In January, I wrote about how not to lock topics. Reader Jeremy wrote this comment:

There is a certain online forum for a photo gallery I use where the Moderators are just plain mean. A good portion of the time when someone asks a question the moderator is the second or third person to respond, and it’s with a snippy comment about searching before you post, and not posting questions that have already been asked/answered. They often go on to lock the thread. Often times when searching for information, I’ll come across these threads long before the ones where the original question was answered!

I’ve even seen people ask questions about that gallery on other websites, just because they were afraid to be scolded by these mean moderators.

The moderators never help by providing links, just rude comments. It’s a shame their product is so good, because their attitude is not…

The emphasis is mine here as this is what I’d like to talk about today. There are a lot of support communities out there. I run two communities that would fit in that vein: the phpBBHacks.com Support Forums and PhotoshopForums.com.

But, back before I had them – before I had phpBBHacks.com, specifically – I noted a tactic I saw all too much. The moderators on some support forums, or the support team, would chastise people for asking questions they deemed repetitive or simple. They’d tell the people they should search, they’d lock their topic – they’d be snide and disrespectful. It bothered me so much that I made it a founding principle at phpBBHacks.com for my Support Team. That policy was, simply, if you are on my staff and someone asks you for a solution, you don’t tell them to search – you link them to what they need. Even if the question has been answered a million times. No exceptions. While I am sure there were slip ups, I am always quick to correct them. I am pretty fanatical about this.

When you are on staff at a support forum, chances are that part of your responsibilities are to actually help people – to support them. If you are telling people to search, you aren’t doing that. I don’t count this as teaching a man to fish – rather than giving him a fish. Teaching people how to search is another discussion for another day. What you exist to do is to give people a solution, not to send them off into the never ending search results.

The reason that they are using your forums is because they really don’t want to search. They want an answer, that’s why they are asking a question. Provide them with that answer, if you can. If you don’t know, don’t tell them to search. If it’s a question that has been asked a million times, write a tutorial and link to it each time. People will ask the same question over and over again – that’s natural. Maybe the more important thing to ask yourself is why – why are they asking this question so much? Can you do something to prevent that? Or help it? But, if you can’t, just write a detailed tutorial and whenever someone asks the question, link them to it and encourage them to ask questions if they have any, after reading it.

The same goes to pointing people to an FAQ in a flippant manner. “Did you read the FAQ?” “Why didn’t you read the FAQ?” “Before you posted, you should have read the FAQ.” Don’t send people to long FAQs, send people to what they need. Give them their answer. That’s your task. It’ll make them happier and you’ll be better off. And people will come back.

Do I allow regular members to suggest that people search? Yes… but, it has to be done respectfully and not in a condescending, “you’re a newbie” way. When it comes to a support community, it’s important that both the question answerers and the question askers receive respect.

Questions for the comments: Do you run a support community? If so, how do you instruct your staff to handle repetitive questions?

On January 28, Mahalo CEO Jason Calacanis sent out an e-mail to his private mailing list titled “We Live in Public (and The End of Empathy).” The e-mail talked about the state of the internet as it relates to how people behave online and how accountable they are for those actions. There is a dehumanizing element to the internet that is fed by anonymity and the fact that you don’t have to see or face the people you are talking to, or about. Jason posted the e-mail on his personal site. I’d recommend reading it. If you are a community manager or moderator, parts of it – at least – will resonate with you.

Jason invited replies, so I decided to send him one, since I enjoyed the e-mail and found myself identifying with parts of it. I can’t share all of what I sent, but here are some of the more important thoughts.

What Jason talks about, I’ve certainly noticed, as well, and it does bother me. I’ve been managing online communities for nearly 10 years now and it’s something that I battle on a daily basis, so this really resonates with me. I’d like to think I’m “winning,” my communities are free of this type of thing. I could never run a community that worked like that. My communities are friendly, respectful and family/work friendly (for the most part). It takes work to get there, but that’s the environment that I want and that is my goal – that is the allure of the community. We welcome disagreement, but it must be respectful. We don’t allow anyone to call anyone names, to flame people, to beat people down, whether it be a member, myself, a staff member, Britney Spears – whoever.

