Poll: Injustice of the Permaban

[-Dragmire-]

I do think that the mods get a little too ban-happy from time to time (especially the past 2 months or so) and that people should be allowed to discuss piracy so long as they're civil about it, especially given how much it affects the gaming industry as a whole.

I'm pretty sure the rules about piracy are there so the site is more appealing to publishers who want to buy ad space on this site. Since ad revenue is the primary source for this site's income, it's understandable that discussion of piracy is kept to a minimum. I find it's a necessary loss of a topic for the benefit of free content.

snip

I find your avatar is lacking in power via visual appeal. The last one was from Diablo 3 right? Suited you well.

....Also, your post count is cheating...

 

[knight steel]

The rules are fine,but it's the inconsistency and the fact that contributors get away with stuff we would be banned for that I hate.
Example:The latest ZP video features image of penises,yes they have a fuzzy filter over them but you can still clearly see all of it [balls-shaft-tip] if I posted the exact same image here the mods would take issue but when he does it it's fine.

 

[V da Mighty Taco]

I do think that the mods get a little too ban-happy from time to time (especially the past 2 months or so) and that people should be allowed to discuss piracy so long as they're civil about it, especially given how much it affects the gaming industry as a whole.

I'm pretty sure the rules about piracy are there so the site is more appealing to publishers who want to buy ad space on this site. Since ad revenue is the primary source for this site's income, it's understandable that discussion of piracy is kept to a minimum. I find it's a necessary loss of a topic for the benefit of free content.

Can't say I agree, as the point of a gaming forum is to discuss games and the industry, and piracy is a major factor of just about everything that's been going on in the gaming industry for at least the past half-decade now. There's also the fact that this site's forums and main content is extremely fond of tearing these publishers apart and is a surprisingly big voice against their business practices. Remember how it was us who first brought up Origin's privacy policy issues and permanently wrecked it's reputation? If scaring publishers and their ads off is a main concern of this site, then I can't help but think that publishers would be far more terrified of the Jimquisition, Yahtzee, and the daily EA flogging from these forums than I would be of piracy debates.

 

[saintdane05]

I've actually come up with an alternate ban system

The report function will come with text to know what the person is reporting in a thread.

It will use a health bar that goes down, rather than up.
Now here is where it gets tricky.

All users, no matter what, start with 1000 HP. Infractions bring you down. Reach zero, and 6 day ban. Then you get 250 back. Most infractions are worth 100 HP. Minor ones, such as low post, are 50. Major ones, such as OVERT racism/Sexism/homo and herterophobia/anti-theism/anti-atheism/anti-semetism/ whatever esle is worth 500. If you get banned three times, it is permanent.

This gives us something close to the current system without having a low post count be teh equivalent to going "I think all blacks should be slaves".

And no, I do NOT take that quote as my personal belief. That is an example.

 

[Joccaren]

I think it's more a case of being a self-control issue.

For whatever reason, some topics will set some people off. Either the topic itself, or the comments within, might cause certain people to fly into a rage, and lose all ability to stick to the rules.
I've seen it happen many times before.

For such people, it's probably best for their forum health if they just avoided those thread topics altogether.

For some topics, sure. The 5 pages thing? That's not self control, that's knowing your going to enter a thread and find someone who's lost control and end up going off at them.
And I'd wager the same thing happens for the sexism and such threads too. I know I can control myself in civil discourse quite easily in pretty much any conversation. I enter those threads though I and know I will get quoted by someone who can't, and end up spending an hour typing my response to ensure that as little of their hostile tone is kept in my post as possible, and that doesn't always work out.

 

[Chromatic Aberration]

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...

Well I sincerely hope this to happen at some point - and I don't mean Copper Zens prediction; You'd do a good job over there, I imagine

Still, the stance of the staff towards this topic seems to me like annoyed indifference - nobody seems to care much and from what I could gather during the last months there is a certain feeling of decline in the section; less topics, less posters and overall sense of, well, "meh" also voiced by some of the regulars. I think the staff should ask themselves the question if or if not they are ready to invest a little bit to keep a section on this website that will only serve to attract more of the kind of demographic that this website seems to be so keen of attracting.

EDIT: If I might also add a question here: I'm still curious as to why all these things really didn't come to pass as of yet. Except for finding suitable candidates and considering that all mods are volunteers are there any kind of other reasons that prevented this from happening? What was the actual reasoning behind not implementing these ideas, anyway?

