The temperatures are reaching 80 degrees, flowers are starting to peek out, and I swear I saw a guy mowing his lawn today.  It’s strange to think that only last week we had snow on the ground.  Anyway, all this is a sign of spring’s arrival; and along with spring comes baseball season. 

Baseball is a game of comings and goings at the plate, long home runs, and umpires make calls that the audience (and coaches) may not agree with.  In truth, that’s every sport.  The audience, coaches, and players will all have their moments when they disagree with the officials calling the game. 

In forum management, the moderator is like the umpire, and just like sports games need referees, so do forums. Unfortunately, people will be people and there will always be at least one individual who is a rebel and insists on breaking the rules. 

Take street baseball for an example.  No umpire is present so strikes, balls, and outs are called by players.  Inevitably, the players will disagree, arguments will break out, feelings will get hurt, and someone will just pack up and go home. With an unbiased umpire present, fights are greatly reduced and in turn, so is everything that would follow a fight.  The umpire may not be liked very much, but the players and umpire deal with it. 

In forums without moderators, members will wage written wars against each other and the forum would eventually fall apart due to ugly comments and vulgar language.  With a moderator, fights are minimized and when conversations cross the line, a moderator can remove it from the forum.  However, the moderator must be willing to stand by their call. 

Whether he or she has removed a conversation or banned a member, they must have the guts to put their foot down when the punished member or members start complaining.  In baseball, players and coaches will get in the umpire’s face and occasionally kick dirt at the official when they disagree with the call yet the umpire never changes his call. Players and coaches have been thrown out of games for such behavior. 

Moderators will get the same treatment.  When they make what certain members think is a bad call, they will throw mud at the moderator, so the moderator must be prepared to put a quick stop to it and sometimes that means they have to ban a member.

With a strong moderator who can make the tough calls when they come along, a forum stays relatively harmonious. When everybody’s happy and participating you know you’ve hit a home run.