Matthew Schenker
Member
- Joined
- Jan 15, 2007
- Messages
- 2,619
Everyone,
Due to some recent ruffles in the fabric of the Festool Owners Group, moderation of the off-topic areas is now changing.
We all need a place to express random non-woodworking ideas. That will remain the same. However, certain things just cannot continue, even in an "Off-Topic" zone. I have spent countless hours over the past month dealing with forum postings that are overly personal, intended to do damage, and generally out of character for the FOG. If I leave the post alone, members call on me to respond. If I craft a diplomatic response, it never seems to help once a damaging subject is out in the open. Truly, a no-win situation!
When an inappropriate discussion appears here, most members wisely prefer not to stir things up and instead choose to report the post to me offline. That means that most people never even see how much work goes into dealing with the mess created by negative postings. The vast majority of the effort to deal with damaging discussions occurs offline, in the tedious process of member-by-member correspondence.
It has been extremely difficult dealing with the negative posts that have appeared here recently. However, dealing with it has taught me something positive: about 99.98% (actual calculation) of Festool Owners Group members want peace, and support whatever actions are necessary to make that happen. I have listened to you, and am prepared to make this forum stronger in the face of challenges.
Until today, I have essentially left negative and damaging posts alone. That must now change. It has become too time consuming to deal with the aftermath of purely negative posts that add nothing to our community and are designed to cause disruption and harm. It risks alienating the vast majority of our members who don't want such things in their forum. Why would I allow that to continue?
Following the wisdom of the vast majority of FOG members, these kinds of posts will now be deleted without comment:
For 99.98% of our members, these new rules will not affect their posts in the least, because they have never done anything even close to what I'm describing. In other words, for the most part this is in response to 0.02% of members. Even so, the changes are necessary because that minuscule minority has had a disproportionate presence in the FOG.
Thank you to all those many members who have worked hard to make this forum a truly fun, exciting, informative, and positive community. This is your forum!
Stay in touch,
Matthew
Due to some recent ruffles in the fabric of the Festool Owners Group, moderation of the off-topic areas is now changing.
We all need a place to express random non-woodworking ideas. That will remain the same. However, certain things just cannot continue, even in an "Off-Topic" zone. I have spent countless hours over the past month dealing with forum postings that are overly personal, intended to do damage, and generally out of character for the FOG. If I leave the post alone, members call on me to respond. If I craft a diplomatic response, it never seems to help once a damaging subject is out in the open. Truly, a no-win situation!
When an inappropriate discussion appears here, most members wisely prefer not to stir things up and instead choose to report the post to me offline. That means that most people never even see how much work goes into dealing with the mess created by negative postings. The vast majority of the effort to deal with damaging discussions occurs offline, in the tedious process of member-by-member correspondence.
It has been extremely difficult dealing with the negative posts that have appeared here recently. However, dealing with it has taught me something positive: about 99.98% (actual calculation) of Festool Owners Group members want peace, and support whatever actions are necessary to make that happen. I have listened to you, and am prepared to make this forum stronger in the face of challenges.
Until today, I have essentially left negative and damaging posts alone. That must now change. It has become too time consuming to deal with the aftermath of purely negative posts that add nothing to our community and are designed to cause disruption and harm. It risks alienating the vast majority of our members who don't want such things in their forum. Why would I allow that to continue?
Following the wisdom of the vast majority of FOG members, these kinds of posts will now be deleted without comment:
- Posts designed to raise personal gripes between two or more members
- Posts that contain the text of PMs or e-mails exchanged between two or more members without the consent of all involved
- Posts meant purely to spread lies or rumors about FOG members or the FOG itself
- Posts with racial undertones or overtones
- Posts that generate more than 20 complaints from FOG members
For 99.98% of our members, these new rules will not affect their posts in the least, because they have never done anything even close to what I'm describing. In other words, for the most part this is in response to 0.02% of members. Even so, the changes are necessary because that minuscule minority has had a disproportionate presence in the FOG.
Thank you to all those many members who have worked hard to make this forum a truly fun, exciting, informative, and positive community. This is your forum!
Stay in touch,
Matthew
