Changes in vBulletin.org staff.
 

As you know things have not been going so well over the last couple of days here at vBulletin.org. We (the staff) recognize there is need for change and we are currently working towards improving things in the community and the site as a whole. Because of this we're going to change the structure of the staff and bring in more staff members to help with the workload.

Before I go on I should mention that we've lost one member from the admin team today. As of today Erwin has stepped down as admin for a number of reasons. This is a big blow to the staff and the site as a whole but I hope we can move forward in a positive direction. I would personally like to thank Erwin for his time his as an administrator, he will be missed. :(

Moving on...

We will be separating the staff into 3 separate groups: Coders, Designers, and Customer support. Each group will have it's own responsibilities. For example the coder group will work on coding new additions for the site and moderate the release forums. The designers will design and maintain a style for vBulletin.org and be responsible for moderating all design forums (graphics, template mods, styles etc.). The Customer support group will mainly deal with users, and help members whenever possible when it comes to modification requests, or posts in the site feedback forum.

Each moderating group will work directly under their own admin, I will be the leader of the designers for example, and Stefan (Xenon) will be leading the coding group.

As this time we are currently sorting the current staff into these new groups and preparing the tools that will make it possible for these groups to work with each other. Once we've sorted our current staff, we will be looking to bring in more staff members into these new groups.

As I mentioned before Erwin stepped down today, due to this we've promoted a new admin to help with things. I'd like to be the first to extend my congratulations to Danny.VBT who'll be coming on board to oversee the Customer support group and help out with the day to day workload for the admins.

Please try to bear with us while we get all of these things sorted out, I promise that once they are in place we'll see improvements happening at vBulletin.org as a much faster rate.

- Brad

All change - sounds an interesting plan.

Well done to Danny, it doesn't seem like five minutes since you became a mod, and now administrator :)

Groovy

Congrats Danny!

I like the new system that has been thought out. Let it all be for the best and a thank you to everyone that has helped the change so far and everyone that will in the future!

Congrats Danny :D

Congrats to Danny! The new changes sound great :D

Sounds excellent. Congratulations Danny.

I'm all for it and Danny is a great choice for admin...fine young man ;)

Danny.VBT ??? hmmmm my personal view is i would have rather seen some one else who was more helpful and was willing to help others... Paul M or someone else just my opion though.. but i guess my opion dont matter around here...

I suppose you haven't dealt with Danny in the past, as he has helped me and various others a great deal. Also, please lets not turn this into a debate or try and say something like this in a thread where he should be congratulated and such, while the staff is trying to improve.

Awww my little Danny is growing up soooo fast!!!

Much love Danny... much love....

Glad you guys choose a great addition to the administration! :)

Congratulations Danny, and the best of luck.

congrats Danny again :D

The staff is younger than me!

Everyone is younger than me. ;)

Even god!

And he calls me "Sir"? :cross-eyed:

Way to go Danny! And someone get Boofo his walker :p

Nice to see progress, although a shame about Erwin.... Congrats Danny..

Congrats Danny.

"With great power comes great... er... power!". Use it and have fun.

Why sir! I know we're trying to get friendlier and more intimate around here, but gosh, that's a little forward, don'tcha think?

Still, if it'll help matters, I guess a gal's gotta do what a gal's gotta do... ;)

Seriously, thanks for the update, and congrats to DannyVBT for the promotion. The changes look interesting and ambitious, and I truly applaud everyone who helps return vB.org to the phenomenal resource it once was, and will surely be again.

I'm very sorry to see Erwin go. I'm gonna post in his farewell thread, but I just want to say that I hope all new admins and mods will take a page from his book on how to display grace and humility under fire. He's a terrific role model for any admin to emulate.

Well put Kira! I agree with everything you said. Well, and also, about that "baring" thing.. feel free to forward or post images. :banana:

Thanks for the update concerning the site and I'll toss my "congrats Danny" into the pool as well.

We've had one of our low points, now let's focus on being positive and get things changed to please the people; after all, this is your site. For me, it's a very exciting time to be a part of vbulletin.org and I look forward to contributing what I can, toward a very promising future.

