Poll: Injustice of the Permaban

[Daveman]

Well, I only once got in trouble that I recall. Might have got a warning for some piece of dicketry but I only remember being suspended over some silly thing. Twas Mod Sass I believe, though I consider it a misunderstanding, I didn't mean to be harsh. Since then I've gone to a clean record, but I'm always careful.

I note that I don't say "YOU are an idiot", I instead go for "people who say [what person I deem an idiot just said] are idiots". Maybe I haven't been insulting enough, but considering some of the petty things that people get warnings for I feel that that has helped me avoid wrath for a while. That said, other than the occasional gun control thread I rarely feel angry enough to bother any more. More often I'll write out a huge ranty reply, realise I've constructed the perfect reasoned argument, realise that it will be ignored or misunderstood by the idiot and not bother posting it.

Also if I want to post something and it's only one sentence, I just rephrase it and say it again with a line space between. But then the low content post rule is a bit of a stupid rule in my opinion.

 

[incal11]

I assume you'd have them come back with only one "life" left on their healthbar?
All you're doing by doing that is simply adding an extra block to the forum healthbar; - a 1 year suspension.

Not to mention, it would be exploitable to all hell.

If you unbanned people after a year had passed from them being banned, they could just not post anything, let their healthbar recharge to a more 'safe' level, and then proceed to troll the hell out of the forums all over again.
[small]In fact, I'm surprised Zeel didn't do that. He missed his opportunity there...[/small]

I guess repeat offenders could get a true perma-ban. Anyway 1 year is a relatively long time, not even taking the health bar into account. Which is very slow to empty itself. 2 years, then?
Apparently some popular posters get themselves perma-banned regularly, and they are just the most prominent among those who could learn from their mistakes. If only they didn't get the equivalent of a summary execution after one too many speed-limit infraction.

The serious personality problems and "dead baby pics" posters aren't that many. Though they might not be easy to get rid of sometime, they should still easy to process separately.

If I had to guess the whole "the moderation is blatantly unfair!"-argumentation seems to suffer a lot from the psychological drive to think as oneself of being right, or how Guppy put it so succinctly,

GOOD MODERATION: The guy I reported gets a warning. Tee-hee!

BAD MODERATION: The guy I reported doesn't get a warning. Outrageous!

APPALLING MODERATION: I get a warning. Clearly there is a conspiracy against me.

I did get warnings for things mods posted themselves without trouble. There is a double standard in action. Someone putting it sarcastically won't make it untrue all of a sudden. But I can admit that I've seen much worse on other forums.

This is a community of thousands of people. Behavior that is acceptable in small groups can quickly snowball into unreasonable proportions (low content posts are the best example) when presented inline in a forum thread. Many people are trying to read the interesting content of a given thread, and such things make reading more difficult, driving people away from the forums due to a frustrating and time wasting experience.

Just one line can still be relevant to a discussion. I'm not talking about the "first" and "lol" kind of posts.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

MANY of the people who get these warnings are just not familiar with the way written text can come across to other readers. Things are more blunt then intended, but still "true" to how they feel (so don't get edited - and causes umbrage when moderators action it), which over time can add up to an abrasive and unpleasant Internet person. If one person in 100 presents their discussions in this manner, that can quickly add up among thousands of people browsing a forum, tainting everything with poorly constructed bile.

Ya know what would be good for the low content warnings? If we could edit the post in question to add more content and thus revoke the warning.

I remember getting a low content warning for posting a list of female characters in response to a thread asking what your favorite female characters were. I overlooked the OP requesting we not simply post a list, so mea culpa, but I would've LOVED to go back and add context. But I couldn't. Because once it was warned, the post could no longer be edited.

I realize this likely isn't possible inside the current warning system, but hey...it's been changed before...

I did get warnings for things mods posted themselves without trouble. There is a double standard in action. Someone putting it sarcastically won't make it untrue all of a sudden. But I can admit that I've seen much worse on other forums.

Whether or not something gets moderated will often come down to:

1. Did it get reported?
2. Did the moderator who looked at it find it problematic?

Both of those are relatively random factors, so you're never going to get absolute consistency in moderation. It's impossible. If you think you've been unfairly moderated, there is an appeal process. However, from experience I know that "Other folks are doing it too!" is not viewed as a salient defense.

 

[Edguy]

Next, for the most part it seems that when a regular user gets banned, it only detracts from the conversations that take place here on the Escapist. A lot of the frequent posters I've seen banned seem to have opinions that differ from the norm. I believe that they are more likely to get banned because they tend to be ganged up on, get frustrated, and therefore (understandably) resort to acting a bit more like a jerk than they usually would. Also, I believe that people are more likely to report people they disagree with rather than ones that they are in alignment with. This leads to a homogenization of opinion and I for one don't think it makes for interesting conversation when everybody stands around agreeing and patting each other on the back. Another thing people that get banned tend to have is passion. Passionate posters make more interesting posts that are usually reasonably well defended. Weeding these people out leads to those remaining in the forum to be wishy-washy posters who don't really take a firm stand on any topics.

