The Joys of Overzealous Moderators
 

Apparently, users get banned with no reason or explanation what so ever around here. Or so one (or at least I) would believe?
I'm talking about Calahan here, who just got banned, permanently.

Would any of our glorious mods mind shedding some light on the matter and explaining to us, mere mortals who apparently do not understand the ways of Shrapnel, what the heck just happened?
Of course, I'm just asking out of pure selfishness and self preservation as from what I see Calahan didn't post anything rude, offensive, inflammatory, etc, or pretty much anything at all in the last month or so and still got banned.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

This'll go down well...

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Noooo, he hadn't responded to my last PM yet! :p I have to admit I was confused as well since Calahan hadn't been involved in any recent arguments (he seems to have deliberately stopped posting in this area - see his absence from the discussion re: neeeding blood slaves for communions) and his last posts were offering map help and YARG 3 postgame commentary. My best guess is that it was because of his sig, which I note has disappeared from his posts. Honestly I think there could have been a compromise position here, remove the reference to any individual (which may conflict with Shrapnel rules) and leave it generic. Something along the lines of "because the people here are dumb-asses I prefer to discuss the game at Dom3mods." ;) And I think llama would have been a good person to discuss it with Cal and see if a compromise were possible.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Oi i see another drama coming around, and right so.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

i have always found callahan to be honest, insightful and helpful.

i think banning him only makes shrapnel's forum weaker. personally, i could use all the help i could get.

a few months ago, i was getting battered pretty good on a thread and callahan stood up for me. he told me in a PM it would likely end up in him getting banned. unfortunately, he may have been right.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

I dont think it would have been BECAUSE he stood up for you. That would be desirable.
Altho it might have been how it was done.

Most of the bans seem to involve that type of decision from the forum owners. Should the quality justify the mood that goes with it. Thats why there is a fan-based forum. Where the decision flip-flops.

(had to post so as not to disappoint my fanbase)

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Yeah. If the reason is something totally arbitrary like it seems, it sure makes me prefer a forum run by fans who don't get butthurt enough to ban people for trivial things instead of a forum where you never know when you angered some random forum police who'll ban you for something completely meaningless. The net quality of a community doesn't usually go up when you ban the people who contribute the most.

I only know of some little details of this case, so sure, if Calahan really did something completely aggravating and unredeemable, I'll take my words back. Honestly though I think I'll just remove whatever content made by me that I can before someone decides to ban me for this post or whatever I've posted in the past.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Nice to know that shrapnel have no interest in maintaining a worthwhile, informative community for this game and prefer a sycophantic echo chamber that misinforms potential new players.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Now this is what boggles my mind.
How does it serve your interests and help You, Shrapnel, to act in such a matter? Are people supposed to tiptoe around this forum, being careful not to say or do anything You (and apparently only you) considered offensive and ban worthy in your delusions?

What you're doing is bringing down a community, one that used to be much bigger and better as I remember. That didn't change due to people moving on to new games and forums, you're the ones who instigated that exodus. Frankly I don't see how that's good for you or your business in any way possible.
You're on a pretty good way to alienating all those long year game fans which have kept this forum alive and running. Actually I think you already did that a while back and are now just finishing the job with banning people like Calahan without even giving an explanation.

I get that you can, should and do run the boards any damn way you please. But providing a simple explanation in such situations ( something you are dead set on never doing from my experience, no matter the cost ), or just being a bit courteous, respectful to the people on the forum goes a long way.
However acting as you do now, without what seems to me the slightest bit of respect to any of your users, goes a long way in establishing a bad reputation and just a net lose to your company.

You've already managed to split the community right down the middle with the Sombre drama. I personally think you handled that in the worst possible way btw. If you'd shown a bit of respect to all those people involved in that drama or given a proper explanation I'm betting half the damn community wouldn't have just up and left. Now I may be wrong of course, but to me it seems the larger, better, more active, helpful and contributing a community you have, the better it is for business overall generally.

Now, how I think this discussion will probably end sadly;
You'll lock down this thread, give some vague explanation (at best!) or why you did what you did, anger a few more members (like myself) along the way, and probably threaten with some more bans if people don't just drop the matter and go away.

