Poll: New forum rules - Yay or Nay?

[Yureina]

Disgusting...

I've got no problem with the rules themselves, but this health meter business is going too far. So people are to be hung and judged for even the smallest of incidents many months or even years ago? That this information is to be public? I know what is on my record, and I can say with absolute certainty that they weren't even worth the minor warnings that they received. Stuff that would be forgotten within a day and not worth the slightest bit of notice. And now... that stuff gets to stalk me for the rest of my time on this site. Beautiful. So I'm a criminal now almost halfway to being permanently banned? For one 1-word post, a perceived troll comment, and one off-topic post? You have got to be kidding me.

I know what the reply is to that. "Be better and you will be fine" and all that. I *have* been fine. Some of the mods, on the other hand, have gone way overboard in dealing out punishments in the past to people. Yet they are not the slightest bit accountable for any of that. The appeal system does not work. They didn't even reply back. There is no check on the rampaging authoritarianism that certain "higher-ups" on this site indulge themselves with. Someone is clearly on a very serious power-trip around here. I guess I shouldn't be surprised, since the worst power-trippers i've ever seen have been those who are involved with running gaming-related organizations. Except this time I can't even fight back for any effect.

I used to really like this place. I've made alot of friends here and enjoyed a tame community that had decent discussion and little drama. I never felt like there was a looming authority overhead that was always watching and wanted to slap people around arbitrarily either for show or amusement.

But... that's gone. *sigh*

 

[maddawg IAJI]

We don't want the admittance of such acts on the forum so allow me to go down the list.

Piracy and Ad Blocking are one of those subjects that are free to talk about, but against the rules to admit too. Like a Marijuana debate in the states, no cop is gonna arrest you if you favor the legalization of Marijuana, but you can bet he'll stop you if he catches you with the stuff.

Illegal Drug Use and Illegal Acts, see above.

Pedophilia is one of those subjects that has just given way into action. Its brought too much trouble to the forum in the past and Spinwhiz requested that we just lock them.

Pornography, well...just keep it off the forums. If you wanna talk about it, fine, I'm not gonna punish you for that unless told otherwise, but don't post pictures or videos of it.

And Sexist, racist remarks should be self-explanatory.

So like I originally said, (I think) I doubted you meant it how it was worded. Why can't that explanation be put in the rules, since it makes much more sense and is much more clear?

Because they should be obvious upon first glance (Most of them are in my opinion at least) as they have always been like that on this forum.

 

[MaxwellEdison]

So like I originally said, (I think) I doubted you meant it how it was worded. Why can't that explanation be put in the rules, since it makes much more sense and is much more clear?

Because they should be obvious upon first glance (Most of them are in my opinion at least) as they have always been like that on this forum.

The point of a rule list is to explain things so that they can be understood, right? I'd think that "well it's obvious" shouldn't even enter into the thought process while making the rules.
Then there's the flip side of the coin - under these rules, technically, it's alright to get people in trouble for mentioning these things. Now, in practice, is it used that way? No. But on paper, it's allowed.

 

[bob1052]

We don't want the admittance of such acts on the forum so allow me to go down the list.

Piracy and Ad Blocking are one of those subjects that are free to talk about, but against the rules to admit too. Like a Marijuana debate in the states, no cop is gonna arrest you if you favor the legalization of Marijuana, but you can bet he'll stop you if he catches you with the stuff.

Illegal Drug Use and Illegal Acts, see above.

Pedophilia is one of those subjects that has just given way into action. Its brought too much trouble to the forum in the past and Spinwhiz requested that we just lock them.

Pornography, well...just keep it off the forums. If you wanna talk about it, fine, I'm not gonna punish you for that unless told otherwise, but don't post pictures or videos of it.

And Sexist, racist remarks should be self-explanatory.

So like I originally said, (I think) I doubted you meant it how it was worded. Why can't that explanation be put in the rules, since it makes much more sense and is much more clear?

