*banned 4 MarkDown love* @design_RG@social.cleverlibre.org

Ooops.

Selective Content. Got Gold?

#humour #gold #omg

To finalize, all of these points above are my personal opinions, I believe they allign with the QOTO mission statement and site policies.

I have been a moderator in various sites in the past, mostly Forums, starting the process as an interested user and acting the ways I suggested above, being recognized as a valued Contributor, and eventually being invited into Staff positions.

I have time and enjoy my activity in the Fediverse, have volunteered for the position now open in the December 2019 Moderator Nominations and would be grateful for your support if you feel I might be a good Staff member here.

The Discourse Forum for Nominations is at : https://discourse.qoto.org/t/nomination-for-moderator-december-2019/110

...or you can consider suggesting any names here or via Direct Message to our Administrator, Dr Freeman, @freemo

Thank you for reading this, please feel free to comment in this thread, your input is important.

RG.

Any user can contribute to the site, through their posts and added content, thru their interaction with others. I find the size of the community ideal, we don't have a huge crowd or overwhelming numbers of new posts.

We all can help:

- say hello to a new user, when they post that first toot. I remember it, mine was just a month ago, this masto thing totally new to me. And I also remember receiving a welcome message from the administrator, which is not something you see in many larger places.

- keep an eye out for unwanted posts (for example, as per site rules, porn, open advertising, any spamming, etc). Use the Report button at the bottom ony such post, and send in a report to Staff. This will result in that post being checked and removed asap if in fact it's improper.

- respond to other user threads, even a small comment is encouraging. It's sad to see someone put the effort to create a nice post, well written, with additional info link(s), maybe image(s) --- and see that post sit, ignored. It's disheartening but sadly common.

- make the place feel like a collegial, friendly place to be, which we enjoy spending our time in.

6. What kind of experience could be valuable? Someone with Forum, or Facebook User Group moderation experience, for example. Or people who have worked in leadership roles in team projects.

People with varied knowledge and backgrounds related to the instance's theme of STEM (Science, Tech, Engineering and Math) are ideal, as this is the focus and pretty unique in the Fediverse.

7. This is interesting. I might like to help or be part of it in the future. What should I do?

QOTO is a work in progress, there has been a big influx of new users (more than 1,000, or 33% of the existing user base in the past month or so), and this growth is likely to continue.

We enjoy some great things here. Professionally hosted site (at OVH, one of the largest European Hosting providers), full daily backups, an administrator that is very present and open to suggestions and discussions. There's a lot of positives, and we can help in many ways.

3. Who can be nominated? the site rules expects a user to have been registered and active in the instance for at least one month. A good candidate would be someone who has shown balance and tact in their posts, ideally also being helpful and building community spirit.

There is currently a thread open for nominations, which can be seen here:

4. What makes a good Moderator? Ideally a stable and pondered person, capable of communicating clearly and actively present in the community.

The job of a Moderator is, in my personal view, more than simply keeping an eye out for un-acceptable behaviour or content. But any Staff member in a site should be interested in it and a community builder him/herself.

5. Previous experience, is it required, mandatory or what? It certainly would be helpful, and make the person's job easier, if they have experience in other communities, by producing content, helping other users, assisting site Staff. All of those can be characteristics of a valuable member, and sometimes they are recognized with a "Contributor" tag and status in the system, even if they are not in the moderation team itself yet. They might progress to that level in the future, or might prefer to stay in their current role.

QOTO Moderator Nomination Process - Notes

This month we have a process for nominating candidates for Moderator position here at QOTO.org. It is an important one, and I would like to post a few notes and thoughts about it.

1. First of all, it's surprising how open and transparent the process of Staff selection is here; In most cases, these discussions are hel In Camera, by existing site staff (moderators and administrators), sometimes subject to a vote between them, sometimes with Admins having the final decision, after accepting input.

