Is it really ok for those of us who are not community members but want to show solidarity to pop in here? If so: I am so sorry that things went like this. As someone who was reading the meeting as it went, this is a disappointing and hurtful conclusion after a lot of thought and effort made by this community.
I've reported the thread lock and said thoughts to staff on it, for whatever good it does. The flippant locking like this without considering the consequences does not feel like they - or at least whoever made the decision to lock it, specifically - learned from the meeting, especially when this kind of harsh lock without any response to concerned users was directly mentioned in the Meeting as one of the obvious problems. Negative takeaways are takeaways and to claim them as derailment is... well, let's say a bad sign for the ability to learn from criticism at best. Especially without any attempt to steer things back on track or engage with why it supposedly was derailed first; that was not a random OT thread criticizing them, it was something where the staff was supposed to be invested in discussion and use it to make things better for people. I do not see how it benefits anyone, both users and the staff, to so quickly and completely burn any good will that was earned through the meeting.
Also, ironically... I had a suggestion on the staff's repeated insistence on PMing Mod Captains as a solution ready to post (tl;dr - 3/5 of them appear to be very inactive, which makes it discouraging and risky for a form of communication with staff when you can only pick 2 at most to PM and have to rely on them responding, and they should at least have a way to contact to the entire team as was suggested in the meeting), but held off on posting it because it didn't feel as relevant as the other criticism. Apparently it was. The meeting thread had people repeatedly pointing out racist threads together and doing that actually had them dealt with quickly; it does not follow that the best way to handle things going forward is still to PM specific people by yourself and hope they eventually respond favorably... or else use the Contact Us form, which supposedly takes forever or never when it comes to response-time. Things may get heated in threads but there is significant value in having public group discussions with staff and the meeting was literally an example of that.
EDIT: well, shit, now I feel weird topping a page
I've reported the thread lock and said thoughts to staff on it, for whatever good it does. The flippant locking like this without considering the consequences does not feel like they - or at least whoever made the decision to lock it, specifically - learned from the meeting, especially when this kind of harsh lock without any response to concerned users was directly mentioned in the Meeting as one of the obvious problems. Negative takeaways are takeaways and to claim them as derailment is... well, let's say a bad sign for the ability to learn from criticism at best. Especially without any attempt to steer things back on track or engage with why it supposedly was derailed first; that was not a random OT thread criticizing them, it was something where the staff was supposed to be invested in discussion and use it to make things better for people. I do not see how it benefits anyone, both users and the staff, to so quickly and completely burn any good will that was earned through the meeting.
Also, ironically... I had a suggestion on the staff's repeated insistence on PMing Mod Captains as a solution ready to post (tl;dr - 3/5 of them appear to be very inactive, which makes it discouraging and risky for a form of communication with staff when you can only pick 2 at most to PM and have to rely on them responding, and they should at least have a way to contact to the entire team as was suggested in the meeting), but held off on posting it because it didn't feel as relevant as the other criticism. Apparently it was. The meeting thread had people repeatedly pointing out racist threads together and doing that actually had them dealt with quickly; it does not follow that the best way to handle things going forward is still to PM specific people by yourself and hope they eventually respond favorably... or else use the Contact Us form, which supposedly takes forever or never when it comes to response-time. Things may get heated in threads but there is significant value in having public group discussions with staff and the meeting was literally an example of that.
EDIT: well, shit, now I feel weird topping a page
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