Add some meaningful Infractions

Dee (or Clay or Ian),
Do you think we could get some meaningful infractions added to the current list? Not that I ever really use it (or anyone else, for that matter), but that's partially because we have to pick things like "inappropriate language" for... well, whatever. Their just not that descriptive right now.

Of course, I'm not really sure what exactly to add... I guess we should have a bit of a discussion about what should be added. So, let's hear it guys. What should be an "Infraction"?

By the way, does anyone know what exactly the deal is with this system? I see points and whatnot, but I don't have any clue what they mean.

Ah hah!
http://www.vbulletin.com/docs/html/m...er_infractions

Another forum I frequent uses the infraction/warning system to determine when to suspend/ban users. Their use of it is detailed here.

I don't think we need to implement anything with it really.

That forum has at least 5 times the number of users online at any given time, and nearly 3 times the amount of registered users, as well has 4 times the number of individual posts, and many different forums and subforums. It also features tough spam rules, whereas we're completely lax regarding spam (and by spam, I'm not talking about advertisement bots and the like. I'm talking about meaningless posts devoid of content. An "lol" post would be warned, or actually, infracted i believe, at that forum. For a forum of that size, it's needed).

So, frankly, I think we're better off just ignoring that system and just alerting any users via PM or in the thread itself if they do something they shouldn't.

I just finished reading the manual for it. I'm actually pretty jazzed about it now, although it would take some setup to really make it useful.

Dee, Ian, this could be really useful for the BMO league forums. What I envision is a user group for each individual BMO forum (or probably all of them, that might be easier). Permissions in the BMO league forums could then be restricted to... well, nothing by default. Being a member of the league would add the person's forum account to the league forum's usergroup, allowing them permissions to post, etc... League forum mods could then use the infractions system to remove permissions from people for their forums, as they see appropriate.
Basically, it really could make the League sub-forums almost their own independent forums. It'll allow BMO league forum moderators to "ban" people without having to open up the admin control panel to them.

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Originally Posted by HoustonGM

Another forum I frequent uses the infraction/warning system to determine when to suspend/ban users. Their use of it is detailed here.

I don't think we need to implement anything with it really.

That forum has at least 5 times the number of users online at any given time, and nearly 3 times the amount of registered users, as well has 4 times the number of individual posts, and many different forums and subforums. It also features tough spam rules, whereas we're completely lax regarding spam (and by spam, I'm not talking about advertisement bots and the like. I'm talking about meaningless posts devoid of content. An "lol" post would be warned, or actually, infracted i believe, at that forum. For a forum of that size, it's needed).

So, frankly, I think we're better off just ignoring that system and just alerting any users via PM or in the thread itself if they do something they shouldn't.

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Yea, I generally agree. It could be a useful system though. It'd be much better to use infractions then, say, temporary bans. I just used it today for something (which is what brought this up in the first place), and it's much more forgiving than a temp ban, for example. Gets the point across pretty effectively, but it's not so draconian as temp bans.
I agree that it's not going to be a system that we'll be using a whole lot, bu tit could certainly serve a purpose.

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Originally Posted by HoustonGM

An "lol" post would be warned, or actually, infracted i believe, at that forum. For a forum of that size, it's needed).

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I don't see that, HGM...I applaud a Lol post 'cos of its brevity, and positivity, and, in response to a post that tries to amuse...well, it's applause

And in a long, oft acrimonious thread, this counts for me.

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Originally Posted by ohms_law

I just finished reading the manual for it. I'm actually pretty jazzed about it now, although it would take some setup to really make it useful.

Dee, Ian, this could be really useful for the BMO league forums. What I envision is a user group for each individual BMO forum (or probably all of them, that might be easier). Permissions in the BMO league forums could then be restricted to... well, nothing by default. Being a member of the league would add the person's forum account to the league forum's usergroup, allowing them permissions to post, etc... League forum mods could then use the infractions system to remove permissions from people for their forums, as they see appropriate.
Basically, it really could make the League sub-forums almost their own independent forums. It'll allow BMO league forum moderators to "ban" people without having to open up the admin control panel to them.

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No. We don't need to mess with the league forums at all. They're quite autonomous and that's how it should be. The league's owner is paying for that forum as well as the league he's commissioner of. They don't need anyone on the outside looking over their shoulder. BMO forums are easily managed already, usually a removal from the league takes care of a problem poster, and if not, a short request to a mod does the trick. The biggest issue with BMO league forums is sticky/unsticky requests and those have been dealt with by making owners into moderators of their own forums.
So far as permissions to post go, again not a good idea. A lot of leagues have waiting list threads that people post in to get an available team, as well as past members dropping in etc. That's another area that's not a problem and has no need of being "fixed".

I think it's pretty d@mn insulting when some jerk comes along and decides your post is spam and deletes it or sends you a nastygram. Spam should stay as it is now. An unsolicited advertisement in the forum by a non-player.

