Quote from: Christmas ApeApologies for the threadjack, but...
Dominus. I offer you a challenge with no risk or reward other than fulfilling or failing the challenge, which you may also ignore if you wish. But try this:

Go a week without talking about your hate boner for the SJG forums. One week. Seven days, one hundred and sixty eight hours, without mentioning it in any thread. Just to see if you can manage. I mean, it's not like it's offending me, but we get it. You don't like their moderation policies. But this isn't the "people pissed off with SJG forums" site. We're not here to nurse grudges.

To my knowledge.

CA, if you don't like my posts, feel free to use your IL.

Quote from: Dominus NoxCA, if you don't like my posts, feel free to use your IL.

I don't recall saying that. I've seen some posts from you that were easy to read and even entertaining or useful. I was just theorizing - okay, bad word for here - that maybe it's not applicable in every situation. That possibly, just maybe, given it's one of your central non-Klan themes, we'd all figured it out. That in the same way Pundit didn't want this place to become the anti-RPG.net, your efforts to make this an anti-'SJG forums' site might be inappropriate.

You're not interested? Hey, that's your right. I don't have a black avatar, I have no power over you. Just thought I'd put that out there, see if you felt up to it. No skin off my ass if not.

Besides, IL you? I'd miss all the wonderful times you open your mouth and jam both feet in up to the knees.

Quote from: JimBobOzMy personal advice is not to post a new thread to Trouble Tickets. They already closed down one; that means they don't want another! If a person doesn't want to discuss something, constantly prodding them about it won't improve matters.

In general, private emails and comments will be better-received than public ones. There's nothing special about rpg.net in this regard - if you're confronted publicly about anything, you're more likely to respond with hostility than if you're confronted privately. It's just human nature.

Given that I tried doing things their way by appealing J Arcane's ban with a considered and polite PM and got no response whatsoever, I'd consider that a waste of time. Posting on TT at least gives me a voice to express my dissent, even if it is closed immediately. And of course, closing it immediately would only prove my point. But then today's events have sadly convinced me that it is pointless - they just aren't prepared to listen or tolerate dissent.

QuoteThankyou for your compliments. I would say, firstly, that I am far from unique, and there remain many fine and interesting posters, and rpg.net will still be well-worth checking out, and posting to (for those of us who can). So keep checking it out!

Oh, I will. To be honest, I don't find much of value in roleplaying open these days - it's just swamped with Theory and Forgite proselytising. But I'll stick around for the PbP and Art of Game Design if nothing else.

QuoteI think it's entirely fair for them to ban people based on nothing more than personal dislike. It's a pain in the arse, but we have to accept that a forum is like any other kind of social group. It's not entirely rational.

Well I strongly disagree, but then my views of freedom of speech are fairly extreme.

QuoteI've been surprised at the number of people who give a shit whether I'm banned or not, it's quite flattering. I'll say again that I'll miss the conversations there. They just need a few more mods with active game groups to give them perspective

Actually I think the moderating culture there is the problem. I think the only way things would get better would be a sweeping change, with at least half the current mods replaced with fresh faces. Generational change and all that. Maybe they should invoke term limits.

We're unfriendly to women and homosexuals?  Is that forum policy now?  Do we have to be or can we just like not get in the way when people are ranting about women and gays?

Because you know, I post on other forums and work from home quite a bit so I don't think I'll be able to devote myself full-time to the job of hating women and homosexuals.

Quote from: BoyTypeRanmaYou people are unfriendly to me? I hadn't noticed.

Me either.  There was some sort of rant that included furry fans as a target on this site somewhere, but nobody's been shitting on me personally yet.

Quote from: JimBobOzI said long ago, that really rpg.net - and any other forum - has just one rule: don't fuck with the mods. All the rest is just tinsel on the tree. I didn't fuck with the mods, but someone there obviously disliked me.

If you post a lot, you'll come to their attention. Some, like Amado G., they'll like. Some, like me, they'll dislike. Likes and dislikes are not rational. Haven't you ever kicked someone out of your game group because you just plain didn't like him? Or kept someone who was a cocksmock, but you liked him?

That's life. They're only human.

Unfortunately that bodes ill for me.  I've pissed off an admin in the past, to the point where I requested via PM that he refrain from conversing with me.

And now that they're openly banning people just because they dislike them.  Ugh.

I've found RPOpen to be a good place for roleplaying discussion in the past,  but it seems like it's grown harder and harder to separate the wheat from the chaff.  Good gaming discussion rarely happens anymore.  Instead you get Kiero-esque bitter-ex-gamer naval gazing.  Threads with topics like, "People that make you think of Exalted characters" and and "WUSHU - is anyone still playing?" hold about 0 interest for me.  I'd like to...  I dunno, dig into the meat and potatoes.  So maybe it won't be too big of a loss now that we're being lined up against the wall.

