@Fomite - continuing the discussion, I think that's exactly where that discussion should be held. If you look at other elections, the nominations board is typically where credentials for moderation are discussed.

Please note that I'm not trying to bash or support; I'm just trying to look at history as a guide

@eykanal I found, for the stats.stackexchange.com, that the Q&A section of the election allowed for vastly more productive long-form answers, not only the the questions asked to all the candidates, but to answer specific questions, like the ones that have been raised about my nomination.

A question for current mods (@eykanal I'm looking at you): besides for patient, fair, respectful, etc., what traits are you looking for in a moderator candidate? In a comment you mentioned "janitorial-type tasks that take up most of a mods time," what kind of things would that be?

@eykanal Expanding a little bit as I've thought about it: I dislike the idea of using the nominations board because it either involves using the comments in exactly the way SE comments are not supposed to be used, or creating weirdly ever-evolving documents.

Further, I think it puts potential candidates on an unequal footing - for example, I have a chance to engage and expound upon why I should be a moderator addressing EnergyNumber's concerns, while aeismail is in the enviable, but boring position of essentially only being able to say "You're right, I am awesome, thanks for saying."

Whereas, in the Q&A section, everyone is answering a panel of questions.

But I could be wrong, and I can be content in my wrongness.

@Fomite Ha! If only everyone could be content in wrongness like that

I'm honestly not sure, this is the first election I've been involved in... I'm just following the model of other elections I've seen

The problem is that the Q/A component works, but for specific questions, and it doesn't allow for discussion of credentials as much (you won't see a "you look unqualified... can you expound on credentials?" as a general question)

I'm honestly basing it on an N = 1 sample, because I'm not nearly involved in any site besides CV to the point of the elections mattering much. That is the problem with "take it to the Q&A period" as an answer, and I can edit my nomination post just as easily if it seems the better option.

But you could easily expect to see "Could you touch on X thing..." in the Q&A section. Or a general question like "What are the duties you expect of a moderator, and how do you support that you could accomplish those?"

@ff524 In my opinion, the specific traits needed, in order of importance, are:

(1) has available time time to moderate the site

(2) has patience in dealing with the same issues every single day, over and over again, for months on end

(3a) has the ability to think and cool off before posting something stupid (like this gem of mine)

(3b) willing to listen to and act on the opinion of the community, even when their personal opinion is different

if (1) isn't there, it's no question that the person cannot be a mod. If (2) is not there, they'll be an OK mod for a month, but quickly lose interest. If (3a/b) is not there, then they'll just be a mediocre mod.

a distant (4) is that they should be willing to get involved in drama, since part of managing a community is being involved in community drama

a person can be a mod while avoiding drama but they'll be less effective as a mod

(4b) While they may gladly face the drama, they should probably not summon it themselves. See: 3a.

@Fomite :)

@ff524 To answer your specific questions ("what kind of things would that be?"), that would be clearing flags of all types, replying to posts on Meta, deleting spam, migrating stuff, discussing things with other mods (both academia and broader community)

hey @F'x, if you have anything to add to either of the above lists, please add to it

I don't see much to add…

despite having be a pro tempore mod on 3 different sites, this one included, I don't have much of a "theory" of moderation :)

I've met many wonderful mods from across the SE network, but they have very varied approaches to moderation

having a complementary team is nice: some fresh eyes, some experienced eyes, etc…

@eykanal regarding (1): how much time/week would you say is required to be an effective mode on Academia.SE?

in the case of the Meta post you linked above, for example, I think we — as a mod team — did a very good job of helping hash out that debate, even though opinions were initially very divergent

@ff524 my take on time commitment: you don't need to be present/visiting all the time, but when I'm around I count an absolute minimum of 10–15 minutes a day… it can go up to one hour, during large debates, etc.

@ff524 ...and that really is an absolute minimum... it's much more likely to be ~1 hour, from my experience

less than that and you'll find that you're not contributing as much

we have a dashboard that shows how many flags have been cleared/comments left/users contacted/etc per mod, you can tell who's active on the site

@F'x I agree

@eykanal @F'x why did you agree to be mods here? what have you gained from the experience? why are you not putting yourselves up for re-election?

(if you don't mind my asking)

@ff524 Keep in mind nominations are still open for 5 days, they haven't not put themselves forward yet.

Understood :)

@F'x I'd also like your take on whether "You don't seem qualified/committed/etc. as a moderator..." comments are better addressed in the nomination posts, or the Q&A section. You've got more experience than either myself or eykanal.

@ff524 I don't intend to run, due to time constraints, especially as I have no doubt that many qualified candidates will step up (some already have) to the task

I was a very happy user of the site, former moderator on French SE and moderator on Chemistry SE, when I was asked by the SE team if I would consider joining as 4th mod on Academia, to help spread the load of the mod team. I was glad to accept, because I love the site and wanted it to work steadily towards graduation

the fact that I was already quite used to mod tools meant I had little learning to do, which was good

what I gained from the mod experience is very similar to what a power user gains: great experience of sharing with people from widely different backgrounds, points of view, alleys of life…

However, as a young professor managing a family and a research group, time is hard to come by :) since the graduation, I've been pondering it, and decided to let others step up

@Fomite I don't have a well-formed idea on where discussion about a particular candidate, or general expectations for mod candidates, should take place. What I know, from earlier experience, is that comments below nomination posts are very tricky, but necessary to the nomination process. Try not to take them too hard…

@F'x nod This is mostly a logistical discussion. I've had worse ;)

On the issue of whether having a "track record of using user mod tools" should be a requirement for a mod candidate: no, it's definitely not required to be a good mod… but it's data showing the other users that you have a long-term will to moderate the site.

In other words: you can be an excellent mod without having ever flagged/downvoted/reviewed/meta'd before… but you're asking people to bet on you :)

@eykanal Since my dislike of commentary in the nomination section appears to be a purely personal quirk, feel free to return to commenting there. I'm working on an edit now.

@ff524 I agreed to be a mod because, at the time, I was fresh out of graduate school and very active on the site. During the private beta I seeded the site with tons of questions that I would have asked had the site been around when I was starting grad school.

What have I gained? I dunno, it's been quite fun; got to wrk with fun people, deal with interesting community issues. Very occasionally something stressful happens, usually in the form of someone being aggressive towards me directly.

I haven't put forward my nomination yet as I wasn't planning on running, given that (a) I've been out of academia for a while now and (b) my new job requires more of my time. However, depending on how the nomination phase goes, I may nominate myself anyways... my wife is in grad school, I'm reliving the whole thing vicariously :)