Here, it's done in the public Feed, the posts are also federated with other instances. And the nomination process is open to participation by any current user in QOTO. (an election should ensue, if more than one person is nominated; otherwise, it's considered hors-concours, and the nominated person gets the job)

2. Nomination is currently done via a post in the QOTO Discourse forum (a less known and used feature of the community), you will need to register an account there as it's different software that Mastodon running here.

As an alternative, you could post a Mastodon post, and declare your support for any user here you see as a good candidate, include the person via their @ tag name, and include @freemo, our system admin so he won't miss it.

A word processor works great, has lots of formatting, etc.

But it also is more distracting. I find that sometimes the best is simple, down to Earth things and tools.

For writing, the words come first. Formatting is important, but can come later.

Long writing here in Mastodon-land, using the SMALL toot editor window, not seeing all your text, with distractions and notifications popping up all the time?

Not ideal. Get an Editor. Great free ones out there, many people have favourites.

I like, use and recommend EditPad Lite, it's Free for personal use.

https://www.editpadlite.com/download.html

Very nice article -- and a super handy feature to have.

Earlier today I wrote a sequence of posts (visit to Lisbon Museum series) in a plain Text editor (more space to write, font size control, NO distractions on sight).

When I had completed it, it was time to post here - in individual segments to keep size in control.

I did it via traditional Clipboard commands, hurrying and worried that someone would comment or reply before I had the full set posted.

Went looking for an enhanced Clipboard utility, they have been around. But -- discovered that Windows 10 now has that, Built-In, no added software needed.

The article in PC Mag linked explains it well, with illustration. It's simple and convenient to use.

Thank you PC Mag, Microsoft. 👍

https://www.pcmag.com/feature/364313/how-to-use-the-new-and-improved-windows-10-clipboard

Additional info and links, notes:

- Archeological Museum, Lisbon, Portugal is at : https://www.lisbon.net/archaeology-museum and wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Archaeology_Museum,_Portugal

- a beautiful ancient map of Iberia : https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/Atlas_Van_der_Hagen-KW1049B12_017-PORTUGALLIAE_et_ALGARBIAE_REGNA.jpeg

- the city of Loulé region on Bing maps : https://binged.it/2RqlQz2

- Amphorae page at Wiki with many examples : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amphora

- Lusitania, Roman period Iberia : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lusitania

- Roman Empire map, 3rd Century : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Spain#/media/File:Prima_tetrarchia_Diocletianus.PNG

- Baetica information : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispania_Baetica

- Al Andalus : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Andalus

- Moorish Period : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Portugal#Moorish_rule_and_the_Reconquista_(711%E2%80%931249)

- And finally, Wikipedia's full series on History of Portugal : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Portugal

The original thread mentioned as inspiring this writing was created by @anarchiv and can be found here : https://todon.nl/@anarchiv/103260707759534544

With my thanks for the inspiration for this! :smile:

I should point out that I am not a Historian, but a curious man, fascinated by glimpsing the past and being able to understand a bit of how they lived, by seeing such a nice exposition and the numerous Historical buildings, sites and ancient settlements commonly found in Europe. So, my writing probably has factual errors, which I apologize for, the intent being to jot down those and share with others who might find them intriguing, hopefully.

The collection on display was all dug on sites around the modern city of Loulé. Besides these wonderful Roman and pre-Roman era artifacts, they also had later, Moorish period ones, with beautiful ceramics and metal work.

After visiting Europe for the first time a few years ago, I was so impressed and pleased by all these cultural artifacts and History around everywhere that traveling here in my home region, in North America pales in comparison.

I hope you enjoyed this narrative, and welcome your comments and follow ups. Thank you.

Roman estates in the Andalucia region, then called Baetica, produced fine Olive Oil, another staple of the Mediterranean diet. They sold and exported this widely, quality bringing in demand and profits to traders, farmers and landholders. Baetica was 'next door' to the Algarvians, so trade flowed easily between them.

