Moderator's Principle of Least Surprise

There is a rule in the design of software and user interfaces called the Principle of Least Surprise. It says that when a person interacts with your software or interface, and they take an action such as filling out a form or clicking a button, the correct outcome is whichever outcome is unsurprising, or, if all possible outcomes would be surprising, the one that surprises them least.This is not an ironclad law. And there are subtleties. For example, if a bank website has a button to 'Close Out Your Account', in some sense the least surprising result would be to FedEx you, the user, a large quantity of $100 bills, and this is generally speaking a bad idea they should not do even if you request it of them. (Also probably illegal.) However, the principle of least surprise says that their error is not 'doing that dumb thing,' nor is it refusing to do it; their error is having that button at all. Try instead 'Close Your Account & Transfer' or 'Begin Closing Your Account.' Either of those will produce less surprise when, instead of the dumb thing, they present you with a form asking for information. The bank wants to tell you that a money transfer elsewhere is the option they are offering, and so ensure you will be unsurprised when they ask you to tell them an account number and routing number they will wire your money to.There is a very similar principle at work for community moderation. At least, community moderation as I see it.I approach community moderation with the perspective that it is the moderator's job to make things easy for its members, not the other way around. The point of a community is to provide value to those within it; the moderator is doing a public service by facilitating it, not serving their own interests. By a quirk of how communities tend to develop, the norm is for moderators and community organizers to be volunteers, not paid, but it's a part-time job, and often a difficult one, and needs to be approached as a job. If you cannot moderate well,