The growing concern with the future of the site; the absence of the Site Dev and overall inactivity of Admins/Moderators.

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

10 minutes ago, HarryG said:

With sin taking over I feel like things will definitely take a more authoritarian and even less communicative direction based on his behavior in the past.

 

10 minutes ago, HarryG said:

THE MOST WORRYING POINT TO ME IS THAT IN THE PAST ON NUMEROUS OCCASIONS I HAD TO MESSAGE TEENY REPEATEDLY TO GET SIN TO CONVERSE WITH ME ABOUT SIMPLE ISSUES AND NOW NOBODY IS IN CONTROL OF HIM AT ALL. For this reason I fear sin will be the LAST new admin the site ends up having

In all honesty, like ive done with a lot of the staff today, im giving him, too, the benefit of the doubt. People do change... Sometimes.... But eh, if he turns out to be a terrible Admin, i mean... Teeny will just reverse the promotion innit.

[HarryG]

9 minutes ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

 

In all honesty, like ive done with a lot of the staff today, im giving him, too, the benefit of the doubt. People do change... Sometimes.... But eh, if he turns out to be a terrible Admin, i mean... Teeny will just reverse the promotion innit.

When has a promotion ever not been permanent? How many times have problematic behaviors by numerous staff members been mentioned and swept under the rug like this thread? It’s essentially impossible to get fired from backpack. If he turns out to be a terrible admin, then the site just dies because the person in charge is a terrible admin. That’s just one of the problems here and it was created AFTER the thread about existing problems. How on earth could anyone have thought the solution was hiring a new admin to be in charge of everything? 

[ѕιи]

In regards to 

44 minutes ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

do you think it is possible to get this thread into the "Latest News" box with the idea of "let us know your thoughts here" or something, once other posts come in and update the "Latest Forum Threads" to not show mine, for maximum awareness of the topic and the issues it discusses?

 

I'm unsure on if there's way to do that but I'll try looking into it.

 

42 minutes ago, HarryG said:

1. How was the decision to promote someone who publicly said an hour before they couldn’t handle the job they already have reached? Why were you approached at all?

 

2. Why wasn’t someone more experienced/someone who has more time committed to the site approached? If they were, why were they not chosen?

 

3. Why was this the only measure taken after this thread became popular despite multiple staff members including yourself saying that these things take time? You were promoted literally an hour after the thread started dying down. 

 

4. How can someone who claims they are always available to answer questions claim this when as recently as three weeks ago I had to contact the (inactive, yet still more capable of responding than you were) admin to get you to unblock me because you purposefully made yourself impossible to reach after muting me on discord without giving any reason as to why (you had also claimed before this that anybody was free to contact you about mutes you gave out). 

 

5. Number four also seems to imply that despite you saying you were already overburdened which is problematic in and of itself, that you still have time to take over the job of discord mod and ban people quite often when there is an entire job (called community moderator). Why should the community trust that you won’t abuse this new power even more?

 

6. If you’re really trying to effect positive change, why only respond to the price suggesters that keep the site running as opposed to trying to appease everybody? That’s what one of the problems before you became admin was.

 

1. I don't think my original post was me saying "I can't handle the job." It was moreso an attempt to help everyone better understand why I personally have been pretty inactive over the past couple months. These things were namely school and burnout. Now that's its summer my university workload has been cut down to about 1/3rd of what it normally is during the fall and spring semesters, and taking a break for those couple months has helped me get back to mitigating the reports backlog we have right now. With that being said, I do have more free time now that it's summer, I'm just not completely free bc I've got a couple summer school courses at the moment, so that coupled with the leadership skills I have is most likely why I was approached.

 

2. This is kind of a difficult question to answer because I wasn't the one contacting people about this, but if I had to guess it was likely because of my leadership skills like I said before. I also wanna reiterate that while I do have summer courses right now I'm not going to be anywhere inactive the way I was during my spring semester if that helps put things into perspective.

 

3. This is also kind of a difficult question for me to answer because I've only been promoted after a couple hours, but regardless of that I would also have to say that we need time to properly assess what our problems are how to go from here, along with the time it'll take me to adjust to being an admin. Like i said before, all of this is kind of overwhelming so I and the others need some time to process everything.

 

4. I've not had you blocked within the past 3-4 weeks (and longer ofc); it was likely bc we didn't share servers anymore which led to you being unable to contact me. In addition, I also never received a friend request from you on Discord or Steam so I've not got much else to say here.

