Moderator Sign-ups

[sprat.livejournal.com]

Although the first few discussions in this community will be moderated by gurrier or sprat, we would eventually like to share this responsibility with other members of the community.

How we think it'll work:

* Each Monday, a new story will be linked for discusssion by its author. The author will include a contact email for you, the weekly moderator, at the bottom of her post.

* Once that initial post has been made, your duty as moderator for the week begins. You will need to watch the comments as they are posted to make sure that everyone who participates in the discussion is following the guidelines for the community. If there are concerns about a comment posted while you are not around to see it, participants will be asked to email you to let you know about it (rather than engaging with the commenter themselves).

* Some comments you might need to delete outright (i.e.: "YOUR STORY IS SUXXOR!!1!" or "You are obviously just writing this story to deal with your own deep-seated psychological issues, which I will helpfully list right here." And etc.).

* Other comments may need a little more thought--does the poster seem to have been trying to engage in a rational discussion, but has veered away from the guidelines a little? In that case, you may just want to step in with a comment reminding them to stick to the rules. But if the comment seems to be steering the discussion away from a useful critique of the story, you will need to delete it.

* It's okay for you to participate in the discussion, too--and in fact, it would be cool if you could keep things moving by asking questions, etc--but as moderator, it's obviously a good idea for you to try to stay neutral in any polarized debates.

* At the end of the week--say on Sunday afternoon--either the story's author or one of the comm's maintainers will freeze the comment threads on the post and edit the post itself to say that the discussion is closed. At that time, you can read through what was discussed and make a second post summarising all the major points brought up that week.

* Then you're done!


If this sounds like something you'd like to do:

1) Join the community
2) Participate in a few discussions.
3) Comment below with a contact email address to sign up! We will email you to set up dates and details.