Policy Review Closing PRC Threads

[Birkal]

Hello and welcome! The Policy Review Committee currently follows this procedure for closing its threads:

https://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/prc-review.3508606/post-5568786​

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I would argue that this largely... isn't happening. Doug & I simply do not talk often enough to designate a thread closer, especially within a 48 hour time limit. I am personally not wholly invested in the Policy Review Committee, compared to my other duties, so I haven't pushed this hard. Furthermore, it's a bit inorganic to end a policy thread in such a way. I think this idea looked good on paper, but it hasn't been effective in practice. We've been left with a few Policy Review threads over the past year or two that have difficulty closing.

Therefore, I propose that we tweak this policy by allowing any CAP moderator to close PRC threads. The CAP moderators are well-versed in finding a community consensus, and know how to keep conversations going if we don't have it. Nothing else would change due to this proposal; any user may approach a CAP moderator for permission to create a Policy Review thread. This also would allow PRC members to bug any CAP moderator in order to find resolution on CAP policy threads.

What are your opinions? Could we move forward with this? Or do you have a better alternative?

 

[jas61292]

In principle, I have nothing against moderators being allowed to close threads. I think we should try and make sure each mod is staying within their area of expertise (I would not take it upon myself to close an art related PR thread, for instance), but beyond that I generally have no issues with the idea.

That being said, if we are to implement something like this, I think its success may hinge on there being good communication between the mods. While I don't think there will be any issues most of the time, if the idea is to "allow PRC members to bug any CAP moderator in order to find resolution on CAP policy threads," I wouldn't want to open the door to individuals intentionally trying to bug the moderator that they feel is most likely to give the conclusion they prefer. The vast majority of threads are not going to be contentious enough for that to be a concern, and any moderator should be level headed enough to not make a conclusion overly influenced by their own opinions, as opposed to the community's. Even so, we are all human and we have our biases, so I would just like to see us at least attempt to communicate with the other members of the team before closing out any thread, even if that is as simple as posting "yo, anyone mind if I close up this thread" on discord. Knowing the mod team and how we operate, I don't think that would be an issue. But I think it would be good to just have it recognized as standard operating procedure.

 

[Quanyails]

Hey, Birkal, Thank you for getting this thread up. :)

I agree that we should make PRC threads be more easily able to be concluded, but I don't think it should be left in the hands of single moderators. I can't trust that mods will make the best decisions on whether a conclusion to a thread represents the wishes of the CAP community, especially if it's a divisive issues that individual mods will have different opinions on. :T (But if "concluding" a thread also means bringing it to a poll, then that'd be fine. :))

I think that a "#-Man Rule" can suffice here. If a certain number of mods agree with the conclusion to a thread, that thread can be concluded. When I closed PRC threads, I always checked in with Birkal first.

 

[Birkal]

Unless anyone has any thoughts here, I am going to close this in 24 hours with the resolution I posted in the OP.

CAP moderators are always in communication, but I appreciate that jas made that clear. To address that point (and Quanyails'), let's just arbitrarily state that 3 moderators need to sign off on the closure of a thread. That way it's not two people trying who could be called "in kahoots," but three gives a nice solid amount of names signing on to anything that moves forward. If we find that this is too slow in practice, I'll reopen this thread and we'll discuss it.

Agreed?

 

[Birkal]

Conclusion

CAP moderators will now close all Policy Review Committee threads, based on the community consensus. It will take three moderators to sign off on any resolution that is made. If you are not a moderator and would like an outstanding Policy Review thread to come to a conclusion, you may contact any CAP moderator about setting those gears into motion.

Approved by Quanyails, reachzero, and Birkal.