Admin Feedback

Hi everyone. Every once in awhile, we post feedback threads like this where we want to know how you think the staff is doing and what suggestions you have for improvement. Normally we post one thread per administrator and then a thread for the staff as a whole, but this time, in the interest of getting it done before the new timeline starts, we're just going to do one thread.

In this thread, you can review the overall staff and give us your suggestions for where we could improve. If you want, you can also comment on the individual administrators. If you're going to comment on individual administrators with your feedback, I would recommend reviewing every admin. That way, you're not singling anyone in particular out.

We are looking for feedback on:

• Level of site-wide activity
• Level of RP activity
• Effectiveness as a group
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
• Suggestions for improvement
• Overall performance
• Anything else you want to comment on

We want your honest and thoughtful feedback on everything we do as staff, whether that's in public or through our interactions with you. We want to know what you think of our performance and what we can do better. We may also choose to respond to your feedback, and we will do so with the same respect and civility we expect of you.

Remember, this is for your benefit as well as ours. We're here to provide you with a great website, so we want your honest assessment of whether we're living up to that. You will never be banned for giving your honest feedback. So, please feel free to post your feedback in this thread. Thanks!

Maybe have this as an anonymous survey instead?

Outlander said:

Maybe have this as an anonymous survey instead?

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We've utilized this process for years and we encourage you to share your thoughts. No one gets in trouble for it.

Brandon Rhea said:

We've utilized this process for years and we encourage you to share your thoughts. No one gets in trouble for it.

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But that doesn't change that people would be more comfortable if it was anonymous. It might also give you a better set of feedback if the people giving it don't feel like the administration's feelings might be biased by their critique.

We will continue with this process. We welcome your honest feedback, so at this point let's move on from this particular point. Thanks.

The questions

1. Overall in what I see the admins tend to post as much as would be expected of them. Seems to meet expectations.

2. This hard to gauge since I don't rp as much as I used to. It seems however when an Admin is involved it seems like its one of the slowest threads around. More on this in another point.

3. From my outsider view it seems everything is pretty good and the team works together.

4. Relations are touch and go, I feel like some Admins are way more responsive to questions than others, this might be for many reasons but I think it falls to the fact that the admin staff seems to be spread thin. Making them ignore or simply miss questions presented to them. There is bias towards groups and individuals, this is normal since you are all humans however at times when it should be set aside. Whether this is favoring one side or being unfair to another. With a new timeline coming up I think it would be a good time as a team to work on setting those aside and trying to as unbiased as you can when it comes to time for rulings and the such. Out side of that I that you all meet expectations when it comes to all the other facets of relations.

5. I agree with Outlander here running an quick anonymous survey would help out with getting you guys plenty of feedback. You could run it along with the open door. They don't take long to set up and it lets people who might have reservations say something where otherwise the might not. Yeah you will get the troublemakers as well but its not hard to filter those out. Along with that, I feel like you could do better utilizing the forum as a whole when it comes to sourcing ideas. There are many great writers with many great ideas that I feel get ignored or their ideals are not looked at because they go against tradition. As mentioned above work on being unbiased when it comes to your general actions, its something we all need to work on. I would also suggest maybe being more transparent on dealings in some cases. Case in point is the Empyeron mines that loco used in a thread that were voided because of a ruling not player got to see. Barring that, making sure to make rules threads are always up-to-date and additions are clearly marked or added in a another post to make it easy for users to see updates have happened. This one is the hardest but we all have bad days but as admins, I should point out this is rare but it holds true to everyone really, you should try to leave your bad day/s at login screen when you are doing official business. Whether you like it or not you are acting as a manager of sorts and it can make you look bad.

6. Overall Rating: Meets expectations.

7. Nothing really, It seems your doing what in my mind is meeting expectations.

Edit: Separated the questions so its not just one wall o text

Padmé said:

Just to piggy back on the private review thing- I honestly believe in transparency, and thus oppose the private review. (This is my none admin stance)---> It's just shady to put on a front and complain or whine behind closed doors.

In short, say it like you mean it, folks! No one will get banned for being transparent.

Also, just FYI- not that anyone forgot- but if you ever have a forum related issue with an admin, please bring it up to their attention. If the issue doesn't get resolved, bring it to Bac/another admins attention.

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I do as well, but I also feel and have seen both open reviews mixed with a survey to be really good at getting the full story. People also might not have the time to sit down and write out all of the thoughts on everything. The way I see it is it gets you even more feedback that you would otherwise might have missed out on. I don't hold it against you all for doing it this way. Just as I see it nothing is lost by also adding in a quick survey type deal.

