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Suggestion: How about Democracy?

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Astraea

Astraea

The Storm of Friendship
    • 2,107
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    Hey! I just wanna ask the Administrators, how about an Election System! Members who'll become the moderator of a particular forums must be elected by normal users and they may choose whom they want to see as Moderators and will vote for him or her! This'll be great and people will also be happy to thier Representatives and also a 1 year election system, a particular mod will be a mod only for 1 year and if people are not happy with him, a new mod will be made!
     
    Right on brother! It's about time the staff listened to the people. Why should the elite be the ones to choose who gets to be inducted into their little circle? I say let the PEOPLE vote on who watches over us.

    We want a fair democracy and we want it now!
     
    It would just be a popularity contest. Besides, the high-level staff generally does a good job of picking the mods and super mods. I've never had a problem with any of the mods/staff I've run into.

    EDIT: lol, should've expected Introvert to post on this thread.
     
    Nah, theoretically it's not a bad idea. In reality, becoming a mo. just off popularity would not be good and could lead to much conflict and fighting in the system. It's best for the best for the smods and admins to pick the mods because they are best suited to. No offense to use members, but many of us should not pick mods. The system sees to work well now, let's keep it the same.
     
    No Chance Without Zekrom said:
    It would just be a popularity contest. Besides, the high-level staff generally does a good job of picking the mods and super mods. I've never had a problem with any of the mods/staff I've run into.

    EDIT: lol, should've expected Introvert to post on this thread.
    Click to expand...

    The key word of that post is ''generally". Besides I trust our community enough to think that they could refrain from simply voting their friends in.

    Introvert for mod 2014!
     
    This won't prevent you if you're doing a good job there and it's not about that the Admin's choice for mods is not good, its about what people are happy with! if people of your section are happy with you they'll vote for you in the nominee list for being mod in your section!
     
    The thing is though, h-staff takes into good consideration on who they believe is good for staff. If they find a mod isn't doing their job good enough, or is just being plain rude, then I'm sure that there are consequences. I don't speak for the h-staff though, but it'd be kinda common sense, really when one holds such a position.

    Besides, what's wrong with the staff we have currently? I've worked with a majority of the staff for six months now (some of course have come in since my term and others left) and I can say I've had no problems whatsoever with anyone on staff, and vice versa.
     
    What is wrong with the current way of picking mods?

    Don't fix what isn't broken.
     
    Zach said:
    Unless my vision is cloudy, the only "people" I see speaking right now on the issue are you and MegaIndianCharizardX.
    Click to expand...

    Unless my vision is also cloudy, most of the "people" in here so far against his idea are current staff members.

    What's the matter guys? Afraid of what the people want?

    Introvert for mod 2014!
     
    It's not a bad idea but I think it would need a loooot of work, restrictions and regulations to make it practical and that just seems very counter-intuitive given that the staff currently chosen are, on the whole, very good picks. Sections could very easily become essentially just big cliques if this were the way people were chosen, having one group of people 'run' the section and giving no one else a shot, and it would lead to a heck of a lot of 'butt hurt' from the people who've been dying for a staff position for ages and then being rejected by the community. I think the current system works well given that hstaff here aren't at all biased or afraid to make 'unpopular' choices for the good of the forum, and believe it or not they do know what's happening within each section well enough to know who would be a good staff candidate. Popularity most certainly is useful in being a moderator, but it's far from important compared to everything else required and unfortunately it's the main trait that the majority of the voters would focus on.

    Also one thing I had a major issue with is the "re-elect every year" point, but I don't imagine that would ever be even remotely considered so I won't go into detail.
     
    Introvert said:
    Unless my vision is also cloudy, most of the "people" in here so far against his idea are current staff members.

    What's the matter guys? Afraid of what the people want?

    Introvert for mod 2014!
    Click to expand...
    To answer your question, with an attitude like that, you're not going to become a moderator anytime soon, so you may as well stop trying to ask and become one.
     
    It's just like what has been said by everyone else. Whilst it sounds great in theory, we don't want this turning out like political elections which are more and more becoming mindless popularity contests in which complete idiots end up in charge.

