AFW Discord - Mod Announcement and Open Forum Discussion

[killcarrion]

For a few years now we've had an AFW Discord chat that, at least at it's inception, seemed to be a centralized and genuinely healthy community for members of the site to congregate and mingle amongst themselves. All in a way that the chatbox on the main page could not have done, and it seemed to be a prosperous method of aiding our fledgling members and helping integrate them into the site, while offering an easier method of communication aside from just private messaging.

Unfortunately, it's apparently degraded severely from it's original state and strayed far from it's purpose due to mismanagement on our part and lack of oversight, and for that we'd like to apologize. Moving forward, the mods and admins will be exploring several avenues of potential solutions to this issue, one of which is assigning a Discord mod to help us manage it and and help it grow in prosperity. We'll like to announce that we'll now be accepting applications for this position, and that anyone who seems interested in aiding us in this endeavor can contact myself, or any of the other mods and admins. We'd prefer people who have some experience moderating chats such as ours, but having no experience will not disqualify you in the slightest. We'd be immensely grateful towards anyone who could help us.

Furthermore, I'd like to have an open discussion in this thread in regards to how we can better improve the Discord chat and make it a more appealing hub for ALL members to congregate, since one disturbing trend we tend to see is that nearly none of our active members on the site take part in discussions there, offer insight, or just derive any enjoyment out of it. We'd like to know why that is, and if theirs any solutions you'd like to volunteer.

Thank you.

[Diesel_Electric_Razor]

Well, I have several ideas upon fixing the server as I've said before.

the first naturally being an increase in Moderation as to crack down on the more random inane shitposting and toxicity

Secondly I'd say we remove a few certain... uhhh, let's just say uncouth individuals from the Server...

Overall however I agree with Old_Man_Tai's ideas upon the server such as the invite and such, however I do not support destroying the current server, I'd rather we just completely overhaul and revamp/revitalize it

those are my two cents on the matter

[Iceman]

Hey, good thing that you want to tackle the discord server again. I'm afraid I don't have enough time to think about being mod, but kudos for the hero who steps up to the challenge.

Concerning how to improve the server, I don't claim to have all the answers and I don't use it much, but I would add some channel for the new people to ask questions concerning the site or how to do some stuff. I would gladly help any newbie in there.

[Agent Hunter]

I believe that this Discord Server is in desperate need of differing channels, ones that separate actual discussions from more "Meme-ish" conversations. Say a Meme channel so that General chat isn't going to be overwhelmed by rather joke-based pictures or chat. While I am aware of the "Spam" and "Picture Spam" channels, these are not specified to be meme channels, their usage is rather vague at best, and thus entices more than just spam. I shall be frank, I am indeed responsible for some of this, if not a good amount in recent time, And would like to apologize on behalf of my "dumb-ness" if I have caused any of you Mods or people headaches since my introduction into the server.

[Tarantulust]

Discord Chat discussion.

Will likely just list past and present issues I have had that kept me from enjoying the official Discord server. This list is done in no particular order, and varies from personal issues to professional issues.

__

1. White Noise: Much of the discord server has little to nothing to do with the actual AFW site.  Majority of the chat channels are loaded with random shitpostings and arguing. Reaction images are a staple of Discord, which makes the Picture Spam channel inconsistent and muddles the conversations even more. The conversations are rarely related to the site, and so I personally skip past them.

2. Inconsistent Moderation: I understand that the Moderators are very busy. But a huge factor of why the Discord chat has become that way is due to the fact that the channel has no clearly stated rules, and the moderators actively avoid the Discord channel. They often act disgusted when they arrive, but it feels like very little is done to alleviate the situation. The solutions feel like a band-aid on a gunshot wound, and then the Mods disappear for another two months,only to return and churn the bucket even more. I am also concerned that this entire situation is only being brought up because the mods fear losing new players rather than engaging with the veterans of the site. There are some individuals that clearly stir the pot, but are left alone with Moderators usually doing little about them. Be nice if they had a more active role rather than showing up acting surprised the discord is a mess.

3.Pony Spam: This is just a general complaint, but I hate coming into discord to check my messages and see that my screen is covered in MLP memes, reactions pictures, and GIFs all from the same two or three people in every single populated channel. I have also noticed this happening With 40k, and Gundam. However, the latter two are nowhere near as intrusive as the former.

4. Nobody on site: Most of the people on the discord don’t post on the site. Most of the people on the site don’t post to the discord. Why would they ever do so? The two have become so separated from each other, they may as well be different beasts. Those few that work on both don’t do so to propagate the other. I go on the site to write RP’s, I go on Discord to try and talk to those that don’t go on the site often. If people want to RP on the site, they send PM’s.

