About Staff. . .

[Josh]

I think I like the idea of guilds, or something similar. I certainly agree that MM should stay away from silly hierarchies. We don't need them. Places like DV do, in a way, need established authority and a 'pecking order' at times, but here at MM, we're like a big family. We're each a member of the larger overall team.

I like the idea of guilds for the purpose of giving recognition, organization, and making it easier for new members to know who to go to for what. How do you feel about custom badges? Not stars, but images that directly relate to the responsibilities that the group takes on. Icons and visual representation is a large part of usability, as being discussed in the other thread.

I'm not sure if I like the Oracles idea, though. When there is one person decisively in charge with a title, it is easier to get things done faster, and it's great to have a project leader, but at the same time it puts a hindrance on things, as the instinct is to wait for their final approval, or assign more weight to their opinion only in deference to their perceived position. The one with the most expertise in a particular area will naturally take up the responsibility anyway, and be known as such, I'd think. I'm not saying we shouldn't have project leaders, not at all. Just that I see no need to give them a separate title: the people participating in the projects will know who's leading what. Of course, it would have advantages for usability and easy recognition by new members as to who's leading what, and so who they should talk to first about helping out or any problems they may have.

Just thinking out loud here, really. My apologies if I seem to rant and ramble.

[joshbotch]

i too liked the old adoption program idea but back when i was still on DV NO ONE wanted to adopt me!  probably because there were just SOOOO MANY newb's trying to get adopted, but i think with our cozy community there wont be that problem. 

as far as newb's asking people various newb questions... when i was new to DV i found myself seeking out people with tons of posts and asking them questions, assuming that because they had a ton of posts that they knew what was up.  i would assume this is fairly common... perhaps once people hit a certain number of posts they can choose if they want to be labeled as an "it's ok to ask me stuff" person

?

[Bro]

The key difference is that guild members would be recognized for accepting certain responsibilities rather than for being empowered or specially privileged.

That is really key. It's a fine line between being noticed for your authority, or empowerment on the forum, and being recognized for your dedication for certain responsibilities..but I'm pretty sure with the atmosphere here it can be done.

I really do hope the idea of the members owning the community is not scrapped, it's a wonderful sentiment, however I do recognize and agree with the need for "guilds" of some sort.

I'm all for Josh's idea. An identifying image, or emblem for your respective guild, as opposed to a more intimidating title or stars, and perhaps sort of reminder emphasizing to every member (regardless of the focus of their guild) the importance of genuinely welcoming new ones, helping them along, and letting them know what Mortal Mist is all about

[StarSeeker]

An identifying image, or emblem for your respective guild, as opposed to a more intimidating title or stars, and perhaps sort of reminder emphasizing to every member (regardless of the focus of their guild) the importance of genuinely welcoming new ones, helping them along, and letting them know what Mortal Mist is all about

After all, any member of any guild would be able to redirect newbies into their areas, or to more savvy users.

perhaps once people hit a certain number of posts they can choose if they want to be labeled as an "it's ok to ask me stuff" person ?

Instead of joining a guild and without guild system? Like this?:

Newbie: Hi! Where do I do X?
It's ok to ask me stuff person: You can do it in Y
or
It's ok to ask me stuff person: [other person] is responsible for that. I'll ask him

[unseen wombat]

Guilds are a great idea. And I think that the custom title feature is adequate for recognizing them, with perhaps a standardized icon below their name or maybe even just in their signature. I'd be willing to help with noob welcoming and translations, if any more are even needed, since I don't really know about website stuffs.

One thing I might add is that seeing as we have the main page description translated into so many languages, there might be people for whom English isn't a first language coming on board. It might be nice for them if, in the welcome email, give them a list of people they could talk to in their native language. Maybe anyone who speaks a certain language could select it in their profile and something like the country flag we have on the left there could show up, that way, if a new member speaks swahili, and they see someone's post with the "swahili spoken by me" badge, they could chat or pm with that person. May make them feel more welcome and comfortable at first.

[Bluefinger]

Either way, one is still stratifying the community with the 'guilds' concept. This in turn could still be perceived as a form of hierarchy, regardless of intent and relative ease of becoming part of said guilds. Mind you, even with no guilds, perceived hierarchies still form (newbies/old-timers dynamic, etc), so the focus shouldn't be on 'removing all hierarchies', but on creating an inviting 'atmosphere'. In this light, giving people more focused roles in order to guide the community better should achieve this, because to an average newbie, they come here because they are curious and wish to explore, not necessarily because this community is different from DV or LL (though, it might be the case for some, not necessarily all). So whether one perceives a hierarchy or not, the goal should be to create a system that works with the community, so that a newbie doesn't feel out of place and can easily locate appropriate persons in order to get inducted better into the forums.

