I've been brainstorming the organization of the dA Group for once @BadKarma drafts the guidelines, though that may be worth spinning off into a dedicated thread.

I can put the architecture in place, but I'll need volunteers to help with administration: I try to check in at least once a day, but I have a lot less free time than I used to, and I'm hoping we can get enough moderators to cover all time blocks—as per my warnings about the Buzzly shills, there will be fights, and they will get ugly, so we'll want the pumps manned at all times.

Default dA users can only administer three groups max, premium users up to 10, though expiration won't kick you out.

FYI: The site rules/rating guide have been updated with acceptable/not acceptable sexual content. It's not an exhaustive list, and I'm sure there are flavors of sexual content that I am not aware of that need special consideration, so please feel free to bring those to my attention.

Links to this new explanation page appear on the rating guide, and site rules.

-- BK

I'll want at least one deputy ('Co-Founder') who can handle administration in my stead, so as to maintain chain of command, and avoid episodes I've encountered on chat servers where the admin went AWOL for months and we got locked in with abusive mods. Co-Founders will be responsible for upholding the forthcoming code of conduct among Group staff, ensuring we stay up to date with Site announcements, and adjudicating moderation disputes, including promoting and demoting lower-level users. Optimally, can check in at least once a day and can provide authoritative correspondence to the public regarding official S7 policies.

I'll also want lower-level moderators ('Contributors') to help police user interactions, i.e. shut down flaming and censor abusive actors in accordance with the code of conduct. Not responsible for, but can pick up the slack on, news bulletins &c. in the admins' stead, and answer general inquiries as comfortable. Optimally we can get enough people active in different time zones that we respond promptly and minimize gaps in oversight.

General Members don't count against a user's admin cap and don't have administrative authority; they can be fast-tracked through the (optional) approval system for submissions to the Group gallery and favourites. No real quota for this; I'm mainly thinking of people willing to spread the word and/or share promotional art.

In terms of the Group's initial gallery content, I'm thinking transcripts of S7's key policies and page screenshots showcasing site features. (For the latter, I'm making a specific appeal for third-party donors—more names to the project will boost strangers' confidence, plus if we're showing off an art site, best do it through actual artists. )

Making a tooltip for user discretion is ingenious.

I'm gonna be a pedant and recommend swapping 'sentient' for 'sapient' – the former simply means capable of sensory experience, the latter implies self-awareness. Robots can be sentient, but they're not yet sapient.

P.S.: The 'T' rating section for Literature currently includes "Content within this audio recording..." :B

Good note.

D'oh!

And fixed.
-- BK

Real-life managerial experience is certainly An Asset™; familiarity with administering dA Groups is likewise valuable. The upper echelons will be juggling multiple responsibilities (PR, curation, staff oversight) so time management and prioritization skills are key. General mods should be good with people and able to keep an even temper under pressure—as I'd written in my dissection of the BA Community Poll, staff members are public figures, and must conduct themselves as such.

In the broad philosophical sense, I'm looking for people that can subordinate their personal bias to uphold the integrity of the organization as a whole—people that can put their best foot forward to promote Side 7 with unflagging professionalism. BK is signing off on the Group's guiding charter, so we are in effect official representatives of the site. We reflect its values—our behaviour must be beyond reproach.

So now that rules of engagement are up, I can start putting the dA Group together. @SheevraSidhe0274 has agreed to aid in top-level administration, but as I've said, I'll also need general mods to help with daily decorum.

Since blocking users from groups isn't directly analogous to suspensions here, I'll need to adapt the infraction policy for dA as there isn't an equivalent to 2nd Offence censure. I want to keep the three-strike rule, so a potential tweak is: 1st Offence, caution; 2nd Offence, formal notice and demotion to basic Member; 3rd Offence, full block. Hiding comments will be reserved for anything constituting a Major Infraction, which instead is two strikes: first a warning, second a block.


As to the Group content itself, I'm seeking advice on what specific features we want to show off: certainly the front page, the upload screen, and unique perks like the oekaki are worth full screenshots. Again, if people want to volunteer their screens for the gallery, it'll help prove our community bona-fides. The only question is whether we want to work to a standard resolution.

Fortune willing, I'll finally have this thing up before February's out.

What other screens did you have in mind? I am not opposed to sharing mine.

Basically anything off the user page, since we want to give prospective members a peek under the hood. Account Stats and gallery management have colourful charts so they're especially good candidates; possibly the Credits Store though I notice there isn't actually a button to purchase subscriptions. D:

Anything public can be perused at leisure so they may not even need more than inline reference links in the text pitch, though anyone who wants free advertising can volunteer their gallery/profile pages for full shots.

