Another Open Letter

[iavatus]

If the last few days have highlighted anything, it's that accountability and transparency is *one* facet of the issue at play, and by far the easiest one to deal with.

As has been evinced in several cases now, it is quite within the powers and choice to permanently ban an account, without a reason given, without any of the steps listed as moderation. When this is overturned as unreasonable, it can be swiftly reinstated with a single line of reasoning ("Reason given for ban: Infraction to the forum rules") *. This is the sum total of communication, moderation, mediation that has happened.

So, when is enough enough? When does it go from one person plus cronies, to a culture of this style of behaviour? If it was clear from the beginning that this was the case, then I would never have volunteered my time and effort to making the game better in mechanics, but would and have volunteered to make the culture itself better, with better communication, better respect shown and given, better laid out rules. In short, the game itself is fine. The rules and trappings and moderation, well. They need a bit of polish.

This is without getting into the swift deletion and hiding of all discussion, the insistence on hiding all communication, and other areas of serious contention. They, can be sorted out and thought about, later.

Regards,

iavatus




* Corollary. One of the benefits of multiple views on something, is they pickup the slack on one persons weak English. Of, not to. Even a spellcheck would've caught that as bad grammar.

[Father Brian]

If I post in this thread, am I going to get banned as well as OP?

plz no

[Optimus Christ]

If I post in this thread, am I going to get banned as well as OP?

plz no

High possibility. Oh crap, I posted too....

[Ignacius]

If I post in this thread, am I going to get banned as well as OP?

My personal experience strongly indicates the answer is possibly "Yes."

[Rebma]

And mine as well!

Iavatus(and Ignacius!), first, welcome back from the land of inexplicably unexplainable bans.

Second, I agree. There's a point when we have to open our eyes as a community and see what's going on and ask ourselves whether this is what we want for ourselves and our fellow players. Transparency. Please. Not a sweeping a player under the rug and hiding them from the general public, swearing them via 'rules' to a vow of silence re:the sweeping, and no justice. It's a little harder to sweep whole groups, as I'm sure is being recently realized by some people.

[Alutka]

I just wonder how many times the same thing must be written and how many people must get banned (unbanned and then banned again) for something to finally change in here.
I hope that this time PD will make a stand, instead of swinging the ban hammer.

And yeah, I hope that this time we are unbanned for good.

[EchoMan]

If the last few days have highlighted anything, it's that accountability and transparency is *one* facet of the issue at play, and by far the easiest one to deal with.

As has been evinced in several cases now, it is quite within the powers and choice to permanently ban an account, without a reason given, without any of the steps listed as moderation. When this is overturned as unreasonable, it can be swiftly reinstated with a single line of reasoning ("Reason given for ban: Infraction to the forum rules") *. This is the sum total of communication, moderation, mediation that has happened.

So, when is enough enough? When does it go from one person plus cronies, to a culture of this style of behaviour? If it was clear from the beginning that this was the case, then I would never have volunteered my time and effort to making the game better in mechanics, but would and have volunteered to make the culture itself better, with better communication, better respect shown and given, better laid out rules. In short, the game itself is fine. The rules and trappings and moderation, well. They need a bit of polish.

This is without getting into the swift deletion and hiding of all discussion, the insistence on hiding all communication, and other areas of serious contention. They, can be sorted out and thought about, later.

Regards,

iavatus




* Corollary. One of the benefits of multiple views on something, is they pickup the slack on one persons weak English. Of, not to. Even a spellcheck would've caught that as bad grammar.

So the messages you got from me and GreeK doesn't exist in your world? I understand you are disgruntled, but "forgetting" a chunk of the things that has happened doesn't really improve the diplomatic state of the current situation. Players should always be given a reason for any ruling, perhaps not in much detail, but it should be clear why a moderation has occured. Why that did not happen in recent situations isn't entirely clear, but we (GAB) are working on it.

[EchoMan]

If I post in this thread, am I going to get banned as well as OP?

plz no

High possibility. Oh crap, I posted too....

No, there is no risk of being permanently banned for participating in a discussion. As long as that discussion follow the forum rules of course.

Sarcastic remarks is no reason for a ban either, but they don't really help to "fix" an occurring situation, they just add fuel to the fire.

[EchoMan]

And mine as well!

Iavatus(and Ignacius!), first, welcome back from the land of inexplicably unexplainable bans.

Second, I agree. There's a point when we have to open our eyes as a community and see what's going on and ask ourselves whether this is what we want for ourselves and our fellow players. Transparency. Please. Not a sweeping a player under the rug and hiding them from the general public, swearing them via 'rules' to a vow of silence re:the sweeping, and no justice. It's a little harder to sweep whole groups, as I'm sure is being recently realized by some people.

The best way to change or improve is to engage yourself into staff work. It's really easy to sit on the forums and yell "I demand change". It's a whole other thing to actually make a change, while making sure the change provide an increased fairness, does not affect game play, is actually possible to adhere to by staff, etc, etc, etc.

