Soccer Forum Annual Review Thread

Aidric

There are definitely cases of inconsistency in application. This isn't just a soccer forum issue, it's site wide. This brings in to play the importance of the report button on a forum as busy as this.
A little more cognisance on the part of the mods when it comes to banter would go a long way. Context is very important in an area as heated as soccer debate. Throwing the rule book at someone isn't always the best approach.
Fwiw I think the forum is very well run and mod interference is kept to a minimum. All the mods are good contributors on the forum also which is always good to see.

Iago

pickarooney wrote: »

Based on the few examples that I know of (and I suppose this is self-fulfilling in a way, the ones I've never heard of are the ones who aren't missed) this is not really true at all. There are a couple of recently evicted posters whose contributions I always found interesting and entertaining and hundreds who have never been carded who I wouldn't care less about. There is a high ratio of Shearers to Dunphys on the forum and by kicking out the controversial, highly-visible posters the place becomes more sterile and dull.

The bit in bold is the key part, can you name more than 4 posters who are currently on 6 month bans that are missed? If not, my point is actually right on the money.

Iago

Mink_Man has asked that I include his thoughts on thread, so here they are below

Mink_Man wrote:

There are 4 main issues/questions that I have

1. I believe there's a bias towards certain posters because of their previous history, this is unfair and shouldn't be the case.

2. I have reported posts on back seat modding without them being acted on, it could be they were missed or it could be that because it was aimed at me that the moderators left it without infractions.

3. There's a culture of unfair accusations of trolling simply because you don't agree with someone else, having a different opinion to someone isn't trolling and shouldn't be treated as such.

4. overall more banter should be allowed on the forum

redout

Iago wrote: »

Mink_Man has asked that I include his thoughts on thread, so here they are below

Is he banned again ?

I thought he just returned from a 6 month ban like a couple of weeks ago!

I cant agree with his first point (not sure I have picked him up right though) - A posters previous history should play a part in mod decisions - known trolls or trouble makers should be treated more harshly as they have previously demonstrated they are a nuisance to the soccer forum and/or other forums of boards.ie in general and its members.

L'prof

redout wrote: »

I cant agree with his first point (not sure I have picked him up right though) - A posters previous history should play a part in mod decisions - known trolls or trouble makers should be treated more harshly as they have previously demonstrated they are a nuisance to the soccer forum and/or other forums of boards.ie in general and its members.

Maybe you're right, but I'd be of the opinion that each infraction should be judged on an individual basis and once a certain amount are hit/a ban needs to be handed out, they be reviewed as a whole to decide whether said ban is warranted.

JimsAlterEgo

redout wrote: »

Is he banned again ?

I thought he just returned from a 6 month ban like a couple of weeks ago!

I cant agree with his first point (not sure I have picked him up right though) - A posters previous history should play a part in mod decisions - known trolls or trouble makers should be treated more harshly as they have previously demonstrated they are a nuisance to the soccer forum and/or other forums of boards.ie in general and its members.

agreed , look at SOTS attempts

Le King

redout wrote: »

Is he banned again ?

I thought he just returned from a 6 month ban like a couple of weeks ago!

I cant agree with his first point (not sure I have picked him up right though) - A posters previous history should play a part in mod decisions - known trolls or trouble makers should be treated more harshly as they have previously demonstrated they are a nuisance to the soccer forum and/or other forums of boards.ie in general and its members.

Can't agree with a word of that tbh. I don't think posters should be judged on their previous record. Mistakes are made. This isn't prison. This isn't a penal system, it's an internet forum. I think the onus should be on encouraging people to improve their posting record rather than banning them out-right.

IMO, there are far to many rules. This leads to exploitation. Lot's of posts fall through the system where an infraction should be given.

Also, I don't agree with calling someone a troll or WUM as an infraction. Often the person who is a victim of a wind-up or trolling ends up being infracted. How is that fair?

gandalf

I am sorry but on the whole a posters previous history is taken into account. If they are continually causing problems then they are going to be red flagged. Likewise if some one posts something that is borderline and they have no history of causing trouble they may be given the benefit of the doubt.

Someone who has caused trouble in the past should know better than continue that behaviour and I would consider it correct that they be dealt with harser than a user making their first mistake.

Aidric

redout wrote: »

A posters previous history should play a part in mod decisions - known trolls or trouble makers should be treated more harshly as they have previously demonstrated they are a nuisance to the soccer forum and/or other forums of boards.ie in general and its members.

Nah. Mods just use this as a stick to beat someone with previous, despite the fact that they may be trying to change their ways. Posters with previous are never given the benefit of the doubt.
L'Prof & Osu's opinions I'd go along with, judge each case on its merits.

UnitedIrishman

Not really a soccer question but moreso a Boards question - is there any way that quoted things from people on your ignore list could be made invisible too?

