What's Going on at MOFIB?

[Anonymous]

I just placed my vote. Then I went to switch male Banggais in the breeding room... both turned out to be really easy to do! :wink: Good job Rook!

I did the first and it was painless Thanks ROOK and the election committee

I was disenfranchised. :x

 

[Anonymous]

lol i surprised MOFIB run like RC (nazi) now? opps, sorry i spill it out too quickly, is it allow on reef.org?

 

[Anonymous]

lol i surprised MOFIB run like RC (nazi) now? opps, sorry i spill it out too quickly, is it allow on reef.org?

I don't know about reef.org but I am sure its ok here on reefs.org

 

[Grym]

64th to vote vote early and often!
Len

 

[mpedersen]

64th out of 384 or so. A lot of people are choosing to NOT exercise their rights it seems...which I honestly find disappointing in light of the amount of folks who DO want to vote but have been deemed ineligible by the sitting BOD.

 

[Anonymous]

64th out of 384 or so. A lot of people are choosing to NOT exercise their rights it seems...which I honestly find disappointing in light of the amount of folks who DO want to vote but have been deemed ineligible by the sitting BOD.

Perhaps many are looking at the Q and A thread and waiting to vote at the last minute. After all, whats the point of a Q and A thread after you have voted?

 

[mpedersen]

Perhaps many are looking at the Q and A thread and waiting to vote at the last minute. After all, whats the point of a Q and A thread after you have voted?

True, a very good point. Of course, wouldn't it have been more commonsensical to allow this to happen before you actually opened the vote in the first place?

 

[Anonymous]

I asked a question about censorship and how to deal with it but I have yet to get a response on it it will be able to be submitted or if it's declined. Several have all ready spoken about it a little but many haven't so IMO it's an important question.

 

[Veng68]

I was # 40.

Cheers,
Vic

 

[LargeAngels]

#61. Either they are waiting as stated above or are so fed up with all the drama.

 

[Anonymous]

I asked a question about censorship and how to deal with it but I have yet to get a response on it it will be able to be submitted or if it's declined. Several have all ready spoken about it a little but many haven't so IMO it's an important question.

Well I got a reply at 8:30pm last night re: my submitted question of which was submitted ~8 hours earlier. With only 4 days of Q&A WHILE the vote is being cast it seems rather obvious how much even an 8 hour lag is horribly wrong.

They asked me to rewrite it, suggested some text and apologized for allowing Enigma posting his own question that was done by circumventing the election committee and breaking the rules in place for the very thread.....SCUSE me, did you just say a standing BOD member went around the election committee, broke the rules in place and submitted his own question?
But you guys did moderate his post, right? NO? Why not?

From a PM on MOFIB...

I of course realize that Mark got a similar styled question through; we have likewise contacted him and directed him, any other BOD and any administrator to submit the question first to the committee via PM for review.

Rook

But you didn't censor or moderate the post? No indication to the public of this? Even if a mistake it should be publicly noted.

Rules as posted in the election thread:

This thread will be moderated by the Elections Committee, and all posts will be approved PRIOR to being posted for public review. The Elections Committee will make every attempt to moderate posts in as near real-time as possible, but understand there may still be delays depending on the time the post is submitted. In cases where the Elections Committee has objections to a post, the poster will be notified and given the opportunity to amend the post.

Hmmm seems pretty clear to me. Another hmmm.... the committee knew about this since noon yesterday but didn't say a thing in the thread or anywhere else but in private. They didn't even moderate their own thread. MOFIB censors are a strange cat to follow.

Bring on the excuses!!!

 

[Anonymous]

This is the post in question:

by enigma » Wed Jul 01, 2009 12:19 pm
If I may another question.

Sometimes board members are called upon to make difficult decisions on behalf of the membership with the knowledge that the membership itself is split on what it wants.

Or

The membership has voiced an opinion on a matter that is counter to what you know or feel is the best or legal choice for the organization.

How do you go about handling decisions in these instances? How will you handle it if other board members disagree with your choice?

 

[mpedersen]

Gresh, sadly, Mr Vera and any other website adminstrator can do whatever they want anyway, which means that even if the post is locked, they can post.

Even if the forum is set to be moderated, admins can bypass that and frankly, they may not even know they're doing it. So I think, quite possibly, when it comes to someone like you posting vs. Mark Vera posting, when you post, it gets trapped and checked before being approved. When Mark Vera posts, it goes straight in because he is set to be an "admin" level user on the site. As much as I'd love to get on the bandwagon with you, I think this is a case of access levels conflicting with the rules. Of course, If the rules were "submit directly to the elections committee via PM" and Mark Vera skirted that, well, I can just say hey, I gave him my trust, he blew it in the past, and as much as he like to say I'm now showing my true colors, in fact any change in my commentary towards him is directly the result of his ACTIONS and statements. Folks, I'm allowed to change my opinion of someone based on experience

Furthermore Gresh, have Rook and the rest of the elections committee been given moderator powers? I suspect they have NOT. Which means they probably cannot remove Mr. Vera's post even if they wanted to. So I hate to say it, but if they can't pull his post, they can't, and it's not their fault at all.