Congratulations on the promotion Danny! :)

So THAT'S how that saying ends. Thanks for the heads up. ;)

That sounds like a really good idea. Hopefully, bringing in people who have some respect and don't be causing some sort of upset every 5 mins here.

hear hear

Now we are getting somewhere :) This seems to be a really good plan. Having teams will give more idea of who is dealing with the backend and who deals with the users. This will speed up support providing that there are another staff in the customer support group.

Again, sounds like a great plan. This will make the staffing side of things a lot more structured. A who reports to who, and then as long as these groups are made public, a who speaks for what will be established.

I hope that the groups are arranged according to skills and current staffs wishes, and new staff brought in are not chosen out of a popularity contest. It doesn't matter how popular you are, if you can't do the job right, then you are not the person for the job. I suggest interviews with potential staff members via IRC/IM/Phone to check them out further before making the final decisions.

I think everyone probably has the same feelings here, and if they don't then I'm one on my own ;)

Congrats Danny. I hope you continue to be active and helpful and manage the support group well. Good luck to you. :)

I ain't gonna bare with you lot, you'd just be perving ;) I will however bear with you. It's not an easy process at any time, but with all the disruption that has happened normally it is even more difficult. Don't rush it, but keep the community updated. Better to get staffing right first time than have to keep changing them.

KA

Are the new team, gone build on what Erwin "promises"/wishes was considering the coders?

Congrats Danny.

The Staff is planning on picking up where things were left off and continuing on from there. ;)

The things that Erwin discussed in the public forums were discussed between staff members before he hinted at them.

His input will be missed around the staff forums and we will have to learn to get a long without him as a staff member, I hope he will stick around as a user and continues to provide input. :)

We are going forward with all things mentioned so far, but at what rate I am un-sure of. We want to move things quickly, but we want to get it right at the same time. I think once we make these changes to the staff, and bring in some fresh people things will start moving a long at the rate we all want them to.

Of course this will take time, it's not a next week thing. There is a lot of stuff to deal with on the back-end before all of this will be in place. :)

While all of this is going on I'm trying to find time for little improvements. For example I fixed the 'latest releases' quirk on the modification index today, a little change a few people wanted. I placed a few links to the mod index in the forums today, because some people were having problems finding them. I'm not trying to toot my own horn here, just trying to show that things do happen. ;)

I edited the first post and will edit the front page now, thanks for the laugh ;)

Thank you fore answering me. :)
Was it me who gave you the laugh?:bunny:

We'll all miss Erwin, i will at least. i got comfortable with his presence and what is offered. I'm sad to see him go.

Well done Danny though :)

I think Boofo would have done a better job. Whilst I have nothing against Danny, Boofo has more experience and I think the members here respect him a lot more.

You can't expect the entire vBorg staff to be made up of people like Boo either now can you ;)

Also, I hope this coding staff of yours isn't going to be picked purely on number of releases...

Congrats Danny :)

@Revan - No it will be based on the largest bribe sent to me :)

Chris

Did you get my check yet?

There is only 1 Boofo and I think that is actually 2 too many.

And what Chris said. :cross-eyed:

LMAO! Yeah I can vouch for that :p
My gf is 17 years old, is that enough? :p

No comment.

[high]* peterska2 just points and laughs instead[/high]

To give out a few little informations:

Each group leader is absolutelly free who he chooses into his team, we deeply change the staff structure and bring in a concrete hierarchy, which wll also be made public, so whenever a user has a problem with any staffmember, it will be obvious, who to contact about.

As for possibel staff members. well, each one chooses those who we think will be best. Of course personal reasons may play a role, as it would lead to problem if we have some direct "concurents" within the staff of course. But speraking for myself, i have already a few users on my list, which aren't know as pro-staff in the past ;)

And for those who'd like to see boofo as admin:
Sorry, but he didn'T have a real chance....


Ok, i'll tell you the reason: I wanted Boofo in my coding staff team, in a leading role, and therefore he couldn't be an admin ;)

More details will follow ;)

Butbutbut... Boofo is sooooooo cool Stefan, he'd be a wordful admin :P

Not even like a 2 percent chance? I'd settle for that. ;)