Reef Squad

[tehmadreefer]

Curious as to what are the vetting criteria for reef squad members? Also, how to get on the squad gang?

I've seen numerous posts by reef squad members that are just so wrong it's scary. Also a lot of noobies in reef squad which is weird?

 

[JoshH]

I believe that to be brought onto the reef squad you need to be nominated by another member of the Reef Squad. As for the vetting process itself I'm not entirely sure of.

I don't believe you have to be a proven masterful reefer knowledgeable in every aspect of reefing to be a part of it. Just have a good positive attitude towards helping others and demonstrating some reefing knowledge.

And I don't know how to define a Newbie that's on the Reef Squad. New to reefing in general? Or just few posts and a little activity on the forum itself?

 

[tehmadreefer]

Ok thanks.

I feel and many others it seems calls on reefsquad to answer important questions but often times they end up giving bad advice albeit, in a friendly way. That is not helpful.

Noobness as in new to the hobby and marine biology in general, not to the forum. To clarify.

 

[JoshH]

Any time, I am by no means a RS member but I do follow the hashtag and respond to threads when I feel I have a comfortable knowledge base to do so. If not I will atleast tag a member (RS or not) of whom I know can assist in the issue.

Some of the RS members who are new to the hobby can still be helpful in some aspects, just not all. I feel like they get overly excited to assist others and end up giving unsound advice in the process.

Oh and if you would like to be helpful as well and feel you can help other reefers, you should follow the Reef Squad hashtag and you will get notifications as well when someone posts the tag. You'd be surprised in a day how often it is used

 

[Xam]

I'm not sure of the process either, but it's an interesting topic. I would hazard a guess and think that being a nice person is probably a requirement. But I'm a newbie so what do I know. o_O

 

[tehmadreefer]

I'm not sure of the process either, but it's an interesting topic. I would hazard a guess and think that being a nice person is probably a requirement. But I'm a newbie so what do I know. o_O

Lol

 

[tehmadreefer]

I guess I think it would be good to have an expert panel to assist those with questions when ppl tag reefsquad, perhaps a higher level of reef help. Like when one call IT at work and they just tell you to clear your cache and restart your pc, they get lvl 1, then if they cant help then you get a ticket for a higher level of assistance.

 

[JoshH]

I guess I think it would be good to have an expert panel to assist those with questions when ppl tag reefsquad, perhaps a higher level of reef help. Like when one call IT at work and they just tell you to clear your cache and restart your pc, they get lvl 1, then if they cant help then you get a ticket for a higher level of assistance.

I think the only difficulty with that setup on a forum platform is implementation. If you knew the tag for the higher level of help, you would never use the level 1 tag to begin with.

 

[kschweer]

The “vetting process” for lack of a better term requires members to meet certain criteria such as being a forum member a certain period of time, having the excellence banner, no history of being an issue on the forum and also knowledge is a big part. We certainly aren’t going to put a member who is constantly in the reports, has a bad attitude or tends to be rude on the squad. We actively recruit members with different levels of knowledge in certain areas such as DIY, nems, chemistry, qt, diseases, critter identification etc to make sure we have a well rounded group. We also take on members who are generally helpful, friendly and kind. As with anyone or any group not all will be perfect nor will all info posted be 100% correct but remember just cause you don’t agree it’s not necessarily wrong. Any member is welcome to challenge a squad members response (nicely of course) or provide an answer that they feel is more accurate. And there really aren’t many noobies on the squad I’m not sure where you got that info.

 

[kschweer]

I guess I think it would be good to have an expert panel to assist those with questions when ppl tag reefsquad, perhaps a higher level of reef help. Like when one call IT at work and they just tell you to clear your cache and restart your pc, they get lvl 1, then if they cant help then you get a ticket for a higher level of assistance.

Even if we did that I’m sure someone would argue it as well. I have seen many argue chemistry with Randy Holmes Farley who is one of the most respected chemist in the hobby.

 

[Mastiffsrule]

I see it as a benefit for all of us. They choose to take time to help. No one knows all, but knowing at least someone will reply is nice. And there’s tons of experience here to help if advice is not on point.

I don’t see the reef squad as thinking they are all knowledgeable experts as much as they are folk who want to help. The fact there are some highly knowledgeable folk on the squad don’t hurt neither. Plus a member may not be perfect on one area like diseases but helpful on equipment.

I usually don’t have an opinion cause I hate conflict, but speaking bad of someone trying to help not so good. If bad info is given I would not see an issue with pm them to discus in further.

I think maybe a badge which area a member can help in would be nice. Such as squad member for lights

Can I be a member :)o_O. Only dosing.

 

[Mastiffsrule]

The “vetting process” for lack of a better term requires members to meet certain criteria such as being a forum member a certain period of time, having the excellence banner, no history of being an issue on the forum and also knowledge is a big part. We certainly aren’t going to put a member who is constantly in the reports, has a bad attitude or tends to be rude on the squad. We actively recruit members with different levels of knowledge in certain areas such as DIY, nems, chemistry, qt, diseases, critter identification etc to make sure we have a well rounded group. We also take on members who are generally helpful, friendly and kind. As with anyone or any group not all will be perfect nor will all info posted be 100% correct but remember just cause you don’t agree it’s not necessarily wrong. Any member is welcome to challenge a squad members response (nicely of course) or provide an answer that they feel is more accurate. And there really aren’t many noobies on the squad I’m not sure where you got that info.

