Another last straw.

[bladespark]

This is an public explanation of why I have left fursuit. While I hold no personal grudge against the moderator, I feel that the community is not being well moderated. One can be a good person and still lack the leadership skills needed to run such a community, which I think is the case here. The rules are far too numerous, and are far too irregularly enforced. I have stated my objections as posts related to sales were banned, as posts related to performance were banned, and as posts related to fur buying were banned. I feel that the community would be better served by being open to all fursuit related topics. However, if there are going to be rules, these rules should be fairly and consistently enforced.

I certainly do not think that the moderator had any malice in the way she is moderating the community, but her enforcement is very spotty. Some things which violate the rules are left, others are removed. And lately comments have been coming under fire as well. Today it seems an entire post, which was asking how to build a fursuit, was removed solely because the post mentioned incidentally that the poster had been defrauded when trying to buy one, and this was why she was looking to build instead. The comments, of course, mostly centered around the fraud, but several were also on topic, and removing an entire post simply because the comments strayed is going far beyond the bounds of appropriate moderation.

I commented to this effect myself, pointing out that the main post was on topic, and apologizing for taking part in the off topic comments, but of course this comment was also removed, without any response, along with the rest of the post.

Leaving this community was a serious decision for me, as it is a source of a great deal of valuable publicity and exposure for my business, but as comments are now being arbitrarily removed without explanation and without any real reason that I can see, I feel I no longer wish to be subjected to the risk that anything I say which is not perfectly in line with the moderator's vision of the community will be summarily deleted. Therefore I have left fursuit and this time I do not expect to return.

Having given my opinions about the way the community is run several times previously without seeing any changes, I do not feel like trying to fight this out with the moderator. I prefer to just leave.

Comments

:(

[aazhie.livejournal.com]

that sucks, although i have to agree. it is tough to moderate these kinds of things, but i see where you are coming from. :/

[scribe-of-stars.livejournal.com]

Wow. Are there any other communities of this sort you can join to promote your business?

[lanabananaotter.livejournal.com]

That's really stupid.
I mean, how sensitive is this lady?
Actually, this is past sensitive. This is like reminding everyone that she's the moderator and we have to follow her rules.

As if we were attacking or detracting from her community! It's not like a million friends pages were clogged up with off-topic spam posts! Geez.

Just retarded. *shakes head*

[lanabananaotter.livejournal.com]

I'd probably get flamed to Hell and back if I made a new fursuit community, right?

A community for everything and anything fursuit related?
Maybe people would find it handy.

[bladespark.livejournal.com]

There are already three or four such communities. The only one that gets any posts is fursuitlounge.

[bladespark.livejournal.com]

I'm in pretty much every fursuit community on the planet. I don't actually expect this to hurt my business much. *shrugs* I don't get any business directly from that community anyhow. Advertising my services or discussing purchases there is, after all, against the rules. It was just a little boost to my name and reputation as an expert, to be able to participate in discussions of methods there.

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

And yea the hills did echo with the sound of camel's backs breaking

[draggo.livejournal.com]

I stopped participating in that community a long time ago. Last time Iactually posted something I had others literally asking me stuff similar to how do they boil water in great detail. It seems like that they simply waned me to do all of the work for them.

Also moderating is not that hard to do. I've done it before. If the group gets bigger you get more moderators to keep up.

That group is not well ran at all. If they keep it up I predict that the group is going to fall apart sooner or later.

[aurora77]

Usually things are bad if a mod needs too many rules. The best-moderated communities I've seen have a couple of basic rules (usually pertaining to the scope of content and trying to limit duplicate posts and the like) and a few guidelines (which usually come down to respect for others and keeping a positive attitude). Most mods can get by using just those few because they're basic principles and can be applied to most situations.

[jordanis.livejournal.com]

A mod that resorts to too many rules completely hampers their own ability to moderate. Moderation is a dictatorship--your power is derived from your ability to make the call yourself. When you set too many rules, you either rob yourself of discretionary power by following them, or rob yourself of credibility (and the associated power) by not following them.

[aurora77]

Very true.

[lanabananaotter.livejournal.com]

Sorry, I was seriously not thinking straight that day. I know that's a silly excuse but it's the only real one I've got. lol

I've been sort of depressed lately and I'm kind of ashamed of those two comments. :(

Anyway, I totally forgot about fursuit lounge... even though it's on my friends page. haha