As documented by the various amphorae, either whole or in fragments, on display at this Museum exhibit. The notes pointed out how many Baetican amphorae had been found in the Algarve, testimony of vigorous trade. Algarvians had income and could purchase finer goods - their own region produces olive oil and wines to this day, but the Museum had fragments which had been manufactured in Baetica, and even in mainland Italy, Rome's homelands.

Algarvian amphorae fragments had cruder handles and rougher surface texture. The Baetican ones were finer and prettier ceramics. Past contents of these vessels could still be determined by analysis of residues in some of them.

The Museum showed photos of the larger artifacts, like these stone vaults, carved into natural rock. They showed site maps with pointers of what each part was intended to do. Once you have a product, and an eager market, things will work to get it supplied.

How do we carry this out? The Museum showed many Amphorae, large earthenware/ceramic vessels which were built to store and carry various products around, locally, regionally and along longer routes to Rome and Beyond.

During the Roman era, there were thriving colonies not only in Lusitania, today's Portugal, but also in the Southern region of today's Spain now called Andalucia, which came from the Moorish era name - Al Andalus.

In the Algarve, Phoenicians, Romans set up colonies. The Romans saw the abundance of fish and built an industry of processing then into a preserve, the "Garum" fish sauce which was popular in their cuisine. Garum produced in the region was high quality, and had a demand from various regions of the Empire, including the Capital, Rome itself.

Garum was created by cutting up the fish and placing them into stone vaults cut into the local bedrock. Salt was added as a condiment but primarily as a preservative agent. The salty fish mix was left on the stone vats to cure for some time, months possibly. And once finished, it provided a concentrated sauce with protein and a flavour judged exquisite by the people.

Quality brings demand, and demand attracts traders; there's money to be made and livelihoods could focus on supplying it.

The Algarve is the most Southern part of Portugal, the warmest and sunniest. Trees, fruit, grapes grow well there. Fish in the seas are plenty. It was good land for settlements.

And they came, different peoples over different eras. Phoenicians, traders at heart, created outposts to explore the land and it's products, while also supporting passing seafarers going to farther places. Some of their mariners came from the homeland in modern day Middle East, traversed the whole Mediterranean, and went past the Columns of Hercules, now Gibraltar, into the open Atlantic.

Wild ocean waters, for people with small ships, but brave they were; and the profits from trading moved them. From home, via this route, into the Bay of Biscay, always a dangerous passage, and on to Cornwall for the Tin metal so demanded by the Bronze Age technology. Tin was plentiful there, and provided profitable mining for thousands of years. Traders came from far an apart to purchase the ore and bring it home for resale.

Reminiscing of a visit to the Archeology Museum, in Lisbon, Portugal.

It started this morning, the thread. And over short posts, someone told a story. Of a Greek man, who lived in antiquity, by the Mediterranean side; in a city whose name is still preserved, and today is written "Marseille".

This series of posts was interesting, I caught one flying by the Local feed, about halfway down his sequence, liked it and went to the top to find the rest.

Enjoying his post, I remembered similar thoughts, of History, and how things worked, how small bits and pieces came to me as I visited an exposition, at the Archeological Museum, in Lisbon.

Stopping at each display, I would read and examine the artifacts. All of them had came from the same region, countryside around today's city of Loulé, in the Algarve, Southern Portugal.

The region has been inhabited for thousands of years, and the exhibit had pieces from pre-historic, Phoenician, Roman, Moorish and more modern times.

@anarchiv

#dystopian #art #xp #moa
---
RT @AheadLooms
HOOKED - VR sculpt, Darius Bartsy https://buff.ly/2RdDBRX
https://twitter.com/AheadLooms/status/1202920890394128385

Beautiful Persian & Tabby mix, Beast is gorgeous. #xp #moa
---
RT @Beast_the_Cat
The only closeups that I want feature treats 🤔😸
#whiskerswednesday #catsoftwitter
https://twitter.com/Beast_the_Cat/status/1202107491204644864

A picture, or it didn't happen.