One person in particular in the MU thread is wrecking my buzz and it doesn't help when people quote their ideas when it's clearly a child looking for attention.

Another thing that Mink_Man picked up on - perhaps more banter should be allowed. Infractions are handed out a bit too quickly at times for silly things - IIRC, I was banned at one stage (last year/year before) by a certain mod because I had suggested that Liam Brady was to become Ireland manager ("banned until Brady becomes manager" was what they said with a sense of smugness).

If/when things are getting out of hand i.e. name calling - then mods could step in and give a warning.

Also, I'd reconsider the banning of headshot and Archi for 6-months. Thats a ridiculous amount of time to be fair and they're two of the best posters on here. Maybe there should be a review of the bans handed out to posters at certain stages.

mike65

Pretty sure the answer is nope, as the quote exists within the script of the reply you can't seperate the two. Pity though!

redout

Osu wrote: »

Can't agree with a word of that tbh. I don't think posters should be judged on their previous record. Mistakes are made. This isn't prison. This isn't a penal system, it's an internet forum. I think the onus should be on encouraging people to improve their posting record rather than banning them out-right.

There previous actions dictate that they should be held to a higher level of accountability.

If they do not want to be treated as so then they should have thought about that before they set out looking for a rise, acted like fools and decided to piss other people off for their own amusement.

I have no sympathy for them whatsoever.

Vanbis

While i don't get involved in slagging i do like a bit of banter and sure thats what most people will respond with and yes it goes to far at times but i think once it get to name calling or that then automatic ban should be placed.

Also just question with infractions on yellow cards, is there anyway these can be shown on a user profile, only the user themselves can see it so they know to be careful. It's probably stupid idea just some might forget and continue arguments and get a ban.

redout

Vanbis wrote: »

Also just question with infractions on yellow cards, is there anyway these can be shown on a user profile, only the user themselves can see it so they know to be careful. It's probably stupid idea just some might forget and continue arguments and get a ban.

Infractions do show up on user profiles - oddly enough under infractions!

Jazzy

astrofool wrote: »

Agree with Des on the low level trolling, there's a few people around who do this, and it's really obvious when they do it, and it always gets a few people to respond and get themselves banned.

On the modding

Seems to be mostly grand. I'd be concerned over the frivolous bannings over the last couple of weeks, they should have been rescinded and apologised for. T4TF seems to be letting things get a bit too personal, whether that's the amount of time he's been modding for, or another reason, I don't know. It's worse when the other mods circle around to protect each other when calling someone a "lazy bum" is not an infraction offence.

On the structure

I really don't like the idea of club forums, but the superthreads are an abomination. Instead of going down the club route, we should go down the league route. A World Cup/International forum would have been fantastic over the last month, and kept the day to day ruminatings from whiskeynose and Woy from taking centre stage over Klose getting close to the all time record, Brazil/Argie/Italy/France going out early etc.

We should have an LOI forum. It stops arguments over "Football this weekend" and lets the non barstoolers have their own forum to grow and attract new members. It also allows for discussion on the footballers of this division, in the same way C. Ronalodo, or Leiva might get their own threads.

Just doing this should free up more space in the Soccer forum front page, and maybe less content will need to go into "superthreads" as a result.

On the Spurs forum

It should either be made fully private, or be brought under the same rules and regulations as the rest of Soccer, it's existance is a slap in the face to all pool and manu supporters who want their own forum, and is an existing double standard on boards.ie.

Dav promised he'd look into this a few months ago, but I've seen/heard nothing.

Des wrote:

Low-level trolling. The 6 Yellow Card system was meant to put a stop to this, but it hasn't, so it's not working. There are people who troll within the rules, and nothing is ever done. I've seen many, many reported posts, and I know that the mods can't do anything about them. Believe me, we've the same problem in Rugby. It's the sneaky feckers who rile people up, but stick within the rules are the actual problem, and not people who lose the rag from time to time and tell someone to fúck off. A troll is someone who posts for a reaction, but won't back up their position. We can't force people to post, but we can stop them from posting in this manner.

could those issues be looked at please

Vanbis

redout wrote: »

Infractions do show up on user profiles - oddly enough under infractions!

As I've yet to receive an infraction i wasn't aware.

Le King

gandalf wrote: »

I am sorry but on the whole a posters previous history is taken into account. If they are continually causing problems then they are going to be red flagged. Likewise if some one posts something that is borderline and they have no history of causing trouble they may be given the benefit of the doubt.

Someone who has caused trouble in the past should know better than continue that behaviour and I would consider it correct that they be dealt with harser than a user making their first mistake.

Key word underlined. Redout had phrased it completely different. Obviously if a poster is continually causing problems he should be dealt with much more severely than a first or second time offender. But not if it's his first or second time.

redout

Osu wrote: »

Key word underlined. Redout had phrased it completely different. Obviously if a poster is continually causing problems he should be dealt with much more severely than a first or second time offender. But not if it's his first or second time.

