Elephant in the Room (xpost with /r/mcpublic)

[schererererer]

So what exactly is the elephant in the room:

 

Are people unhappy that they feel out of the loop? How can we as staff better keep people informed and keep the community involved and feeling they have a say in things and help remove this conceived "us vs them" mentality?

 

Is the community simply angry at the actions of a few staff members and not the entirety of it? How do we plan to work it out with those individuals and prevent incidents like this from happening again? Can we even prevent incidents like this? If it can't be prevented or addressed entirely is there really a reason for getting the community involved?

Thank you for injecting a reference point into this quagmire. Far too much of this "discussion" right now is debating the merits and attributes of individuals themselves.

 

From what I can tell, the primary motivating factor that comprises the "elephant in the room" is the accusation and subsequent perception (warranted or not) that a significant portion of the staff have a predisposition toward unilateral action, hostility and/or indifference toward criticism, reduced transparency, and have made a variety of minor abuses of power - particularly accusations of favoritism. The members of this camp feel that these problems have been brought up and summarily dismissed in the past over the course of many months, and that a large number of active, prominent players have mostly left nerd.nu in response, until recently fairly quietly. They contend that administration has ignored these complaints up until now, when Tharine's departure and revelation of troubling conversations made in confidence were revealed, and believe that there has been no response from staff besides denouncements of 'drama' and 'toxicity'.

 

I feel as though almost everyone involved has the best interests of the server in mind, though I'm not familiar with all of the specifics, because there are people on both sides (and in the middle) whose opinions and thoughts I respect. The "us vs them" mentality does us no favors in what is certainly not a simple matter.

 

My primary concern is with this theme of polarization - it is from here the suspicion of criticism, siding with "allies", and disregarding "enemies" come from - on both sides of the aisle. I think that assumption of good faith is severely lacking all around when it comes to sensitive issues. I do have specific concerns with some of the enumerated problems above, but this is the root aspect we must deal with - through collaboration and compromise.

[Zuziza]

I agree very much with your summary schererererer. Some generalizing and summary is necessary to make this complex issue a bit more "digestible", and hopefully no one takes it as you trying to designate sides.   

 

I think saberfysh's post on the forum also does a good job of explaining exactly what the non-staff are faced with:  

 

 

None of the drama behind the scenes has directly impacted the way people play on this server, so I generally am fine with leaving the politics to the politicians. But when the whole pot boils over and we have to read how nasty a spill it was, you can't help but think that something is wrong with how people are treating each other over Minecraft, and that it needs to be at least addressed, if not dealt with.

I do not know if or how often the pressures of running RedditMC as a head admin has caused people to explode and rage internally. If it means staffing up to reduce overall workload on everyone, that should be looked into. That aside, my problem with this particular incident is that it doesn't seem like a misunderstanding between people who intend to resolve their differences in a civilized way, or at least agree to disagree. Instead it shows a fundamental lack of respect, trust, and communication between the people in charge of upholding the virtues, rules, and continued success of the server.

I like this server and the people that play here. I don't want it to suffer destabilization, become ostracized, and then acrimoniously shut down over something that is entirely within their control. So before something like this happens again, I'll simply point out server rule #1: Don't be a dick. If all players obey it, then so should the staff. Leaders by nature are exemplary people that represent the RedditMC community, and with great power comes great responsibility. They wouldn't write this as part of their rules if it didn't reflect their values. There will be problems, and people are only human, but the focus should be on dealing with problems, not each other. And if players get banned for breaking these rules, I don't want to see staff break them simply because they're in charge.

 

The comment is on the subreddit thread, permalinked here.  

 

What people in this discussion have to realize first and foremost is that there is a divide of information. Non-staff do not have access to the same logs, chats, and other records that the staff do. We are looking at this situation after seeing something dragged out that was appalling to say the least. We have no method whatsoever of verifying anything staff has told us about the severity and frequency of these occurrences.  

 

The first thing nonstaff have done, after finding out about this and whether they read it or not, was decide whether it was important or not. Not everyone who plays is aware this has happened, and not everyone who knows thinks it's worth discussing. Next, what is there to discuss? Are they upset specifically because Tharine was involved, and therefore it affects S? Were they upset because this pertains to an issue that was brought up in the logs during the arguments? Are they upset at the behavior? Are they upset at the response?  

 

There's a lot of people who are a mix of any of those things. Some are holding to just one of them, and others to all of them. However, saberfysh's comment does well at summarizing what the basic problem is for any such combination. "it shows a fundamental lack of respect, trust, and communication between the people in charge of upholding the virtues, rules, and continued success of the server."

