Forums discussion: The new rule on complaints

[SierraKomodo]

i think the rule's fine; You shouldn't be cluttering a player complaint thread with irrelevant things/opinions if you don't have anything to add to the thread.

Should we be removing any possibility for third party contributions (and thus risk making complaints very one-sided), when posts could also be dealt with on a case-by-case basis?

If the post someone has is actually relevant to the complaint thread - I.e. they were involved in some manner and can actually provide additional input/another side - I see no problems with them posting.

When we get bandwagonning, shitposting, etc from people that were not involved in the incident in question at all, then it's a problem.

[Guest]

I think peanut galleries and opinions are important and should be allowed to clutter up complaint threads. If they don't add to the discussion they can very easily be deleted by a janitor. Reduction of input and transparency over time is cancerous to a community. I've seen forums and communities with policies that follow along this vein of thought, and without fail- it trends towards more and more tone policing and faux staff victim complexes/cronyism.

In addition, it generally leads to dogpiling and administrators and moderators defending each other with only the complainant or their accusers having a voice. Baystation's kangaroo court of a staff complaint system is a very good example of this.

[Killerhurtz]

Yeaah no, I have to say - sometimes, outside opinions even though there's not personal stakes can be useful (like, for instance, people saying whether this is a recurrent issue or if the player/character usually doesn't react unless provoked).

Plus there's the whole censorship thing with which I disagree.

[Guest]

I think peanut galleries and opinions are important and should be allowed to clutter up complaint threads. If they don't add to the discussion they can very easily be deleted by a janitor. Reduction of input and transparency over time is cancerous to a community. I've seen forums and communities with policies that follow along this vein of thought, and without fail- it trends towards more and more tone policing and faux staff victim complexes/cronyism.

In addition, it generally leads to dogpiling and administrators and moderators defending each other with only the complainant or their accusers having a voice. Baystation's kangaroo court of a staff complaint system is a very good example of this.

 

Unfortunately, Baystation's forum community is hella more toxic than ours will ever be. If you think you've seen mad, you haven't read the Baystation forums. Not a very apt comparison, considering their forumbase is composed of people who put more effort and emotion into shitposting than anyone I've ever seen from /v/.

Also, this isn't 4chan. That's also a blessing, considering you can actually get shit done past 'let's waggle our fingers and screech at the name of this person'. If you actually bring up a legitimate problem with relevant information proving that person did something really dumb, that person will definitely be punished.

You will not, however, get someone banned/warned on the basis of disagreeing with someone. That's not how it works.

Frances, while I am an advocate of free speech and open discussion/criticism on just about anything, I think this point hits where I stand at the moment (and coincidentally, where a few of the other staff stand).

 

Can I just interject, as someone who isn't important and doesn't want to start shit?

If I have a complaint with admins or other players, I don't want a entire peanut gallery present with the ability to comment their stance however and as often as they please. I'm talking about people who have absolute no say or witnessed nothing, they just want people to know how they feel because their thoughts are important, even though the person in question had absolutely nothing to do with the situation in question.

Complaints threads have been filled to the brim with shit like this lately, with people who weren't even involved in the damn incident arguing in circles around the people who actually have an issue they want solved.

 

I would argue problems get solved in a more civil, expeditious manner if we follow these conditions. People who have nothing to contribute will be discouraged to post if they have no relevant evidence or standing in the complaint.

Yes, it is nice to have a third party to come in and say, 'Hey, this is what I think and this is why I believe it's right/wrong', but there comes a point in time where far too many third parties decide to chime in because they were allowed before to comment on something, and attempt to speak for the person who is complaining, more often than not.

And believe it or not, there are some people who get very much offended when others use their voice as a shield or sword. I assume you know this, though, so I won't preach further.

No hard feelings, but I don't want people who weren't there to speak for me when I see someone break the rules or be a dick to other people. I would appreciate it if you stood up for me if I have something to complain about, but if you weren't there to see it yourself with me then I wouldn't ask you to parrot what I'm complaining about.

[Frances]

Welcome back, Delta.

[Guest]

I dig where you're coming from delta, but I've got a hard on for transparency and rampant free speech n'shit. I've seen where careful, incremental increases in staff size and policy leads, and it leads to hellholes like discovery GC and baystation.

I hate to see cool communities turn into toxic places. So I try to advocate for what I think helps keep that sort of thing at ... Bay. :^^^^^^)

[Frances]

Also, to address the actual thing, from my point of view.

I would argue problems get solved in a more civil, expeditious manner if we follow these conditions. People who have nothing to contribute will be discouraged to post if they have no relevant evidence or standing in the complaint.

Why do we need to have a blanket rule for this? What does that rule do that simply looking at posts and saying "okay, this is relevant and can stay" or "this is derailing and can be deleted" cannot do?

[Jboy2000000]

I don't want to sound cynical, but do any of you really think arguing this will go anywhere? The thread this rule is about already says plenty about what the staff thing about opinions of the community. Fighting a censor of opinions with opinions seems futile, doesn't it?

[Guest]

It's all we can do as members of the community aside from leave or ignore the rules and be banned as a result.

[Gollee]

Also, to address the actual thing, from my point of view.