Padmé said:

Just to piggy back on the private review thing- I honestly believe in transparency, and thus oppose the private review. (This is my none admin stance)---> It's just shady to put on a front and complain or whine behind closed doors.

In short, say it like you mean it, folks! No one will get banned for being transparent.

Also, just FYI- not that anyone forgot- but if you ever have a forum related issue with an admin, please bring it up to their attention. If the issue doesn't get resolved, bring it to Bac/another admins attention.

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I agree with @Grim here. And the survey doesn't have to be private, just anonymous.

Let's move on from the survey topic now. I don't want that to drown out the intention of this thread. Thanks!

I'm going to seek to be very open, straightforward, and blunt with my reviews. I will be as civil as I possibly can, and I ask that no one get hurt feelings over what I have to say, as it is just my opinion and nothing more. But as you have asked for each of our opinions, I will give them.

Staff as a whole:

• Level of site-wide activity
  • Overall the staff seems to engage rather actively. It seems that certain staff members engage the public quite a bit more than other staff members, but overall the team seems to be rather active.
• Level of RP activity
  • While I haven't participated in RP in about a month, it seems like only a handful of the Admins actually RP anymore. And even then, those that do rarely post in threads, and especially not threads with the rest of us in them.
• Effectiveness as a group
  • They seem to be effective as a group, and work rather well together. I have never seen the team fight in public.
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • No. To be honest, not at all. I feel like there is no particularly easy way to ask a question to the admins, rather than just single one out in PM, and whenever I do, the response I get typically seems to be annoyed. In addition, when doing their jobs in threads, the admins come off in general as rather pissed off and unapproachable. There definitely feels to be a bias towards certain members. Those that are in the inner circle with the administration seem to get better treatment OOCly, more leeway in what they're doing, a looser interpretation of the rules, less repercussions and such. While I understand it's almost impossible to remove human bias, it is a bit disheartening to those that aren't in that circle.
• Suggestions for improvement
  • A little more 'warmth' when dealing with us users, especially in OOC threads and such. An anonymous feedback system. It seems, at times, when the admins have to step in and rule, that its always going to be ugly because they're pissed off at having to do it. I understand that it may be a difficult thing to do, but for someone that is specifically an RP admin, it is your job to do that sort of thing, because the nature of the game is that we are going to disagree on things that can and do occur. It's often a very frightening thing to report a post, because more often than not both sides of a dispute are punished for the admin having to rule.
• Overall performance
  • Borderline 6/10
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • Maybe a little less handwave? It seems that the admins step in and hand wave a LOT of things because either the rules aren't clear, or they just don't outlaw something that X admin doesn't agree with so they just kinda hand wave it out. I understand there is a time and a place for everything, maybe just a little more moderation?

@Bac

• Level of site-wide activity
  • Hit and miss. You seem to join in on the big things, or the things causing a lot of commotion, which isn't necessarily a bad thing seeing as your are the top boss. You should have lower level admins to deal with the day in day out things. You have been really active as far as new timeline rumblings have been going, between the "Timeline Ending" thread and the new timeline announcements.
• Level of RP activity
  • TBH I've never seen you in an RP. I heard you were in the battle of Naboo but I didn't see it. It would be great to see you stretch your legs in RP a bit more, and have some charas out there that aren't the top of their faction, or super important. It'd give a more grounded feel to you, and the site as a whole.
• Effectiveness as a group
  • N/A
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • TBH it's very hard to reach out to you. You can seem to be very dry and humorless sometimes, and difficult to talk to. Other times I've seen you cut loose and joke around. I guess it's all different days and such, but I'd love to see you cut loose a little more and take things a little less serious.
• Suggestions for improvement
  • Try being a little more open minded? I've never been an FL, or an Admin, so I've never personally worked with you to try to set policies, but from what I've heard rumbling around, and what I've seen where I've seen you talking with other members about policy, you seem to be a little closed minded. I understand that this is your site that you own, and you are a very smart person with an obvious talent for setting plot lines and policies. All of that is a really great talent, but at the same time you have some really great talent as far as writers, plot inventors, and policy setters here on the site. In addition to that you have a massive pool from which to gain suggestions and criticism for things. A simple suggestion would be to keep more of an ear out for what the people like and try to incorporate that more into what you do.
• Overall performance
  • 7/10
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • Your profile picture is getting a little stale.