Doing a bang up job so far guys.:up:

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

The biggest joke of them all is that Crapnel will refer to their Terms and Agreement and say he messed up. but in them they have a detailed infraction system that includes infraction points (i know pyg got like 1 point once) and temporary bans before anyone is supposed to get perma-banned. Of course Crapnel has never once followed their own procedure. Just like in the Sombre thing, they just banned and didnt give a **** what their own rules were

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Darn, I was hoping this was a thread discussing Dominions mods that were excessive (1 gold ettins, conj 5 Tartarians, that kind of thing :)

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Forums that are moderated in this manner make it extremely unlikely that I will choose to purchase future games that are affiliated with shrapnel or recommend them to others. Your customers deserve to be treated with more respect than this.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

How come it's ok for people to be misinforming passive aggressive arrogant doubletounged selfimportant douchebags, but not ok for Calahan to call them out for it?

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

I think it says something about shrapnel that they're more interested in banning people who are irreverent as opposed to people who actively spread misinformation about the game.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

This is not right.

Yes, it's your business alright but if you start throwing customers out like this w/ no explanation and no visible justification it doesn't look good.
In-fact it makes me not want to step into your business anymore.


parone : "i have always found callahan to be honest, insightful and helpful." - Yes, yes and yes. He can be brutally blunt but bottom line he's one of the most helpful players, as in generous w/ his free time and advice and help.

I am posting here for many years but now I'm seriously considering to move completely to http://z7.invisionfree.com/Dom3mods once the games I admin. are through.

BTW - FWIW the only ppl you're hurting are the dom fan community.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

I doubt the mods are reading this people.

Also, it could have just been a mistake. Somebody reporting him, and a mod throwing the banhammer at him.

It is annoying that we just don't know what happend and where the line is we shouldn't cross. Sure Calahan could be annoying at times. An wordy... But he also tried to help people out a lot.

I hope he just got a warning before he was banned.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

cool ignoring of your own rules dudes

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

I looked at the rules and this was clearly in bold on the first pageSry, I don't want to stir. I only have an idle interest in this matter.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

people aren't really arguing that it's a 'legal' problem but a moral one. Those are the rules yes,but they should not be. Also plenty of people on here are rude but only certain ones seem to get banned.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Well, I don't want to acuse you of "spreading disinformation" and I'll not hurl insults at you for it but you just changed your tune drastically. Its hard to know what in this thread is realistic complaint.

You think people should be allowed to bash others at will?

Ofc, I understand there is a demand for this kind of community but surely you understand there are those who prefer a more civil discussion (not sure what words to use.. you know what I mean). It seems there is room for 2 forums.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

There definitely is room within the Dom3 community for both.
There is a standard, corporate-owned, Q/A forum, support for all aspects of the game, where the mood of the forum is prime.
And then there is a fan-owned, fan supported, fan moderated forum where the quality of the answers is prime over considerations of mood.

It does no good to try and shut down or alter either one since both seem happy with their forums, and have people who feel comfortable there. As long as both are willing to allow mention of the other then I would (irritatingly diplomaticly appropriate because it is on this forum) tend to say that the community in general is happy.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Nice theory, but if it was true that this fora is oh, so nice and cosy, then why is all the drama, fighting and inflammatory discussion HERE and not at dom3mods?

Seems to indicate repression as cause rather than solution.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Its not "repression" if you are free to leave at any time (just to diffuse hyperboly).

Seems to me that there is much inflammatory stuff on dom3mods directed at individuals on this forum. That this doesn't result in infighting is surely BECAUSE it is written there and not here.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Wow... wait a minute. We do have drama at dom3mods. It was my fault :D. I was pointing out some hypocrisy of a new member of dom3mods and shrapnel. People asked me to do it at dom3mods. So we did.

And the dom3clone thread is also a bit drama like.

@momfreeek
"you are free to leave at any time" you forgot to add, but "leave your stuff behind". This is still the main forum for dom3 newbies. I doubt they would like it if there was a sticky pointing to better places to get your questions answered. (Which is usually Calahans issue, people not explaining the game mechanics in detail enough, usually he did this without any regard for diplomacy).

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Yeah true, I guess it would be repression to be ejected from your own home. In the case of being ejected for not following the forum rules (Calahan claims no innocence) "repression" is hyperboly.

In my experience its very easy for insolence to lead to bullying. One knowledgable individual may insult others for a cause but when others follow his lead and start hurling insults for their own causes (often less righteous) the result is chaos and those who suffer are those trying to be civil. At dom3mods I suspect the sense of unity against a common cause (this one) creates much feeling of brotherhood right now. Doesn't mean it isn't bull**** (disclaimer: poorly informed opinion ;)).

