12 Days of Anime #1 – Community Involvement – Moderating /r/anime & Leaving

It’d be easy to say that this is the top moment of the year because this was a relatively weak year for anime, or that I haven’t watched much anime over the past three months. It could also be said that I just like myself a bit too much, but since these moments are all about our personal moments, and that this particular “moment” took up hundreds of hours of my time over half a year, I don’t really see how anything else could’ve taken the #1 spot.

Nothing like some self-deprecating humor to start us off.

I’ve spent many times on various internet communities since roughly 1997. Every community I come into, I become very involved with, and relatively well-known in short order. I’ve started using reddit’s /r/anime’s subreddit more heavily when I revived this blog, back in April 2013, and completely immersed myself in it when Fall 2013’s season began, back in July. And as part of the community, I’d post pointers to people, correct mistakes, call out when people broke the rules, ask for rule clarifications, etc.

As such, it wasn’t all that surprising, as a high profile and very active poster that I’ve been offered a position of moderating the subreddit back in February, which I accepted. I did step down after 6 months, during which the subreddit grew from roughly 160k subscribers to 200k, and from about 650k unique monthly visitors to over a million. Did I have numerous times where I’m sure I pissed off users, or where users greatly annoyed me by trying to break the rules or attack others for flimsy reasons, or for constant blog-spam, malicious spoilers, and a colossal sense of entitlement? Sure, but that wasn’t why I stepped down.

Always look for a community with which you’re a right fit.

I decided to step down for the same reason I actually became a moderator to begin with, the time investment. It was more than the several hours every day I spent moderating, but that it was a drain on my attention span even as I was doing other things. Watch an anime episode? Tab out every so often to check new reports, then spend 10-20 minute dealing with something that’d break the attention I was giving something else. I decided I want to spend my time more productively, and that I did not want to keep fighting with users to try and make the subreddit better, and that if I don’t wish to fight to make things better, and if I wish to spend less time on being a moderator, and just “ignoring it” didn’t work for me, stepping down would be best. Do I think I left behind the community in a better or worse shape than when I joined? No really, but I do think I’ve done a good job while I was doing it.

I also lowered my involvement on /r/trueanime, the discussion-focused subreddit, that was filling up with discussions and arguments I’ve found to be a bad use of my time.

And if things aren’t going as planned, take responsibility. It’s your life.

So this year I delved much deeper into the online anime community, in a way that makes maintaining a blog seem quite minimal, and then I backed off, having realized it’s taken the time I actually spent on the hobby at the core of it all. I’m still active, and provide feedback, but as always, moderation in all things. Hopefully I’ll be more moderate about my Diablo 3 time as well, or any other endeavour I partake in, and as someone with revolving “addictive hobbies”, it’s always been a struggle.

So, dear readers, any moment related to anime-related, or hobby-related, communities that stands out to you over the past year? Starting a new blog, developing readership, forming an anime club in college, all apply!