Moderator Central is the place for new and experienced moderators to go to connect with fellow moderators to ask questions, share advice, collaborate, and find resources. Since membership to Moderator Central has grown by over 3,000 members in the last few weeks, I wanted to make sure that everyone is aware of the wealth of information that can be found on the Message Boards.

The Moderator Message Boards are the place for new moderators to ask for advice about setting up their group, for more experienced moderators to discuss tips on member recruitment and managing group dynamics, or to stay up to speed on technical issues, common challenges, and workarounds. These public forums are in a threaded message format, so they are easy to follow and search. You can even subscribe to an RSS feed or Alert so you don’t miss a thing.

Some basics for participating on these Message Boards include:

Search the existing topics on the message boards before posting a new topic to see if your question has already been asked and answered. Just type your keyword(s) in the search box at the top of the board and click the search button to see what’s already been posted on the topic. The key is to be as specific as possible so you can narrow the search results down as much as possible.

Post a new message: Go to the message list view, sign in to Yahoo! if necessary, and, click “Post New Message.” Select your public profile (which is how others will recognize you), write both a message subject and message, and then click “Post Message.”

Create a new topic: Briefly summarize your question or subject in the “message subject” line when you post a message.

Reply to a message: Click the “Reply” link at the bottom of any message, sign in to Yahoo! if necessary, select your public profile (which is how others will recognize you), write your comments, and click “Post Message.” You can edit your message as you write it but you cannot edit it after you preview or post it.

Thank you,
Jami Heldt
Groups Community Manager

Tis the season to get crafty! The holiday season is upon us and what a better way to express yourself to your friends and family than to craft a homemade gift? Whether you are a seasoned crafter or someone who’s always been interested in nurturing their creative side, there’s a Yahoo! Group out there for you.

The best place to start is our Best of Hobbies & Crafts page where we’ve highlighted a myriad of groups all with something unique to offer. If you don’t find what your looking for here, search by keyword for the craft you’d like to learn more about. From beading to soap making, there’s bound to be a community of crafters more than happy to share tricks of the trade with you.

Christmas came early for me this year. The fabulous faux fur shrug with gorgeous green satin lining pictured below was a custom crafted gift delivered to me early by Santa’s elves this year!

What are you crafting this season? Share your holiday gift ideas with us by commenting below.            

Happy Crafting!
Jami Heldt
Community Manager

In case you haven’t heard, the Groups team is currently testing new features and enhancements to the Groups product based on feedback we’ve heard from many of you.

As mentioned in a post in early July, while we test and make enhancements and improvements to the Groups Beta product, some features will be temporarily unavailable. These include: Shared Calendar, Polls, Database, Scheduled Messages, and the Online Rich Text Editor. These features will come, but we need time to get them right.

We’ve asked moderators who are interested in testing the new functionality to set up a beta test group and share their feedback with us as well as collaborate on ideas and recommendations for improvements.

If you want to set up a beta test the group, you can by taking the following steps:

1. Join the The Official Group for the Yahoo! Groups Beta or any other Beta group (but if you do join the Beta Forum, we recommend becoming a daily digest or special notice subscriber given the volume).
2. Click on the “My Groups” link in the upper left-hand corner and then click on “Start a Group” link at the very bottom of that drop down
3. Once you click on that link you will then be prompted with the steps to set up your new
   beta group
4. Finally, share your feedback with the Groups team on the Beta Forum or by making a suggestion on the Groups Beta Suggestions Board.
   

If you aren’t interested setting up a beta group to but want to stay up on the latest beta news, you can stay do so by checking the Groups Beta Status module in the upper right hand corner on of Moderator Central.

Thanks!
Jami Heldt
Community Manager

Below are known issues that may be affecting some Groups users:

Hotmail Update: Good News & Bad News (current forecast: scattered showers)

The Good News

Hotmail used to reject some messages sent from Yahoo! Groups because they exceeded 15 “hops” (the default limit set on Exchange Server to prevent mail loops, which Hotmail refused to reset to a higher, more appropriate level). This would happen most often in groups that moderate messages, since the moderation process causes more hops within our system.

But we’ve recently made changes to the way hops information is presented in Yahoo! Groups headers, so that this 15 hops limit should no longer be an issue. These changes should mean far fewer bounced messages to Hotmail members.

The Bad News:

In the last couple of weeks Hotmail has adjusted their filters in a way that is pretty much blocking all “invitations” sent from Yahoo! Groups. And despite our attempts to get them to stop this blocking, we’ve not yet seen them lift this block:

So we have two recommendations:

1. If you’re sending invitations to Hotmail users through the Yahoo! Groups system, consider also sending them a direct email (from your own email) either pointing them to the group home page and directing them to click the “join” button or point them directly to the join page: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NAME_OF_YOUR_GROUP/sjoin

2. Encourage your Hotmail users to complain to Hotmail about the problem. Ultimately, they will only take action to fix the problem if enough Hotmail users complain.

Calendar Reminders (current forecast: clear skies ahead)

We’ve recently seen a surge in reports of calendar reminder problems affecting approximately 20% of our users. The Calendar team pushed a fix on Tuesday that should have corrected this issue. Let us know if you are still experiencing this issue by commenting below or submitting a report to Customer Care.

One thing to be aware of is that if someone posts an event to the calendar who is on moderation status, a reminder won’t be sent.

Thank you,

Jami Heldt
Groups Community Manager

In reviewing suggestions on the Groups Suggestions Board this evening I read a comment left by a long time moderator indicating that they weren’t certain how to share their feedback with the Groups team.

The most useful feedback members and moderators can give us comes in the form of suggestions. It’s one thing to hear input on what works, what doesn’t work, or where you’d like to see product improvements, but that only tells half the story. By sharing your specific product suggestions, you illustrate what it is that you’d like to see and help us to find solutions .

In addition to the Suggestion Board, you can also send feedback into the Groups team by completing the Yahoo! Groups Help Form.

We want to hear from you!

Jami Heldt
Community Manager

So you’ve finally set up your group and now you’re ready to get the party started, are you unsure of the steps you should take?

There’s a ton of useful resources for Groups moderators in the Yahoo! Groups Help section (there’s a link located in the upper right hand corner of every Groups page).

Within the Help section, there are numerous tips dedicated specifically to inviting members and managing membership within your group.

There you’ll find information on how to:

• Invite and Welcome Members

• Promote Your Group

• Manage Members

• Manage Moderators and Co-Owners

In addition to the Help pages, you can also find a plethora of resources on Moderator Central, including links to our Moderator Message Boards where you can connect with other moderators to ask questions and share advice.

Jami Heldt
Groups Community Manager