@Boli

• Level of site-wide activity
  • You are EXTREMELY active on the site and I have to commend you for that. You're one of the most common admins that I see ruling on matters, dropping in to give advice, and fielding questions and comments from the general public.
• Level of RP activity
  • You were active enough to wreck the hell out of KES. I never kept track of Bogan threads and such, so I don't know how active you are, but you seem to be moderately active.
• Effectiveness as a group
  • N/A
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • It really depends on the day to be honest. Some days you're a really approachable admin, and other days its quite terrifying to approach you. Sometimes I feel like just reaching out to you will result in a ban, and other times you'll make jokes and stuff. I assume a lot of it has to do with RL and I totally understand that. Maybe just take things a little less serious? You've got a real passion for this site and for SW and your job, and you do so tremendously, just try to be a little more friendly while doing the amazing work you do?
• Suggestions for improvement
  • I touched on this some in the point above, try to be a little more warm and fuzzy? You do a great job as an admin, but you can be very difficult to talk to as you come off as hostile and pissed off a lot of times.
• Overall performance
  • 8/10
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • Benny totally should have died on Velmor ;)

@Padmé

• Level of site-wide activity
  • You don't really seem to be active in the affairs of regular members that much. You're quite active when it comes to greeting new members, but I don't really see you do much more than that.
• Level of RP activity
  • Decently active.
• Effectiveness as a group
  • N/A
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • I can never tell if you're pissed off or joking :p But you do seem to be rather easy to reach out to.
• Suggestions for improvement
  • None really
• Overall performance
  • 7/10
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • iPhone autocorrect sucks.

@Bee

• Level of site-wide activity
  • I don't see you in too much day to day activities with the rest of the members, but you are the tech admin. Your work goes largely unpraised, but you do an excellent job for the staff. The site you've built for us is incredible, and you keep it very updated and operational. Thank you bee!
• Level of RP activity
  • You seem to be pretty active in RP
• Effectiveness as a group
  • N/A
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • I feel like you're very accessible. You were really helpful when I needed your help with something, and you seem pretty fun and nice.
• Suggestions for improvement
  • None that I can think of. You perform your job excellently. You are, in my opinion, the hardest working admin on the site.
• Overall performance
  • 10/10
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • @Bee > @Lucid

@Ben

• Level of site-wide activity
  • you're a really cool dude Ben, and I love talking to you, but you're not particularly active as an admin. It could be that its late and I didn't get much sleep, but I can't think of a time that you've weighed in on admin things, or done a ruling. You may have some behind the scenes responsibilities that I'm not aware of, but from everything I can tell you don't. I do understand you're balancing FL and Admin, and I think it's a good move that that situation won't occur next TL.
• Level of RP activity
  • You're decently active in RP, which is good considering that you have to balance FL duties.
• Effectiveness as a group
  • N/A
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • You're a really cool dude. You were the first SWRP person I added on Skype, and you'd be the kinda dude I'd hang out with and talk with. You're really accessible, and very fun and nice. You aren't afraid to get real and tell someone how it is, but you're always nice about it.
• Suggestions for improvement
  • Maybe pick up a little more weight as an admin? Like I said, I don't know what you do behind the scenes, or if you have some IRL stuff that prevents you from doing so. If that's the case I totally understand.
• Overall performance
  • 4/10
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • Nothing I can think of.

@GABA

• Level of site-wide activity
  • You're fairly active, and pick up a fair amount of reports and rulings.
• Level of RP activity
  • I do see you RP quite a bit.
• Effectiveness as a group
  • N/A
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • TBH, no. I do not feel like you're accessible. You've been verrryyy difficult to reach out to OOCly (to be blunt). I'm sorry if that is offensive, but it is my honest opinion like I stated before. Almost all of my dealings with you OOCly both in public and in private have been disappointing. You come across as very hostile in interactions, and very closed minded.
• Suggestions for improvement
  • Try to lighten up a little bit? Be a little more friendly? Take things a little less personal? Be a little more open minded?
• Overall performance
  • 5/10. Your rulings often times seem very biased, and can sometimes, to be honest, make absolutely no sense. This is a concern I've heard from many others on skype, besides just myself.
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • Aren't you 12?

