In my time at Armor Games, I've seen a few new moderators come on board, and every time we promote a user to Moderator status, there's always a flurry of "why wasn't I picked?" or "I think _____ should be a Moderator" or "why is ________ still a moderator" or lots of other questions about what it really takes to be a Moderator on the site.
As of this writing, I have three comments on my profile asking for 'exact' requirements for becoming a Moderator.
I know we have information scattered around the site, but I wanted to sum up briefly a few of the core things we look for in a user in order to be nominated to become a Moderator. Hopefully this will help clear up some of the confusion.
This topic is meant to be informational in nature. I will delete any message containing text which is negative towards our current team, comments suggesting some other user be nominated, replies of "well, I guess I'll never qualify" or anything else off-topic -- even if your message contains other good ideas. This is not the place for *those* discussions.
Also, it should be obvious that this list is NOT complete, because we don't want to give away EVERY detail about what we look for in a moderator. And this list is also subject to change over time, especially when AG3 launches.
--------------
BACKGROUND
We are obviously much more strict in our criteria than other sites, but that's only because we already have the best users out there and we want to be sure that anyone being a Moderator can follow our rules, guidelines, and get along with others.
THE PROCESS
In a nutshell, candidates are presented to the entire Moderator team, and are reviewed thoroughly by an Admin. The Moderator team decides unanimously (the exception being users who are on hiatus/holidays) on whether to accept the user or not; a negative response could either be "this user should never be a moderator" (and give reasons why) or "let's check back in 3-6 months". If an affirmative decision is made, an Admin user will Email the user asking if they'll accept the role and responsibilities. If the user accepts, the Admin user will promote them to become a probationary Moderator. We guide probationary Moderators for a little while and then release them into the wild.
HOW WE FIND USERS
There are two ways we find potential nominees.
First and foremost is by daily interactions within the forums or user profile comments. That's not to say that ONLY "opular" people will get nominated, but we're not likely to nominate someone that nobody really knows. We've recently passed on a half dozen users because none of us really know them as individuals. We'll start paying more attention to them now, of course.
The second method we use is a piece of software I wrote which takes some of the quantifiable criteria mentioned below and scans our database looking for users who qualify. Generally, this software finds HUNDREDS of users, and then starts disqualifying them based on other factors. Once it reports the users to me, I examine the user profiles, and then present a final list of nominees to the Moderator team. Candidates to whom the Moderator team give a definitive 'no way, never', we add to a 'skip' list so the software won't even look at them next time. There's a second "skip list" for users we want to check back on in a few months.
The last scan I did, which resulted in Freakenstein being added to the team, found almost 400 users, filtered them down to less than a dozen, and we were left with one definite 'yes' (Freakenstein), and a handful of "let's check back later" candidates (who we will not name).
SOME OF THE CRITERIA WE LOOK FOR
To be considered as a Moderator nominee, here are SOME of the things we look for. This list is not complete and is subject to change at any time without notice. We may or may not alter this forum posting to describe new or changed criteria. Also, meeting all of this criteria doesn't guarantee anything, because the rest of the Moderator team still has to vote on accepting you into our small team.
- You obviously need to have an excellent understanding of our Terms and Conditions for being on the site, and know the Rules & Guidelines for both the forums and game/user comments. And you follow them yourself.
- You need to stay up to date on things happening at Armor Games, especially with Armor Games v3 coming out later this summer. Users who have been in the beta since late last year will get extra points.
- You need to have an exceptional grasp of the English language (excellent spelling and grammar) but being fluent in one other language for support purposes may help your chances. You don't need to be an English professor, but 1337-speaking / textmsg writing styles, or writing styles which are difficult to read/understand will disqualify you.
- You need to be able to take criticism, from Admins, other Moderators, and especially other users. And you need to humbly accept this criticism when it's "constructive", or learn when it's "destructive" and deal with it accordingly without losing your cool.
- You need to be at LEAST 18 years of age; if you don't share your birth date on your profile (at least the year and month), you'll never even show up on our radar. And we have backups of our user data, so don't go changing your profile birth date trying to cheat the system -- we'll ask for proof.
- You need to have been an active, consistent member of the site for a minimum of 12-18 months. Big gaps in your login/posting history will generally reset this timer.
- You must be a genuinely helpful person within several forums. We watch where you post, how frequently you post, how many times you've posted in each forum, whether you're posting just to jump in on the conversation or genuinely getting involved in the topic, etc.
- We look for well-rounded users who also have good communication via user comments, but not to an excessive (spammy) degree. As such, users who carry on really long conversations back and forth (technically against our rules) will probably get passed on.
- We look for a minimum participation level from forum posts AND user comments. We need to see that you don't just focus on one type of commenting. Obviously we won't quantify these "minimum" values, because we don't want users trying to cheat the system.
- We look for a minimum number of rated games and game comments, and *recent* game ratings and comments, because we need to know you're actually playing the games and having fun too, not just hanging out in the forums 95% of the time. If you never participate in game comments, how will you recognize bad game comments versus merit-worthy comments?
- You must not have excessive quantities of user/game comments removed as spam. "Excessive" is subjective, but we can see how many comments you've had deleted, and we weigh that as a ratio against your remaining active comments.
