I wanted to post a big thank you to the moderators of these forums. The stealthy work you do to keep these forums professional and helpful does not go unnoticed. It's a vast contributor to what keeps these forums a top notch resource for us covers. Thanks for contributing your time and assistance guys and gals, it is much appreciated!

:thanx:

DITTO :applause: :thanx:

I agree...If it wasn't for this site (Moderators, Host, and others) I would have not learned alot of what I know (or clam to know :notme: ). So, I too want to THANK ALL OF YOU. :applause:

I´ll toast to that!! Moderators and MARC... the mentor of this Forum...

:applause: :thanx:

Hats off to everyone. That is why I am not wearing one!!

Very true. :applause:

I'll add my Thanks as well! :applause: The help every moderator provides is very much appreciated! :thanx:

I'll add my Amen to that! Thank you to all the Moderators, and Marc. This is a great resource for all of us.:applause:

Me, too!:bigwave:
As a small border skirmish threatened to turn into a full scale flame war in another thread, I recalled this thread and though I would post my thanks (so I could stay in Steel's good graces and still put in two cents).

From my experiences in other forums, on a multitude of subjects, it is extremely rare to find one that is as flame free as the Cove. Part of that is a reflection on the Covers but I suspect the tone and attitude of the moderators here plays a larger part.

Quality is a science, or art some say, that can have many right (and wrong) answers to a question. The ability to allow people to tell others that they are flat wrong but step in when that devolves to simple name-calling, understanding the difference between behavior that tends to offend people a statement that intends to offend people, these things take skill and time. We've come a long way since energy was sheriff.
Thank you, mods!

If he were here, I wouldn't say this, but...

Energy played a pivotal role in changing the tone of the Cove, IMO.

If he were here, I wouldn't say this, but...

Energy played a pivotal role in changing the tone of the Cove, IMO.

Yes, energy changed the forums in a number of ways, both positive and negative. If he was here, I'd not hesitate to say so. But then again, many people have had a significant impact on the evolution of the Elsmar Cove forums if you think about it. Considering where the forums were at 3 to 5 years ago, where they were at in 1997 - 1998 (http://elsmar.com/old_forum.html), 1998 to 2001 (http://elsmar.com/ubb/), and now (http://Elsmar.com/Forums/).... I'm very happy.

I'm sorry energy never came back, but I think he had a lot on his mind and this was a stop over point for him. There was a lot that went on 'behind the scenes' between energy and me.

I wasn't watching - As you know it would be hard for me to read every post and follow every discussion thread every day - But it appears a 'flame war' was quashed today. I thank the moderators involved for seeing it and for taking action. We simply don't need that type of 'personal' discussion here.

I hope everyone remembers that we want to be civil in discussions here and that personal attacks or disrespect (http://elsmar.com/Forums/showthread.php?t=7759) will not be tolerated. We're professionals and I think I speak for everyone in saying that we expect everyone to post as a professional. I hate to even say that, when I think about it, because it's even less of a 'professional' issue than a general issue of communicating with a 'neighbor' in a public forum.

And --> Everyone can help. PLEASE - If you see a thread going 'astray' for some reason, PLEASE let us know - Use the 'Report This Post' button in the upper right of every post - http://elsmar.com/Forums/images/buttons/report.gif

http://elsmar.com/gif/Report_this_post_1a.gif

I wasn't watching - As you know it would be hard for me to read every post and follow every discussion thread every day - But it appears a 'flame war' was quashed today. I thank the moderators involved for seeing it and for taking action. We simply don't need that type of 'personal' discussion here.


Benjamin, forgive me in advance if I have hijacked your very nice thread that you have started. First, I am such a newbie at moderating, that I find myself still a little bit in your camp. Stepping back and looking at this forum, it really is an amazing product.

I have to say I admire what a shrewd job Marc has done inviting moderators to assist in the site, and giving them latitude to make decisions regarding things going on the site.

As he posted above, he cannot be on here 24/7, hence the reason he has a group of moderators to assist. Please, all... be patient and understanding with the moderators (especially me) should we perform an action that you don't quite understand. We are all learning, and sometimes (as we don't have a phone to make a call, or pop into someone's office) have to make a decision regarding certain activities with posts based solely on our own judgement and gut instincts.

While moderators do help keep things in line a little bit, the true backbone and spirit of the Cove is the quality practitioners visiting every day. The jokes, the different viewpoints, the different questions that propels all of us to think, and to accept different viewpoints and perspectives. It is so nice to see those folks who watch and read, but feel too shy or whatever to post, start posting and sharing their insights. It is truly noticeable and makes for better discussion.

Again, sorry if this derails your thread. But I give a HUGE thanks to the long-time Covers who have been moderating a long time, and doing A LOT of work behind the scenes. This ones for you!:drunk:

While moderators do help keep things in line a little bit, the true backbone and spirit of the Cove is the quality practitioners visiting every day. The jokes, the different viewpoints, the different questions that propels all of us to think, and to accept different viewpoints and perspectives. It is so nice to see those folks who watch and read, but feel too shy or whatever to post, start posting and sharing their insights. It is truly noticeable and makes for better discussion.

