Just as a side note, since so many people are mentioning it. I’m not 100% sure, but I think Glitch linking quotes from chat indicates that there was a chat log that moderators or at least admin could access… It wasn’t entirely unmonitored and it seems like some sort of log was created that was searchable for in cases where something unsavory was reported as happening. The key there being “reported”. The moderators don’t know something is a problem unless you tell them, instead of spreading toxic rumors and complaining to people who can’t do anything.

I have to agree with. Kiwi, Deddo and Nyx. Forums were always harder for me to post on and until I popped my head into chat a few times I felt like I wouldn’t get to know anyone on the site. Even now it’s not like I talk to anyone on here regularly, but I was quite a bit more comfortable in the chat. It was especially nice during events. -shrug-

I’m kind of surprised at this development. I’ve been on lots of sites with live chats, and have never seen this kind of problem before. I would love to see live chat here continue to exist.

That being said, I would like to make a few points/suggestions:

1. I never spent too much time on chat, mostly because it moved too fast and was a bit hard for me to read because of the lack of space between posts. I think a redesign might make chat a bit friendlier to people—space things out, use peoples’ forum avatars to identify them in chat. A chat that is more user-friendly might convince people to poke their heads in—and stay longer.

2. I’d like to see live chat have stricter content rules than the forums. Because live chat does move quickly, it becomes harder to moderate. I think chat might need some guidelines to help keep the content friendly to everyone.

3. A ‘report chat post’ button may also be useful to draw mods’ attention to unsavory stuff, as well as keep the reporter anonymous and comfortable using it.

I really do love getting to know people via live chat, and I would really hate if this were taken away on MC. But I think that some improvements to how it is run will help keep issues from cropping up in the future.

A report function is a basic feature I see on a lot of forums and chats, but I’m surprised it’s lacking here. You need clear guidelines/rules and a contact feature that everyone using a forum or chat service can easily see at least once to be aware of how to report users doing unsavory things and breaking rules. It’s as simple as the common [!] red button and telling people how to press PRT SCRN and save/upload for proof or accessing a log.

Basically, if communication is a problem, open up a line of communication and let people know it’s there.

When you have a problem with something, report it so staff know about; then you don’t have to just sit there and pout about nothing being done.

If people aren’t telling you, produce an official incident reporting feature so you don’t sit there a frown at no one telling you about problems. Also make sure you actually have rules you enforce; I know site rules are under construction right now but it’s a must.

As an admin myself for a gaming community, I know it’s annoying to see people complain about something they didn’t make any effort to report in the first place, but it’s also crucial to let people know how to do so in the first place.

I don’t really have any suggestions just I’m really glad that your doing this for a bit because sometimes I feel uncomfortable chatting in the live chat, so thanks! I hope the live chat will improve greatly :)

Having gone through all comments & suggestions personally, this is a summary of my feelings with regard to the issues brought up. I think I’ve covered most of the ones I personally felt were essential and at the very least covered all the ones I feel should be addressed by changes in staff behaviour. I have also focused on solutions that are the least demanding of glitch, as his to do list is longer than the to do lists of all other staff together, and many features that have been suggested and requested would take a lot of time and effort from him and this is currently simply not feasible.

Please, please keep in mind that these are my opinions, and not a reflection of what ‘all of staff’ thinks or feels :) We all have our own opinions just as much as you do!

And now, apologies for an essay sized post. I find it hard to keep things concise and to the point, but this post is part of me practising :)

Some users prefer chat, others prefer the forums, for various reasons mentioned earlier both in this topic and outside of it. I personally like both the chat and the forums, so I would love for the chat to eventually come back, even if only during events. The biggest issues I see are the definition of expected involvement of moderators and the consequences of bad behaviour that they should enforce.
* I would like for chat return with three different chat rooms. PG-13 Mycena related (moderator moderated, casual player/staff chat), [M] ‘any topic legal under USA law’ (non-moderated with a warning landing page before entering for the first time and player-selected moderation in the form of contacting a moderator if a user steps over boundaries) and a private staff-only chat.
* I would also like for there to be a specific set of ‘consequences’ for moderators to stick to with regards to issues both on the forums and in the PG-13 Mycena related chat.
* Regarding 24/7 availability, I very much liked the suggestion of adding a notice along the lines of ‘beware, no moderators are currently online!’ when no staff member with moderating capabilities is actively available in chat. Additionally, moderators are allowed to be afk and should be given a nudge if something is going on and they happen to be tabbed out momentarily. The previously mentioned dedicated chat moderator would be an option, too.

“More staff should post around the forums, instead of in the chat” to me is not valid reasoning. Some staff are too busy to post on the forums, and only had time to drop by the chat. Removing chat does not make them more communicative on the forums, it makes them more invisible than they already were. These issues, to me, are completely separate. A staff member does not post less in the forums due to being more involved in the chat. That said, I do think the forums deserve just as much, or more, attention from the site admin and any staff member that has enough time to visit the forums. I do not, however, think this will change very much. From my perspective we are already posting ‘as often as we can’ given the time we have to spend on Mycena.

I feel there should be a public staff policy that states we guarantee that we will always try to be as professional as we can be, while relying on our players to let us know when they are offended by something that (unintentionally) upset or offended you. Anonymous backlash just feels counterproductive, and I hope you will help us become better at what we do. Professionalism, in my perception, would be along the lines of something Eluii inspired, such that whenever staff posts something they’re unsure of, they check, “Am I aware that word “x” hurts/offends some people, and is there another word I could use?”