5. Opened Floodgates: The fact that the invite button is on the front page is an issue. It invites people who are not all that invested in the site to begin with to either jump in and start shitposting, troll, or otherwise ignore the entire discord. Not every new person does this, but an invite only system would be appreciated, rather than just leaving the door open and having no moderators watching it at all.

6. Established groups: This is a personal reason. I pretty much had no desire to speak to anyone outside my usual clique. There is no real interaction in the match request channel due to the lack of active site members so there was little reason to explore and meet new people. Because there is virtually nothing related to the AFW site, there is not much point in using the discord to grow or expand your profile. Wouldn’t surprise me if many people have their own channels with the people they regularly talk to and only use the AFW discord to look at pictures.

7. Trouble Children: As mentioned before, there are trouble children on the server. Kinda self explanatory.

8. No Memes: Personal issue again. It would be nice if there was a clear channel for memes, so I don’t have to look in general or picture spam for them. May actually cut down on some of the white noise.

[skip-stop]

Hmm. I hoped that after I asked to create additional channels, this would reduce the fervor of idle talk in every other channel that was not designed for this. But this helped only partially. I will not raise the issue of moderation, but I will outline how I see an attempt to put the server in order

1) Clearly describe the purpose of each channel and create new ones if necessary. What I mean? Channel "General" - only for discussing things from the forum. Channel "Spam" - discussion of anything in any form. Channel "Picture Spam" - only for safe pictures and the opportunity to briefly discuss the pictures you like without creating a whole discussion. Etc. A clear description of the channel creates a limitation on its use.

2) Clearly describe the set of rules and what punishment will follow for breaking them. What I mean? Have you started a discussion of useless shit on the channel "General"? Get banned for an hour. You did not understand anything and started trolling the person who sent the picture to the channel "Picture Spam"? Get banned for six hours. Still think you're the smartest and decided to send a couple of memes to the channel "Matches"? Get banned for two days. Still don't understand anything? Well then, get banned forever. If a person wants to be on the server, he must follow the rules. If a person does not want to follow the rules, then he should understand that there is a punishment for this. Punishments for racism and the like should be spelled out too. But here everything should be logical, everyone can have their own opinion, but everything should be cultural. For example. If someone says that he does not like gays, this does not mean that he is homophobic, it's only his opinion. But if someone begins to directly or indirectly insult sexual minorities, then it’s time for this person to go to the ban.

3) You need a person who will monitor the server or quickly respond to complaints. It depends on this person how clean the server will be. It's simple in general. There are clear rules. And this person must punish those who break these rules.

4) I read above that there is a problem that active forum members do not use the discord server and do not discuss forum things there. No comment.

5) Make the link to the server private. I think it will be more effective to pin the topic on the forum that we have the discord server and to get access to it, you need to ask the moderator for a link. Because now there is a very large percentage of people on the server who have nothing to do with the forum at all. These people only spam, spam and spam. And why are these people needed on the server?

I think that's all. My idea is very simple. Describe the purpose of the channels. Write the rules. Appoint a person who will enforce the rules and punish those who do not. It sounds very simplistic, I know, but it seems to me that this will be enough

[Yori]

Much of my own issue with the discord was the overabundance of what could be considered loud and toxic people treading over the channels. It's why I originally decided not to bother with it and why, after returning to it, rarely speak. I have always been a firm believer that the chat should be comprised of active people in our community and should strive to be a fun or informative place to be for people to get to know one another of chat about things. While this is idealistic because we not only are on the internet but have a community based around highly questionable content, I still think this sort of thing is achievable

Discord Rules
What we need: Clearly defined rules, for community behavior as well as the discord. What can be posted where, a degree of expected etiquette, and general expectations for community members.

How to do that: A master channel that is only there to display the general rules of the discord that can easily be refer to and has an overview of what sub channels in the discord are for. In each sub channel, this description with or without examples can also be pinned to ensure there is a second location to refer to that is also easily accessible to someone unsure.

Enforcement
What we need: Moderation. While in a perfect world, things work the way they are suppose to. Then humans existed so that flew out the window. To pair with clearly defined rules, we need bodies to enforce it.

How to do that: Having more in the chat is the obvious go to solution, but we need more than that. Having moderation staffers for the discord is nice, but no one can be expected to be there around the clock. Having a reliable way to catalogue and report issues so moderators can deal with these problems when they are able. This falls both on the community and the staff to work hand in hand to how they want to set this up, be it doing more with proof or having a whole system for reporting. I don't imagine this will see much use given our smaller community though.

Supportive Community
What we need: Easy access to forum, discord and community information for new members.

How to do that: Devote a channel for new member welcomes and introductions, something our forum still lacks a defined section for. Have a channel also used specifically for asking questions a new member, or any member, may have in regards to the community.

Roleplay Assistance
What we need: Promote tie in use for the discord with the forums.While having a general "RP" section is fine, the discord should be an extension of the existing forum.