I caught this part: “At some point, all humanity in an online community is lost, and the goal becomes to inflict as much psychological suffering as possible on another person.” I can say that, in my case, that hasn’t happened on my communities. That’s what I prevent. Funnily, that is one of the reasons I wrote the book, to give a blueprint on how to create a respectful community. Community managers, like myself, don’t have to settle for this sort of stuff, just because there are people out there who want to inflict it and people out there who cry foul when you stop them from doing it. You can stand up and you can protect your community. The problem is that it takes work and not everyone wants to do that. In some circles, it’s also not cool. It’s “censorship.” But, I don’t care.

I had a guy recently come to one of my forums and as his first post, I think, he posted and said that everyone else that had replied to the thread was a “clown.” Not in the funny way, but basically he said, “you shouldn’t take the advice of any of these clowns.” We removed his post and he replied to a member of my staff that the removal of that post reminded him of 1939 Germany. Ah ha, Godwin’s law! Yes, this comparison has happened many times. I’m used to it. I’ve been called every name there is. I’ve written about it some.

But, just because that happens doesn’t mean it needs to be that way. I would like to believe there is room for people like myself, who are cultivating communities with this in mind. Part of the problem is what Jason says – the mentality where people want to get as many pageviews, unique visitors, friends, followers, etc. as they can. For this reason, a lot of people don’t want to offend the users they have, so they let people do whatever they want. Sometimes they pass it off as “well, this is what my user’s want.” They take the traffic, they cash the check, but in the process, they create a community of trolls.

I was on the phone a couple of weeks ago with two people from a major corporation and I was giving them some feedback on an internal community they have going on and I told them that one of the luxuries I have is that I own my sites, I am my own boss – no one tells me anything. I don’t have to worry about someone above me that I have to please with numbers – someone that needs to see that the community has X number of posts, members, etc. to justify it. Results are good, but sometimes to get those results, to please your boss, you sell out the would be soul of your community and that’s sad.

Those aren’t my values and I’ll never run a community where that is OK. I would like to think this is not the majority – that what we hear in these IAS comments is the loud shouting of the minority. I hope so.

Tanner Smith is one of my moderators on the phpBBHacks.com Support Forums. He’s 17 years old and he’s been on my staff since he was 13. Often times, when I discuss community environments and maturity levels with people – age becomes a topic. How someone approaches this topic, how they talk about teenagers, impacts my perception of them as people. I started managing communities in 2000 – when I was 15. I dealt with people who wouldn’t listen to me because I was that age. I will always remember that. And that’s why I will always respect people based upon their actions and their merit – not their age.

Age doesn’t mean a heck of a lot, I’ve found. Some of the biggest idiots I’ve had to deal with have been people in their 20s, 30s, 40s and older. Some of the greatest people I’ve had on my communities have been in their early to mid teens. And vice versa – some of the biggest idiots I’ve had to deal with have been people in their early to mid teens and some of the greatest people I’ve had on my communities have been people in their 20s, 30s, 40s and older. Simply, great people are great people. Age doesn’t make you great.

In other words, when someone comes into my community, my reaction to their age is always “Meh.” It doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t tell me what to expect from them. It doesn’t tell me whether or not they’ll respect our guidelines. The phrase, “we’re all adults here” means nothing – absolutely nothing – to me. It doesn’t tell me whether or not they’ll be great contributors. Age doesn’t dictate personality. Too often, too many people fall into this trap, stereotyping a certain age group.

Anyway, the main reason I am writing this post today is because I wanted to highlight a post that Tanner wrote on his personal blog. Not just because he titled it, “Why I like Patrick O’Keefe’s way of managing forums…,” either. Heh. But, in the post, he talks about his experience watching me manage the community and describes what he likes about it, in three sections: it’s organized, it’s professional and it’s good for users. I think it’s a great read. I didn’t know anything about the post until it was already up. But, having read it, it clicks. This is what it’s all about. Thanks Tanner.

Some feedback is easy to take. Someone makes an awesome suggestion that makes a ton of sense or simply loves what you are doing and wants to tell you so. Some feedback isn’t as easy – someone doesn’t like something you’ve done and wants to let you know about it. As long as they aren’t overly disrespectful or crude, they deserve a reply, like anyone else. But, regardless of what it is, you can respond to feedback in three easy steps.

