The Buffalo Rumblings Podcast launches this week; staff changes, community guidelines

The Buffalo Rumblings Podcast is here, folks. (Almost.)

This week, the new Buffalo Rumblings Podcast will debut ahead of the 2018 NFL Draft with your hosts John Boccacino and Anthony Marino. John has been writing for us since last July and has experience in the radio and newspaper industries. Anthony has experince with podcasts, working on the Bills Mafia’s podcast for a while and has been writing here on and off for a couple years. He currently brings you daily links posts.

Listen to our teaser now and subscribe to the RSS feed if that’s your thing. We are going through the process of adding it to your favorite podcast hosts.

The podcast is something you asked for in our post at the end of the playoffs asking how we could improve the site. This is the start of Phase 1 of that movement this offseason.

There have been a few more changes on the masthead. We’ve reorganized Corey Giacovelli’s role. He’ll be doing less social media, more writing, more fanshots in the Web Rumblings section, and a lot of stuff behind the scenes to get our work in the hands of other SB Nation brands that might be interested.

We have two new additions to the staff as well; Daniel Bender and Matt Hodowany. Hodowany is a Sports Media student at Ryerson University in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He’s covered some National Lacrosse League action and wanted to branch into the NFL. Bender has previously written for Buffalowdown, Fansided’s Bills blog. Both are coming in as contributors.

We are still looking for one person to join the staff this offseason. We are looking for a visual media contributor to work with Josh Rawdin on images and video for the site and social media. Proficiency in tools like Photoshop, Illustrator, iMovie, and/or Premier Pro is necessary. If interested you’ll also be able to pitch in on writing articles, but this position will be focused on visual media. If you’d like to join the team and continue to make this the best community for Buffalo Bills news and discussion please complete this Google Form. We’ll reach out if we’re interested!

Last but not least, you’ve noticed an increased presence in the comments from the writers and moderators and more comments being hidden or deleted. Some of you have received more warnings than normal and messages to your account. We are trying to improve the culture in our comments section so everyone feels free to participate.

Here’s a refresher on the community guidelines:

• No name calling. If you call people names, your comment is going to be deleted. A commenter, a writer, a player, a coach... anyone. The includes modification of a person’s actual name or username on a consistent basis.
• If you see a comment you deem insulting, flag it. We don’t pay moderators so we are scrolling through the comments to check it all day. If you see something that you find offensive and/or which violates any of the guidelines here, flag it. Any comment, FanPost, or FanShot that is flagged by our community members will raise an alert for our editorial staff.
• Certain words are an automatic delete while some will get you a warning or banned. Swearing is typically not permitted on our blog, though we do relax that during certain posts covering live events as long as it’s not directed at other users.
• The moderators and I have established a regular line of communication and will be checking in with each other consistently to make sure we are on the same page when it comes to the comments.
• Finally, argue the argument, not the arguer. It’s a cardinal rule, in my opinion. If you say something like “You always take that player’s side” or “You’re just infatuated with this player” then your argument becomes less powerful. If you have a comment against an argument, make it.

If you have questions or concerns about any of this, email us at MattRichWarren @ gmail.com.

There is going to be at least one more of these updates this offseason as we hit Phase 2 in July, but we wanted to give you a taste of the podcast and introduce our new writers. Comment away.