Abolish the recommendation system

    Recommendations have been a part of admin applications for a long time, and I feel like there's never really been a point where recommendations were actually part of what made a good admin or senior admin applicant. I feel like it's always been a way for admins to hand out brownie points to people they like, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the fact that you actually need recommendations to apply is a good way to promote "suck-up" behavior rather than qualities that we actually seek in potential administrators. The recommendation system can also bar potentially good administrators from creating an application, as they don't necessarily need to form strong bonds with certain administrators to be a good administrator themselves. These same issues apply to the senior admin recommendation system as well, and they also occur in conjunction with another issue that RedEastWood mentioned in another thread: there are very few admins of a high enough seniority to be able to give out enough recommendations to meet the minimum requirement.

    One important use of recommendations that is common on applications is to put emphasis on positive feedback provided about an applicant. This is important, however, I don't think there actually needs to be a recommendation system for this to happen, as admins can still express that they strongly support the candidate without the system in place. Another use of recommendation system is that it is an easy way to filter out applications that obviously don't meet requirements, but I think most of these applications have some sort of other issue that would immediately cause them to be declined. Even if they didn't, I still think that these applications would be quickly denied anyway.

    neutral

    im a bit conflicted on this, I think recommendations should be abolished for senior admin for the reasons red mentioned but for just admin i don’t know.

    It’s not exactly hard to get a recommendation for normal admin and I think that it’s a good way to filter out people who aren’t qualified.

    But i agree with a lot of your points, i’ll come back to this later and see what the community thinks.

    Vouch, recommendations don't matter much in the end, but what admins have to say under the post is what counts in the selection process.

    A fool's fool fools fools who foolishly accept the foolishness of a fool's fool.

    Vouch. The recommendation system does nothing to stop people who don't qualify applying for admin. They also put a lot of pressure on the admin giving the rec.

    Patrolling the Mojave almost makes you wish for a nuclear winter.

    In the last thread about this (https://forum.totalfreedom.me/d/581-remove-admin-recommendations), multiple people suggested that the application system needed to be changed. I don't have the impression that removing recommendations and keeping everything else the same would result in the best possible system. As I said in the linked thread, if we do overhaul the system, maybe we don't want to remove them after all because they could become very useful.

    Object. I think they have uses in encouraging people to apply, and knowing when is a good time to do so. I also don't think abolishing recommendations will stop any "sucking-up" that occurs because the people who would recommend would merely vouch on the application anyway, giving the same effect.

    I agree with Steven as well. I'd gladly reconsider once the system is overhauled.

    Neutral. I think it is good to have so we dont have 100 different OPs applying randomly, But i dont like that people have to make reccomendation threads just to get a reccomendation so they can apply.

    Neutral. I understand both sides of the argument. On one hand, you could ask for recommendations and there's bound to be an admin that gives them out like candy. On the other hand, there are some people that do get noticed in game. What I think should happen is that recommendations should be given out during the applications (not sure if it'll do anything different tbh).

    I can see both sides of this.

    I can see how the reccomendation system can be based solely off popularity. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, combined with other factors.

    I think what really needs to be done here, is be a bit more strict on reccomendations.

    Rather than just saying "Confirmed rec", they should explain in detail why they think they would potentially make a good admin. E.g. what qualities have you witnessed that would want you to reccomend them.

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