The FAQ is generic (came with the software) and not accurate. As said above moderators are restricted to moving messages around. Historically it has been shown that it's best if more destructive moderating falls at a single point of responsibility.
And that is me.
Basically my aim in moderating is to preserve the quality of the forum both in terms of content/function but also in form to some extent. This means I occasionally have to clamp down to prevent
Eternal September from infecting the forums. If you do not know what Eternal September is, please read up on it.
Before Eternal September, people behaved according to a well-established
Netiquette that generally lead to a highly informative and respectful exchange of ideas.
It is this culture I try to preserve here on this forum.
Specifically ...
I WILL lock down threads if they appear to degenerate into personal attacks on other forum members or other people in general. Basically I will give anyone ONE chance to say something stupid. It is my hope that other people will be mature and ignore the flamebait. If this does not happen, there's a 50% probability that I will lock it down. If the first person comes back again, that probability just increased to 100%.
Sometimes if someone says something truly stupid or abrasive, I might delete that post if it means saving an otherwise good thread from degenerating to a flame war.
But overall ...
ABUSE OF OTHER FORUM MEMBERS WILL NOT BE TOLERATED! This is to preserve the integrity of the community. I will sacrifice the continuation of the the thread for this. If this is not enough, I will sacrifice individual posts for this. If this is not enough either, I will terminate access for individual users.
ABUSE OF PEOPLE IN GENERAL WILL ONLY BE TOLERATED IF IT IS CONSTRUCTIVE! This means statements have to be factual and useful. Threads or posts hating on particular persons or groups of persons based on simple opinion amount to bullying and will not be tolerated. If this does not make sense to you, please read the Netiquette above again.
Like various other online forums I will also but very rarely lock down threads if the signal to noise ratio has degenerated to zero, but basically, if you see a thread being locked down it means that more than one person in that thread clearly behaved in a way they shouldn't have.
As a forum member the best thing you can do when you see someone making a (hopefully rare) asshat comment/post is still to IGNORE it. Don't take the bait!
On the issue of bandwidth we no longer have to worry about actual line bandwidth, but we do still worry about reading bandwidth.
Here are two HIGHLY ANNOYING behaviors that will cause me to edit individual posts!
1) Don't include your signature at the end of the post. We already know who you are. You're writing forum posts not emails.
2) Don't quote 20 lines of text to make a 2 line reply. Use the quote function only if there's doubt as to what you're specifically replying to, e.g. specific sentences. If you want to reply to a person, just start the post with @whoever.
That is all for now ...