It's been a few months since the last S.o.S address. I was hoping we could get another one before the start of 2017, addressing some questions and concerns that some members of this subreddit may have, and perhaps a general plan for the direction of this subreddit going into 2017.
Some things I'd like to see addressed:
Mod transition / addition of new mods / choosing of Head mod
Desired changes to the sub from the moderator's perspectives
I saw talk of a new CSS design / banner contest about a couple weeks ago, is this still happening? Any chance of getting an ETA?
What is being done about /r/DarkNetMarketsNOOBS? /u/ziz1, the head mod seems to have disappeared. How is that sub being monitored to help prevent noobs falling victims to malicious actors?
This is probably just the nostalgia speaking but the culture of the community and quality of posts seems to be deteriorating. Many front page posts can be repetitive and would probably be better served by [megathreads]. Top level comments are often the same rehashed, unfunny, and unhelpful jokes. A majority of the solid contributors I used to recognize either no longer participate here, have moved on to different yet related subreddits, or have deleted their accounts. I suspect the fracturing of this community is due in part to the increase in "specialized" subreddits like /r/DankNation as well as private DNM subreddits where the outstanding posters get invited, and as a result participate less in the general DNM sub. The perceived increase in shitposts combined with more lenient moderation probably plays a role too. And I don't think that can simply be attributed to the reason that is commonly thrown around - "as any community grows it tends to get shittier" because the traffic stats for this sub are actually declining. IMO the quality of culture that was once expected and enforced here is not as common anymore. What can we as a community do to reverse this course of action, or have the majority of solid contributors moved on and simply don't care anymore? Who remembers the days of gwern, who appears to have been driven away by the lack of intellectual discourse here?
Can we see the mod log matrix over the longest timeframe possible to get an idea for who does what for this subreddit? The tools to create this can be found here.
Lastly, a recap of the major subreddit changes in 2016 would be nice. Such as what new rules, policies, automod changes, mod additions, etc. were done to help improve the subreddit.
Looking forward to seeing what 2017 has in store for this subreddit.
Let's Make /r/DarkNetMarkets Great Again.
*Edited formatting for readability.
Hey Dank!
Yes, we are working on a SoS that'll probably get posted very early next year.
This is the toughest. We are currently rebuilding the team back up as its pretty skeleton right now. Obviously ensuring the most seamless transition is important to all of us. I was asked to stay onboard until we added more mods. I agreed to that. Choosing the next head mod will be our toughest challenge I think. Obviously as most of the OGs around here already know, the last time I stepped aside as head mod, she ended up stealing money raised by this community for a charitable/worthy cause. And the head mod before her made the sub private and kicked everyone out for 5 or so days. Unfortunately due to the nature of how modding on Reddit works, we will have to be very careful and not rush this aspect since its essentially very difficult to reverse if there is a problem with the head mod. I think everyone would agree that finding the right person is paramount. There seemed to be a "head mod" curse which I'm gonna break and hope that stepping down scandal free becomes the new norm. Believe me, I wish there was a better solution to Reddit's "head mod" problem and that deciding who is head mod doesn't become as critical a decision as it is now.
This will definitely be discussed. I always think its good to be forward looking and share a vision of where you'd like to be headed.
lol, let me discuss this with the other mods. I'm not terribly comfortable giving stats out for anyone else unless they consent and for a potentially out of context view of work they performed. But that being said, I may blur everyone but me (you'd still be able to see a percentage of me overall). I don't believe there is precendent on giving the stats out, but what the hell, might just give the stats for me as compared to everyone else. I'm not sure how helpful it is, but I can spoil the surprise - I'll have the lowest stats, by far. Outside of me, I'd rather not have any other mod judged by these stats.
Yes, definitely will be including things such as this.
~Econ