Suggestions & Membership

[Millacol88]

What are the wages for an EB admin?

[Shadows]

What are the wages for an EB admin?

Can't say, sorry.

[AwesomeStar]

You guys actually get payed?!

Aren't you just supposed to be an admin because you love the site and volunteer to take on such a position?

But you get payed?

...

Am I being naive here? I think I am...

~A.S.

[Shadows]

Am I being naive here? I think I am...

Did you know that the word gullible isn't in the dictionary? Don't believe me? Try to look it up yourself and report back.

[AwesomeStar]

Heard that one already

Its been a hard day and I haven't had any coffee yet, seriously, my mind is confuzzled.

~A.S.

[Spyder]

Did you know that if you say gullible slowly, it sounds like ice cream?

By the way: Do you guys seriously get paid? I thought it was a volunteer job. Or you could just be tricking me and I feel for it. And to think I used to trust you moderators! I think I'm gonna have to tell Jipay...

[Luke McAwesome]

I personally doubt it; but I've been wrong before... many, many times.

Edited July 10, 2009 by Striker™

[Siegfried]

What are the wages for an EB admin?

One tenth of SFA.

[The Who]

Did you know that the word gullible isn't in the dictionary? Don't believe me? Try to look it up yourself and report back.

Anyway, I'm almost a thousand percent sure EB mods/admins do not get paid with anything other than a smile.

Then again, I'm neither a Mod nor an Admin, so what do I know.

[Millacol88]

Can't say, sorry.

Jipay keeps the noose pretty tight, huh?

One tenth of SFA.

Well then...I'd ask you to spell out the words but I think swearing is discouraged here.

[JimBee]

We've actually found that pinning a topic achieves nothing but have it at the top; that is people often ignore pinned topics. For this reason we try to keep pinned topics to a minimum in the hope that they will be noticed.

For the sake of having an opinion from a regular reader on this forum, I'll say that my eye tends to skip over pinned topics. I rarely even notice topics such as news topics and indexes, and only recurring topics such as the SW 2009 discussion thread catch my eye.

And the staff gets PAID??!?!?!?!

[SuvieD]

Of course staff gets paid. They get all the sass, back talk, gibberish, and idiotic posts as regular pay and if they do a good job Jipay lets them read and participate in the decent threads.

That and the special magic rings Jipay sends them in the mail. They need those to ban members and delete threads.

Of course . . . one ring to rule them all!

[Hinckley]

Of course staff gets paid. They get all the sass, back talk, gibberish, and idiotic posts as regular pay and if they do a good job Jipay lets them read and participate in the decent threads.

That and the special magic rings Jipay sends them in the mail. They need those to ban members and delete threads.

Of course . . . one ring to rule them all!

That's the exact wording in our contract too.

Brilliant Suvie!

[Siegfried]

That's the exact wording in our contract too.

Jipay recently offered me a raise. I think I'll turn it down.

[posades]

DISCLAIMER: I'm taking this idea almost directly from another forum I frequent (BigSoccer, I doubt anyone else goes there but you never know ), so this isn't my idea and I'm sure a ton of other forum type sites use this general system as well.

DISCLAIMER #2: This is a long post by the way, sorry.

So my suggestion goes a little something like this:

Since I don't frequent and post on these boards as much as I like, I tend to not know who many of the better members here are. Wouldn't it be great if there could be a way to see who really contributes meaningfully and is generally a well respected member of Eurobricks? Enter the Reputation System.

For instance, if I see a post from somebody that I find particularly on-topic to the conversation at hand, contains top secret info that is punishable by death if TLG finds out, is genuinely funny or that I just plain agree with, all I would do is add to that particular poster's "rep". After a certain amount of reputation points there could be certain titles that could be achieved such as "World Renowned", "Local Hero", "Unknown Entity", etc.

Since this is supposedly an 18+ forum, there theoretically wouldn't be any childish abuse of the system (rewarding friends back and forth), and there could be restrictions in place where you had to rep 5 other people before repping the same person again or something to that effect. For the sake of this not turning into a popularity contest the points attained by posters would not be publicly shown, and this doesn't have to be something that is trumpeted around. It can be hidden away on someone's profile if need be, with only the title you've obtained visible.