 

5. Like I said earlier, I was overburdened the past couple of months but as I've transitioned into the summer semester I've got a lot more free time since my coursework has been cut down tremendously. In regards to discord moderation, there would be times when I'd mute or ban someone when a community moderator wasn't available to or when I happened to be in chat, but I've not done it nearly as much as the comm mods do. All of the staff team have the ability to mute and ban people but the majority don't do it because they don't have previous community mod experience, and as you might know I was a community mod before I became a report mod. With that being said, other types of moderators using comm mod tools such as Dynobot and other discord perms isn't an abuse of power unless they are purposefully misusing their power, and if you believe that's happening we've always had a policy of contacting admins if you disagree with a moderator's decision (even comm mods).

 

6. My last post was intended as a response to all of the responses I got on the post before that but I didn't want to waste space by quoting every single response. If I do end up missing some responses though, it's likely because it's sort of difficult to keep track of everythingI'll try my best though.

 

If there's anything else I can help with do let me know

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

1 hour ago, HarryG said:

If he turns out to be a terrible admin, then the site just dies because the person in charge is a terrible admin.

But he is not the only Admin.

1 hour ago, HarryG said:

How on earth could anyone have thought the solution was hiring a new admin to be in charge of everything?

This, ideally and assumably, is only the beginning to the solution.

[Diamond jozu]

im kinda surprised how you made sin to become an admin but denied procave to be a mod when procave has tried to applied like 2 times.the 1st time was surely gone wrong but for the second time would seem reasonable and procave has improved a lot and been helpful

[Ash, God of Thunder]

I'm pretty much in the dark about this site's management but I've been using since about early 2015/late 2014. I just read through this entire thread, and I've just got to ask, if the admins/mods are so busy why don't they hand the reigns over to trusted and vetted community members that can handle the workload? It seems like the mods are willing to address the issues with the site but they aren't willing to actually take any substantive action to hand over power to those who can actually use it. Sin seems like he's at least open and willing to talk with people but knowing how college can be myself, it's only a matter of time before he becomes swamped with responsibilities, schoolwork, and life in general. It just doesn't seem like the staff of this site are interesting in taking any major action towards turning things around, and instead are looking to placate those who are outraged with platitudes. Maybe coming from an outside perspective means I can't really see the inner workings here, but that's just my opinion.

[Zeckatz]

Zeus is more worthy of being an admin than sin, in my opinion.

[Payback]

31 minutes ago, Zeckatz said:

Zeus is more worthy of being an admin than sin, in my opinion.

Not your decision to make 

[Zeckatz]

Just now, Payback said:

Not your decision to make 

So I'm not allowed to share my opinion?
if so, I can remove it

[SmokE]

Okay, Since most questions were already answered and people are now complaining or have concerns about sin becoming admin here is my view on the matter. 

1st of all I will accept I am not really active on the forums yes! (but that is just in posting comments) I regularly go though many posts in the forums and I only post something if I feel I need to step in. I believe most community mods are like that, You guys do not see all the discussions they have everyday about various posts made on the forums on discord in the community mods chat. (Just saying because someone pointed out mods activity based on how many comments they have on the thread? - this is a wrong way of judging activity)

Sin is by far the most worthy for the promotion, This does not mean he is better than other report mods (Plax Zues Toughsox & Myself) or us less than him, everyone is treated equally, but yes some are more experienced, but that was not the only thing an admin needs. Leadership quality and decision making capability is what is needed and with sins past experience with leading a lot of things he fits best for the role. We are really happy for him for the promotion and we are sure he will do wonders.

The main issue here on the site right now and the main topic of this whole thread is inactivity of staff and backlogs - as sin has stated in  a comment he had started working on the reports again even before he was promoted, same for zues plax and myself we are trying to reduce the backlogs as fast as we can and this started before this discussion started and not because this thread was made.

Yes - Inactive Dev is an issue, this is out of our hands as said multiple times before but we are having internal discussions on what can be done (which has happened multiple times before) but its up to geel at the end of the day. Even if a new dev is hired geel and fisk have to guide them though the basics and get familiar with the code base which is not possible with them being inactive now.
 

You cannot expect people to prioritize the site over real life / health / family. Life happens people get busy not everyone sits home in front of a computer 24/7 during this pandemic (not pointing fingers at anyone directly or indirectly I personally know a few who are like that) - most staff got busy with stuff and the backlogs went up in numbers and I highly respect teeny's decisions and what she has been doing during this pandemic, criticizing her is fine but being blind and saying she hasn't done anything for the site / doesn't care about the site anymore (I read comments like that) is a bit too harsh and wrong. If you think like that then you are either very new to the site or you are on the wrong.

