1. How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments?

I would communicate with them privately, and lead with something like, "I want to let you know how much I appreciate all the great answers you provide. I can see that you care like I do about helping people learn English. There's something I hope you can help me with. I want you to continue with your quality contributions, but I often notice you're involved in arguments in the comment section, and your comments have been flagged as inappropriate more than once. I'm concerned this is leading towards requiring some kind of punishment, which is the last thing I want to have happen to you. So thought I'd start a conversation with you so we can find a way to avoid that. What do you think?"

2. How would you handle a situation where another mod closed/deleted/etc. a question that you feel shouldn’t have been?

I would communicate with that mod privately, and lead with something like, "I noticed you closed [this question]. I currently don't think it deserves to be closed, but I don't know your reasoning and I'd like to chat with you about it so one of us might change our mind."

3. What are your criteria for what makes a good question? What qualities cause you to upvote questions? What qualities might cause you to downvote a question?

Nearly all of my criteria for a good question are captured by the rules of what type of questions are allowed, and the [How do I ask a good question?](https://ell.stackexchange.com/help/how-to-ask) page, to which I regularly refer question askers. Beyond that, a really good question is one that is presented so clearly that I know it will attract solid answers, and another learner with the same question down the road will understand that this is exactly their question.

If a question is poor quality, I prefer to either leave a constructive comment or vote to close rather than downvote. For me, downvoting a question is reserved for people who seem to be going against the spirit of the site, like asking the same type of low-quality answer over and over, despite getting comment feedback on how to do better. If reputation means anything, that type of question has earned a reputation hit, that's worth sacrificing some of my own reputation to do it.

That said, I mercilessly downvote answers when I believe they're wrong or misleading. I have no time for misinformed people interfering with a learner's progress like that, so I always leave a comment about why it's wrong.

4. What do you think is the most important issue that the ELL community needs to work on, and what would you do as moderator to address it?

I think the biggest area of concern for ELL is how we treat people asking questions, especially new users. Other candidates have already mentioned unhelpful downvoting and comments. I extend that to include close votes without consideration for whether that question deserves to be closed. So often in the close votes queue I see questions that appear to be voted closed for "lack of research/details" simply because the question is brief, but is actually a well-formed question as it stands.

I'd propose a badge for commenting on a question after downvoting it. For over-eager close votes, I'll continue commenting that people should consider whether a question actually violates the rules of the site, or just seems to.

5. Sometimes people post comments on ELL that attempt to answer a question, in whole or in part. How would you handle these comments?

In these situations, I often leave comments like, "That looks like a complete answer to me. Care to make it official?" I'll continue doing that regardless, but perhaps to greater effect if my comments carry the weight of the Mod diamond. I do the same for partial answers if there's already an answer that doesn't cover that aspect of the question. Otherwise, there's lots of half-answers in the comments, and I haven't seen any harm in it. I like it that people often leave short and simple answers in the comments because it maintains the standard of fully fleshed-out answers as the norm. Simple yes-no questions don't deserve full answers.

6. This question is about your site commitment and involvement. Users may feel that they want moderators who understand SE English Language Learners in particular and how it works. Many sites now have moderators that moderate on five or six sites. How many other sites do you moderate on? Is this one of your top two sites in terms of reputation? Why are you a good candidate for English Language Learners in particular?

I currently moderate on no other sites. This is my top site in terms of reputation and current participation. I'm a good candidate for English Language Learners in particular because helping people learn languages is the only thing I'm expert enough in to contribute to the extent I do.

7. Generally what is your stance on comments? For example: Do you consider comments ephemeral and nearly always distracting? Do you agree that they should be deleted if they do not ask the author to clarify? Do you believe that a long discussion under an answer or a question does more harm than good, and must be deleted once someone raises a flag? Why? Do you consider that discussions, as long as they are on-topic, should be left alone? Why? Should lengthy discussions be migrated to chat? When?

