Poll Time: Should We Put The PH Xat Back On Xat Listings?

Tue Mar 24, 2015 4:46 pm

«XAT COMMUNITY DISCUSSION»

•WANNA EXPERIMENT WITH SOMETHING•

LETS PUT US BACK ON XAT LISTINGS

• Okay, following the staff meeting we had last night, it was discussed that we may potentially want to bring back a certain feature to our humble (Huehuehue) xat. For those of you not in the know, a few years ago, Platinum Heart's xat used to be featured in xat listings. This brought with it a ton of guest always coming in the xat, we were advertised on xat directory and we got new members from time to time with this function.

Now, the ultimate reason why we ended up disabling it is because some were just a wee bit tired of the guest that came through. As, from time to time, we'd get trolls in the xat and staff would need to ban them. Anyone from the old days actually remembers that.

So, with that said, it was brought up that perhaps we should reconsider opening it up. As, although there is a risk for trolls and the such, the potential to tap into the RPing section of xat is rather great. Since, when it did work out, we did get great members like JJ, Zero and the sort.

Along with that, this time around, we can have a bot to monitor the xat. What is a bot you may ask? Well, it is simple: the bot overlooks the xat and makes sure no one is really spamming it, trolling it or anything like that. If you need more information on the bot, follow this link below:

http://util.xat.com/wiki/index.php/Bot

With all that information, I believe you can make an informed decision on whether or not we should add this function back to the xat. Thus, at the top of this post, you will see a poll to decide if we will do this or not. I'd also like to see some comments on why you did choose this decision so we can have some discussion going on about this before making a move towards yes or no.

THE PROS
- More exposure
- Potential for new members
- Lively XAT

THE CONS
- Potential for trolls
- Staff may not be able to always get them in time

Additionally, I'd like to add that we'll experiment it with it for a month. If things turn out to be problematic, then we will simply turn it off like the flip of a switch and lock down the xat.

Tue Mar 24, 2015 4:59 pm

Chao's Thoughts

My only issue with this is xat trolls and the reliability of the bot. The fact that we can get in more people is fantastic, but those assholes that decide to turn up will need to be dealt with swiftly, even if they are not saying much at once to avoid spamming or simply messaging everyone privately. I can only hope that you have enough people on xat at all times to be able to deal with the increase in visitors.

If you do need it, i can offer my services as a xat mod, but nothing more than that. Otherwise, you have my only thoughts. It's a good idea down to the core, but it needs to be watching. I'm intrigued to see the results.

Coding By: [THEFROST]

Tue Mar 24, 2015 5:09 pm

«THESE ARE MY THOUGHTS BELOW»

As far as the xat trolls goes, we may have more people overlooking the xat if it becomes an issue. We'll look for active folks and determine bringing back the xat mod position to the site once more if it really gets out of hand. As for the time being? I'm confident in the ability to maintain the xat with this feature.

As far as the bot goes? We'll have to test out it's reliability. The reason I say that is because I've never used the bot power, but I've seen it at work in other xats and they have certain features set-up to where they shut down spam and flooding automatically. Therefore, with a bot already being assigned to the xat, we'd have to experiment with it for a few weeks to see its effects in action.

So yes, the core intent is good, but the real world play is going to need to play out to determine if it is a good move or not.

Tue Mar 24, 2015 5:15 pm

Staff has activity issues normally and putting up with Shizuo's random lobotomy victim friends is usually painful enough. Opening the door to those people sounds like an atrocious decision.

Tue Mar 24, 2015 5:26 pm

«THESE ARE MY THOUGHTS BELOW»

Shizuo's friends aren't too much of a problem in my experience. Usually we'll just end up banning them, they leave or we kick 'em from the xat. And gauging back from the time we did have this feature up, removing xat guest wasn't too much of a hassle. Especially during the era of xat mods we normally had people taking care of them and that's all I'd feel we'd need to do if we wanted to realistically do this.