 

I don't know if you guys realize or understand how hard it is to transition to online schooling from going to regular school everyday all of a sudden, or try to lead an entire team of staff from home and guiding them via calls or emails when you used to do that face to face at work. Its not easy and its very exhausting.
People will get used to all of this just like how we are all adapting to live in this world now during this pandemic. Things will go back to normal and the backlogs will be cleared, this I can assure everyone.

 

8 hours ago, HarryG said:

I cant even begin to understand the logic here. The solution was to give sin more power? I’ve heard that he apparently will only work on reports; wasn’t he already a report mod? How does giving him more power (if it is only limited to reports) address the issue especially if he himself JUST said he was inactive a literal HOUR before he was promoted?

Teeny was also the same, she focused on reports while woifi focused on price suggestions? - If you didn't know that. 
Its not about giving more power its more about having someone to keep us all motivated and make decisions when there is a conflict of interest or if we are in doubt on what needs to be done etc. 

 

4 hours ago, HarryG said:

If he turns out to be a terrible admin, then the site just dies because the person in charge is a terrible admin.

Why only think the negative way? why not also think if he turns out to be a great admin it will keep the site alive for the years to come? - A coin always has 2 sides.

 

4 hours ago, HarryG said:

How on earth could anyone have thought the solution was hiring a new admin to be in charge of everything? 

I think I answered this already, being admin isn't totally about being in charge, its about keeping everyone motivated and being able to make the right decisions. Having experience also matters but leadership quality is what is mainly needed.

 

5 hours ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

 

In all honesty, like ive done with a lot of the staff today, im giving him, too, the benefit of the doubt. People do change... Sometimes.... But eh, if he turns out to be a terrible Admin, i mean... Teeny will just reverse the promotion innit.

 

3 hours ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

But he is not the only Admin.

This, ideally and assumably, is only the beginning to the solution.

Yes, lets wait and see how he does, criticizing is fine, not being happy about it is fine, but since he is now admin, give him the time and lets see how things turnout?

 

2 hours ago, Ash, God of Thunder said:

I'm pretty much in the dark about this site's management but I've been using since about early 2015/late 2014. I just read through this entire thread, and I've just got to ask, if the admins/mods are so busy why don't they hand the reigns over to trusted and vetted community members that can handle the workload? 

This is not something we can just handover, people need to prove they are willing to help and stay with us and the 1st thing to do is apply for staff and then we review and decide.

Please feel free to ask any question to me personally or as a staff and I will try my best to answer anything.

All that being said, I did not mean to hurt or shoot arrows at anyone, If I did my apologies.
As always any criticism appreciated!
 

- SmokEy 

[Bocks]

Give it a few weeks and all will return to the same old routine without any memory of this thread, lol.

[Cave]

9 hours ago, Diamond jozu said:

im kinda surprised how you made sin to become an admin but denied procave to be a mod when procave has tried to applied like 2 times.the 1st time was surely gone wrong but for the second time would seem reasonable and procave has improved a lot and been helpful

Well I came to this thread in all curiosity due to the discord talking about some drama on the forums.

Although I have been denied for the 3rd time (and the last time I'll try) I have no bad or negative feelings to the community and/or Sin for denying me, the comment made on my application that was denied by sin showed me the mods just didn't trust me and couldn't see how my judgement would be.

 

My actions in the past have made me unfavourable to be a mod candidate (along the lines of racism back in 2018) and was just a bored out of my mind teen, I do wish I can revert all that has been done, but this is public knowledge of me that I can not erase.

 

I have made some friends which I would've never met if I didn't get that ban and such, I've improved physically, mentally ever since due to my pal FishCrimes and others who kind of got me out of my echochamber with other like-minded indivuduals with my ban, I am thankfull for the ban, it did show me something had to be changed.

 

That's when I decided that I would like to better the backpack.tf community like it bettered me, I actively showed my real self (friendly, non-toxic, just happy in general) so people actually got to know me and encouraged people to contact me in times of need (depression and others) from members in the backpack.tf community; I don't like to gloat but I do hope I helped the couple of persons who contacted me and bettered their mood.

 

And that's really when, around the 1 year anniversary of my ban being gone, I told myself after being encouraged by friends to apply for moderator, although the chances were slim I was happy I got another chance and wanted to help the community.

 

I know that moderating the backpack.tf community is no small thing, but when I waited for months for the reply, my hopes going down it did hurt when I finally did get declined and vowed to not apply anymore since, well, 3rd times the charm, but in the case third time was indeed, not the charm.

 

Don't take this wrong, I appreciate the decision that was taken and have no hard feelings to either the staff or sin which declined it, I accepted it and, hell, it was their decision! Sure, it sucks, I had me hopes up this time since I was actually serious and not trolling and multiple persons encouraged me to do so.

