Improvement

Hello everybody. My name is Brandon Chan. I am a 20 year old from Long Island. I run a group called Pokéumans. Pokéumans has been part of my life for the past five years. In those years, I have met many wonderful people. And then I created this group, in hopes to share a world together, and many deviants come here to share their experiences. These are the members. In the process, I hired deviants to help run this group when I am unable to. These are the admins. Together, members and admins come together to make this a special group, a group with 700+ members. A group that feels like a community.

But that community has been fractured.

You see, we are not a perfect group. The admins are not perfect people. I am not a perfect person either. I have made many mistakes while running this group, mistakes I hope to learn from. This group has come under heavy fire lately, and I cannot say it hasn’t been justified. But we are not perfect. We don’t do this as a job, nor do we do it because we have to. This is a hobby, no, that’s not right; this is something we do because we are passionate about Pokéumans, a fictional story that allows for others to take part in its universe.

I am going to say this outright: we have banned a member from this group. Most of you know who I am talking about, but for those who don’t, I will not say names. I will admit that some of the drama stemmed from this incident. has left the admin board and the group altogether.

I have seen the admins being accused of being too constrictive; I have heard things like me being in total control, and hurtful things, like how I am not fit to run this group.

I am not going to deny anything, I’m not going to admit anything either. All I will say is this. I try. They try. We try.

I know we have problems. I am aware of that. There have been a few concerns among members about the direction this group is headed. We’ve seen several remarks that the overall quality of the group is falling due to an increase in lower quality and irrelevant submissions, and less creative and original content. This comment describes the general mood pretty well. comments.deviantart.com/4/1456…

As a group, our policy has always been to allow anything Pokéuman related into the group. Sometimes, unrelated things slip through, and we’re looking to improve that from an admin standpoint. But there’s also the question of what we should consider “Pokéuman related.” Are impact font memes related enough? Should streaming advertisements and "thank you" Shoutouts be allowed simply because they are from members?

There’s also the question of whether they’re actually “good” enough to be worthwhile. I won’t give any specifics, but if you’ve been in the group for a while you’ll likely recognize the things I’m talking about. We’ve always discouraged “clone-fics,” but that ultimately doesn’t stop them from happening. Other pieces are very poorly formatted and composed to the point that one wonders if the author had ever wrote anything before that. We’ve never felt the need or desire to enforce or judge the quality of what enters the group before, but we also understand the frustration that this flood of poor quality can cause.

We have rules, and we enforce them to protect the group’s canon. I do not want this group to become unfocused on the clear goal here: a place where Pokéumans can call home. Where people can submit their stories to share with the world. If there is an issue that needs to be resolved, we try our best to correct it.

I cannot express how much sorrow I feel to see this much hostility between us, the members and the admins. When someone says they don’t want to be part of this group due to all the drama; that deeply upsets me, because I feel like I failed my purpose.

So, there is something I want to do. I want you guys to get involved. Because this is much your group as it is mine. I want you all to remember the purpose of this group, and why it’s been running for 5 years, the members.
These are the questions we have for everyone: What level of quality do you want us to strive for? Should we admins be more or less involved in quality control? What type of submissions should be allowed into this group? Should we start policing the related submissions we receive?
The bottom line is: How can we improve the quality of the group?
Please comment, discuss, and share your opinions on this. Anything is appreciated. Thank you for reading.