Update on Situation (not a "rant" post)
Feb 15, 2019 2:52:39 GMT -5
Post by Noland Hardy on Feb 15, 2019 2:52:39 GMT -5
Considering the staff's morale has been restored, I'm going to post this now while it's still etched into everyone's memory, because there will be some resolution to all of this.
First and foremost, I decided to move the original update thread to the staff room so that only the staff can see it. I no longer deem it necessary to have it in public, and I'll explain why shortly.
Second, this will be a three part update. On this post, I'm going to address the controversy with a much calmer tone than before.
For those of you who haven't heard or are new and have no idea why an admin went crazy on the members, here it is. There has been an epidemic of people not following the rules, which caused the staff to lose motivation to continue with this site. While it does run deeper than that, I'll just leave it there.
Now, I want to give a more thorough explanation as to why I chose to post what I did. The general truth is that I have been very lackadaisical on rule enforcement in an effort to retain active members. As much as it was against my nature and my values, I consistently excused the inexcusable. I figured that if I was more patient than normal, then certain individuals would start to fall in line, and I wouldn't have had to be as strict as I used to be.
This was the wrong choice.
Before I knew it, the frustration was starting to build up, but it didn't just affect me. My fellow staff members were so disgusted by what they were seeing that they stopped doing things entirely. It even extended to the roleplay as well. In general, the motivation to do ANYTHING was depleted. I had more than enough once I began to realize what this all culminated into, so I came out with the update post.
Initially, I had planned to leave it at that, but one of the people that was addressed in the post made some comments. Those comments motivated me to go more in-depth with what I was talking about, because - as history clearly showed - simply saying something and moving on to something else was not going to fix the problem. I named and shamed a couple of people, because as a community, we deserve to know who is causing these problems and how they are affecting the processes here.
Do I feel bad for that thread? Yes, but not for the reason you're thinking of.
For the record, let it be known that I am more than happy that I did it. That is for two reasons.
One, it allowed me to get over my fear of strictness and to do what's best for the site as a whole instead of worrying about numbers. Two, it exposed the toxicity of one of the people causing the problems.
You may have seen in the chatbox or in discord about me banning someone, and I sure did. ULI is out of here. He did more than just constantly break the rules; he didn't care, he thought it was funny, and - worst of all - he deliberately chose to ignore it in favor of bossing me around as if the system was the problem and not him. There was no hope for him. I'm glad he's gone.
I'm not glad that it took me that long to deal with him. My failure to act lowered the morale of the staff, and THAT is why I'm in the dumps over it. I failed them, and I failed all of you for allowing the problem people to run rampant and to get this reaction out of me.
So, to summarize:
People were constantly breaking the rules without any sign of comprehension.
I mistakenly allowed this continue until it reached a breaking point, which caused the update thread to be made.
No, I'm not sorry for making the thread. I'm glad it was made and will happily make another one.
ULI is banned.
I failed the staff, and I'm sorry.
You better believe that there won't be any mercy from the staff from here on out. You either comprehend the rules, or leave. It's that simple. I couldn't care less about who's active or not. You break the rules, then see ya. That's all there is to it.
First and foremost, I decided to move the original update thread to the staff room so that only the staff can see it. I no longer deem it necessary to have it in public, and I'll explain why shortly.
Second, this will be a three part update. On this post, I'm going to address the controversy with a much calmer tone than before.
For those of you who haven't heard or are new and have no idea why an admin went crazy on the members, here it is. There has been an epidemic of people not following the rules, which caused the staff to lose motivation to continue with this site. While it does run deeper than that, I'll just leave it there.
Now, I want to give a more thorough explanation as to why I chose to post what I did. The general truth is that I have been very lackadaisical on rule enforcement in an effort to retain active members. As much as it was against my nature and my values, I consistently excused the inexcusable. I figured that if I was more patient than normal, then certain individuals would start to fall in line, and I wouldn't have had to be as strict as I used to be.
This was the wrong choice.
Before I knew it, the frustration was starting to build up, but it didn't just affect me. My fellow staff members were so disgusted by what they were seeing that they stopped doing things entirely. It even extended to the roleplay as well. In general, the motivation to do ANYTHING was depleted. I had more than enough once I began to realize what this all culminated into, so I came out with the update post.
Initially, I had planned to leave it at that, but one of the people that was addressed in the post made some comments. Those comments motivated me to go more in-depth with what I was talking about, because - as history clearly showed - simply saying something and moving on to something else was not going to fix the problem. I named and shamed a couple of people, because as a community, we deserve to know who is causing these problems and how they are affecting the processes here.
Do I feel bad for that thread? Yes, but not for the reason you're thinking of.
For the record, let it be known that I am more than happy that I did it. That is for two reasons.
One, it allowed me to get over my fear of strictness and to do what's best for the site as a whole instead of worrying about numbers. Two, it exposed the toxicity of one of the people causing the problems.
You may have seen in the chatbox or in discord about me banning someone, and I sure did. ULI is out of here. He did more than just constantly break the rules; he didn't care, he thought it was funny, and - worst of all - he deliberately chose to ignore it in favor of bossing me around as if the system was the problem and not him. There was no hope for him. I'm glad he's gone.
I'm not glad that it took me that long to deal with him. My failure to act lowered the morale of the staff, and THAT is why I'm in the dumps over it. I failed them, and I failed all of you for allowing the problem people to run rampant and to get this reaction out of me.
So, to summarize:
People were constantly breaking the rules without any sign of comprehension.
I mistakenly allowed this continue until it reached a breaking point, which caused the update thread to be made.
No, I'm not sorry for making the thread. I'm glad it was made and will happily make another one.
ULI is banned.
I failed the staff, and I'm sorry.
You better believe that there won't be any mercy from the staff from here on out. You either comprehend the rules, or leave. It's that simple. I couldn't care less about who's active or not. You break the rules, then see ya. That's all there is to it.
Battalix Dragonoid :: 2000G