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Say rather that, just like in the Sombre thing, you and several others didn't understand the rules or, more probably, didn't want to understand the rules.

The forum has a detailed infraction system, yes. But this is not the only way to get banned, it is just a guaranteed way to get banned.

The very same section of the rules that contains the infraction system contains the following words, which you and other rules-lawyers usually ignore:
In other words, whether you like it or not, the rules are very clear on this issue. You can be banned for anything that is considered, at the sole discretion of the forum administration, to be detrimental to the community mood.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Peter you are the one rule lawyering. (Rule lawyers also tend to write a lot of rules. Which trolls then abuse to make their points. Which leads to the dom3mods rule of ... (and only spambots get banned)).

I think the rest just understands that the rules are just bull, and the mods will do as they please and think up reasons and justifications afterwards.

This whole rule system is worthless. But you know this. You now perfectly well what I'm talking about. As we discussed this to death with you the last time somebody was banned.

We already discussed this the last time. You think written rules are important. I think it is more about unwritten social rules. I imply you do not understand unwritten rules. You imply I do not understand written rules. Etc.

And again, like I said the last time, the problem with shrapnel is that they do not apply any of the other they say they should do. Like having two user accounts for example. A new player here has gotten a new account while he still had an old one. That is allowed. But suddenly calahan gets banned. It is the ambiguity that is the problem.

Look at my posts for example. I have clearly been out of line every once in a while. Did I ever get warned for that? Or infractions? Nope. Not once. The only way for me to see if I crossed the line is to look if I'm banned or not(*). (Not that I want to).

Ps: The infraction system has not been used for years. Just ask the mods. They will either come clean and say "indeed has not been used for years". Or they will make up some story that they cannot give examples because that would void the privacy of the people infracted. Or some other lie that we cannot confirm or deny.

@momfreek. Yeah, I know, gotta pipe down with the mob mentality. But I have not really felt that much community brotherhood of us vs shrapnel myself. And have not seen that much reaction. Not that much people seem to care. (Apart from calahan, executor, and a few of the other posters here).

And I have repeatedly told people when they crossed lines. The constant harassing of batman (we get it, we know who he used to be) and ghoul was really annoying. (And I have crossed some myself of course). Of course, I also cross lines... but yeah.

Once again, Calahan probably deserved it. But why today/this week? Why not when he posted the bad stuff he posted.

Ps: looking at the rules again. I see this:

"Strong profanity should generally be restricted. "Damn," "Hell," and "Microsoft" are all okay."

And this:

"Do not post any material which is knowingly false, and or defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, hateful, harassing, racist, obscene, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, or encourages conduct that would constitute a criminal offense, give rise to civil liability, or that otherwise violates any local, state, national or international law or regulation."

Good job not defaming Microsoft shrapnel.

*: there is also an informal method. Lets call it the Strider way. If he shows up, people get banned. Just like last times "who the **** are you" episode.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Well, I certainly won't argue this point. I also won't argue that Calahan can be quite rude at times.

He's always right mind you, but he doesn't bother to be polite about it. (At least, he usually is frienly enough the first time he argues something, but loses patience when people disagree for unsound reasons.) So honestly, even though I like the guy, I can kinda see where the mods are comming from.

What I am upset about though is a genuninely helpful community member getting banned without a warning, nor being asked by anyone if he'd be willing to change his behaviour*, and at a time when he had actually consciously - and publicly - decided to stop bothering to argue with idiots (There, now even I have been tempted to call people names. Probably the first time in my entire internet career. I hope you're all proud of this achievement, because I doubt this will happen too often in like the history of the world ever and stuff.) and stick to helping (new) people with game settings and maps and the like.

* At least according to him nothing of the sort happened, and I'm inclined to trust him on this.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Explain me this one thing. Why are the rules so important people? I don't get it.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

"Laws don't stop anyone from doing anything. Tthey aren't really expected to. But they will stop most of the people most of the time, and the rest we will handle as they come." -AAGP

Rules arent laws but the sentiment seems to fit. Maybe if you call them guidelines instead of rules you would be more comfortable. Then the way that some feel they are getting used would be easier to accept. It would be "These are a list of guidelines on what we want our forum to be. And we reserve the right to ban for that purpose at anytime".

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

The rule system is hillariously retarded. There is a detailed list of rules and then basically "We may ban anyone permanently should we feel like it".

