takeru51 said:
thetonestarr said:
I didn't read through this entire thread, but I think allowing guests to post would be a great idea. Just make sure they can only post replies, and not start new topics.
HOWEVER
I believe they should have to be approved first. As in, a moderator or administrator would have to log into the control panel (or however it is on these boards), and read through the posts to deem them acceptable.
That would be a heck of a lot of work, I know. That's where my next concept comes into play.
We'd probably have to appoint a few new moderators to help handle the extra load. I believe we'd get a pretty heavy mess of guest posts and it'd be too much of a workload for the current staff. I'd say, before enabling guest posts, we'd want to go with two new moderators to start with. Then, if it turns out we need more help, ioi can easily just appoint another moderator or two. Or three, however many it takes.
Sure, that means we'd have quite the staff here. However, think about it. Many people don't want to bother to register just to say something that happens to be on their mind. But, they still want to say something. Well, they see they've gotta register, and they decide, "Eh, it's no big deal. I don't need to say it." Then they never say it, they leave the site, and they never come back.
However, let's take it down Road B. This time around, that person comes in and wants to say something. They see that they can say it without bothering to register. So, they say it. Then, a day or two later, they get curious about what others may have said about their post. They come back, and they see that there were a few replies to what they said - including one reply that refuted the point they'd made. So, they decide to post again. This time, they decide maybe they actually SHOULD register, since they're coming back and all and getting involved in a fairly detailed discussion. Oh, and they click on a few ads and ioi gets paid big bucks for it too.
*cough.*
Point is, yes, it'll be a hassle. However, we can filter out all of the troll/spam posts by making all guest posts approval-only. And the extra hassle of doing that will be worth it because it ends up generating a greater degree of activity and traffic, which causes the site to grow even larger and more popular. Boiled down, there are a lot of things to be wary of when enabling guest posting, but done the right way, it can be a great blessing. |
Maybe instead of having full on moderators, just have a few extra people who are created to help sift through these extra posts? I think there'd be fewer claims about moderator abuse and bias if the only extra power these people had was to help get through these comments. That way you could appoint more of them and there would be less of a potential uproar over who was appointed. Sometimes I swear this is like a political forum and not a videogame forum with how passionate people can be towards their choice of circuits and plastic. |
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