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At 5/31/09 12:17 PM, Porkchop wrote:

At 5/31/09 12:13 PM, Jonas wrote:

Well, flat out bitching is kinda boring and stupid to listen to, seeing as how it's mostly whining about a justified ban.

Now, if it's fairly mild discussion of a ban, that's not that bad, is it?

It probably is boring and stupid to listen to, but at the same time, so was most of junior high.

Just because you don't want to listen, doesn't mean you shouldn't.

A lot of moderators could do well to deal with the screaming and pissyness and listen to through the shouting. It does help us when users are polite and question their bans though. Easier to hold a conversation that way. But snarky ban comments and reasons sometimes set the wrong tone to a user, and then at that point the moderator is really at fault if the user comes back angry.

Users set the tone for posts, but moderators set the tones for a ban. Both should remain polite, but rarely is that the case currently.

I think its not so much that the mods can't take a joke, as it is that the USERS can't take a joke. All the old timers around here laugh when a mod does something that is objectable but funny. But then the new users get pissed off because they just don't get it, so various mods are forced to be boring nazi mods or quit.

At 5/31/09 12:24 PM, zero-gravity wrote: I think we all have to look at the amazingly sad truth. The user demographic of newgrounds is slowly starting to lower in age (more 13 year olds). All you can simply do is one of two things.

1. Keep your integrity and keep at it
2. Play to the demographic and lax up.

I prefer the former.

And you were... 14/15 when you signed up? There's not alot in it. I signed up at 15, and I was a massive noob.

I'd say the average age has always been quite low, but we have mature games and shit like that. That stuff caters to 13 year olds.

All we need to do is offer encouragement, tell people how they can improve, and leave it at that. Really, if we don't fight them, then they'll either discover that we can be compassionate and learn to be that way too, or they'll get bored at the lack of conflict and move on to 4chan.

Good thread, and some interesting responses.

At 5/31/09 11:20 AM, Conspiracy3 wrote: There are some rules that mods have made by posting threads on the general forums and posting in their news posts. Those rules are not in the rules page linked to from the sticky at the top of the forum. A lot of new users get banned for breaking those rules even though they aren't in the rules page. For instance, clone posting is against the rules but it is not mentioned in the rules.

If those rules could all be put into the rules page that would help the forum a lot.

This is what I was going to say. Several times I've seen people complaining about their thread being locked/deleted saying thinks like "I read the rules and I didn't break any of them". I know that you moderators can't edit the rules page, but it's something that needs to be done. Zerok's rules blog should be included on the official rules, because even if all the stuff mentioned there is obviously bannable, new people may not know about it.

I think that's the most important thing that can (and should) be improved :)

I disagree entirely. This is a public forum, a forum is a place for discussion, imagine a thread as a conversation, if you're having an argument with a friend about the best way to cook eggs and you say something and your other friend who's walking by says "Yeah, good idea" you don't go "OMFG GET THE FUCK OUT I'M BANNING YOU FROM SPEAKING TO ME EVER AGAIN!!" do you?

Yes, but conversiing over a forum is different to a verbal conversation. People should be taking more time over there posts, because the pace of communication is slower. Do you like news threads where 75% of the posts are just 'That's cool' or, 'That's sick'? Posts with no substance which do not offer anything at all to the thread.

I do agree with you in some ways though. If you are actually directly responding to someone then I would think it as ok, but if its just a general reply then I dont really want to see it because 5 other people are probably going to post the same thing. Which leads back to the point about the community.

upload .png images?

At 5/31/09 12:27 PM, Jonas wrote:

Now, if it's fairly mild discussion of a ban, that's not that bad, is it?

It probably is boring and stupid to listen to, but at the same time, so was most of junior high.

Just because you don't want to listen, doesn't mean you shouldn't.

A lot of moderators could do well to deal with the screaming and pissyness and listen to through the shouting. It does help us when users are polite and question their bans though. Easier to hold a conversation that way. But snarky ban comments and reasons sometimes set the wrong tone to a user, and then at that point the moderator is really at fault if the user comes back angry.

Users set the tone for posts, but moderators set the tones for a ban. Both should remain polite, but rarely is that the case currently.

