Joker: Why don't all the moderators describe themselves? I don't just mean "I do coins" or "I am 6ft with brown hair" but describe your personality and the rules you live your life under etc.

Mike: There are a great many people on the internet who profile other users. Sometimes for illegal usage, other times simply because they are bonkers and have nothing better to do with their time. A lot of people fear these profilers, not me, though, as I am an American gun nut. In fact, I'm such a gun nut, that at one time I had 19 different fire arms in my home, from shotguns, to high power rifles to side arms. Financial difficulties have dictated that I don't own so many at this time, though, so now I'm down to only the bare essentials - a shotgun, a high powered rifle (bolt action - the most accurate of fire arms), a .22 semi-auto rifle, a .357 magnum (which is actually my wife's, kept by the bed, fully loaded with hollow points - specifically Golden Sabers which are highly invasive to the target - since I work at night [and she's right handy with that side arm, a dead eye, so to speak]) and a gold plated .44 magnum that hangs on the wall in a glass case (a museum piece, but fully functional). You'll be interested to know that I am a gun smith, as was my maternal grandfather (yep, mom's right handy with a fire arm too!). All of this in mind, I have never owned an illegal fire arm in my life and am against the illegal ownership of such. Although, I think we should go back to the '30s, when fully automatic machinery was legal in this country. Ah well, one can dream, you know?

I've lived in Toledo for most of my 38 years. I moved to Vegas for a short stay of 8 months where I existed gambling day to day. The other time I moved away from the armpit of the nation was when I was managing restaurants and lived in Van Wert - that was a two year stint. All in all, I managed restaurants for 5 years. My last gig as a restaurant manager was at a downtown shop on third shift, here in Toledo. All the freaks were there, from the pros to the drug dealers and I would venture to say that 3/4 of my customers were armed at any time. In the two years that I put in at that place, I got to see the worst of society walk through that door, I fed many homeless (to keep them from begging in my parking lot) and I came to a distinct hatred of the human animal.

I live in the dark world that is my brain. Sometimes I find some light, which I find in these pages dealing with the many magicians, of whom I feel most comfortable being around. I hate parties, I hate anything that gathers more than four or five people together. I am as anti-social as they come. If I were rich beyond imagination, I would hole up somewhere and never be touched by humanity again, save this world that is Magic Bunny. Unfortunately, I don't have this luxury, so I plod along.

My weakness is bitterness. I see hatefulness oozing out of every pore of the human body. I see death and I don't fear it, I welcome it. I don't cry when those closest to me die, I envy them. I feel the loss in my heart, but it is a selfish loss and I mourn for myself, not for them, as they have gone on to something better and left me behind to exist with one less loved one. Break on through to the other side.

My strength is loyalty. I will move heaven and earth to see that my friends get what they want. Money means little to me and there is nothing, and I mean nothing, that I will not do for those who I call friend. When I feel in the depth of my very being that someone is my friend, pity the fool who would wrong them. I ask no quarter and I give no quarter and I can hold a grudge that will last to the end of my life. And, when I honestly hate someone, I hate them during every waking moment. There are those alive today on whose graves I will dance - if unable to dance I will crawl across it. These are not just passing things, I'm talking people who've wronged me over 2 decades ago and I still remember and I still hate and I will still rejoice at their passing. If I must live, then I live with the express desire to see their passing. Revenge is a dish best served cold.

I am told that I come across on these pages as arrogant. Gotta laugh at that one. Nobody in this lifetime will ever hold themselves in lower esteem than I do me. I am a psychologist's nightmare and life's study. I guess the best summation that I can give you is how one of my closest friends describes me: "An enigma wrapped in a paradox." I am ultraconservative. Then again, this is the internet, and that could all be one big lie.

Joker: What are the advantages of been a moderator? What makes you keep doing all the extra work?

Huw: I plead temporary insanity.

Chabang: for me its purely for the ego boosting qualities and as a way of overcompensating for my complete lack of social skills. The glitz and glamour are just an added bonus.

Rich: The advantages for me are that it's something to do, it keeps this great board squeaky clean and it just brings me a lot of personal satisfaction. And like Chabang, it helps me to socialize a bit more than I do in person.

Laura: It fills time in my otherwise empty and boring life. Although, it is starting to detract from my favorite hobby, staring into space!

Mike: I get a great deal of personal satisfaction in the job that I do around here. It makes me feel like I'm actually somebody, rather than a broken down, middle aged man who delivers pizzas to earn a living. It is also a way of giving back. Further, it is an ego boost, to be a moderator on a forum that gets 100 posts, on average, daily. It is also a good feeling to know that I am part of the reason that this board is so successful and enjoys such a huge readership.