    If we do this things might hardly change, but I think it is far more likely that people will jsut vote randomly for their friends and whatnot and we'd end up with a forum with either no mods or useless mods and I'm not sure what's worse. Furthermore, if this was the case what would happen with our current staff hierarchy.

    As nice as it sounds in theory there's just too much that could, and probably would, go wrong.

    For the record, you may notice I'm not a staff member and hardly talk to the majority of them.
     
    We do not need a "democracy", because this is a website. Democracy encompasses social, economic, and cultural conditions that enable the free and equal practice of political self-determination. However, this is a forum run by a number of people, and primarily owned by fewer. Unlike a country or society, this website and its domain are run and owned by a a small collective body (the founders, which is about 2 or so). You could then argue that this is a derivative of a "monarchy", but you'd be wrong, because as I explained previously this is a forum and not a political system. The hierarchy present here is to assist others and add features to an already functional system and service.

    PokéCommunity is a service, a lot more than it is any sort of governmental society, it is a non-profit organisation. For the same reason a charity does not have a "democracy", or a business does not have a "monarchy", PC doesn't have one either. We run things, but we do not rule over people. You see, we have no legal obligations in which to serve or protect people, which is why there is no such thing as "politics". There are social politics, yes, but such things have no actual meat on their bones to suggest that we're running it correctly or not. So before we start arguing about whether PC is a democracy, oligarchy, monarchy, dictatorship, or whatever, remember this is a website and not a political body. So I hope to nip that in the bud.

    However I will look at this suggestion without any political stigma attached to it. In theory it makes sense of course, but right now we have a really well formed system in which to promote Moderators. It's usually evident who works hard enough for a position, and who is positive enough to promote a forum. In a way, we do actually vote on Moderators, but there's a smaller panel. This panel is the HQ-staff (Super Moderators, and Administrators). We decide on who to promote (or not), and we each have an equal vote. In saying that I can understand why there may be the rebuke that "well you're not the every day members like us". Thing is, HQ-staff did their time as members, and still do. Nobody on staff (with the exception of the site owners) joined as a staff member, which means that they worked their way to becoming a staff member by being an outstanding member. To attest to this, we also have a simple outline of how Moderators are chosen, and how you can become one (though I think we should expand on the latter).

    Aside from our current system excelling (very rarely does a Moderator not perform their proper duty - note I will actually state what you as a member can do if you feel they are not performing their duty), there's less practicality in a forum-wide election of sorts. There's quite a few reasons to that. If there were to be an election, it is a lot more likely that the "popular" members would be promoted, rather than those who would be fit for the position. If a member was up for election, or was voted to be in such an election, it could simply be due to their standing as a person, and how many friends they have. However, there could be a member who makes a lot of great posts, makes great reports, and is overall; an amazing candidate. However, if there's a thousand people on the election committee, and 500 people are friends with another candidate, yet have never spoken to the other - there's too much cause for bias or favouritism. In saying that, you could say that the HQ-staff could be just as bias, however we're much less likely to be as there's a small number of us, and we're very diverse. We do not vote until we discuss completely objectively, and our promotions need to be justified. If we had thousands of people in one thread discussing a candidate, it would be chaos and you would run in circles. If you had thousands of people voting on a candidate, then you are open to the chances of rigged votes or biases. With Member of the Year, people get upset annually because its a popularity contest, but essentially it means nothing, and there's little reward. Imagine this if we were to start putting staff positions on the line, the forum would collapse.

    Speaking on more practical matters, if there has been a promotion you are particularly unhappy about, you're welcome to PM a HQ-staff member about it, and you're also welcome to offer your own suggestion as to who you thought would be more fitting. If you have a valid reasoning behind your words, there's a chance your message would be considered. One person can make the change where thousands could create a mess, that's the way of things.

    Hopefully what I stated above makes some degree of sense. I won't summarise as I'm afraid of people skimming. It's a great idea in theory, but it simply would not work, I'm afraid. This would be far too political, this is a community based website, not any form of political embodiment and so, true Democracy has no place here.
     
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