Are the forums too strict?

[Yureina]

And as I just said, the Moderation Team is always open and you're bound to get feedback from there if you feel you don't understand. PMing the moderators and staff is another way. There are several ways to get feedback if you think one is ineffective (Which I don't agree with, but I don't really have time to get dragged out into a discussion about it.)

Very well. My opinions remain completely unchanged however due to a lack of evidence to the contrary. Until proof exists that thinks work, they are broken. But... that is something to bring up some other time, and not tonight. Assuming such discussion is even allowed or wouldn't be tossed into a dark closet, of course.

 

[Bohemian Waltz]

Sarcasm & jokes shouldn't be subject to any real punishment especially if done so without vitriol or malice.

Low-content punishments are a bit of a joke considering there are numerous threads each day with 100+ responses with often 90% of which parroting of the exact same opinion ad nauseum, which makes one wonder the value of acceptable content being contributed.

IMHO.

 

[RaDeuX]

It depends. I had several users call me ignorant, mentally challenged, troll, et cetera because I was stating opinions far different from theirs on a rather subjective topic. I kept myself composed the whole time without insulting them explicitly. But because the moderators were on their side, they only edited one of their posts to tell them not to make hateful and insulting posts, which was similar to a mere slap on the wrist.

It's more along the lines of "If you piss off a moderator, you're going to be punished," rather than "You broke the rules, so here is your punishment in accordance to the severity of that violation."

 

[Admiral Stukov]

For the most part I agree with how strict it is.

If there's one thing though, here all trolling is looked down upon.
I personally feel that trolling total morons isn't really a bad thing, and that way to many seem to have eggshell feelings.

 

[McPulse]

Honestly, I've been on forums with seven active members and stricter moderation. The sheer activity on The Escapist means mods have to make snap decisions and pre-empt complaints. Image the escapist if the moderation was complaint based? We'd be in three or four camps that just attacked eachother!

On the other hand, that does give me a good idea for a video game...

 

[Scorched_Cascade]

I've found the rules pretty easy to stick to:
Thou shalt nots
1) Don't insult The Escapist
2) Don't insult The Escapist staff (even though there's probably a few that would tolerate it)
3) Don't insult The Escapist content (unless it's constructive)
4) Don't insult other posters (pretty much if you start a sentence with "You" then you should be very careful what follows it)
5) No offensive content
6) Don't post when angry or grumpy

For those having a problem with these remember that you are not in your house on your computer you are in their domain. You wouldn't walk into some random person's house in real life and say "you're all dicks and your collection of artwork sucks" and not expect to get punched would you?

Thou shalt:
1) Always re-read your post before you post it to see if there is anyway it can be taken out of context. If there is then either mitigate any possible offensiveness or quote the person who caused you to say it so they get wrath too if they report you (Mutual destruction is an awesome policy ^^)

2) Remember that nothing is serious on the internet. If someone posts a view you think is stupid and you can't think of a way to say it nicely then you don't have to respond to it! Just ignore it or let someone else get wrath'd for over enthusiastically responding. *here is where you insert the XKCD pic of "Someone is wrong on the internet".

Easy you see? If you got wrath and you didn't break any of these then it's probably just going to be a small probe which in the long run is just equivalent to a slap on the wrist.

TL;DR: I salute the moderators for their work in keeping this a nice place to be.

Always remember that when you check to see what someone got punished for you are only seeing half the story; you cannot see their previous offenses on their rap sheet. Sometimes as well the user has been being offensive earlier in the thread but it's that last post that secured them punishment

 

[sky14kemea]

Yeah they're too strict.
Never been put on probation myself, but I swear half the time people are put on probation the mods are just having a really bad day.

It depends which mod finds what you've said I suppose. I got put on probation yesterday for being satirical about Americans celebrating Osamas death...

Yeah that's the kind of thing I'm talking about.
Yes you were being controversial, but what you said was related to the thread's topic and wasn't especially offensive or anything...don't understand.


Then there are some times I see people put on probation for a post that, no matter how much i analyse, can see no fault in whatsoever.

Sometimes people are put on probation due to their past history. Sometimes it might look like we're being uber strict, but we try to be as fair as possible. :/

 

[Custard_Angel]

Naw. But you have to be really, really, really, really, really careful at times when making jokes because all it takes is a mod to come along, miss the humour and take a swing with the ban hammer.

It's happened to me.

Even when I used tags.

 

[Your once and future Fanboy]

A friend of mine got suspended when he tried to make a tread about a Danish movie called "Gay- niggers from outer-space", he said it was a movie in his post, but yet, he was suspended.
So if you want to talk about something here, be sure that its not something people can be sensitive about.
By the Admins laws, we can't talk about Schindler's list, the General's Daughter, Sleepers, to kill a mockingbird, a Serbian film, or anything else, especially if the title of the movie is offensive.

 

[googleback]

yeah but if it wasn't where would we be?

THAT'S RIGHT...


GAMETRAILERS

 

[SckizoBoy]

It's pretty nice. The mods are fair and just. But try to be conservative on this forum, and WHAM! Feel the fury of the uptight liberal Escapists!

Come on, look around you, this place is crawling with game/anime/sci-fi/fantasy nerds and geeks, so 'liberal' is the decided majority. Though 'uptight liberal' is just a lol-worthy oxymoron.

OT: No, I think it's OK here. Hammering to those that deserve it, it only seems unfair sometimes (to me) because of priors I'm unaware of. For the most part, though, I get why...

 

[silversnake4133]

I wouldn't necessarily say the escapist is the mod's "house". If anything the escapist is like the ocean and the mods are the lifeguards. Because if this was their house, what's stopping the mods from shutting down the site and telling everyone to "get out".