 

The staff responses, while obviously not completely representative of the staff as a whole, have been varied.  

 

Some were apologetic:

 

 

 

More than anything else, I'm sorry this situation has happened. The users don't need this kind of thing happening in the background of a game they like to play.

 

Some believed that this is just a symptom that there are issues to be dealt with, and they will be in time: 

 

 

 

Shit's not fucked, it's not broken. Sure, we've got a little cleaning up to do, and there's days I have second thoughts about my position as a server admin here, but this too shall pass.

 

Some think this is blown out of proportion:  

 

 

 

However, there's a reason that so many staff are taking the stance that "it's no big deal". We all do this.

 

Some, like some nonstaff, are tired of the topic:

 

 

 

Goddamn I'm sick of hearing about this bullshit.

 

(Note: names were left out and links not given in the instance one of these comments gets deleted and the author wishes not to be connected to it.)

 

What many of us are looking for is for acknowledgement of a specific problem. While I only gave short clips of various comments, none of these comments or any other staff commentary has done that.  

 

Any nonstaff member can say "X is the problem". Several comments by staffmembers in the subreddit post have included commentary along the lines of the following:

 

 

 

Play the game, support the community, send your feedback, but don't expect it to go anywhere ever. Expect results when you have a bugfix to report, or a support request submitted. Don't like it? Bail. There are only about a thousand other Minecraft communities in the world.

 

It's been repeated several times that nonstaff input is irrelevant. Not by troublemakers, drama starters, or trolls. It was told by staff. 

 

Hearing a final response on what the staff has decided is what many of us are looking for. We want to hear what staff thinks about this problem. Is it a problem? If it is, what will they do to fix it?  

 

The ball is in their court. The rest of us are just watching to see what comes of this. To repeat: this decision won't change playing on the server at all. This is just something that many of us think is important, and we want to hear something from staff about what the final decision is. 

[WayneByNumbers]

According to her leaving thread, she still had the trust of the s players, who's trust do you think she broke? please elaborate.

 

Which of her ideas were actually implemented?

 

Since you asked, I will elaborate.  The trust I was referring to was that of the other administrators, as applying to the commonly understood practice of keeping staff discussions private.  Her views that were implemented were, first, the addition of more forum permissions to moderators, and, second, the deletion of JohnAdams1735's subreddit post which she felt reflected poorly on staff.  Both courses of action, the posted logs reveal, were taken.

 

 

"Play the game, support the community, send your feedback, but don't expect it to go anywhere ever. Expect results when you have a bugfix to report, or a support request submitted. Don't like it? Bail. There are only about a thousand other Minecraft communities in the world.[/size]"

 

It's been repeated several times that nonstaff input is irrelevant.

I can't speak for the other several times you reference, but I have to admit I recall seeing this comment and reading into it differently than you seem to have done.  Specifically, I think the meaning of the word "expect" could be interpreted a couple ways.  My impression of this comment was that it was saying, yes, participation and feedback are welcome, but no single player ever has the right to a guarantee that their ideas will be used, and those who can't accept that are free to leave if they wish.  I agree the wording could be taken other ways, and it would be up to the poster of this comment to clarify the intentions (I refer you back to my previous monstrosity of a sentence, ¶ 2, bemoaning the limitations of text-only interactions).

 

Hearing a final response on what the staff has decided is what many of us are looking for. We want to hear what staff thinks about this problem. Is it a problem? If it is, what will they do to fix it?

Well, if you want to hear what I think of all this, I could tell you, but I can't speak for all of Staff, and I'm glad that you've noted that staff members' individual responses have been just that; individual.  Announcement of an official statement, collaborated upon by the admins, is probably what you're looking for.  I have to admit, I would like to see one as well, if only to put the whole matter to fitful rest.  All this discussion about transparency, civility, and the role of staff members vs. players is not an issue that started with Tharine.

 

Maybe we need a constitution or something.

[SpiderMan]

Edit: Instead of Downvoting, please reply,

 

Thanks,

 

-gsand

 

 

 
Since you asked, I will elaborate.  The trust I was referring to was that of the other administrators, as applying to the commonly understood practice of keeping staff discussions private.  Her views that were implemented were, first, the addition of more forum permissions to moderators, and, second, the deletion of JohnAdams1735's subreddit post which she felt reflected poorly on staff.  Both courses of action, the posted logs reveal, were taken.
 

 

ah, so those were her only 2 requests, the ones that caused her to ragequit. It doesn't make sense she would ragequit like that...

