The Gang of Five

Beyond the Mysterious Beyond => The Fridge => Topic started by: Paradise Bird on July 26, 2009, 06:28:04 PM

Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Paradise Bird on July 26, 2009, 06:28:04 PM
Just asking
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: DarkHououmon on July 26, 2009, 06:35:14 PM
You mean from GOF? Yes, some people have been banned here. Ones I can think of right off the bat are nabil, mcr mad, and gloverboy.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 26, 2009, 06:40:25 PM
Yes we've banned people here, but the number of those is pretty small. and  we take pride in that. we pride ourselves on being a tolerant, openminded and accepting, and the vast majority of posters are well behaved..
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: landbeforetimelover on July 26, 2009, 06:50:18 PM
Although there have been a few legit members who have gotten banned for inappropriate behavior, most members who have been banned weren't people at all but rather spam bots.  I remember one bot that made a few posts linking to a couple of porn sites, but fortunately several admins were online at the time and were able to deal with the situation before it got out of hand.

nabil r got banned because he wouldn't stop harassing members about getting full versions of the LBT movies.  mcr mad got banned because he was constantly inconsiderate of other members and broke several rules.  I forget why gloverboy was banned but I'm sure it was for good reason.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: DarkHououmon on July 26, 2009, 07:01:00 PM
Gloverboy was banned because he was aggressive and rude to other members, including myself.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: pokeplayer984 on July 26, 2009, 07:07:12 PM
If members getting banned ever gets out of hand, I demand we put example posts in the "rules" area.

The ones that have already been dealt with were bad enough. :(
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 26, 2009, 07:18:15 PM
poke, we give legit members every opportunity before booting them. We don't ban people straight off the bat, in fact we rarely ban them at all. case in point.  out  of  over 300 posters who are currently members of this board, we only have three on the banned list, which is a percantange of well under 1%. Banning posters has not been a major problem here, and I don't see it becoming one either.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: landbeforetimelover on July 26, 2009, 07:19:50 PM
What are you afraid of getting corrupt admins?  That'll never happen.  I've been part of forums who's admins had become corrupted and there's nothing you can do about it if it happens.  Admins can just change the content of posts to make anyone look guilty.  But this will never happen on GOF.  The cause of a corrupted admin base is an unstable individual at it's core.  Petrie is not an unstable individual and even if he did become that way, he's chosen excellent people to assist him.  I just don't see GOF's admin base ever becoming corrupted.

Trust me, if the narcissistic snakes over at Demonoid forums can scathe off corruption so can we.  Demonoid is a base of incredible amounts of money.  So long as money doesn't get involved in a forum there shouldn't be a problem.  Now if the admins started asking for donations then I'd be worried but until that time I don't see any reason to doubt the stability of the admin base here on GOF.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 26, 2009, 07:28:29 PM
I've had to edeal with corrupted .ineffective admins before. It aint fun.. one board I frequented- a Spyro board, had a Owner who had come to completely loathe the newer version of the games..and the series itself He eventually shut the board down over the other admin and mod objections, and the board collaspsed..
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: landbeforetimelover on July 26, 2009, 07:47:07 PM
I don't know any more about the situation except what you've told me, but from what you've said I don't see that the owner of the forum did anything wrong if he was in fact the true "owner" and founder of the board.  If you create something you have the exclusive right to destroy it or order it's destruction.  If my server or website got large enough for me to appoint other admins, I don't believe they would have the right to stop me if I wanted to shut the place down.  After all, I was in fact the one who originally created it...........
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 26, 2009, 08:16:30 PM
Well if you don'rt want to run the place anyone, you can always turn it over to someone who does.,. I'd prefer that to destroying the board, over everyone's objections..as he did. As you can see the experience didn't sit well with me.. It didn't help that he called everyone who opposed his move " idiots".. in all it left a very bitter taste in many people's mouths..mine included.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: landbeforetimelover on July 26, 2009, 09:04:40 PM
If you create a painting and dislike it while the people around you think it's the best thing in the world, don't you still have the right to destroy that work if you wish?  It doesn't matter if that artist could just not look at it ever again.  It was their work and if they wanted to destroy it I don't see why they shouldn't be able to, regardless of how others feel about it.