- Generally, we tell users that even a single temporary ban will disqualify you. A temp-ban for flaming, spamming, harassment, fighting, racial comments, excessive swearing, or blatant rule breaking like hacking will certainly disqualify you. But if the temp-ban happened a long time ago (more than a year and a half), while we never "expunge" them from your history, we may treat them lighter than if your temp-ban was more recent.
WHAT DO WE EXPECT FROM OUR MODERATORS
New Moderators will start out working on cleaning up game comments and forum posts, and looking for merit-worthy game comments. They'll also continue to be helpful in the forums and via user comments to offer help and support, making sure other users are aware of the rules of the web site (and follow them).
We understand that life throws a curve-ball now and then, and while we certainly don't expect Moderators to be on the site every single day, we do expect that you're on the site several times per week. We also expect Moderators to take a break/holiday from time to time. This isn't a paid job, you're doing it for free, so don't feel guilty if you need to step away for a little while. Excessive absences may get you demoted back to regular user status.
And of course, you can always turn us down if you don't want to be on the team, and you can leave the team at any time as well.
----------------
Hopefully that helps clear up some of the confusion about what kind of users we look for as Moderators.
I agree, there are obviously flaws, but even if the site made another five users mods, these problems would all still exist. The mention of an up/down system for AG3 would make the mods jobs easier. I can understand the admins being a bit MIA at the minute with everything they're up to, and sure the systems probably not a great tool for the mods - that said, I do understand why Gantic refers to it as stressful. If you're dedicated enough to a site to mod, it tends to become second nature, even if you don't want to care, you kind of end up caring anyways. It's better feeling stressed and some work getting done than not caring and zilch getting done. Even with the waves of spam being continual, at least some of it is getting dealt with.
My point isn't to add more mods, but to not stress over game comments and don't waste time trying to make a difference in them. The system may have worked years ago when there were a few thousand users and few hundred games, but not now. There are over 2600 games and over 2 million users. It's foolish to think that deleting spam from a few games will make a difference, especially the popular games that gain a lot of attention. Sure some of it gets dealt with, but that same spam they delete shows right back up after they're done.
I understand caring about the site and wanting to keep it clean, but focusing on game comments won't do much good. Just browse through the games on the front page. They're better off not worrying about them and simply waiting for AG3.
Game comments shouldn't be ignored in my opinion due to the merit side of things. If they were ignored, even more users who write merit-worthy comments would go unnoticed.
You read the first page. And pray. Then do a jig for the audition round. Honest.
Ha. You know there is something i'm curious about.
The second method we use is a piece of software I wrote which takes some of the quantifiable criteria mentioned below and scans our database looking for users who qualify.
Since Cormyn isn't about anymore, does the site still use his software?
Not sure why you guys are talking about workload and spammy comments. Workload isn't the problem. Spammy comments aren't the problem. They don't even register as stressors. I don't know why everyone keeps going back to the spammy comments. Sure there's tens of thousands of them and it's time consuming just to deal with a small fraction of that, but they're hardly a bother. It's not even a real problem unless someone is doing it to get AP by posting meaningless comments as fast as possible over and over again across multiple games. I honestly don't get why anyone cares about the comments, outside of just wanting all the merits they think they deserve.
It's users that are the causes of stress. The main thing we deal with is people, because people are the ones creating the problems. Everyone wants everything they're way and some can't grasp the concept that the world doesn't live by their rules and react to anything beyond instant gratification or opposing their view as if it were a direct attack on their person.
Since Cormyn isn't about anymore, does the site still use his software?
Guess that's another thing you can add to the stress-ball
But it's our stress ball. We mods hardly do jobs together; we always go our separate ways. And I guess they are quicker as such. But deciding who gets to be the next moderator makes us all work on one job toge~ther~.
Comments aren't much of a problem. We delete them, yes, and we look for merit-worthy comments in the meantime, yes, but when we get this nice message in ArmorGames Beta about the beta ending this month? TON of pressure off. That's not to say I've been slacking mind you. The more I work on it, the more I'll remember it when I'm sitting at a campfire.
Not sure why you guys are talking about workload and spammy comments.
You can call it an assumption on the stress, but okay.
It's users that are the causes of stress.
Let me try to understand this through an example: Bob complains to Gantic about posts/comments getting deleted. Gantic explains to Bob why they got deleted. Bob tells Gantic he's wrong and tries to insult him on a personal level. Gantic further explains and warns him. Bob continues and drags it into the forum. Gantic bans Bob. Bob comes back and repeats.
Is this something that causes the stress? There must be dozens of Bobs out there.
You should be happy that your a Mod, but stressed mostly about the spamming here. Spamming is just annoying. I can't even write a "merit" because of the number of spam messages produced here.
Maybe if that's all you want out of ArmorGames. I don't completely understand why so many people want to be mods. It's not all fun and games, you have to dedicate a lot of your time to some pretty boring stuff.
I can't even write a "merit"
There's this saying: You do not write a merit. You write a review of the game, and maybe it will get rewarded with a merit.
In AG3, will potential moderators actually be given a chance by being appointed chatbox mods first, or is the system going to stay the way it is now?
The idea of having chat mods was submitted by a user and never discussed with admins. At least nowhere we can see, so anything involving chat mods are just more ideas. Nothing concrete.
