Interesting model; it probably doesn't help moderation effort if mod team members start to feel like they've gone from village elder to mall cop.

It absolutely doesn't. A friend of mine was a [player authority] (I forget the term) in the early days of Asheron's Call. As I understand it, that's basically what happened to them, and most of them went from passionate volunteers to just throwing in the towel. He's still bent about it if it comes up in conversation for some reason.