People who ruin forums

It's nice here. Haven't had a forum I've liked spending time at since TOTSE went away. I at least try to contribute, or ask useful questions. On the plus side is a lot of the people I really don't like here seemed to have all gotten the ban hammer or found new homes. Although I'm sure there's a contingent wishing I would do the same. I understand, I'm not exactly Mr happy social guy, and not always easy to deal with.

I'm about equally annoying in real life as I am online.

Well this went in a little different direction, not that there's anything wrong with that.

I've only ever been banned from one forum and it was this one, and though I've been accused (here) of being a jerk, miserable, and an shiny happy person,  that's clearly not the case and I have proof, 8000 posts worth

And FWIW, I think very few people on here are annoying or post whores

Mndsm said:

Stampie said:

I once banned the entire continent of Australia because of one shiny happy person. When I woke up sober the next day I removed the ban.  

Ok, I can't beat an entire continent. 

Once of my favorite stories is how one group of admins got mad at each other. The Secretary ended up banning the President of the club. I had to step in and remove admin from everyone and not give it back until they promised to behave. 

This is why some forums have sections just for memes that someone can post away on and other's don't have to look at it. This forum has been fortunate enough to have people levitiate to the hotlink thread for years instead of posting random new threads.

A friend created a facespace group to learn about every aspect of firearms. Another ruined it by constantly posting pictures of guns no one asked for and political memes. berkeleying useless.

In reply to N Sperlo :

Sounds like every Facebook post.

"Here's a question I have about [Insert object here]"

*Everyone who has object same as OP will post a picture, not providing anything*

The hard and fast ban against political threads is one of the things that keeps this forum civilized. It's been pointed many times that we try to be mature and helpful, but it's also clear that falls to pieces once politics becomes involved, even on this forum.

Avoiding most anything NSFW also means that it's not been blacklisted on a lot of corporate firewalls, so popping in during lunch still remains an option.

So, reading this thread, plus some other comments elsewhere recently... I'm curious if everyone is aware of the board's "3 strikes" policy before banning?

I did a search, and it only turned up a four year old thread... where it was made as a suggestion.

In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :

In reply to Steve_Jones :

I got a 30 day ban as MGUAR for repeating language someone else used.  I'm pretty sure we both got a similar ban. But like most sites I forgot my password and had to start over again. 
 

I hate passwords. My wife keeps a sheet of them for me but I've learned the hard way not to interrupt her business day up in the office where she keeps them. 

Brett_Murphy said:

The hard and fast ban against political threads is one of the things that keeps this forum civilized. It's been pointed many times that we try to be mature and helpful, but it's also clear that falls to pieces once politics becomes involved, even on this forum.

Avoiding most anything NSFW also means that it's not been blacklisted on a lot of corporate firewalls, so popping in during lunch still remains an option.

Here's one of the ways I'm annoying-Every time someone says this forum is better because we don't discuss politics I get sad and say this: I learned a TON when we argued politics. There are some really really smart people on here from many differing political views. This was one of the few places where the arguements usually had lots of valid points and informed discussion mixed in with the anger. I miss the politics. I stay without them because you guys are awesome. Even SVReX 

Brett_Murphy said:

The hard and fast ban against political threads is one of the things that keeps this forum civilized. It's been pointed many times that we try to be mature and helpful, but it's also clear that falls to pieces once politics becomes involved, even on this forum.
 

I lobbied for that (and religion) for a long time and until it happened this was the most combative, argumentative forum I had ever seen.  And it's not like the arguments were interesting. It was the same people saying the same thing time after time. It was just argument for the sake of argument that would eventually degrade into name calling, and IMO,  cast a real ugliness on the WHOLE forum

One of the other posts reminded me of something. Teamswift. It was an excellent forum that was ruined and eventually shut down because of two completely egotistical pieces of E36 M3. The original Canadian owner moved on from Suzuki's and basically gave the forum to an Australian who's only interest was owning all the Swift forums in the world. He took over and cut off all our admin privileges and gave us only the bare minimum, then was mostly absent. He couldn't get along with anybody and all the mods stopped modding. He sold it to another Canadian, but he was even worse. He ran it into the ground, then tried to sell it but wanted real money and nobody would pay it. So he eventually just let the hosting run out and basically lost everything, even though people had offered to pay for it so that didn't happen.

