26
$\begingroup$

With the growth of the Math Stack Exchange, it is time once again to hold Community Moderator Elections. The winners of this election will be joining our current group of moderators.

The 2011 Community Moderator Election is now underway!

Community moderator elections have three phases:

  1. Nomination phase
  2. Primary phase
  3. Election phase

Most elections take between two and three weeks, but this depends on how many candidates there are.

Please visit the official election page at

https://math.stackexchange.com/election

for more detail, and to participate!

If you have general questions about the election process, or questions for moderator candidates, feel free to ask them here on meta -- just make sure your questions are tagged .

$\endgroup$
22
  • 9
    $\begingroup$ Are still votes to close from moderators binding? IOW, is the moderator hat always on? $\endgroup$
    – Mariano Suárez-Álvarez
    Jun 6, 2011 at 21:59
  • 2
    $\begingroup$ Curious question: Are we allowed to nominate others? I can't seem to figure out how. $\endgroup$
    – Eric Naslund
    Jun 6, 2011 at 23:59
  • 5
    $\begingroup$ @Rebecca, @Community (!?): let me remark that that is one thing that stops me from nominating myself. $\endgroup$
    – Mariano Suárez-Álvarez
    Jun 7, 2011 at 1:49
  • 3
    $\begingroup$ @Mariano: This is a real pity, in my opinion. But you seem to imply that there are others... $\endgroup$
    – t.b.
    Jun 7, 2011 at 2:10
  • 7
    $\begingroup$ @MarianoSuárez-Alvarez, you could still add a comment indicating the way you're leaning. As a moderator, or really, as a member of the community, guiding comments are extremely useful as signposts to help teach new members of the community. $\endgroup$
    – Rebecca Chernoff
    Jun 7, 2011 at 2:43
  • 8
    $\begingroup$ @Mariano: That struck me as well, but I think that you would be an excellent moderator. Perhaps relying on comments and discussion, as opposed to casting a non-binding vote, would not be so bad? I certainly hope so. Otherwise my nomination is a terrible mistake. $\endgroup$
    – davidlowryduda Mod
    Jun 7, 2011 at 8:44
  • 2
    $\begingroup$ @ZevChonoles, Any community member with 150 reputation may vote in the election. $\endgroup$
    – Rebecca Chernoff
    Jun 8, 2011 at 6:03
  • 8
    $\begingroup$ @Rebecca: Why is it that the the mods once elected can hold the position as long as they wish? I think having a term for the position will be good. The old mods can nominate themselves again. (I have nothing against the current mods. In fact, they are doing a great job!) In the long run, it would be better to have the job of moderating the site changing hands among different experienced members. $\endgroup$
    – user17762
    Jun 8, 2011 at 10:27
  • 5
    $\begingroup$ @Sivaram, meta.stackexchange.com/questions/984/… $\endgroup$
    – Rebecca Chernoff
    Jun 8, 2011 at 16:49
  • 2
    $\begingroup$ @zev the announcement banner lasts two days, as with all site banners -- if it appears too often, it gets ignored. This post is featured so it will appear on the main site all the time in the sidebar. $\endgroup$
    – Jeff Atwood
    Jun 9, 2011 at 3:07
  • 3
    $\begingroup$ So, only two candidates till now? Anyway, forgive me if I'm dense but do we really need more moderators? MSE has many (nearly 20) high-reputation members that have access to moderator tools. $\endgroup$
    – lhf
    Jun 10, 2011 at 0:51
  • 3
    $\begingroup$ @lhf: 10k tools ("moderator" tools) ≠ actually being a moderator $\endgroup$
    – Isaac
    Jun 10, 2011 at 15:58
  • 4
    $\begingroup$ Shouldn't the list of candidates be "displayed in most recently nominated first order"? Eric Naslund entered more recently than I did, but he isn't at the top of the list (this is the case even when I log out). Also, I could have sworn that there was originally less time than this remaining for the nominations, was there time added? $\endgroup$
    – Zev Chonoles
    Jun 11, 2011 at 5:22
  • 2
    $\begingroup$ A small question which is hopefully useful for those who are new here: what is the difference between a moderator and a user with "10k" reputation? It is written on the faq that there is "very little difference" but it is not clear what the difference is, at least to me, except that a diamond appears next to your name in one case but not in the other. $\endgroup$
    – Amitesh Datta
    Jun 12, 2011 at 9:41
  • 3
    $\begingroup$ @Amitesh: I asked exactly that question in the last election. Here's the answer I received. $\endgroup$
    – Mike Spivey
    Jun 12, 2011 at 11:50

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
7
$\begingroup$

I will go ahead and ask the first question. Some candidates have already explicitly addressed this in their speeches, but it probably won't hurt to have it here in one place:

will you, should you be elected, close questions pro-actively if they are blatantly off-topic or will you only cast the last closing vote when already 3 or 4 have been cast? Slightly less focused: where do you see your main role as the moderator, in contrast to just being a high rep user?

$\endgroup$
7
  • 3
    $\begingroup$ @Alex: Question about the process: Should we answer in the comments, or elsewhere? Or should we wait until the "Primary"/"Election" phase. $\endgroup$
    – Eric Naslund
    Jun 12, 2011 at 17:02
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ @Eric I recall that the primary phase might be skipped (I don't remember the criteria for that to happen), so you might as well answer now. Also, I seem to remember that in the last election, the answers by the candidates were given in the comments. $\endgroup$
    – Alex B.
    Jun 13, 2011 at 1:31
  • $\begingroup$ @Alex, Here is my response: (1) I will not vote to close questions proactively, and would only vote if 3-4 votes had already been cast. I am not too fond of closing questions, and I believe that when this is done, it can and should be done by the community. (2) I don't see my role as been enormously different. I imagine the biggest difference will be devoting a portion of my time to the background maintenance of the site. That is, looking after flags, merges and retags, and the other more administrative problems which arise daily. $\endgroup$
    – Eric Naslund
    Jun 14, 2011 at 16:38
  • $\begingroup$ @Alex: I essentially agree with Eric's response, but I do think it is reasonable for the moderator to proactively close a question if it is obviously spam or an exact duplicate, or if there is some other clear-cut policy violation. But anything with even the slightest gray area should not be acted on by a moderator until other users have spoken. Like Eric, I think the moderator's main role is to handle those administrative issues like merging or migrating questions that anyone other than a moderator simply can't; $\endgroup$
    – Zev Chonoles
    Jun 14, 2011 at 22:02
  • $\begingroup$ if the +2k (or +3k, or +10k) users have the power to do something, they should be the ones to do it (again, excepting only the most clear-cut of cases, in which case the moderator might be proactive if they so choose). $\endgroup$
    – Zev Chonoles
    Jun 14, 2011 at 22:36
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ Indeed: anything which is "blatantly off-topic" should be closed and probably deleted without much thought. $\endgroup$
    – Mariano Suárez-Álvarez
    Jun 14, 2011 at 22:39
  • 2
    $\begingroup$ @mariano I do hope this is representative of your "moderate as little as possible" election platform, and by that I mean, "when necessary, moderate decisively." $\endgroup$
    – Jeff Atwood
    Jun 17, 2011 at 7:33
5
$\begingroup$

Some people may also find the various statistics accumulated here useful—clicking on "Mathematics" under "Completed Elections" will, in fact, bring up stats on the current live election candidates.

$\endgroup$

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .