While the forum does have some neat information on Skylanders and old Spyro the Dragon games, what members don't know is that there is more than just fancy walkthrough pages and galleries. There is the communication and the enjoyment fans gain by talking with others about the Skylanders and Spyro games. Or it can be about topics related to silliness and standard real world discussions. There is also the forum moderation. It can help make your time on the forum fun, or it can make your time there difficult.
 |
| The current 2016 darkSpyro Main Page |
Most of you may know me from the forums, and I have been around since 2008. Back then, the darkSpyro forums was just about Spyro games, solely operated by dark52.
Besides posting walkthroughs, managing and creating news posts on the Spyro games, dark52 was mostly on top of rule-breakers and trolls and would ban them from the forums as soon as they ignore their first few warnings. Sometimes though, trolls would come on when the admin was asleep, and it would take hours later until he would come online to clean up the mess. But other than that, darkSpyro was a pleasant place to talk and chat with other Spyro fans.
Until the time came when dark52 decided to follow Skylanders and made the site a part Spyro part Skylanders division. As time went on, more and more members joined due to the audience of Skylanders, and it became too much for the admin.
Some of us suggested to dark that he should appoint moderators so he wouldn't feel so overwhelmed. But dark refused to accept help and believed that he could handle the forum on his own like he always had.
Big mistake.
At one point, a troll posted inappropriate images on the forum that lasted for 6 hours until dark52 finally woke up and deleted them all. I can't even imagine how many kids late at night or in the morning were possibly scarred by those pictures all because of dark's stubbornness. Even after all of that, he was still convinced that he didn't need any moderators. Completely ignorant to the fact that he doesn't do anything when something obviously bad is happening. Can you believe it??
Sometime after the horrible incident, the admin allowed trolls to get away with harassing users. They broke the forum rules on multiple occassions, drove away older members, and the trolls even had the nerve to start speaking on the admin's behalf just to belittle others. In a nutshell, dark52 basically just sat back and watched the rule breaking scenario all happen. And this lasted about... a few years and it could've lasted a LOT longer.
I was one of the main victims of the trolling, and I can tell you, it was the worst experience I've ever endured on any forum. Imagine being harassed and trolled on for months, being the target of an upcoming war started by a troll who was in the process of tricking an entire forum section of children to be against you. And the admin knowing fully well what's going on but refused to do anything about it. All just to update forum news and making posts about Skylanders. Like the concerns of his userbase don't matter to him at all.
It can drive you extremely fustrated, crazy even. Honestly it drove me insane that I wondered WHY I was still on that forum.
After some time during all of the chaos, dark52 FINALLY gave in and went on to appoint moderators after 8 long years of solo moderation. At least he admitted that he neglected his duties. Although he never did apologize to the users, including myself, who were harassed constantly by the trolls thanks to him. But even with mods, dark didn't do much moderation himself sometime afterwards, besides removing the occasional spambot or inappropriate picture troll.
Nowadays, there is a 10% chance you will get a private message response from the admin, regardless of your question, request or in need of intervention. The other 90% is him updating the forum polls, getting news on Skylanders, and making the site look prettier. He rarely communicates with the forum members and his fellow moderators, keeping most rule changes and decisions to himself until he feels like revealing them at the last minute. You will very likely see him talk about Skylanders, than forum issues that aren't worth his time to talk about.
In addition, dark has shown some severe signs of neglecting his admin duties. Such as causing an harassment war to nearly happen, allowing a kid to post his private information more than three times (and we're talking about family names, home address, email that kind of private information that should be kept your self), and allowing scenarios to escalate out of porportion until he feels like dealing with it.
If you have a logical issue about dark52 and his way of moderation, he will simply disregard your topic subject at hand altogether and will respond to an-off topic comment on popup ads instead.
As a longtime member of the forum, I would not recommend darkSpyro.net unless you are used to a user who doesn't take his job as admin and site owner very seriously. You might become stressed or unwanted, a victim of trolling caused by returning rule-breakers and egomaniacs. All of this happening to you, with dark52 not doing anything about it. And normally he would leave the moderators to do most of the work for him.
An admin should learn from his or her mistakes. But dark52 is one admin who apparently never learn from his. And even if dark changes his ways now or after this video is made, chances are he will go right back to being a recluse and sit quietly while watching rule-breakers run amok until he FEELS like stepping in.
 |
| 2007 Layout of darkSpyro.net |
I've been on darkSpyro for ages, and it's hard to leave a place where I grew up going to after a day's work. But with the way things are on the forum, and the admin STILL showing no signs of improvement on his moderation, I may as well just move on.
So I ask you, viewers. Would you want to join a nice looking forum like darkSpyro.net, but with a reclusive and ignorant admin like dark52? I wouldn't. But in the end it's your choice. You may like the forum just because of how fancy it looks or it's the only popular place to see new Spyro or Skylanders info. But remember that in the end, it is run by a user, a user whose actions can either make your time on darkSpyro fun or outright miserable and unenjoyable.
Thanks for tuning in, everyone, see you next time.
Video version
No comments:
Post a Comment