I so agree with this. If you've ever been to the SuperHeroHype boards, then you'd know that this is a major problem there.

Overall, I feel like there's no popular casual forums to go to. Most forums are too strict, and then you have boards like 4chan on the other extreme..

 

[AnthrSolidSnake]

I've had an account for almost two years, so not long, but I've been on this site even longer. It wasn't until about a month or two ago that I really started paying attention to the forums. I made one small mistake in posting, and that was due to the advertisement that disappeared as I clicked on something and I posted on the wrong persons quote. Sure, I only have one warning out of 10, but it makes me look bad when really I just post about the topic at hand. I understand there needs to be moderation on the internet to make sites more accessible, but apparently moderators can't tell the difference between an actual infraction and a simple mistake. If someone gets banned for something like what happened to me, then I absolutely think that it's not fair to permaban someone.

 

[Kross]

Ya know what would be good for the low content warnings? If we could edit the post in question to add more content and thus revoke the warning.

This isn't completely unreasonable, however the issue is that (already fairly busy) volunteer moderators are the ones who would have to go back and audit the old posts. Essentially this is what the appeals process is for, as if you actually hit the point where site functionality is removed, then we can review your entire history in light of all information available and clean things up as appropriate.

Ideally, this won't happen enough times to add up to a punishment, and the automated ban level degradation will fix it over time.

Just one line can still be relevant to a discussion. I'm not talking about the "first" and "lol" kind of posts.

Indeed, that's why we say "low content" versus "low character count". Of course, sometimes mods may not see the subtlety in certain kinds of short comments in the report queue and a warning slips through, which we always try to avoid. There's plenty of short comments that add information to a discussion, and there's plenty of longer comments that add nothing (but may be worthwhile if it's a unique presentation)

If you're going to push the boundaries, keep it entertaining and you should be fine. Also keep in mind that if you're pushing those boundaries, that you actually be entertaining and not merely regurgitating a meme/etc.

I did get warnings for things mods posted themselves without trouble. There is a double standard in action.

It's true, we try to avoid it, but sometimes staff or mods will break our own rules. We'll yell at each other internally, but aren't going to bicker amongst staff publicly. It's similar to when you visit a friend's house and take off your shoes out of respect, but they might sometimes run through the house with dirty boots to grab a forgotten thing (or just being lazy, though mods try not to be lazy in such ways). Maybe not the best example to parallel moderation policies, but yeah, it happens. We try to avoid it. <3

 

[Blow_Pop]

You know in the 4 years I've been here and the over 6k posts I have accumulated I've only received 1 warning. And that was my fault on low content.
The mods here are wonderful(for the most part I don't know them all so I can't say they all are but a good majority are). I'm not even just saying that because I know a few of them and talk to them occasionally outside of this site. I'm saying that because they actually are.
I've been on forums where actually the last one I joined (coincidentally enough for a friend since he and a few others he knew ran the forum) I got banned because I had a gmail account. Yes. Some forums are THAT ridiculous on rules. So the fact of

As I stated before, you can avoid mod wrath entirely by just stopping and going "Am I being am asshole?" If I can see random individuals go 6 months or 1 year without a single case, then I don't see why anyone should be incapable of doing it.

Also to prove case in point I went 2 or 3 years before my one warning(since it's been over 6 months since I got it) and I was fairly active those years. I've dropped with how active I am now because most of the topics just piss me off and I'll do something stupid and get myself banned intentionally because of it so I just avoid most things. But seriously, not that hard.

Sadly, some people will never learn.

 

[incal11]

Whether or not something gets moderated will often come down to:

1. Did it get reported?
2. Did the moderator who looked at it find it problematic?

Both of those are relatively random factors, so you're never going to get absolute consistency in moderation. It's impossible. If you think you've been unfairly moderated, there is an appeal process. However, from experience I know that "Other folks are doing it too!" is not viewed as a salient defense.

At least one of the warnings I once got I can say with absolute certainty was due to the moderator disagreeing with me and using the relative shortness of the post as a convenient excuse. Since it was an unpopular opinion (but nothing racist or intolerant either, btw) the appeal wouldn't have done me much good.

My own experience was more along the lines of "I get a warning, and now this one posts almost the same thing in another thread". I reported him for kicks, with an unsurprising lack of results. I'm not sour though, now I know how to avoid these situations better. So I actually find the whole thing kind of funny.

