Lack of new people is killing the backroom and the entire forum

[caravel]

I am not at all trying to defame your character.

You could have fooled me. So far you have hardly addressed any points in this thread and your first post was in page four in response to me. This indicates to me that you were not interested in this thread or responding to my points but in attacking my character and trying to cast doubt on my credibility.

There was no indication of sarcasm in that final reply of yours (the discussion on swearing). Maybe you meant it to be but it was not at all clear to me. Lets put an end to that discussion...
A little? In my eyes you were one of the more hardball Mods in here, so I can't really look at your current argument without wondering about the agenda. But that could be why you chose to create an alt to post this.

Whether you detected the sarcasm in my reply or not it irrelevant. Suppose I have changed my position? What business is that of yours? Do you see trolls and blackguards around every corner, if so you've been in this game too long. Why do you find it ethical to try to undermine my character and quote me from a private forum, that's what I'm having trouble understanding here?

To say I was a "hardball" mod is nonsense. I never believed in nannying, mollycoddling or playing social worker but I've always believe in fairness. Look for my posts around the time the EB Tavern was nuked and you'll surprisingly see that I was against it. My opinion on the social groups was that they should be moderated just like the rest of the board - moderation involves deleting porn (which was posted in there) and censoring swearing (due to the lack of a filter). That has not changed. I've already said that the .org does not have to turn into a flamefest.

I can only assume that you're deliberately misconstruing what I'm saying in order to portray me as some kind of hypocrite or someone with an agenda. If you have those suspicions, do you really think this is the right place to air them?

The Avatar thing is to me not important at all. All though I was awarded a unique avatar once for my exemplary behaviour. I don't think Tosa is against personal avatars, but I guess he likes them to conform to a certain theme. Both mine and Andres' avatars are custom made. You only have to ask Tosa to load them in to the portfolio.

This is a good example. It's "not important" to you. It may be to someone else, but more importantly it affects the perception of this place as seen by outsiders. It makes the .org appear overly restrictive. A prospective member will not be aware of this nor will he want to go through that hassle. Why on earth should a member have to ask an admin for a custom avatar, wait and get it approved. They can simply go to the TWC, upload their avatar and job done.

When I first joined up here 8 years ago, there was a member system based on post count. You couldn't choose the avatar, but it changed with the post count. I remember I liked it and it encouraged me to post more to get to the next level.

That's the usual veteran members attitude of "if it was good enough for me..." etc. Back in the day you had to use the basic avatars for IIRC emissaries and diplomats, but as your post count advanced you'd get access to kings and generals, etc. While this might have seemed like something to strive for back then, I don't think it cuts it today and reintroducing it would be a bad move. The "back in my day.." attitude is not going to help here and is one of the main issues that has been discussed.