[ToS Clarification] ROTS Forum - Social Thread

Okay, this situation gets long and complex, IMO, and needs some serious attention from not only the ModSquad, but from the USERS, too. And by that, I mean a lot of posts about how "it's always been that way" don't cut it.

Last nights, and todays, Opera House thread has been totally out of control. Two users were banned last night for starring out words in excess of what ModSquad there wanted to see going on. I can understand their position, but have to raise the question: What is excessive? ToS states that they need to be completely starred, and they were. It does not state that there cannot be 1000 posts in a row with 100 starred out words each. While I personally would not want to see that, and believe what was going on was excessive, this needs to be addressed because there is a major 'culture-clash' going on in ROTS at the moment.

I want it understood that I am not picking on any one person, as this goes far beyond any one individual and encompasses the entire forum.

Taking a step back, the situation last night was wrong on both fronts. The users making the situation worse were in the wrong for not backing off. But in the same regards, the Mods in the forum were a little excessive in their warnings (in the public thread, at least), and were perhaps a little heavy-handed in their overall handling of the situation.

Now, part of this is the fact that you have 3SA and 3NS clashing together. When the decision was made for the 3NS threads to be archived, and everything turned over from 3SA into the ROTD forum, I'm not completely sure there was 100% thought given to the differences in the forums, and what might occur from basically annihilating one, and giving the other complete reign. I say it that way because, as I said before, you're going to get a lot of "it was always that way", as these threads were originally 3SA, and many users feel it is basically still the same forum. It is not.

There is no 3SA any longer. There is no 3NS. There is ROTS. But that begs the question of why one forum was given, essentially, preferrential treatment by allowing it to remain, while the other was archived. Why not throw them all together, or, possibly better in this case, throw them all out and start with a totally NEW forum? Again, this goes way back. These forums started as 1SA and 1NS, and grew to where they were when the merge happened. With the shutdown of 'expectations' of upcoming movies, did it not make sense to start over on forums, as well?

Would that, logistically, have been a little harder? Possibly. But, would it not have forced the two to come together a little more, instead of the existing "this is OUR forum" mentality that is currently happening?

Again, I know this is a lot, and it's the root of the problem that is currently creating the situation that needs to be addressed for a beneficial change to take effect.

And I would certainly like for the clarification on ToS with regards to the situation last night in the thread, as that does affect at least one member of my group directly.

Thank you, and I appreciate your input on this matter.

 

It does not state that there cannot be 1000 posts in a row with 100 starred out words each

sounds like spamming to me

 

That's not exactly true. 3SA was created after the release of AOTC. What was PSA (Prequel Spoilers Allowed) became the AOTC forum. But you're right, 3NS did grow from the original NSA (No Spoilers Allowed) forum.

 

True, Malkie, and I was only using that as an example.

Myself, I found what was being done in the thread to be excessive. BUT, that does not clarify what 'excessive' in board terms is, and I think that is part of the problem here.


EDIT: And I understand that, Jeff, but that's more arguing technicalities. The base user-group for the forums moved with them. But in this instance, the forums are basically dead and gone, but one was given the luxury of having theirs turned into the 'Official' forum, where the other was not. This is creating more than a little tension in the forum itself, and could be the root of some of the problem there, as the two groups are used to totally different forums, in tone and structure.

Understand, first of all, that this is why I had previously avoided the forum altogether.

 

There was way to much confrontation and baiting going on from both sides. It is still going on. Nobody should have been banned last night. If the thread was too hot the thread should have gotten a temporary lock to let everyone -- Mods and Users -- cool off.

 

by nature you can't define 'excessive' - not only is it entirely subjective, it is also entirely dependent on situation and context.

*cough*case-by-case*cough*

 

i want to know if you are gonna ban pictures in the social threads all together. that's what sinister is implying.

it was the only thing i felt crossed the line. what if i want to show off my action figures or some junk?

FF

 

No, the same thing happened with the previous releases. PSA became the AOTC forum, and in doing so became the "official" place to discuss AOTC. The base usergroup didn't move from AOTC to 3SA until many months after AOTC was released - possibly even after the release of the DVD.

 

malkie, I understand where you are coming from regarding it seeming like spam but the ROTS social thread is one of the fastest moving social threads around. Five minutes can easily see 3 pages at 25 ppp.

FORCEFED . . . junk?

 

i see your attempt to change the meaning of the word "junk" and have me incrimnate myself in a comms thread of all places.




FF

 

YodaJeff posted on 6/24/05 12:48pm

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No, the same thing happened with the previous releases. PSA became the AOTC forum, and in doing so became the "official" place to discuss AOTC. The base usergroup didn't move from AOTC to 3SA until many months after AOTC was released - possibly even after the release of the DVD.
[hr][/blockquote]

Okay, but with the 3NS there was a sort of 'sheltered' existence, as it was Private to prevent Trolls. Now, as I see it, part of the problem there is that the tone of the two is so totally different, there is a clash between the two. And it does not extend entirely to Users. Even to the way situations with Mods are handled, there is a clash, as 3NS was much calmer and more 'civilized', if you will, than a lot of situations were likely to occur in 3SA.

And it's that root that the problem lies in, IMO.

 

I never said that we were going to ban pictures for the entire message board. Much less the ROTS forums. I said that could be a solution for that thread. The picture content is boardering on being too provacative. The mods, not just myself, asked for them to be cut back. They were until people decided to disregard our earlier statements. So we had to say it again.

