I noticed that the “Please Read and Pass On” thread was (most deservingly) locked by my pal Ukelele Ike. However, Ike isn’t listed as a Pit moderator.
Ike’s listed as the sole Cafe Society moderator. (Good job, by the way, moderating one of the busy forums all by your lonesome.)
Does this mean that moderator status is boardwide? Can moderators cross forum lines and moderate haphazardly? Willy-nilly wherever they please!?
Or are the Pit moderators such slackers that our intrepid Ike is forced to step in and do a yeoman’s job of covering their bases so as to protect us all from the vapid dreck of less-than-cogent posters?
Either way, it’s not a huge issue. I was just curious. That thread richly deserved to be closed.
Our Holy Moderators’ powers are strange and mysterious. These magic powers cross forums as easily as we pathetic mortals cross a room.
IOW, yes, Mod / Admin powers are boardwide. Sometimes when an obvious violation occurs and is witnessed by a visiting mod who is just browsing, that mod will take care of it then and there.
They don’t say “aha! Moderator So-and-So missed Thread X in Forum Z, so I shall take care of things and be a HERO!” But they DO say “oh yeah, Moderator So-and-So is on vacation, and Moderator LaLaLa isn’t usually online at this hour. Well, I’m here. Guess I’ll get that one for them, and they can buy me some beer as payback later.”
Or something along those lines. Seriously, though. While there might not be beer involved (having met several mods at several fests, it’s probably more like cash, hookers, blow, and real estate ;-)), they’re a team. They cover for each other, as most people cover for their co-workers when necessary in ordinary “straight jobs.”
Haphazardly or willy-nilly? No. They follow board and/or forum rules. So if Ike (the Cafe moderator) closed a Pit thread, it was most likely because a) said thread violated Board rules, and b) he was closer to his keyboard than the other mods, at the time said violation occurred.
Nothing to worry about, Frank. Just Ike doing his job.
What if there’s a disagreement about if a thread should be closed? Say, for example, Coldfire doesn’t think a Pit thread warrants closing, but Ukelele Ike does, can Coldie take the position “Close it if you want, Ike, but you’re the one who has to take the heat for closing it, not me” and do nothing while Ike closes it? Yeah, it sounds like stepping on toes to an extent, but with so many threads, the situation has to have come up before, hasn’t it?
Ike’s powers don’t actually extend into the pit, but in several parallel universes, there is a parallel universe Ike moderating a parallel universe pit. All our Ike has to do is contact this Ike using the secret moderator’s forum, superimpose the parallel universe thread over ours, and have the other Ike close it for him. It’s the same effect that creates multiple posts when we know we only hit submit once.
ROFL! But the last effect is actually caused by the Transdimensional Hamster Wheel – a variant on the skill exercised by the cat Pixel in Heinlein’s The Cat Who Walked Through Walls. (I knew being a Heinlein freak would come in handy sooner or later!)
Coldy may take issue with my decision on the subject, if he so desires, but that sort of obstreperousness generally leads to a bout of Naked Moderator Wrestling in Hot Oil.
And HE knows that his girlfriend told me about his ticklish places.