*Tongue wedges firmly into cheek*
Wow, maybe I just don't know who I'm dealing with over there, but check a bit of what I just Googl'd:

The wrath of Mods are like great waters that are dammed for the present; they increase more and more, and rise higher and higher, till an outlet is given; and the longer the stream is stopped, the more rapid and mighty is its course, when once it is let loose. It is true, that judgment against your evil works has not been executed hitherto; the floods of Mod's vengeances have been withheld; but your negative posts in the mean time are constantly increasing, and you are every day treasuring up more snark; the waters are constantly rising, and waxing more and more mighty; and there is nothing but the mere pleasure of Admin, that holds the waters back, that are unwilling to be stopped, and press hard to go forward. If the Admin should only withdraw his hand from the flood-gate, bannings would immediately fly open, and the fiery floods of the fierceness and wrath of Mods, would rush forth with inconceivable fury, and would come upon you with omnipotent power; and if your strength were ten thousand times greater than it is, yea, ten thousand times greater than the strength of the stoutest, sturdiest storm giant in Faerun, it would be nothing to withstand or endure it.

The bow of Mods' wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the string, and justice bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the bow, and it is nothing but the mere pleasure of Admins, and that of angry Admins, without any promise or obligation at all, that keeps the arrow one moment from being made drunk with your post count. Thus all you that never passed under a great change of heart, by the mighty power of the Spirit of Tangency upon your souls; all you that were never born again, and made new creatures, and raised from being dead in gaming discussion, to a state of new, and before altogether unexperienced light and life, are in the hands of angry Mods. However you may have reformed your life in many things, and may have had Narrativist RPG preferences, and may keep up a form of GNS discussion in your families and closets, and in the house of Big Purple, it is nothing but his mere pleasure that keeps you from being this moment swallowed up in everlasting permaban. However unconvinced you may now be of the truth of what you hear, by and by you will be fully convinced of it. Those that are gone from being in the like circumstances with you, see that it was so with them; for bans come suddenly upon some of them; when they expected nothing of it, and while they were saying, Peace and safety: now they see, that those things on which they depended for peace and safety, were nothing but thin air and empty shadows.

The Mods that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes, than the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours. Your posts about gaming have offended him infinitely more than ever a stubborn D20 fan did a Wushu fan; and yet it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the fire every moment. It is to be ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go to hell the last night; that you was suffered to awake again in this world, after you closed your eyes to sleep. And there is no other reason to be given, why you have not dropped into hell since you arose in the morning, but that Admin hands have held you up. There is no other reason to be given why you have not been banninated, since you have sat here in the house of Big Purple, provoking his pure eyes by your sinful wicked manner of talking about RPGs. Yea, there is nothing else that is to be given as a reason why you do not this very moment drop down into hell.

It's a fire and brimstone fest!

Essentially the published RPGnet rules are a stick with which to beat people the mods deem troublesome.  If a rule can be stretched to exclude someone bothersome then it will (for example, I was banned under the group attack rule last time for saying that people who read Drizzt novels are wasting their time... the group attack rule being originally written so as to exclude racists and homophobes).  But the mods have other sticks too.

I remember back in the day the big ginger guy, benjamin something or other was permabanned "pre-emptively" on much the same grounds as JimBob.  there was a big stink kicked up about how he hadn't broken any actual rules and he was re-instated.

Nowadays, seemingly it's common practice for people to be banned pre-emptively without actually breaking any rules.  The difference is that A) the posters have become institutionalised and are used to it so they don't complain and B) if people DO complain then the thread gets locked before it picks up any steam.

The scary thing about RPGnet isn't the actual moderation, though it is arguably some of the worst anywhere on the internet, it's the attitudes of the posters to moderation.

If you look at it from a sociological perspective, it's actually quite similar to some of the stuff going on in America right now.  People become use to having their freedoms trampled on and they come to love the people that do the trampling.

The thread Balbinus started won't be interesting for the responses of the mods (they'll bring out the old platitudes about the spirit of the rules, the fact that it's a private site and so on), but rather the posts that uncritically "support them".

RPGnet is not a nice place fucked up by bad moderation... it's a fucked up place full stop.

JamesV, that was fucking awesome. Your post makes Cessna's "komissar" title look as lame as Dominus Nox's revenge pr0n fantasies. They have much to learn

Quote from: JimBobOzJamesV, that was fucking awesome. Your post makes Cessna's "komissar" title look as lame as Dominus Nox's revenge pr0n fantasies. They have much to learn

Ahh, posters in the hands of an angry Mod.

Quote from: Mr. AnalyticalNowadays, seemingly it's common practice for people to be banned pre-emptively without actually breaking any rules.  The difference is that A) the posters have become institutionalised and are used to it so they don't complain and B) if people DO complain then the thread gets locked before it picks up any steam.