Perhaps it wasn't the owner who had changed but the board itself?  He might have believed that the board had lost it's way or had become warped/corrupted.  Whatever the case, I don't bear any ill will towards someone that terminates their own work, regardless of the circumstances.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 26, 2009, 09:11:44 PM
I think it was him, the board at the time was  pretty well behaved, it was a community, as message boards are.. I think any feeling that board was completely corrupted came froim an internal view. Maybe I simply can't grasp destroying what you built with your own hands and built a community on it, which grew as time progressed. I'm the type that would hand over my  board to a trusted person, when I felt like I could no longer do the board justice. The board would survive my involvement.. whether it lasted would be up to the new owner..
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: landbeforetimelover on July 26, 2009, 09:17:56 PM
From what you were telling me it wasn't that he didn't feel he could "do the board justice", but rather that he disliked the board itself.  Maybe I've just had too many moments of realization, but I can fully understand his feelings in this matter.  At the same time I understand your feelings and the feelings of the other members.  If I look at this from a personal point of view, I would be quite angry if Petrie shut down GOF but at the same time I could understand if he did it due to not liking the way the board was going.  I admit that I too have a biased opinion on this, but I'm just trying to get you to see the other person's point of view and at least have a recognition of the other person's feelings.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 26, 2009, 09:23:47 PM
And I understand that, and I think my personal feeling color my recollection of the issue.  I've run boards myself.. and I've had to shut down a couple. But I've never shut down a community that still showed interest in the boards.. the ones I shut down were dead anyway..
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Malte279 on July 27, 2009, 03:13:56 AM
Rest assured that at least 3 out of five admins would have to be "corrupted" for anyone to get banned as a consequence. We imposed rules not just on our members, but also on ourselves. A single admin may not ban a member (with the only exception of the kind of porno side spambots already mentioned above) but can only temporarily suspend a member until the staff has come to a decision. If there are less than three out of five votes in favor of a ban it won't happen. Those bans we have had so far were all unanimous and nobody has been banned without a previous warning and / or suspension along with a message telling him about which rule violations he committed and the urge to change that kind of attitude. If in spite of all that members continue to break the rules thereby harming the GOF the point is reached where, for the good of the community, the admins will make a decision about whether or not to ban a member. Apart from this regularized procedure we also take the individual case into account of course (e.g. how severe the rule breaks are, if other members had been directly affected, and if the rule breaks were conducted deliberately or possibly out of ignorance (no warning message goes without a link to the board rules though, so nobody who repeatedly breaks the rules can claim ignorance)).
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Jasper on July 27, 2009, 03:28:38 AM
I think this other forum I'm on might have corrupted admins. They just banned someone for asking a question and she just joined the forum only five days ago just to get banned three days later.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: landbeforetimelover on July 27, 2009, 03:32:06 AM
If it makes any difference, I was warned to shape up by the admins myself when I first came aboard.  I never got a warning posted to my account, but I was close! :! I have no doubt that if I continued my behavior I would've eventually been banned.  But the admins explained to me what I did wrong and were very helpful with letting me know how to change myself for the better.  GOF has changed me as well as changed the way I look at the world.  To be frank I was a conceited jerk and needed to be put in my place. :p I don't know what was wrong with me.