This could also go the other way as well. If there is a spammer, someone who isn't adding anything useful to the conversation or a post that is disrespectful or demeaning they could receive negative rep. After a certain number of negative points against them they could "Take a Break" or be "Banned".

Would it be possible to incorporate a reputation system? I'm no computer programmer and I don't know the first thing about code so for all I know this could be impossible to implement in an established forum like this. If this isn't possible that's ok, I've just wasted 10 minutes of my life writing this down in a post that is pointless (kidding). So what do you guys think, is this a viable option to consider? Flaws/tweaks/comments?

[Siegfried]

So my suggestion goes a little something like this:

I don't dislike the idea. Their forum runs on vBulletin so it's possible it's implemented in the board itself; our board has a similar feature that's disabled. Consider it possible.

[JimBee]

It's a good and well thought-out idea, posades, but I have to disagree with it. Even though this is an adult forum, there are still childish people here (adults or otherwise), and those people could take advantage of this function. These people sometimes bend the "rules", or rather lack the proper manners or maturity, and disrespect the members who actually have something to add to this forum. Then the childish members would take points off of other members' "score", and people who followed this function wouldn't read any of his/ her posts.

While this may seem very complicated and unlikely, I would put it past some of the people here to disrespect others' opinions in this way.

Other problems could arise, too. People with a good posting rep might be "popular", but others, who may sometimes have great stuff to add, might be ignored because of a low rep.

Then again, I'm sure that some of these issues could be avoided, perhaps with a limitation to members with a higher post count, such as citizens and higher.

[Darth Legolas]

It's a good and well thought-out idea, posades, but I have to disagree with it. Even though this is an adult forum, there are still childish people here (adults or otherwise), and those people could take advantage of this function. These people sometimes bend the "rules", or rather lack the proper manners or maturity, and disrespect the members who actually have something to add to this forum. Then the childish members would take points off of other members' "score", and people who followed this function wouldn't read any of his/ her posts.

While this may seem very complicated and unlikely, I would put it past some of the people here to disrespect others' opinions in this way.

Other problems could arise, too. People with a good posting rep might be "popular", but others, who may sometimes have great stuff to add, might be ignored because of a low rep.

Then again, I'm sure that some of these issues could be avoided, perhaps with a limitation to members with a higher post count, such as citizens and higher.

Hey, you're not talking about me are you?

But I agree here, with JimButcher. There are always going to be childish people (like when they get giddy around Princess Leia,) who will put someone' rep down or up just because they can. Also, everyone likes a fast forum. A lot of Lego forums I've been two are now almost completely barren and memberless because so many additional things were added to the site that it moved as slow as a dead snail, and half the time you tried to get on to the site there would be a server error. I'm not sure how complicated this point system would be, but I still think it would add a ton on the bandwidth. AAlso, sometimes people make worthwhile comments but they're in a grumpy mood so it sounds angrier than they really are. We don't want people getting band for being cranky after their dog gets hit by a bus!

And last but not least, we already have a form of that system. Once the moderators really get to know you, you get a funny title. I guess if that counts for anything, it means that people know you on the site, and that you don't have a life like me don't need other members deciding your status for you.

[Sandy]

But I agree here, with JimButcher. There are always going to be childish people (like when they get giddy around Princess Leia,) who will put someone' rep down or up just because they can. Also, everyone likes a fast forum. A lot of Lego forums I've been two are now almost completely barren and memberless because so many additional things were added to the site that it moved as slow as a dead snail, and half the time you tried to get on to the site there would be a server error. I'm not sure how complicated this point system would be, but I still think it would add a ton on the bandwidth. AAlso, sometimes people make worthwhile comments but they're in a grumpy mood so it sounds angrier than they really are. We don't want people getting band for being cranky after their dog gets hit by a bus!

And last but not least, we already have a form of that system. Once the moderators really get to know you, you get a funny title. I guess if that counts for anything, it means that people know you on the site, and that you don't have a life like me don't need other members deciding your status for you.

