First of all I want all of you to understand that I'm not creating this thread to complain about anything but to invite MT members to think about the actions that were taken in the past days (the gallery cleaning) and their consequences.
When the mods were talking about the gallery cleaning I express my opinion in favor of it. The gallery really needed it. But now, with all the changes done, I'm asking myself... what is more important, image quality or people?
I'm sure that almost everyone have notice that the ambient of the site has been very different since the cleaning start. It was predictable. But, it has gone way beyond the mood changes I was expecting. Of course, you can't make every single member happy, there will always be people who just can't take the changes and feel like the mods are against them. That is normal and can happen at any community.
OK, so some changes in the mood of members are normal when facing this kind of measures. But there is a limit to what we can call normal and I think the overall mood change of MT members has gone beyond that limit. Now we have to think about the factors that made the members to feel unpleasant about the gallery cleaning.
I can think about some of this factors, and here they are:
The cleaning was announced too late and the announce didn't have enough
coverage
I know there were threads announcing the policy changes, the walls and scans deletion. When the policy was created it
was announced as news, so every member get a notification about it. Once again, when the policy and the FAQ changed, it
was announce as news.
But what happen when they announce the walls and, later, the scans deletion. A mod create a thread about it giving a
deadline for the deletion to start. I know I already said this and I understand it would “erase� the news
about donation to the Asia Tsunami survivors from the main page and that the members should already know the policy so
they know what is not allowed at MT but those were very important news for MT members that needed a wider way to be
spread.
The thread was all right, the problem (IMO) was the time. Look, MT didn't have a policy before so most of the
members didn't think that the images they post before the policy were going to be deleted because of it. Besides a
one week notice is not enough to allow members whose images were violating the policy to change them.
It allow some members to upload scans that were at the gallery before and keep the
credit
This point is related with the previous one. Lots of images were deleted because the member who upload them didn't
provide the source of the image, not for bad quality. Since this scans were deleted, anyone who has the same image
(maybe even downloaded here) were free to upload it.
I have heard that even a mod fall in this practice, uploading images (maybe not the same scan but the same illustration)
that the mod has deleted from the gallery, I'm sorry but I find this morally wrong. When you're making
something and are on an advantage position you have to make sure to keep your impartiality and, in this case, upload a
scan that have just been deleted allow people to think about second intentions.
Some people felt targeted
There are some members who think that they were targeted for the deletion (I'm not telling they were, but they felt
that way) first I didn't think that way, but after seeing that just after one member complain about the deletions
his submissions were deleted more eagerly... well I can only think that the one who deleted that member image was trying
to punish the member for express it's opinion.
For me those are the main reasons of the overall mood change, now it's time for making a reflection so this don't happen again in the future. In my opinion the problem is only one, sometimes mods act as if they hold the absolute knowledge (I guess I'll be scold for this but it have to be said) and don't take into account other members opinions and even warn the ones who express their opinions in a proper way just because their opinions don't go in the same direction as mods ones. All this while complaining about the members low participation. For me this is totally contradictory since this is a community and all members should be able to express their opinions while it's done in a proper and respectful way.
I'm not trying to satanize mods, I believe they do a wonderful job managing the site. It's just that they have to understand that a community is build by their members and not just by it's leaders. And that an opinion is valid while the one who hold it's defended with the right arguments no matter who propose it.
Btw, there are already options for people who want to have their works judged and are afraid to upload their works
because them can be deleted.
Visit this group: http://groups.minitokyo.net/mtn00bclub/
