Author Topic: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?  (Read 24722 times)

Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #50 on: September 11, 2007, 03:12:55 pm »
Seems to me you folks here do moderate with a light touch (compared to what I've seen over at DCF):)

Thank you darlin'!  ;)

L

Well, one thing that I appreciate here is that as long as people play nice, the moderators generally seem to let discussions develop naturally--even organically, you might say--and move in whatever direction they just happen to develop and move in. Someplace else (ahem) I've seen moderators jump in and wrench a discussion back to whatever the thread title just happens to be. I suppose that's an equally valid approach to moderating, but I find it sort of ... constraining.
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline serious crayons

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #51 on: September 11, 2007, 03:24:10 pm »
Someplace else (ahem) I've seen moderators jump in and wrench a discussion back to whatever the thread title just happens to be. I suppose that's an equally valid approach to moderating, but I find it sort of ... constraining.

Yes, I've heard that's more the norm on ... some other forums.

My feeling is, if we kept the discussions strictly on track, we'd miss some fascinating detours -- some of which become as interesting as the original topic or more so.

 

Offline MaineWriter

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #52 on: September 11, 2007, 03:37:27 pm »
Jeff and Katherine,

I agree completely. I have come to think of threads as living, growing things that develop in unexpected and interesting ways. I don't mind if things take a detour...witness the recent sock diversion over on the Heath Heath Heath thread.

L
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Offline dot-matrix

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #53 on: September 11, 2007, 03:40:11 pm »
I agree the topic is what draws to the thread but just following the conversation where-ever it takes you is half the fun.  ;)  Just like face to face conversation.
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Offline Shasta542

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #54 on: September 11, 2007, 08:32:22 pm »
For instance, I have chosen to ignore myself.  :)

 :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Sometimes I chastise myself. But I always get off easy. I'm a pushover. :P
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Offline Shasta542

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #55 on: September 11, 2007, 08:33:03 pm »
:laugh:  But that wouldn't work for me ... I often send myself a message as a kind of reminder, or just to save something for later .... or perhaps just to talk to myself if no one else wants to listen to me!  :-\

Susie  :D

 :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

I bet you have some great conversations with yourself,too, SB!!  ;D
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Offline Toycoon

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #56 on: September 11, 2007, 11:57:27 pm »
Well, I'm glad you decided NOT to delete your account. I personally would miss your contibutions to the Jack with Ennis FanFic Game and I know several of your friends there would also miss you very much.  :(
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Offline dot-matrix

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #57 on: September 12, 2007, 03:35:35 pm »
chatter away Susie any ol way you please I LOVE your posts and your sense of humor.... but just so you and Jess have it straight.. David likes ME best  :laugh:
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Offline David In Indy

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #58 on: September 12, 2007, 03:43:40 pm »
chatter away Susie any ol way you please I LOVE your posts and your sense of humor.... but just so you and Jess have it straight.. David likes ME best  :laugh:

I love reading Susie's posts too, Dottie! She has made me laugh out loud SO MANY TIMES, and a few of those times I really needed a good laugh. I love Susie's wonderful British humor (humour  ;) ) and BetterMost wouldn't be the same without her. We need more people like Susie around here!  :)
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Offline Phillip Dampier

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Re: Should a member be allowed to delete her/his own account?
« Reply #59 on: September 12, 2007, 05:59:22 pm »
Well, one thing that I appreciate here is that as long as people play nice, the moderators generally seem to let discussions develop naturally--even organically, you might say--and move in whatever direction they just happen to develop and move in. Someplace else (ahem) I've seen moderators jump in and wrench a discussion back to whatever the thread title just happens to be. I suppose that's an equally valid approach to moderating, but I find it sort of ... constraining.

I can see the benefits of both styles of moderation.  If you are trying to find a specific piece of information in a thread and a thread suddenly changes course, it might make sense to "moderate" it.  But around here, we usually write the participants and let them know we'd like to split the thread into two independent topics as opposed to dropping a hammer.  We also never delete posts unless they are in serious violation of our personal attack rule.  If a topic goes completely into another world, it can make it very hard to people to find things.

One thing that is very different about this forum as opposed to the ones I've been involved with before is that most of our people are reticent about starting new topics -- they prefer to reply to existing ones.  That is very unusual.  Now I know on some other forums, you have to earn your stripes to be even permitted to start a new topic, but BetterMost has been a real learning experience for me as well in watching how these discussions develop.  And because that is the tendency here, the threads tend to develop organically as you said.  Because that is what the community has grown comfortable with, that is what we do here. 

The truth is, this is the first forum I've been involved with where women are writing in equal numbers (if not more so) than the men are, and that is VERY VERY unusual to see online.  I think this comes from the fact that we are extremely friendly and welcoming to new people, we do not allow personal attacks of any kind, and we are very hands-off about trying to control things.  I'm also thrilled to have a great team of moderators here that have been told to make their respective forums their own.  Ellemeno, who is my co-admin here, has written more messages than I do, and probably knows more about what is going on here than I do.  :)

If you look at my own 'profile' of activity here, you'll find I've comfortably found my niche as master topic starter, having probably opened more new topics than anyone, as well as probably writing more messages that people 'consume' but don't feel any particular need to reply to.  That's my journalistic streak coming through - convey information to people without necessarily being too conversational about it.  But most of my work here is behind the scenes in developing the site and taking care of things around here that people don't necessarily see.  Since I am not a control-freak kind of guy, it's not surprising that I run into people who write me (or even met me in Alberta) who had no idea I even started the site.  And that's fine with me.

The only thing I feel I have not done as well with is pushing our forming agenda here - to help people move within and out of AND BEYOND the story.  There are still a lot of people here who I believe could do well with a more formal and structured approach at self-improvement, fighting depression, and achieving more happiness.  These are goals that need not only community support, but some steps and advice people can follow.  There are folks out there who need more than nice thoughts to get moving forward (I was one myself).  In the early days of the site, I tried a more formal approach with some motivational exercises and advice to help people make some changes, but it didn't garner much response.  Now I'm never sure if that was because my writing style often doesn't suggest people need to reply or if such a structured approach just wasn't going to work here.  But it may be time to revisit that, because we certainly have built a much bigger community than we were back in February of 2006.
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