Congratulations on self moderation

[admin]

The way Austech is moderated has changed vastly over the last decade.

Previously a team of moderators was required to basically "follow the action" non stop dealing with a range of issues. This was taxing, its not much fun adjudicating fights all day and moderator burn out was a problem. Although we are not as busy as then (primarily due to the major decline of the Satellite tv industry....but we have gained a lot in recent times in Communications), Austech, primarily through long term established members, now operates on mainly self moderation.

Spam is almost instantly reported by members and dealt with promptly. Longer term members, knowing how the site runs, will occasionally give us a "heads up" on a thread that's about to have a problem. Most post reports are valid, ie, someone is breaking the rules. We do get post reports that we don't take action on for a number of reasons, sometimes the report is basically because someone doesn't like what someone said, or our opinion is that someone is not breaking rules.

Regardless, a lot of threads particularly in General Chat, are on difficult current affair topics of which there are always people who support either side of a debate. Despite this, the amount we have to moderate is realistically quite small for the amount of content. Although we are not as hard in our rules as Whirlpool forums for example, the amount of moderation they have to do is astounding. As an example, would be out of control. Looking at the current 2 pages, it shows me that in general there is some good conversation and discussion.

So basically, I am saying well done and thank you for the general good standard of behavior. Of course some will say "what about this, what about that" - there will always be arguments as long as 2 people have a different opinion and its how people go about presenting that argument that matters. I will never censor General Chat simply because growing leftist social policy demands it and firmly believe that the words of l, who wrote the phrase "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".