EDIT 2: Okay...seems as if these issues seems to have seen some developments now, so the question is already moot. Thanks for listening once again

 

[HalfTangible]

(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.

Not what I meant, but thanks for the info.

 

[-Dragmire-]

I do think that the mods get a little too ban-happy from time to time (especially the past 2 months or so) and that people should be allowed to discuss piracy so long as they're civil about it, especially given how much it affects the gaming industry as a whole.

I'm pretty sure the rules about piracy are there so the site is more appealing to publishers who want to buy ad space on this site. Since ad revenue is the primary source for this site's income, it's understandable that discussion of piracy is kept to a minimum. I find it's a necessary loss of a topic for the benefit of free content.

Can't say I agree, as the point of a gaming forum is to discuss games and the industry, and piracy is a major factor of just about everything that's been going on in the gaming industry for at least the past half-decade now. There's also the fact that this site's forums and main content is extremely fond of tearing these publishers apart and is a surprisingly big voice against their business practices. Remember how it was us who first brought up Origin's privacy policy issues and permanently wrecked it's reputation? If scaring publishers and their ads off is a main concern of this site, then I can't help but think that publishers would be far more terrified of the Jimquisition, Yahtzee, and the daily EA flogging from these forums than I would be of piracy debates.

Negative press is still press right? I'm pretty sure that piracy scares them more than internet celebrities. This is a very weak argument from my side on this since I can't comprehend much of publishers thought processes so I'll leave that side of it.

From another point of view the lack of moderation on piracy could be mistaken for support of it which may cause a variety of problems. I still believe that if an ad company looks at a site to buy ad space and sees a complete lack of effort by the site to suppress topics around piracy, specifically the how and where, then they just won't buy the space for fear of their own game coming up in those topics.

As for topics that have piracy come up as a topic for how it affects the industry, there have been several that come up in the news like this http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/122054-Anodyne-Developer-Turns-Piracy-Into-PR . You just can't advocate or link to pirate sites based on the Code of Conduct. That's not much of a loss, is it?

 

[twohundredpercent]

The warning system is alright. The rules suck balls though. Low content? What does that shit even mean? Other places don't got that rule.

 

[Mr.Pandah]

Oh no. Someone popular got banned. TIME TO CALL BS ON THE SYSTEM. The knee-jerk reactions of people astounds me.

 

[kickassfrog]

It's 8 strikes actually, not 10.

Really you don't just accidentally make 8 low-content posts. One or two before you understand the rules, maybe.

It's really not that hard to not insult people, if someone insults you, report them and let it go. If someone disagrees with you or even if someone has repulsive ideas on any subject, discuss things civilly or leave the discussion.

There's really only 1 rule: make sure your content is worthwhile.

Insults aren't, low content isn't, spam isn't, being a jerk isn't

I had a response in mind that did all 4 of those, but I didn't post it because I want my strike to go away.
Ironic, isn't it.
But I do feel that sometimes it's possible to give a valid opinion with a low content post.

 

[Saviordd1]

The moderation here is fine as it is, it's only when the big names at the time get banned the moderation suddenly becomes a damn problem.

Seriously. No one was complaining about this til a week or so ago.

Yeah, I noticed that too.

We wouldn't be having this discussion if Vault was still around, these things only crop up when someone people actually liked, get banned

Wait, Vault got banned? What the hell for?

 

[Lucem712]

It isn't unfair. If it were unfair, you could be permaban for one post.

It isn't that hard not to fuck up 8 times in a six month period. Even if 'The Mods are out to get me D:', there's an appeal system so you can get a fresh perspective on your infraction.

Hell, there are some users (a-lot of them) that haven't had a warning at all and have thousands of posts. You don't have to walk on eggshells, you just have to be a decent person and not lose your cool. And if you do lose your cool, edit it and say 'Hey, man. I'm sorry, I was really upset when I posted that, so just disregard that.'

And when in doubt, just ask a mod. They aren't going to eat you, just your first born child. They don't want to smash the hammer in people's faces and have the community lose a valuable member.

 

[Lucem712]

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.

Infractions have a 6 month amnesty period.[footnote]Or are suppose to, rather.[/footnote] Just click on, 'contact moderator' on the blue header and you can ask a Mod when the infractions took place and if they should of been cleared yet.

The amnesty just counts towards being ban. They are 'cleared' so they don't go toward you being ban but note that Mods can see every user's infraction record, regardless of being cleared by the 6 month rule.

