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April 27, 2005 at 2:25 am #18075Jeff HesterKeymasterBigBlueBall has existed with the current forum structure for several years. Yes, I’ve made minor changes here and there, but it hasn’t changed much. The time has come to infuse BigBlueBall with new energy, new organization and a new structure that will make it easier for users to find the information they need.
How will we invigorate BigBlueBall? Here’s what I’ve planned…
First, I will be reorganizing and expanding the staff. The staff will be organized into teams consisting of Mentors, Advisors and a Team Leader.Let me explain what each role means:
Mentors are a new role. There will be several mentors on each team, although I’ll leave the exact number up to the Team Leader. Mentors are regular members. They don’t have special moderator rights, but they do get special recognition on the Community Leaders page and a special “Mentor” badge that appears next to their name. Mentors are the eyes and the ears of our forums. They greet new members and help them feel welcome and encourage them to participate. They make sure questions get answered in a timely manner, and report problems to the Advisors. The only prerequisite to become a Mentor is 100 posts. Members do not apply to become Mentors; they are invited by a Team Leader. New Mentors serve for a three-month commitment, after this period either party can choose to discontinue the relationship with no hard feelings. If both parties agree to continue, we ask for a one year commitment to the role.
Advisors are moderators. Rather than assign individual moderator authority on a forum by forum basis, Advisors will have moderator rights over an entire section with multiple forums. Advisors have all of the same responsibilities of Mentors, but also have moderation authority which allows them to edit, move, delete and split discussion topics. They are also responsible for organizing the forums in their section to make it easy for people to find the information they need. New Advisors must first serve as Mentors, make a three-month committment, afterwhich time the Team Leader and the Advisor meet to determine whether to continue or not. At that point, either party can decline to continue with no hard feelings, but if they want to continue, the commitment is for a period of one year.
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Each section will have one Team Leader. This leader is responsible for selecting their team of Advisors and Mentors. They build on the responsibilities of the Mentors and Advisors, but also manage the staff of their respective team, providing judgement calls on questionable posts, and most of all, encouraging high-quality participation. They lead by example. Team leaders also have editorial privilege for all related news categories, allowing them to post news articles and approve member-submitted news stories. [/size][/size]
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At the very top, will be the Administrator (namely, me). I will give Team Leaders a lot of autonomy in how they run their section of the forum, and will set the overall policy for the forums. I will also step in when necessary to deal with problems that cannot be resolved on a team level. [/size][/size]Why the change? I’ve found that when you give distribute responsibility and ownership to members, they become more active participants, and in turn, become evangelists, encouraging their friends and contacts to also get involved. This also spreads the workload, and gives members a clear path toward leadership in the forum, should that be of interest to them: Member > Mentor > Advisor > Team Leader.
I realize that because we don’t currently have Mentors, our initial Advisors will not have prior Mentor experience. We’ll make a one-time exception for the initial teams. Team Leaders will nominate Advisors and the Forum Leadership board (a committee consisting of all Team Leaders and the Administrator) will review and vote on initial Advisor selection. A simple majority confirms the Team Leaders’ selection.
