An Open Dialogue Regarding Forum Moderation

Just eyeballing it, that looks like a substitution cipher that shifts every letter to the right 13 places (with wraparound between z and a).

If they were to implement something that strict (suspending for first offense and permanent ban on second offense), then there would have to be something in place to make sure that the post in question was intended as a personal attack. Don't get me wrong, there are some posts that are unmistakably personal attacks. However, in this thread alone, there are posts where a statement was meant as a compliment, yet seemingly taken as an insult by the other person.

As far as going to a website to decipher it, all someone needs is a sheet of paper and a pencil. First they write half of the alphabet down, then the other half underneath. Like this:

a b c d e f g h i j k l m


n o p q r s t u v w x y z

The letters with the same ordinal number in each (e.g. first, second, third, etc.) are equivalent. Then, using that as a key, they can read any message that uses that cipher.

It is

Do you seriously expect people to transcribe it out letter by letter when they can copy and paste the scrambled text into the box on the rot13.com website and press one button to get it unscrambled?

My opinion is that this really isn't a feasible solution because

a) DBG have stated they are resistent to editing out offending text, let along encrypting bits of it (although in fairness Radar X said he might be willing to consider just removing offending lines in posts),
b) it would be time consuming on the moderators part to have to edit the post, copy, go to other website, paste encrypt and then copy and paste back into the orininal post and
c) it is far more time efficient for them to just delete the whole post, but then we get back to where we are today.

Then send a PM explaining why it was deleted along with the reason. My solution takes less than 10 seconds.

As I said in my post its a rot13 cypher. Not mean to be difficult. Simply meant to remove the reinforcement trollers get by posting. If no one understands that the post says the troller can get no joy. Someone can easily decyper buy cut/paste to rot13.com but most people wont.

The beauty of this is you're not removing or changing the meaning of what someone says. You're not editing their words. You're simply making it more difficult for the post to be read. More difficult. Not impossible.

In the spirit of openness and the obvious fact that contradiction is King here I will respond to the drop it request with one word


LEMMINGS.

I really like this idea Oldskool!

I'm also going to chime in and say limiting how many times someone can post in a thread would dissuade discussions.and severely limit the exchange of ideas. It would also keep folks from being able to clarify points that they have made. I would really dislike this type of moderation.

Now you will learn to like borchs and pirozhki

I cannot believe there is still so much hatred toward russians.

I think (hope) it is all tongue-in-cheek.

I hope so too but it seems not likely.

Historically in EQ2 there's been a lot of rivalry between the Russian guilds and guilds on other servers. All sorts of accusations and stuff about how servers are/might be tweaked differently.

It's like the race to the Moon, except with a lot less Moon.

I've had my own forums in the past and am currently a mod at one that has very strict rules. We have children there and everyone is expected to behave themselves right down to not even being rude. The one thing that it has always come down to is consistency.

Basically:

1. There are rules. Please read them.
2. If you do not read the rules, you are bound to break them. Please see #1.
3. If you do break the rules, we will:
   1. Delete the offending text and leave a red Mod note in its place stipulating why
   2. Remove the offending post altogether
   3. Give the user a temporary or permanent ban
   4. B & C

Sometimes if we notice the direction a thread is going in will take it the Dark Side, we post a warning and remind everyone to keep it civil and/or on topic. If it continues downhill, we lock it and state why.

Infractions range from trying to be sly to skirt the rules to **** spam to people going completely off the air. The last 2 will disappear quickly with no notes from us as to why, but the first is handled in a way that reminds both the OP and the rest of the community that the rules are strictly enforced. But the key is consistency. Everyone knows they can report any violation and how it will be handled when we get there. If anyone gets a ban they can send us an email to ask why, although for many cases we will email them first and tell them the reasons, along with how long the ban is and when they can return.

This seems like it must be a lot of work, especially with how many members we have, but it really isn't. It's a pretty well-oiled machine by now and the forum members police themselves a lot of times, simply because we are consistent when it comes to enforcing the rules. They know for absolute certain what is ok and what is not.

We're also very open with the community - we are there daily posting ourselves so we are very visible, and I think that may also be a key factor: we are not strangers. Everyone knows they can PM us directly or post in the thread or whatever, and they will get a nice response and an explanation of whatever they wish. We're not there to really "police" them - we are fans of the subject ourselves and we are all there for the same reason, us mods just have a few more rights to the forum software and know how to keep it cleaned up or fix problems as they arise. We're there to keep everything running smoothly so we can all enjoy it.

So my suggestions would be..
1. Be consistent
2. Be a larger part of your own community. Join in the conversations. You're players, too, right?

Reddit? That is a joke.. in poor taste. There is no discussion there, only a mob gleefully downvoting any honest criticism. Half a bubble off 4chan.

Re permabans....Just be thankful Virrago is long gone.

No, it's a legacy of the cold war that never died.

I expect it is that and sometimes fear of war. However, regular citizens have little control over what their countries do. I think interacting with each other can ease some of the knee jerk reactions though.

The moderation here has mostly been awful nice to see it hasnt changed at all,so sad it really is.

This could benefit from some punctuation.

There you go.

Much like there is no graceful way to use the emergency brake on a train, there is no graceful way to close this thread. This one I think has just about played out entirely and I'd like to close it while it's still in decent shape.

After 37 pages what did I learn:

• Many of you prefer we censor you on a granular level instead of removing an entire post.
• Some of you believe we regularly suspend peoples games accounts for forum violations.
• A few of you weren't going to believe me regardless of what I said.
• A few of you would prefer we take into account someones contributions instead of using a consistent system of warnings/suspensions.
• Some of you did not realize the forums are considered an additional service not inclusive to your subscription or purchase.
• Some of you were unaware that cumulative impact can result in moderation, not just a single extreme post.
• People had higher expectations than I believed for moderation.
• Almost everyone wants some type of appeal process.
• Some of you want blacklisting/complete transparency.
• There is a perception moderation actions are significantly higher than they are.
• Things happened a long long time ago which may created rumors.
• Prayos may in fact be my arch-nemesis due to his fondness for Rocket Raccoon.

What are my takeaways and what can I confirm:

• We are going to initiate the edit post policy at minimum on the EQ2 forums.
• We cannot re-institute the forum-admin email process based on the resources we have available. We're discussing what alternatives we can provide. .
• We are doing a full review of our moderation process to ensure everyone on our team is fully trained and capable of providing consistent practice across our titles.

I'll add more as I think of it (last week was kind of a blur) but if you have additional thoughts or think of questions do not hesitate to PM me. I'm more than happy to answer additional concerns.