 

[Ashannon Blackthorn]

More like "Daring to have the AUDACITY to suggest that people who didn't understand professionalism may have never been in a position where it was required of them", but, you know. Six of one, half a dozen to the other.

If he acted like he did the all the convos I saw him post in (belligerent, insulting and quite frankly impossible to argue with, reason with or even be halfway civil with) I'm glad he's gone. Too many people have this quirk to see people like katatori-kun and think they some intellectual rebel or whatnot and think they should be ablove the rules. He was an arguementative sort in the worst way. I honestly don'ty know if he was devil's advocating, trolling, honestly believing his stuff or what. I still don't.

Also, Katatori-Kun whenever I saw him argue was seldom professional... mostly obstinate and bull-headed. He had a tendancy to not argue his points but attack people arguing against him, claiming they were too stupid to understand his point But as you say six of one, half dozen the other, po-tay-toe, po-tah-toe

 

[Mersadeon]

Didn't we just have a thread just like this? In that one I voted that it's neither too harsh or too lax, it is just too inconsistent. Sometimes, a guy just being a little rude gets a strike. Sometimes, someone who simply behaved arrogant gets a strike. I don't quite get it. I'm not a regular here, so I don't care too much, but it seems a bit arbitrary.

The six months on the other hand I support - you have 8 strikes, if you manage to piss the mods off 8 times in 6 months, I am okay with that. I mean, even if it sometimes is inconsistent, after 8 strikes you can be pretty sure that person did enough to get banned. Hell, back when I moderated a forum, it was way harsher. Even a bit of bad language or missing capitalisation (of which there is a lot more in german) could get you a personal message asking for you to change that.

 

[lord.jeff]

The warning system is alright. The rules suck balls though. Low content? What does that shit even mean? Other places don't got that rule.

I'm rather fond of that rule epically because of all the videos on the Escapist, a lot of other sites that lack that rule seem to have nothing but people posting things like "great video" and it's really annoying to go through pages of that when you want to discuss the topic at hand.

 

[Kross]

I do think that the mods get a little too ban-happy from time to time (especially the past 2 months or so) and that people should be allowed to discuss piracy so long as they're civil about it, especially given how much it affects the gaming industry as a whole.

I'm pretty sure the rules about piracy are there so the site is more appealing to publishers who want to buy ad space on this site. Since ad revenue is the primary source for this site's income, it's understandable that discussion of piracy is kept to a minimum. I find it's a necessary loss of a topic for the benefit of free content.

snip

I find your avatar is lacking in power via visual appeal. The last one was from Diablo 3 right? Suited you well.

....Also, your post count is cheating...

Piracy, or any discussion about enabling/admitting to illegal things is banned because we don't want to have to deal with law enforcement and similar issues.

This avatar is temporary until I find a decent animated one again.

 

[Legion]

Wait, Vault got banned? What the hell for?

This.

Bearing in mind under the rules system, she was on a "final warning" for quite some time. A lot of people (I imagine you must have seen the avatars) are not happy with it, but I haven't heard of any appeal attempt on her part.

 

[Zen Toombs]

The warning system is alright. The rules suck balls though. Low content? What does that shit even mean? Other places don't got that rule.

Low content posts are posts that consist only of "Lol" or "first" or "oh god" or "this is dumb" or something of that nature. If it's short and adds nothing to the discussion, it counts as low content.

Wait, Vault got banned? What the hell for?

She implied someone was being a crybaby in a post, basically. IMO it was a bit excessive moderation but that happens.

Spoiler: Alternate ban system

I've actually come up with an alternate ban system

The report function will come with text to know what the person is reporting in a thread.

It will use a health bar that goes down, rather than up.
Now here is where it gets tricky.

All users, no matter what, start with 1000 HP. Infractions bring you down. Reach zero, and 6 day ban. Then you get 250 back. Most infractions are worth 100 HP. Minor ones, such as low post, are 50. Major ones, such as OVERT racism/Sexism/homo and herterophobia/anti-theism/anti-atheism/anti-semetism/ whatever esle is worth 500. If you get banned three times, it is permanent.

This gives us something close to the current system without having a low post count be teh equivalent to going "I think all blacks should be slaves".

And no, I do NOT take that quote as my personal belief. That is an example.

Something along those lines could be cool, but the 8 warning system seems good. The only thing that needs work (at least in my opinion) is being more consistent. But I know Kross and co. are doing their best to do the right things, so I can forgive them for their trespasses.

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.

You. I like you. Keep on talking sense!