It's true, we try to avoid it, but sometimes staff or mods will break our own rules. We'll yell at each other internally, but aren't going to bicker amongst staff publicly. It's similar to when you visit a friend's house and take off your shoes out of respect, but they might sometimes run through the house with dirty boots to grab a forgotten thing (or just being lazy, though mods try not to be lazy in such ways). Maybe not the best example to parallel moderation policies, but yeah, it happens. We try to avoid it. <3

This is great of you to recognize this, I really appreciate it.

 

[Roxas1359]

I've been here for a long time and I think the rules are perfectly fine. I've not gotten a single warning at all in my entire time here and we've gone through many rule changes. Before the rule change it was way worse believe me, and it's really not hard to stay out of trouble.
Honestly these threads only pop up when a forum "celebrity" gets banned. I have to say it's a lot calmer than how it used to be, back in late '10 and early '11 it was the worst. The rules are a lot better than they used to be and a lot of people just don't seem to learn from their mistakes.

 

[Malkav]

I'm moderating a smaller forum myself, which is part of a larger forum network. We treat each user and infraction individually, so there's no set amount of infractions you can have. They're seen as guidelines. The downside is that our system isn't as transparent from the outside. Here's how it works, and why I don't blame escapist-mods for the 8-strike-system:

We're all about your habits, style of discussion and personality, and how it fits in your favorite forums. There's countless nuances to take into account. We see the whole package individually within context.

If it gets critical, moderators who know you will have an internal discussion with the admins. If you got unreasonably provoked and your freakout was understandable, we can see that. Also, we appreciate unpopular opinions and heated discussions, within reason. We HATE this part of our jobs, so we look to avoid bans.
The goal is to find a solution for your problems (if they are frequent and severe enough), and if every viable option failed, we discuss a ban. Normally, the admins will contact you personally. They're nice, but not dumb-nice. If you're unwilling to address your problems, you leave.
If you got permabanned, you can wait and contact the admins yourself. In many cases, they allowed people to create a new account, but under observation. In fact, at least two of our ~150 mods were ex-banned, and they turned out great.

And now, take a guess how time-consuming this is. It costs patience. For everyone who turned out well, you get 5 complete a-holes who antagonize or disappoint you, lie to you and abuse the system. The admins must have wasted weeks of their lifetimes trying to discuss with ungrateful idiots. It's unrewarding, and it's really not as easy as you might think.


Hell, very few of our users ever reach 8 infractions. If you got 4 for the same reason, we assume they don't work. Nobody likes banning frequent longtime users. I bet there's intern discussions here as well.

 

[Eleuthera]

This agrees with what I suspected. In this case it makes even more sense to enshrine this self-policing nature by finding someone from over there to take on a mod-baton for the section - it would make the moderation efforts more consistent in that regard and someone who reads around anyway might see posts that are unreported but worthy of moderation. Implementing something like this would also make the board more accessible for the newcomers as a single or maybe a pair of mods could work closer together and clearly state the rules about how to treat insults to minorities or very controversial opinions - a question that I think a lot of the criticisms that were levied back then and resurface sometimes these days are based on. To peruse my example from my previous post: if someone repeatedly describes homosexuality as a choice or immigrants as "toxic" is this just a very controversial opinion or an attention-worthy offense?

When Nasrin first approached me about becoming a mod (last September), this was going on. I remember the idea of a R&P specific mod (or at least a mod who would be focussed on R&P) mentioned. I mentioned that, since I am a R&P regular (reader at least if not a prolific poster), I might be somewhat suited for that position. I did have some reservations though, mostly due to the conflict of interest that could be created if you're part of the discussion, since there are a few R&P regulars I'd like to beat with a wiffle bat for some of the things they say.
At that time however two other new mods were already being 'trained', so my ascension was delayed until a few months ago.
In short, maybe a new mod will be instated specifically for R&P. Maybe one of the existing mods will take it upon them to focus more on that section and maybe Copper Zen is right and the world will end April 1st and we wont care anymore...

 

[FalloutJack]

I did get warnings for things mods posted themselves without trouble. There is a double standard in action.

It's true, we try to avoid it, but sometimes staff or mods will break our own rules. We'll yell at each other internally, but aren't going to bicker amongst staff publicly. It's similar to when you visit a friend's house and take off your shoes out of respect, but they might sometimes run through the house with dirty boots to grab a forgotten thing (or just being lazy, though mods try not to be lazy in such ways). Maybe not the best example to parallel moderation policies, but yeah, it happens. We try to avoid it. <3

Well, I'm glad you agree, Kross. Moments of passion SHOULD be curbed. And with that in mind, bans done in passion should be negated as well. Mods can make mistakes, so I should like to put it to you...to reconvene after a host of bans and discuss among yourselves with cooler heads if it was really worth it. We lose some good people here sometimes, and it doesn't have to be. Should you come to the same conclusion, relent...and explain yourself to the one afflicted. You need not distance yourself from the people because of a position of power. If a double-standard exists, I would ask only that you double-check and try to fix what was broken. I'm sure plenty of the people who find moderation here too harsh would feel better.

