New moderation approach

We know there are people who have been waiting for this announcement, and we want to thank you for your patience. We take changes to the moderation policy very seriously, so we have been discussing these changes at length.

When intfiction.org first adopted the Code of Conduct, there was some resistance from part of the community, and the mod team adopted a policy of conservative intervention (preferring to let many conflicts sizzle out by themselves and use warnings over suspensions) because that was what we believed the community as a whole wanted. But over the past two years, the desires of this community have shifted, so we’re updating our approach.

As a condition of participating in this forum, all community members must follow the Code of Conduct. (If you haven’t read it before, please do so now)

1. Moderators will act immediately when they see problems.

We used to discuss moderation and come to a consensus before taking action. We won’t be doing this any more, which should speed up mod responses in time-sensitive situations.

2. There is now a formal warning/suspension progression for when people violate the Code of Conduct.

  1. Friendly reminder
  2. Official warning
  3. 1-week suspension
  4. 1-month suspension
  5. Either further temporary suspensions or a permanent ban, by moderator judgement.

The list above is approximate, not set in stone. We recognize that every situation is different, so moderators have the authority to use their good judgment in all cases.

3. If we delete a post from a thread, we’ll do so by deleting all the text and leaving a note explaining that it was moderated and why, rather than deleting the post entirely.

Posts may be deleted either because they violated the CoC, or because they responded to posts that were violating the CoC. If your post is deleted for being out of context, that doesn’t mean you’ve done something wrong - it just means your post was a reply that didn’t make sense any more, or that it quoted someone else’s CoC violation.

4. Harassment will not be tolerated.

We won’t be monitoring other sites closely (we’re the intfiction mods, not entire Internet mods) but specific personal harassment will be considered a CoC violation no matter where it occurs. If you’re being harassed by another forum user, PM a mod with details.

In closing, we ask you to remember that the mods are volunteers. We do our best, but none of us are superhuman, and all of us have day jobs and responsibilities that have nothing to do with intfiction.org. If you think a mistake has been made, please send a PM and let us know, and we’ll check into it.

This forum should be a safe, comfortable, friendly environment where we can all talk about playing and making and sharing IF. As a community, we can improve intfiction.org, but the mods can’t do it alone. It hasn’t always been those things, but if we’re all on the same page, we can change it from here on in.

Sincerely, your intfiction mod team:
curiousdannii, cvaneseltine, DavidG, Draconis, and Emerald

Thanks, mods! I haven’t been following the conflict all too closely, but I appreciate all of the attention and consideration you’ve applied to this nonetheless.

Belated, but I appreciate the clarification of where things currently stand, as well as the decision to act more promptly on CoC violations in the future. Thank you.