It is certainly in bad form that your question wasn't allowed to stand as is in my opinion...it certainly was a pointed question and frankly, I love the irony that a question directly asking "How do you feel about censorship" is quite possibly the only question that has been censored. Whether Rook and the elections committee like it or not, the simple truth is that Mr. Vera's "similar question" has been left to remain, and whatever perceived "damage" or "problems" it has created already exist. Therefore, in the interest of doing what is fair and what is right, your question should be allowed, as-is, as well. I see NOTHING wrong with any of the questions - I should be able to ask "do you feel that the 3 seated BOD members should be removed by the 4 newly elected BOD members". That's a valid question. I'll submit it right now.

(my submitted question - How do you feel about the decisions and choices made by each of the three currently seated Board Members (Luis Magnasco, John Lauth, Mark Vera) over the past 4 months? Is it appropriate for the newly elected board members to consider removing one or more seated board member based on your opinions of these actions?)

Matt

 

[mpedersen]

Some followup on the topic of Mark Vera's post "circumventing" the Elections Committee. Let me say now that with a little more thought and review and input, I believe that Mark did not intentionally circumvent the elections committee, but I believe that the elections committee is possibly not being given the opportunity to retrospectively examine and approve the post by Mr. Vera either. As much as I might relish the thought that Mark did this intentionally, I do not believe he did. Read on if you like.

As far as the posting thing, from my own very recent PM's with Rook, I've deduced it to be this.

#1. Posts to those threads ARE "moderated", which means that certain people have to approve the posts before they become public view.

#2. Understand that Admins, by virtue of their higher security access, don't have their posts suppressed while waiting for "approvals". That's a function of the software. Admins can post on locked threads, heck admins can throw out the entire election committee if they want. The software takes for granted that the admins are people we want to trust with that kind of power I do not think this is a case where Mr. Vera posted, had his questions surpressed, and then used his administrative powers to "approve" his post. I geniuinely believe, based on my two years of working with PHPBB, that Mark Vera's post was automatically approved by the software itself because Mark is an Admin.

I looked back, and there's no record in the rules that tell Admins to not post on the thread, which is what the rest of us are expected to do. So, when someone like Mr. Vera posts on that thread, to ask a question himself, he probably did not realize that his post would AUTOMATICALLY go through, by virtue of his Admin status. I'd love to say that Mr. Vera intentionally broke the rules, but I really don't think he did in this case. And by the same token, because the post was made by an Admin, the Elections Committee probably never saw it as a post to be "approved", and furthermore I suspect they were NOT given the power to edit/delete threads once they were approved. Thus, I strongly suspect that they can't remove or edit Mark's post even if they wanted to.

I think the censorship of Gresham's post is wrong. End of story there. Ironic that a question about censorship is the only question censored (as far as we know). I do have to say that there were some HARSH RULES put down for what COULD and could not be asked / talked about. Those guidelines are:

1) Posts should be specific to the election at hand, and preferably to confirmed Official Candidates under consideration for the four open seats on the BOD. Comments, questions, etc. regarding the three current BOD members will only be allowed if and to the extent that it is necessary to discuss a Candidates platform should they be chosen to the BOD.
2) Specific "platform" questions are allowed; ie. broad policy discussion.
3) Posts regarding desired qualities a nominee should have will be allowed. However, these posts must be in the spirit of moving MOFIB forward.
4) Endorsements of Candidates are allowed.
5) Nominees may, of course, respond to specific questions asked of them.
6) Personal attacks, name calling, or threats will not be tolerated, and will be deleted.
7) Any comments on what is or is not "legal" will not be permitted.
8) Re-counting the past will not be permitted. Lets focus on the future of MOFIB and and how a Candidate is or is not a best choice to lead MOFIB into the future.
9) A Tete-a-Tete will not be allow; i.e. we will not allow multiple back and forth he said / she said arguments. State your position and move on.

It is quite possible that my question asking about the board's decisions over the past 4 months might be thrown out under #8. I should however, post my endorsements too

FWIW,

Matt

 

[Anonymous]

Rook is a member of RDO. If he can't post about the problem post on MOFIB he certainly can here.

 

[Tal Sweet]

Knowing Rook, I'm fairly certain that he's not ingnoring this. More likely he's tied up at work and hasn't had time to respond.

 

[Anonymous]

Knowing Rook, I'm fairly certain that he's not ingnoring this. More likely he's tied up at work and hasn't had time to respond.