The comments I see in the forums are mostly helpful, not distracting. Almost every comment contributes something. I see very few "me toos" and the like on ELL. A long discussion isn't a problem in itself, but it's a signal there might be a problem, and therefore worth looking into, but not necessarily responding to. If it's off-topic, then I'll delete it. If it's helpful, I'll tend towards leaving it where it is. Moving helpful discussions to chat creates extra steps for users to read them --leaving the main page and coming back-- which is a barrier to access, not part of a user's flow. I suspect very few discussions moved to chat are ever read by anyone else. Also, the chat interface is so much less intuitive than the site proper.

8. Some native-speakers on ELL have a view that native-speakers understand more about the subject-matter in questions than learners—who may have been learning about English and English grammar for many years. Some native-speaker users also think that native-speakers are the best judges of what makes a good answer for learners. Are native-speaker users a better judge of good answers for learners than learners themselves?

It's all about collaborative effort.

I don't think anyone -- native speaker or otherwise -- should decide for someone else that their question is wrong. Yet sometimes people asking questions in any venue accidentally demonstrate that they don't understand their subject matter, and need help just to ask the question.

Just today someone asked a vocabulary question about a sentence. Someone corrected the content of the sentence as an answer, and turned out to be wrong about even that. I downvote those and comment that they don't address the OP's actual question. I also comment to the OP to confirm they want what they asked for. As a Mod, I would delete that answer.

On the other hand, I've also seen native speakers --and I include myself here-- realize that the OP is almost certainly asking the wrong question, and use this as a "teachable moment" by reformulatiing the question, explaining why, providing an answer to that, and still offering to answer the original question if they're sure that's what they want, taking into account the possibility they're wrong. I've gotten a lot of positive feedback on this type of answer because I looked beyond the words of the question, figured out what the OP really wanted, and they agreed.

Also, I don't think it's only an issue just for native speakers. I've seen some very brash English learners do this too. Everybody's got an ego.

9. In your opinion, what do moderators do?

The biggest role moderators have is to participate properly in the site, and so lead by example. To the best of their abilities, a Mod should first and foremost be a good user. On top of that, Moderators also have special powers and responsibilities they use to keep things running smoothly, often using a firmer hand when the normal self-corrective processes from the community aren't working, or if one particular act requires an immediate strong reaction.

But above all, a Mod should be a good user.

10. A diamond will be attached to everything you say and have said in the past, including questions, answers and comments. Everything you will do will be seen under a different light. How do you feel about that?

There's one somewhat aggressive comment I made a few months ago where I thought, "I sure am glad I'm not a Mod or I wouldn't let myself leave this comment." If I'm elected, I'll try and delete that comment. Otherwise, I'm quite happy to have my actions be marked as representative of how the community should work. Going forward, I'll have to consider that my words will have more impact than others' because of the diamond, and gauge what I say accordingly.

1. How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments?

[Arguments themselves aren't a bad thing. If they are not intentionally insulting someone, I will leave them be. Arguments can be a great way to learn for natives and non-natives alike. We are all adults here; if people are arguing about say "grammar", within reason, then let them be. Michael Jordan punched his teammate on the face in practice. And they went on to winning multiple championships. Kobe Bryant was notorious for getting into arguments with his teammates (holding them accountable for their lack of effort and what not); he too went on to become one of the all-time greats. If two users, say each with +50K rep. points, are arguing - let them. They aren't wasting their time here arguing for nothing; they most likely have a very good reason. I will clean up the comments where I think it's necessary. If I ban them, I risk losing them. And I don't want ELL to lose people who are knowledgeable and who write helpful answers for non-native speakers. We've lost some remarkably talented answerers - for whatever reason. As long as arguments are just that - arguments - and not dirty insults, I will allow it while cleaning up here and there. Yes, if it's more like no fuck you - no fuck you - no fuck you type of an argument, then I am going to just delete all the comments and speak to the user and tell them to calm down. Sometimes, people who are direct can appear to be rude, but they are some of the best of teachers.]

2. How would you handle a situation where another mod closed/deleted/etc. a question that you feel shouldn’t have been?

[I will urge the mod to reopen it - if the decision is 50%-50%, i.e., between two mods, then the question should be kept open to help the OP. Better help than close the question in this case. If two mods think the question should remain closed, while I think it shouldn't be, then I will give them my reasons and have a discussion. If they are not convinced, then I'll be fine with the question being closed.]