Site Structure Changes
The other change I’m implementing is related to the first, but involves the organization of the forums themselves. We currently have the following five forum categories and forums:
- Instant Messaging
- AIM
- MSN Messenger
- Yahoo! Messenger
- ICQ
- Trillian
- Alternative IM Applications
- IRC
- IM Add-ons and Helpers
- Web Cams
- Online Status Indicator
- Bots & Agents
- VoIP
- Instant Messaging in the Real World
- IM at Home
- IM in Business
- IM Privacy & Safety
- IM in Education
- Computer Support
- General Computer Help
- Computer Hardware
- Web Development
- General Computer Help
- Community Center
- Introductions
- Off Topic
- What Makes You Laugh
- Food, Romance & Other Essential Distractions
- Computer & Console Games
- Movies & Television
- The Oscars
- Music Room
- The Song and its Story
- Forum Support
I would like to expand and restructure to eight categories, and reorganize the forums like this:
- AIM
- AIM Support
- AIM Add-ons & Utilities
- Buddy Icons & Smileys
- MSN Messenger
- MSN Support
- MSN Add-ons & Utilities
- Display Pics, Emoticons and Skins
- Yahoo! Messenger
- Yahoo! Support
- Yahoo! Add-ons & Utilities
- Yahoo! Personalization
- ICQ
- ICQ Support
- ICQ Add-ons & Utilities
- ICQ Personalization
- Trillian
- Trillian Support
- Trillian Plug-ins & Utilities
- Trillian Customization
- Chat and IM Alternatives
- Alternative Instant Messengers
- GAIM (potential sub-forum… could be others)
- IRC
- General IM News
- IRC News
- Alternative Instant Messengers
- Computer Support
- General Computer Help
- Computer Hardware
- Web Development
- Online Status Indicator (OSI) (this will be archived in the future)
- Online Privacy, Safety and Security (broader scope than IM issues alone)
- Webcams
- VoIP (this is a growing area)
- General Computer Help
- International Forums
- Foro General de Mensajería Instantánea
- Community Center
- Introductions
- IM in the Real World
- IM at Home
- IM at School
- IM at Work
- Off Topic
- What Makes You Laugh
- Food, Romance & Other Essential Distractions
- Computer & Console Games
- Movies & Television
- The Oscars
- Music Room
- The Song and its Story
- Forum Support
Each section will have a single Team Leader. Advisors would have moderator rights across their entire section. There will be a few Advisors who will have global moderator rights, but this is only to provide emergency support in cases which require immediate action outside of an Advisor or Team Leaders assigned area and no one else is available to handle it.
You’ll also notice that this forum categorization mirrors the structure of our IM Centers. This is purposeful.There will be special development areas for each section that will give Teams more direct input and control over the content of the respective IM Centers (for those applicable categories). In addition, many of the categories will include one or more special “news” forums that are not displayed within the forums, but are appear as part of the news system. These news articles appear in the related IM Centers, on the BigBlueBall home page and in our IM News RSS feed. Although anyone can submit a news story, they require moderation, meaning that Advisors and Team Leaders must approve them before they are visible to the public.
I’m asking for all moderators who choose to continue as either a Team Leader, Advisor or a Mentor to make a one year commitment to that role. If you have reservations about that commitment, please discuss with me.
If you’d like to be a Team Leader, contact me and let me know which section you’re interested in. If you have any questions, suggestions or feedback on these proposed changes, I’d like to hear them. I plan to implement these changes by the end of this week.
Thanks for your thoughtful consideration and all the many ways you help make the BigBlueBall community something I’m proud to be part of.
JeffApril 27, 2005 at 8:59 am #120505sciencefeelingMemberThe reorganization of the staff is nothing that I am worried about, as you all know. I will be happy to be a part of BBB in whatever form I can possibly be useful.
On the other hand, and provided that I have been given the opportunity as a a moderator to state my opinion in this case, I see the reorganization of the site as possitive, and the “team strategy” as a way of making the members and the Advisors more active and energetic.
To me, everything looks possitive.
Greetings,
N.-
April 27, 2005 at 12:26 pm #120510OreoMemberThis will be a great way to make the site more friendly and I think it will be a REALLY positive change! Thanks for the head’s up Jeff and your post explained everything. 🙂 I agree with Natalia, everything looks postive and I’ll be involved in whatever capacity needed. 🙂
April 28, 2005 at 12:29 am #120496Jeff HesterKeymasterI want to clarify a few things based on some of the questions I’ve fielded via IM.
How many people will be on a team?
To some degree, this is up to the Team Leader, but I would suggest 3-4 Advisors and 3-4 Mentors.Can one person fill multiple roles?
Within the same category, no. But in different categories, yes. In other words, you might be a Team Leader in one category, an Advisor in another, and a Mentor in yet another (although that third scenario isn’t too likely). I expect we’ll need to do some of this initally, but over time I expect to see more specialization and more participationCan I be Team Leader for the ____ section?
