Site Banning. A False Economy?

K-9

The Moldy Gowl wrote: »

Don't loads of re regs get away with it though? It's not exactly difficult.
These 'automated' notices I always hear about, do they even exist or are they just a phrase admins use for the sake of an easier life because we can't prove they exist. Not that I blame them.

I am a rehabilitated re reg, who re regged around a ban. *gasp*
Took 5 months for this automated response to flag me and at that stage the account was inactive for 3 months and I wasn't even subtle and slipped a few times.

Re-regs who change their spots will get away with it. Not that it is getting away with it, if somebody changes their posting style then great.

Those who don't change will get found out, might take a bit longer for some, but it's only a matter of time.

I've seen re-regs post away grand for 3/4,000 posts and then blow a gasket over something small, simple card or on thread warning.

Turtle_

Why not have a jailbreak option?

Poster gets banned, can be considered for early release after a month if 30 posters with 250+ posts each and minimum 6 months active request it. Any posters objecting (obviously need to be legit) would have 2 weeks to do so and submit any supporting evidence, and a decision can be made then by the mods. No facilities for the banee to respond to objectors, obviously.

Means a siteban could be anywhere from 6 weeks to indefinite. If released, the poster would be on a 3 strike rule for a year of probation whereby 3 yellow cards in the year following release results in permanent siteban. After the year, the poster goes back to being a regular poster.

Steve

Turtle_ wrote: »

Why not have a jailbreak option?

Poster gets banned, can be considered for early release after a month if 30 posters with 250+ posts each and minimum 6 months active request it. Any posters objecting (obviously need to be legit) would have 2 weeks to do so and submit any supporting evidence, and a decision can be made then by the mods. No facilities for the banee to respond to objectors, obviously.

Means a siteban could be anywhere from 6 weeks to indefinite. If released, the poster would be on a 3 strike rule for a year of probation whereby 3 yellow cards in the year following release results in permanent siteban. After the year, the poster goes back to being a regular poster.

If a sitebanned account appeals and is successful then fair enough, boards has never been a democracy so there is no reason to listen to a whinging majority.

Turtle_

Steve wrote: »

If a sitebanned account appeals and is successful then fair enough, boards has never been a democracy so there is no reason to listen to a whinging majority.

Yeah but it might address the balance of banning an interesting poster vs losing members who that poster annoys. If enough people think that the poster is a good person to have around for interesting debate, it might be worth keeping them on much stricter than usual terms. If that doesn't put manners on them then to hell with them.

Steve

Turtle_ wrote: »

Yeah but it might address the balance of banning an interesting poster vs losing members who that poster annoys. If enough people think that the poster is a good person to have around for interesting debate, it might be worth keeping them on much stricter than usual terms. If that doesn't put manners on them then to hell with them.

In fairness, that is what happens currently in prison. if someone admits they broke the rules of the site and agrees to not do it again then generally a solution is found.

Being 'interesting' or 'popular' does not absolve anyone of being uncivil.

knucklehead6

Steve wrote: »

Context is important.

Someone getting a ban for their opinion is different to someone getting a ban for conning a boards member out of their hard earned cash.

I make no apologies for the latter.

Maybe i'm too dumb/honest/naive but HOW would a boards member con another boards member out of cash. Or are you referring to adverts here? or have we a lot of Nigerian princes on the site who just need to hide their cash in your account to keep it from their corrupt uncle?

genericguy

Tom Dunne wrote: »

Do you have visions of Dav sitting in his mist-cloaked citadel, surrounded by subservient megalomaniac Admins that seek his counsel when deciding on what punishment to mete out to wayward posters?

I actually have this exact image. I imagine a team of neckbeards drinking Pepsi max as their Christmas party.

Gordon

knucklehead6 wrote: »

Maybe i'm too dumb/honest/naive but HOW would a boards member con another boards member out of cash. Or are you referring to adverts here? or have we a lot of Nigerian princes on the site who just need to hide their cash in your account to keep it from their corrupt uncle?

Airsoft forum. Or simply via PM.

A lot of stuff happens on the PM system that only victims and admins get to see. And sometimes, it seems that some victims may be too afraid to report their PMs, meaning nobody sees wrongdoing, which is terrible. We've had a number of scenarios where police have been involved.

Turtle_ wrote: »

Why not have a jailbreak option?

Poster gets banned, can be considered for early release after a month if 30 posters with 250+ posts each and minimum 6 months active request it. Any posters objecting (obviously need to be legit) would have 2 weeks to do so and submit any supporting evidence, and a decision can be made then by the mods. No facilities for the banee to respond to objectors, obviously.

Means a siteban could be anywhere from 6 weeks to indefinite. If released, the poster would be on a 3 strike rule for a year of probation whereby 3 yellow cards in the year following release results in permanent siteban. After the year, the poster goes back to being a regular poster.