Last night, several people were not only just posting excessively with words starred out, but were also flaming through it. I told those who were banned to knock it off. I gave fair warning and they refused to comply.

 

ROTS FORUM: As to the picture deal, well, we could always ban pictures in here.

I realize you didn't say you would. I said you implied it.
And from a mod, that seems like you are gonna do that. I just want clarification.


FF

 

darth-sinister
Title: ROTS Forum Manager
Registered: Jun '01
24181
Date Posted: 11:22am Subject: RE: The Galaxies Opera House Social Thread - Vol. 3

YTMND posted: Oh,well perhaps you would like to explain why?

Let's put it this way, it said I did certain things,which I clearly didn't if we go back and look at the previous pages.

I had an entire post deleted just because someone in particular didn't like it.But guess what? It didn't break ther TOS!

Neither did the single post that got edited. I love that I was told I posted SEVERAL non TOS approved images,yet I only had one post edited. I looked at everything I posted the other night and all of it fell in the TOS.

kthxbye



If you got issues with someone, come talk to us in private and let us see it. We'll deal with it. As to the picture deal, well, we could always ban pictures in here.

Well,that's what you said.

 

The people who were banned had prior marks on their record which helped to decide whether or not to ban them. But the thread was totally out of control. From the excessive number of animated gifs, to TOS violating photos to excessive swearing. The RotS mods together have decided that we have to seriously put our foots down, to get in back under control. Sinister and I explained to those in the thread that no longer will TOS violations and indecency be tolerated. Some posters responded with blatent insubordination and hence were banned.

All we are asking is:

Do not violate the Rules of Conduct, in words or photos: User agrees not to post material that is knowingly false and/or defamatory, misleading, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, sexually oriented, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, that otherwise violates any law, or that encourages conduct constituting a criminal offense.

That animated gifs be limited to 4 or 5 per 25 posts.

Swearing is kept to a minimum, even starred out swearing. There have been many instances where several posts in a row have just been swearing for the sake of it.

 

alright, i'll do my best to avoid your foots.


FF

 

Guys, give it a rest. You're not being persecuted. It's not censorship. You've been warned by the mods not to do something, so stop doing it. If you think there's a problem with what the mods have said, there are better ways to handle it than by pushing their buttons and testing their patience in the social thread.



Oh, the humanity! Oh, the injustice! The mods have violated our constitutional right to say whatever we want on somebody else's web site! We have been e-raped!!!


Gotta love drama.

 

RS77, it would have made more sense to give the thread a temporary lock to let everyone calm down. I've seen that done before with other versions of the ROTS social thread as well as other threads in the JC.

The whole thread was way out of control with people being ruled by emotions instead of rational thinking -- mods included.

 

Users will always get banned, before a thread gets a shut down.

Why punish all, if a couple are the culprits?


After 2 or 3 users get banned...then if there are still problems...then the thread gets shut down.

 

I lurk in the thread on occasion, and they're right about the excessive swearing. Even when starred out, it's just plain annoying. Do you like watching TV shows in which every other word is bleeped out? That's basically what the thread had become. The point of a social thread is to build the community and socialize, not see what one can get away with.

They're right about images being bad on dialup. I have to use dialup on occasion depending on where I am, and even with the banners adblocked on firefox it still takes a long time to load the pages. Animated pics also slow down computers with slow processors regardless of internet connection speed.

Last night sinister gave countless warnings and many of the posts responded in direct opposition to his warnings and contained exactly the content that he warned again. The bans were completely justified, and I thought he was being extremely patient with them under the circumstances.

 

Satimber

1) You haven't read the thread
2) You don't know the culture of the ROTS forum
3) It was more than a few users

I posted this in the Opera House:

sinister, by continuing to argue in here this thread is turning into nothing but a battle ground. This goes to everyone. More bannings are going to be handed out, more people are going to become angry. A Comms thread is now open to deal with this.

Let this thread return to being a social thread, not a firing range.

Sinister, you responded:

---

I didn't start this, but I will finish it if I have to. [hr]

That is propagating more hostility which isn't needed.

 

That response is what I call hilarious!

 

And as I said in the thread last night, I can see where there was excessive use of the lenient starring rule was taking place. And a lot of it was directed at the MS's attempts to quell the usage, and the MS themselves.

I'm not claiming any angels in this, and that's where I raised this point, to see if there could be found a middle-ground between everyone. I think a lot of 'flying off the handle' happened, but then, that's going by what I see there last night. What might have occured previously, I do not know for sure.

 

Dark_Lady_Jada posted on 6/24/05 1:52pm

---

sinister, by continuing to argue in here this thread is turning into nothing but a battle ground. This goes to everyone. More bannings are going to be handed out, more people are going to become angry. A Comms thread is now open to deal with this.

Let this thread return to being a social thread, not a firing range.

Sinister, you responded:
[hr]

I didn't start this, but I will finish it if I have to. [hr]

That is propagating more hostility which isn't needed.
[hr][/blockquote] He's given them more than enough warnings. The hostility is already there, and isn't going to go away. Many posters in the thread directly disobeyed his orders countless times in a row last night. He has given them more chances than they deserved, and yet they are still complaining.

 

1) So what? It is all the same e-Drama that happens on this site.
2) Don't have to go there too know it, since I have seen enough evidence to know that it can be hostile and troublesome.
3) As far as I have read, in the discussions...3 or 4 people were mentioned to be the troublemakers....