I totally disagree with your first point, but surprisingly, agree with your second point.

That is, I don't believe such a "reputation"-system is necessary here (although it's a cool idea in itself), since we already have several rewarding systems for the members here - namely, the rank benefits, the titles and the Fellowship.

However, I don't like that often when someone suggest something, other people turn it down by pointing to the diminishingly small minority of ill-behaving members. You guys are making abuse, vandalism and trolling a much bigger problem than it actually is - much thanks our vigilant staff. And with your logic that every new feature is going to instantly get abused by someone, nothing new could ever be added here. I'm only saying this because this isn't the first time I've read such claims in this forum (last time was in the discussion about the delete-button, which I still sorely miss).

So in summary, I for one would see no need for this suggested "reputation"-system, but not because of someone might abuse it.

[JimBee]

Hey, you're not talking about me are you?

About what? Being childish? Definitely not.

And last but not least, we already have a form of that system. Once the moderators really get to know you, you get a funny title. I guess if that counts for anything, it means that people know you on the site, and that you don't have a life like me don't need other members deciding your status for you.

Right, if a member is really acting up, the staff will take care of him/ her, and likewise, you will be rewarded if you behave well.

That is, I don't believe such a "reputation"-system is necessary here (although it's a cool idea in itself), since we already have several rewarding systems for the members here - namely, the rank benefits, the titles and the Fellowship.

Yeah, those rewards should be incentive enough to be a good member.

However, I don't like that often when someone suggest something, other people turn it down by pointing to the diminishingly small minority of ill-behaving members. You guys are making abuse, vandalism and trolling a much bigger problem than it actually is - much thanks our vigilant staff. And with your logic that every new feature is going to instantly get abused by someone, nothing new could ever be added here. I'm only saying this because this isn't the first time I've read such claims in this forum (last time was in the discussion about the delete-button, which I still sorely miss).

But it's true- while we have lots of great and wonderful members here, there's always those who have to ruin it, and it's more than just a few.The staff has had to make several changes to the boards to eliminate spammers and immaturity, such as the Buy, Sell, Trades, Finds forum (although, the limitation has been lowered), the PM system, polls, and a couple others. My point is, there has to be limitations because of those people, and without them, the forums would be extremely difficult to handle, even for our vigilant staff.

[Svelte]

I'm against the rep button idea, not only because we already have multiple systems in place which encourage good members - tags, titles, changes in rank - but because it seems something which kids might enjoy due to the instant results but hardly appealing to AFOLs - and we are an AFOL community after all. Personally I would feel odd going around thinking 'Great post, Sandy! +10 Hit Points' or 'Boo, Jimbee! -10HP!'. I'm not here to judge my peers in that way.

It would also seem to go against the grain of the site in terms of encouraging thoughtful, nuanced responses from members. For example, wasn't part of the reason that voting in competitions has moved away from the poll-based format to individual posts to make the results more transparent and accurate?

I don't really favour the idea suggested by posades that such a system makes it easier for casual browsers to know who is a 'good' member or not - what are we, goldfish in a bowl? While we should always welcome new members, which we do, we shouldn't pander to them. You don't have to visit the site that much to get a sense of its flavour, and if in doubt, that's what mods and admins are for. If you want to be a part of the community; participate - that's all it takes!

[Siegfried]

OK, well it seems that people don't want it anyway. I've seen it work well on some sites I visit a lot, such as CodeProject, but it does have a different memberbase.

Great post Svelte +10.34!

[posades]

Lots of replies to an apparently unpopular idea.

I'm against the rep button idea, not only because we already have multiple systems in place which encourage good members - tags, titles, changes in rank - but because it seems something which kids might enjoy due to the instant results but hardly appealing to AFOLs - and we are an AFOL community after all. Personally I would feel odd going around thinking 'Great post, Sandy! +10 Hit Points' or 'Boo, Jimbee! -10HP!'. I'm not here to judge my peers in that way.

Changes in rank are great but it tells me little about a member (only that he/she has been here for a long time or they tend to comment on every single topic they come across). Titles to me are also fairly useless; most of them are inside jokes or are changed on a regular basis so you never know what they are talking about. Tags I'm not too familiar with but I'm assuming they are the expert MOCer, etc. pics I see at the bottom of member's name (which is fine).