Because they should be obvious upon first glance (Most of them are in my opinion at least) as they have always been like that on this forum.

Similarly, posts including...
Piracy
Ad Blockers
Illegal Drugs in the United States

Any post including discussion about piracy, ad blockers or illegal drugs will be banned is what the rules state.

Your clarification is clearly different and nothing about what is in the rules make it "obvious upon first glance"

 

[Xanthious]

Wow, never thought I'd see a forum that punishes people for using an Ad Blocker if they choose to admit it. Really? Really? Admitting to using an Ad Blocker is a punishable offense. You do understand that most browsers come pretty standard with them right? Wow, I really do fear the direction this is all heading. Guess I will see you all at the book burning . . . .

I really thought that it was common knowledge people choose to visit this website for leisure or to have "fun". Having to feel like you are walking on egg shells if you happen to get into a spirited debate isn't fun.

I think the powers that be really ought take a few steps back and ask themselves are the rules in place setting up an place where people can come to shoot the breeze and enjoy themselves and maybe have a debate or two or are they setting up something that's fashioned after some sort of internment camp where people are controlled through fear of the smallest misstep. Honestly, the way the new rules read (with permanent, never erased, strikes) and the way this is being pitched by staff and mods it sure as hell seems more the latter than the former.

 

[maddawg IAJI]

So like I originally said, (I think) I doubted you meant it how it was worded. Why can't that explanation be put in the rules, since it makes much more sense and is much more clear?

Because they should be obvious upon first glance (Most of them are in my opinion at least) as they have always been like that on this forum.

The point of a rule list is to explain things so that they can be understood, right? I'd think that "well it's obvious" shouldn't even enter into the thought process while making the rules.
Then there's the flip side of the coin - under these rules, technically, it's alright to get people in trouble for mentioning these things. Now, in practice, is it used that way? No. But on paper, it's allowed.

In my opinion, it depends on context mostly. A user threatening to attack another one is technically committing assault (Or cyber bullying, not sure if assault carries over digitally) and we can punish them for that. I won't punish someone for talking about the news story that a user posts regarding that threat though.

 

[MaxwellEdison]

So like I originally said, (I think) I doubted you meant it how it was worded. Why can't that explanation be put in the rules, since it makes much more sense and is much more clear?

Because they should be obvious upon first glance (Most of them are in my opinion at least) as they have always been like that on this forum.

The point of a rule list is to explain things so that they can be understood, right? I'd think that "well it's obvious" shouldn't even enter into the thought process while making the rules.
Then there's the flip side of the coin - under these rules, technically, it's alright to get people in trouble for mentioning these things. Now, in practice, is it used that way? No. But on paper, it's allowed.

In my opinion, it depends on context mostly. A user threatening to attack another one is technically committing assault (Or cyber bullying, not sure if assault carries over digitally) and we can punish them for that. I won't punish someone for talking about the news story that a user posts regarding that threat though.

I know you wouldn't. I sorta said that you wouldn't in my post. "...is it used that way? No." That doesn't really change my argument at all.

 

[Labcoat Samurai]

Disgusting...

snip

Excellent points all around. Given your prodigiously high post count, it looks as though you've invested more into this site than I have, so what I'm about to say may not be very comforting.

If they ban you, they lose. Maybe not if they ban *just* you, but if they, as a rule, ban people like you, it hurts the quality of the site, and it hurts their bottom line. They don't want to just pull in advertising revenue from people coming in once per week to watch Zero Punctuation. They're aiming higher. If they drive off their community, then they'll have killed the goose that's laying their golden eggs.

And you'll always have somewhere else to go. The internet is a big place.

Maybe part of the reason why my post count *isn't* so high is that I don't think this is the best place for intelligent discussion on the internet. It's relatively devoid of rudeness and obvious trolling, so that's nice, but it's also an awfully young and immature site. Can't even tell you how many times my unconscious reaction to reading a user-created thread has been to roll my eyes and sigh audibly. Talking to people on this site makes me feel downright old, sometimes.