I do understand if someone does something that obviously crosses the line, but at least for my sense of general internet forum behavior the line here is placed so that I have absolutely no idea what crosses the line. Not that I believe I have a high chance to get banned from anything I post apart from maybe my posts in this thread since it isn't A HARMONOUS CONTENT THREAD. Seriously, if someone crosses whatever random line Shrapnel's forum moderation has pulled out from their place of harmony, ban them for a week and tell them the reason unless it's something that's absolutely obviously intentional and very offensive. Then if they don't stop it for at least a decent time go ahead and ban them forever.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Okay. Let's start with the basics.

I don't have a right to post in this forum. You don't have a right to post in this forum. None of us do, save the Shrapnel staff. It is, effectively, a private club. And in a private club, you follow the rules regardless of whether you like them or not. Now, why is that, you ask?

Because I have entered a voluntary agreement, whereby in return for agreeing to follow the forum rules on this particular private forum (the price), I am extended the privilege of posting here (the benefit).

If I violate the forum rules consciously, then I violate my given word.

Which is something I will not do.

If I no longer wish to adhere to my side of the agreement or if I cannot in good conscience do so because I disagree with the rules, then I will no longer post in the forum.

This argument is good enough for me.

The question to you is then, given that you, too, have voluntarily entered this agreement, knowing full well what you agreed to as it was presented to you to read before joining and having all the time in the world to reread the agreement later on, why is obeying the forum rules not important to you?

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

This extremely - I underline extremely - good book on the topic; why rules are important and why it is very important people voluntarily follow them:

http://www.schneier.com/book-lo.html

http://www.schneier.com/images/book-lo-175w.jpg

The Finnish review said if there were Nobel Security Price, this time it would go to Bruce Schneier and, having read the book, I second that.

The list of notable (readable) reviews here, the Finnish review among them:
http://www.schneier.com/book-lo-reviews.html

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

If shrapnel sets rules that it intends for us to follow, and it tells us what action it will take if we don't follow their rules, and they ignore that and just do whatever the hell they feel like, there is no sense of order whatsoever. Especially this whole business of not bothering to inform a person why they've been banned is nonsense.

As stated earlier there is no good reason to be banning calahan right now as opposed to times when he actually did something. In fact banning him at this point is sheer stupidity, regardless of whatever reasons shrapnel things they had to ban him. But what else is new.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Very nice. Added to my Dom3Minions.com store.
http://astore.amazon.com/dom3minions...ail/1118143302

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

I'm honestly not sure why we are even talking about rules in this context. Obviously, Shrapnel can and does do whatever they feel like with regards to moderation. If Mr. Parker decided to instantly and permanently ban people for, lets say, calling anything under-powered, and that's what Shrapnel wanted then that would be fine and dandy. They wouldn't even have to make an explicit rule about it, much like arguments for legalizing necrophilia or cocaine*, we can simply say what people choose to do in their own time on their own property is their business.

What I think confuses so many people though, is the why. If we take at face value Shrapnel's claim to be promoting a vibrant and harmonious community, some actions seem hard to fathom. I can see very little reason, for example, to refrain from even the briefest of warnings or explanations on bannings. Or why temporary bans seem so seldom used as opposed to permanent ones. These sorts of tools seem easy enough, and indeed as far as I'm aware are used on the fast majority of internet forums.


*I mean to neither support nor disrespect such arguments.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Except that it obviously was intentional and very offensive. Cal made posts in a variety of threads expressly for the purpose of harassing people, including game threads. And not just once - often. It was frequent and flagrant abuse.

Calling someone a "douchebag" for being wrong about game mechanics is inappropriate. Defeat the idea, prove it wrong. Enjoy the presentation of ideas and their merits. Discuss the game. Doing it often is grounds for being banned.

For the record, AFAIK I had nothing to do with his being banned. I didn't report it, I didn't request it, I'm relatively late finding out about it.

But baiting people, harassing them, and maligning them is against the forum rules; claiming that this is anything other than a textbook example of why shrapnel has that statement in their TOS is just willful ignorance.

As for "why now" - I suspect because the administrators here have other things to do. Selling games. Raising families. Whatever. And that they check in to moderate threads infrequently.