 

I do wish everyone luck on the admin team, Sin got more responsibility on his shoulders and Teeny is inactive due to an active pandemic doing the rounds.

 

Good luck everyone!

 

 

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

6 hours ago, « SɱokEy » said:

sins past experience with leading a lot of things he fits best for the role.

Can you bring out some concrete examples? I am honestly failing to see where this "in case you didn't know, sin's ability to lead is leagues high, hence why we chose him out of the entire staff". To add on, the past experience with sin has been very much negative, while in like 2018 (not exactly sure) and before he used to be very nice, he, the next years, got very hotheaded and douchey. Thats why Harry is panicking and thats why i had a few (anonymous i assume? just in case not gonna name any names) contacts that were extremely unpleased by sin's promotion - this was also talked about in the Discord and one thing i can say...

6 hours ago, « SɱokEy » said:

Why only think the negative way? why not also think if he turns out to be a great admin it will keep the site alive for the years to come? - A coin always has 2 sides.

...is that i am definitely very hopeful that the positive side of the coin is what turns out to be the one the coin lands on.

 

6 hours ago, « SɱokEy » said:

The main issue here on the site right now and the main topic of this whole thread is inactivity of staff and backlogs

 

6 hours ago, « SɱokEy » said:

Yes - Inactive Dev is an issue, this is out of our hands as said multiple times before but we are having internal discussions on what can be done

Well, actually, the main issue here is the inactive Dev. Cause while the first issue is the easier of the 2 to solve, as you said

6 hours ago, « SɱokEy » said:

but its up to geel at the end of the day. Even if a new dev is hired geel and fisk have to guide them though the basics and get familiar with the code base which is not possible with them being inactive now.

we have to really push hard to reach the goal of an active Dev, while getting the staff in check is a little bit of a easier task.

 

6 hours ago, « SɱokEy » said:

You cannot expect people to prioritize the site over real life / health / family.

Yes, if you've been reading...

 

23 hours ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

We need to, in a group effort, really encourage new suggesters, Veteran Price Suggesters, Devs that are well-known in the community (manic :3) to contribute. We need to be more careful at how we welcome new suggesters, we need to make them really feel welcome, but that requires time and time is not what the current staff/the punch of retired Veteran Price Suggesters have, hence why new blood is so important. We need to give incentive for the retired Veterans who do have time, but just don't find suggesting worth it anymore or don't find its current rewarding fun and fresh. And if possible, we need to encourage eligible Veterans to become Price Moderators, however it be done (obviously here, people like Scourge are very much eligible, but him being on the front lines and KILLING the suggesting game is also extremely important for the site, he is of a lot more use keeping a lot more hats updated, than if he were a Mod). We need Price Moderators to stop discouraging Veteran Price Suggesters by continuously pointing out and not giving a break to some mistake(s) theive made in the past. We keep the site alive by voluntarily suggesting, we need more recognition (yes, there was a discussion about this some time ago, where Mods pointed out that they, too, don't get recognition they rather deserve from the community, but thats why the bond between a Price Mod and a Price Suggester is so important; we need to support each other, we need to give eachother the recognition we deserve, if noone else does. We all make mistakes, but we must aknowledge them and not give shit to people for them long after they were made (im guilty here too tho *coughfoamyandburninglilbiteycoughcough*).

 

23 hours ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

To continue; We need to seriously, in a group effort (community ambassadors, moderators and admins) notify the site Owners (pretty sure without their cooperation, hiring a Dev or making changes so that more voluntary code work could be done, is not possible), that there seriously IS need for a new Dev.

...we need to prioritize efforts into getting new suggesters, retired Veterans (as many as possible of the each) and Dev(s) to contribute to the site, while secondary priority would be to get as much of the inactive current staff to work as possible, while not pushing it for them. We need no more burnouts of the burnouts.

 

6 hours ago, « SɱokEy » said:

Things will go back to normal and the backlogs will be cleared, this I can assure everyone.

I believe you that the backlogs will get better, but am skeptical about "cleared". Afterall, like ive said before, the staff's inactivity did not start with the pandemic.

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

1 hour ago, Bocks said:

Give it a few weeks and all will return to the same old routine without any memory of this thread, lol.

Oh you best believe i will not let that happen.

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

34 minutes ago, TheProcave said:

My actions in the past have made me unfavourable to be a mod candidate (along the lines of racism back in 2018) and was just a bored out of my mind teen, I do wish I can revert all that has been done, but this is public knowledge of me that I can not erase.