I fully understand that people have felt ‘secrets’ have been shared with a (varying) subgroup of users, and I know this unintentionally upset users. I’m sorry players have felt this way about information that to staff felt trivial.
* I feel we (read: staff) should try our hardest to prevent this from happening in the future. I suggest we do this by posting all updates in the monthly news thread, which should be moderator-combined into a second “monthly FAQ” post in the same monthly discussion thread. This also requires you, the player, to be diligent; If you feel a staff member told you something that you felt is unknown to the general public and they would appreciate hearing it, point it out to us. We are human and may not always know :)
* This “monthly FAQ” would be reused in next month’s discussion (e.g. ‘what happened last month?’) and should consequently, at the creation of the new month’s post, be posted on tumblr. A link to the new News post should be posted on Facebook and Twitter.

I do not think we need more, or different, moderators, I think we need a site-wide report feature.
* The moderators we currently have strongly overlap in timezones and availability, thus situations outside of their availability go unnoticed. They are, however, not thus overwhelmed to need ‘more force’, only ‘better spread of availability’, which could be taken care of with a reporting feature. This, however, depends on glitch to code in, and would have to be added to a long list of to do’s.
* The aforementioned issue that moderators from Digis have come over was a decision I believe was made purely out of good business sense; Work with people you know, trust, and that have proven to be capable. If you have a complaint about a particular staff member, take it to them or to an admin.

I have spoken out against guilds (and with this I mean, the concept of Guilds as it can be found on Neopets) before, and I am still convinced these would cause an elitist can of worms nobody wants to open. Officially recognised private groups will always cause some sort of entitlement and on top of that are much harder, and much more involved to moderate.
* I therefore think user hangouts would be a much more satisfactory solution. This could be a forum category that could be checked off in the Recent Posts selection. Adding a [Private] tag to your topic would mean people could read it, but are aware the owners consider posting restricted to pre-selected users. [Public] would mean people can read it, and are aware they are welcomed to post if they would like to. Making a [Private] topic invisible to other users makes this completely redundant, as the multi-user Echo feature supports exactly that. And that even has notifications, to boot.

One thought occurred to me, along side the new site rules that may or may not go into effect. If we had a chat room that was labeled as [M] that’s unmoderated, it would maybe be a good idea to enforce an age limit, alongside potentially requiring age verification on profiles/on sign-up to comply with the child online protection act. Maybe for the [M] chat make it inaccessible to users below age 15 or something. It would help ward off any backlash (and legal trouble) from (for example) a 12 year old going in there and being scarred for life by a discussion about horror movies or adult subjects (not sex, but topics pertinent mainly to adult members; what if I want to have a discussion about the wars going on?).

Plus I wouldn’t feel comfortable chatting in an [M] marked chat room that doesn’t have some sort of safety net since to me [M]=Mature, which makes me tend to think 17+ age range. There are discussions that still comply with Mycena rules that might not be appropriate for younger members.

But I don’t know. It was just a thought I had in regards to what “[M]” means in the literal sense, rather than what it tends to be used for on Mycena (to me, using the word “damn” once in a seventeen page RP doesn’t warrant the [M] tag, but others feel differently). Like in most places in the USA now anyone under age 17 can’t buy “M” rated video games without a parent present. It probably isn’t relevant to Mycena though *shrug*. I was just considering why we might need an [M] rated chat to begin with since it seems like there is a sizeable mix of adults to minors on this site. It might make all involved a bit more at ease to have a clear cut distinction so they aren’t walking on egg-shells in the [M] room wondering whether or not 13 year olds can see the messages and get offended or their parents offended since everyone has a different idea of what [M] entails. Especially if the [M] room would be unmoderated.

I think an official report function is absolutely crucial and should be introduced as soon as possible. I thoroughly agree with everyone that’s suggested that. I think, to me, at times echoes often feel too… unprofessional? They’re fine for inquiries and the like, but don’t feel “official” enough, I suppose, for more serious matters like reporting bugs or problematic occurrences. That coupled with a “staff professionalism policy” will iron out a lot of issues and “issues-to-be”, if you will. And, of course, finally putting together the revised site rules. I think that’s what I was trying (and failing) to get it at the other day. Sorry.

The more I think about the more I am most definitely in favor of chat being around for events. At least. If it makes a full return I would like to see it with the changes Juney and others have mentioned. I also agree with hiring perhaps one or two mods devoted just to chat (or at least primarily devoted to chat)?

I still really like the idea of hangouts, though. Something that is non-restrictive where anyone can come and go as they please and with the option for “private” hangouts. Guilds can definitely lead to similar “clique-y” experiences, etc. Unless you were to make it so that people could join more than one? Gaia had guilds, but you were allowed to join as many as you liked. It gave you the option to have more private, “homey” guilds while still branching out and communicating with a wider userbase by joining several other, larger guilds. It might be a way to bring people with similar interests together, at least? I’m not sure how feasible/coding-intensive this would be though. May just be easier to do the simple hangout idea. heh. Regardless, I think if chat makes a return something should be done forum-side to promote more activity in the community.

Again, thank you for taking the time to open this up for debate and all. I really like a lot of these suggestions and I’m especially glad that more information will be cross-posted so it’s more accessible to everyone. Thank you.