I have to disagree with you on the rep system catering to the younger crowd because of "instant results". We aren't talking hit points or popularity points or anything, it's simply a way to reward deserving individuals when they post something extraordinary. No one is forcing you to judge your peers as you put it, so if you feel that is something you are not comfortable doing then there's no reason to do it. In my mind giving out rep would be somewhat of a rare occurrence, but I guess that would depend on the member's philosophy toward the system.

It would also seem to go against the grain of the site in terms of encouraging thoughtful, nuanced responses from members. For example, wasn't part of the reason that voting in competitions has moved away from the poll-based format to individual posts to make the results more transparent and accurate?

As I mentioned, it could be something that is discreet. The number of points you have wouldn't be shown, just your rank (changes after 10, 50, etc.) in your profile. I also forgot to mention the person giving the rep would also have a certain amount of characters to leave a message along with the rep to explain themselves; this would also not be viewable by the public, only the specific member it was given to.

I don't really favour the idea suggested by posades that such a system makes it easier for casual browsers to know who is a 'good' member or not - what are we, goldfish in a bowl? While we should always welcome new members, which we do, we shouldn't pander to them. You don't have to visit the site that much to get a sense of its flavour, and if in doubt, that's what mods and admins are for. If you want to be a part of the community; participate - that's all it takes!

I can't remember what word I used, but if it was 'good' then I apologize for the nebulous categorization; maybe finding 'quality contributors' to these boards is a more accurate description. Not sure where you going with the goldfish comment, maybe something to do with how you pick a certain one out at the pet store?

While this new system does incorporate newer members more so than the current setup, I'm not seeing how it would be pandering to them. If anything, I think this new system would encourage more thoughtful and meaningful dialogue and participation by the newer members instead of the "That's a good MOC" or "Me too" comments I see simply to raise their post count. Older, more established members like yourself would naturally be more respected throughout the Eurobricks community so it wouldn't take long for your reputation to reflect that. Newer members might find it more difficult to obtain reputation (only given to them in those exceptional cases) which is good, right?

As for the whole mature members and abuse of the system argument, I'd like to think the majority of people here wouldn't misuse the system like that but that may be the optimist in me talking. Safeguards can be put in for situations like that (like the idea I gave earlier). And the negative rep could be tweaked where you aren't automatically banned but instead put on a "watch list" for the admins and mods to decide your fate.

[Svelte]

As I mentioned, it could be something that is discreet. The number of points you have wouldn't be shown, just your rank (changes after 10, 50, etc.) in your profile....

While this new system does incorporate newer members more so than the current setup, I'm not seeing how it would be pandering to them. If anything, I think this new system would encourage more thoughtful and meaningful dialogue and participation by the newer members instead of the "That's a good MOC" or "Me too" comments I see simply to raise their post count.

But if changes in rank reputation are only visible via a member's profile, how does this system encourage new members to make higher quality posts? The two don't seem intriniscally linked.

Even if the reputation system *is* transparent and you know exactly why and who has a reputation in good standing, I also don't see how the introduction of this system works to actually improve post quality by new members. Maybe you could post a specific example of what you mean.

[posades]

But if changes in rank reputation are only visible via a member's profile, how does this system encourage new members to make higher quality posts? The two don't seem intriniscally linked.

Even if the reputation system *is* transparent and you know exactly why and who has a reputation in good standing, I also don't see how the introduction of this system works to actually improve post quality by new members. Maybe you could post a specific example of what you mean.

It doesn't just have to apply to new members. I don't know about about you, but being rewarded and recognized by others is a great feeling (yes I realize this is the internet, but still ). If you know that posting a well thought out comment that is truly helpful to the topic starter or another member will potentially net you this reward (albeit for yourself), I'm guessing most people will strive to do this more often than not. Right now it just seems new members will say anything to get their post count up; I guess it would decrease the amount of less useful posts more than increase the amount of quality posts, so I can see where you'd be confused.