The issue that so many people get into toruble with over at ETO is the rule set is rather vauge and very open ot being misinterpereted/abused by moderator rullings.

Here are the actual rule sets from ETO.

The providers ("we", "us", "our") of the service provided by this web site ("Service") are not responsible for any user-generated content and accounts ("Content"). Content submitted express the views of their author only.

You agree to not use the Service to submit or link to any Content which is defamatory, abusive, hateful, threatening, spam or spam-like, likely to offend, contains adult or objectionable content, contains personal information of others, risks copyright infringement, encourages unlawful activity, or otherwise violates any laws.

All Content you submit or upload may be reviewed by staff members. All Content you submit or upload may be sent to third-party verification services (including, but not limited to, spam prevention services). Do not submit any Content that you consider to be private or confidential.

We reserve the rights to remove or modify any Content submitted for any reason without explanation. Requests for Content to be removed or modified will be undertaken only at our discretion. We reserve the right to take action against any account with the Service at any time.

You are granting us with a non-exclusive, permanent, irrevocable, unlimited license to use, publish, or re-publish your Content in connection with the Service. You retain copyright over the Content.

These terms may be changed at any time without notice.

If you do not agree with these terms, please do not register or use this Service. If you wish to close your account, please contact us.

Really thats the whole rule set. The bold areas I highlighted come off rather easy to be misinterpreted/open to abuse.

 

tcmtech.
You had warnings over the Brownout incident for which you were temporarily banned.
You are the only on your list I temporarily banned some time ago for making adverse comments about Moderation.

The issue between me and brownout was dead for over year, heck I had him on my ignore list for over year. I think he was even banned from the site already when you started tossing me undefined bans left and right over some mistaken comment or whatever it was you insisted on taking way out of its proper context. That's when I got a sour feel for you.

I would have put you on my ignore list as well if you weren't a moderator. But then had you not been acting the way you had as a moderator I would have never had reason to want to ignore you either.

I made an offbeat tease and joke at you. Something that if had been done to me I never would have so much as raised an eyebrow over. You took it personally and used your moderator privileges to rain hell on me for it for any and every excuse you could justify under the loosely stated ETO rules and a whole lot of people saw it that way.

Then once I was out of the way you went after someone else for whatever until they got banned or left, Then someone else and so on. To be honest I don;t think I was seen as even being your first target. There were a few other former members you chased off before you went after me.

That's where and how I see this angry mob against 'eric the moderator' started from.

 

While I hope this thread will serve as a debate stand that will help both sites' moderation to get better, let's keep it constructive, honourable, straight and direct.
Starting fights is not constructive, by my book, so if any break out, I'll jump in.

[...]Take your zero post count and go back where you seem to be able to make sense of the situation.

Yeah... and that is not constructive either...

Other than that, I'd like to comment on the ETO Terms of Service.

While AAC's ToS also has the clause about the absolute and unquestionable power of the moderation and reads as such:

The Administration and Moderating Team reserves the right to edit your posts, threads, and user information in any way they deem necessary. The Moderators will only do such a thing if there is a reason and such reasons will not be questioned. Reposting content that was removed by The Moderators will result in swift action and a ban.

But we also provide a clear set of rules by which we moderate and judge the posts. It only makes sense, since the members can read them beforehand and not claim ignorance of the rules. It also makes our life easier, since we don't have to explain each time why we moderate posts. It's all in the ToS and we refer to it daily.

 

But we also provide a clear set of rules by which we moderate and judge the posts. It only makes sense, since the members can read them beforehand and not claim ignorance of the rules. It also makes our life easier, since we don't have to explain each time why we moderate posts. It's all in the ToS and we refer to it daily.

Amen to that and that's from a trouble makers point of view!

No. Wait. I have yet to cause trouble here.

Darned defined rules are keeping me inline.

 

The best part of this site is that the moderators are not part of the problem.

ps, please forgive my rant. My only excuse is that is was very honest about my feelings.

 

To be honest I don;t think I was seen as even being your first target. There were a few other former members you chased off before you went after me.

Yes - I can confirm.

 

The issue that so many people get into toruble with over at ETO is the rule set is rather vauge and very open ot being misinterpereted/abused by moderator rullings.

Here are the actual rule sets from ETO.



Really thats the whole rule set. The bold areas I highlighted come off rather easy to be misinterpreted/open to abuse.

Basically it says that whenever they feel like it, they will throw a tantrum and take their football and go home.

 

One thing I really dislike about moderation was time wasted attempting to explain why people should follow rules, and how their breaking them was bad. Its been a year or 3 since I was moderator and here I am wasting more time explain the same old stick.

One might almost think that explaining why somebody was banned was part of what one might expect to be doing if one was a moderator.... it's unfortunate the selective service system is still in force to keep drafting people into moderator service. If it was an "all volunteer" service, one might be more sympathetic to the complaints of those having to put up with questions from people who have no idea how or why they got banned.