I think that those users just need to learn to take a joke and understand how sarcastic the mods are. I fully accept this and i respect them more for their sarcasm. If they want to go on a bitch fest that is their problem. I would personally stop coming here if the mods were a bunch of boring, by the book, farts who refuse to show a lick of humor because some pissy preteen is going to bitch about it.

At 5/31/09 12:20 PM, zero-gravity wrote: That way there is NO way any user can say they didn't know the rules.

Why does there need to be rules? It should be common sense. If this were my forum I'd scrap rules, I'd have basic posting guidelines which users were supposed to look at that outlined what you're encouraged to discuss. Negative rules suck, why can't we just have "Topics should encourage discussion, think of a topic as a real life conversation, try to post construtively."

Why do we need rules like "don't post rape her!!!!", why do we need to ban people for it? This is a community, all we gain here is respect from other users; if I have 10,000 posts of "rape her lol" nobody will care about me or respect me, if I have 500 posts that encourage discussion and present well thought out opinions I'm going to be respected, why do I need to be banned every post for "rape her!" or "epic lulz"?

If a moderator feels a post is stupid, delete it, why ban? Okay, if they're posting thousands and thousands of bullshit posts that don't contribute and they haven't taken onboard any warnings about being such a twat, then ban them, but banning for one stupid post is crap and encourages people to feel hard done by.

At 5/31/09 12:25 PM, TehSlapHappy wrote: Don't get me wrong, me and Poozy cool as far as the internet goes, but people that just complain about a simple ban from him need to shut up.

Why? If I disagree with a rule why can't I complain, why can't I tell a moderator that I think it's ridiculous that they've banned me for whatever reason?

At 5/31/09 12:21 PM, yhar wrote: if someone feels the best way to contribute is to post "lol cool", why shouldn't they be allowed?

If thats their best way, then they are more suited towards downloading aim and having a conversation in that. The forum post engages users and invites more conversation. A good first post. or even one liner should do that at the very basic form. lol cool doesnt really offer anything to the topic. Not really a bannable offense but you want to encourage healthy posting habits.

Like the term faggot, words like win, fail and epic should be bannable offenses.

I think that backseat moderating should be aloud to an extent. Like pointing out a mistake a mod made or telling someone to post a picture in another thread (if its in the thread it doesn't belong)

I don't know how many people have been banned for just making an observation.

I wish the mods would post weekly youtube videos of themselves dancing, in an event to see who the best dancer really is.

At 5/31/09 12:32 PM, yhar wrote:

At 5/31/09 12:25 PM, TehSlapHappy wrote: Don't get me wrong, me and Poozy cool as far as the internet goes, but people that just complain about a simple ban from him need to shut up.

Why? If I disagree with a rule why can't I complain, why can't I tell a moderator that I think it's ridiculous that they've banned me for whatever reason?

Yeah. Whilst bans may be quite insignificant, people should still have the right to complain about them in an appropriate manner. Screaming about it solves nothing, but if you have a genuine problem, then I see no reason why you shouldn't be allowed to voice your concerns.

It isn't just the users that should be aiming to improve, the moderators should too, and I think that's been something they've been generally too stubborn to do in the past.

At 5/31/09 12:33 PM, Luis wrote:

At 5/31/09 12:21 PM, yhar wrote: if someone feels the best way to contribute is to post "lol cool", why shouldn't they be allowed?

If thats their best way, then they are more suited towards downloading aim and having a conversation in that. The forum post engages users and invites more conversation. A good first post. or even one liner should do that at the very basic form. lol cool doesnt really offer anything to the topic. Not really a bannable offense but you want to encourage healthy posting habits.

I think the people that are like lol cool would really benefit from a 'props'/'diss' option or they come from forums where they are more used to lurking and they have those little karma options. They just want to say they agree or disagree, but don't anything to add. That being said, NG doesn't really encourage users to throw their two cents in, the way it currently is, we demand a buck fifty in exact change.

At 5/31/09 12:32 PM, yhar wrote:

At 5/31/09 12:25 PM, TehSlapHappy wrote: Don't get me wrong, me and Poozy cool as far as the internet goes, but people that just complain about a simple ban from him need to shut up.

Why? If I disagree with a rule why can't I complain, why can't I tell a moderator that I think it's ridiculous that they've banned me for whatever reason?

Complaining never got anyone anywhere. Complaining just makes people look so much more annoying. Now sending a mod a PM is cool, but when you constantly flame a mod on the forums, you're just making an ass of yourself.

