I can't stand by and watch stuff like this happen around here. I will not support subverses (by featuring them or making them defaults) with moderators who impose questionable rules such as "your post has to end with a questionmark". Moderators need to calm their tits and focus on nurturing and growing their communities. Rules can always be bent and what better time to bend the rules then now, while Voat is still growing and under development?
I am thankful for moderators who help keep Voat spam-free and I respect your work. I really do. I started working on automoderator for comments and submissions and your job will be made much easier when this is implemented, but for the time being, moderators need to relax and focus on removing spam and eventual illegal content. If I submit a new post and it gains some traction (hundreds of comments, views and upvoats), and my post gets removed because I broke a rule by forgetting to include a question mark in my submission title... well, I would be pissed. People take removal of their comments and submissions very seriously and moderators must think twice before removing stuff if they want to avoid offending users. Voat has a ranking process where time acts as gravity and older posts will eventually fall off the frontpage. Voat also has automatic public moderation logs and everything you remove will still be visible in these modlogs and your actions may be questioned by the community, just like what happened yesterday.
This action can be reverted if /askvoat mods can convince us that the issue has been dealt with or if some other, less restrictive community takes over.
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FitMachoNaziAtheist ago
Went back to reddit, voat is no different.
Atko ago
I wasn't aware that it was abandoned. Thanks, I'll discuss it with @puttitout.
Krael ago
Does nobody else see the irony of Voat considering an outright hostile admin takeover of a sub?
The head moderator disappeared. Ok, pick one of the active mods to take over. Problem 1 is solved. You don't like how they're approaching the situation? Delist them as a default. Problem 2 solved.
Kicking them out of what is unarguably their subverse sets a really fucking bad precedent, in my opinion. What happens next? You disagree with how I'm running /v/Skyforge and I suddenly find myself taken off the modlist? If someone has a different idea for how a subverse should be handled, they can make their own. Isn't that the entire point of subverses in the first place?
EDIT: Seems my radical suggestion of "don't steal subverses from people" turned out to be a little controversial.
White_Raven ago
I'd love to agree with you, but the point is you aren't creating something for yourself when you make a new sub, you are creating a community that you happen to have started. Once it grows to a certain size (and it could be argued that even 1 or 2 subscribers is enough) it's not "your" little space, it's a community that you moderate. That's why the position is called "moderator" and not "owner". It's not your sub, it didn't start as your sub, and you will never own the sub.
Broc_Lia ago
That's all wonderful and flowery, but "community" is an amorphous and ill defined group. Who is the the community? The subscribers? Anyone with more than 20 ccp? Anyone who's hit the front page of the sub? No matter what definition you take, giving more power to the community will make it vulnerable to infiltration and coups. Dictatorial mods are absolutely and strictly necessary, particularly in small subs, to prevent them from being brigaded.