There’s reports?......

 

[JoshH]

I see it as a benefit for all of us. They choose to take time to help. No one knows all, but knowing at least someone will reply is nice. And there’s tons of experience here to help if advice is not on point.

I don’t see the reef squad as thinking they are all knowledgeable experts as much as they are folk who want to help. The fact there are some highly knowledgeable folk on the squad don’t hurt neither. Plus a member may not be perfect on one area like diseases but helpful on equipment.

I usually don’t have an opinion cause I hate conflict, but speaking bad of someone trying to help not so good. If bad info is given I would not see an issue with pm them to discus in further.

I think maybe a badge which area a member can help in would be nice. Such as squad member for lights

Can I be a member :)o_O. Only dosing.

I like the different tag idea, Plumbing Squad, DIY Squad, Dosing/Chem Squad, Coral Squad, Disease Squad:)

 

[DLHDesign]

The goal of the Reef Squad (RS) is to help other R2R members. Sometimes that help takes the form of technical or procedural advice on some aspect of reefing, sometimes it takes the form of a welcoming hand towards someone new to this slice of the Internet. Both objectives are viewed as important - and the latter more-so than the former.
So that - in a basic sense - is what the RS does here on R2R. It’s membership is made up of people who have demonstrated a consistent ability to deliver on those goals. That, in the end, is a subjective measure for the most part. Which is not to say that our standards fluctuate or are applied unevenly - they do not and are not - just that it’s hard to quantify something like “consistently demonstrates being helpful” to a number of posts or likes (though those do factor in).

One criteria we don’t have for RS membership is that a person be all-knowing about reefing. We each have our areas of strengths in this hobby, and we all know we have areas we’re working on and learning about.
Which brings up the next thing that is not a criteria; we don’t expect ourselves to be perfect. We try to ensure that when advice is given, we also include some indication of how certain we are about the answer, though it’s not uncommon to miss a detail or confuse a point in the rush to help in a timely manner. Yet even when we fail to indicate our certainty, there should (hopefully) be an understanding that we are all just hobby reefers as well. We make no claim to being experts (that is specifically not a requirement) and we don’t get paid for our time. Both of those things exist - and they usually go hand-in-hand; if you want expert advice, you have to pay for it.

One thing to keep in mind as well is that there are often many ways to achieve results in this hobby. Reefing is complicated and there are few absolutes. What may seem wrong to one reefer, may be the perfect solution to another - especially in areas like disease handling, automation, coral care, and many other areas. As RS members, we attempt to help fellow reefers in ways that best suit their needs - which is often different than what we might do in our own tanks. This dichotomy can sometimes be hard to overcome completely, which can contribute to confusion or inappropriate advice.

In the end, the RS is a group of fellow hobby reefers who are helpful first, and accurate second. So I’m happy to see that you recognize that we do things, “in a friendly way”, for that is the truer option for us when compared to giving perfect advice in a rude and off-putting manner.

 

[JoshH]

There’s reports?......

Any post that gets reported for bad language, attitude and so on gets reviewed by the mods. So they are watching if someone reports you

 

[tehmadreefer]

Even if we did that I’m sure someone would argue it as well. I have seen many argue chemistry with Rany Holmes Farley who is one of the most respected chemist in the hobby.

True true

 

[Mastiffsrule]

I like the different tag idea, Plumbing Squad, DIY Squad, Dosing/Chem Squad, Coral Squad, Disease Squad:)

Different squad members could watch certain threads.

Any post that gets reported for bad language, attitude and so on gets reviewed by the mods. So they are watching if someone reports you

It’s the CIA mind reading all over again
:)

 

[DLHDesign]

Different squad members could watch certain threads.

We’ve discussed this, but it doesn’t really hold up well in a practical sense. The challenge is getting users to know of - and use properly - the tags.
It’s hard enough explaining to new users how the single RS tag works (include it and helpful people will get actively notified). That’s just one relatively simple tag. By the time a user could learn of even a handful of tags, they would have a good enough understanding of the site to use the various forum sections to ask their questions in.

Of course; nothing stops anyone from using #whateverhashtagtheywant. Once a tag exists, anyone could follow that tag just the same as the RS follows the RS tag. So topic-centric help tags can certainly be something that organically grow on the site... :-)

 

[JoshH]

#whateverhashtagtheywant.

Definitely following that Hashtag!

 

[KJ]

The “vetting process” for lack of a better term requires members to meet certain criteria such as being a forum member a certain period of time, having the excellence banner, no history of being an issue on the forum and also knowledge is a big part. We certainly aren’t going to put a member who is constantly in the reports, has a bad attitude or tends to be rude on the squad. We actively recruit members with different levels of knowledge in certain areas such as DIY, nems, chemistry, qt, diseases, critter identification etc to make sure we have a well rounded group. We also take on members who are generally helpful, friendly and kind. As with anyone or any group not all will be perfect nor will all info posted be 100% correct but remember just cause you don’t agree it’s not necessarily wrong. Any member is welcome to challenge a squad members response (nicely of course) or provide an answer that they feel is more accurate. And there really aren’t many noobies on the squad I’m not sure where you got that info.

Agree 100% . Let's get on!!!!!!!!!!!! Sorry Guys!