I understand there is a risk for crazy people, but I'm pretty fine with that risk as it worked well enough in the past during periods where there were a handful of staff. Following a blowout in March 2011, there was only myself, Chao and two other moderators on the site watching the xat. This feature was still enabled at the time, we pulled in guest and I remember it being one of the founding blocks to how we exploded the following summer. There were the occasional trolls, yeah, but we run that risk daily just maintaining the site.

Since, to my understanding, we are pulling in some traffic lately to the site from reddit. Gauging from the google analytic data, we've been featured on reddit and 4chan a few times related to that whole denko incident. And to me, I'm more concerned about that kind of crowd then anything that xat can unleash. As, for the past eight years, I've become familiar with xat and I know how to deal with xat and the sort.

So, with that said, I'd rather just watch it playout and if it becomes a problem we'd just shut it down like that.

Tue Mar 24, 2015 5:27 pm

I'd be fine with this. I remember when the xat used to have all kinds of guest come through the xat and I kind of miss it. As long as you guys can actively enforce I won't mind it. I was staff once myself and I can say that xat trolls weren't that bad to me. I'd also volunteer to be xat staff if you want as well.

Tue Mar 24, 2015 6:28 pm

«THESE ARE MY THOUGHTS BELOW»

Yar, the plan will basically go into effect once we have sufficient staff to man the resources. So I may make a list of those who want to volunteer and make site assistants have moderator powers in the xat.

And the reason I'm pretty relaxed about it is because if we run into problems, like I said before, we can just shut it off at a moments notice. Gearing towards active staff, as long as two or three active people are on the xat, I'm assuming we shouldn't have too many problems from how it has worked in the past.

So if all else, I just figured we'd experiment a bit, see if we can gain something and if it fails we can just toss it in the junk pile and try something else.

Tue Mar 31, 2015 2:02 pm

«THESE ARE MY THOUGHTS BELOW»

Well, with the vote decided, I believe I will go ahead and experiment with the whole xat listing. It will take place anywhere from today until tomorrow. In order to help moderate things, taken in Ima and Trim's concerns, I will be using the temp moderator power in order to have temporary xat mods oversee the xat at times when I do begin this.

Wed Apr 15, 2015 9:41 pm

•ACTIVATING THIS NOW•

IT'S TIME TO PUT THIS THEORY TO THE TEST

SO LET US WELCOME THE NEW XAT GUEST

Well, I'm now going to put this thread into effect. The reason I waited so long is honestly because I was a bit burned out and needed time for myself. Now that I'm getting back in the swing of things, I'm ready to do some tinkering with the site and I'm going to test out the xat listings. This is going to be an experimental phase that I will overview for the next few weeks.

If we get a MAJOR problem during the time that this is up? I'll just disable it. If we need people to watch the xat? I have an xat power that makes temporary xat moderators. Depending on how this goes the first week, I may or may not bring back xat moderators based on how the results of this turns out.

Thu Apr 16, 2015 12:49 am

•ACTIVATING THIS NOW•

IT'S TIME TO PUT THIS THEORY TO THE TEST

SO LET US WELCOME THE NEW XAT GUEST

Well, after the first night of experiments, I've decided to make a few adjustments already. One of the first? I'll most likely turn off the feature that allows us to be featured in the xat listings when staff is away. This is to lower the potential for anything bad occurring in the xat when it comes to trolls.

The second? I've added an xat bot to the site. This allows us to have someone watching the xat at all times. It is also able to answer questions, perform specific duties and just generally provide entertainment at times. As I learn and tweak our bot, I will make a separate announcement thread for that with more details about it.

So far, I've also noticed that the ratio of potential members to trolls so far is 2 out of three. I say that because I've encountered one troll, but two other people who were going to come back later in the xat to join and another that is lurking the site. Therefore, I will say there is a one in three chance of a troll coming in the xat at some point. I'll keep an eye on it, but the bot should help along with temporary moderators and switching the off/on button on this feature.

Let's keep up the experiment!

Poll Time: Should We Put The PH Xat Back On Xat Listings?

Should we put the PH xat back on xat listings?

Poll Time: Should We Put The PH Xat Back On Xat Listings?

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