In reply to nutherjrfan :

I'll mark that one down as a "no" then

sleepyhead the buffalo said:

So, reading this thread, plus some other comments elsewhere recently... I'm curious if everyone is aware of the board's "3 strikes" policy before banning?

I did a search, and it only turned up a four year old thread... where it was made as a suggestion.

Never heard of it

fwiw, I think it's relatively recent... and as with anything it is subject to 'executive override'

In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :

I’ve never heard of it either. 

Honestly, Marjorie’s “Welcome to the party” thread doesn’t communicate the forum “rules” concisely to me. I’ve read it more than once, but that doesn’t mean I’ve retained it. 

If I was a newbie, I’d have a hard time finding it.

I think a simplified “Forum Rules” section would be quite helpful. 

In reply to SVreX :

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic...

In non-sarcasm I feel almost exactly the opposite. I've even encouraged other folks who were trying to set ground rules for groups of likeminded individuals without legislating all the minutia to read that post because I think it is very effective at establishing a baseline without writing "rules".

Sort of like "don't be a dick" vs trying to list out every single way in which someone could be a dick. 

In reply to SVreX :

Actually I think some of the subject's on here skirt the no politics ban.  But because of the no politics it stays pretty civilized.  
  Some subjects just are political but I've learned a lot and from different perspectives than my own.  I think if we avoid party politics a lot can be discussed without it breaking down. 

SVreX said:

In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :

I think a simplified “Forum Rules” section would be quite helpful. 

Having been involved with writing and enforcing a comprehensive set of rules for a very large and active forum, I profoundly disagree.

The more explicit you make a set of rules, the more explicitly the douches of the world will try to test the fabric and exploit the loopholes.

Forum rules need to be a feeling that can be easily grasped, not a set of laws that can be carefully analyzed.  People who refuse to grasp that feeling get a few nudges, and if they don't get the hint, they are politely invited to find somewhere else to hang out.

Or, as Robbie put it, "Don't be a dick."

Now I want to know what bike forum and user is pissing in cheerios. 

Stampie said:

Mndsm said:

Stampie said:

I once banned the entire continent of Australia because of one shiny happy person. When I woke up sober the next day I removed the ban.  

Ok, I can't beat an entire continent. 

Once of my favorite stories is how one group of admins got mad at each other. The Secretary ended up banning the President of the club. I had to step in and remove admin from everyone and not give it back until they promised to behave. 

That happened to me once. One of my supermods banned me because I was in a particularly bad mood and cussing out a good portion of my members. Live. I used my backup admin account to unban myself. And then I sold the site. 

Duke said:

SVreX said:

In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :

I think a simplified “Forum Rules” section would be quite helpful. 

Having been involved with writing and enforcing a comprehensive set of rules for a very large and active forum, I profoundly disagree.

The more explicit you make a set of rules, the more explicitly the douches of the world will try to test the fabric and exploit the loopholes.

Forum rules need to be a feeling that can be easily grasped, not a set of laws that can be carefully analyzed.  People who refuse to grasp that feeling get a few nudges, and if they don't get the hint, they are politely invited to find somewhere else to hang out.

Or, as Robbie put it, "Don't be a dick."

 

I hear you, and it makes good sense. 

However my comment was in direct response to the question of whether we all knew about the 3 strike rule. Since many of us don’t, then there must be a better way to communicate it. 

Personally, I don’t care if there are 3 strikes. But in response to the question, “Do you know about the 3 strike rule”, my answer is no. And I have no idea where I would find it. 

MrJoshua said:

Every time someone says this forum is better because we don't discuss politics I get sad and say this: I learned a TON when we argued politics. There are some really really smart people on here from many differing political views. This was one of the few places where the arguements usually had lots of valid points and informed discussion mixed in with the anger. I miss the politics. I stay without them because you guys are awesome. Even SVReX 

I'm not saying it can't be educational or even fun- the problem is when it goes off of the rails, it goes WAAAAAY off of the rails. 

pheller said:

Now I want to know what bike forum and user is pissing in cheerios. 

Probably Adventure Rider.

Their "JoMamma" section was stellar.