I would argue problems get solved in a more civil, expeditious manner if we follow these conditions. People who have nothing to contribute will be discouraged to post if they have no relevant evidence or standing in the complaint.

Why do we need to have a blanket rule for this? What does that rule do that simply looking at posts and saying "okay, this is relevant and can stay" or "this is derailing and can be deleted" cannot do?

 

I would say the blanket rule came into effect recently because we have had a lot of peanut gallery...ing, in the recent complaints, nearly every one in the last couple of months have exploded into a multi-page shitstorm; the rule is severe, but a loud proportion of the community has shown that they can't be trusted otherwise.

The rule in and of itself is not bad, it's just the other hand, in an ideal world, it would work fine, everything would be worked out in an unbiased fashion.

Real life isn't ideal however, a better suggestion than removing the rule, however, may be to alter it to allow evidence from other people to be presented, and strict penalties for shit-posting and flame-inciting in those threads.

[Frances]

in the recent complaints, nearly every one in the last couple of months have exploded into a multi-page shitstorm; the rule is severe, but a loud proportion of the community has shown that they can't be trusted otherwise.

A great majority of the recent lengthy complaint threads I've witnessed are mostly comprised of back and forth between the administration and the complainants. It'd be really difficult to qualify any of it of "irrelevant salt".

Pretty much the only "shitstorms" (a.k.a. very long threads in which a large group of people debate) I can recall are those involving Cassie's ban, and that was a forum announcement followed by general threads.

I just don't know. If I had to sum this up I'd say it's a choice between long threads that are at a higher chance of reaching a satisfying compromise, or short threads in which the users are at a higher risk of feeling muzzled or ignored.

Edited September 30, 2015 by Guest

[Gollee]

A good number of the ones against The_Furry as well.

[Frances]

A good number of the ones against The_Furry as well.

These are player complaint threads. I'm fairly sure most of what was posted in them was from people who had direct interactions with him, so I don't think it's really applicable.

[Gollee]

But... The new rule is in the complaints thread...

Hence the relevance...

It's not just admin complaints, it's player complaints as well.

[Frances]

But... The new rule is in the complaints thread...

Hence the relevance...

It's not just admin complaints, it's player complaints as well.

It's actually not. Though I'm assuming the guidelines are expected to be something akin to "only contribute if you have information relevant to the topic at hand".

That seems reasonable, no? Why can't we just make a rule like that? It gets us rid of mods and regulars alike chastising users by reminding them "they did bad" (and contributing nothing besides stating the obvious), while still letting relevant discussion happen. That way if someone else wants to argue against or for a person's behavior they can do so as long as their argument is relatively intelligent.

[Gollee]

Real life isn't ideal however, a better suggestion than removing the rule, however, may be to alter it to allow evidence from other people to be presented, and strict penalties for shit-posting and flame-inciting in those threads.

 

I already said... Plagiarist, *sprays a spray bottle at Frances* Bad.

[Frances]

I wasn't disagreeing with your suggestion, simply stating that I didn't think complaints were as chaotic as you made them to be.

[Xelnagahunter]

I fully agree with our new rule. I've posted why previously. I'd be entirely for not having it too, if we could fully trust the community to stay our of the way. It's ok, in my opinion, for someone to come in with a point of view that is relevant, even without logs or the like. HOWEVER, we have to draw a line somewhere. People coming in and posting those same opinoins that were posted 6 times is repetitive and useless. It makes us read more useless junk and gives nothing to the argument. HOw can we trust people to stop making the clusterfuck worse? Make it punishable.

If we could let the userbase moderate itself, we would. I promise you all of us want it easier when moderating. It's not that simple though. And we have to create ways to moderate more people with less people because we don't want a 1:1 player to staff ratio.

[Jboy2000000]

If posting the same opinion is useless, why are you here? You're not the first person to say you like the rule, so why would you post? More people posting with the same opinion isn't useless, it shows that more people agree with said opinion.

[Frances]

If posting the same opinion is useless, why are you here? You're not the first person to say you like the rule, so why would you post? More people posting with the same opinion isn't useless, it shows that more people agree with said opinion.

Furthermore, a way to remove repetition could be to bring back the "like" button in the complaints, so that when multiple people are in agreement we don't have a comment thread of five people rephrasing each other.

[Guest]

Also, to address the actual thing, from my point of view.

I would argue problems get solved in a more civil, expeditious manner if we follow these conditions. People who have nothing to contribute will be discouraged to post if they have no relevant evidence or standing in the complaint.

Why do we need to have a blanket rule for this? What does that rule do that simply looking at posts and saying "okay, this is relevant and can stay" or "this is derailing and can be deleted" cannot do?

We don't, it's better off if it's implied and thus applied case-by-case, as you suggested. However, do note the concerns I mentioned.

The written nature of the rule misrepresents and betrays the actual spirit of how to deal with terrible shitposting.

Besides, you know, forumbanning people for a couple days so they can cool off.

It needs to go, honestly, and the staff needs to be more reactive to what's going on.

[Jboy2000000]

So, this rule is to rule is to stop peanut gallery-ing and people making posts of no relevance?

 

To be completely honest with you, this sounds like a

 

 

Yes, I see.