Is this where they're selling bagels?

@Behaviour Hello Mr.

I think I know you.

There are days when I think so, too.

@Behaviour That's quite poetic. But really, didn't you use to have an xkcd avatar?

Back in the good ol' days

@Behaviour Hehehehe.

Although I share your point of view in many matters concerning the site, that wasn't the best approach to matters, eh? ;)

It's the worst one, except all the others.

@ArthurFischer It's certainly more fun that way

Hi everybody. I would like to make public my self-nomination. What do you think about it?

@Behaviour Why don't you nominate yourself?

I should put the answer into a FAQ of some sort, considering how often it's asked in various chatrooms... I don't need mod tools, I can do a lot as a regular user. Some others agree:

can we nominate other people?

@JorgeFernández Officially, no. Though this thread has been opened up on meta to unofficially nominate others.

The reason for this, IIRC, is that in the past it was possible to nominate others in SO elections, but this resulted in a number of nominees who weren't actually interested.

How long does the moderator status last?

One is a moderator until they decide to not be a moderator.

@JorgeFernández Until they quit or are "forcibly" removed.

I see, thank you

I'm not certain if there's a case when egregious moderator actions have ever lead to the dismissal of a moderator (throughout all of SE), but it is a possibility.

Has a moderator in the history of the stackexchange network been forcibly removed?

@MikeMiller Depends on what is meant by forcibly. As I said above, I cannot think of a case where egregious moderator action (or user coup) has lead to the dismissal of a moderator. But moderators have been removed for prolonged inactivity.

(There is a current situation on an SE site where a user revolution was close to becoming a reality, but the SE team has stood by the current moderators there.)

Puzzling, I suppose, aka "the weird one".

@MikeMiller Somewhat related, from the history of this site:

@ArthurF I was interested in the coup, rather than the inactivity.

@Behaviour Of course. (Though the site is about as weird as PP&CG, IMHO. PP&CG just has better quality control, and puzzling wasn't originally set out as a site for puzzles/riddles.)

@MikeMiller I'm going to be keeping a close eye on you.....

@ArthurFischer I wouldn't have it any other way.

I thought about posting to the question a question about approach to casting binding votes.

But it is possible that the mods already have some system to cast a binding votes in a way as a regular users. (Maybe the discuss this in private moderators room, or post comments instead of voting. If another mod sees that they are already enough "suggestion to vote" from mods, they cast the binding vote.)

So before asking such a question I wanted to ask whether the mods already have such system. (That would render my question completely useless.)

I think I recall having a short discussion with one of the mods in chat about binding votes. But I cannot find it now.

Oh I found it. It was a very short exchange which starts here:

Basically, the response is summarized here:

@MartinSleziak There's no official (or even unofficial) system in place, and each of us acts in ways they are comfortable with.

Personally, if I strongly feel that something should be closed, I'll close it without considering what numbered vote I am (mainly these questions which are clearly too broad, or are clearly primarily opinion-based, or are obvious duplicates). Similarly, if I strongly feel that a question should be reopened, I'll do so. In the more borderline cases I try to resign myself to being the 5th (last) vote.

I have no trouble mod-deleting nonsense and other non-answers (even link-only answers, since those aren't really answers, but I generally give a warning before nixing those), but won't touch simply incorrect answers with a mod-deletion.

For real spam and offensive stuff, it would be a waste for me to wait to be the 6th flag.

Thanks for the answer @ArthurFischer

@ArthurFischer There is that "clear" word again :-)

@robjohn Obviously. ;-)

@MartinSleziak: the moderator's binding vote keeps me from voting on some things that I would like to vote on, but that is just the cost of doing business. Instead, I will comment; it's the next best thing to voting.

I see.

IIRC the discussion I linked to was about question where I did not entirely agree about another question being a duplicate, which was why I did not like the binding vote. But it is never going to happen that all users are going agree.

But clearly, I did not feel strongly enough about that to make a post in a reopen thread.

@MartinSleziak Closings can always be undone; fairly easily in the grand scheme of things. Especially with the reopen queue. The amount of brouhaha (often including demands for resignation) over a moderator closure generally far exceeds the actual harm done.

(Of course, I'm just a Nazi mod saying this, so am somewhat biased.)

I definitely do not request resignation. Basically all I did was ping robjohn in the chat about that back than.

I don't think this qualifies as too much brouhaha/kerfuffle/whatever you call it.