 

 

gsand, you're correct that I have said this before in IRC, and I found myself incapable of responding to questions there in a timely manner that that medium usually follows. I posted these comments here to put my observations and opinions on record as a better way to responsibly discuss them.

 

I appreciated your apology the first time.

 

 

In response to your request for further explanaiton of harm, Tharine's unilateral choice to post private chat logs has taken away a secure  and private location for staff to have discussions.

 

The primary issue most players appear to have is the toxicity of those discussions.  She was very meticulous in sanitizing² those logs.

 

 

 

 

² relatively

 

 

We served you better because we had a private place where we could develop ideas together, which we could not on our own.

 

From my perspective it appears to be mostly gossip. I'm sure you're capable of forming ideas all by yourself.

 

 

 

It helped us form a strong sub-community within nerd.nu's staff.

 

A lot of people consider that to be one of the main problems.

Edited September 27, 2013 by gsand

[SpiderMan]

We also (and primarily) served you better by having a secure place to discuss server security preventing threats from damaging the community.

 

The contents of that chat room did more damage to the remaining community than her departure. Also, care to elaborate on the those threats?

 

 

 

Without these being assured I do not feel we serve you as well as we once did. I call taking that away "harming the community".

 

 

So by getting caught with your pants down, it means that you can no longer moderate efficiently on a minecraft server.

 

 

 

Unless I missed something I didn't dictate any player's opinion, in fact I stressed how your opinion matters to me in the post you responded to. Though you might believe my opinion is "trash", I am open to having my opinion changed, and the only way to do that is by discussing it.

 

Please note the usage of the word "we" below. Does that not seem like character assasination?

 

This person does not have nerd.nu's best interests at heart, and has violated our trust deeply in her most recent actions. Hopefully, you will then understand if we consider any points made as part of this final derogatory action to be anathema.

 

 

 

I take your, and other members opinions that Tharine has long been one of our most upstanding, and hard working admins very seriously. I don't believe that history has a direct bearing on how she is likely to act towards the community at the moment, her character, given her action which started this discussion. Her noted history will affect how I value any future communications and actions she has with the server and myself and is not to be disregarded.

 

 

Ah, you dont believe history has a direct bearing on how she is likely act towards the community... are you refering to the player community or the admin/mod subcommunity you mentioned earlier.

 

 

Her actions are far more harmful in my opinion than any of the issues she brought up and validated by that action. I think we simply disagree on that point and perhaps my above explanation of "harm" has changed your opinion. I do think her issues should be addressed and discussed, but preventing the associated actions holds priority for me in the immediate future.

 

Ah, the blaming the messenger. Also, your opinion has not changed my own opinion in the slightest.

 

 

I am not seeking to assassinate anyone's character. As bad as Tharine's actions were in my opinion, I still think there are ways I could welcome her back to the community eventually. I'm definitely not seeking to insult you, Tharine, or anyone, and so I hope I have been direct in responding to your issues.

 

Really, you can't be serious? explain the following:

 

This person does not have nerd.nu's best interests at heart, and has violated our trust deeply in her most recent actions. Hopefully, you will then understand if we consider any points made as part of this final derogatory action to be anathema.

[Synergetrick]

While nitpicking each others' posts is all well and good, the topic of discussion appears to have very quickly been dissolved. Can we please try and remain on point here? The forum is the best medium for communication and potential resolution of these issues. While I understand that grade-school microscopes are great tools, they're not particularly useful on forum posts.

That said, there are people from both sides who, on a scale from "not having any idea" to "first-hand involvement" probably fell off the scale somewhere on the left side. While the opinions of survival players may have a degree of bias, we (well, some of us) are the players that have known Tharine from player through to administrator - her dedication to the server was nothing short of impressive. Yes, she sometimes took calls from mediums outside of the game (Facebook, Steam, Skype), however it wasn't out of obsession but out of a care for the playerbase. Contrary to WayneByNumbers' post I believe she managed things quite well, and I know of multiple times that people were told to take other mediums of communication (i.e., that Facebook, Steam, Skype were not appropriate) in order to get something resolved.

I feel it necessary to reiterate something that another player said the other day about the logs being posted. I've had trouble so far coming up with a way to put it in as many words, but "Tharine's loyalty was to the players, not to the staff 'gang'" sums it up nicely. It definitely was MCPublic's best interests at heart, but where those "best interests" actually are is what's separating the majority of the playerbase; without the players these servers are nothing.

