Briefly: I highly recommend you get all the editing on your article done *before* posting it to a moderated group.
One of the reasons your articles are being rejected by moderated groups is that you, like me, always see something in your article that needs fixing. Or, someone – thank you Jessie – alerts you to a glaring misspelling in your topic (of all places). I go back in and edit.
I have learned however, that this has the unfortunate consequence of forcing the group moderator to accept the same article over and over.
In some cases, I can only presume the group owner sees me coming and rejects me right away, because he knows I am in the habit of editing the same article over and over. This is the only viable explanation, because I refuse to believe he has a problem with my writing articles that address his group’s subject matter in a more lucid manner than he can summon.
I will not be editing this article.
We’ll see.
I suspect this is an especially prickly problem for Gather. Group owners moderate to ensure articles in their groups adhere to a certain subject matter or - in the case of my No Fighting, Whining or Putting Things Down group - decorum. If I could go in and edit after an article was accepted, I could change the entire content of the article – even the topic – and thus circumvent whatever standards the group hopes to uphold.
I hope Gather will find some way to accommodate a perfectionist streak. God knows this is tendency is going to show up at least occasionally among people who find themselves compelled to write.
In the meantime, I encourage you to read and re-read your posts before submitting them to any moderated group. Do this for the group moderators, and I am sure they in turn will give your article a fair shake.
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Comments: 15
Mandi, I have only one group I moderate. I have another I patrol. Both are a chore. I prefer patroling though, moderating is and almost absurd exercise.
Thank you Ruth. I thought I was the only person who could read though something flawless in Word, and then see it full with warts once it's posted to Gather.
Audrey, you're most kind.
I meant this to be for the benefit of moderators, but we never know where our efforts will lead, do we?
And I prefer moderated groups. People generally are careless about where they publish. Many publish to every group they belong to, and sorry, folks, but this pisses me off. When I receive a notification that an article has been published to a group, say Arbor Day, and that article has nothing to do with trees, I just cross that author off my list. It's annoying, and unless you have 20 hours a day to devote to Gather, you have to be somewhat picky.
The whole point of groups is to limit the subject area. Nothing wrong with that. It makes the site manageable.
Thanks for writing this, Ron. I appreciate it.
You bring up a very good point. I remember making multiple edits to an article (20+) that was published to a moderated group. This was before I understood the consequences. The group owner has mysteriously not returned to Gather since that time. However, I am hopeful that my resubmissions were not the cause!
Kathleen, you bluegrass group's being moderated his kept me in check for sure. I just posted an article about Telluride, and at least where I come from Telluride is synonymous with bluegrass. Still, the article said not a peep about music, so I didn't post to Bluegrass Lovers. So moderating works; it's just work.
I have experienced the removal of carriage returns, and I agree it is maddening. I've gone back in and relocated where the paragraphs should be. I haven't had to do this for a while, and I think it's because I used to compose in text-only. I think the carriage returns in Word are more easily recognized by Gather. Maybe that will help you, I don't know. You could contact Gather directly with questions, but I've almost never done that, so I can't say how that would turn out.
Mandi -Watch why have so many groups if you seldom read what is them? Guess I wonder about that for anyone with groups. If the group owner doesn't read them , who else cares .