 

[Judgement101]

Eh, I think the mods are doing their jobs properly. Just a question though, do the marks ever go away? I have 2/8 strikes on my profile and they've been there for about a year now and I haven't been warned/suspended/marked again since the system was implimented, so I'm a bit lost to that whole thing.

 

[Kross]

I did get warnings for things mods posted themselves without trouble. There is a double standard in action.

It's true, we try to avoid it, but sometimes staff or mods will break our own rules. We'll yell at each other internally, but aren't going to bicker amongst staff publicly. It's similar to when you visit a friend's house and take off your shoes out of respect, but they might sometimes run through the house with dirty boots to grab a forgotten thing (or just being lazy, though mods try not to be lazy in such ways). Maybe not the best example to parallel moderation policies, but yeah, it happens. We try to avoid it. <3

Well, I'm glad you agree, Kross. Moments of passion SHOULD be curbed. And with that in mind, bans done in passion should be negated as well. Mods can make mistakes, so I should like to put it to you...to reconvene after a host of bans and discuss among yourselves with cooler heads if it was really worth it. We lose some good people here sometimes, and it doesn't have to be. Should you come to the same conclusion, relent...and explain yourself to the one afflicted. You need not distance yourself from the people because of a position of power. If a double-standard exists, I would ask only that you double-check and try to fix what was broken. I'm sure plenty of the people who find moderation here too harsh would feel better.

Good idea! There's a lot of moderation traffic, so we would need a way to bring such issues to the attention of our staff for a second look. I'll toss along the idea of some kind of appeals system so we can catch overzealous moderation and adjust the penalties as appropriate. That way users can present their case and we can respond with our rationale/etc and maybe get some posting privileges restored for some people who have lost their voice on the forums.

 

[Eleuthera]

Eh, I think the mods are doing their jobs properly. Just a question though, do the marks ever go away? I have 2/8 strikes on my profile and they've been there for about a year now and I haven't been warned/suspended/marked again since the system was implimented, so I'm a bit lost to that whole thing.

You drop one level every 6 months without an infraction. And all of them if you're clean for 2 years.

 

[The Lost Big Boss]

Man, I left right after the original forum rule reign was put in place, has nothing changed?

 

[FalloutJack]

Okay, props for that, but the appeal system doesn't work if you're all still riled. You have to decide to discuss it with a cool head yourselves. I know what goes on in an appeal. I've been there for warnings. Sometimes, you guys agree and sometimes you stick with your guns so tight and fast that I'm sure super glue was involved. There's a big difference between other people saying you might be wrong and deciding so yourself, because we both know the first response to other people, especially if they've been banned.

 

[HalfTangible]

The Playground (my personal favorite forum) has a three-strike system in which after 3 infractions, you're put on probation, and one more infraction gets you permabanned. There's no other kind of ban there.

Ten strikes is practically coddling you.

(Personally I would set up a system to ban for a set period of time for each infraction that carries over as bonuses to future bans (First ban is one week, second is a one week ban again but you get a second week, etc etc) but hey, I'm not a programmer and I don't own a forum, it's probably harder to do than it sounds.)

 

[madwarper]

(Personally I would set up a system to ban for a set period of time for each infraction that carries over as bonuses to future bans (First ban is one week, second is a one week ban again but you get a second week, etc etc) but hey, I'm not a programmer and I don't own a forum, it's probably harder to do than it sounds.)

We do have that, only it's called a Suspension. After being put on probation, a user will get a 3-day and then 2-week Suspension.

• * Up to 4 Warnings (Green)
  Warnings do not negatively impact your account but will stack against you for penalties.
  * Probation (Yellow)
  This is your final warning. Once you receive probation, you are always on probation. All penalties after this will be suspensions, and all badges for good behavior will be negated.
  * 3-day Suspension (Red)
  You will be unable to post in the forums for three days, and all badges for good behavior will be negated.
  * 2-week Suspension (Red)
  You will be unable to post in the forums for two weeks, and all badges for good behavior will be negated.
  * Permanent Ban (Red)
  Your posting rights on the site, as well as other methods of community participation, will be revoked permanently.

 

[Ashannon Blackthorn]

Katatori-kun got banned? I had him blocked for giving me a stomach ulcer so didn't know.

I had him blocked, too. I just went and looked at the post that got him banned, though, and it sorta seemed dodgy to me.

I guess it was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back type of deal...