Thread closing is getting way out of Hand

In a recent thread of of mine, Snape wrote:

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Well, yes, it would have been appropriate to tack a public apolgy to Neil, for my erronious assumtion, onto the end of the thread. I was about to do precisely that but I could not. Guess why?

Because Vantastic closed the thread! Within three hours of OP, and before I had chance to even read the replies. This time I know it was Vantastic because he helpfully posted:

however, even you failed to notice the thread was closed apparently.

I am stunned. On other fora. a dead issue is just allowed to naturally drift out of sight and only gets closed by mods if it contains abuse or suchlike, or the OP asks for it to be closed. I mean, it is up to the OP not the mods to judge if a thread is so very dead that it needs to be swiftly put out of it's misery


I think I shall give up posting on this forum, and use it for reference purposes only. If I make a thread, I like to be able to post in it subsequently, if only to thank the people who respond to my query.

However, don't expect any such thanks or acknowledgment from me, this time. I've given up.

jay

PS sorry Neil! (too annoyed to be more gracious but that's not your fault)


​

 

They will get better with the forums.

Its a new team of people with different views.

I Imagine the ARK team is going to review a lot of the people they have taken under there wings respectively.

At the moment they are running a lot of events and such, and with the delays of content its hard to see them focusing on much else until that time.

Forum modification, Changing events in the middle, these can all be growing pains of a good company. Or these can be the norm.. Its up to Arkadia to decide what they will do. One thing is clear, over moderation is going to lead to forums in which nobody will post. Spending time to write out forum posts for whatever reason seems trivial with the current state of moderation. I know for a fact that a active forum will lead to much more enjoyment from the player base, and profitability in advertising and much more for the arkadia team.

I am not saying these people are all bad, or don't serve a perpouse. I just think the forum will do much better in the years to come if people can respectfully discuss issues. And Sometimes when these issues lead to unrespectful chatter on the forum. You take the party, or both parties and you simply give them a warning ban, maybe 2-3 warning bans before a perma ban..

And face it, sometimes your emotions can speak for you instead of your careful thought out responses. And on the other hand if your banned 3 times then nobody here is going to care to see them go. We need to build a community, and we do that by learning the good, the bad and the ugly of all involved. To just shut them down and take them out.. well to be honest.. nobody knows who to avoid.. and it paints a rosy picture sure, But not a realistic one.

 

Can someone close this thread, please? Kidding...

Oberto, as you said yourself, IF the threads are discussed respectfuuly, they should continue. But I hope the mods continue to lock down the non-constructive, disrepectful rhetoric that spews forth from those that have no desire to resolve their differences, yet are only interested in provoking anyone opposed to their views or style of play.

 

I believe the idea is that once the OP's question has been answered, the threads are closed to keep things tidy. However, I do agree that sometimes the mods close them a little prematurely. There have been a couple times I've wanted to add something to the OP's question—something that I thought was valuable—and found the thread closed. I'd say leave them open a bit longer if there's any doubt that the OP's question or issue could benefit from additional comments.

P.S. No offense, Jaywalker. I was confused at first, but what you said makes sense if you thought I was a mod.

 

No clue what the specifics of this thread are in regards to, but in general terms I'd rather see threds remain open unless there is a real problem with them getting out of hand. Even if there is an issue that has been resolved I'd still like the option to comment in the thread if I want to for whatever reason.

 

Umm, just want to make it clear (to those who didn't see the other thread) that I hadn't said anything worse about Neil than that he closed some threads! So it was a case of misattribution, not flaming .And the thread was closed because of "1. The OP has had his question answered"

Snape, yes I could have sent a PM to Neil, but I think that if misinformation is given publically, then it should equally be publically retracted. It would be pretty bad form , on my part, to just send a PM. Also, as I said, it is only polite for the OP to thank respondants, and i had no opprtunity to do this either. I see that others have already given further reasons for keeping threads open. There are many, many reason.

Honestly, the problem with people necroing threads is relatively rare , compared to this problem , here.

Vantastic, may i make an observation re. 4?

On the surface of this, this is very reasonable. But people tend to forget that forum threads also have the potential to resolve controversial issues. I've seen this happen any number of times. We also forget that this is a game forum, people do communicate outside the forum, and that the controversies and rumours under discussion will continue to rage, unmoderated, in-game. Sweeping them out of sight, on the forum, does nothing to stem them, it only makes them worse.

Here's a good example of the forum playing a constructive role here:

I heard in-game that a certain ava was a confirmed pirate, so I posted that question on this forum. The accuser posted in answer, others posted, and it turned out to be a case of mistaken identity.

Now, if not for the forum, that accusation would have been propagated throughout the Universe, and even if the accuser had realised his mistake, it would have made no difference because they couldn't possibly trace evey chain of chinese whispers and speak to all the people who heard the rumour, individually.

Yes, that discussion might have got heated. It did not. But even if it had, that would still be a small price to pay for the eventual resolution (especially given that people will have heated words in-game, nonetheless)

jay

 

Yep, nearly all fora have such a rule. In most fora , you can take it with a pinch of salt, realising that it's only there to cover you, when people push the boundaries too far. Literally banning all public criticism is the hallmark of a Mad Dictactor, after all, isn;t it? .