 

[MinishArcticFox]

I don't really care either way and even if I did it wouldn't matter the rules are here to stay regardless of what we think. Seems like most of the new rules are here to protect people from getting their feelings hurt but hopefully the rules will be enforced reasonably. It is ironic though that there was a paragraph dis-crediting the use of capitals only to have "I AGREE" be typed in all caps.

 

[Brad Shepard]

This is the Law and Order SVU approach to rule breakers ain't it? You did something bad before, and your going to do it again, so we are going to keep a record of you, nothing you can do can change it, i have gotten 2 warnings and a probation, the warnings where for calling extremists asshats (Don't warn me for that or anything please, I'm just giving examples) and one for low content, and the probation was for posting 30 seconds before 5 minutes after a ZP video. I dont like that the health bar does not lower, is what im trying to say. Let the crimes reset depending on things, low content, a month, flaming, 6 months, telling someone to do something 4chan would find sick, A year. stuff like that.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

I will examine these rules.

Edit: That's completely ridiculous. If I say something nasty because I was in a bad mood or something I get a strike that never goes away? That's pretty heavy handed and unnecessary.

 

[Naheal]

A text box is meant for text, not images. If you want to add them to convey your point further, fine, but you should be capable of writing how you feel on a subject.

Woah, woah, hold on. Ever heard that adage "A picture's worth a thousand words"? There's a reason why I use pictures like I do. There's a certain amount of information and emotion that's displayed with a message or adds a certain amount of humor to an otherwise controversial topic.

Example: A topic about today's corporate journalists in the R&P forums may contain a post that simply has this and no text:

This alone could convey the message that the poster is attempting to give in less than a paragraph, yet they'd get nailed with a low-content post while putting up a paragraph about Jon Stewart being one of the hardest hitting journalists wouldn't, despite the fact that both conveyed the same amount of information.

You do realize that until a few weeks ago, Warnings weren't made public correct? We're not out to get anyone, we just punish those who have been reported or those we catch in the act.

Which is a different issue entirely from "there's no way to redeem yourself from your transgressions." On a message board that had just Off-Topic, Forum Games, and Game Discussion, you'd be in the right. However, with the addition of boards such as a Politics and Religion, issues will come up that will provoke a certain level of passion that wouldn't otherwise exist and, because of this, the board changes from a case of if someone will be banned, but when.

The punishment system is there to be used and I understand that it's there for that, but to simply state that your record from last year could invoke a ban despite having a relatively clean record in the meantime is a little ridiculous. Now that we have access to our own record (so to speak) we should be able to at least view how far we are down the track, but to say that this is a permanent state is a little alarming.

[user]BonsaiK[/user] put it best, though.

I think "advocating pornography" is a pretty hypocritical thing to be getting in trouble for, when it's being administered from the same company that brought you "I Hit It With My Axe", and the whole "might offend someone" thing is stupid to take into account when we've got content on here like Jimquisition and Zero Punctuation which is pretty much designed to be offensive on some level. I don't think they thought any of that that through very well, but I guess it remains to be seen how it's interpreted and how hardcore they get with it.

If you're going to send a message of this forum being "family friendly" and set up an area where "offensiveness" is something that needs to be watched, the site needs to really take that into account when they're putting new videos up. While I understand that Jimquisition is intended to be satire, you also need to realize that satire can easily turn into being offensive. It's an extremely fine line that's being walked there.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Hrm.

Question! Sorry if it's been asked already, but we're 19 pages in, you'll excuse me for not reading them all. If I've already been in trouble, does that count to my new permanent record I now have?

Derp, nvm. I just looked. And am a sad panda that I'm already so far along

 

[Labcoat Samurai]

Wow, never thought I'd see a forum that punishes people for using an Ad Blocker if they choose to admit it. Really? Really? Admitting to using an Ad Blocker is a punishable offense.

Worse than that. The wording may be unintentional, but technically, they seem to be under the impression that ad-blockers are illegal.

Think someone should tell them?