EDIT:  
My biggest problem was wording things....diplomatically.  My family doesn't do that at all so I never learned that skill.  My behavior was quite rude and I spoke my opinions with NO sugarcoating at all.  Needless to say it created.....problems. :p  :wow
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Alex on July 27, 2009, 03:53:03 AM
I'm alot like that in real life. I'm alot like that on the internet, when I don't restrain myself from doing so. I recently got banned from posting comments on a site for things like that. I got banned from a game forum for doing that. The list goes on and on. That's why I'm a bit dull when I post on the GOF. I don't curse (that's half my vocabulary in real life :() or say everything with my brand of..."honesty"...
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Petrie. on July 27, 2009, 06:47:31 AM
There's not much else for me to explain here.  We help people out and try to get them on the right path before banning is considered.  If that doesn't work, three admins need to give the go to ban.  That's pretty much how it works here.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Paradise Bird on July 28, 2009, 09:59:50 AM
I see so anyone else that was been closed to ban?
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Malte279 on July 28, 2009, 10:59:20 AM
That is not the business of anyone else. The admins will not give anyone information about any warnings or pm / email based rebukes to any member that may or may not have occurred.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: DarkHououmon on July 28, 2009, 12:57:00 PM
Quote from: Paradise Bird,Jul 28 2009 on  09:59 AM
I see so anyone else that was been closed to ban?
Why are you so interested to know that anyway?
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato) on July 28, 2009, 01:18:21 PM
It's interesting information. Some people (myself included) love to figure out as much of the history of a place as possible. Why else would I go on an archive spree into long-dead posts, or try every form of URL "http://z7.invisionfree.com/thegangoffive/index.php?showforum=X" where X equals a number from 1 to 47, to find which (http://http://www.gangoffive.net/index.php?board=1.0) was off-limits, and therefore possibly the admin discussion forum? It's just fun.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Kor on July 28, 2009, 02:20:50 PM
I figure if the admin wanted me to see the admin sections they'd let me.  I'll not go poking around to see if I can accidentally see those places.  Having been admin on a talker, and mush/mux, I know the talk isn't anything exiting nor like, isn't x a git.  It's likely fairly similar to here except when a member is causing trouble, talking if someone may make a good admin, ect.  At least in my experience on the talker and mux/mush that is what the talk was of usually, and some talk of rp plots and problems certain plots may have, though that likely doesn't happen here since there is no rp admin sort of thing with them running most of the tinyplots.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Petrie. on July 28, 2009, 05:44:58 PM
LBT, if we want things to be public they'll be in the Announcements section or our newly created Rock Circle section.  Otherwise, no touchie. 'K? ;)
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: aabicus (LettuceBacon&Tomato) on July 28, 2009, 06:07:59 PM
K. :oops I did that a long time ago, I think when I had around 200 posts. It was blocked, I couldn't see anything.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Petrie. on July 28, 2009, 06:22:09 PM
As it should be.  Like I said, we have a public govt. section now...there shouldn't be anything left to be interested in.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Paradise Bird on July 29, 2009, 07:49:02 PM
I'm interested in who was banned because I want to know who were the naughty ones.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Malte279 on July 30, 2009, 04:25:56 AM
You were asking about those who got near a ban too.
So let me be very, very clear on this one:

It is nobody else's business if anyone has ever done anything that the admins did not think was necessary to be told publicly. There will be no prattling on our part about any information that might embarrass any of our members. It is a very sneaky thing if anyone attempted to spy or gathering sensitive information about our members' personal lives or anything that has not been published by the admins out of concern for the well being of the GOF or that our members decided to tell about themselves :angry:
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Paradise Bird on July 30, 2009, 07:13:30 AM
ok I guess so
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Petrie. on July 30, 2009, 07:24:38 AM
If you're really that interested, ask a member on MSN or something.  People who have been here long enough know the bad members who aren't welcome here.  Please stop asking the staff about banned members.  We have our reasons for doing what we do. ;)

Trust us...you really have to do something...evil here to get banned.  Its not as simple as it sounds.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Paradise Bird on July 30, 2009, 08:42:36 AM
Well if I were a spy I would have hacked the website not asking here.Anyway perhaps one day the admins could archive the history
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: DarkHououmon on July 30, 2009, 08:44:57 AM
Archive the history? What do you mean? Make everything that happened with members public?

Anyway, I understand where Malte is coming from. Personally, I don't see a reason against saying who was banned, the ones that will never come back, but I don't understand why you must know who was almost banned.

Let me ask you this. Let's say, theoretically, on another board, you did something to embarrass yourself and nearly get yourself banned, such as starting a huge fight with someone or telling off an admin more than once. Now, would you want the admins to make this embarrassing info public so that future members can see and read it? Chances are, I'd think you wouldn't want that to happen to you.

This is pretty much what you are attempting to do here; you are attempting to get such information released public on the forum about members here that nearly got banned, thus embarassing them as a direct result.

