ORIGINAL: wahoo
ORIGINAL: Thomas B
I do not think the moderation standards were arbitrary, but I do think the moderation was excessive. IMO, ''the baby was tossed out with the bath water'' on numerous occasions. The excessive moderation turned off enough people that the forum became ever less visited and ever more irrelevant to the few that wanted to participate in the beginning.
The forum should have been a place for members to be able to freely air their opinions, good or bad, about what the AMA is up to and about the AMAs policies and procedures. As long as the constructive criticism was on topic and not abusive, posts should have been allowed to stay.
In a perfect world thats the way it should work, unfortunately that won't happen as long as a human is involved.
Think of it this way for a second, you lay out the funds to open your own forum, then you allow whoever wants to join and they start bashing you and the way you choose to run YOUR site. I can GUARENTEE that you would use your own moderation powers to only hear what you want to hear, and basically that would only be the sunshine being blown up yer arse.
Very true in many ways....
It is difficult when "Personal Feelings" get hurt on the matter EX: AMA or even a RC plane manufacture... As the immediate response is anger, and a colonic flush is issued promptly....
A very simple analogy to this is BRAND LOYALTY and how people take offence to ones opinion of a product of a brand...