Fishing Confrontations -Thread removals-

[Jennie@ifish]

Hi guys,

Every once and a while, I find it important to let you know how I'm feeling about the site. This is one of those times. Please humor me.

It really bummed us out to have to remove a few threads (and a few others...lol) but they contained a couple hours editing of vulgarities, illegal suggestions, hostility, racism, and general obnoxiousness. We had to put the threads in quarantine with the exception that if a moderator had the time to clean them up, we'd replace them.

So far, all of us have not had the time. Life for us is busy, too!

This included a thread on LIG that had several serious allegations against someone that could get ifish in trouble, so the whole thread was dumped. Even after hours of cleansing, we still felt that ifish could be in legal trouble for it, so it had to go.

After editing threads, we feel it's kind to write a note to the members explaining our actions. Sometimes we don't have time, but most often we do. We always try but it is time consuming and sometimes other matters are more important.

True or false as anything said here may be, -proven or unproven, ifish is really not the place to accuse or make allegations against someone, please.

Please... I ask you, if we are going to discuss tough situations, complaints against business or people _and I know it's tough when there are explosive subjects_ you have to follow the rules of ifish. They protect our site and they protect me, the owner.

Following our rules is the only way we can leave important issues on the board. We, the moderators, want to discuss these issues too. They are just as important to us if they are fishery related. Imagine our disappointment when we, just like you, put in precious time to weigh in on a hot topic, only to have to remove the whole thing. We share your frustration!!!

I am proud of the fact that ifish is allowed in many schools, and I intend to keep ifish that way so long as it is under my name.

It upsets us, when we don't have the time to clean threads up and instead have to remove them. These are threads with otherwise very good and very interesting info and stories.

If only we could express ourselves without vulgarities, illegal suggestions, hostility, racism, and general obnoxiousness, oh, what a great great board we would have! Better than what we already have! I want that!

My idea of a great message board is that it should almost run itself, and the effort required by our moderators to keep it going smoothly and on-topic should be minimal. This requires a great membership and I do think that we are able. There are many valuable members who have not once shown up on the mod board, but instead have posted thousands of posts with valuable information.

It's been really difficult and time consuming to moderate lately, and I don't think it's us, in total. I would hate to have to prune the membership of those that seem to often be alerted to us, on the mod board, because their posts are mostly interesting and valuable. But, the mods volunteer time IS at a premium! When the work exceeds our allotted time, no matter the otherwise quality of posts, the consequence is to delete threads and sometimes cut off memberships to reduce our workload. We do not choose this option lightly.

There are many very hard things to deal with in our world in general, today, and also in our fishing world! Many are impassioned to the point of posting things out of frustration, and likewise, not within our rules. We can relate, but we wish you would take care in your frustration. Be a good netizen!

Finally, I just want to say that ifish members sometimes look at moderators with varying degrees of either like or dislike, and we fully realize that it is up to us as moderators to create the best image we can for ourselves and for the benefit of ifish.net.

The moderators love ifish a whole bunch, and we try very hard to do the best we can for our site. We know that our example will reflect not only on our own performance, but on other moderators and the whole site. We work together as a team for the betterment of our site.

I am asking you to help us by trying to remain calm when posting, and try, try, try, to follow our AUP rules so that we can leave threads open and viewable to all members.

REPLY REGRET: Remember, if you even THINK you will make someone mad with a post, you will! If you have any second thoughts about what you posted, you are right! Edit yourself, before someone else alerts your post to the moderators. We don't enjoy editing one bit. We'd SO much rather you self police yourself because we are determined, 100 percent, to keep ifish healthy, to keep ifish viewable by all, and to keep ifish the best darned fishing site on this planet!! You are a part of my family and I want you to stay! I value your participation and your friendship!

Lastly, I am removing the notice pinned to the top of the board above as almost everyone forgets it is there, or hasn't even seen it. I'm guilty of bypassing those notices, myself.

So, here is that notice:

Please don't assume that when you see a questionable post that as admins and mods, we have read and approved it.
Please don't quote it and discuss it on the board.
Please alert our attention to it, immediately and we will deal with it.

I find that over and over, people assume we think things are alright, if they are left on the board for a while, when in reality, the mods and admins haven't even seen it!

For the most part, we spend our days answering these alerts from kind and caring members who want to keep ifish a great family site to visit.

We appreciate it SO much!

So, please follow my directions in my signature, and Be A lert! (Ifish needs more lerts!)

Jen

If you have comments on this thread, please discuss it with me privately by sending me a private message.
Thanks,
Jen