Of edited posts, of locked threads, of frayed tempers, of friends lost, of foes made, of modding PaGaLGuY.com!!!

[rahulatcloudnine]

Originally Posted by Chandoo

Boy, Wayne, you sure command some respect and love from fellow members
Good work

~C~

You Betcha!!!!!!!!!!!

[grondmaster]

My my...

What a thread... what a find from the ole' PG archives...

What an insight into modding itself, I say...

Worth reading by a lot of people today. I would also like to hear what mods today have to say about their feelings...

I must say, awesome thread, again. Truly bump-worthy, I say.

Regards,
Grondmaster

[Mahip]

Modding on PaGaLGuY.com is an amazing experience, one gets to learn so many things that it can't be expressed in words. People Management Skills can't be deveoped in a better way I say.

I was never keen on becoming a mod, nor I had any intention when I joined PG in Sep 2005. I was just another confused person opening threads without searching and spamming all around the forum I also made some 6-7 clones, if not less But it was all fun part we used to do on SB with a gang of 8-10 oldies. But within few months, I realized that all these acts were not good for the comunity and it also makes other members at ease to do the same.

Anyway, my first major act was the PaGaLGuY.com Dinner Meet which I organized at Khar where I had a chance to meet Apurv, gnrs, Monil, puneet, denish and many others. It was real enlightenment then to know details about the community. [Link to that meet thread] (PG Mumbai Meet!! 22nd JANUARY! Be there!)

I came to know that MavericK was also working in TCS, so I searched him on the intranet and got his ID. This is the first conversation we had:

Originally Posted by On TCS Infinity messenger; 30 Nov 2005

Anil Gorti: Hi
Mahip Vyas: Hi Maverick
Mahip Vyas:
Anil Gorti:
Anil Gorti: I dint know your name was Mahip
Mahip Vyas:
Mahip Vyas: so you have been associated to pagalguy from a loong time!!
Anil Gorti: Hmmm.. unfortunately yes
.
.
.

I discussed a lot about the forum, its history, about modding with him on the messenger and it was real hands-on training. Now don't say that we people were not working in TCS, we really worked very very hard to get a decent rating.

All this went on and I increased by daily surfing time on the forum to some 6-7 hrs a day and may be all this prompted PG HQ to make me a sectional mod.

Its a different experience once you become a mod, people start looking at you differently. You feel a sense of power and also get the responsibility of doing your tasks. I managed pretty well. A green mod doesnt have all accesses which a Blue Mod has, a green mod can't search for IP addresses nor he can ban members. So many times, I was in a tight spot when I was the only online mod and someone was posting ad links on some different section. I could only warn him, neither ban, nor lock the thread. Many users PMed me, "What a useless mod, why can't you lock the thread instead of warning" But it was always difficult to explain so many members.

The TCS messenger was a great help to catch MavericK online anytime, but then there came one more common messenger between us - The GE Sametime messenger. I used to take MavericK's help in searching IP addresses and banning members.. One small chat can be seen here:

Originally Posted by On GE Sametime messenger; 9 Sep 2006

Mahip Vyas/Healthcare/GeneralElectric Hi Anil
Anil Gorti/Energy/GeneralElectric Hey boss!
Mahip Vyas/Healthcare/GeneralElectric One PGite "<snip>" is very irritating on SB... details pata chal sakte hai kya ?
Anil Gorti/Energy/GeneralElectric Yeah sure
Mahip Vyas/Healthcare/GeneralElectric okay .. thanks
Anil Gorti/Energy/GeneralElectric Guess who shares the IP
Mahip Vyas/Healthcare/GeneralElectric kaun !!
Anil Gorti/Energy/GeneralElectric <snip>
Mahip Vyas/Healthcare/GeneralElectric oh yeh duplicates
Anil Gorti/Energy/GeneralElectric clone
Mahip Vyas/Healthcare/GeneralElectric Ban kar do

Monil and other mods also helped me very much in learning things out here. And I was always associated closely with the PG HQ folks, be it Bday Week Planning, Tee Shirt Selling or any other activity. The only mod I havent met are Akshat, Chandoo and Simba. Hopefully shall meet SRK in AIPGM.

We all have healthy discussions amongst oursleves in working out on the guidelines and changes required each season. We also ponder upon frequently on selection of new mods and many other user related issues. It's real fun when in some threads the tempers are running so high that users start spamming and even mods interference is unable to help it. And when mods take strict action, we see many threads like "Biased nautre of Mods" etc etc. Modding teaches you how to talk to people and convince them with your thoughts in public whom you don't even know and most probably would never meet in your lifetime. The trust which members show towards the mod and other members is really heartening. But this trust should not come because of the fear of the mods, but as an experienced user. Mods are users first, modding activity comes later.

I don't know what have I written here, and it's surely a khichdi of all ideas. But let it be.
I'll come up with more experiences soon.

Cheers!

[sir roy keane]

Originally Posted by Mahip

A green mod doesnt have all accesses which a Blue Mod has, a green mod can't search for IP addresses nor he can ban members. So many times, I was in a tight spot when I was the only online mod and someone was posting ad links on some different section. I could only warn him, neither ban, nor lock the thread. Many users PMed me, "What a useless mod, why can't you lock the thread instead of warning"

thank you!

at least someone can understand what i'm going through right now!

[get_amazed]

hey mahip boss, (of ma-hips dot lie fame) (kill the poor joke corner not me ),
the words you said above can only come through true experience.

But one question remains, what do you do when friends turn perpetrators, when you have to meet them offline and explain why you did something what you had to. Is one supposed to let such friends go or does one stand his ground for the action taken.

I know ther has to be a boundary for the above, and i want to know how you decide this boundary. Thanks for making and keeping pg as it is. by the way i found a site called management paradise which looked like a true copy of this site, except without the members and the participation pg enjoys.

[Mahip]

Originally Posted by get_amazed

hey mahip boss, (of ma-hips dot lie fame) (kill the poor joke corner not me ),
the words you said above can only come through true experience.

But one question remains, what do you do when friends turn perpetrators, when you have to meet them offline and explain why you did something what you had to. Is one supposed to let such friends go or does one stand his ground for the action taken.

I know ther has to be a boundary for the above, and i want to know how you decide this boundary. Thanks for making and keeping pg as it is. by the way i found a site called management paradise which looked like a true copy of this site, except without the members and the participation pg enjoys.

There are two parts - Mahip as a user and Mahip as a Moderator.

I might not like some post if I see it as a moderator, which I would do looking at a community as whole where a newbie, certified pagal, anyone would read a post and might not like it. Suppose if I snip that post and inform the user about the same. The user might be my old friend on the forum or a newbie. He/She would feel offended straight away; how can anybody snip a post where his/her intention might not have been to create some issue. But then as a moderator I was correct and the user needs to understand that. I might like the above snipped post as a user Mahip, but for a whole community it might be distasteful.. hence it has to be treated differently. There is a very thin line between this which one can undetstand only by experience.

Now if that user meets me offline and asks for explaination, I would give the same reasoning. We generally do discuss and give explainations on PMs as well. And then if the user is still not satisfied he can ask some other mods to look into the matter. That's the only way out. Yah, in the process we make many so-called enemies, but all that is very temporary. It fades out of the memory in some months.

Abt management paradise and its looks, well I would say that the template on which PG frontend is made is freely available on the net and anyone can use it and make a ditto looking site. Its an open source world. But the real community is made by the members, not by some technology. And FYI the creator of management paradise was one of the old active members of this community.