We don't have significant problems with trolling or habitually disruptive posters. We have other problems that expanded moderation would not solve.

The opinion of a lurker:

I can see why it can be beneficial for a corporate forum to have moderators (maintaining the brand, keeping control and so on), and I also think that it is not possible to compare the forums today with those in the days of the beta - in those times GoG was unknown and only attracted a certain type of people, sometime through channels where they already knew each other from before or were at least in the same circles. Today it is a open business who's main priority is to create enough revenue to stay afloat, which means a much larger and more divers user base. To maintain the forums, this could then be an argument for introducing moderators. I can not say that the forum today is worse or better then it was in the beta, it is just different.

However my personal feeling is that there is a very large problem using moderators - just who are they going to be and how much power are they going to have? it is very easy to abuse moderators rights, even though the moderators themselves thinks that they are acting correctly (lawfully good vs. lawfully evil?) and in many disputes it is all based on personal opinion. I do not trust any moderator to be completely neutral in a dispute - such a person do not exist. So then it goes back to the good old "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?"

For me I think that the most democratic way is the self regulating forum, which is in effect here now. I read the threads I want to read, a few times reply something if I am in the mood, and sometimes I give a + or - depending on how I like the post. If I see a thread with a title I do not like, I don't bother reading it. I have found that threads that I don't bother reading quickly disappears.

Linking it with splitting up the general forum, I do not think it is a good idea, it can be a way of killing of the community if it get more segregated then it is (i.e. all the games are separated and then there is one general forum). The down-graded threads also disappear quickly into the realm of obscurity when it is all in one forum...

Hahahahahahahahahahahha! :D

I have tried to stay out f the GR mess beyond using him as an example, but wow, that has to be the most "rose tinted glasses" description of GR's activities I've ever seen. You make it sound like he was nothing more than just a common troll. Common trolls we can deal without without any moderator's help and we have done so many times before, but GR was something different. His goal almost seemed to be to change these forums into his own personal 4chan. When he was legitimately neg repped for his activities, he didn't ask why, he just insulted everyone who did it and cried about being "attacked", then created his alt accounts to start sabotaging the rep of anyone he felt was "attacking" him (though IIRC, that whole thing started because the rep system broke and his activities started causing really wild swings in rep, but he kept it up even after the system was fixed). When it became apparent that GOG was doing nothing about GR, the less restrained members of the forums responded by negrepping all of GR's activity and the "The Great Rep War of 2011" began, where GR couldn't post anything without getting negrepped and he prowled the forums with his alt accounts looking for his "enemies" and did the same to them. After his first ban, which again IIRC, was caused by that fault in the rep system, things were really bad. You almost couldn't go into a thread without GR showing up to ruin it (to be fair, he did sometimes post legitimately, but got negrepped anyway which would cause him to take the bait and start one of his rants) and nearly every thread he started was either offensive or inappropriate in some way and not innocently so, despite his claims of naivete. When people did try to talk to GR rationally about his behavior, he simply would not listen to reason and lumped those people in with his "attackers". Eventually GOG did step in and the situation was calmed down but the sad part is, had GOG acted sooner or had GR simply been the "bigger man" and brushed off the supposed "attacks" or had those few forum members who kept negrepping him just shown a little more restraint, there might never have been a problem.

However, and this might just be my opinion but I stand by it, the majority of the blame for the situation does not lie with GR or the other forum members, but with GOG for not taking a strong stance from early on and allowing all the activity on both sides to continue unchecked in any way. They were well aware that things were getting way out of hand and it seemed like any time they would address this, it was kind of like "GameRager, you play nice now, everybody else, what have we learned about sharing? That's right, the forum is for everyone. Now go back to playing." which only frustrated everyone more and made the situation worse. If they had simply taken the worst "battle thread" and handed out temp bans to everyone perpetuating it (not just GR), they would have sent a clear message to the entire forum about what the limits of their tolerance were and we could have gone back to the business as usual hand-off moderation that seems to work most of the time. To me, it is simply unreasonable to expect the hand-off approach to work all the time, just as it is unreasonable to expect heavy-handed moderation to work all the time. A balance of the two must be struck so that limits are defined, but freedom within those limits is maintained. That's all I would ever expect of any moderator around here, but that's not really what we get right now.

Funny that "you" should jump into the mix.. Consider it "adjusted".

http://www.gog.com/en/forum/general/why_are_asian_men_presumed_to_be_so_low_endowed/post8

EDIT: And for the sake of any further discussion, One "experience" to the contrary does not balance out the ONGOING experiences of many. Tired of this GR bullshit and the many threads that give this.. Person.. more importance than he deserves.

Hmmmmmm, can I offer a moderation suggestion that I think is fairly balanced and not very heavy handed?

What about a combination of the rep system we have, and an actual moderator. The moderator doesn't get involved until the system sees large rep swings. If the person deserves a ban/warning/whatever, it's issued and the account can be watched. If ABUSE of the Rep system is noted, then those people who abuse it can get a temp ban and told where the limits lay.

The Moderator is hands off, so that should keep the people who don't want to see heavy moderation, but there is someone available to draw the line, it's the best system I can think of that keeps as many people happy as I am able to come up with.

@TwilightBard: That's what we have now for the most part, isn't it? GOG staff do act as moderators when the need arises. Tho I'm sure some think that their hand is too light based on what I've read in this thread.

From what I've gathered, it seems to be more automated, meaning abuse of the rep system doesn't really even get looked at, but I could be very mistaken.

Soooo not going into that thread. The title alone throw me out of it

That was my goal, although I used to typically post in that manner, I was beloved for it. I personally have lost a lot of interest in the community, not because it's bad, but because I, as a person have moved on to other things. For you guys who love this community, and stay here, good on you. I'm glad that you've found something to entertain you (for whatever brief a period of time).

I found that most topics I don't really have anything to say about, so why post? The boards are slow for anyone to post anything I have any remote interest in, and the majority of the games that have been released are really not that interesting to me either. I understand a good number of people love whatever game, and good on them, enjoy the fuck out of it, it's not my kind of game.

But really, I wanted to encourage discussion on it, and I am glad that the majority of the posters feel that self-moderation is for the most part sufficient, there are times where a GOGdev needs to step in, and that actually happens. So there is no problem with Moderation, is there?