At 5/31/09 12:30 PM, Haynesyb0y wrote: I do agree with you in some ways though. If you are actually directly responding to someone then I would think it as ok, but if its just a general reply then I dont really want to see it because 5 other people are probably going to post the same thing. Which leads back to the point about the community.

Just because my opinion matches that of 100 others, should I be quiet about it? Okay, from just looking at a thread it can be annoying to see 10 of "This is so cool!" but when you're sitting at your PC reading what someone has written and think it's cool you want to make your opinion heard, I honestly think it'd be a struggle to find any thread that has more than 4 different opinions on a single matter, just because someone doesn't take 10 minutes to write a long and complicated reply, it does not mean their opinion is any less valid.

At 5/31/09 12:33 PM, Luis wrote: If thats their best way, then they are more suited towards downloading aim and having a conversation in that. The forum post engages users and invites more conversation. A good first post. or even one liner should do that at the very basic form. lol cool doesnt really offer anything to the topic. Not really a bannable offense but you want to encourage healthy posting habits.

This forum is public though, if someone feels that their opinion can be summed up in "lol cool", why shouldn't they post it? I agree that constantly seeing "lol cool" posted is annoying and should be deleted, because they obviously can't be bothered to think, but if it's a one off, or very rare, what's wrong with it? I don't think it should be encouraged, but I don't think it should be something someone gets banned for, because they feel no need to pad out their post into something more lengthy.

At 5/31/09 12:39 PM, yhar wrote: This forum is public though, if someone feels that their opinion can be summed up in "lol cool", why shouldn't they post it? I agree that constantly seeing "lol cool" posted is annoying and should be deleted, because they obviously can't be bothered to think, but if it's a one off, or very rare, what's wrong with it? I don't think it should be encouraged, but I don't think it should be something someone gets banned for, because they feel no need to pad out their post into something more lengthy.

Yes, the forum is public, that's why it would benefit to be a generally social person and post like a half-minded person. If a person can sum up a post in "lol cool" then they obviously aren't thinking hard enough or lack the brain power to be apart of a forum. Usually if it is a one-off, then no action is taken, it becomes a bannable offense if the majority of your posts are short one-liners, not just 'lol cool' but other short posts. You obviously miss the point of a forum.

At 5/31/09 11:58 AM, X-TERRORIST-X wrote:

At 5/31/09 11:54 AM, gumOnShoe wrote:

At 5/31/09 11:52 AM, Gagsy wrote: Mods encouraging the making of gimmick alts

I'm not sure what you're talking about. I'll be taking everything into consideration.

Maybe he's talking about transformer? Who is obviously the alt of a staff member or mod. So if one of the higher-ups does it, it's okay. But for the average user, we get banned?

The rules are pretty clear when it comes to alt- and gimmick accounts:
- Creating parody threads or posting with gimmick accounts.
- Posting with an alternate account whilst banned or your main account while an alt is banned. Both accounts may be deleted.

you may have as many alt accounts as you wish, but if you make an account soley for the purpose of bullshitting around, it will be banned - just llike any troll/flamer/whatever would be.
and the other one is pretty clear, if you post with an alt account to get around a ban, you will get banned. Now, forum mods practically never do this, since they can't get banned from the BBS unless having angered Wade or any other admin.

Also, stop calling me a gimmick alt, I'm my own robot. Now my circuits got all sad and oily. :(

you should let things like "ALL HAIL THE HYPNOCAKE" slide a bit more..
everyone getting there post deleted and getting a 3 day ban seemed a bit bittersweet, considering everyone was in the joke..

At 5/31/09 12:46 PM, Transformer wrote:

Also, stop calling me a gimmick alt, I'm my own robot. Now my circuits got all sad and oily. :(

Don't worry that's not what I was getting at, at all. I've alerted a mod on what I mean and hopefully they'll deal with it.

People just assuming here.

At 5/31/09 12:39 PM, yhar wrote: This forum is public though, if someone feels that their opinion can be summed up in "lol cool", why shouldn't they post it? I agree that constantly seeing "lol cool" posted is annoying and should be deleted, because they obviously can't be bothered to think, but if it's a one off, or very rare, what's wrong with it? I don't think it should be encouraged, but I don't think it should be something someone gets banned for, because they feel no need to pad out their post into something more lengthy.