@Clayton

• Level of site-wide activity
  • You're very active! You both manage your personal portion of the site, and you take on reports and rulings.
• Level of RP activity
  • From what I've seen you are fairly active IC.
• Effectiveness as a group
  • N/A
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • You seem to be very accessible! You are a rather fun and nice admin, and one of the easiest in the group to reach out to. I feel like out of the entire team you are probably the least biased.
• Suggestions for improvement
  • I can't think of any at the moment, to be honest.
• Overall performance
  • 9/10. You were really on fire when you were first promoted to Admin. You were unbiased, and very helpful and proactive. I feel that about the time the fall semester started (for those of us that are students) or around late August you kinda burnt out and you got very difficult to reach out to, and seemed rather pissed in your rulings and dealings. But a couple months ago you seemed to have recharged (probably in part to the tech boards closing) and you've really gotten back into it and seem to be on fire again. You've done a miracle with the tech boards, and I think you're doing great things for the site. You have some of the best rulings, because yours always seem to be rooted in the physics and the tech, and while they can be more damning for parties involved, they don't seem like a benevolent handwave intended to please all parties involved.
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • I hate you for never approving my KES Star Destroyers. We could have ruled the galaxy.

@Weiss

• Level of site-wide activity
  • Fairly active
• Level of RP activity
  • I don't see you in RP all that much.
• Effectiveness as a group
  • N/A
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  • It really depends on the day. Sometimes you seem easy to reach out to, other times you seem a little grouchy. Overall you're fairly accessible.
• Suggestions for improvement
  • None at the moment.
• Overall performance
  • 7/10. Your rulings seem to be rather fair and balanced, and often times logical.
• Anything else you want to comment on
  • You shouldn't be allowed to name anything.

Overall performance

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I moved this one to the top in case anything I say hereafter seems negative nancy-ish. Overall though, I'd say you all do a pretty fair job. I've experienced managerial positions first hand both IRL and in online forums, and I know how time consuming it can be and how hard it is trying to make as many people happy as possible at any given time, especially on a completely voluntary basis. You guys could do much, much worse. But there's always room for improvement, and a lot of times it's just easier to point out what's wrong over what's right.

Level of site-wide activity

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For those of you that are actually active, you're on point. Brandon and Boli post every day just about, Clayton and Weiss are not far behind- you're also the four that I see doing the most actual Admin work. Bee's been out a bit lately, but she's normally pretty solid on both activity and work, and I know most of hers is behind the scenes anyway.

Padme and Gaba... I mean, I see you guys on pretty regularly, but it's mostly as RPers from what I see. I don't see you guys getting involved in Admin rulings as often, or carrying out additional duties like Tech, Planet/Species, Indie Factions, etc. Maybe you're doing something else in part of the site I don't venture to often or have other behind the scenes duties, I don't know. At least we know you're at least online regularly if we were to desperately need an Admin for something.

Now this might be an awkward time to ask, but is Ben still alive, or are rumors of his death greatly exaggerated?

I know Empress resigned today, and we all liked her and she'll be missed, but I think the fact she's just now getting to resigning or being replaced is kind of a problem. I'll expand on that later in the suggestions.

Level of RP activity

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Some are more active than others, but I feel like this is a hugely secondary consideration to actual performance as Admins, and I'll second Grims statement that it seems like any RP relying on some Admins (Sorry Bac) will take months to complete.

Effectiveness as a group

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Don't take this the wrong way, but you guys close ranks well. Regardless of whatever a particular issue is management always has to present a unified public front, which you guys do very well. That's a good thing. I don't think I've ever seen a public dispute amongst you except for maybe when Lucid left.

Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?

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Hit and miss. Part of that has to do with the fact that everybody has ups and downs, but as Administrators you guys are not allowed to let that bleed through to your official duties. Bac and Boli are the admins I've seen this happen with- it's pretty clear to the entire member base when you guys are having a bad day or are frustrated.

Padme is incessantly cheery to an almost disturbing degree.

@Bee is full of salt. plz dun ban me.

Suggestions for improvement

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My number one biggest suggestion is one that I know you've heard in past feedback threads- you need more active Admins. Period. Empress even acknowledged in her farewell thread how little time she's been able to devote to her work here, and while we're all appreciative of the completely voluntary efforts she has put in, the fact remains that Planet and Species reviews took months for the better part of the last year or so. We hardly see Ben. Weiss, Boli, and Clayton are by far and away the most active Admins we see insofar as RP issues are concerned, and they're stretched thin. I can't even imagine how we'd get along if those three suddenly developed real social lives. I'd bold this whole point if I didn't think it would look douchey. You guys are stretched thin, especially with the losses of Jiang and Lucid- big shoes to fill.

