(1) For pseudonymous candidates, Are you a professional mathematician? In what capacity?
This does not apply to me. In any case, let me say that I would very much prefer not to have moderators known under pseudonyms only, not because I find anything wrong with pseudonyms on the site but simply because I find it better to have actual names attached to moderators.
(2) Assuming a notion of "culture" as explained here, what would a newly elected moderator do to preserve it? Will there be more efforts to preserve the culture, or more to steer it toward things nearer to "what a Stack Exchange forum should be?"
I am considerably more in the «preserve the culture» mindset.
I think the initial somewhat Borg-like approach to SE sites has withered a bit, in no small part because successful sites developed their own cultures and —I guess— this has been rightly observed to be correlated to their success.
(3) What time zone are you in?
I am in Buenos Aires, which is UTC−03:00.
(4) How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments?
(5) How would you handle a situation where another mod closed/deleted/etc a question that you feel shouldn't have been?
I am of the position that mods should not be editors of the site. We have a considerable number of users with essentially the same powers as moderators with respect to closing/deleting/etc (except, of course, that mods votes to do such things is immediately binding) and it is they who should be doing the closing, deleting and so on.
As a mod on M.SE I vote, in fact, much less to close/delete/&c than when I was a `regular' user (It should be observed that a mod cannot turn off his modhood) and I restrict those actions to obvious spam and other matters which require immediate action.
I do think that on MO we could be more aggressive voting to delete off-topic questions. I do think, too, that users should do this more, rather than mods!
(6) In your opinion, what do moderators do?
Clean up stuff, turn comments into anwers and answers into comments, take care of migrations, and lots of other small janitorial work. Handle little conflicts that sprung often and spark flags, and on occasion handle some more dramatic and visible problems.
As I said, I do not think that moderators should be editors nor —much less!— referees on this site.
(7) A diamond will be attached to everything you say and have said in the past, including questions, answers and comments. Everything you will do will be seen under a different light. How do you feel about that?
Let me put it this way. I would not do, write or say anything I would not do, write or say as a `regular' user.
(8) In what way do you feel that being a moderator will make you more effective as opposed to simply reaching 10k or 20k rep?
Well, I think the site should be run by users with sufficient rep, and we shouldd strive to make it easier for them to be more effective in doing it. Mods should be there to enable that.
(9) Do you think women are underrepresented in the MO community compared to the mathematical community as a whole? Is this a problem for MO? If so, what would you do about it as a moderator? See also: 1483 and 985
There are fewer women on MO (at least visibly) than what I would have expected there to be. This is a problem for MO in that MO is clearly missing good users, good questions and good answers because of that!
(10) As MathOverflow is growing, the diversity of the moderator team might become an issue of interest. As I understand, the present moderators have much in common, and women are, to say it that way, underrepresented. In which way do you think would you contribute to the diversity of the moderator team?
Well, I've never met the current mods (we should set up a MOnference™...) and most of the year I am in a different season :-)
