pouët.net

Normally, in debates like these i hide in the background, but this

made me change my mind.

Be assured, there is a group of people that regularly visit Pouet and appreciate the effort and work that goes into Pouet, just that these people don't post comments very often, don't flood the BBS and don't visit that many demo parties, they just occassionally make demos.
I know that this group of people exists because i am one of them.
Apparently this group of people has failed to give you and all the other admins supportive feedback when it was needed and for that i am sorry.

elephant in the room, maybe, but easy to solve with some less anal rules regarding delegation

(which is not directly targeted to gargaj, but, pouet has historically been a one-man-show analogue->ps->gargaj->next spinning plates guy which is the ACTUAL problem i'd like to address)

I can feel all your resentment. But the fact is: hard work is needed to maintain this place? Then work has to be rewarded and I think that a job is not necessarily a torture. There might be someone (not even a scener) out there that just needs a job and is willing to maintain this place in a less emotionally involved manner. If the thing that you oppose to the "capitalistic view" is a failed "communism" (or "monarchy with a single servant"?) where all the burden is on the shoulder of a burnt-out guy, I go with "capitalism". Or, philantropy? Somebody said "Everyone, according to his capabilities, shall contribute to the common good". Well, I'm no php coder, nor a webmaster, but I don't want this place to close and donations of hard-earned money are the only thing I can do.

that's not a very good idea.

As I understand it, the job of the Pouet administrator is mainly - content moderation, processing requests for content editing, responding to complaints, deleting spam and inappropriate content. And in general - maintaining public order on the site.

I don't think that Pouet needs daily administration of a Linux server and PHP development, and something that is not related to the demoscene.

And to moderate content, you still need to be initiated into the demoscene.

Money motivates when a person needs it. Our donations can hardly be very significant for a person with a normal income. It would make sense to donate to hosting if there were problems with this. But here, as I understand it, there are no problems.

content moderation --> moderators

processing requests for content editing --> gloperators and moderators

responding to complaints --> emails go to the admin, FMB as you can see is gloperators/moderators

deleting spam --> in the content --> moderators, in the comments and bbs ---> admin

deleting inappropriate content --> moderators

maintaining public order on the site --> mostly admin

about money, do you think gloperators and moderators would enjoy working for free under a paid admin?

(i guess it could be argued that gloperators also do content moderation in some forms)

Why can't this be delegated to moderators?



I wouldn't care. If the administrator doesn't beat me with a stick (too hard) :)

If adding a release to Pouet cost, for example, 1-2 euros, I wouldn't mind either. It would also filter out a bunch of crap. Alas, this is a utopia, demoscene people will never support something like this :)

i should have added that oneliner spam is also handled by the admin.
as to why it can't be delegated to moderators, i don't know.


well i would, if i put in similar or more hours i would expect to be paid similarly or more.

As a gloperator, I don't expect any kind of thank you for what I do in the background on Pouet.

I keep visiting Pouet daily, almost religiously, adding old prods or Youtube links, fixing screenshots, release dates, missing info and taking care of requests submitted through the change request form. I do it because it's a passion, because I love to see our database improve and see "progress to the youtube singularity: 30.88%" increase every week.

Hopefully, all gloperators do it for the same reason and are not waiting anything in return.

I don't read the oneliner and the BBS anymore because it usually leads to what Gargaj mentioned.

I would really miss Pouet if it were shut down, it would somehow cut my ties with the demoscene since it's basically the only demoscene site I visit nowadays.

Keops: Like you, I don't expect anything in return for my services, least of all in financial form, but I will admit it feels nice when users say "thanks" in response to a fix or explanation. Because it balances out the negativity we're exposed to on such a regular basis, I guess. And also because it's just nice to know at least a few people appreciate our work.

keops, would you take on the role of administrator?

We would feel better knowing that there are already authoritative and competent sceners ready to support the site.

havoc, if I don't write a thank you after processing a fix request, it's probably because I don't want to take up the moderator's time for reading this formality. But of course, I'm always grateful to all the guys from Pouet team. I'll make rule to do this in the greets part of my prods ;)

bitl: that's cool, obviously it doesn't have to be thanks on this site, other forms of appreciation also warm my soul and solidify my motivation \o/

btw other things that make me feel good (and i hope other staff members too) include but are not limited to:

- suggesting prod data fixes via the automated edit request system
- suggesting extra links as per the definitions in the FAQ
- digging up old prods and adding them or fixing existing deadlinks
- answering people's sincere questions on/in the BBS/oneliner/prod comments
- ignoring obvious trolling attempts
- linking to the site and/or prods
- mentioning the site in blogs/articles/papers/demos/etc
- warning staff about mischief/potential exploits/etc
- heartfelt comments
- contributions to a lively/positive atmosphere
- keeping a positive attitude even if we sometimes do not accept your fixes/suggestions/etc

and i am probably forgetting as many things as i wrote. point is, we're making this site for an audience, it's nice to get almost any kind of positive feedback.

Gargaj : sorry you feel that way. I guess it’s time for you to take a break. I sincerely thank you for the dedication during all those years.

To be fair, I envisaged something along the line of donations going into a pot and once it reached a reasonable amount, being split between the active admins/moderators/moderators. The downside of course being a small amount of extra admin on an already stressed admin. It was just a suggestion, not intended to offend.

That second moderators was autocorrected from gloperators.

xeron: well it seems none of us are doing it for the money. so i appreciate the offer to donate but would rather see it spent on initiatives that would benefit the site and not our wallets. like, idk, a bounty for X amount of fixed items/glöps/lines of code/prods added/etc. maybe not in money but rather as a tangible item. kinda like prizes at demoparties i mean, it's the idea that counts and so on. sure it won't motivate everyone equally but it seems more useful than donating a couple eruos every once in a while to a bunch of ppl who are not doing this for money anyway and make comfortable livings of their job/business/whatever.

Fair enough

I guess what I'm saying is that I value pouet and the work you all do, a lot. I can't contribute time or energy to help, so if there is ever some other way I can show my appreciation, I would like to do so.

i know what will solve all of the issues here:
mod/admin/gloperator hug button

Ultimately, Pouet is too important to let die and Gargaj's departure is, in my opinion (especially with the very fair deadline) an indication that help and change are necessary.

It might make sense to establish a “coalition of the willing” that can take on the moderation work.

"Well gentlemen... a great deal of money has been invested in this project and we can't allow it to fail."

The cynicism is sickening.

Gargaj:
Thats not the point. pouet is an important file and history database aswell as a spreadpoint for news . It would just be sad if it would go offline.

Your frustration on the othe hand is fully understandable.

If you just want the "database", https://data.pouet.net/ has always been there.