Project Staff

The designation of "official Staff" of Project Topaz is granted to Community Members who have been selected by our community to represent our project. They are given additional privileges and responsibilities beyond those of Contributors, and as representatives of the project, their voice given additional weight and authority. While not exclusively, such Members represent some of the best our collaborative community has to offer.

Privileges

Contributors who are given the "official Staff" designation for Project Topaz are given the following additional privileges and powers over other Community Members:

• Granted membership to the Project Topaz organization on GitHub, which:
  • Gives them the "Member" tag next to their name when commenting on Pull Requests and Issues in our repository
  • May grant the capability to label, edit, or close Issues and Pull Requests, depending on their role
  • May cause their Pull Request reviews to be considered "Approving Reviews", depending on their role
  • May grant Write access to the repository, depending on their role, allowing them to:
    • Merge Pull Requests
    • Push commits
    • Revert commits
    • Create, rebase, or delete branches
• Granted the Staff role in our Discord server, which:
  • Allows them to delete messages sent by Community Members
  • Allows them to mute, kick, or ban Community Members from our Discord server
  • Gives them capability to send messages in our #staff channel
  • Allows them to view our #moderation-log channel, which contains messages which have been deleted by Community Members or other staff
• Granted membership to the Project Topaz Google group, which:
  • Allows them to upload, edit, or delete files on our shared Project Topaz Google Drive
• Given a weighted voice in project direction, shaping the future of the project when:
  • Surveyed regarding Project Focus selection
  • Surveyed regarding the potential addition of new official Staff
  • Discussing how the project repository is managed
  • Discussing how the project's Discord server is managed

Responsibilities

In exchange for these additional privileges and power to shape the project, official Staff are expected to:

• Abide by our Staff Code of Conduct at all times, which governs how Staff interact with Community Members in our public Discord, downstream server Discords, any other communities relating to Final Fantasy XI private servers, and Direct Messages with Community Members
• Participate in our weekly Staff Meetings when available; participation is not always required each week, but some effort is expected should their schedule allow
• Abide by - and carry out if applicable - any final decisions made by the Project Lead

Survey

When a Community Member involved with Project Topaz indicates to the Project Lead that they wish to join Project Topaz as official Staff, all Community Members will be surveyed regarding the potential merits - and demerits, if any - of that Community Member's inclusion as Staff. Responses from current members of our Staff, and all members of the project's Consul of downstream servers, will be given additional weight.

A sample of our current Staff Selection survey may be found here:
Staff Survey

Successful candidates will most likely have a demonstrated history of contributing to the project, and a positive history of interacting with our community. Specific expertise is not required, but the community may take it into consideration when evaluating the candidate.

Selection

While all members of our community will be surveyed and their input taken into consideration, these surveys are not votes, and interested candidates being added as official Staff will ultimately be on decision by the Project Lead.

Therefore, no matter who a Community Member is, it is important they share any input they may have regarding a potential new official Staff member.

A candidate with vast support will not be selected if there have been incidents which indicate that potential member would not embody the collaborative spirit of Project Topaz. A candidate who is relatively unknown by the community may still be selected based on few positive reviews indicating the individual's fitness for the role. The purpose of these surveys is to gather this information, which may not be known by the Project Lead or current Staff members.

Acceptance

A candidate will be accepted as official Staff when:

1. Adding a candidate as official Staff has garnered positive support by our community
2. There is no indication that candidate would be ill-suited to represent the project
3. The candidate has affirmatively agreed to abide by our Staff Code of Conduct
4. The Project Lead assents with the potential addition

At this point, the candidate will be granted them the privileges - and responsibilities - which were previously enumerated.

Review

Staff will be reviewed every six months by method of surveying our community for input on our current Staff. This process will allow for Staff who have not been living up to the expectations of our community to be considered for removal by the Project Lead. This process will also allow the community to express appreciation and support that they have for individual Staff members, and guidance on where that Staff member might improve to garner even more support!