Step 1: Appreciate

First and foremost, appreciate it. Appreciate that they are offering their thoughts and that they took the time to do so. Express this clearly and in the simplest of terms. “Thank you for writing. I appreciate your feedback and your perspective.” Do you want people to provide you with feedback? Then act like it. Thank them for it.

Step 2: Acknowledge

Take the time to read what they say and consider their position and where they are coming from. Once you understand what they are suggesting, say so. “I understand what you are saying.” “I can see what you mean.” Emphasize with them, honestly. If you do not understand what they mean, ask them questions to find out more, so that you can get the compete picture.

Step 3: Consider

Finally, since you have expressed your appreciation and acknowledged and understood what they said, consider their suggestion or feedback. See the value in what they are saying. Consider how it would impact the community and how feasible it is. Don’t feel inclined to do it if you do not feel that it is the right thing to do or that it would require an effort that you cannot commit, at this time. There is nothing wrong with this. There is nothing wrong with being honest with yourself and the limitations of your time.

We all have an idea of what we would like our moderators to do and how we want them to act. In deciding these things, we are also able to figure out how we don’t want them to act. Sometimes, we realize this by seeing other moderators behaving badly. With this in mind, here are 10 moderator behaviors that I would never want to see from my moderators.

1. Condescending Thread Locking

I think you should avoiding locking topics in general. If a post is bad, it’s removed. Not closed. You don’t close threads and leave problem posts in public as that sends the wrong message. But, there is a time and place for locking threads. And when that is done, it should be done gracefully.

Locking topics shouldn’t be an act of provocation. It’s not a statement as to your dominance of  the forum. That should be conveyed. Posting something like “Locked.” just sends a totally wrong message. It’s unprofessional, condescending and crass.

2. Moderation Individuality

Individuality in people is a great thing. We’re all different and those differences are what makes life either difficult or awesome. If we were all the same, it’d be boring.

Moderation individuality is when a moderator decides that policies that have been set for moderators can be circumvented and that the moderator is free to make decisions against them and do what they want. It could be deciding not to document something, deciding something isn’t a violation when it clearly is, or something else. Whatever it is, it causes a lack of consistency in decisions, leading to confusion from members and staff alike. If done knowingly, it’s insubordination.

Locked topics have a purpose on most communities. I try to avoid them, except in specific circumstances, but they have a place and they are a tool in a moderator’s arsenal. What I want to discuss today isn’t the locking of topics in itself, but what one says when they lock a topic.

When you lock a topic, you should have a legitimate reason that you can politely convey, in a final reply to the thread. For example:

Hey guys,

We actually have another discussion on this very same subject that was recently active, so I am going to go ahead and close this one and redirect you over to that one.

http://www.communityadmins.com/how-many-mods-do-you-have-vt30.html

Thanks,

Patrick

Unfortunately, sometimes people don’t take the time to politely explain. Often times, these folks include a sentence like “Locked.” or “Lockey lockey.” in their post. This is ugly and lazy. Closing threads should be done with grace. Not with condescending and flippant remarks or statements that basically say “I’m a moderator, I can close this thread – I just did. Too bad.” The lock thread option isn’t a toy, it should be used for specific reasons and not as a flight of fancy.

If you run a community, make sure that you define when you want your moderators to use the close thread functionality and how they should do so.

Closing Question: Without citing specific names, websites or links, what is the worst example of moderator gone mad topic locking that you have ever seen?

We’ve talked about what contact templates are, but now I’d like to talk about a tip for those hardcore users of them, like myself. Consider using a text expander. This is a program that allows you to type a string of text and have it replaced by another string of text, most commonly a longer one. These applications have all sorts of uses, but one thing they can be great for is in making your contact templates readily and quickly accessible.

I have contact templates for each of my forums, with links to that forums’ guidelines and the name of the site, etc. So, I have developed an easy to remember system that allows me to quickly enter any contact template into a text box where I am working on a message to a member.

