No Stupid Questions

Likely because Lemmy doesn't have private communities so we use other channels.

Excellent timing on this post.

First of all, I'm not sure how new users are invited to the Discord that I'm aware of, so I don't feel very comfortable in addressing that - but there is a Discord where some mods hang out.

But second of all: I've relatively recently been added as an admin here on lemmy.world. It's been a very slow onboarding process for any number of reasons - for one, it's summer so I know in places that actually have vacation days, some folks have been out on vacations. Also, there's not really a formal admin on-boarding process, if I may be so bold as to say so. Not that I think it's a problem - I'm slowly gaining access to more of the tools we use, and slowly seeing what all we do, so I've started to take a few actions, but not much yet.

But one of my big missions is that I have had some moderation and administration experience in other places that I want to bring in here.

Just yesterday in one of the admin's groups I posted something about trying to pick up more of what we are doing so I can participate more in doing those things. But also:

One of the things I've noticed about sites like Lemmy - but also reddit, which I will say I ahve some experience with as well - is that because anyone can start a community, and by starting a community become its sole mod, and remain its sole mod unless they add more people - the people who start communities are not always good moderators. Just because they may well lack the skills and experience.

And I think that's an issue on sites like Lemmy and reddit, where a lot of the users' interactions with "authority" are community (or subreddit) moderators.

When I asked about moderator onboarding, the answer I got so far was "I think we have a few things somewhere" - but not an answer where yet. I'm sure someone will point me there, but I don't have it yet.

I think it's very important. I've had a few idea on some things I'd like to do. One of which is to find communities that the mods have abandoned - well, we do keep an eye on those already. And in fact, if you find a community that appears that the mods haven't done anything on Lemmy in a few weeks or more, and you'd like us to consider handing the community over to you (or perhaps start a thread in the community discussing and give us a list of people who volunteer), post over at !support@lemmy.world and we'll investigate. I've been involved already in a couple of communities that had mods who hadn't been around for a couple of years and helped get them handed off to new mods.

But I also want to have a dialogue with new mods - particularly those who don't have previous moderating experience. I see a lot of mods taking actions that are rather unfriendly and unwelcoming - from removing things and banning people for insufficient reasons to just handling moderating poorly.

I've found that while you can't do much against people who come just to troll, opening a dialogue with people who are new to your community who break the rules usually without intending to - or not understanding WHY the rules are the way they are - a surprising amount of time, being patient with them and explaining actually helps.

Also, over on reddit where there are some good moderator tools and the ability to have notes on a user that only mods can see (that also link to the comment where the note was added so you can easily see the reason for the note) - it allows for doing things like first giving a warning; then, if they repeat the behaviour, escalating to a one-day, three-day, seven-day, thirty-day, and THEN a permaban only if needed. (Although egregious violations can skip steps and go immediately to permaban if bad enough).

It can be difficult because it requires time, energy, patience, kindness. And a lot of the time, you still get personal attacks from the moderated user. But a lot of the time… it's worth the effort.

So I don't yet know where this will end up. I've sent a message to one of the admins who does a lot of the looking at abandoned communities to see if some of what I want to do is plausible without interfering with their work. Haven't heard back, but gotta give a couple/few days - everyone is busy with life.

I don't plan on doing anything too radical, I can't imagine. But I definitely want to work with mods to help show them a better way to interact with users - although again, understanding that, to quote Cool Hand Luke, "Some [people], you just cain't reach". But the ones you can can turn into valuable community members. I won't give specific details that would identify myself, but I saw this firsthand on subreddits I moderated as well as other sites.

So I'll be keeping an eye on this thread and hopefully posting here again in a few days or so with some updates - maybe giving those who express interest whatever info I can as I'm able.

So nothing concrete yet, but I'm hoping to help change this exact experience.

That isn’t what !moderators@lemmy.world is?

Good idea.