So I'm working through drafts for the initial Group page content (thanks to @fragmented_imagination for volunteering screenshots). One good thing about dA is I can post things to Sta.sh for preview, so everything can be vetted before we go live.

Was hoping I'd have things in place this weekend, but the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan's advantage (plus I forgot to cap the front page when it's not marred by my cringe ). Side note: is the logo in the upper-left custom work? I want to mock up an icon in Inkscape but I haven't been able to match it to the listed fonts

P.S.: How does one purchase a subscription? There's a brief description at the bottom of the Credits page saying it's available, but no actual instructions. I presume one contacts BK directly, but I want to double-check for the official pitch.

That is a feature I'm still working on. It requires I build an interface with Paypal to take payments so that people can purchase packs of S7 credits if they need it. There are other systems I need to put in place (like automatic renewal reminders) and other infrastructure.

So, how are the other efforts going? Is there anything you need from me?
-- BK

Nothing specific at the moment; it's not critical for launch, but if you're good with the oekaki I'd love a screenshot with a decent doodle on the canvas, though I may already have someone doing that.

Fingers crossed I'll have the key expos drafted for review later today.

AtTENtion, DUELlists!

My hair has finally completed drafting the inaugural Group content! Barring substitutions, description revisions, and thumbnail links to related pages once everything's gone live, this is basically what it'll look like to the public, sans the full HTML code:

* "About Us" text briefings
* Side 7 front page
* User account overview
* Gallery Manager
* Upload Page
* Character Page
* Portfolios & Serials
* Favourites Page
* Credits Store
* Site Forum
* Oekaki with pressure-brush demo

Thanks to everyone that volunteered their time and screenshots to make this prettier than it would be relying on my potato technique. :^)

If BadKarma approves, we may finally launch this as soon as tomorrow.

Glad I could help!

(WHOA! When did the review feature go up!? This is AWESOME!)

Consider it approved! It looks great! Thank you for everyone's hard work on this!!
-- BK

And we are live!

Gallery organization is still WIP but the meat and potatoes are served. The only thing missing is the second Oekaki showcase, as there's a hard cap of 10 submissions per user per day.

This is very exciting! Thank you all!
-- BK

Would it be possible for background images to be added to profile themes in the future as well? Perhaps for S7 credits? While profile colors can definitely make a profile pop, background images can make profiles pop even further.

Background images will be part of the profile themes when they roll out, yes.
-- BK

I have an idea of how customization can be achieved without needing HTML/CSS. It can be similar to dA's customization, too! There's a site called Arthaven that allows you to fully customize your profile biography/about, thread posts, and status/journal posts by using custom tables. These custom tables allow you to set a certain number of columns/rows, allows you to resize the grids and the table sizes themselves, allow for tables within tables, remove/add columns/rows, and allow tables to have custom color and image backgrounds. All of this is done 100% without HTML/CSS. This is the result. Here's how the editor works (I'll take screenshots of the individual settings soon! It was lost in this recording). Something like this could definitely be an alternative to HTML/CSS—perhaps with more customization options involved, though (similar to Wix/Carrd). (Also, apologies if this is the most unbearable "tutorial" video you've ever watched—some stuff occurred that wasn't in the recording since they were either in another program or in Chrome but considered to be another program to the recorder. Also, I was a bit indecisive about certain actions that should be enacted in the tables + at some points, there were "long" pauses because someone in real life was trying to get my attention.)

Thank you for sharing that. The way I'm envisioning allowing customization would not require HTML or CSS from the user. However, an interface as fancy as the one you demonstrated is beyond my capabilities, and would require a lot of front-end development. So, what I am planning is not quite as fancy, but should allow for customization to an extent.
-- BK

I know you’re discussing adding html and css functions, and my god I want them so badly.
This could be a bit dangerous- I don’t know much about executing malicious code or anything, but a huge part of me wants to decorate my page with slight smatterings of JavaScript, too. Nothing dangerous, just little arrays and such. If you could implement that eventually I’d be very happy ^^

Speaking about customisations, maybe it would be good idea to have another color theme, or two, to choose from. Alot of sites at least have a dark mode these days. I've just did a 10 second image flipping the site color scheme into something darker just as an example:
https://ibb.co/GR0znv0

Dark mode is on my list. There's some technical debt to get over, first, before I can implement it, however.
-- BK

That is beautiful.