How to do it: One of the more obvious ones to me has always been to move the "AFW" chatroom from the forums to the discord as its own channel. It gives people a very casual easy to access way to roleplay and worldbuild without having to commit too much time for posting.

Double up on the notice board. Have a channel set for people looking for matches, ropes to fill, or threads to make with other people. Provide links back to the notice board in line so people can cast a far wider net when looking for what they want from a roleplay thread.

Worldbuilding and idea areas. Need help coming up with details for a character? Finding some good moves? Making up special move types? Thinking up fun spots? Having a notable not in a thread? There should be an area for it. Roleplaying is collaboration, why not help promote that by lending a hand to other people. Sometimes just having a new perspective on things will give a character something grab to do or a plot to embark on.

Roleplay prompts/events. Consider the running something, perhaps on a monthly basis, where there is a plot element going on in AFW. Something simple people can chose to take part in, or ignore altogether if they don't wish to be hamstrung by whatever it is. The main purpose of this would be to get people thinking of how they might react to this and perhaps inspire them to make a plot around it. This could be something simple like:

"Tourism is booming this summer month, flooding the beaches. Tensions are high when people are fighting over their perfect spot"

or

"There is a rumor AFW is going to be releasing some talent. They are saying it's being based on lack of fan reactions…"

These events don't have to lead to any lasting effects on a meta level, but give people ideas of things to build a thread around or include with their threads.

Discord Accessibility
What we need: To ensure we have people who want to actively contribute to our community in a meaningful way. Are they active on the forums? A community artist? Just an nice fellow who lurks but is well informed enough to help people? I don't see why they cannot be allowed to add to the conversation.

How to do this: Many have suggested invitation, which yes that is certainly one way. It won't however really entice many people to join up or give them a good idea of what to expect. As I am sure many people in our community know, our newer members can be shy about getting involved when they have to contact a bunch of strangers to even get in the door. I suggest making the link accessible to everyone, but only allowing these new faces the ability to post to a special section of the discord meant for new arrivals.

As mentioned earlier in this post, a welcome area, a place for questions, and a rules section. All the other chat channels could be viewable, but unable to be typed to until they have made a request and been granted access, via a discord role, to type to those locations. This gives us the means to vet out people who have not gotten an application approved, don't wish to actively contribute to the community, or are general bad seeds that can be booted out  long before they put down roots in our main channels. I also recommend making any and all NSFW channels inaccessible for anyone without proper posting permissions.

Chat:
What we need: Engage with the community.

How to do it: Use the discord.

P.S. Please make it a rule that people should change their discord names to match their forum names since this can be done on a server to server basis with nicknames in discord. It will make identifying people easier.

[Harrier]

I admit that I have no idea how to patrol such a server. But I am with Yori in the following topics:

Welcoming culture and accessibility:
The main reason for a chat that is not opened privately between two persons are a sense of community and a news section. I know that if I had not casually asked another member in a PM, I wouldn´t be on discord today because it is nowhere stated where it is located. If it´s secret, what use should it have in regard to a sense of community? If I am looking for news only, I can just wait until the mods public it here and on top of that spare me the drama to discuss about it.

Roleplaying assistance.
I personally have no need for an AFW chat like the one we have in the board, I am more of a forum or bust person. But the rest of the Roleplay assistance paragraph sounds very reasonable.

[killcarrion]

Just wanted to thank everyone for their contributions and suggestions. I assure you they've all been acknowledged and scrutinized thoroughly...and I promise you all I'm really doing my best to get these changes applied for the betterment of the Discord and the site in general.

[LtLukas]

To be honest, I don't go on the AFW server that much. For a lot of reasons listed here.

But something that I think would be beneficial would be to come forward some concrete policies. I found Yori's post to be very helpful, and I think skip-stop bringing up a zero tolerance policy for insulting gay people and tarantulust bringing up taking the invite button off the site also has merit. I understand that we cannot possibly account for all situations, but one of the things that I think is helpful is to have something that you can point to, to establish ground rules. I agree that having more engagement is a good goal, and that seems to be the consensus of what everyone wants, but it would be better if there was some sort of coherent plan in place. Yori made tremendous strides in his 'how we do that' sections and I personally would like to see more of that.

Something that I personally found to be a bit overwhelming is the number of channels. As much as I appreciate history (I actually posted there) there isn't a clear reason why we need a history buffs channel. And the tv-tropes page is fucking sick, but it seems like everyone spamming RadiantKarna332 to include their characters. The video games server is also not great, in my opinion. It divides discussion too much when I think more discussion should be brought together. I am not a discord native and I thought it was odd.

I particularly like the idea of having a welcome board. Or at least something like, you must have posted 10 (or whatever number) times in an RP thread to get access to all the servers.

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