Talk:Livestream Chat Guidelines

MediaCritic's Q&A
Original via Contact Form, Fri, 25 Mar 2011 00:35:57 +0200 (EET), reply interspersed with quotes:


 * MediaCritic314: Just to follow up [on an earlier email] (having read the new chat
 * guidelines that place a greater emphasis on not talking back to the
 * mods (and not being a jerk, of course), I've felt that my choice when
 * a mod takes a disrespectful/confrontory approach is between backing
 * down (not happening), resisting (not good for community respect of
 * mods if permitted), or leaving the community (not the greatest
 * option, though this may ultimately be necessary).

And then there's the option you've taken here, which is to privately contact me so that I can discuss these concerns with interested parties.


 * I think that since the cool SMP stuff the channel was doing (not only
 * Funnyman's GMTools mod, but also yours and Abs' SMP survival plays)
 * have been paused pending more stable mod development, the channel has
 * lost a lot of viewers and growth,

It's not just that, either -- if you've noticed, many streamers are currently at a point where they have to back off and deal with other things for a while, and this has resulted in the autopilot playing for long periods of time. It's basically a slow time at the moment.


 * and the chat has correspondingly stagnated (the origin of the
 * 'arguments' about color).

This, I'm not certain of. The chat has always tended to stick to the same memes, especially if they're ones that we (streamers and chat) created together. This mostly makes sense as an aid to a feeling of 'belonging' to the group.

The arguments about color, though, in particular, have never (in my opinion) been entertaining, and they've actually frustrated some streamers [...] to the point where they haven't really contributed as much as they might've done otherwise.


 * I'm hoping that sort of content comes back someday and that the
 * channel gets more Coe's Quest endorsements to re-popularize it, but I
 * don't know what to expect (or whether that's even something the
 * content generators are interested in).

Every time that's been brought up while I was around, the consensus was that we'd like to start doing those things again. There are some difficulties involved, however, as you've noted.


 * At this point, I've probably put more thought into these comments
 * than likely required, but you called me out on Livestream and wanted
 * to know what's on my mind, so yeah.

I was hoping you'd get around to a private communication channel like this. My impression of you was that you had good reasons for what you said, so I was very unpleasantly surprised to find you arguing seemingly for the sake of arguing. I'm glad to learn this latest impression was a mistaken one.


 * I'm actually pretty curious as to what you think. This essentially
 * seems to be your community: where do you stand on how the stream's
 * community has gone and where you'd like it to be?

As in everything where more than one person is involved, there are compromises, miscommunication, and many other difficulties. Overall, my impression to date is that, with help from the moderators, we've kept together a mostly friendly, open, helpful community without turning into internet help desk or into 4chan.

For the future, I'd like to put together some sane guidelines for moderation, but that's only the first step, and it's minor compared to the big question: how do we enforce moderation rules? Moderators have little power over one another, and to get anyone de-moderatored, we'd need to take up Coe's time, which is precious little already.

A less than pleasant, but interesting option would be to step away from the Coe "brand", and start a different channel with the same crew (and with visits from Coe), but with someone else as the super-mod (probably myself, since I seem to have time for that). Aside from other difficulties, what are your thoughts on this? What do you think the community would do?


 * When a game is being streamed, do you want them to be giving advice
 * to the streamer, chatting as spectators, or do you not care if
 * they're off topic completely?

In general, advice shouldn't be given unless asked for. As stated in the guidelines, we don't like it when the people invited to look over our shoulder insist on saying "put the black 7 on the red 8" -- but if I said "I'm not sure what I should do here", I would appreciate suggestions and advice. Otherwise, chatting as spectators is ideal, but not always possible -- the Gothic series, for instance, consists of a lot of drudgery while following a marginally interesting plot, and there's not that much to talk about ("Oh, killed another molerat, nice, that's 500 now, isn't it?"). Off-topic, therefore, is not only allowed but even encouraged as long as on-topic comments are allowed their place in the spotlight.


 * How much reverence is due a mod for mod status alone?

If someone is a mod, that means they're a streamer -- therefore, when they're streaming, what they say goes (within reasonable limits that I need to draw up and write out). When they're not streaming, things get interesting. Firstly, they are content creators, so you don't want to piss them off until they stop wanting to contribute. On the other hand, you don't want to give them leeway to turn someone else's rules around[...].

You asked about reverence, though, and the answer has to be: as much as you have for the stream itself. As you've pointed out above, arguing too much with a moderator will undermine their power, and this is a bad thing because it undermines all moderators' power, and forces them to be more heavy-handed (and drive viewers/chatters away). Ideally, if you have a problem with a moderator other than myself, you'll want to accept their judgement and then privately contact me so that we can resolve the issue out of the limelight -- not airing our dirty laundry in public.


 * How much idle/non-clever trolling is too much? (Of course, you can
 * never have too much genuinely clever trolling)

That's a function of the streamer, the time of day, the phase of the moon, and alignment of the electrons in a predetermined atom of carbon currently located somewhere in the back of my hand. When I'm tired, my tolerance for tardness drops heavily and I'll use the banhammer more (as you've noticed). When I'm well-rested, in a good mood, etc., I'll allow almost anything and prefer to warn before banning. We're dealing with humans, and trying to set down a specific rule here, at best, will fail horribly half of the time. Tonight I was short on patience and wanted the argument over with -- and since I couldn't remove Dread (nor saw a good reason to do so), I removed you from the conversation. It definitely ended the argument, though I hope it didn't create any lasting resentment -- there was a logic to it.

Finally, to come back to an earlier point: if you have a problem with me and how I do what I do, you can just tell me, privately, and ask for me to explain myself. I try not to be capricious and to be fair. My desired outcome is a chat where people can come and hang out, discuss things with others of similar interested, and not be trolled out of their minds or have to argue until they're blue in the face. My tools for this are words and bans, and I'd much rather use the former than the latter (and I don't really like that it's become a running joke that I'm "not myself" when I warn people instead of banning them, but such is life; if I have to make myself out to be the bad guy, I'll live with it).