3. What are your criteria for what makes a good question? What qualities cause you to upvote questions? What qualities might cause you to downvote a question?

[A good question (1) provides context, (2) shows "research effort", (3) is free of spelling errors and other t pos (liek this), and (4) states the question clearly. I would upvote questions that meet 2-3 of these. I believe that we should not spoon-feed people. We should encourage them to solve their own problem first. And when they have tried, that is when we can best help them. Context is very important if we are to write good answers. And so I am willing to not be overly strict about "research effort" - like I was before - if they provide us with sufficient details about their problem.]

4. What do you think is the most important issue that the ELL community needs to work on, and what would you do as moderator to address it?

[Get good writers and answerers to stick around. There are many people who are excellent answerers, but they don't commit to the site/community. That is a problem. As mentioned, we have lost a lot of great writers here, we need to fill that gap. I don't know how I'd do that. I don't have the answer to that problem. Knowing what the problem is the first step. Second step is to find a team and devise a plan. I can't do it on my own. ]

5. Sometimes people post comments on ELL that attempt to answer a question, in whole or in part. How would you handle these comments?

[Delete. OK maybe I will try and get them to convert the comments into answers. If the comment-answers are really informative and helpful, I will use the community wiki to post them as actual answers.]

6. This question is about your site commitment and involvement. Users may feel that they want moderators who understand SE English Language Learners in particular and how it works. Many sites now have moderators that moderate on five or six sites. How many other sites do you moderate on? Is this one of your top two sites in terms of reputation? Why are you a good candidate for English Language Learners in particular?

[Zero. I've talked about this in my intro. But let me also quote what someone said to me, which is one of the nicest things I've heard here in ELL:

"Please consider nominating yourself for the position of moderator on ELL. Your English is native-like yet you also comprehend the difficulties of mastering a language, and the embarrassment of being misunderstood. I believe you have the necessary qualities to be a just moderator because from what I've seen you never snap back at people. You are respectful, kind and patient, and ELL needs a moderator who guides users, and cares about standards."

There are two SE sites that I really care about: Martial Arts (reflects my hobbies and passion) and ELL (reflects my professional/academic side).]

7. Generally what is your stance on comments? For example: Do you consider comments ephemeral and nearly always distracting? Do you agree that they should be deleted if they do not ask the author to clarify? Do you believe that a long discussion under an answer or a question does more harm than good, and must be deleted once someone raises a flag? Why? Do you consider that discussions, as long as they are on-topic, should be left alone? Why? Should lengthy discussions be migrated to chat? When?

[Comments are useful. Even if they are not asking OP for clarification. No need to delete unless they are partial or full answers. I can already imagine some users with some useful comments like the "Here's the BrE version of things." No not necessarily. Just cause it's a long discussion doesn't mean it does more harm than good. Let people discuss. Flag shouldn't lead to deleting all the comments. Yes, discussions, as long as they are on-topic, should be left alone, because they are on-topic and can help OP and others in the community. Migrating to chat doesn't help anyone (as in learners) other than people who are involved in the discussion. Sometimes leaving useful discussions on the main site is a good idea, so people can also learn from the additional knowledge and information on the comments.]

8. Some native-speakers on ELL have a view that native-speakers understand more about the subject-matter in questions than learners—who may have been learning about English and English grammar for many years. Some native-speakers users also think that native-speakers are the best judges of what makes a good answer for learners. Are native-speaker users a better judge of good answers for learners than learners themselves?

[I once talked about this kind of behavior in Meta. See Answerer to OP: "No one will ever say this." I comment: "Can you provide a source to substantiate that claim?" Answerer: "I am a Native speaker." I don't agree with the fact that because someone is a native speaker, they are always right. I only care about the quality of their contribution - how many answers have they written, how well can they explain a problem, are they patient with non-native speakers, etc. etc. Just because someone is a college-level basketball player, doesn't mean they'd be a great coach for a school team. It takes a lot of experience to learn and understand what's the most effective way to answer questions and help teach English to non-native speakers. A native speaker can be good judge of what constitutes a good, helpful and effective answer - when they have been doing this for a long time. Sorry, I don't trust the native speaker who shows up out of nowhere seeing a particular HNQ that they think they have the answer to and then claims they know best because they are a native speaker. I trust users who have contributed here in ELL consistently. They have written many many answers. They know how to write an answer that's effective.]