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Originally Posted by Rongar

I don't see that, HGM...I applaud a Lol post 'cos of its brevity, and positivity, and, in response to a post that tries to amuse...well, it's applause

And in a long, oft acrimonious thread, this counts for me.

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It contributes nothing to the conversation is the point. Like I said, in this forum, it's fine. In others, it's not.

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Originally Posted by robinhoodnik

I think it's pretty d@mn insulting when some jerk comes along and decides your post is spam and deletes it or sends you a nastygram. Spam should stay as it is now. An unsolicited advertisement in the forum by a non-player.

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Yep, agreed, for this forum. I was just pointing out the differences between the forum I linked to, showing an example of how the infranction system is used, and this one. For a forum of such large size, meaningless posts would quickly make the site an eyesore to participate in. For our forum, everything is fine the way it is. We don't have many members, and there's only a small amount of consistently active posters.

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Originally Posted by Rongar

I don't see that, HGM...I applaud a Lol post 'cos of its brevity, and positivity, and, in response to a post that tries to amuse...well, it's applause

And in a long, oft acrimonious thread, this counts for me.

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He was talking about another forum that he's a member of, not this one.

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Originally Posted by robinhoodnik

No. We don't need to mess with the league forums at all. They're quite autonomous and that's how it should be. The league's owner is paying for that forum as well as the league he's commissioner of. They don't need anyone on the outside looking over their shoulder. BMO forums are easily managed already, usually a removal from the league takes care of a problem poster, and if not, a short request to a mod does the trick. The biggest issue with BMO league forums is sticky/unsticky requests and those have been dealt with by making owners into moderators of their own forums.
So far as permissions to post go, again not a good idea. A lot of leagues have waiting list threads that people post in to get an available team, as well as past members dropping in etc. That's another area that's not a problem and has no need of being "fixed".

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robin, that's exactly the kind of thing that I'm addressing. See Ian's quote here:

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Originally Posted by iansmith

Moderators of a league forum will have full control over the forum with the exception of banning users. I'm looking into how to ban users from a single forum without locking them out of the whole system.

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That's exactly what this system can accomplish.

All the above that you're complaining about, that's exactly what I'm trying to help avoid. I don't want to be involved in BMO league forums, if I can help it. Let the league commissioners deal with their own league forums as they see fit.

There should be a step before temporary banning, and this is it. I don't understand why using tools that are available seems to be generating such angst, especially since those tools allow us to be nicer.

I know on that forum I linked to, they have things known as "usergroups" and forums can be set to be viewed only by certain usergroups, and I believe moderator powers can be extended to them for specific forums, although I'm not positive on that one.

That's the way the system can work, according to the user manual (link in post #2).

To clarify, I'm not talking about changing anything here in the regular forums. Mostly, I see this system as a way to accomplish what Ian said that he wanted to accomplish for the BMO forums.
This can also be useful for the regular forums, though. I'd much rather hand out a couple of warnings than ban people and/or close threads. Robin wants to talk about people being jerks, that's it (especially when we don't have to).

As a sidenote, how exactly do you "warn" or "infract" a post?

You click the little yellow and red cards in the top right of a post:
Attachment 11532

Ah. That's why I didn't see it. I was looking at your post, and you can't warn or infract a mod's posts apparantly. :)

Just as a forum user I like the idea!

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Originally Posted by ohms_law

All the above that you're complaining about, that's exactly what I'm trying to help avoid. I don't want to be involved in BMO league forums, if I can help it. Let the league commissioners deal with their own league forums as they see fit.

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Complaining? I didn't realize I was complaining. I was giving an opinion on a product which I use regularly. If you're complaining about moderating the BMO forums, then leave it to those mods who play the game.

That was exactly my point.

Wouldn't not opening with a 7 or 10 day ban help some? How about a 24 hour ban for smaller offenses or warnings? The initial bans are ridiculous, and for things that aren't all that bad too often.

Aside from one group, who are you talking about? I can count on one hand (if that group is counted as one "instance") the number of non-spam related users I've banned.

Nevermind the fact that I've pissed off Dee a couple of times for unbanning or reducing the length of a couple of bans.

The general rule of thumb is not to over step our boundries. I will not un-bann somebody unless I find the banning to be unwarrented, but if an Admin does the ban, I do not touch it.

Just something that I do, and of course if I would do an unbanning or reduction I would first consult the moderator who did so...

Replying to this post from ohms in another thread:

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Originally Posted by ohms_law

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and then put the blender on medium high

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hehe, funny.

I'm trying to encourage people to quit posting like this in (most) of the Baseball Mogul, Football Mogul, and Baseball Mogul Online threads though. I mean, certain threads it's obvious that it's not a problem, but things like this where there are actual questions and discussion going on, it gets to be real distracting.
The key is that these threads serve as a reference into the future. Many of us link to them when new threads come up on the same subject. Occasionally, new people who actually know how to use the forum's search feature (it does actually happen! This thread is a perfect example.) will even come along and resurrect these threads to ask and have their own questions answered.