I still never got an answer on that one.

 

I see this message:

BountyHunter.
He did get a PM saying sorry about the Ban error, he never replied.
This happened because of changes in the site software

How would I be able to read a PM message when, by virtue of being banned, I could no longer access the site?

How would I know that at some future date, my access had been arbitrarily restored as it was arbitrarily terminated before?

I think that sometimes mods lose sight of the fact that a permanent ban is the equivalent of a site death sentence. The user removes your tag from their browser and never returns. If you go "OOPS!" and restore service later, the deed is long done.

maybe that fact would make one a bit more careful about banning someone.....

 

[...] it's unfortunate the selective service system is still in force to keep drafting people into moderator service.[...]

I don't understand that part, bountyhunter. Can you rephrase it, please?

And on this part:

[...]If it was an "all volunteer" service, one might be more sympathetic to the complaints of those having to put up with questions from people who have no idea how or why they got banned.[...]

I get that you are trying to say that moderators are supposed to read feedback from the community, but I get lost on the way of selecting the mods.

The irony gives me a hard time understanding the post.

 

I don't understand that part, bountyhunter. Can you rephrase it, please?

Just a meager attempt at humorous irony, after reading someone railing about the abuses suffered serving as a moderator.... the joke is that people are not forced to be mods, and they know what the job entails when they take it. Nobody gets "drafted" into that service, they volunteer.

I probably wouldn't want to do it either, but I wouldn't do it and then whine about how unfair it is that people complain about being arbitrarily banned and have the chutzpah to ask why they were.

 

The irony gives me a hard time understanding the post.

Need a sarcasm flag........

 

Basically it says that whenever they feel like it, they will throw a tantrum and take their football and go home.

Unfortunately.... Um, Well, they didn't so much take the ball home but just toss you off the field and tell you it's your fault they had to do it.

It was in the rules you know.

 

I really don't mind if there actually are rules..... even if the rules are stupid and arbitrary, they are the rules. It bugs me when the rules are that there really are no rules and they are going to "make it up as they go along".

Been there, done that, don't like it.

 

Brownout
Was not Banned by me, he got into trouble after being repeatedly provoked by you.!
I was disappointed that he was Banned because he used to check my ETO test modules for me.

FYI, I was not banned for anything I did there. I informed E-M that I would not be returning to ETO and asked for my account to be disabled to prevent it from being used by anyone else, and instead, the punk gave me a ban for life. Nice guy, eh?

 

Maybe that's the only method he has available.?

When I want an account closed, I close my eyes, roll my knuckles on the keyboard to produce a long, random string of characters, enter it (twice) to confirm a password change, and burn the piece of paper I had it written on.

 

FYI, I was not banned for anything I did there. I informed E-M that I would not be returning to ETO and asked for my account to be disabled to prevent it from being used by anyone else, and instead, the punk gave me a ban for life. Nice guy, eh?

I think #12 is right, that's probably the only method he had. It was the only way he could actually disable your account without deleting all of your content (which is a part of the forum--and there's some good info in there). I don't think it's anything to get upset about, I'm sure he didn't mean anything personal.

 

Maybe that's the only method he has available.?

Yeah, his only method for every issue, except for the legions of trolls he allows to run amok on all over the site.

 

I'm working with Electromaster on establishing a better defined rule set over there. He asked me so that's where things stand.

I have a thread open in the site feedback section relating to it where EM agreed that the moderators don't have any power there unless I ask specifically for their intervention.

I am working up a rough draft for a new rule set and will have it posted some time in the next day or so once I feel its presentable.

From there I am hoping others will help better define and refine it into an agreeable new Terms of Service disclaimer!

 

FYI, I was not banned for anything I did there. I informed E-M that I would not be returning to ETO and asked for my account to be disabled to prevent it from being used by anyone else, and instead, the punk gave me a ban for life. Nice guy, eh?

I regret that I have done something similar. The only sin I really get hot over is people deleting past posts (which can be in the hundreds). The old posts are needed for context in old threads, and arbitrary deletion just for the sake of spite is sabotage.

If there were truly a way to "delete" an account I would do it, but the only way we can do that is a ban.

Yesterday 09:54 PM #12 Maybe that's the only method he has available.?

When I want an account closed, I close my eyes, roll my knuckles on the keyboard to produce a long, random string of characters, enter it (twice) to confirm a password change, and burn the piece of paper I had it written on.

I like it, maybe I'll try that instead next time, moderators do have control over passwords, but if a user wants back online he can do so just by requesting a new password. So I have no good answers.

I don't know what ETO uses, but here the moderators try to work as a team, there are a lot of offline discussions before action is taken against a user in many cases. It allows tempers to cool in many cases, a good thing. And yes, I do have a temper (but I try very hard to control it).