If a user is a known troll or troublemaker well then he/she has been continuous in their actions on boards.ie hence how they became as a known troll/troublemaker in the first place.

I'd perma-ban continuous trollers if I had the power.


Give me the power !

LuckyLloyd

rarnes1 wrote: »

Trolling deserves a more severe punishment than other rule breaks imo.

Especially the ones that do it day in day out as they are the people that make a complete mess of the superthreads.

If you recieve 3 yellows for trolling you recieve a 6 month ban.

Completely agree with this. Topic has been done to death at this stage, but you have a limited number of posters who reek combined havoc over the course of a season.

Frank Spencer

UnitedIrishman wrote: »

Not really a soccer question but moreso a Boards question - is there any way that quoted things from people on your ignore list could be made invisible too?

One person in particular in the MU thread is wrecking my buzz and it doesn't help when people quote their ideas when it's clearly a child looking for attention.

If you're using Firefox or would consider switching to it then this add-on does just as you want and it will also block threads as well as users plus more. Some people may find it handy.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/7023/

ntlbell

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Completely agree with this. Topic has been done to death at this stage, but you have a limited number of posters who reek combined havoc over the course of a season.

I wouldn't say it's limited at all.

A huge percentage of posters post things that they know verey well will rile up someone or other.

Because of how thier post maybe worded or based on their history it gets overlooked or not percived as trolling.

Some people post "witty" pictures knowing it's going to get a big reaction, even mods have history of it.

I can't recall ever hearding any football discussion where there's rival fans involved that didn't involve some sort of "trolling"

The vast majority of this forum are guilty of trolly remarks/comments/posts

very few posters could claim they have never trolled or dont so on a regular basis

Jazzy

ntlbell wrote: »

I wouldn't say it's limited at all.

A huge percentage of posters post things that they know verey well will rile up someone or other.

Because of how thier post maybe worded or based on their history it gets overlooked or not percived as trolling.

Some people post "witty" pictures knowing it's going to get a big reaction, even mods have history of it.

I can't recall ever hearding any football discussion where there's rival fans involved that didn't involve some sort of "trolling"

The vast majority of this forum are guilty of trolly remarks/comments/posts

very few posters could claim they have never trolled or dont so on a regular basis

so we should cut down on the casual trolling then?

eagle eye

gandalf wrote: »

I am sorry but on the whole a posters previous history is taken into account. If they are continually causing problems then they are going to be red flagged. Likewise if some one posts something that is borderline and they have no history of causing trouble they may be given the benefit of the doubt.

Someone who has caused trouble in the past should know better than continue that behaviour and I would consider it correct that they be dealt with harser than a user making their first mistake.

This is a huge problem right here. This can be construed as favouritism and its inconsistent modding.

If two people post the same thing and one gets yellow carded and the other doesn't, well thats just plain wrong.

History should not dictate yellow cards. This is exactly why one guy feels that he is being treated harshly and why people think there is a protected clique in this forum.

redout

eagle eye wrote: »

This is a huge problem right here. This can be construed as favouritism and its inconsistent modding.

If two people post the same thing and one gets yellow carded and the other doesn't, well thats just plain wrong.

History should not dictate yellow cards. This is exactly why one guy feels that he is being treated harshly and why people think there is a protected clique in this forum.

I believe that Gandalf has it spot on to be honest.

LuckyLloyd

Dub13 wrote: »

Another point on the alleged bias against United supporters,recently as in the last few days a well known Utd fan who was permanently banned from the forum was allowed back in.This was voted on by all soccer mods.

Who?

eagle eye

redout wrote: »

I believe that Gandalf has it spot on to be honest.

He actually does not.

Lets say poster x has a history and posts something.

Poster y doesn't have a history and posts the same thing.

Poster x gets yellow carded and poster y doesn't.

Immediately we have inconsistent modding.

Then

Poster z who has a history posts something a month later.

Poster y posts the same thing as poster z.

Poster z gets yellow carded because he has a history and poster y yet again does not get yellow carded because he has no history.

So now poster y has gotten away twice without an infraction while two infractions were handed out to posters for the exact same thing just because they have a history.

Mr Alan

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Who?

Homerjay

redout

eagle eye wrote: »

He actually does not.

Lets say poster x has a history and posts something.

Poster y doesn't have a history and posts the same thing.

Poster x gets yellow carded and poster y doesn't.

Immediately we have inconsistent modding.

Then

Poster z who has a history posts something a month later.

Poster y posts the same thing as poster z.

Poster z gets yellow carded because he has a history and poster y yet again does not get yellow carded because he has no history.

So now poster y has gotten away twice without an infraction while two infractions were handed out to posters for the exact same thing just because they have a history.