> get posts in meta if "clear" is not clear enough. [quoting robjohn]

There have been such statements made in the past. I'm not saying that you have made them (and actually don't think you would). And I'm talking about the way these generally trend, and not a specific instance.

I'd say this comes with territory. I get my share of less-than-loving meta posts, too.

You certainly do. (Is it a hint to make a thread going in the other direction ;-)

No, not that. I mean that doing what is right is more important than not being criticized / called Nazi / whatever.

I have to say that I disagreed with you on many things when your activity on SE started. And I still would do some thing differently. But I definitely see that you do a lot for the site (it seems that you care about it a lot).

Naturally, "what is right" means different things to many people.

@Behaviour Oh yeah. It took me some time to decide to run last time because I wasn't sure if I wanted to handle "impolite criticisms" that were sure to come. I am glad we have a pretty good support network behind the scenes.

An SE-sponsored rehab for meta-battered moderators? :)

It's more like group therapy.

@Behaviour What makes a good mod? I mean What should I look for? (in nominated candidates)

@Integrator Maybe make a ton of downvotes. ^^

@Integrator I think Arthur's answer here is on target:

@Behaviour It's gonna take too much time to read that! Stay here! Don't leave

@Integrator my comment on main sort of paraphrases Arthur's answer

vote for ahaan, i saw him on aops he's good

It seems to me that a lot of people don't really understand what a moderator is/does (cf. the many nominations, both official and unofficial)...

Yes, the amount of very brief nominations from users with no activity on meta, flagging or review queues is staggering. As I remember it, last time there were very few nominations.

Yes, you are right. We got a lot more frivolous nominations this time than ever before.

@AnalysisIncarnate Good at moderating, or at something else?

@Behaviour In the trolling thread on meta, quid has expressed a feeling that such frivolous nominations are normal; you might link him the history there. (I am unable to with my phone.)

@MikeMiller quid said it occurred often on the network.

Not here yet, but the site grew quite a bit, so the big city problems appeared here too.

I think we will eventually move in the direction of SO with far stricter requirements for candidates. (Too late to change the rule for this election, of course).

When you say "far stricter", what, other than the larger reputation requirement, does that entail?

Thanks.

@MikeMiller Is this your first election?

@NajibIdrissi Sure, but being moderators they can say: "ok community, we have this and this issue, what should we do"? Yeah, I know any user can do it as well, but if moderators do it something will be done afterwards, instead of almost nothing just like right now.

@leo I can offer a long and confusing cautionary tale from another SE site, if you are interested. (Their issues themselves are not on-topic in this room, but the thread is an example of how a top-down effort can backfire.)

I can also offer a quote from a Community Manager who has dealt with issues of all kinds, shapes and sizes around the Network...

@Behaviour modding. He's been mod on aops for years, he's highly experienced.

Good to hear.

@AnalysisIncarnate He is 15 years old and he's been mod on AoPS for years? At what age did he start...?

@Integrator This is first Math.SE election I have actively participated in. It is not the first MSE election I have observed, nor the first SE election I've participated in.

@Behaviour What are you waiting for to nominate yourself? :-)

Is it possible to have the many off-topic comments on nominations be deleted?

@leo Can you clarify what you mean in your comment on Pedro's nomination?

@MikeMiller He's usually rude with some people for no other (apparent) reason that he dislikes them

I find it difficult to read that from your comment; would you mind leaving one on the nomination page with more detail?

@MikeMiller How not? Someone pointed him that a language is subset of another. He responded rude. That can be read in the transcript, that's the purpose of the link there

Ah, I didn't notice the blue-link.

Regarding the off topic comments, maybe @GraceNote can do something about.

@MikeMiller For the record here, here it is

@leo sigh... :)

@Behaviour So are you running for mod or not?

;)

I know, I'll change the name to Not running for a mod, stop asking.

@Behaviour lol

But if you can do a lot as normal user imagine yourself with mod powers

Heave a sigh of relief

^^

@leo Having mod powers also, in some sense, restricts your powers. In particular, if you find the ability to close vote helpful as a user who wants to maintain the site, you have to give it up as a moderator (as the community generally agrees that moderators should not unilaterally close questions).

I think that particular tradition is also something that should be left in the past (eventually). When users disagree with mod closure, they can reopen -- no big deal.

@Behaviour Tell us why you don't want to be a mod and I will star it.

I appreciate the thought, but let's not. I'm not the only active user who does not want to be a mod, no need for special notice.

