TOS Violators - How Should We Respond? Options

[Canar]

You're admitting to being suspended in a constructively-critical way. I doubt anyone's going to call you to task on that.

Also your comments about suspension are noted. That does seem like a strange inconvenience, though I can imagine a case where it'd be intentional!

[Yirkha]

I think it's good if even long time users with high post admit they got warned or suspended before, because it proves those are not some fatal ordeal but very common thing here on HA and any new members shouldn't have a feeling that only they are treated exceptionally badly.

[extrabigmehdi]

@Yirkha

any new members shouldn't have a feeling that only they are treated exceptionally badly

Yes , that's a problem here.

For the record, there's also an old thread , of someone "frightened" by the big number of bans:
Lots of Banned Users, It makes me feel a little nervous...

[greynol]

If that were such an issue then I would suspect that such a thread would not have essentially died after less than 30 hours some three and a half years ago. Perhaps you can dig up some other discussions as this one falls well short of supporting your idea that this is actually a problem.

AFAIC, if new members can't seem to figure out how to avoid additional warnings they shouldn't be allowed to participate in discussion.

This post has been edited by greynol: Oct 20 2009, 17:46

[rpp3po]

I follow several boards covering a broad range of interests. I have yet to find a better moderated board than HA. You usually get either under-moderation, causing endless and tiring flame wars, or over-moderation, where some jackass mods consider their own purpose as exercise of their personal princedom. If you take into account that HA mods are also just human beings, there is really not much left to wish for in my opinion.

This post has been edited by rpp3po: Oct 21 2009, 02:43

[Canar]

For the record, there's also an old thread , of someone "frightened" by the big number of bans: Lots of Banned Users, It makes me feel a little nervous...

Of course there are a lot of bans. Subjectivist nonsense is not welcome here.

[DocBeard]

In any internet community of any real size, there are always going to be people who don't feel like (or aren't capable of) playing nicely with others. My experience is that problems with that only really arise if (a) those people aren't dealt with in a responsible fashion or (b) those people are actually in charge of the place, and neither seems to be the case here. Not that I haven't seen moderation here sometimes that's seemed a little (or a lot) heavy-handed, but I'll take heavy-handed moderation and generally civil and interesting conversation (as we have here) over utter chaos with one or two frothing malcontents dominating everything (as I've seen more than one place devolve into) any day.

I don't really have a stake in the whole Grim Present Where There Is Only War Between Subjectivist Audiophiles and Scientifically-Minded Folks What Also Like To Listen To Music. I'm only here because of foobar2000, and because some of the technical discussions are interesting (though I will admit I don't understand that much of the very technical stuff!) But since you guys make it quite clear from the outset that there are certain lines of discussion -- specifically, unscientific assessments of audio quality -- that you'd rather not entertain, it seems to me that someone who comes in making wild claims about their $10,000 cables (or for that matter, someone who makes unsupported claims about how all differences between two sets of equipment or file formats are all in your head, you idiot) hardly has a right to be surprised when they're challenged on it. And there does seem to be a genuine effort to give people some benefit of the doubt before labeling them trolls and consigning them to outer darkness where there is only wailing and gnashing of magnetized vinyl teeth.

(I do cringe a bit every time someone here calls themselves an objectivist, though.)

This post has been edited by DocBeard: Oct 21 2009, 15:40

[Canar]

I do cringe a bit every time someone here calls themselves an objectivist, though.

Easy solution: Check your Ayn Rand books at the door. :B

[extrabigmehdi]

I just wanted to add, that some topics are more likely to induce some TOS violations from participant
than others.

Let me bet, that it will be the case with this new thread:
Fantasy Audiophiles vs. Objective Audiophiles: Has the hobby changed?

[Woodinville]

Well, although it's not much of an issue now, I've had more than one person try to call TOS #8 on me publically in a thread when mentioning some conventional understanding. It has been used here and there in an attempt at intimidation and/or discounting.

The moderators, however, don't do this, and don't seem to be very easy (if at all) to be dragged down this road.

[Nick.C]

Reporting commercial / website spam is working reasonably well, but surely a delay of a few hours between registration and first post would deter these parasites?

.... or alternatively make all newly registered users automatically have moderator review of posts set to on until the new member proves themselves to be a real member rather than a spammer.

[odyssey]

Reporting commercial / website spam is working reasonably well, but surely a delay of a few hours between registration and first post would deter these parasites?

.... or alternatively make all newly registered users automatically have moderator review of posts set to on until the new member proves themselves to be a real member rather than a spammer.

I second the review idea. Over at the doom9 forums, they have a week delay until you can post your first message, which is really annoying.

[Soap]

IIRC, Rockbox forums dump your first post into a spam folder. You're told explicitly your first post is going there, yet it still catches an awful amount of automated spam.

[botface]

I would simply like to see consistency. I realise that moderators are all individuals so, what "offends" one may not bother another but what concerns me more is that established members seem to be treated far more leniently than newcomers. This is especially true in the case of TOS 2 in my opinion, and to a lesser extent TOS 8.

I think TOS 8 has a glaring "let out clause" that should be closed :

"All members that put forth a statement concerning subjective sound quality, must -- to the best of their ability -- provide objective support for their claims." (my italics)

So, I can claim almost anything and back it up with completely inadequate data as long as that's the best I can do.

TOS 9 also needs a rethink. In the UK and many other countries, I believe, it is a breach of copyright to make a copy of copyrighted material without the explicit permission of the copyright holder. Yet a large part of the forum actively encourages and supports this illegal activity. I'm sure most of us don't feel that we're doing anything wrong and not suggesting that it should be discouraged but this topic is about how to deal with TOS violators. When The TOS themselves are ambiguous or inconsistent - let alone the enforcement - it undermines them I feel

[Canar]

I would simply like to see consistency. I realise that moderators are all individuals so, what "offends" one may not bother another but what concerns me more is that established members seem to be treated far more leniently than newcomers. This is especially true in the case of TOS 2 in my opinion, and to a lesser extent TOS 8.

See inconsistency? Report. If us mods agree with your rationale, we'll do something. My trouble is that I can only think like me, so all my moderation is based on the way I think. Help expand my view points! Report inconsistency! Or if you've got a lot of text to dump, just PM me. Having someone spoonfeed me with analyses of how the dynamics of a thread are playing out makes it far faster for me to go through and see if their complaint has any merit. This holds true especially in some of the lengthy technical debates that go on here.

I think TOS 8 has a glaring "let out clause" that should be closed :

"All members that put forth a statement concerning subjective sound quality, must -- to the best of their ability -- provide objective support for their claims." (my italics)

TOS2 fills that hole nicely. Legalism sucks. Leniency is necessary. We are human. We mess up.

This post has been edited by Canar: Oct 31 2009, 17:08

[Robertina]

May I ask whether each moderator is allowed to punish offences against the HA TOS (especially deleting SPAM and to ban Spammers)?

I have some good reasons to be interested in that.

[Yirkha]

What kind of reasons specifically?

[Robertina]

Answered via PM.

Robertina.