See, I disagree on the maturity part. My 14 year old could run the company I work at. He is far more mature than the 26 grown men I handle. Its a matter of the aforementioned 18+ legal statue, and the parental statue. An 18 year old can legally make life decisions on their own (in the United States). As long as they are under 18, the parent is their legal guardian. Parental permission to be a mod? Not happening. Too much of a risk of false persona. Not worth it. Getting into the legal ramifications of "employing" an under 18 year old (technically, a "volunteering" person who is not getting paid, isn't an "employee") is a risk. ATA have simply made an age limit that they are comfortable with. Boom. No risk. As far as "mom's grounding a player" into inactivity.... What about wives? Mrs. TheDeuce has outright banned me before. But I stole her purse and retrieved my manhood. All set. But that was not easy. Jobs? Ol' Moosey disappeared for a bit due to his job. I can name a few more players I know that had work or school get in the way of their unwritten mod responsibilities. It sucks, but RL is more important. Junior Moderators exist. Just without the green, speakers, and mod box. Just email ATA. Narc on people. Thats the spirit!
Willies point about emailing supoort is a very very good one. You don't need to have a green or orange colour to moderate. If you're under asge and you really wanna make a difference, then go ahead. Answer player quesrions and email support when you see violations. Presto. You're a jmod!
No support, my apologies but the main point you made was that "Junior Moderators" would be there to (as it was insinuated) "prevent" the players from spamming or bypassing...and so forth. The factor remains that they may not always be on when it's happening, thus there being no point in having them. Secondly, we have the "14-18" age range. Yes it's partially a good idea because there are those who are mature enough to handle the responsibility... Then there are those who are not. People between that age can be flippant, moody, and often will hold grudges (we've all experienced that teenage grace, whether it's through children, or general age). What's to say someone just doesn't like someone and gets "moody" or "mardy" (yes not everyone is like that, but just for this example please just accept it), and silences someone because of it? Does this not create more problems than it actually solves in the long run? Thirdly, as those before me have said, the developers have chosen an age that they're happy with, meaning they aren't likely to settle for anything less. Let's be honest there's not much you can do to "change the developers minds." Finally (my apologies again for dragging this out), I don't actually think the moderators get a choice on whether your permanently silenced or regularly silenced (24 hour period), It's probably just like the feedback button. You press it, state your reasoning and if the developers feel it's unjust they'll lift it (highly unlikely). Although in all honesty if your offended or you don't like what a player is doing in world chat, just screenshot it and send it to support, the process is fairly rapid...in the end it's still the same result. The player will still get silenced, it will still cost you the speakers to post any message, whether it's spam or not.
Under aged mods may have the tendency to power trip. Although not all. You said before getting chosen, players should vouch for a JMod instead of them applying for the position/title. IMO, we really can't expect having 100% reliability on the vouches. 80% of the players might not even give a flying fudge to vote. I think too much work or things to consider for the devs to come into a decision of who they're going to give them to.
I like this idea however I would suggest the possibility of a 'probation period' where JMods undergo a 3-6 month period of their JMod career in which a moderator, developer or some form of authority monitors the JMods behavior to see if they suit the role. Lying on a written statement isn't hard and you can't exactly expend someone of the age of 14 to start skyping random people they have never met before. Parental consent maybe advised. Otherwise this idea has my full support.
I refuse to support an expansion of the oppressive regime that already exists. You advocate the Hitler Youth. Anarchy!
I support this, but I believe that someone should be able to apply to the devs. The devs know as well who's in the forums, and how they act. If you're on that list, and you apply, you'll have a larger chance of being accepted.
Though I'm wondering about what everyone is saying in response to this: "Don't give the modship to kids". "These kids will abuse their power". I don't know how you acted from 14-18, but most people I know would never abuse their power and just want to help.