And in the “not everyone is your friend” department….

There was that one person who tried to time the closing of the sharks list to get in the last word, which was his “appreciation” of all the work we did over the years.

What is it about people who think everything you do sucks, but who insist on staying around and telling you how much they hate it, instead of going off somewhere else where they might be happier?

Because, of course, there are some people who get off on screwing things up for others. And when you’re managing communities, I’m more and more convinced you need to recognize and isolate those people early and often if you can.

Trolls — they’re easy. But there’s another group, which I always called Eeyores (nothing’s ever good, much less good enough), that can turn into cancers and sour or destroy a community if you aren’t careful.

I used to believe it was the admin’s responsibility to make a community work for everyone. I now understand some people like to take advantage of that, because ultimately, they get their joy not out of being part of the community or contributing to it, but screwing it up and watching people be miserable. The virtual equivalent of the boy poking a stick into the anthill.

Some people simply get off on destroying, not creating or using. And they don’t WANT to be helped.

If you don’t believe that, just ask the wikipedia folks. they’re learning the reality of what happens when the gang-bangers show up to have a little fun. and they assumed everyone would be like the core group was, which is a fatal mistake if you grow and get popular, because backpatching protections in (instead of designing them in up front) is a bitch.

If you have a group of 300 and four people think it sucks, the proper answer is to invite them to go elsewhere, not try to make it work for them. Of course, they’ll hate that,b cause they want everyone ELSE to change to fit their ideas, not try to fit themselves into the group. And that dynamic is easily 90% of the problems online groups end up having.

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