I'm not really trying to be a stick in the mud here, but I've noticed quite few threads recently where there's basically a bunch of garbage in the middle of them. And before anyone else points it out: yes, I'm just as guilty, if not more so, then anyone else.
:)

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This is the reason that forum I linked to has such strict spam rules. Posts that don't add to the conversation in any way just muddy up otherwise flowing discussions. They have a "Testing Grounds" forum where posts don't count towards post count, which mainly serves as just that - a place to test things regarding posting, but spammy threads also end up happening.

I've never paid any attention on our forums to meaningless or short posts that have zero value to the thread at hand, and I've also never bothered to not post such things, as that's basically how this site has been run for a while now - really laidback. I'm fine with that, but I also understand the need to have organized threads where each post contributes to the discussion (outside of "moderator" posts that say "Thread closed." or "Thread moved" or the like. On the linked forum, moderators actually post such "mod messages" in bold red font to make it stand out and separate it from the rest of the discussion).

Personally, I'm fine with keeping things the way they are, or getting a little tighter on "spam" (using the "meaningless" post definition). Though, I am afraid that if we do do that, there's going to be an outcry of "abuse of power" or "too strict" or whatever. But, here's what a little outline of a plan if we were to do something regarding this.

Sports Talk and Ejections would be left unchanged. Things would go on as they currently are.

For the Baseball Mogul and Football Mogul forums, except the Leagues and Dynasties forums for obvious reasons, meaningless off-topic posts, as well as short posts like "lol" that contribute nothing to the conversation, will be deleted, and a PM will be sent to the poster letting them know why the post was deleted and kindly instructing them to keep posts in those forums on-topic. A poster who ignores this and continually does this will get "warned" or "infracted" and some sort of "punishment" (in the form of a suspension [ie. temporary ban] or a ban if they've been previously suspended for the same offense) would be instituted.

Obviously, an announcement would be made to alert users of the new rule, and perhaps a sticky thread added to each affected forum outlining the new rules.

I'd also suggest adding a forum for the posts that currently go in General Discussion that showcase players, interesting games, records, etc. and keeping General Discussion on actual game issues that don't fit in Bug Reports or Suggestions & AI. I actually think that this would be a good idea regardless of whether or not any new "spam" rules are used. I would even offer to clean up the current General Discussion forum by moving all currently existing posts of that nature to the newly created forum. This forum would not be subject to the "spam rules". I'm actually going to cross-post this into a separate thread.

This is just an idea for if we did decide to "crack down" on such posts and make sure to keep all threads on topic. I'm perfectly fine with keeping things the way they are and just "encouraging" people to stay on topic.

FYI: I put this post as moderated so that only moderators can see it.

As for the crack down, I don't think that we need to do that, we don't need forum police here. I like the sense of community here and think that locking threads...should never happen but instead moderate the thread...

The lol post don't bug me...and I love to post pad and it keeps people on the forums and more loyal to the product. Lets not crack down the forum unless Clay request it, because it is his company, vision , product and his service he provides. It isn't are's

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Originally Posted by boomboom

FYI: I put this post as moderated so that only moderators can see it.

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Good idea.

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As for the crack down, I don't think that we need to do that, we don't need forum police here. I like the sense of community here and think that locking threads...should never happen but instead moderate the thread...

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I don't think that locking threads should never happen, as there are times when "enough is enough."

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The lol post don't bug me...and I love to post pad and it keeps people on the forums and more loyal to the product. Lets not crack down the forum unless Clay request it, because it is his company, vision , product and his service he provides. It isn't are's

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I agree. Ohms post from another thread just got me thinking, and he does have a point, but I don't think what I outlined above is necessary, just an idea.

Good idea on making this moderated. Hey, I think we can use that in general for threads which are intended to be moderator discussions. They are hidden from non-moderator users... I guess this is our "new" mods forum.
:)

As for the subject at hand, I'm of the opinion that nothing needs to actually change. I like the openness of the forums quite a bit, myself. Like I said in the post which you've quoted, I'd like to encourage folks not to post superfluous comments in meaningful threads. I'm not about to actually take any action about it if people do though, beyond occasionally bitching at them for doing so. I really don't want to do anything more than that anyway. Handing out infractions, or something similar, for it would be a real PITA anyway.

Ask Clay or Dee to add a strictly Q&A subforum to each area if you're that interested in dumping posts. We don't need to piss off any more customers/subscribers/potential clients/etc. by deleting and threatening than already have been driven off the boards.

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Originally Posted by robinhoodnik

Ask Clay or Dee to add a strictly Q&A subforum to each area if you're that interested in dumping posts. We don't need to piss off any more customers/subscribers/potential clients/etc. by deleting and threatening than already have been driven off the boards.

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agree, I don't think there should be much moderation, unless needed.

Who's been driven off?

Anyway, no one is talking about deleting or closing threads here. I don't understand the hostility...