Im very confused. Correct me if im wrong. You have clearly changed since then. There is not a single reason why you should not be given the mod position you applied for, atleast a chance. People need chances to prove themselves. What am i missing here?!?? Imo you should not be fine with your application being denied, you should raise your voice. I can not be the only one to think this... THIS, TO ME, IS OUTRAGEOUS.

[Cave]

11 minutes ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

Im very confused. Correct me if im wrong, but you have clearly changed since then. There is not a single reason why you should not be given the mod position you applied for, atleast a chance. People need chances to prove themselves. What am i missing here?!?? Imo you should not be fine with your application being denied, you should raise your voice. I can not be the only one to think this... THIS, TO ME, IS OUTRAGEOUS.

I rarely try to have a decision I can not revert be changed, I am just not the kind of person to pit people against eachother for my own sake, in the case of my application, this case has been closed sadly, I wish I can change it but who am I?

The person (who is now an admin of the site) who denied it has decided and, knowing backpack.tf mods, if they don't trust me, will they be able to trust my judgement?

 

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

31 minutes ago, TheProcave said:

I rarely try to have a decision I can not revert be changed, I am just not the kind of person to pit people against eachother for my own sake, in the case of my application, this case has been closed sadly, I wish I can change it but who am I?

The person (who is now an admin of the site) who denied it has decided and, knowing backpack.tf mods, if they don't trust me, will they be able to trust my judgement?

 

We'll see, i definitely want a Mod response on this. @ѕιи

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

6 hours ago, « SɱokEy » said:

You cannot expect people to prioritize the site over real life / health / family. Life happens people get busy not everyone sits home in front of a computer 24/7 during this pandemic

Oh, something else i completely forgot about and am curious about. @Teeny Tiny Cat @« SɱokEy » @ѕιи @ᴾᴾᴹ Shuffle Spy @Mindacos @FishtheFish @Erik @A Delicious Cashew @Woifi The Viking How many hours per day or like how often do you play games?

[Woifi The Viking]

2 minutes ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

Oh, something else i completely forgot about and am curious about. @Teeny Tiny Cat @« SɱokEy » @ѕιи @ᴾᴾᴹ Shuffle Spy @Mindacos @FishtheFish @Erik @A Delicious Cashew @Woifi The Viking How many hours per day or like how often do you play games?

I dont think it makes much sense to monitor the staff now for how many hours they play.

[_inu]

This went from a discussion to demands to monitoring staff on how they spend their free time. Yikes.

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

8 minutes ago, Woifi The Viking said:

I dont think it makes much sense to monitor the staff now for how many hours they play.

You think so? There is a reason i asked about gaming not how much time the staff spends going outside. The latter is irrelevant to me, free time is extremely important. Why i asked about gaming is cause it is very addicting and easy to get lost in time to.

 

3 minutes ago, _inu said:

This went from a discussion to demands to monitoring staff on how they spend their free time. Yikes.

Keep memes off this forum post, please. I reported this issue here on forums for the exact reason of there being too much off-topic talk, (memes, spam etc.) were i to try and discuss it on Discord (the only plus on Discord being cause its the place where Mods are more active than here and this refers to the entire Forum inactivity of mods, that was discussed here aswell).

[Woifi The Viking]

15 minutes ago, Master Throne Crimson said:

You think so? There is a reason i asked about gaming not how much time the staff spends going outside. The latter is irrelevant to me, free time is extremely important. Why i asked about gaming is cause it is very addicting and easy to get lost in time to.

(Multiplayer) Gaming is just another form of spending your free time with friends, just like going outside. It's nice that you are worried about gaming addictions of staff but this is not the place for this. 

[🔥Master Throne Crimson🔥]

12 minutes ago, Woifi The Viking said:

(Multiplayer) Gaming is just another form of spending your free time with friends, just like going outside. It's nice that you are worried about gaming addictions of staff but this is not the place for this. 

Yeah, but gaming is addictive and makes you put more time into it, than going outside... This is very much the place for this. We are discussing the inactivity of the site staff (mostly caused by being busy irl, completely understandable) and are trying (mods have agreed so) to make the current staff more active, while also planning on how to possibly get more new blood in. That being said, if a staff member spends too much time gaming, there is a clear issue.

[creepio]

The real world obviously take precedent over the problems here. The site still needs admins/mods. Dev's are obviously an ownership call. I would never ask a mod/admin to cough up their position because of real world responsibilities. I can't expect them to focus on the site over their personal lives and health.

 

Probationary positions to users that are near-passes for mod applications could be a solution temporarily? Either they perform their job adequately and are considered for a permanent position, or they mess up and they are out?

[Payback]

lol this went from a discussion to the future of the site to demanding people's mod applications get reviewed and questioning how people spend their free time