JMO, but I think this thread has started to outlive its usefulness.
Let me recap quickly the issues we have seen and addressed:
1. The thread being moved. New guidelines were set forth by me in this thread as far as posts with photos in them. From this point forward, those will be followed by the mods. The thread in question was retroactively moved back to where it started by me, because I felt that conformed with the new guidelines. Tooloud has put forth the proposition of a new forum. We will consider the support for or against this forum, if the majority of members who speak out want it, we’ll give it to you. The minority will have to live with it, because we simply can’t please everyone. That’s just the reality of being part of a community. If the arguments going on here spill over to Tooloud’s suggestion thread, it will be locked and the mods will have to decide if the forum will be created or not. A simple “for” or “against” would be a much better way to express your opinion in that thread, I think we are all very well aware of the reasons why you would feel either way.
2. Consistency in moderation/overpolicing. We feel this is a justified concern, and the staff was already making progress in addressing the situation. Yesterday morning, before any of this started, Teri and I distributed new guidelines to the moderators concerning edits or the private requesting of edits. We feel the new guidelines will help us work toward becoming more consistent and fair in the future. There is no instant solution here, we have to try our best as we go, so you may not see the results of this action instantly. As a result, you will be seeing much less editing going on, and when it does happen it will take longer to happen- it will be a deliberate process rather than a reactionary one. This presents the members who may be offended the opportunity to do so by reporting threads. This will give us all a better idea of what the community as a whole will tolerate and what you won’t. In retrospect, I should have brought forth this information sooner, but I did allude to it in my first post on this thread.
I want to thank you all for speaking up, but again, if this thread continues to degenerate into circular arguments that accomplish nothing, it will be locked. I don’t want to do that. So if you reply here, this is what I suggest you reply with:
Any outstanding issues that haven’t been addressed and what you propose we do to fix it.
If you want to continue to argue the details, I suggest you take it private, keeping in mind that personal attacks will not be tolerated in private just as they are not in public.
It’s time to move forward, guys.
Travis