9. In your opinion, what do moderators do?

[They moderate the site. Handle flags, delete spam, laugh at comments, have secret conversations, etc.]

10. A diamond will be attached to everything you say and have said in the past, including questions, answers and comments. Everything you will do will be seen under a different light. How do you feel about that?

[I don't care. I mean I'd be really excited about the diamond, but it won't change my words or what I believe in or how I behave.]

1. How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments?

I don't think valuable answers excuse such behaviour. I would give private warnings at first, if the issue persists and it warrants a suspension, I might suspend them for a period of time.

2. How would you handle a situation where another mod closed/deleted/etc. a question that you feel shouldn’t have been?

If it's a reasonable and well-researched question, I would privately discuss it with the mod that closed/ deleted it or might start a discussion on meta.

3. What are your criteria for what makes a good question? What qualities cause you to upvote questions? What qualities might cause you to downvote a question?

A good question is one that is well-researched and on-topic. I also appreciate questions that can't easily be answered by Google and other commonly-available references. I mostly use downvotes for spam posts and not for poor questions but that doesn't mean I don't downvote questions: I might downvote a poorly-researched question that can be answered by a cursory Google search and has got a lot of attention.

And of course, I do upvote well-researched questions or questions that I find interesting such as questions asking about the English equivalent of a phrase/idiom in another language which can't be answered by a Google search.

4. What do you think is the most important issue that the ELL community needs to work on, and what would you do as moderator to address it?

The only issue that's been bothering me is downvoting new users without giving them an explanation as to why they got downvoted. It's very off-putting and I strongly disapprove of it. I've noticed that most users throw their downvotes at new users without explaining what's wrong with their question (or answer). I never downvote a new member (unless of course it's spam) and would encourage others to do the same.

5. Sometimes people post comments on ELL that attempt to answer a question, in whole or in part. How would you handle these comments?

If the question is well-researched and I feel that it deserves an answer, I would encourage the commenter to post their comment as an answer. If they do, fine, otherwise I might post their comment as a community wiki.

6. This question is about your site commitment and involvement. Users may feel that they want moderators who understand SE English Language Learners in particular and how it works. Many sites now have moderators that moderate on five or six sites. How many other sites do you moderate on? Is this one of your top two sites in terms of reputation? Why are you a good candidate for English Language Learners in particular?

I'm not and have never been a moderator before. ELL is the only SE site where I have the highest reputation. I'm a good candidate for ELL because I myself am a learner of English and I'm well aware of the pitfalls learners of English run into.

7. Generally what is your stance on comments? For example: Do you consider comments ephemeral and nearly always distracting? Do you agree that they should be deleted if they do not ask the author to clarify? Do you believe that a long discussion under an answer or a question does more harm than good, and must be deleted once someone raises a flag? Why? Do you consider that discussions, as long as they are on-topic, should be left alone? Why? Should lengthy discussions be migrated to chat? When?

Yes, comments are unsalvageable. If the discussion in comments veer off into an off-topic conversation, I will purge it. However, if it's a helpful and on-topic discussion, I will move it to chat.

8. Some native-speakers on ELL have a view that native-speakers understand more about the subject-matter in questions than learners—who may have been learning about English and English grammar for many years. Some native-speakers users also think that native-speakers are the best judges of what makes a good answer for learners. Are native-speaker users a better judge of good answers for learners than learners themselves?

I don't think this question can be answered objectively. While I agree that native speakers understand questions better than learners, there are some learners that also have a good understanding of what constitutes a good answer for learners.

9. In your opinion, what do moderators do?

Lots of exhausting things such as reviewing flags, deleting harmful posts (spam), purging rude/irrelevant comments etc.

10. A diamond will be attached to everything you say and have said in the past, including questions, answers and comments. Everything you will do will be seen under a different light. How do you feel about that?

