Just wondering if there are any board owners that have had bad experiences with people they made Admins or Mods? I recently had an experience with someone who I made Admin that tried to steal my board.......it's a long screwed up story. I was told by my server that this is a fairly common occurence......anybody else experience this?

Salveregina

I've never experienced this, but I have moderators that have been around in some form or fashion for 5+ years, but I will say that it is hard to keep and find good moderators who don't go power hungry.

Find active members, someone that is well articulated and has a cool head, and its a good start.

I have. And it was not a great feeling to have. It took months to root out all the backdoors he placed on our board. My advice: only give out what permissions and access that is absolutely nessecary to get the job done, then take it back when the task is completed.

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Just one piece of advice, you may already know this. Never make your friends Admins/Mods.

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That's crap, sorry to say. You should always trust the people you know and not someone you do not know who may claim to have experience. The admins on my boards are friends I have known for years. ANother forum I'm involved in gave admin status to a problematic fellow and it cuased no end of trouble.

Go with your friends, they are the ones you trust, and the ones who importantly won't screw you over. After all, it's just a forum. A friendship is worth more.

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I don't see the need to make anyone else admin. I have lots of moderators who all cover a small area of the forum. If they do decide to be trouble their damage would be limited.

We had one moderator who decided he didn't like how I ran the place, apparrently being as democratic as possible and conferring with all my moderators wasn't good enough.

I didn't even ban him, or remove his moderator position. I put him on miserable user, at the point he started posting porn and obscenities.

He soon got the message.

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Quoted for truth. I learned the hard way.

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Well I think we have to draw a distinction between "friends" and picking those people who you "trust". I can see a situation where a friendship can be ruined because of board business. In my case, I don't know any of these people IRL, I only know them from a previous board but they are all pretty brilliant, each in their own way. I think the key is trying to find people that are "agenda free" but how you tell that in advance, I'm not sure. I'm pretty sure that they have the same values that I do in terms of how the board should be run.

With the previous admin, I pretty much knew that he wasn't sufficiently getting my ideas - unfortunately I didn't trust my own instincts. I think if you see a red flag, you probably have to address it pretty quickly because you don't know what it can mushroom into.

Thanks for the feedback,
Salveregina

I agree. A friend isn't someone I'd necessarily trust with my sh Stuff.

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I went to Vegas, and all I got was this Blister. - true story!

I've never had a problem with my staff. My forum is run by a triumvirate (3-person) administration. My co-admins have considerable power, though I have more power in some areas being the founder and guiding vision of the forum. I do not know my co-admins personally, but they're good online friends of mine. I have talked with them often and have worked as staff alongside them on a previous forum. We also have good respect for each other, which I think helps. Because of our long history together and having gotten to know each other well, we have a great bond. We also have the mutual understanding that our fellow administrators have the integrity not to do something stupid like hijack the forum.

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