I don't think it's appropriate to have people that don't understand the whole story to decide on someone's fate. Why does it matter if 30 people want someone unbanned, if that banned person sent threats of violence to another user, for example? Or if someone just doesn't give a f*ck and says in Prison 'I don't give a f*ck, I want let back on to boards coz I'm a ledge and I'll kick you all in the nads if I want' - and they get voted out of Prison? Are admins the end decider? If that's the case, then what's the point of the vote?

Tom Dunne

genericguy wrote: »

I actually have this exact image. I imagine a team of neckbeards drinking Pepsi max as their Christmas party.

We are more Coke Zero kinda guys.

Pexi Max is for girls.

Not that any girls attend our Christmas party.

knucklehead6

Gordon wrote: »

Airsoft forum. Or simply via PM.

A lot of stuff happens on the PM system that only victims and admins get to see. And sometimes, it seems that some victims may be too afraid to report their PMs, meaning nobody sees wrongdoing, which is terrible. We've had a number of scenarios where police have been involved.

Fair enough.

guil

Steve wrote: »

In fairness, that is what happens currently in prison. if someone admits they broke the rules of the site and agrees to not do it again then generally a solution is found.

Being 'interesting' or 'popular' does not absolve anyone of being uncivil.

This thread that was linked earlier is a perfect example of what you described not working.
http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2057575466

The 'prisoner' appears to be in no way uncivil yet his requests are falling on deaf ears. I hope I'm not breaking any rules but from previous threads I have seen in different forums, buffybot seems very heavy handed with decisions they make and often the only reason seems to be they don't want discussion of things relevant to the thread title.

Gordon

Appearances can be deceiving.

guil

Gordon wrote: »

Appearances can be deceiving.

Absolutely but it wasn't just the once off, I have seen it multiple times.

Gordon

Appearances can be deceiving multiple times.

KERSPLAT!

I often feel sorry for banned users after reading their prison threads, then I see their record across the site.

guil

KERSPLAT! wrote: »

I often feel sorry for banned users after reading their prison threads, then I see their record across the site.

I'm a mod on another site and know all too well that things can be completely different behind closed doors but when the user asked what had he done the first thing that was replied to him was a banning that was 6 years ago. How long can someone hold a grudge?

Steve

guil wrote: »

This thread that was linked earlier is a perfect example of what you described not working.
http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2057575466

The 'prisoner' appears to be in no way uncivil yet his requests are falling on deaf ears. I hope I'm not breaking any rules but from previous threads I have seen in different forums, buffybot seems very heavy handed with decisions they make and often the only reason seems to be they don't want discussion of things relevant to the thread title.

If you rob a car or beat up an old lady and steal her money and are arrested, brought to court and convicted. Your 100 previous convictions are not taken into account when guilt is decided. Thankfully, boards does not have that restriction.

I, and the admins / cmods / mods concerned can see a whole lot more about a user than you can.

KERSPLAT!

guil wrote: »

I'm a mod on another site and know all too well that things can be completely different behind closed doors but when the user asked what had he done the first thing that was replied to him was a banning that was 6 years ago. How long can someone hold a grudge?

Don't believe everything you read.

KomradeBishop

Gordon wrote: »

Appearances can be deceiving.

Ya but isn't the whole point of Prison/DRP, to provide transparency, so people can see that things are done in a relatively fair way?

What you've said there amounts to - "trust me" - but the whole purpose of Prison/DRP is to give the userbase a way to, ahem, "trust, but verify"


Perhaps - to solve that specific issue while not disrupting how mods/admins do things - the persons mod record can just be publicly posted in their prison thread.

Zaph

KomradeBishop wrote: »

Perhaps - to solve that specific issue while not disrupting how mods/admins do things - the persons mod record can just be publicly posted in their prison thread.

Where someone has been banned for their overall poor record, it's usually pointed out to them in the thread how many warnings, infractions and bans they've racked up by way of an explanation for their ban.

guil

Zaph wrote: »

Where someone has been banned for their overall poor record, it's usually pointed out to them in the thread how many warnings, infractions and bans they've racked up by way of an explanation for their ban.

In your opinion, is it good enough to just say your overall record was the reason for the banning or should there be some infractions/warnings referenced to?

Steve

KomradeBishop wrote: »

Ya but isn't the whole point of Prison/DRP, to provide transparency, so people can see that things are done in a relatively fair way?

What you've said there amounts to - "trust me" - but the whole purpose of Prison/DRP is to give the userbase a way to, ahem, "trust, but verify"

Mostly, their offending posts can be found by non-mods. If they have been deleted then mostly they can't be found even by mods.