Fine... It would be much appreciated and I'll have to choose my words carefully. :)

1. How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments?

[Answer 1 here] I will try to make him realise that it's important to respect other's opinions so that he may abstain himself from generating a lot of arguments/flags from comments.

2. How would you handle a situation where another mod closed/deleted/etc. a question that you feel shouldn’t have been?

[Answer 2 here] If a mod closed/deleted/etc a question, he/she must have grounds for that. A moderator cannot close or delete a question without any sufficient cause. If there is any opportunity for the moderators for discussion, I will do that.

3. What are your criteria for what makes a good question? What qualities cause you to upvote questions? What qualities might cause you to downvote a question?

[Answer 3 here] I think a one has to do some research on the question first before asking in the site. Therefore, a question which has some prior research on it, which has authentic reference, and which is thought-provoking is a good question.

I will upvoat such type of thought-provoking informative good questions.

A question should be downvoted if it carries misinformation without any reference. I will downvote those questions, the answers of which are easily available simply by googling and not by thinking like "Who is the Present of USA?" etc.

A question that contains its own answer or that is ambiguous or poorly written should be downvoted. Unhelpful, misleading, offensive and poorly written questions should be downvoted.

4. What do you think is the most important issue that the ELL community needs to work on, and what would you do as moderator to address it?

[Answer 4 here] The ELL community is always helpful. I think there is only an issue that the ELL community needs to work on : when a question is downvoted, a reason should be mentioned there so that the post makers can learn from his/her mistakes.

5. Sometimes people post comments on ELL that attempt to answer a question, in whole or in part. How would you handle these comments?

[Answer 5 here] I will remark on the comment section. Sometimes I may edit the answer if it needs such improvement.

6. This question is about your site commitment and involvement. Users may feel that they want moderators who understand SE English Language Learners in particular and how it works. Many sites now have moderators that moderate on five or six sites. How many other sites do you moderate on? Is this one of your top two sites in terms of reputation? Why are you a good candidate for English Language Learners in particular?

[Answer 6 here] I have a social media platform, a facebook group created by me. Therefore, I have some experience of the task of an admin or a moderator.

7. Generally what is your stance on comments? For example: Do you consider comments ephemeral and nearly always distracting? Do you agree that they should be deleted if they do not ask the author to clarify? Do you believe that a long discussion under an answer or a question does more harm than good, and must be deleted once someone raises a flag? Why? Do you consider that discussions, as long as they are on-topic, should be left alone? Why? Should lengthy discussions be migrated to chat? When?

[Answer 7 here] Discussion is a key to learning. But sometimes it is seen that someone carries the discussion too far and turn it into an off-topic discussion only to establish his own personal thoughts without having any authentic reference only to satisfy his ego. Such discussion surely does more harm than good. It needs to be migrated to chat or deleted. But useful positive discussion is always good, however lengthy it may be, because it contains food for thoughts.

8. Some native-speakers on ELL have a view that native-speakers understand more about the subject-matter in questions than learners—who may have been learning about English and English grammar for many years. Some native-speakers users also think that native-speakers are the best judges of what makes a good answer for learners. Are native-speaker users a better judge of good answers for learners than learners themselves?

[Answer 8 here] Yes, I think that native speakers know better than the learners. But no one should be led by ego or prejudice. Because it's a learning platform where a homely atmosphere of mutual understanding and comfort is necessary so that learning becomes joyful and fruitful.

9. In your opinion, what do moderators do?

[Answer 9 here] 1. To encourage participants to share. 2. To remove unrelated, inappropriate or misleading content. 3. To advance the site's mission and to enforce its rules and regulations.

Actually the role of a moderator is like that of an "umpire", not to get into fights with the members nor to start petty arguments.

A moderator shouldn't personally target someone, or wrongly punish someone due to personal reasons.

Sometimes a moderator may ask questions intended to allow the debate participants to fully develop their argument in order to ensure the debate moves at pace.

10. A diamond will be attached to everything you say and have said in the past, including questions, answers and comments. Everything you will do will be seen under a different light. How do you feel about that?

[Answer 10 here] It will be obviously very much encouraging and inspiring and motivating, indeed.