How It Works

I have an abbreviation for all of my sites. KarateForums.com is KF. SportsForums.net is SFN. And so on. And then each template is associated with something. Like inflammatory or vulgar. Put them together and what do I get?

Well, when I type “kfinflammatory” without the quotation marks, my inflammatory comments template for KarateForums.com automatically fills itself into the text box. Poof. Just like that. When I type “sfninflammatory” without the quotes, the same happens, but with the SportsForums.net version of the template. Yeah, I could do a shorter string, but it’s just easy for me, so I roll with it.

After testing this out for a while, I can’t live without it. I recommended it to all of my staff members, so that they could make more efficient use of their time, as well.

Alternatives

As an alternative, you could have something like a drop down menu for staff members above your new private message text box that allowed them to easily select the template they needed and have it inserted. This has some benefits, as well, such as them always having the most up to date version of every template. But, this likely isn’t possible without some sort of hack to your forum software. Anyone can install a text expander.

Text Expander Options

Speaking of installing a text expander, I am on Windows and I use Texter, a free piece of software from Lifehacker. I did some research looking for a Mac one, for my staff members that had a Mac, but I could not find a good free one. The one that seems to be widely recommended is TextExpander, which is $29.95. I can’t expect my staff members to lay out that kind of cash for something like that, though, that they might only use on my site.

But, if you are a power computer user, a text expander is a great app to have in your productivity arsenal. You’ll find more uses for it than just this one. I definitely recommend checking them out.

When removing a post or some content from your forums because it violated your guidelines, it is a good idea to let the creator of the post know why, so that they won’t wonder where their post went and so that they will be less likely to commit the same violation in the future.

But, with yourself and however many staff members you may have, how can you ensure that the messages that are going out are consistent and are worded in a fashion that you approve of? How can you save both you and your staff members the time and tedium of having to type up these messages? The answer is contact templates.

Contact templates are pre-written form messages with blank fields that are completed before the message is sent. Let me give you an example of what a contact template might look like, if the violation was cross posting and it was done on KarateForums.com.

Hello <USERNAME>,

Thank you for visiting KarateForums.com.

Unfortunately, I have had to remove your post quoted below as it violated our [url=http://www.karateforums.com/userguidelines.php]User Guidelines[/url] as cross posting.

[quote]<PASTE THE POST THAT WAS REMOVED>[/quote]

Cross posting is posting the same content in two or more locations.

Please keep this in mind to prevent further violations in the future.

Thank you for your time and cooperation.

Sincerely,

<YOUR NAME>
KarateForums.com Sensei

This is how the message would appear in our staff section. Note the BBCode in place, to automatically create a link to our User Guidelines.

Contact templates are created for some of the most common violations of our guidelines, such as inflammatory comments, vulgarities, cross posting and more. We also have a general template that can be used in many circumstances, such as advertising.

I’m not a fan of automation for the sake of automation. I am a fan of automation that improves the quality of your community and helps you to do your job in a more efficient manner. This is such a case.

Contact templates are great because they allow you to maintain a consistent, quality level of communication when it comes to interacting with members and explaining why this or that post may have been inappropriate for your community. They think of most things you need so that you and your moderators do not have to think about them every single time you need to contact a member. They include the proper greetings and they convey the ideas in a respectful manner.

As you can imagine, this also can save you a lot of time because you do not have to type those messages. This allows you, and your staff, to get more done.

As your manage your site, you are sure to notice trends and violations that happen with frequency. These are the types of violations that you will want to create a template for.

How to get started? I would start with the general template and then get more specific from there. You can always take the general one and then create branch templates with specific language for things like inflammatory comments, advertising, etc. The book website has a downloadable archive featuring some contact templates that I use on my sites. You are welcome to use them as a basis for your own.

At my communities, we are proactive when it comes to defending the rights of others, in fairly clear cut matters. There are people out there who are tickled to allow hotlinking, mass copying and pasting of copyrighted articles and blog posts and unbelievable piracy, just as long as no one calls them on it. When they are called on it, they act. But, until then, they are happy to have the traffic. Not me.

One good example of this is our handling of hotlinked or direct linked images. I use hotlinking as an umbrella for when someone embeds or directly links (such as posting the link http://www.ifroggy.com/image.jpg) without permission from the person who is hosting the photo.

