Being a Better DM

So, recently at the Save vs Poison blog, there was a post describing a failed game session. I want to talk about the discussion that has happened around the post both in the comments and here and here.

In the comments of the post, there is continual mention of different editions and the different play experience of different games or editions of D&D. I feel like everyone is focusing on the wrong thing. The author of the post talks about his players not adjusting to a different playstyle because of the edition he is running. My question is, why is the playstyle different if you are still the one running the game and it's D&D? A DM should be running the game in the same manner no matter what rule set they are using. D&D is D&D, why should it feel different if you use different numbers or dice to roll to hit or damage? The style or feel of a game should only change if you change genres; if you go from playing D&D to a horror or sci-fi game there should be a noticeable difference. As the DM you are in control of how the game feels, the impression the players get from the game, and just which rules to use when. When running a Star Wars game, the game should feel like Star Wars and be DMed the same whether using the d6 rules, the d20 rules, the the new Fantasy Flight games; it's should be immediately recognizable as Star Wars. The same goes for D&D, or Call of Cthulhu. It doesn't matter whether you are using Pathfinder or BX or 5e, D&D should feel the same when the same DM is running the game. The system is subject to the DM, if you want to run in an 'old-school' style then you should be doing that in every D&D game. If the players don't like playing a different system, that means the DM is changing how he runs the game. I agree with Alexis when he says that it is the DMs fault when a bad session happens, but we need to learn from that and be proactive in solutions. Don't blame the failure on the rules. The players enjoy most of your games, right? So if you change systems, but are maintaining genre and the base conceits of the game, then the factor which was unenjoyable was how you ran the game. Figure out what you did different and learn from it. If the players are exhibiting behaviors you want to avoid it is because that is what they learned from games in the past. Figure out how you can encourage different behavior though natural play. Every DM should always be working to better themselves, and never assume they know 'how to DM.' It may be easy to begin your career as a DM, but it can be extremely difficult to measurably improve. A good DM is constantly analyzing their game sessions, looking for mistakes and areas of possible improvement because it is the DMs responsibility to run a good game.