Finally, on moderation, this community is still very small and very focused, and thus does not necessarily require moderation. However, it might become something to consider once the community reaches a certain size. For the moment though, it manages without because the community is small and well-knit, and since the board is very focused on a single goal (that of lucid dreaming). MM doesn't seem to get much of troll invasions, nor does it tend to dabble much with controversial topics/discussions/etc. So for the mean time, it is quite sustainable as is. Though, depending on how things turn out on the future, might have to be reconsidered (emphasis on depending).

[pj]

You make an important point, Bluefinger.

Anything and everything we do should be measured against our mission, which is to explore and promote the art and discipline of Lucid Dreaming.  How well ideas measure up to the mission should be the final arbiter of appropriateness and desirability.

Unless we change the mission, of course.

[Delphinus]

I agree with pj completely, I'm also quite fond of the Voluntary Guilds.

(Plus I like my blue stars.)

[Burned up]

The only "special class" we have here are the Ambassadors.  We (I) created the Ambassadors as a lark for one of the first few members who came in here and complained (jokingly) that he didn't have stars.  The Ambassadors actually became somewhat functional for a time, as they were translating the content of our original front page into many different languages.  Other than that, there are no special powers or privileges for Ambassadors.  Even their forum, The United Nations, is wide open to the public - and is one of those boards that doesn't really serve any purpose here anymore.

I think I've said before that I've always found the concept of "ambassador" and all that "your excellency" stuff that used to go on rather divisive.  Seems to me that ambassadors don't actually do anything that non-ambassadors don't do so why designate them at all?

It is an awesome thing that we can manage to carry on here without moderators - in other words, without a police force or babysitters.  In fact, everybody here has full Mod privs over themselves, if you think about it.  Each member-owner owns all their content and can forever edit and delete and lock their own threads.  Every member-owner has an admin panel and can change and edit the News Flasher.  Mu is currently working on an integrated system to add the ability to directly maintain the front pages through standard forum interfaces.

Yes, we have been fortunate that we haven't been plagued with abusive posts.  I think we should continue with confidence on that one.  It must be something we're doing right!

At the same time, there are many here who are willing and able to take on special responsibilities.  Those responsibilities don't entail control over the material of other people - in other words, they have nothing to do with traditional Moderator roles.  And yet people absolutely deserve recognition and, as the administrative roles here continue to be disbursed more widely, it is going to become harder and harder to know who to go to in order to get things done.  And, as we are discussing in the Newb Dilemma thread, it is obvious that there is a LOT needing to be done.  In order to get it done, we need to be able to recognize those doing the doing and start moving the perception of responsibility further away from the admin team - who really aren't here to be project managers.  But we DO need project managers!

It's reasonable that anyone doing work on the MM site is recognised for it.  As you imply, the recognition isn't meant to be something elitist, just something that credits people for what they really do.

Even using the word "newb" suggests a different class of user.

Currently under discussion is the possibility of creating something like the old Dream Guides at DV.  I cringe at this for a couple reasons.  First is the idea of separating out a group of people here who are more responsible than others for taking care of the Newbs coming in.  It seems to me like that should be everybody's job!  

Easily dealt with.  Someone perhaps new to the site comes in and posts/clicks "Request dream guide".  Someone at MM picks up said request and PMs the requestor.  They "contract" with each other (or not) and off they go.

The second and probably deeper reason is because the creation of a specially recognized class creates a goal - a reason for people to be here besides a love for the community and for Lucid Dreaming.  This one is difficult to convey, so please try to bear with me.  Many of us enjoyed the privileged positions of responsibility back at DV, along with access to the private and secret forums that went along with them.  This created a hierarchical arrangement - the Admins, followed by the Mods, followed by the Dream Guides, followed by the select Community Members.  All served The Owner - though for a good part of our time there, The Owner was absent and there was only one real Admin, Seeker, whose love and dedication to the forum shaped pretty much everything that went on.  We were all working very happily for a benevolent dictator. . . a man we all loved and trusted.  When his "lordship" was usurped by a more active owner with an agenda that had little to do with lucid dreaming, everything changed.

