantasy message board (that I loved dearly) about 20 years ago called Final Fantasy Alpha. It was... more drama than it was worth, in hindsight.

Click to shrink...

Oh, I remember this. I was a mod on a Mega Man community that had Moderators (of specific forums), Super Moderators (of all forums), and then Admins. I worked my way up the whole ladder. The drama was insane and even destroyed the community multiple times. It ended with two separate forums being made, each filled with followers of one of the two admins. It was like Game of Thrones and The Dance of Dragons, it was truly insane. Each admin had a very different personality too, so it was interesting to see who went with who.

It's really ironic because said community came about as an offshoot of a larger community unsatisfied with the moderation. So it was really all drama from the beginning. It was very nice and peaceful though, for a while in between.

I still talk to people from back then.

 

[Mivey]

I would run away and never look back if someone offered it to me

 

[echoshifting]

Always wondered if the dopamine rush from banning someone gets addictive

Click to shrink...

No because every ban you do becomes a conspiracy

There are better highs

 

[NateDog]

I moderated on a decent-sized Metal Gear Solid forum, a smaller private forum, and N4G. N4G naturally the biggest and was the most annoying. Gamers can be difficult, especially on a forum that's very much leaning towards one side when you try to ignore that and be more partial. Drama level from moderating on forums in particular is something I'm happy to never have to deal with again.

 

[aidan]

Oh, I remember this. I was a mod on a Mega Man community that had Moderators (of specific forums), Super Moderators (of all forums), and then Admins. I worked my way up the whole ladder. The drama was insane and even destroyed the community multiple times. It ended with two separate forums being made, each filled with followers of one of the two admins. It was like Game of Thrones and The Dance of Dragons, it was truly insane. Each admin had a very different personality too, so it was interesting to see who went with who.

It's really ironic because said community came about as an offshoot of a larger community unsatisfied with the moderation. So it was really all drama from the beginning. It was very nice and peaceful though, for a while in between.

I still talk to people from back then.

Click to shrink...

This sounds *exactly* like my experience, including members splintering off eventually (though that was due more to the board dying and being revived multiple times once the original owner left.) It was absolutely the case of moderator status being used as social currency to establish a hard hierarchy among members, and the back room drama was INSANE. I look back on that time both fondly and with a mild sense of horror.

I've tried to track FFA folk down from time to time, but it doesn't seem like anyone kept their handles, so they're all lost to me.

 

[Goldenroad]

Yeah. I was one of the early members and moderators of a Phish message board that was really popular for a good 6 or 7 years then just kind of died out with the advent of social media and reddit and what have you. We had a really good community going. Lots of good friends. Good jokes. Lots of people that I ended up meeting up with at Phish shows over the years, and a lot that I still keep in touch with now.

 

[Mahonay]

For a very short time I was a moderator on the DashboardConfessional.com forums about 15 years ago. Lmao.

 

[RKasa]

Seeing a couple of former mods of Final Fantasy fansites on here, so adding to the pile: I've been a mod, admin, and webmaster at the FF7 Citadel (nowadays, I'm just the site host).

They were interesting roles, each with their own types and degrees of drama and bs to deal with on top of the fun stuff. I don't have the energy to do that sort of thing anymore. Maybe as an actual job, but I've never seriously looked into that.

 

[Instant Vintage]

I was once for a former popular hip-hop website, but gosh that was 17+ years ago when I had time to do so.

I loved it, honestly. I didn't have to do much cleaning; for the most part we were all pretty chill towards one another.

 

[molnizzle]

Yeah, a pretty big gaming forum when I was younger. Before the rise of GAF. Never again.

 

[Bend]

I was a mod on a forum called General Mayhem back in the early 2000's. I loved that place. The only thing I ever did was ban spam accounts, everything else was pretty much good to go back then

 

[Deleted member 25606]

Yup, big site and I hated it, because it was one of those deals where other posters couldn't seperate the mod from the poster and cults of personality formed around mods (including me for a short time). I freaked and wanted out because I just want to post and I noticed some of those ties led to moderation being applied differently for different folk.

I would do it again on only on the condition that rules are actually applied fairly regardless if your a mods friend or not, and I would have to be able to post without my being a mod changing in a thread just causeI posted there.

Old GAF was pretty good and era is even better I must admit that unless it's a controversial/moddable topic most here act and get treated like normal posters in most threads, one of the reasons I post here, I hate authority figure cults of personality.

 

[Deleted member 5334]

I help operate the Discord side for an IRC server that still runs (I helped get it set up and everything), along with one of the co-admins of the IRC server. We use a bridge to operate it, which the co-Admin set up for us. Thankfully, it's been... mostly fine? We haven't had any serious issues, thankfully. Earlier years prior to Discord, yeah, but I wasn't a moderator or anything like that during that period.

 

[Serpens007]

Yeah, I was mod and then up to admin of a gaming forum in spanish.

It was fun, a lot to do and a lot of problems too, specially with some members that were long time good members but a bit of entitled because of it. Some other users became the usual separatists and made their own forum. Lots of work, good time, good people, and problems. But it was fun. A lot.

I was let go because of internal problems with the Webmaster (who became the owner after a while)

Still have some of those users as friend in social network, talking from time to time.