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Weekly Meetings

As well as discussing support issues here on the blog, we use Slack for group communication.

Our weekly meeting is held fortnightly on Thursday at 20:00 UTC, with agendas published below. The next will be at Thursday, 20:00 UTC (your time zone) in #forums on SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/..

Jan Dembowski 2:24 pm on April 29, 2015

Agenda for the April 30th meetup

Items for discussion:

Dr. Moderator or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

Yes, that’s very tongue firmly planted in cheek. I do want to talk about less moderating or at least avoiding over moderating if possible. Nothing too serious, I just want to touch on being more sensitive to forum members.

Note: the WordPress support team is IMHO the most fun group to be part of. It should be fun but that can be maintained while also being sensitive to other forum member’s intentions and replies.

If there are items you want considered then please comment below or bring them up at tomorrows meetupMeetup All local/regional gatherings that are officially a part of the WordPress world but are not WordCamps are organized through https://www.meetup.com/. A meetup is typically a chance for local WordPress users to get together and share new ideas and seek help from one another. Searching for ‘WordPress’ on meetup.com will help you find options in your area..

Jon (Kenshino) 5:50 pm on April 29, 2015

Could we discuss about the possibility of me gaining weight as divine retribution for calling Clorith fat?!
Andrew 10:28 pm on April 29, 2015

> . I do want to talk about less moderating or at least avoiding over moderating if possible.
Are you saying you want to avoid talking about moderating in these Meetups, or are you saying you want to talk about avoiding talking about moderating?
- Ipstenu (Mika Epstein) 10:31 pm on April 29, 2015
  
  He wants to talk about us being too heavy handed when we’re moderating the forums.
  - Andrew 11:47 pm on April 29, 2015
    
    I don’t quite like these, these talks are based on specific examples of “over moderating” with the moderators in question anonymised (though we know who they are) – It’s very humiliating.
    - Ipstenu (Mika Epstein) 12:56 am on April 30, 2015
      
      What would you suggest as an alternative then?
      
      Ignoring the issues, that we, as a group, can be too hard on users, doesn’t solve anything.
      - Andrew 6:30 am on April 30, 2015
        
        Discuss it privately, rather than invite people to poke at it.
        
        Ipstenu (Mika Epstein) 2:45 pm on April 30, 2015
        
        Provided the people being talked ™ privately actually change, sure.
        
        After that, though, then what?
        
        I’ve never found a perfect answer :/
      - Andrew 7:10 am on April 30, 2015
        
        It reminds me of an example in school when someone submits work that is not satisfactory, and the teacher holds it up in front of the classroom to study how NOT to do things.
        
        Jan Dembowski 2:57 pm on April 30, 2015
        
        That’s a good example. And that’s not going to happen on the meetupMeetup All local/regional gatherings that are officially a part of the WordPress world but are not WordCamps are organized through https://www.meetup.com/. A meetup is typically a chance for local WordPress users to get together and share new ideas and seek help from one another. Searching for ‘WordPress’ on meetup.com will help you find options in your area..
        
        No one will be put on the spot. If there’s any examples of someone over moderating then that example will be me. I’ve done it before (oh man, have I) and I won’t put another volunteer in the spotlight that way. That would not be fair to do.
Jan Dembowski 10:15 am on April 30, 2015

It’s not that there’s a specific instance and I do not want to put anyone on the spot. Honest. 😃

Everyday there’s thousands of posts and they’re handled really well. It’s the odd one offs that sometimes are over done. You don’t hear about the users who are handles well, but the one who had a bad experience get’s LOTS of attention.

That’s not avoidable at all, I know. Some people are itching for a fight. But on the support team side of the fence we can adjust our replies and how we handle support.

Which is all something I want to discuss later today. ☕️ But here on make/support is also a great place to discuss too.
- Jon (Kenshino) 1:19 pm on April 30, 2015
  
  I think we’re all mature enough to handle it.
  
  We’re not school kids. 🙂
  - Andrew 1:30 pm on April 30, 2015
    
    As long as the discussion doesn’t get hung up on a specific instance, that’s fine.
  - Andrew 1:31 pm on April 30, 2015
    
    @Jon, you’d be surprised at how demotivating it can be hosting a wide discussion around your actions on the forums.
    - Jan Dembowski 2:42 pm on April 30, 2015
      
      Which is exactly what I want to avoid.
      
      Drinks more you-know-what-I-drink
      
      Support should be fun. Honest. When it gets to be a drag then that’s not good and morale suffers. We can still provide support, have a good time AND also be sensitive to one off cases. Those cases may need to be escalated to someone else and that’s fine.
BigActual 4:55 pm on April 30, 2015

What time is the meetupMeetup All local/regional gatherings that are officially a part of the WordPress world but are not WordCamps are organized through https://www.meetup.com/. A meetup is typically a chance for local WordPress users to get together and share new ideas and seek help from one another. Searching for ‘WordPress’ on meetup.com will help you find options in your area.?
- Jan Dembowski 8:36 pm on April 30, 2015
  
  It’s Thursday’s at 16:00 UTC. We had the meetupMeetup All local/regional gatherings that are officially a part of the WordPress world but are not WordCamps are organized through https://www.meetup.com/. A meetup is typically a chance for local WordPress users to get together and share new ideas and seek help from one another. Searching for ‘WordPress’ on meetup.com will help you find options in your area. over 3 hours ago. ;(
BigActual 9:32 pm on April 30, 2015

Next week then. !*)

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