Welcome with your applications!

[Ignacius]

So the messages you got from me and GreeK doesn't exist in your world? I understand you are disgruntled, but "forgetting" a chunk of the things that has happened doesn't really improve the diplomatic state of the current situation. Players should always be given a reason for any ruling, perhaps not in much detail, but it should be clear why a moderation has occured. Why that did not happen in recent situations isn't entirely clear, but we (GAB) are working on it.

It's possible that Iavatus received messages I didn't. And I absolutely appreciated any message I received, although I couldn't read it while banned. But if they were anything like mine, while they were very welcome, they didn't really do anything to explain the reasoning behind the initial bans, or what the heck was happening with the rather... tumultuous everything since then.

I think you're right, we're all disgruntled here, and we should perhaps take a step back for a moment. I know that I'm very grateful that GAB is looking at this, because I think it needs to be looked at. But that doesn't change the nature of the extreme lack of transparency with everything that has happened up until this point, and that has mostly continued to happen. I haven't recieved any message about what's happened, either with bans or unbans. And after last time, I'm partially bracing myself to wake up tomorrow morning with another ban. I think that's all that most of us are trying to get across.

[EchoMan]

It's possible that Iavatus received messages I didn't.

Did you not receive a private message from GreeK when ythe ban was lifted? And you probably won't get a full explanation of what lies behind everything, since it won't be productive in resolving the situation.

[Ignacius]

It's possible that Iavatus received messages I didn't.

Did you not receive a private message from GreeK when ythe ban was lifted? And you probably won't get a full explanation of what lies behind everything, since it won't be productive in resolving the situation.

I did receive a message from Greek, although I didn't have a chance to read it until recently because I was immediately rebanned. I haven't received anything since then.

This is obviously not the place to discuss a private message from an admin. And I want to make clear that I do appreciate receiving any kind of message. But it didn't give any reasoning for the initial ban. It did say that the ban was lifted, but then I was rebanned. And since the second (essentially unexplained) ban was lifted, I've received nothing to give me any idea of what's happening one way or another, with the Ban/Unban/Reban/Reunban process.

I don't expect a full explanation, but I do think some explanation is warranted. Both for the initial ban, so I/we can avoid repeating whatever errors lead to it. And also for the series of bans/unbans since, so we can have some stability and certainty that we're not going to find ourselves suddenly banned again.

[Alutka]

It's possible that Iavatus received messages I didn't.

Did you not receive a private message from GreeK when ythe ban was lifted? And you probably won't get a full explanation of what lies behind everything, since it won't be productive in resolving the situation.

I received the PM and I even managed to read it before I was banned again. It only made me more confused. Don't get me wrong, I appretiate Greek's help. But getting rebanned was just insane.

[Rebma]

And mine as well!

Iavatus(and Ignacius!), first, welcome back from the land of inexplicably unexplainable bans.

Second, I agree. There's a point when we have to open our eyes as a community and see what's going on and ask ourselves whether this is what we want for ourselves and our fellow players. Transparency. Please. Not a sweeping a player under the rug and hiding them from the general public, swearing them via 'rules' to a vow of silence re:the sweeping, and no justice. It's a little harder to sweep whole groups, as I'm sure is being recently realized by some people.

The best way to change or improve is to engage yourself into staff work. It's really easy to sit on the forums and yell "I demand change". It's a whole other thing to actually make a change, while making sure the change provide an increased fairness, does not affect game play, is actually possible to adhere to by staff, etc, etc, etc.

Welcome with your applications!

Firstly, the best way to change or improve is not through staff work when the issue is transparency and a sense of community at risk, and it isn't fair of you to suggest people are "sitting on the forums yelling for change" when a vast majority of the player base is of course, not staff, and so have their voices heard through the forums and the community. I'm actually a little insulted by what you're implying and the tone of that, as you are obviously aware not everyone has the free time to do staff volunteering. It's the equivalent of someone refusing to play with my characters because I only have an hour a day to play so I don't really count.

I guess you're suggesting everyone should join staff, (all, how many of us?) or our voices aren't worth a shit arou d here? Is there room for the entire player base on staff?

Secondly, I've been staff. So again, not sitting around yelling for change. Was neck deep in PD in the past, and mentoring, when I had the time, so perhaps it would do good for you to remember that I am one of action as well.


In regards to your previous messages about how we were contacted, yes, I appreciated Greek's message, even though it was a promise to follow up that hasn't been, and also even though I didn't get a chance to read it until being unbanned for the second time today, as Greek's attempts at good faith reactions were immediately undone by another staf member before I got a chance to see it. And no other contact wasmade after my hour free and re-ban. So. Kinda speaking to the whole point of things here.

[EchoMan]

Rebma, You are weaving in things into my statement that isn't there. The BEST way to make a change is to join staff and work on the change. That is true, however much insult you weave into that.