Catalog ( /meta/ )

110 replies

moar announcement

Hokay…
So, time for another announcement.

This may be long so I'll make a list of the points I will be addressing and you can decide what concerns you.
-Banned cows still being a concern
-New Farmhands and the application
-"Sperg-chan" (our resident Taylor-obsessed spammer) and other invaders, like from /r9k/ etc
-Dramu with old admin (or lack thereof??)
-What you as Farmers can do about the current problems
-Brief summary of some changes being made

>Banned cows
Not the 8chan board, though they are also part of the reason for this announcement being made in the first place.
I know that there was a lot of backlash when former admin took down some of the threads and I am 100% behind that decision. However, I also think there's a way we can effectively give everyone a place to post about them without allowing them on main boards. This would be done by creating a few new boards where the banned cows can be discussed, along with a separate set of staff members that would be able to police these offshoots of the community. (Example; a board such as /sh/ for Shuddercows could include all the ana posts that aren't allowed currently. Someone from that part of the community could run the board and appoint staff members appropriately, as long as the main rules of the site are respected)

>Our new staff members
I have appointed a few new staff members since the admin change. One of the janitors from the previous administration was made a mod right from the start and I brought in someone I trust from off-site as a mod to deal with reports from the get go, and some janitors were appointed via the application I created. Some of the new Farmhands started as janitors and were later promoted to mod.
I have a few more applications to read over, and potentially recruit more members. If you plan to apply and would like to come onboard to specifically moderate a certain board, feel free to mention that in your application. The Farmhand application can be found in this thread >>2823
Right now we have a lot of moderation being done by people following the basic schedule of daylight hours in the US. We need more people who are available during the daytime in the UK and EU (which corresponds to night hours in the US)

>Spammers and other evil forces at work
It's pretty clear by now that our site has been invaded recently. Part of this is due to the URL being posted elsewhere. And the reason for the URL being shared, partly was due in part I suspect to Spoony's being banned. I very much would find it believable that she's behind a lot of the /banned cow/ threads on 8chan. In the past she was responsible for the initial /r9k/ incursion. Now we have some other anons who are annoyed by the admin change and have been further making lolcow's presence known to the rest of the Internut.
There aren't a lot of options for combatting this, since robots are plentiful and have too much time on their hands. So we have been issuing bans and deletions. It's not hard to proxy, though, and we are dealing with a plethora of IPs which leaves little to be utilised by our home team.
A few other possibilities are adding a captcha, which has only the >potential< to be effective; a prolonged hellweek; and overall encouragement for more users to make reports

>admin "drama"
It may not be a good idea to engage any trolls further, but there has been some talk of thirst for milk from the former lolcow staff. The fact is that there is no involvement in the site from the former staff any longer, so whatever speculation is being made has no real chance of being confirmed. I can also testify to the vast level of samefagging being done by the involved parties. Imho any dramu being brought up is the invention of a very minuscule number of people and they are literally milking themselves at this point.
I have also un-stickied former-admin's farewell announcement, as it was making some people salty over the attention he was supposedly recieving from it.

>ways you guys can help improve the site
Ultimately this website doesn't belong to me or any one individual. We are a community and the best way to make changes is for everyone to do their part. Making reports is a big deal. Staff can't constantly monitor every single thread. The more detailed reports will make for better judgement calls.
Also, I am asking for ideas anyone has on how to benefit the site. I've taken into consideration the posts that have already been made. Some of the ideas are met with dissent and it ends up being a matter of trial and error to see what works best. Hellweek and captcha have been brought up a lot and that's the next thing that's going to be implemented. Just keep making suggestions; this thread would be the best place right now. Anywhere in /meta/ is appropriate but suggestions and complaints made on cow threads have the potential to be overlooked.

>stuff in the works
As mentioned in other points within this announcement, I would like to add a few more boards that would accommodate certain people's interest in some of our banned cows (see the banned cows segment I wrote for more details). Some other boards I would like to add are an oekaki board or just a general art board. It would be cool to see some comics drawn of our board-tan as well as potentially some of the cows and/or resident village idiots. It would be cool to get some more drawings done by some of the artists in the tan thread. I want to do a summer-theme for our homepage so if we can get drawings that correlate to that theme we can add them in random circulation at the homepage.
Other "changes" include the concept of creating different styles. I have always used the classic chan style myself, but if there are users who have preferred styles then you can specify which ones you like. I think it would be fun to make some more involved ones that have backgrounds and such, or otherwise different buttons and/or fonts. A kawaii theme and gothic Lolita would be the obvious choices. This idea might be seen as useless to a lot of people but if it interests anyone then I will work on it.

Look out in the near future for another session of Hellweek, because that could begin at any time. Also know that a captcha and possible flood detection filter might be added soon but will most likely be temporary until the influx of idiots is curbed.

Catalog (/meta/)

What's Changing?

Please apply here:
Application form

See the new rules here and the usage guide here.

Please apply here if you'd like to be a Farmhand.

The survey is up, click here to take it

Usage

What's Changing?

Please apply here:Application form

See the new rules here and the usage guide here.

Please apply here if you'd like to be a Farmhand.

The survey is up, click here to take it

Usage

Please apply here:
Application form