Maybe. I want to hear back from everyone and I’m taking notes on your interest. Currently I haven’t had anyone express interest in leading any of the IM categories!This seems like a lot of people. Is it necessary? Will we lose the friendly atmosphere?
It is a lot of people, but for BigBlueBall to grow, we need to be ready beforehand. Is it necessary? Not if we want to stay exactly the same. But if we want to improve, we need to change.With Mentors to help greet people and make them feel welcome, I firmly believe these changes will significantly improve the friendly atmosphere.Please contact me and let me know your thoughts and what kind of role you’d like to have.
April 29, 2005 at 8:21 am #120518quietbritishjimMemberWell, the Trillian forum doesn’t seem very active to me, spreading those few posts over three forums seems a bit thin. Still, maybe it just seems that way to me because it’s the only forum I look at, so if you think they’re enough go for it.
The only thing I would say is don’t split the Trillian forums in the hope that it will force there to be more posts, because I very much doubt it will.
May 2, 2005 at 11:10 am #120497Jeff HesterKeymasterI’ve heard back from everyone. Thanks to everyone for your feedback. I’ll be contacting you in the next day to discuss the next step.
May 2, 2005 at 4:31 pm #120498Jeff HesterKeymasterI’ve assigned community leaders to each section and updated to show the advisors and mentors. The names listed in bold have agreed to the position. The red names are temporary. I want to move towards each Team Leader only in charge of one section. The blue names have been invited, but not been confirmed.
Consider who you would like as advisors and mentors for your section and let me know who you’ve selected. I’d like each section to have at least two advisors and two mentors minimum.
Section Team Leader Advisors Mentors AIM Dave Tigerblade
Someguy03MSN Messenger Shifter Detn8r
EvilSeph
Martin_Bradley
DuphusYahoo! Messenger Shifter Toe_bee
Netti
Amy_d_gMiami_Guy
hatedjealousy
ICQ Jeff Shmanky
OreoTrillian QuietBritishJim Jeff Kudo Chat & IM Alternatives Jeff Hasan Amy Computer Support Dave Shifter Someguy03 International Forums Sciencefeeling Community Center Oreo Dr Kimble
Sciencefeeling
Detn8rSarahtowny
Martin_Bradley
RabidKitten
And updated colors for the active users area:
Administrator, Team Leader, Advisor, Mentor, Premier Member+, Regular MemberMay 2, 2005 at 11:47 pm #120499Jeff HesterKeymasterIn case you’re wondering, “What about DJHyperbyte?” I’ve asked Hyperbyte to take a role in a staff position as server administrator for the BigBlueNetwork (BigBlueBall, MessengerMods, and numerous other websites). The Server Administrator gets also additional recognition in the Active Users page with a unique color/title/badge combination.
Hopefully he’ll agree, otherwise I’ll be looking for a Linux admin.
May 4, 2005 at 10:10 am #120506sciencefeelingMemberI was out on a week vacation (you know we do get vacations here, hehehe). I think is awsome…
Natalia
May 4, 2005 at 9:41 pm #120511OreoMemberWelcome back from your vacation Natalia! I like the look of this too! (I know you get NICE vacations there…because my husband is always wondering where they are here in the States!)
May 6, 2005 at 10:28 pm #120500Jeff HesterKeymasterImportant!
If you’re a Team Leader, I need to know who your proposed team will be. I’ve heard from Shifter and Oreo, but still need to hear from Dave and QuietBritishJim.
Once you’ve selected your target team, you’ll need to invite them to join. They’re going to want to know what the role entails, and what will be expected of them, so here is a description that you can email them.
For Mentors…
Hello _____,
BigBlueBall is reorganizing the forums and as Team Leader for the ______ section, I’d like to invite you to join my team as a Mentor.
