From The Otherkin Community

Contents 1 Bylaw Amendment 2 Posting of Meeting Chat Transcripts 3 Rules & Regulations 3.1 Harassment Policy 3.2 Severity 3.3 Moderation of "Trolls" 3.4 Racism & Bigotry 4 Moderator Action 5 Website Modifications 5.1 Moderator Thread Notifications 5.2 Inbox New Message Count

Bylaw Amendment

In the 12 Sept 2009 meeting, the directors discussed amending the Bylaws to increase the meeting interval to four (4) months, increased from two (2). The bylaw was adopted and the Bylaws were appropriately amended by Clodaus.

Vote: 3/0, all in favor of adoption

Posting of Meeting Chat Transcripts

It was recommended that the transcripts of each Board meeting be made available to the public under the condition that personal and non-pertinent information be removed. This would allow others to see exactly how the Board came to its decisions with much greater detail than the minutes could provide. It would also allow for greater transparency and trust, two qualities The Otherkin Community strives to convey.

Transcripts for all Board meetings will be available shortly, beginning with the meeting on the 12th of September, 2009.

Vote: 3/0, all in favor of adoption

Rules & Regulations

A number of considerations were made to the Rules & Regulations. Please note that the Rules & Regulations, as discussed within this meeting, are revised and unpublished. They will be made public once the final modifications have been made.

Harassment Policy

It was felt that the harassment policy, as mentioned within the Rules & Regulations, was not sufficient to protect against harassment of The Otherkin Community itself as a single, general entity. It was suggested that the language be modified as follows:

Harassment is where one party is intensionally and systematically being abusive,
aggressive or acting in some way that is offensive or upsetting towards another
party, whether those parties are individual people, groups, or the community as
a whole.

The above will be posted to the Community staff and helpers in order to determine if any changes should be made.

Votes: 3/0, all in favor of modification

Severity

Much thought was put into the concept of "severity" - how certain situations may need to be moderated differently than others due to their nature. The difference in moderation would apply to severity of the punishment, not the policies behind moderation. The Rules & Regulations do not require a three-warning system; that has just been considered good practice within the moderation staff. However, under certain situations, it may be necessary to skip to an account suspension.

Such situations should be few and far between, and is subject to the better judgment of the moderation staff at the time. While this may be an uncomfortable policy, it should also be noted that the moderation staff should be reflective of the Community's goals and ethics, as the moderators are chosen by the staff. However, it was also argued that moderators do make mistakes, and its still possible for moderators to abuse their privileges. Some reassurance was provided by the moderators requiring administrative approval for most actions (see Moderator Action below).

Votes: 3/0, all in favor

Moderation of "Trolls"

In the 12 Sept 2009 meeting, the directors discussed the moderation of malicious individuals, sometimes referred to as "trolls". It was decided that such users should be moderated the same as other members, taking into account the following considerations:

1. The possibility of increased turn around time, as discussed in a variety of areas during the meeting (see Website Modifications below), and
2. the ability for moderators to act according to severity

Votes: 3/0, all in favor of adoption

Racism & Bigotry

It was suggested that the "Racism" rule in the Rules & Regulations would be more appropriately named "Racism & Bigotry", due to the covered offenses.

Votes: 3/0, all in favor of adoption

Moderator Action

Previous to this meeting, a policy existed where all moderator actions must require the vote of at least one forum administrator, unintentionally giving the administrator veto power. This was unacceptable. It was instead decided that at least one administrator should authorize an action by stating whether or not the situation was properly handled according to staff procedure. This would mean that an administrator cannot veto a vote simply due to a difference in opinion. Instead, the administrator looks at how the moderators handled their voting procedure and considered the issue at hand. If they followed proper procedure, the vote goes though.

If proper procedure was not followed, the vote will then go to the next highest authority (which is, at this time, the forum administrators). This system is intended to ensure that moderators (especially those getting used to our policies) do not abuse their privileges, and is meant to help limit mistakes. It is not intended as a means for administrators to override the votes of moderators, and will be reconsidered if abused.

Votes: 3/0, all in favor of amendment

Website Modifications

A number of modifications to the website were suggested in order to increase response time. These modifications will be made by Clodaus as soon as time permits.

Moderator Thread Notifications

In order to aid in increase the response time for moderation, it was decided that all moderators should be automatically notified of new posts within the Moderator and Helper forums. This way, when a moderator makes a new thread regarding a post or member that may need moderation, other moderators will be able to immediately respond to and act upon the situation.

Inbox New Message Count

Currently, the only way to see whether or not there are new messages in a user's PM Inbox on The Otherkin Community Forums is to check the home page. This is inconvenient and may in a long duration before realizing new PMs exist. The only other means of notification is e-mail.

It was decided that the Inbox link should be formatted as follows:

 Inbox (#)

Where # is the number of new PMs. If there are no new PMs, it will the parenthesis will be hidden.

Votes: 3/0, all in favor of addition