I think that you are looking at it wrong - To me this post by Gandalf makes sense:

gandalf wrote: »

I am sorry but on the whole a posters previous history is taken into account. If they are continually causing problems then they are going to be red flagged. Likewise if some one posts something that is borderline and they have no history of causing trouble they may be given the benefit of the doubt.

Someone who has caused trouble in the past should know better than continue that behaviour and I would consider it correct that they be dealt with harser than a user making their first mistake.

A poster with a history continually does something wrong they should know better as they have been warned about their behaviour before and can hardly go bitching about it if a first time offender is given the benefit of the doubt first time. No doubt they were most likely given the benefit of the doubt the first time they done it themselves.

A poster with no history does it then they may be given the benefit of the doubt if they have no such history depending on what the violation was. If its something serious then history or not you should be infracted. But as above someone who has a history of continually taking the piss should be held to a higher level of accountability.

History must play a role otherwise holding everyone in the same regard will allow more abuse of the system in my opinion.

ntlbell

Jazzy wrote: »

so we should cut down on the casual trolling then?

That's an impossible task.

Mr Alan

ban known trouble makers from match threads. simple.

missingtime

It baffes me how people get so riled up over things posted on an internet site.

ntlbell

Mr Alan wrote: »

ban known trouble makers from match threads. simple.

They would be pretty quiet.

How would you feel about not been allowed into match threads?

Mr Alan

could be wrong, but i don't think i have a reputation for causing trouble in match threads. If i did, i'd be ok accepting a ban from them for the good of the forum.

The Muppet

Dub13 wrote: »

Another point on the alleged bias against United supporters,recently as in the last few days a well known Utd fan who was permanently banned from the forum was allowed back in.This was voted on by all soccer mods.

One in Three out, I'm onto it.;)

ntlbell

Mr Alan wrote: »

could be wrong, but i don't think i have a reputation for causing trouble in match threads. If i did, i'd be ok accepting a ban from them for the good of the forum.

I would prefer to see titled match threads.

Man U V pool [tactical blah blah]

Mau U V liverpool [BANTER INSIDE BEWARE]

and let the people who want to rib each other at it, don't like it don't go into it.

_Bella_

I have only started using the forum recently but to me it seems to be run very well. I do agree that a subforum for the super-club threads would be a good idea as it would allow for the mainstream discussions to be easily visible. The only thing I would say is that people should attack the opinion, not the poster.

Paul Tergat

ntlbell wrote: »

I would prefer to see titled match threads.

Man U V pool [tactical blah blah]

Mau U V liverpool [BANTER INSIDE BEWARE]

and let the people who want to rib each other at it, don't like it don't go into it.

I wonder how many times we would see the excuse 'oh, this isnt the banter thread? I meant to post that there...'. Wont end well imo.

I do definitely agree though that people need to get thicker skins on here. It does annoy me quite a bit seeing some of the stuff you cant get away with saying. Some need to just man up.

Mr Alan

ntlbell wrote: »

I would prefer to see titled match threads.

Man U V pool [tactical blah blah]

Mau U V liverpool [BANTER INSIDE BEWARE]

and let the people who want to rib each other at it, don't like it don't go into it.

Not practical. Potentially 10-12 match threads clogging up the first page. Better to just ban people from match threads whos only contribution is to troll those same threads.

ntlbell

p_larkin99 wrote: »

I wonder how many times we would see the excuse 'oh, this isnt the banter thread? I meant to post that there...'. Wont end well imo.

Insta ban, problem solved

ntlbell

Mr Alan wrote: »

Not practical. Potentially 10-12 match threads clogging up the first page. Better to just ban people from match threads whos only contribution is to troll those same threads.

As I said, there would be no one left in them.

Mr Alan

i disagree, i think they'd be full.

ntlbell

Mr Alan wrote: »

i disagree, i think they'd be full.

I can understand why you think that.

But you're wrong.

Jazzy

ntlbell wrote: »

That's an impossible task.

so you might as well go balls deep into it.....

Paul Tergat

ntlbell wrote: »

Insta ban, problem solved

and the genuine mistakes?

ntlbell

p_larkin99 wrote: »

and the genuine mistakes?

They won't make it again

ntlbell

Jazzy wrote: »

so you might as well go balls deep into it.....

You're getting warmer..

Mr Alan

ntlbell wrote: »

I can understand why you think that.

But you're wrong.

I really amn't be honest. It'd be simple. I can understand why you'd be against it obviously, you'd have to take up golf or something.

ntlbell

Mr Alan wrote: »

I can understand why you'd be against it obviously, you'd have to take up golf or something.

see?

Nalz

One day ban for 2 or more posts off topic in a row in the same thread. Will stop all bullsh'it. I went into the Man United thread last week and Christ the crap that was thrown around was unbeliveable