Seriously.I would not , for one moment, be willing to trust any Admin, mod, leader or whatever who rigidly enforced it, and would not consider it worthwhile engaging in a PM discussion with the same! (Yeah, i actually have been on fora that were led or moderated by Mad Dictators, and I've seen the kind of PMs they send out, and the kind of responses they make to unwelcome PMs. They are not pretty, and can actually do a lot of harm to vulnerable people)

Don't get me wrong! I don't think you guys are Mad Dictactors. I just think that you haven't all had the same experieces I've had. But I do avoid resorting to PM if I have something negative to say, in general, for very good reasons (too complex to go into fully here, but largely based on the observation that forum bullies and suchlike really thrive in a closed one-to-one environment)

jay

OH! btw, must thank you, Vantastic for NOT closing this thread!!

 

I agree

-ish

Trouble is, there's also the frequent problem that a forum troll will jump in to disrupt a perfectly respectful and constructive thread.

If the thread gets locked, then the troll has won and is sitting there cackling with delight, because that's his whole intention usually.

In such cases it's more appropriate and constructive to delete the troll's posts and all replies to it, but leave the thread intact.

jay

 

And to take it a step further, Have the troll under a temp ban, make something happen to that extent.

Once people see that there actions will lead to them being unable to post for a week, maybe they will reconsider acting irrational.

As of now someone with bad intentions just needs to create a stir, resulting in most cases the thread being shut down. This not only creates a bad blood on the forum between the parties trying to resolve a issue, but it creates a attitude in which forum trolls will "WIN" when they decide to attack a thread.

It seems the ARK team are understanding that things tipped a bit to much toward overmoderation and are doing there best to provide a viable forum for us to use.

 

Asbolutely, Oboy!

I particularly agree with this bit:

Yeah, I am really impressed with their responses on this thread. It's just a pity that I don't have any rep power yet!

jay

 

In my opinion.

It would be no post deletions unless the person has broke a rule that warrants such action. (Such as abuse ect.)

If you handle all abuse the same way your going to have no grey areas. Its when things are up to moderaters decisions that things get dicey.

When the rules are all laid out for those to see, nobody can bitch or complain when there post is gone if they broke a rule. If they don't break a rule the thread should go on without interuption as a rule of thumb.


And for TEMP bans I think they should be handed out more,
PERMA bans on a very rare case.

 

I didn't mean that people couldn't see them literally

Meant it like when the rules are set in stone, than the actions are punishable by set response.

Its when things can be left up to interpretation that moderators will be looked upon potentially in a bad light. Or be thought to be a personal favor ect. When its a "judgement" call is when someone may claim favoritism.

No interpretation in the rule set by having your rules set in stone will mean that people should have a hard time abusing a thread that can resolve itself over the course of debate.

 

Gotta disagree with you , here, Oboy.

Human language is never unambiguous, human motivations even less so. You simply can't set a clear set of rules to determine whether somebody is making a valid point, or trolling. It just isn't possible. Like it or not, Mods will just have to judge every case on an individual basis, and whatever their decision there will be those who disagree.

I like that Snape is contacting people by PM first and giving them a second chance, don't you? But that adds the further complication from our own perspective, that we can't know what's going on behind the scenes. The difference between one poster getting banned and another not might simply be that the first poster already had two warnings. So it might appear unfair, without actually being so.

I'm not fond of bannings and deletions, either, but when the only other option is to close down a whole discussion, I would definitely prefer that the miscreants got a temp ban. IRL, if someone walks into a bar and starts a fight, it's the troublemaker who gets slung out, not the whole roomful of people along with him. Can't see why it should be different online/.

Snape, I can see why it looks contradictory to you :lol: but the point is that something must be done to stop trolls ruining discussions. We all agree on that much. If the thread gets closed,on his account, then the troll has indeed ruined the discussion; he;s probably delighted about it, will only be encouraged by his success ;all the other posters are disgruntled, left unable to repond to each other, and feel that they've been tarred with the same brush.

That doesn't actually fix the problem. Temporary bans and post deletions would. They are not ideal, I would sooner find a less harsh solution, as would you, but at least it is fair and effective. Its not fair to curtail a respectful discussion just because somebody walked in and ruined it. But between that and targetting the troll rather than thread, do you have any better ideas?

I have one or two better ideas, but they are likely too much trouble (eg implement a self-moderating system, where offensive posts are not deleted but hidden from view, in response to user votes. If you really want to read them , you can click on a link.)

jay

 

I know that a user gets banned (whether perma or temp ban, mods/van will have to clarify) when they get to 10 (?) negative rep points... But I think most users are hesitant to use the neg rep. You can report a post.. But not sure if that does anything either.. Other than alerting the mods, of course..

On the mod side.. I've been there.. I know what it's like... It wasn't as big a forum as this is, but it was pretty similar in active members, I think... At least at one point... It's pretty well defunct now, because a mod got power hungry and killed it..

 

Whaaaa ? Really? Are you sure?
Eek! This forum could be ruled by the kind of people who dish out neg reps all over the place, in that case. These are decidedly not the best judges, in my experience.
Here's hoping you got that wrong

jay