A small fee of around 100 rep maybe a good idea for nominees. That way joke applications and low rep users are mostly filtered out and only really serious users are willing.

@Alizter But they become moderators for free, why must they pay to nominate theirself?

@Venus There is no payment. The beauty of the system is that if a user is mature enough to recognise that 100 rep essentially does not mean that much. If they think 100 rep means a lot then they should be reconsidering their position for moderator anyway.

That is an early test of the criteria "Are you willing to sacrifice your own to help the community?".

Apparently, some nominations got removed, because I see 16 now, and a couple of them are new.

What I wanna know is which candidates are soliciting bribes and how much power and corrupt influence my vote can bring. This is, after all, politics! :-D

@Alizter Instead of 100 rep, I think the most logical requirement to nominate yourself as a mod is your track records on mse like how much review you did or how much helpful flags you have been raised and so on.

@Venus Sacrificing rep is like sacrificing time. Sacrificing time is exactly what moderators do.

For the real pranksters, 100 rep means nothing

@Venus that is why I said most.

@leo What's up?

@Alizter But reviewing and raising helpful flags are also sacrificing time.

@Alizter I'd rather go straight for sacrificing time, then, instead of using rep as proxy. You know: editing the posts by others, reviewing in the queues, flagging, etc. There are users who gather substantial rep while doing nothing but posting; they would not be stopped by a rep fee.

@Alizter Let us take Annastasiya as an example, she has lots of reps, she always having fun around here, so spending 100 or even 1000 rep will not stop her playing around.

@Venus nowhere did I say that 100 rep was a deciding factor for being a mod. It is only a precautionary measure taken during application. If a user is that dedicated to submit their low quality contribution then let them but what I am trying to get at is that the majority of low quality submissions could be avoided.

@Alizter Assuming Annastasiya is trolling us, so a rep fee will be useless to be applied here.

@Alizter How did you come with conclusion "majority of low quality submissions"?

@Venus Yes. Annatasiya is not the majority.

@Venus Just look at the other submissions

most of the bad ones have been removed now but its just an idea

ideas are meant to be developed.

This is not a final draft.

@Alizter Chillax bro, we are discussing here, not arguing each other ^^

Did I sound angry? Oh sorry lol :P

I think the best standard for nominating is editing, reviewing, flagging, closing etc. Not rep, IMHO

@Alizter No, just in case :D

@Alizter I see it. In my opinion, the best candidates so far are Sanath, Ahaan & Pedro

Based on their contributions

Actually Pedro is a maybe. And I am not sure about the others.

We will see the final list soon anyway.

@Alizter I'm not sure about Pedro anyway

But I am not in the position to judge anyone else here. Just saying opinions

@Alizter As Ahaan has said, "May the best candidate win!" ^^

Don't overlook the page More Information about the candidates, it gives more details in a more readable form than the nomination page.

(Not to mention that it omits the comments posted under nominations; this reduces clutter.)

If there are off-topic comments on the nominations, I can help clean some up.

@GraceNote this and this nominations are cluttered by comments that don't have to be there, imo.

I don't suppose the nomination pages are meant for everyone to post "+1, you got my vote" as a comment.

It really isn't, no.

@Behaviour On Pedro's nomination, busting down everything but leo's comment and Pedro's response seems fair, yeh?

Yes, seems so.

Done. As for Kasper's... well that'll be a different thing to be looking at.

Kasper's nomination itself is really a meta post. Not sure it can be migrated.

Can't migrate it, no.

Perhaps give him fair warning to make it a meta post and then delete it?

@Behaviour I posted a useless comment

sorry guys

... and then you did it again!

just now :)

@Behaviour Who knows how they will really vote? It seems like noise, but a lot of politics is just noise.

Anyway, I wish to have spent more time on Meta.

I have the feeling that my nomination was just like "a drop in the sea" since I am not so much known by the community.

@JackD'Aurizio meta is a good place to get your opinions on the running of the site known. Chat can do that, too, but perhaps to a lesser degree.

@robjohn Is it fair to say that "most of a moderator's activity involves dealing with flags, things related to the review queues, and meta"?

@MikeMiller That is a good deal of it. But dealing with flags can take different forms: closing and deleting posts, sending mod messages, commenting, etc.

You also work with the community team to track down sock-puppets and other voting irregularities.

@robjohn Thanks. For full disclosure, I was using that sentence to comment on Anastasia-Romanova's nomination, and wanted to make sure I was writing something correct.

heh