CommunityOS Community operations setup Community Ops Setup · USD 99
Rules, an escalation map, and the eleven questions asked every week
The operating layer for a 14,000 member community currently held together by two volunteers and a founder who does not sleep.
The community works and it is not run. Rules exist in a pinned message from 2024, moderation depends on whoever is awake, and the same eleven questions are answered from scratch every week. This is the operating layer: written rules, a three tier escalation map, a knowledge base seeded with those eleven answers, and a weekly cadence.
Everything here is straightforward except the promotion rule, which two moderators interpret differently and which accounts for six of the eight member disputes in the last quarter. It needs a decision from you, not a process from us.
Decision needed
The promotion rule
The pinned rules say no unsolicited promotion. In practice three different standards are being applied depending on who is online, and members have noticed.
| Situation | Moderator A | Moderator B | You |
|---|---|---|---|
| Member links their own project in a reply | Allowed | Removed | Allowed |
| Member posts their project as a new thread | Removed | Removed | Allowed if relevant |
| Member shares a job at their company | Allowed | Allowed | Allowed |
| Member shares an airdrop or token launch | Removed | Removed | Removed |
| Long-standing member shares a paid course | Allowed | Removed | Unclear |
Rows one, two and five are being decided differently by different people on different days. Six of eight disputes last quarter came from exactly these three cases, and every one of them was a member who had seen somebody else do the same thing without consequence.
Self-promotion allowed in one channel only
Simple, enforceable by anyone, and the standard most communities of this size land on. Costs you some goodwill from members who currently promote freely in replies.
Allowed in replies, never as a new thread
Closest to what actually happens now. Harder to explain and still requires a judgement call on row five.
Contribution threshold
Members past a participation bar may promote. Fairest in principle and the hardest to enforce without an argument about where the bar is.
Escalation
Who handles what
| Handled by | Response | Escalates to | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Question already in the knowledge base | Any moderator | Link, under 1 hour | Nothing |
| New question, factual | Any moderator | Same day | Added to knowledge base |
| Question about roadmap or token | Core team only | Next weekday | You |
| Rule breach, first time | Any moderator | Remove and explain, privately | Logged |
| Rule breach, repeat | Lead moderator | Timeout, logged | You, weekly |
| Harassment or safety | Lead moderator | Immediate removal | You, immediately |
| Scam, impersonation or phishing | Any moderator | Immediate ban, no warning | You, immediately |
| Legal threat or regulator contact | Nobody. Stop | No response at all | You and your lawyer |
The last row matters more than it looks. Moderators are volunteers and should never respond to a legal threat, a regulator, or anything that reads like either. The instruction is to forward it and say nothing, and it should be the first thing every moderator is told.
Knowledge
The eleven questions
Counted across ninety days of messages. Each one is answered from scratch by whoever is online, which is roughly four hours a week of re-answering and the main reason your moderators are tired.
Cadence
The community week
- Monday
Weekly thread, same format every time
What shipped, what is next, one question to the community. Predictability is what makes a community ritual work and this one has been irregular since March.
- Wednesday
Moderator sync, fifteen minutes
Anything ambiguous from the week, any rule that felt wrong. This is where the promotion rule would have surfaced six months ago.
- Thursday
One prompt or poll
Low effort, keeps the space active between announcements.
- Friday
New questions into the knowledge base
Anything answered twice this week becomes an entry. The list in section 03 stops growing.
- Monthly
Community call, fixed date
Second Tuesday. Seventy one people asked when it was, which means they want it and cannot find it.
- Promotion rule decided and written in one sentence
- Escalation map shared with all three moderators
- Legal and regulator instruction given explicitly
- Canonical wallet address pinned and linked from the docs
- Eleven answers seeded into the knowledge base
- Community call date fixed and pinned