I also thrive on the PMs that I get from time to time, saying, "Hey, man, you know, you are the reason that I actually got out and tried to show my stuff. You were instrumental in getting me to take that first step and you helped me to gain the confidence that I needed to do it." You know what, that feels damn good for a guy who will never really amount to anything. But that is the point, isn't it? If just one of the members on this board gets out and becomes someone because of me, then I have amounted to something. So, you could say that my reasons are selfless, or you could say that they are very selfish, depending on how you look at it.

Nigel: Daniel, if you allow me to extend the question to include "Admin", I'll give you some feedback too. Just over a year ago, I set up and established a forum as a present for some friends who I felt had been extremely unfairly treated. In fact, for the benefit of the other members who have recently joined, it was the Daniel who is now "Joker" who gave me a huge amount of support in realizing this dream. I never thought one year ago that these boards would develop. I was expecting to see a small private group meet together on a board that replaced what had been lost to them following an earlier incident. The growth of these boards has been phenomenal and the ethos very quickly moved from a small select group to a magicians' co-operative. This is the ethos I like to think we have today.

Why do I continue? Firstly, I am not one to drop a project once started. I like to see something developed to its full potential. I am not the sort of person who will only read the first few covers of a book or complete half a jigsaw. Secondly, I still enjoy managing these boards. Thirdly, I strongly believe that there is something very good happening here and I desperately want to see it continue. The day I feel that these boards can achieve no more, the responsibilities become nothing more than a chore or other members no longer benefit from these boards will be the day that I reconsider your original question.

Sean: Ditto to all that's been said. It's sad, but life is pretty boring. I love Magic and I love to see others enjoying magic and discussing it, and I like to be able to help provide a better place for these people to come to. If anyone of you have ever been to an unmoderated or poorly kept board, you'll realize what utter chaos there is. Could you picture Magic Bunny without moderators? Exposure threads everywhere, secret stealers coming on, people DOING POINTLESS POSTS WHICH ALL LOOKS LIKE THIS, and all the good people would leave because it would be a very bad environment. I enjoy being part of it, and as Mike said, giving something back. It's nice to be able to provide for others and help them out

James: Can we have a vote for our next guest speaker? and then see who we can get to interrogate, oops, I mean ask questions to!

Mike: Ah, if only we had them lining up at our doorstep so that we could vote on such a thing, James!  That would be a dream come true! In any case, you may be pleased to know that our next guest speaker will be Milt Kort. You can view his biography in the library if you are unfamiliar with the name, however, if you have a copy of "Modern Coin Magic" you'll see his name scattered throughout those pages. His interview should start on the 11th of next month.

Sean: LOL. Mike is right. If ONLY! Could you picture what way the vote would go? David Blaine! Derren Brown! Well if ya get ‘em to come here and do it...good on ya!

Huw: As a psychic, I would be pleased to offer my services in order to contact one of the great magicians of the past. Already Houdini is pestering me to be the Bunny guest magician. Personally, though, I'd recommend Tommy Cooper...

Nigel: Please don't feel that magicians are lining up to appear on these pages. When you see a magician appear it is the direct consequence of a month or more of emails and a great number of hours of work from moderators, myself and other members (such as Tora, who has many contacts) before a magician is able to appear. If I were a "real" magician my next trick would be to pull another magician out off the hat every four weeks. The reason why you see long pauses between our very special guests is that it is so difficult trying to track down people who are willing to appear here. This is an important factor why I am so grateful when professionals do appear.

DK: I'm confused; the topics were not locked when we had any other guest speaker so why do if with the Moderator's team? Do you feel the other members would not add any value to the topic, its limits the scope of the communication and I hope it’s not the sign of things to come?

Sean: Quoting Admin, “Due to the number of different replies each question may gain, the settings of this forum have been tweaked very slightly so that only new posts may be made. This is to afford courtesy to all the moderators and to allow them the opportunity to reply to the original question before the discussion in a thread diverges to a different subject.”  Blame it all on Admin!

Nigel: I changed the settings of this forum so that every moderator would have the chance to reply before others members interjected and brought the thread off track. You are right that this was not done before - this is the first time that we have had ten Guest Speakers all at the same time. I want to afford courtesy to all of the moderator team by allowing them the opportunity to reply directly to the question that was set. If there is any point you wish to expand on you could always raise this in a second thread or pm the moderator privately.

Mike: It is definitely not the sign of things to come.

Lucien de Silva: The vast majority of MB’s members are reasonable, amiable people, with an absolute dedication to the art of magic. They come to the board to give advice, share ideas and learn from others with a love of magic.