To top that off, boards is not a democracy, it is at best a privately owned benevolent dictatorship so, in fairness, love it or hate it.

Gordon

KomradeBishop wrote: »

Ya but isn't the whole point of Prison/DRP, to provide transparency, so people can see that things are done in a relatively fair way?

What you've said there amounts to - "trust me" - but the whole purpose of Prison/DRP is to give the userbase a way to, ahem, "trust, but verify"


Perhaps - to solve that specific issue while not disrupting how mods/admins do things - the persons mod record can just be publicly posted in their prison thread.

A level of transparency. But we can't provide full transparency, as I'm sure you can understand. Sometimes there are things that the rest of the site just can't know.

Zaph

guil wrote: »

In your opinion, is it good enough to just say your overall record was the reason for the banning or should there be some infractions/warnings referenced to?

Of course it's a good enough reason, but we're talking about posters who may have 30+ warnings, infractions and/or bans against them, not just a handful. And from my own perspective, while I might see a poster with an appalling record, I will never just ban them on sight because of it. It's only when they do something to pick up yet another mod action that I'll ban them, so I do give them the benefit of the doubt that they will behave themselves. Unfortunately that trust is often misplaced and they inevitably collect another card or ban at some stage. It's also worth pointing out that unless there are exceptional circumstances, a poster being banned for their record will not be permanently banned first time out. The norm is that they'll get a month off in the hope that they will realise that they can't continue as they have been and that they'll become a "good poster" and not cause any more hassle for the mods. This works with some posters and we're happy to have them continue to post on the site. And again, unless there are exceptional circumstances I'm not going to permanently siteban them at the first sign of a yellow card, there has to be a pattern of continuous bad behaviour with several cards and/or bans before I'll permaban them.

Gordon

guil wrote: »

I'm a mod on another site and know all too well that things can be completely different behind closed doors but when the user asked what had he done the first thing that was replied to him was a banning that was 6 years ago. How long can someone hold a grudge?

As a mod on another site, are you saying that if you saw a user say that they were only banned 6 years ago (I presume you aren't referencing the linked thread where the Admin didn't mention 6 years ago) - you would believe they only had one ban 6 years ago or would you check that out and make sure they are telling the truth?

If it's the former, then I query your methods, if it's the latter then maybe you just don't see the whole picture in Prison.

guil

Zaph wrote: »

Of course it's a good enough reason, but we're talking about posters who may have 30+ warnings, infractions and/or bans against them, not just a handful. And from my own perspective, while I might see a poster with an appalling record, I will never just ban them on sight because of it. It's only when they do something to pick up yet another mod action that I'll ban them, so I do give them the benefit of the doubt that they will behave themselves. Unfortunately that trust is often misplaced and they inevitably collect another card or ban at some stage. It's also worth pointing out that unless there are exceptional circumstances, a poster being banned for their record will not be permanently banned first time out. The norm is that they'll get a month off in the hope that they will realise that they can't continue as they have been and that they'll become a "good poster" and not cause any more hassle for the mods. This works with some posters and we're happy to have them continue to post on the site. And again, unless there are exceptional circumstances I'm not going to permanently siteban them at the first sign of a yellow card, there has to be a pattern of continuous bad behaviour with several cards and/or bans before I'll permaban them.

I think that's more than fair, the thread I linked above has little to nothing in common in what you deem as fair. As I said things are often different behind closed doors but it looks like the poster was genuine in what he was saying, a lot of prison threads are mouthy little sh!ts ranting and calling mods this and that but there wasn't a hint of anything like that.

The Moldy Gowl

Ah. That makes sense zaph. The benefit of the doubt is good, especially, for posters who have been here a while with good few posts who actually engage the place rather than people looking for trouble, and more importantly what forum the cards occurred in. Cough soccer cough.

My record is pretty awful, so don't be banning me, I have gifs.

guil

Gordon wrote: »

As a mod on another site, are you saying that if you saw a user say that they were only banned 6 years ago (I presume you aren't referencing the linked thread where the Admin didn't mention 6 years ago) - you would believe they only had one ban 6 years ago or would you check that out and make sure they are telling the truth?

If it's the former, then I query your methods, if it's the latter then maybe you just don't see the whole picture in Prison.

Of course I'd check it out but like I said in my previous post it looks like the poster was genuine.

The Moldy Gowl

guil wrote: »

Of course I'd check it out but like I said in my previous post it looks like the poster was genuine.

'Looks'


You don't get banned for no reason here tbh.

Gordon

guil wrote: »

Of course I'd check it out but like I said in my previous post it looks like the poster was genuine.

A lot of people will look like they're genuine, but a lot of people will lie and tell mistruths just to get back on to the website. I'm surprised you haven't seen that on the forum you mod. Like a coin, there are three sides to every story.