- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
Posted by:Recon Number 54
As part of the Moderator's New Years cleaning initiative and in keeping with the rules, we have been discussing and have nearly all agreed that trolling (and taking troll-bait) is not being responded to with enough..... ninja-ness.
We all know what trolling is. We all know that it's bad. People complain about it, and we're going to do something about it.
Trolls? They get a week off... for starters. If we start to recognize "repeat offenders", well, as I said a week is a "start".
Now, what else are we doing? We're also going to address the folks who give trolls what they are here for..... attention. That's right, we're going to (not because we enjoy it) start giving out blacklists to those who respond to trolls.
Posts like, "I bet this gets locked", "banned in 3...2...1..." and other responses to the obvious attention seekers will get some attention of their own. They too will get a week blacklisting.
Is it fair that they get the same "time out" as the originator of the problem? Probably not. But we've had the rules and advice sticky up at the top of every forum for years now. If members have not read them (and they should), we're not responsible for their failure.
We're going to start treating trolls and flame-baiters like the Flood (the parasitic mega-organism, NOT the Bungie.Net forum). We can attack and kill combat forms, carrier forms and even infection forms. But, just like the Forerunner, we have determined that the only way to kill the Flood is to kill their food. They seek attention, and too many people are giving it to them.
So, what does this boil down to?
If a member sees someone had made a thread that they know violates rules, is going to get locked, or that the member is likely to be blacklisted, members who value their time here have two potential responses.
Stay the hell out of the thread and use the often-overlooked "no reply" button.
or
Report the thread to the moderating team (links in my signature).
Any posts responding to a flame-baiter or troll will get the same punishment as the troll themselves. One week off of the forums. For starters.
Now, this may seem extreme, and maybe a little unfair. The alternative (of following Forerunner protocol) and uniting the Index with The Core and triggering the rings.... well, we're saving that one for really big messes (or the 4th of July, if we've had enough to drink and normal fireworks just aren't "cutting it").
I'm copying this and going to paste it into threads that I consider full of people who would (once this policy/practice begins) who would have been surprised by getting blacklisted themselves. For example, this thread? Lots of people blacklisted. See you post here? Yep, you too!
Tell your friends. And please consider it fair warning. The warnings will not continue forever, or for even very long.
I went through the flood today, and caught a strange string of posts locked, a few for no reason, a few for good reason. Now, from the looks of it I'd say someone, a certain person with powers allowing them to lock such threads, was feeling a bit/a lot vengeful today. Well, here's some of them. And do try to remember, this is the flood "Say your off topic stuff here":
Criticise the poster above you.
Dinosaur attack!
Happy New Year!!!
Xbox 360's Stolen!
Cotton Bowl
How could this happen?! *cries*
And if you are gonna lock threads such as those, then stay consistent and don't just do it to a few and expect that to work. Since when are "one liners" not good enough? Plenty of "Stickied" threads have one to two sentences in them. Some even from you Mods. The flood is the place for 'em. So, if that's gonna hold true and "be the law" on here, kick it into high gear. Since I don't want to see any then in that case on any of the forums. First step if you don't want one liners, remove the bad stickies/posts. Then get rid of all the "Describe the user" posts. And then stay at it for 24 hours, all week. Since it won't just stop.
In all honesty, most posts only need to be one line. A question like this:
"Why aren't one liners good enough on this site anymore?"
That is it. I don't need to write anymore stuff down. Why waste time typing more stuff??? The flood is for off topic stuff. Which opens it up to a lot of junk. That's where it belongs. So if a one lined question in the Septagon or Optimatch is allowed to stay, then someone saying Happy New Year in the flood better dam well hold up. I see no difference in such things.
If you couldn't already tell, someone else was feeling a bit vengeful today as well. I just hate seeing stuff like this on here. If the system isn't broke, then don't fix it. So far, the only people angry at one liners would appear to be those that lock/delete them. Why? What did they do to you? Instead of someone just making that a rule, why not ask the community? Not like it would be that tough. Although, you wouldn't have to waste your time, since I, yourself, and the other members know what the overwhelming majority would be.