Mortal Mist was created in part as the Anti-Whatever-DV-Had Become.  Rather than an owner holding copyright to everything posted there and being able to sell it and exploit it for profit, we started right from the beginning with member ownership.  The role of Moderator was expanded to everybody - but only over themselves.  The Admin role was spread out among six of us, so nobody ended up getting overwhelmed with any one aspect of the technical side of managing the systems.  The focus here is Lucid Dreaming, not rising to power and privilege in a hierarchy.  We weren't trying to be what DV once was - we were working on something quite different and unique.

And yet we now find ourselves floundering - in some regards because we do not have staff.

I have expressed my positions on this matter as best as I know how.  The community belongs to you, the member-owners, not to me or to the admin team.  So what would you, the community, like to do?  How do we establish positions of responsibility without creating a hierarchical system of special privilege and power?  Or is it time to scrap that whole notion, in whole or in part?

I don't get the hierarchy bit.  To me there's either someone who does or someone who doesn't.  OK, certain tasks may not require full access to everything, but to me that's just a technicality not some kind of conferring (or not) of overlordship.

Not sure how you resolve decisions about what to do - indeed your use of this forum is to be commended.  The worst case scenario is if a sizable part of the user base moves from MM because of what you and admin people decide.  Who was it who said "With power comes responsibility"?  (LOL I think it was Yoda).

I think it's fair to say that some people are more than happy to let others do the work.  For my part, I think it's great that you and other admin people do anything at all!  There will surely be decisions that you will need to take - e.g, creating a new forum group - without consulting 300 people and that's how it should be.

[StarSeeker]

Easily dealt with.  Someone perhaps new to the site comes in and posts/clicks "Request dream guide".  Someone at MM picks up said request and PMs the requestor.  They "contract" with each other (or not) and off they go.

[Sean999]

I think having Guilds is a good idea. The only problem I see is the freedom for anyone to join. Once the guilds reach a certain size, delegating and managing tasks would become difficult, especially for simple jobs that only really require a few dedicated people.

One solution I have in mind is to continue with the "project leads" we have going on. An idea/task is proposed in a thread, people discuss, volunteers are chosen and assigned certain tasks, the job gets done, everyone returns to their previous "state".

In other words, rather than being assigned to one Guild, anyone and everyone could choose to volunteer for what they see fit and their titles would temporarily reflect their role. One or more project leads would be optional (though in my mind, necessary). This also addresses those people with multiple skill sets, and also allows for a diversity of problems to be tackled.

Put simply, "Dynamic Titles". (Or it could go by a similar name)


EDIT: This would be for non-permanent type situations, such as re-formatting the tutorials. For perpetual groups such as the "dream guides", guilds or a similar idea would be ideal. However, such groups would clash with this "project leads" idea, most likely. Unless more than one title is possible (though that would be a little cluttered/clunky).

[Seeker]

EDIT: This would be for non-permanent type situations, such as re-formatting the tutorials. For perpetual groups such as the "dream guides", guilds or a similar idea would be ideal. However, such groups would clash with this "project leads" idea, most likely. Unless more than one title is possible (though that would be a little cluttered/clunky).

I've been thinking of guild meisters lately.  A person that would be similar to your project leads idea.  A point person or commitee within each guild that could organize the activities within each guild so that projects do not get stalled out.

[Hazel]

I agree that a heirarchy would not be a good plan. As PJ said, we are trying to stray away from what DV has become.

In other words, rather than being assigned to one Guild, anyone and everyone could choose to volunteer for what they see fit and their titles would temporarily reflect their role. One or more project leads would be optional (though in my mind, necessary). This also addresses those people with multiple skill sets, and also allows for a diversity of problems to be tackled.

I think this is an excellent idea. That way a person wouldn't be constrained to a particular guild all the time, and would make things a bit less tedious.

I haven't had much time to come up with any ideas on my own, but I will be busy thinking now that I am out for Christmas.

[moE]

I also believe that creating a hierarchy would only serve to disband the member-member connection we have going here. I like the fact that everybody here polices themselves, and does not need somebody over their shoulders to 'moderate' what goes on here. My views on being more free/(responsible) and less moderated are not solely pertinent to forums, everything in life is better when everybody keeps themselves in check -in all aspects of life- and needs not to be policed.

Of course when somebody steps out of line... administrative action/damage-control must be taken.

[pj]

Well, I'm really comfortable with the Guild thing that is developing.  It is all volunteer, and it is all project and task oriented.  No police or moderator force is emerging.

Hopefully it is the answer to making some of the necessary changes around here without giving up the "hierarchy-free" environment we've all come to love.