What is a Mentor? Mentors greet new members and help them feel at home in the _____ section. Mentors help make sure that no questions go unanswered. They encourage other members to get involved and participate in a way that helps everyone learn and have fun. Mentors also work with our Advisors if there is a problem post that requires moderation.
As a Mentor you’ll get a special “Mentor” badge that appears next to your name in your posts. You’ll also have special access to a “staff only” forum for discussing ideas for improving the site or questions on how to help the forums grow. And you’ll get recognition on our Community Leaders page (not to mention the respect and admiration of your peers).
What’s expected of Mentors? Besides what I’ve already described, we’re only asking for a 3-month commitment. After that time, we’ll reassess how things are working. If you’re happy and we’re happy, we’ll keep it going. If not; no hard feelings. As a Mentor, I expect you to visit the site regularly, although I realize that no one can visit every day. I suggest you subscribe to the forums in the _____ section with a “Daily Digest” notification so you’ll get email notification when new posts are made. Be involved regularly, and if needed, think of ways to stimulate the discussion. We all benefit from healthy, active forum discussions.
I respect your contributions to the forums, and hope you’ll agree to join the team. Please email me with your decision, and feel free to contact me if you have any questions.
For Advisors…
Hello _____,
BigBlueBall is reorganizing the forums and as Team Leader for the ______ section, I’d like to invite you to join my team as an Advisor.
What is a Advisor? Advisors are a new title for what we currently call moderators. As a moderator, you’ll have special privileges and responsibilities that allow you to move, edit and even delete topics within the forums in the ______ section. You’ll be working with me as the Team Leader and a few Mentors — a new role without moderator privileges. Mentors will work with you if they discover a problem in a discussion that might require moderation.
As a Advisor you’ll get a special “Advisor” badge that appears next to your name in your posts. You’ll also have special access to a “staff only” forum for discussing ideas for improving the site or questions on how to help the forums grow. And you’ll get recognition on our Community Leaders page (not to mention the respect and admiration of your peers).
What’s expected of Advisors? Besides what I’ve already described, we’re only asking for a 3-month commitment. After that time, we’ll reassess how things are working. If you’re happy and we’re happy, we’ll keep it going. If not; no hard feelings. As an Advisor, I expect you to visit the site regularly, although I realize that no one can visit every day. I suggest you subscribe to the forums in the _____ section with a “Daily Digest” notification so you’ll get email notification when new posts are made. You’ll also need to provide a way for Mentors to contact you, preferably via Private Message or IM.
I respect your contributions to the forums, and hope you’ll agree to join the team. Please email me with your decision, and feel free to contact me if you have any questions.
How does this sound? Any comments or feedback? Feel free to edit to fit your style, and go ahead and start inviting those potential staff members (if you haven’t already).
All I ask is that you let me know who you’re inviting and how they respond.
May 7, 2005 at 6:36 pm #120501Jeff HesterKeymasterThanks for catching my typo, Marcus!
More good news — DJHyperbyte has agreed to serve as our server administrator on a month-to-month basis. Thanks, Jan!
I’ve also updated the matrix on page one of this discussion. Please review and make sure I’ve got the right names in the right places.
May 7, 2005 at 9:28 pm #120512OreoMemberMartin has agreed in the community center to mentor as well. I have not had a chance to get in touch with Det or Natalia…but…hey you two! I want you as advisors…you game? 😀 (We could always use a fourth Shifter if you are interested. 🙂 )
May 7, 2005 at 11:33 pm #120502Jeff HesterKeymasterOreo wrote:Martin has agreed in the community center to mentor as well. I have not had a chance to get in touch with Det or Natalia…but…hey you two! I want you as advisors…you game? 😀 (We could always use a fourth Shifter if you are interested. 🙂 )Just so you know, Natalia only has internet access from work, so don’t look for her except on weekdays normally.May 7, 2005 at 11:42 pm #120513OreoMemberI’ll keep that in mind. I’ll make sure to send her an e-mail. I know she’s somewhat restricted in how and when she can access the Internet.
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