 

Character assassination is not the way to go here, nor is projection or speculation. If you're going to add something to the conversation, please make sure it has a factual basis.

[MasterCommaThe]

I think if you change any statement where I said "we" to "I" your issues will be resolved, I do not speak for everyone. As I said before, I was trying to explain staff's response, not just my own. My statement was too authoritative and that caused confusion. Sorry.

 

Focusing on the issues Tharine brought up and whether I feel they need to be addressed. I do not think there is a strong problem of "players vs. staff" from my own observations of Mod Chat. I think there is a strong need for a private place to discuss server issues, and that the subcommunity that has formed around moderating the servers generally carries healthy (non-toxic) discussion. I think Tharine's chat logs show good examples of where that is not true, and where we can do better, but are not a reason to overall change our policy, which should be formalized.

 

[SpiderMan]

I think if you change any statement where I said "we" to "I" your issues will be resolved, I do not speak for everyone. As I said before, I was trying to explain staff's response, not just my own. My statement was too authoritative and that caused confusion. Sorry.

 

Ah, thank you for clarifying.

 

 

Focusing on the issues Tharine brought up and whether I feel they need to be addressed. I do not think there is a strong problem of "players vs. staff" from my own observations of Mod Chat. I think there is a strong need for a private place to discuss server issues, and that the subcommunity that has formed around moderating the servers generally carries healthy (non-toxic) discussion. I think Tharine's chat logs show good examples of where that is not true, and where we can do better, but are not a reason to overall change our policy, which should be formalized.

 

The actual chat logs prove that there is a players vs staff issue. It's made worse by the fact that the subcommunity exists and isn't transparent in any way or responsive to the changes that the player base suggests.

 

Also:

 

https://nerd.nu/forum/index.php?/topic/405-becoming-a-moderator-is-not-a-promotion/

[WayneByNumbers]

Ok, specifics:

 

ah, so those were her only 2 requests, the ones that caused her to ragequit. It doesn't make sense she would ragequit like that...

 

Perhaps you're thinking I was speaking categorically; sorry for not being clearer.  I was limiting my responses to only the logs Tharine posted, and I certainly agree it wouldn't make sense for her to ragequit over just the conversation she used as an example.  There was more to it, and she said so.

 

And Synergetrick, perhaps you misunderstood my intentions in my original essa... post.  I never used the word obsession, I said care and dedication.  On re-reading her post, I do see that yes, she did in fact often tell people to leave her alone on inappropriate channels, but she also said that that didn't help much.  I do believe Tharine, and you, when you say that she really did want to benefit the servers through her actions as SAdmin; I never believed otherwise.  What I really wanted to get across is that too much of this whole hoopla seems to be based on the assumption of malicious intent where there was none.  I don't think any players (or the rest of the all-too-few SAdmins) intended to be a part of overworking Tharine and ruining the game for her, I don't think the other admins were actually trying to drive her away in chat, and I don't think anyone in this discussion is either trying to uphold some kind of tyrannical regime or to incite mass revolt.

 

If anyone has any more questions for me personally, please do ask.  As you've probably figured out, I don't really mind explaining myself.

 

Now more general:

 

In the interest of moving the conversation out of neutral, I'd like to try something; everyone who wants to, include in your next post what you would like to see happen, and, optionally, why, so at least we all know where each other are coming from.  I realize this carries a risk of descending to people responding with what a terrible idea something is and that someone is a terrible person for having it.  I hope one thing everyone can agree on is that no one wants that.

 

What I would like to see happen is maybe an official statement from the Head Admin team, or Admin team in general, with whatever they deem appropriate a message for the community as a whole so that everyone (players and staff) knows where the leadership of the server stands.  I would also like to see a little more formalization of staff-level decision-making, I do feel it's gotten a little "comfortable" as the server has aged.  I also think it would be a good idea to expand the Admin team a bit (somehow), to both spread the collective workload and encourage communication.  Above all, I'd like to see the community get back to discussing Minecraft.

 

Reemphasizing that these are just ideas, not promises or "causes."

[tobylane]

I think we're at a point where there are so many idea for game change, the vast majority of which are damaging to the community even if they don't sound like it. The admins don't have the time to explain why each of them are bad, partly because some people rightly just won't see it that way. If the admins don't explain, they are a mysterious controlling box of magic to be despised. The only way out of that that I can see (and please add more ways) is player discussion without any kind of reality-check from the admins for a week or so. Which wouldn't really work as the staff are players too, and would be drawn in on IRC/etc, and the playerbase could get behind something technically impractical.