My second suggestion is that I think some of you need to take a hard look at your biases. I've seen it in a number of cases where I think unfair rulings have been made largely due to bias (and not just rulings against me either). I do recall Boli having the grace to recuse himself at one point because he decided he was too biased to make a ruling- bravo for that, but you're making things needlessly hard on yourselves and on the community. The community because there's a felt need to tip toe around you guys because we know there's only a small few of you that will be ruling on our next dispute. Hard on you guys because you spend so much time ruling on disputes that I think you develop biases against individuals and groups, rather than looking at situations entirely objectively. It's human nature, and to a certain extent it's unavoidable, but you can certainly do things to alleviate it. Having dedicated "Battle Mods" or something o the sort as has been brought up before would probably help, in addition to bringing on another staff member or two to help alleviate the real work load. It would allow you guys to shop around for a "ruler" who is most unbiased in any given situation, along with just make your lives easier.

Third, and this is just because it's already been brought up and I think it's a legitimate- I actually like Outlanders idea for anonymous surveys. There's a reason it's used so often in both the military and in the corporate worlds. It's not hard to put together and the simple fact is that you get truer, more accurate responses. That's what this is all about, right, accurate feedback? Some of us are more than happy to talk trash in public, but not everyone is going to be comfortable airing grievances publicly, especially when as I've mentioned above the fear of creating a bias is very real. As much as you value transparency and promise there's no retribution, the fact is that you guys are the ones in a position of authority and people will naturally tell you what you want to hear in order to earn your good graces. I've been part of enough jacked up threads that have required Admin rulings after 40 pages of OOC flame war that IDGAF- what are you guys gonna do, ban me? :p

Just some thoughts.

Anything else you want to comment on

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I have a new product you may be interested in:

In terms of me coming across as frustrated, one thing I can say is this - I pick and choose when I go into super serious and direct mode. That's not me losing my patience or getting frustrated - that's me choosing when to be very blunt. Some situations warrant it. Others don't.

I do agree with Loco's post a lot. I feel like the two biggest issues facing the site are:

1. The shortage of Admins
2. The strong biases.

They form a cyclic circle of sorts.

There are so few of you that you are all overworked. Some of you deal with this well, others don't. It seems that for some of you (not all of you) that you get over worked and begin to build up resentment for those that cause you additional work. Those form into biases and then those RPers are treated negatively when it comes to rulings. I could go into personal experience (and will if asked to) but I don't want to be perceived as overtly bitchy. I'd say the best advice I have for the admins are: Hire more, and be more fair.

I also think a monthly review would be great, and some way to show progress that the staff is making. Like after this review thread is done, if you guys could extrapolate some main ideas that are shared by all of us, and make note that you guys are working to fix those issues or implement those ideas, and give us updates on how its going so we can see real progress. Like Loco said, the site is good, but it could be a lot better.

We will be having an announcement soon about a restructuring of the staff. That's been in the planning stages for awhile. In fact this feedback thread was specifically designed to compliment it, to see if there's anything else that can be factored into the plan.

In terms of admin biases, so far I'm seeing a lack of concrete examples, so if you'd like you can PM me specific examples so I know more of what you're talking about (since I don't ever get involved in RP rulings, I know at least most of them probably aren't about me).

I am just going to do a general feedback list, as I don't interact with too many of the admins on a regular basis to go into much detail on each. So I will do an overall response, and I may mention a couple names.

• Level of site-wide activity
  This seems pretty good in general, especially with the DotR TL switch. Again, I don't see some of the admins hardly at all, but they may have duties we don't see (re the @GABA tech admin reference above). You guys are pretty good at answering tags and PMs as well. So I'd put this high and acceptable for me.
• Level of RP activity
  On this I cannot really comment as I have not RPed here in quite a while. I do agree that there is the appearance of not much RP from some admins. And maybe that's ok, but then I'd say that needs to be made clear. The flipside there is that said admin might lose touch with the very community they admin. So in general, I think there is room for more RP activity.
• Effectiveness as a group
  As was mentioned above, you guys definitely have a unified front and I LOVE that. Keep it up!
• Member relations - do you feel this admin is accessible, nice, fun, etc?
  Most admins I've interacted with (@Brandon Rhea @Green Ranger @Padmé @GABA long ago) have been fairly responsive. I would agree that many responses can seem curt or terse, but there is definitely a time and place for that for sure.
• Suggestions for improvement
  My main suggestion surrounds new and returning players. @Padmé does an amazing job welcoming people, but I feel like there needs to be more guidance, and I think the FLs should be involved as well. This would cover things like: general forum navigation, character profile help, character and post formatting, finding story arcs, best ways to consume recent IC events to catch up on things, ensuring a new or returning player is handed off to the appropriate FL, getting OOC and IC training as needed for newcomers/returnees, doing check-ups with these folks from time to time. The list could go on, and this would take a lot of effort, surpassing Padme's workload I'm sure. I would recommend having a welcome "team" as well as enlisting the FLs. Everyone who is brand new, or returns after a long period away, needs the offer of some handholding. I know I would have benefitted greatly when I joined AND upon my return a few months ago.
• Overall performance
  Excellent. While there are some issues others have illuminated, I think you all do a fantastic job. And no, I'm not blowing smoke up anyone's arse. I think with a few improvements, along with the new TL, this site could be a superbly well-oiled machine.
• Anything else you want to comment on
  I think my "Welcome Wagon" suggestion is really what I wanted to suggest at this time. Although I will say an anonymous survey coupled with a thread like this might be helpful. Either way doesn't bother me, but I would fill it out in addition to this if given the chance. *shrug*

