Quote Originally Posted by Subotan View Post
In IMHO, the awards are part of the problem. They encourage clique-iness
Funny, we were just talking about that the other day over champagne and caviar in the Awards Lounge...

As to some of the points discussed:

1) It may be time to drop all restrictions on new members, at least for a trial period and see how it goes. There are so few restrictions (editing and Backroom?) on the accounts now, why not? There were/are reasons for it, but despite the intentions, the system seems to be seen as a "guilty until proven innocent" thing. Perception is reality.

2) A re-examination regarding the direction of the Org is a good thing. However, we don't know if the staff has done this already unless they open up the discussion to the general membership. I see no problem with staying with TW, but us of the old guard have to accept that the game has changed from STW/MTW and need to cultivate the fans of the newer releases. An appropriate moderator is not the key other than having their hand on the pulse of that particular community. A mod is a mod - not a cheerleader.

3) In my experience, the selection of moderators is essentially based on maturity - showing good judgement in posting on sensitive issues, not trolling, avoiding troll bait and generally conducting themselves as good patrons. Active participation helps too.

4) As for limitations on what can be discussed, that is based more on how the topic is handled by the membership. Guns and abortion were banned topics long ago because they always ended in flame wars. A couple of years ago, it was decided to give them another try and this time around the discussions were handled much more maturely by the membership, so they are no longer verboten. Community wars (multiplayer, clan-based mostly) are off limits because Tosa and the staff doesn't want the Org to turn into a battleground for such games. The bottom line is that they want to Org to be a nice, fun place to visit. Any discussions that disrupt that turn into off limits topics.

That's my two cents.

BTW good topic and interesting discussion by all.