I suspect the same reason contributes to why Cal didn't get warned. Presumably no one monitored the threads for a long period of time; by the time someone did a large body of posts were established to show that this was repeat and flagrant behaviour; not the kind of behavior they wanted, and unlikely to be fixed by infractions.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

well, this sure is a lot of wrangling.

i just don't get this: when callahan stepped in for me, a member was systematically misrepresenting things that i said, taking them apart piece meal, and trying to paint me as a person who had serious mental issues, confidence problems, and a mild form of multi personality disorder. it literally got bad enough that i considered quiting the forum altogether.

that's ok.

but...whatever callahan did, none of us can even figure it out? and he IS banned?

i think the problem here might be a lack of transparency by the moderaters.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

From the end of the IEEE Spectrum review, the link to which is listed on Schneier's site:

"In other words, sometimes rule breakers are a threat to society, and sometimes they are its best hope. If that sounds like Thomas Jefferson’s "I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it," we can still thank Schneier for updating this eternal truth for a digital age."

I would agree with this. Yes, rules are important, but there is a reason why it is preferrable to have them applied by a human intelligence that can make a judgement call, that can see gradations, that can interpret grey areas. Shrapnel is doing that, and to the extent that they do it correctly that's great. The problem is that there are a lot of us who are pointing to some very high profile instances when many of us feel that they got it wrong. This is one of those instances.

In this case, re: the banning of Calahan, I am in agreement with others here - I would like to know why Shrapnel banned Calahan. Based on what I've seen of his postings here, Calahan may have given the admins the justification they needed to do so, but there's no question in my mind that his contributions to the community outweigh any offense he may have given. Couldn't some warning have been given? Why can't there be an intermediate step between ignoring borderline behavior and a permaban?

Isn't that passive aggressive? Ignore the rule bending of certain major contributors to the community for months or years and then one day snap and ban them permanently without warning?

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

But I do agree that Shrapnel could spend more time in the forums. Pruning weeding, planting little stakes helps promote a good garden. Doing the same in a forum helps make sure everyone knows the rules and we don't lose interest - either from flame wars - or a forum dwindling away due to disinterest.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Kindof like being irritated at the neighbors cat always crapping on your lawn, then one day shooting it? Its not hard to agree that its a bad thing. But its not surprising to consider it rather average also. Large corporations tend to buffer such decisions thru multiple channels of people selected for their diplomatic ability.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Speaking of hypocrisy, the censorship thingy is ****ing retarded. I mean Jesus ballslapping mother of disney, you can't even write words with *** in them.

I have to admit though that the drama here is entertaining, dom3mods is developing nicely, and the drama here sort of keeps us going. So I'm not sure if I want a smarter Shrapnel or not.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

How is that hypocrisy? Do shrapnel post swear words?

Thats the third time I've seen you make a completely false accusation in almost as many posts. At least learn the words, there's no dignity in being a rude guy thats always wrong ^^

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Yeah, like I said. This is what srapnel says they do:

"We have these rules and regulations, these are the penalties etc. This is what you can expect here."

This is what shrpanel does:

"Look, here behind this shed." *BANG*

Problem solved.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Dude this is your second account. This is against all rules here. You really should not talk about this.

(You really should not use your old email adres).

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

I doubt I have to search hard for swearwords.

Also, you know that Sexism is on par with racism at shrapnel rules right?

Remember the old sexy woman dom3 ad campaign?

Hypocrisy.

(Edit: and if I recall correctly, there was some talk about somebody use a certain slang word for a certain afrikan/australian minority. But I cannot recall the details, it was a war slang term. But apparnatly highly offensive).

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Yeah, you might also want to read the rest of his works, about security theatre, rules that do not work, transparency. Etc.

(ow, and right, I was creating a strawman or something with my question... ;) )

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

So we agree, the rules are important as a social contact kept up by both sides. The contract should be know beforehand and followed by both sides. Like said before, shrapnel doesn't do this.

Shrapnel is not keeping up their side.

In the rules they say the don't like banning people. Well, apparently they do. They dislike giving out infractions more.

(Look, I have little problem with banning people when desired/deserved, just don't get all high and mighty about a large set of rules and don't follow them yourself. All this acting like you are the moral high ground).

Personally I prefer the organic ruleset. With exceptions, personal communication etc. Not this static high and might stuff.

But communication with people is hard. And doing the right thing for the dom3 community is not high on their priority list. Obviously.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Wow... you shoot your neighbours cat without asking your neighbor? What a dick move.

We tend to talk about our problems with neighbors before we result to drastic methods.

Also, it is the governement shooting the cat. And not talking about it.

Re: The Joys of Overzealous Mods
 

Let's not forget about racist comments made by shrapnel staff, either.