Thanks in advance for reading this response!

I'm going to give huge kudos to @Padmé here since, of everyone, she is the one who does the most amount of work that is seen least publicly. Not only does she welcome every person in the welcome thread that they post (as Marcus referenced), but she also PMs them and welcomes them personally with information about the site, links to where to go to RP and join factions, etc. She spends a lot of time interacting with them and answering their questions.

So that's a big case where you don't always see what an admin does, but the impact of what they do is massive.

High fives and cookies to @Padmé!

Don't mind me, just jotting down notes on who to set on fire.

I’m just going to post my overall opinion as a new member – although I have been observing for a while, I have just recently become active – because I know that when I was a staff member on some other sites I would have wished to have feedbacks from new members. You may totally or partially ignore this if you feel like I am completely mistaken…

First, I think you really need to improve the way you deal with new members. Sure, @Padmé is great at welcoming us and it is truly lovely that she takes the time to to reply to every new member’s introduction thread; you feel warm and fuzzy that an admin actually took the time to read your introduction and actually replied, but I feel like more admins should do it. It is not that long/complicated. I understand that you each have your own responsibilities and that it is primarily Padmé’s job to answer new members’ questions, but that doesn’t mean that the other admins shouldn’t be just as welcoming.

Furthermore, it seems as if most administrators don’t actually role play with new members, but rather only with each other [or senior members only] when they do… It is a shame really because as administrators you really understand how this site works and could give some great pointers to newcomers (ex. : what type of characters/backstories to avoid)

Another thing I have noticed is that 90% of the people creating characters don’t actually RP or post more than 10 messages. That, to me, would be an issue. It means that they were interested in this site enough to create a character – and sometimes you know that there was a lot of thought put into it – but somehow lost interest in the site all together. I personally see two major problems that would lead people to quit after creating a character: the amount of information you actually have to go through before you can actually RP and the difficulty to integrate this community.

There are so many, and I mean so many threads you have to read to gather information, that alone will discourage some people and lead them out the door. I even have seen some important bits of information dissimulated on page 20+ of a thread. I really think it would help if you added infographic/charts/drawings or perhaps created a wikia where members could assist or a side site to organise everything. It might just be my OCD, but some forums in particular are really messy.

Moreover, I have already mention how non-new-member-friendly this site is, but I have to say it again. You have built a truly wonderful community with some amazing members and writers, but it is bound to die if you can’t renew and grow your member base. It seems like the shortage of staff members mentioned by other members before me certainly doesn’t help. I introduced a community advisor project on a site I was a moderator on a few years ago that was really successful. These community advisors chosen amongst senior members and were at midway between actual members and staff. All new members that seemed promising were sponsored by a community advisor that simplified their integration to the site by contributing to their first RP and giving them feedbacks on their characters. In your case, I think @Padmé could use some minions to ease her workload.

Finally, another issue – totally unrelated to what I have said prior – that I have noticed is the amount of copyrights infringements particularly on pictures, but also sometimes on characters (personality, description, etc.)… It is quite silly considering that photos are not mandatory. In the past, I have reported images and photos that some members where using – and that I recognized from Tumblr or deviantART – either without authorization or when the artist specifically stated that it was not to be used under any circumstances. Yet, nothing was done. As a Law student and a somewhat artistic person, it affects me a lot. I think that, as administrators and creators, you should have a responsibility to protect other creators and raise members’ awareness about copyrights infringements. Otherwise, everything is going to end up with horrible watermarks.

So yeah, those are my main issue as a new member-ish.

Have a good day! : )