[drupal-support] Questions about organic groups (og module)

Hello everyone,

I've recently started a Drupal/CivicSpace website to support youth groups in the implementation of community-oriented projects. Although organic groups is central to my site, I'm having a couple of problems with it and I wonder if you can help me out. Here are my questions:

a) Is there any way to approve new group members without having to wait for the email messages sent everytime someone subscribes to the group?

b) How do people handle the group-specific blocks that open on the screen? They pretty much repeat all the information that is available on the "create content" menu and therefore make the screen very confusing for users. Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance,

Leo