I've not been a moderator all that long, but I've been visiting here since the very beginning (96). I found the Cove along about the time I was implementing our first QMS. Brad is right, we all started out at the same place, QMS people who needed a hand, some support and a connection.

Count my thanks in with the others, mods! My sanity would be even more at risk without the no-nonsense help freely given here. :yes: :yes: :yes:

No apology necessary Brad, I started this thread mainly because I am very impressed with how much of an asset and pleasure this web site has been. I was looking for a listing of the moderators so that I could better identify just who it is that is operating behind the scenes to keep this forum running so well, and it occurred to me that I should put my thanks up here for those folks. You are quite right, the forum could not possibly succeed if it were not for all of us sharing knowledge and perspective on here...so bravo to those who contribute their time and knowledge to help others.

No apology necessary Brad, I started this thread mainly because I am very impressed with how much of an asset and pleasure this web site has been. I was looking for a listing of the moderators so that I could better identify just who it is that is operating behind the scenes to keep this forum running so well, and it occurred to me that I should put my thanks up here for those folks. You are quite right, the forum could not possibly succeed if it were not for all of us sharing knowledge and perspective on here...so bravo to those who contribute their time and knowledge to help others.

I am unaware of a listing of the moderators, but there may be one somewhere. I think most of us (moderators) really don't think about bring "out front". Just speaking for myself, I think drawing attention to ourselves might be a distraction. That said, I have had private messages sent to me by users (such as "can you help me move my thread"), so that is why my name at the top of the page says I am a Moderator. So, unless there is something specific I can help a user with,

Please pay no attention to the man behind the curtain...

Usually being a Moderator is not that much of an added burden. I/we would be looking around here anyway. There are times when someone is having a bad day, and we have to step in. There are almost always discussions among the Moderators when those bad days do occur, and it pains us when we have to actually step in. We try to do what is best for the site, while avoiding alienating anyone if we can. That is the hardest part, to me. Trying to strike a balance.

Well, I will try to end my rambling now. Who would have thought 20 years ago that people would care enough to share with strangers from around the world like they do here? Amazing, if you think about it.

List of Moderators (http://elsmar.com/Forums/showgroups.php) - Note: Not all moderators are active on a regular basis.

I too will share my thanks. Great site...great moderation...great information.

With the amount of posts, discussions, re-direction of threads, and the like...you all do a stellar job!

Congrats! :applause:

I just got a PM from D.Scott. He is a moderator but is not on the moderator list. The only moderators who show in the list are moderators who have chosen one or more specific forums to moderate. There are also 'Moderator at Large' folks who have moderator access across all forums.

To address the issue of 'Moderator at Large' folks not showing up on the list on the link above, I have modified the list settings so you will now see two different Moderator listings. The second one is just under the $ Contributors list. The second list contains *some* moderators who are also on the first list. This is because their 'master' user group has been manually marked as Moderator in their individual database record. Moderators who were added in the 'Forums' part of the software are automatically added as moderators, but unless their individual master database record is marked 'moderator', their 'master' user group remains as a 'registered visitor', or whatever it was before they were added in the Forums settings part of the vBulletin software.

The vB software has a system of 'User Groups (http://elsmar.com/Forums/showthread.php?t=19040)'. In some cases a person may be in mutiple user groups, such as a moderator who has also donated. I must admit I haven't been real attentive to sub-categories as I have to manually set additional user group(s) for these folks. This is normally not an issue but in the case of moderators, there are several such as Dave who are $ Contributors. When they were made moderators most were already $ Contributors. This is where the 'user group' issue and the 'ladder' of user groups kicks in. Every user is in a 'main' user group. In cases where a 'registered visitor' $ Contributes, they are automatically put into the $ Contributor's user group for the period of the contribution (typically 1 year), and automatically put back into the 'registered visitor' user group when the $ Contribution period expires.

It gets kinda complex in how the 'user group' ladder works. There is also a difference in how someone is (was) added as a moderator.

Now - All this said, I'm sure most of you aren't concerned with, or particularly interested in, the complexities of how the software works. But since the issue came up I wanted to share some of it with you so those that do have an interest, or who see an 'anomoly' like Dave spotted, have some insight into what's happening.

As to the link to the list, the link has been there for years but really isn't obvious. It's on the main forum listing (forum home) page near the bottom:

http://elsmar.com/gif/View_groups_sm.gif

As an FYI - This is the list of current 'user groups' here:

http://elsmar.com/png/Forum User Groups 090407.png

Almost, if not all, Banned users are forum spammers.

If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask.

Playing the Devil's advocate here........

Is the company that puts out the software TickIT certified?:cool:

I'm sure they're not. Started out with just a few people coding BB software in the late 1990's, but it grew so popular that they did form a formal company a couple of years ago. It's kinda interesting. It's a group of people from all over the world.

List of Moderators (http://elsmar.com/Forums/showgroups.php) - Note: Not all moderators are active on a regular basis.

You might want to take a minute and look over the list.

As some moderators are quite new, and some have been around a while, we thank you for your continued patience and understanding with us.