Groups (8)

I was just wondering how people find moderating or co-moderating the groups? Are you quite active in promoting it and starting threads on it? Or do you just let it look after itself?

Is it a lot of work for you and do you regret starting it? Or is it easy peasy and most people play nice?

Are you thinking of starting (another) group? And if so, is there anything stopping you?

I started @Modified_Bodies and it's dead easy to run. I promoted it at first, but it kinda looks after itself now. I only really start threads as me, rather than as the group, cos it's something i'm interested in personally, rather than for business or for just debating topics. All i really need to do with it is pop on now and again to admit people to the network, so they can get the little image under their avatar.

I also run @Burlesque and co-moderate @Manchester and @LGB_Forum groups and apart from a bit of drama llamaring on the @Manchester group, they're easy to do too.

I do like the control they give the moderator in that you could just close a group to anyone causing too much trouble - something you don't really have control over with a board thread, unless someone breaks the AUP.

So, over to you... What's your experience?

mia, x

Quick Lynn, run, they're sex people
@Modified_Bodies
@O_and_P
@LGB_Forum

*UPDATE* Model(s) for "how to" bondage photographs (and other bondage photographs) have now been found. Thank you to all who showed interest.

ToakReon wrote: Damn - now there's an idea. Perhaps I should start a group called "cute_young_females_interested_in_submitting_to_dep raved_lecherous_old_codgers_in_the_south_east" and await the floods of responses ...

I like the idea, but i might suggest you work on the name a little. Think of the icons you could have!

x

Quick Lynn, run, they're sex people
@Modified_Bodies
@O_and_P
@LGB_Forum

mia wrote: ToakReon wrote: Damn - now there's an idea. Perhaps I should start a group called "cute_young_females_interested_in_submitting_to_dep raved_lecherous_old_codgers_in_the_south_east" and await the floods of responses ... I like the idea, but i might suggest you work on the name a little. Think of the icons you could have! x

You mean I should try something a little shorter and to the point? Maybe "Insane_Sub_Girls" ... ?

*UPDATE* Model(s) for "how to" bondage photographs (and other bondage photographs) have now been found. Thank you to all who showed interest.

Happiness is a warm bum

I think one of the better aspects from my side is that people can post and start a new thread without joining the network, some groups don't. That way it's more of a sharing of ideas, concepts and a few personal writings. I also wanted it to be more U.K. orientated where people could get the facts on events. Fetlife is based in Canada and there are loads of Poly groups on there, it's hopeless if your British. I wanted something over here and only IC provides this.

The chat room is a dead loss though, unless I have the wrong browser, I can't see any chat logs.

I have never had any complaints about breaking the AUP, so people seem to use it responsibly, I did watch one thread recently where people posted accounts of there relationship, fortunately it didn't end in some slanging match!

I did set up an e-mail response for people who wanted to join the group which was quite handy as I was able to respond fairly quickly and add people if I havn't signed in for a while.

I noticed a lot of Poly threads mainly end up on the D/s board though!

I think the groups feature was a good addition to the IC website, despite the fractured moaners.

*Choose Freedom* Sign up to http://www.caan.org.uk

i started a couple of threads in the first few weeks, but not for ages now. Informed_debate pretty much perpetuates itself, though it does seem to go through activity spurts. i suppose when there's a lot going on it's visible in peoples' subscriptions page and that prompts them to post. it's a shame a lot of activity isn't visible to anyone but subscribers in that way, as it might encourage more people to get involved.

a small ongoing gripe on that theme is that the groups page is ordered by membership not recent posts, contrary to the rest of the site. it makes it very static, which in itself is dull. It means too that the slow moving old behemoths like kinky singles, which has had only 14 new threads this year, squat immovably on perky little groups like maids market, which despite being less than half its size has had as many threads in the last month. it's not an entirely selfless argument, as kinky singles also squats on Informed_debate. but i wouldn't make it unless i thought it was also a valid one.

it's not without its issues, but i'm generally really impressed with how people behave on Informed_debate, and should probably take a moment here to thank any of our posters reading this. i feared initially that it would be a lot of work to moderate and that there'd be some really silly and vicious disputes to resolve, but to their very great credit most of our posters seem really to want to dispute their points civilly. of course nobody is perfect, and there are some particular topics and posters which need an eye keeping on them, but overall i think it's a track record to be proud of. as far as i can recall we've only had one serious contravention of the posting guidelines and as soon as i intervened that poster removed himself voluntarily from the group. there've been a couple of other reported posts, but nothing that has been substantially upheld.

that said, as far as moderator control goes, i do feel a bit like i'm operating with one hand tied behind my back. it's partly my own fault i think because a) i haven't sought out any moderating guidelines or help pages on IC - though i'm pretty sure none exist and b) because of my group's explictly 'open to all' remit i don't require membership in order to post, and what you don't give you can't take away.

what i'd like to see ideally are perhaps are some mod help pages, just giving a bit of best practice guidance about how you can run a group, both subjectively and practically. and then a bit more flexibilty. i'm admin on another site (which runs on "off the shelf" forum software) and my mods have access to a whole range of tools - they can move posts to new threads if they think they're going off topic, they can edit them, they can merge them, they can merge threads. perhaps most usefully though though they can run a user infraction system, so that if someone consistently steps over the line in a small way, their behaviour can be managed and dealt with fairly in the long run.

as far as starting another group, no thoughts of doing so, no. i only started this one because i thought faery's premise was unfair. though i noticed the other day there isn't one for shibari, which seems strange given its overall popularity. perhaps the riggers and their rope bunnies are all tied up elsewhere. (boom boom )

ETA. ahem. i overcame my laziness long enough to discover there is a groups help page. thanks IC.

Edited 19 Sep 11, 2:30 PM by shit_sub

SOS

The Titter group - for when you don't feel too serious.
I believe in equality for everyone, except reporters and photographers. - Mahatma Gandhi
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I've had a few drama Llama moments but I look at them as marketing moments i notice if a certain person posts people will subscribe to see what happens next.

And will look at the rest of the posts and join thus numbers will go up.

I'm not a @bohnanza but i noticed it on the a few threads especially on the drama llama fest (or as i like to call it people discovering the truth) i was recently involved in.

Also certain events numbers (say as going) increases when they think there is a rumble in the jungle (ie arguement/fight) so to speak.