Yet, sadly, as the membership grows, so will the proportion of agitators, troublemakers and secret-seekers. At present, the moderators take a moderate line with these people. Troublemakers are given a fair chance to amend their behaviour, and secret-seekers are informed of their errors. All this is done in an even-handed, measured manner, even in the face of extreme provocation. For this, I applaud the team. However, as the number of unwanted types proliferate, will a stricter strategy for dealing with them be necessary?

Sean: The simple answer is yes. This site is continuing to grow and grow. As you have said, at the minute, users are given a chance and e-mailed about what they've done, asked to stop etc. When a post is moved or deleted, the majority of the time, the person is e-mailed to inform them. When the membership increases and we get more of these users, it's just not going to be possible to e-mail them all and to give them all second chances and watch them all run rampage around the boards again and again. We will never be a strict nazi regime, as you'll be glad to know, but the way I see it, a more "hardline" attitude will have to be adopted to deal with increasing numbers of these types of people. Mind you, we may get lucky and never get any of them!......if only.

Rich: Thankfully the number of deviant users we get here are few, and any that join and immediately show signs of trouble just get deleted, simple as that. Other times we just give a fair warning to the user. All in all we try to keep it fair, but we're far from gentle with users obviously just trying to ruin to the boards.

Nigel: If you read through the lines of the Constitution you will see that we already have a process that we follow when dealing with the small number of problem users. However, we are all aware of the problems that entail when the behaviour of deviant users does not fit exactly within the criteria laid down.

Personally, I don't feel that the number of deviant users should ever cause the procedure to be altered from what it already is - the important issue is that it is the nature of the act that may cause the procedure to alter. Many issues are relatively easy to categorize and the protocol is clearly defined. However, there are times when some form of indiscipline is outside the boundaries of what is expected and, in these cases, this must be treated specifically and on its own merits.

For example, there is one pending case where another user has illegally obtained private information from my own private restricted files and then publicly posted these on another forum. This is something that is undefined within the Constitution and so therefore, is being dealt with along alternative lines than those laid out within our guidelines. You may rest assured that the moderating team and myself shall continue to ensure that each case is dealt with fairly and justly.

Huw: I personally hate to delete or edit posts. In fact, this is something I almost never do. I would certainly never edit a post simply because I don't agree with or approve of the opinions expressed. If people go well off topic or seem to be on the threshold of starting a flame war, I prefer simply to post a message asking them to desist. Once in a while, a user may refuse to take heed of a polite request. On a couple of occasions I have had to lock threads simply to stop them degenerating into ranting. We do occasionally suffer from users whose aim is maliciously to damage the board or to post offensive messages. These people are very hard to deal with. While I would fight for anyone's right to express their views, we have to balance the health of the entire Magic Bunny board and the happiness of its membership against the rights of individual users who may wish to cause damage. It's a difficult task and I can assure you that the moderator team would always value the help and support of the members to deal with those occasional cases when a user posts maliciously or takes other actions aimed at damaging the board.

Andy D.: My personal feelings on this matter, is that the constitution is too lenient. Most of the time it is quite easy to 'see what's coming' with new deviant members, so why give them 3 chances to spoil things for other users. We don’t want to be tough, but we will not hesitate in taking tough action to protect the many good and decent members that frequent these forums. .......Oh, and one last thing...........if needs be, we are quite prepared to let the 'Pitbull' off his leash….OUCH!!!!!

Nigel: As this forum draws to a close tonight, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the members of the moderator team who contributed to this forum over the past week. Not only have I enjoyed taking part myself but I have also learnt a little more about the very people who have spent so many hours each day and week ensuring that these forums are kept organized and working smoothly. I'd like to thank these very special friends, not only for their input this week but for their support and advice over the past year too. A very big thank you.

Mike: Never being one to pass on jumping on board the thank you wagon, I'd also like to extend my deepest appreciation to my fellow moderators. These people have backed me up and offered support when I was in need. They have listened to me when I simply needed to vent off some frustration. They have slapped me when I needed it and didn't back down when I got upset. They have kept me on an even keel when I was going off the deep end. They have answered questions that I needed answers to and have tirelessly given me support when I couldn't understand the software. I consider each and every one of them a part of my family. And thank you to all the members who've also given me help when I needed it. Thank you to all of those who spend hours on these boards helping other magicians find their way in this convoluted industry. You have given support in the form of massive reviews. You have helped to keep this "ship" running smoothly through choppy waters. You have stuck around through some ugly situations and you have backed us up and willingly supported these forums, in both good and bad. You have had posts that cost time lost to software hiccups but still kept on posting. I consider all of you part of my family, also. Thank you, one and all.

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