We make a reasonable effort to ensure that the person is using a free file host that allows it, a website that has permitted it or their own web space. One site that pops up, from time to time, is Flickr. Flickr’s community guidelines are clear. You can link or embed an image on their server, but you must link to the actual image page on Flickr, as well. So, for example, if you post a link to or embed http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3126/2588974860_9e53e85043.jpg, you must link to http://www.flickr.com/photos/65547304@N00/2588974860/. A common and acceptable way to do this is like this:

As you can see, I have embedded the image here from Flickr’s servers. When you click it, it goes to their photo page. Another way to do this is simply to provide a “photo source” link below the photo. Either way, you are accomplishing the objective and respecting Flickr’s wishes and requirements.

We had a person sign up for one of my sites just the other day and start posting multiple links to images on Flickr’s servers, apparently to photos on his account. Not embedding them, but linking directly to the .jpgs. No big deal, we’ve seen it before, many times. Post removed, documented in our staff area and a kind and polite private message (PM), explaining the problem, is dispatched.

The next day, the guy does it again and adds a question, why was his other thread deleted? (Which, of course, violates our guidelines as referencing administrative decisions). So, again, it was removed and a kind and polite PM was sent, explaining the situation once again.

Now, my moderator – the moderator who handled all of this – did a wonderful job and is a super nice person (as all of my moderators are). With that in mind, here is what the member sends back (note: this isn’t the exact PM, but it is basically a rephrasing of what he said, except with better grammar):

Look,

I linked to Flickr. http://www.flickr.com. Flickr is a FREE host of pictures and videos that allows you to upload your pictures and videos for their blogs and websites. Again, FREE. So you know, Flickr is very large and tons of people use it for direct linking of pictures on their blogs. There’s nothing illegal about it. [Editor’s note: no one told him it was illegal]. Furthermore, the pictures are MINE. I downloaded from them Google and I uploaded them to Flickr MYSELF. You got it now? If not, go to Flickr. http://www.flickr.com. Actually, here are their guidelines: http://www.flickr.com/guidelines.gne.

Thanks for your NICE message. PERIOD.

So, basically, he was a jerk to my moderator. But, this message is pretty funny and the actual one killed me. He probably violated Flickr’s TOS by downloading images from Google and uploading them to their server. That’s nothing to be bragging about.

But, the real gold is in the fact that he linked to Flickr’s guidelines. If you go to the page, you will see that they clearly state:

Do link back to Flickr when you post your Flickr content elsewhere.
The Flickr service makes it possible to post content hosted on Flickr to outside web sites. However, pages on other web sites that display content hosted on flickr.com must provide a link from each photo or video back to its page on Flickr.

My moderator sent him back a very nice message, showing him this excerpt and I ended up banning the fellow. But, that message was just too good not to share. There’s a certain hilarity when someone like this links to the page that shows that he is, in fact, mistaken.

Recently, on one of my communities, there was a member who had a post removed. He didn’t care for this and in his next reply, on the very same thread, he talked about how someone had “snitched” on him. His aim, of course, was to speak poorly of the person who supposedly reported him to a staff member and to devalue the action itself, in general.

Of course, this post was removed as well, for a couple of different reasons, with one of them being that it is inappropriate to attempt to intimidate or belittle members who report posts on my forums. We encourage people to do so, proactively, through our guidelines, through messages displayed on our site and directly to members, when they reply to a painfully obvious violation of our guidelines.

I told the person, in no uncertain terms, that his behavior was unacceptable. Members who report potential violations to us are to be thanked and appreciated, not ridiculed. This is why we never say whether or not something was actually reported and, even in a case where it might be relevant, we’d never say by who. We’d never put someone out like that. You have to protect the people who are helping you and your staff, who are helping you to maintain the atmosphere of the community.

Oh, yeah. By the way, the post that was removed, where the person said someone “snitched” on him? No one reported the post. I saw it myself and I removed it, myself. But, I didn’t correct him because it is irrelevant, whether or not someone reported it. The important thing is that he not be allowed to treat post reporting as something that is dirty, or wrong.