Yhar, I understand what you're saying, but I think you're having a hard time seeing the difference between a comment and a post.

Comments are something you'd see under a youtube video, or in a flash review. A flash in the pan quick hit thatprovides nothing for any discussion. There in lies the ultimate rub, as the basis for a forum is just that, a discussion and chat section where users are able discuss and talk about what other users are thinking.

Lol cool comes off in many senses, none of them show that much thought is going into adding into the thread, and ultimately, it falls on a very simple but big forum rule. If you don't have anything to contribute, don't post. Lol cool really doesn't contribute anything to something, at the same time, 'Wow, that is hilarious, I don't think I have laughed that hard in awhile. I was seriously rofling.' would be acceptable... probably. The biggest portion actually comes from your signature, 'Top NG posters'.

Ultimately, lol cool once it would be allowed into the NG lexicon, simply becomes a legit excuse for a quick +1 post. Post count really doesn't matter since they can be removed, it's the quality that other forum users should respect in that sense, so giving +1 posters a reason to try and ding their stats up, is counter productive since people do come to the forum for discussion.

If a user truly felt that lol cool was all they could manage to muster, I would they refrain from posting, and copy paste that into a flash review instead, or head into stickam :)

At 5/31/09 12:44 PM, Tramps wrote: Yes, the forum is public, that's why it would benefit to be a generally social person and post like a half-minded person. If a person can sum up a post in "lol cool" then they obviously aren't thinking hard enough or lack the brain power to be apart of a forum. Usually if it is a one-off, then no action is taken, it becomes a bannable offense if the majority of your posts are short one-liners, not just 'lol cool' but other short posts. You obviously miss the point of a forum.

If you want to get into semantics, go ahead:
"Define: Forum" "a public meeting or assembly for open discussion ".
"Define: Discussion" " an exchange of views on some topic; "we had a good discussion"; "we had a word or two about it" "
"Define: view" "position: a way of regarding situations or topics etc.; "consider what follows from the positivist view"

So, if I see a topic entitled; "Abortion is wrong" and someone has posted "I think that abortion is right because it gives women a choice about their bodies" and I think "Gosh, that's exactly how I feel!" and I want to make people aware that this is my opinion, should I spend 10 minutes putting together a reply that basically repeats that and then post it, should I post "I agree with this, excellent point" or should I just close the topic?

If they're constantly posting "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" and "I agree" then fine, punish them for it, but if they want to make their opinion known and it matches that of another user, why can't they make it known?

At 5/31/09 12:32 PM, yhar wrote: Why do we need rules like "don't post rape her!!!!", why do we need to ban people for it? This is a community, all we gain here is respect from other users; if I have 10,000 posts of "rape her lol" nobody will care about me or respect me, if I have 500 posts that encourage discussion and present well thought out opinions I'm going to be respected, why do I need to be banned every post for "rape her!" or "epic lulz"?

Because in this setting those kinds of phrases are like fire on kindling. The reason those posts were banned was because that was the only kind of response anyone was posting at the time and it was getting ridiculous. We have a moderation team because the community wanted one and because the administration didn't want thousand page spam threads full of posts similar to that one. I'm all for having fun, trust me, but quality of enjoyment plummets when everyone is simply parroting what everyone else is saying.

If a moderator feels a post is stupid, delete it, why ban? Okay, if they're posting thousands and thousands of bullshit posts that don't contribute and they haven't taken onboard any warnings about being such a twat, then ban them, but banning for one stupid post is crap and encourages people to feel hard done by.

And that's fine, I won't disagree with that. Warnings are cool, but as of now there's no easy way to keep track of which users have received how many users unless I open up a spreadsheet and keep track myself. I much prefer to give people warnings as a lot of you are sensible and will pick up on it, but I will strongly disagree with the idea that the rampant posting of memes and "rape her"-esque comments are not harmful to the community.

At 5/31/09 12:25 PM, TehSlapHappy wrote:

Why? If I disagree with a rule why can't I complain, why can't I tell a moderator that I think it's ridiculous that they've banned me for whatever reason?

Its better if you can do it politely, that's all I have to say.

