There’s a Facebook group which used to be my favourite place when it was run by it’s original owner. Unfortunately she disappeared and the group was taken on by three others.
There are now two admin and one moderator who keep the list going. I had no idea what the difference is between admins and moderators until I googled it and this is what I found. ‘An admin is a person who created a Facebook group and has complete control over its settings. On the other hand, a moderator is someone who assists the admin in keeping track of the group's activities and ensuring that everything is running smoothly.’ All sounds like a good idea to me.
A few days ago in this particular group there was an interesting discussion going on about designs that people have done and which are very, very similar and could be classed as copyright theft. This particular conversation was not accusing anybody of theft but was more about the fact that ‘accidents do happen’ in simple generic designs and this was being pointed out and discussed.
What I am very puzzled about is the fact that the moderator put a total stop to the discussion. This felt to me as if we were being treated like naughty children who couldn’t be trusted to behave when in fact it was developing into an interesting discussion. I am now wondering if it was because the moderator has insufficient knowledge or expertise in our craft and was afraid of the outcome.
No matter - I will not be offering my opinions on that list again. There are other groups where life is a lot more comfortable and discussions are allowed to continue even if it does lead to a lot of disagreements. Everybody is entitled to their opinion and we should all learn to live with that fact.