As Petrie had suggested, if you find it so important for you to know who was nearly banned, and who was banned, then you could send a message to some members via PM and get info that way. That way, the information is not made public.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: AvestheForumFox on July 30, 2009, 10:33:49 AM
I have been apart of certain forums that the leading admin made a list of the baddies public for the entire forum to see.

and in all honesty, its not a grand idea... it was like saying: "hey, these jerks suck! troll them!"

which made the entire staff look like 8 year old idiots.

nobody truly deserves to be marked like that. I don't care how bad they've been.. the ban treatment should be punishment enough..

and Adam, while I would agree about asking about such things via MSN, would it not also be a wise idea to discourage against  rumor spreading and other potential drama starting? such things work like a virus.. they start on the outside and gradually feed on into the inside....
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 30, 2009, 10:39:43 AM
We keep the list of banned people, small as it is, private. What they did, in ultinmately betwen them and us, and to reveal everything they did is simply a low. simply put, that is information we do not, and will not reveal publicly, under any circum,stances. the history of this board can be adequately filled without listed all those who got the boot
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Kor on July 30, 2009, 10:46:24 AM
& quite right it should be private.  The places I was staff at (before they went poof, this was way back, mainly in the late 90's) kept the list private also.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 30, 2009, 10:49:20 AM
Somre things should be kept private... How long were you an admin there Kor?
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Kor on July 30, 2009, 11:14:15 AM
At the various places? Varied from months to a year or maybe 2, before they went poof.  They were quiet places, except for the talker where the owners decided to take it down since it was getting to be to much and they likely wanted more time to do other things for a while, their money getting tight also.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 30, 2009, 11:18:34 AM
Understansable... do you think your experiences there have helped you on here?
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Serris on July 30, 2009, 11:20:52 AM
Ban information should be like medical records, you are not allowed to divulge them if you have been given access to them (for administrative purposes only).
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 30, 2009, 11:24:05 AM
good point.. also sensitive information, about you, should not be divulged unless the poster himself posts it
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Kor on July 30, 2009, 11:32:25 AM
Quote from: Nick22,Jul 30 2009 on  10:18 AM
Understansable... do you think your experiences there have helped you on here?
Not sure, I don't talk about those places much, and didn't mention it till recently I had been staff elsewhere in the distant past.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Nick22 on July 30, 2009, 11:44:19 AM
i should discuss your experiences Kor. Experience running a site can be very beneficial in determining what actions to take..
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Kor on July 30, 2009, 11:56:49 AM
If you like.  They were small sites that had as few problems as this one does.  1 site did occasionally have a guest who would appear, say something nasty then log off.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Malte279 on July 30, 2009, 01:12:24 PM
It is not the people who were actually banned here I am concerned about. They had their chances, they did not use them, they were banned as a consequence, anyone who bothers enough can look them up and that's that.
What I think most questionable about the request here was that it was for very private and personal information on members who are still active and that could potentially be used to embarrass members or worse. This is something we are not going to tolerate on the GOF.
Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Amaranthine on July 30, 2009, 01:14:20 PM
^Agreed. it's okay to be curious, but yeah, we don't want to embarrass anyone here.


Title: Has anyone Ever been banned here?
Post by: Alex on July 30, 2009, 01:59:35 PM
While on the subject, I have an Alex Anecdote.

On the last forum (it was a game forum) I went to, I got upset, because people were trying to scam one member out of one of his game items. I tryed to stop them. One moderator deleted all my posts, put my warning thing up 3 notches or something like that, saying "you know what you were doing wrong, you were ruining a good gesture on (member's name)'s part." Of course, none of the moderators actually played the game, and they only liked people with a big post count. I sent her a big paragraph about how I was tired of the moderators doing such things. Long story short, my warning was set to it's last notch, my name was changed to "MODERATED", my avatar and signature were set to ones they liked, and one mod felt the need to say in the chatroom they had, things like "ahahahahaah ther's that guy I changed the name to lol", "how r u doing today , buddie? keeping out of trouble, I hope." "cause one more strike and you're out". I got banned of course, because of the things I did next. The point being, once I had the name change, everyone could never read my posts of course, they would always just look at the name.

Singling people out that have done wrong is never a good idea. People abuse that knowledge, and ruins any chance that the offenders themselves have of fixing their mistakes.