Because they're getting paid by... um.. house advertisers based on how popular this little house party is. They can kick everybody out, but it would be a bad idea. Nobody can really blame them for wanting to keep the party classy, though. But now that I think about it, I guess it's Themis' house, and the mods are the butlers and such. By which, of course, I mean no offence.

Spoiler: Butlers are awesome.

[/spoiler]

Also, is it just me, or is the Captcha getting drunk?[/quote]

Well, if this site is a house, then the moderators would be renters as well. The webmasters and administrators are the actual owners because they basically are the ones that are running the show. The ads pay for the bills and we are the lifeblood. But I'm not exactly sure if the admins and the webmasters are mods. Some of them probably are, but I wouldn't put money on it.

Yes, yes it is. :D

 

[DanDanikov]

I think you have to certainly have your wits about you and be aware of when you're going to be saying things that are in the grey zone, and strongly qualify such things. In fact, maybe they could experiment with a tick-box that basically says 'I know this is controversial, I only want it posted with explicit moderator consent'...

Tangent aside, ultimately, this is their forums and they have ultimate power as a private entity. While we can push for something we like and makes everyone happy, they will think of themselves first which only indirectly extends to the community. Sometimes it's simpler to alienate a handful of borderline customers rather than going miles out of your way to pander to them (and everyone else). You have to have boundaries.

As far as forum moderation goes, there are a few things I feel are important-

Firstly, the right to go public. While in many cases breaches of the rules are clear or due to a misunderstanding and can be resolved in private messages, people should have the right to take things public on the forum as part of an appeals proccess. Some forums don't embrace this and make discussion/criticism of moderation decisions a bannable offence, which basically turns the forum into a dictatorship. It's can be undesirable if it reaches the point that you have to deal with every decision being questioned. Some people like having that amount of control and it perhaps best reflects the actual state of the world, but it also doesn't do much to satisfy a community that is accustomed to (the perception of) democratic and fair systems. Public discourse on moderation (restricted to its own subforum, of course) can both help moderate moderators in the rare case such a thing is needed, but also keep the rules dynamic and flexible to changes- things always change.

Secondly, a right to group consideration. All moderator decisions should, at least eventually, be considered by other moderators. For clear and minor infractions, this probably isn't necessary, especially when not appealed. For serious infractions, there probably is a time element and a moderator may have to act quickly to quell the flames, lock out of control threads, etc., but such things should be considered with a second pair of eyes ASAP. Moderators are human, after all. This may already happen here, but the lack of transparency in the process makes it difficult to tell. That brings us to...

A right to transparency. Nothing is worse than being held to rules you're not aware of and having no idea of the consequences. While there will always be moderators to judge posts against the rules, on the whole, it should be clear most of the time which way a judgement should go. Most infractions are due to emotional issues or ignorance (both which should have light slaps on the wrist, with a wary eye to repeat offenders... maybe even enforced captchas or previews with timeouts? I think there's a lot that can be done to help users despite themselves and innovation in general around forums). The Escapist does a fairly good job of this, at least,.

 

[JDKJ]

Criticize the post, not the poster. A simple rule many fail to follow, so they get slapped for it.

This, basically. I've disagreed with people several times throughout my time here on The Escapist, but because I've only called out certain points I disagreed with, and didn't resort to name-calling, I've never even gotten a probation. Like Hader said, it's a simple enough rule to follow...

Now, to those people who are saying that the mods only look at the post without looking at the wider picture, you're wrong.
Ok, some posts are so downright terribad that they deserve a pimp-slap right there and then, but they're not the posts we're talking about here. If the mods are unsure about what to do with a post, they won't simply put that person on probation (or worse) and walk away, they will look at the prior conversation to get a feel for what's been said, why it's being talked about, etc. This, and the fact that they may have to work through a whole list of reports before getting to the one that you think needs to be looked at, is also why it may take a little longer for some people to get the probation that they deserve.

How do I know this? People have brought up this issue before, and some of the mods told us how they get things done when that little red button is pushed. Granted, maybe not all mods work this way, but as far as I understand it, most of them work this way. And I wouldn't want them to change. The system works, just stay within the rules and you're fine.

(The rules/code of conduct, by the way, can be found here:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/codeofconduct
They're fair, and easy to understand. It'll take you only a minute or 2 to read them, so if you haven't already, I'd highly suggest doing so.)

Can you dig up some of those posts? Because the way I remember it, the mods in question said they looked at the poster's history more than anything else; they said outright that they spend most of their time staring at the mod queue, and rarely actually get out and read the forums.

Is that really the way they do things?! If so, that would skew the censorship into a self-perpetuating cycle: we censored you this time because we had to censor you before which now makes you more likely to be censored the next time.

 

[JDKJ]

Honestly, I've been on forums with seven active members and stricter moderation. The sheer activity on The Escapist means mods have to make snap decisions and pre-empt complaints. Image the escapist if the moderation was complaint based? We'd be in three or four camps that just attacked eachother!

On the other hand, that does give me a good idea for a video game...

But by their own admission, that's how they moderate: on the basis of complaints. It says so in the forum rules: "we don't read every post, so if you think a post is problematic, report it to us" (paraphrased). That's a complaint-based moderation system.

 

[sky14kemea]

How'd your exercising go?

Didn't give up did you?

Feel free to hit up the Escapist Fitness Club with questions, for advice or simply motivation. It's pretty dead in there.

Also, since when are you a mod?

This is a random place to meet! xD

I never actually got started on it. I'm thinking of taking up swimming, since that's more fun then jogging or anything.

Also I was made a mod last week. I'm still getting used to it. =P