John, thanks for this thread. I appreciate your openness to improvements.

- I'd like to second the request for a "Moderators Mailbox" that all of the admins and mods could read, as well as reading the replies sent. This should lead to quicker responses than sending a note to one or two mods, and also would help keep the whole moderation staff informed on problems and how they are being handled.

- This idea isn't very well fleshed out, but I'd like to see some way of helping when communication breaks down between a member and the moderators, such as when a member can't understand what's being asked of them, or when they can't make themselves understood to the mods. Perhaps a member could ask one other person to act as an advocate or mediator, and they could share PM's with just that one person. I think it's great that issues get handled privately, but if the person is having trouble understanding what they are being told, it can lead to them feeling "picked on." I'm not sure this is quite the right solution, but I think it would help a lot for there to be some way of preventing small communication problems from turning into big resentments.

- I think it would be great to have something equivalent to a "Notify Moderator" button for PM's. This would allow people to report threatening or harrassing PM's, and would ensure that the mods see them in their entirety (cutting and pasting into a new message allows for editing).

- Finally, this is not a recommendation for a change so much as a request of the membership as a whole. While I understand that it is occasionally necessary to recommend to a member that they might be better served at a different online community, I think the *only* appropriate person to make this suggestion is John. I think for one member to tell another member (either specifically or generally) to leave, or to find another site, violates the community guideline that prohibits "messages meant to intimidate or harass others." Again, this is just a request on my part, but I would very much like to see a complete end to posts that suggest people should leave here, for any reason. IMO, only John and the mods decide who should leave.

Thanks again, John, for the opportunity to think of ways to make this site a better place.