I beg to differ.

In the time it would take to send me multiple PM's today he could have posted a few times on either RDO or MOFIB, but he didn't. How about the PM last night he sent? He fully knows about the post, could have saved his breath with me and gone public. Again, nothing has been done publicly to allow readers the opportunity to know the questions posed did not follow the given rules of the thread.


Sure it could have been an oversight, but does that mean you should sweep it under the rug and publicly act like nothing happened?

Why tell me in private?

The process should be transparent and the election committee is not one to choose which color is transparent. Any color they put on this is taking away the transparency.

 

[mpedersen]

Again Gresh, I'm just seeing the same scenario from a viewpoint of experience. I don't think what Mark Vera did was intentional. I don't think that the elections committee is the ones who have the responsibility to know what user levels can bypass the "moderation" of the threads. Those responsibilities lie with the site admins who set this up.

Remember, the Elections Committee, including Rook, are only able to provide this limited discussion because it is what the SEATED BOD has permitted. It is the responsibility of the ones with the powers that circumvent user restrictions to be sure they are not using their abilities in a way that is detrimental, but again, I suspect that Mark Vera did not know his post would go straight to the public viewership. Maybe he DID willingly do this, but unfortunately this is a case where I've seen other admins who don't know the software doing things they didn't intend to do. If we cannot prove Mark's willful and intentional violation of the rules, sadly I don't think anyone, let alone the Elections Committee, can necessarily hold him to account for his post.

Where things do come into questino again - I don't know / believe that Rook and the rest of the elections committee have the power to take the post back at this point either. Nothing posted here suggests that the elections committee wanted to remove his question and would have "censored it" as they have clearly done to your own question. Overall, what I"m saying is we don't know enough about the Election's Committee's functional powers to make some of the judgements passed above on the Elections Committee. But I most certainly believe that your question as submitted (and sent to some of us via email to see the fully wording) is more than valid if Mr. Vera's question is allowed to remain. And in THAT, I will have to fully disagree with the Election's Committee decision. But, I will pose this question - is the Election's Commitee the only one approving or denying these posts?

 

[Anonymous]

I actually do not think I ever stated it was done intentionally on Marc's part, but that does not change the fact it circumvented the process in my eyes.

Answer me this, has anyone but me said anything about this? Why are no ADMINS, BOD, Election Committee members or other members not concerned the transparency has been colored?

 

[mpedersen]

Answer me this, has anyone but me said anything about this? Why are no ADMINS, BOD, Election Committee members or other members not concerned the transparency has been colored?

Gresham, personally if I may.

1st: I for one didn't have any issue with Mark's questions in the first place. That's just my $0.02. Many other people may have felt the questions were appropriate. It'd be more worrisome if a post most people deemed inappropriate were to slip by or to be brute forced in.

2nd: How many people even know this has happened? Ignorance is bliss, right? I think that's really what it comes down to. The Admins/BOD, for the record, all have each other's backs, so of course they're not going to go after each other for "circumventing this process". The Election Committee members are very limited in their own powers and abilities and frankly serve at the discretion of the BOD anyway. For all we know they DID go after this and may very well have been overruled by the BOD itself, and maybe that's part of the rules the BOD established for the Elections Committee in allow them to have this discussions process at all. Afterall, this process is, by design, opaque anyway....we don't know what the BOD is getting involved with.

3rd: Rook conveyed an explanation to me that is in essence an answer to this question - I would invite Rook to post that answer here or send it to you directly.

4th: Maybe it's just not a large enough transgression?

5th: I've found that we need to pay more attention to INTENT these days. I.e. disregard laws and what not - it was John Lauth's direct intent to be problematic when he withheld the domain names from the committee authorized to administrate them by the BOD. That was John Lauth's INTENT. To create a rift and to purposely cause a fight to start. The fact that it was illegal or broke the rules almost doesn't matter. By the same token, I genuinely believe that it was not Mr. Vera's intent to break the rules when he posted, and as such, given my other stated opinions, I can understand why it's not become an issue for the Elections Committee if they've been able to resolve that unique scenario to their satisfaction internally. That's kindof the impression I get from what I've read.

Again, that does not excuse what was done to YOU and your question. I am flat out against censoring YOUR question. I cannot find how it breaks one of the 8 rules. I personally look at the question as worded and don't know what to change to make it ask the same thing yet be OK, as the question was so utterly simple, vague, and open ended, as it could mean ANYTHING. Perhaps though, it is this same notion of "intention" that's being called into question - i.e. if your question intends to address one of the 8 things not allowed, then even if not explicit, it was caught and flagged. Of course, Mark Vera's posts clearly deal with the past in a manner that is indirect, and therefore, so too should your post be allowed to stand. That's the FAIR solution, because a precedent has been set by allowing Mark's posts.