What's surprised me is that a number of people have emailed, or PMed me on this or other sites, saying that they think it's a bad ban, but they daren't say anything publicly. It's not "millions of lurkers support me in email," about half a dozen - but I honestly wouldn't have expected even that many to notice I was banned, or care, let alone bother to email.

I'm surprised people dare not say things publicly.

Quote from: Mr. AnalyticalThe thread Balbinus started won't be interesting for the responses of the mods (they'll bring out the old platitudes about the spirit of the rules, the fact that it's a private site and so on), but rather the posts that uncritically "support them".

Well, obviously I won't see this thread of Balbinus' - what's it about? I hope people will be kind enough to post me highlights

Quote from: Mr. AnalyticalRPGnet is not a nice place fucked up by bad moderation... it's a fucked up place full stop.

I disagree, obviously. It's not fucked-up, it just has somewhat foggy moderation. But it has many fine and interesting posters. After a long time online discussing things, we become somewhat jaded to it all, and cynical about the content, and more snarky about the relative worth of threads and people's opinions. Keeping that in mind, I think it's fair to say that rpg.net is as good and bad as it ever was, for its actual original purpose, discussing rpgs.

Quote from: Mr. AnalyticalEssentially the published RPGnet rules are a stick with which to beat people the mods deem troublesome.  If a rule can be stretched to exclude someone bothersome then it will (for example, I was banned under the group attack rule last time for saying that people who read Drizzt novels are wasting their time... the group attack rule being originally written so as to exclude racists and homophobes).  But the mods have other sticks too.

I remember back in the day the big ginger guy, benjamin something or other was permabanned "pre-emptively" on much the same grounds as JimBob.  there was a big stink kicked up about how he hadn't broken any actual rules and he was re-instated.

Nowadays, seemingly it's common practice for people to be banned pre-emptively without actually breaking any rules.  The difference is that A) the posters have become institutionalised and are used to it so they don't complain and B) if people DO complain then the thread gets locked before itpicks up any steam.

The scary thing about RPGnet isn't the actual moderation, though it is arguably some of the worst anywhere on the internet, it's the attitudes of the posters to moderation.

If you look at it from a sociological perspective, it's actually quite similar to some of the stuff going on in America right now.  People become use to having their freedoms trampled on and they come to love the people that do the trampling.

The thread Balbinus started won't be interesting for the responses of the mods (they'll bring out the old platitudes about the spirit of the rules, the fact that it's a private site and so on), but rather the posts that uncritically "support them".

RPGnet is not a nice place fucked up by bad moderation... it's a fucked up place full stop.

What shits me are the people like Old Geezer who try to derail any critique of the moderation with inane jokes about being oppressed or mindless drivel intended to drag the thread off topic. It's clearly deliberate, and reminds me of nothing more than the old "four legs good, two legs bad" strategy from Animal Farm. Drowning out debate with their bleating, rather than trying to contribute to the discussion. Lalalala!

And what annoys me even more is that Kiero does exactly what people are accusing Jim Bob of and gets away with it. So instead of getting rid of the poster who hates gamers, we lose the guy who actually loves gaming.

Quote from: Illegible SmudgeSo instead of getting rid of the poster who hates gamers, we lose the guy who actually loves gaming.

To me, that's most indicative of what's wrong with that site.

Quote from: Illegible SmudgeWhat shits me are the people like Old Geezer who try to derail any critique of the moderation with inane jokes about being oppressed or mindless drivel intended to drag the thread off topic.

  It's human nature.  Some people's reaction to the emergence of unaccountable authority with supreme power within their community is to try and ingratiate themselves.  Others want to topple it.  Others just want to move along to somewhere a little more accountable.

  Every authoritarian society in human history have had those types as Orwell knew full well.  You're exactly right with the 2 legs bad, 4 legs good reference.  Spot on.

Quote from: Illegible SmudgeAnd what annoys me even more is that Kiero does exactly what people are accusing Jim Bob of and gets away with it.

What is Kiero doing that I am accused of? I didn't think I was accused of anything. "Passive-aggressive trolling" is just another way of saying, "I find you annoying," it means nothing at all.

Kiero should not be banned. But you should defnitely be able to ask what he's doing on a gamer site if he dislikes gamers...

Quote from: JimBobOzWhat is Kiero doing that I am accused of? I didn't think I was accused of anything. "Passive-aggressive trolling" is just another way of saying, "I find you annoying," it means nothing at all.

Kiero should not be banned. But you should defnitely be able to ask what he's doing on a gamer site if he dislikes gamers...

Oh, as annoying as I find him, I don't think he should be banned. But basically, I think he's guilty of what people accuse you of - of being provocative and using the rules as a shield while being careful to stay just within them. I don't think people should be banned for that, but it's very aggravating not to be able to respond or call him on it.