At 5/31/09 12:48 PM, x-factor11 wrote: you should let things like "ALL HAIL THE HYPNOCAKE" slide a bit more..
everyone getting there post deleted and getting a 3 day ban seemed a bit bittersweet, considering everyone was in the joke..

the problem with bandwaggon-jokes and the likes is that some think it's all new and fresh, while some have seen it 10000 times already. it's not easy to be creative and original on the BBS, and it will always get to somone.
but depending on how the joke is performed, bantime doesn't have to be the solution. it's easy enough to just delete a post. problem is if something crappy is catching on, being quoted over and over and effectivley derailing the thread. it's very difficult to be there at the right time preventing such derail-sessions to happen, we're not robots you know.
erhm...

quicker response time would be nice

I enjoy the 'hey stop being stupid' then ban kind of way, but sometimes it feels a bit strong. There should always be a mercy lock or delete for those who just seem to be a bit mad/fucked up a little, but keep the bans coming on those people who make 3 topics to why the first one was locked.

At 5/31/09 12:49 PM, Jonas wrote: Yhar, I understand what you're saying, but I think you're having a hard time seeing the difference between a comment and a post.

Maybe we have different views on what a forum is, I'm open to being persuaded it's different from how I view it right now. I view a forum as a place for discussion and a place to make your opinion known, I post here because ultimately I want people to think "Interesting fellow, I like his opinions!".

Lol cool comes off in many senses, none of them show that much thought is going into adding into the thread, and ultimately, it falls on a very simple but big forum rule. If you don't have anything to contribute, don't post. Lol cool really doesn't contribute anything to something, at the same time, 'Wow, that is hilarious, I don't think I have laughed that hard in awhile. I was seriously rofling.' would be acceptable... probably. The biggest portion actually comes from your signature, 'Top NG posters'.

So you view a contribution as a drawn out post? I could point out at least 10 posts in this thread that are basically "lol cool" but drawn out and longer, hell, most of my posts here are just me repeating what I've previously said, but because they're longer they're valid?

I post here because I want people to like what I write, maybe you don't, but that's why I post here, when someone quotes me and says "lol cool" or "Brilliant post! I totally agree!" I feel that I have self worth, that my opinion is worth something more than nothing.

I'm getting carried away now anyway, I'll stop posting for a bit, I'm just repeating myself.

My ban list is very short, mostly because I haven't seen anything really ban worthy. I guess you could say I'm very lenient, and I don't care how many bans I dish out. We haven't had very many good photoshop threads in awhile, or very thought out posts any more. The thing I usually ban for is stupid short threads/ posts, or people purposely trying to flame or just acting plain retarded.

I'm not one of those types that goes "OH SHI BAN QUOTA ISN'T MET YET, BEST START BANNIN THE FUCK OUT OF PEEPS".

I think it's a good sign that you're asking. But I think you guys should lax up a bit. I'm on late at night (newgrounds time) most days and the bad threads seem to skyrocket. I think there should be another mod that time.

More to the point, I think mods should lay off on being assholes. That has it's place, but I think mods like Poozy go overboard.

At 5/31/09 12:33 PM, The-Condor wrote: I think that backseat moderating should be aloud to an extent. Like pointing out a mistake a mod made or telling someone to post a picture in another thread (if its in the thread it doesn't belong)

I don't know how many people have been banned for just making an observation.

On, this I can agree with Luis that its silly to ban people for these things, but there are several reasons why back seat moderation gets annoying and shouldn't really be done. I'm cool with users who want to help, but moderators have pm boxes.

Sometimes, (looks around the crowd), some of you guys think you are entitled to be moderators and just go around from thread to thread correcting others instead of having fun and worrying about yourselves. That kind of back seat moderation will maybe get you banned because its just not cool. It shows you don't respect the users you are posting with, and if that's the case, you certainly shouldn't be moderating the community.

Other times, I know, you guys just want to help. I was like that myself, but sometimes pming the user instead of posting in the thread is better. By posting in the thread and pointing it out you can derail the thread, you really aren't calling moderation attention to the situation, and you are giving user, who may be looking for it, more attention thats undeserved. The PM system is great if you find a problem. You can pm either the user or the moderator, but posting in threads that a user should be banned etc isn't really helping anyone.

Mostly, I like to present the idea that there's a thin line between TELLING a user what they SHOULD be doing, and SUGGESTING an alternative and maybe linking to an EXAMPLE. Just try not to imply you have authority when you don't because it sometimes make's our job harder.