- Mar 14, 2012
- 7,334
- 0
Once again, the Mod Team has had to ban user Mark Wyda from these forums. Usually a person gets banned and nothing more is said. This time, I felt a point should be made.
See, these forums are alive and well because of you, the forum users. Without your comments and the creation of threads, there is no forum community. I view the job of being a moderator as making sure the community is healthy, alive, and lively. That does not mean I expect a 'hive mind' nor do I expect everyone to play nice with each other at all times. The forum would be quite boring if this were the case.
That being said, now and then a forum member like Mark shows up. He actually had many well thought out posts. More often than not, he tried to bring something to these forums. So why is he getting banned then? Do we moderators strike just because we don't like someone? That accusation has certainly been made before. Or that we're hypocritical and ban people for things we ourselves do. The short answer is no. So allow me to make an example of Mark and explain why he was detrimental to the forum and needed to be removed.
This is not the first time Mark has been banned, it's at least his 3rd. See, he used to post under the name Pinball Lizard, but for reasons prior to my becoming a moderator, he was banned. Then he was allowed back, and this time used Mark Wyda as his name. He was banned once more, because he was being abusive and offensive via private message, facebook, and the chatroom, to a number of people including moderators. When I say abusive and offensive, I mean vile hate speech that simply has no place in society. On top of that, he was spamming the people with it. The moderator in question had over 75 messages sent to him in less than 24 hours. Users were saying they were going to leave the forum because of Mark, and so once more he was banned.
He tried to come back various times under various user names, but he was easily found out each time and banned under all these pseudonyms too, just on principle. Finally he made a plea to come back, that he would change his ways, and promised to not rile any feathers again. And for a while, he did just that. Old habits are hard to quit though. Mark does not take criticism well. My own interaction is this regard came in the form of him siting 'sales numbers' for the various tables, despite not having actual facts that could be shared. Many times in the past, and most recently, he has been told that unless he can show proof, quit stating such things as fact. Simply stating in his posts that he was making educated guesses was all he needed to do. This seemed to be an affront to him, as he was never wrong (if you spend any time going through his post history, you'll see he likes to take a stance and speak as if he's an authority, even if it's obviously just an opinion).
This escalates into Mark becoming a problem. Soon us Mods are getting PMs about him sending abusive messages to other users, and this spills into the public posts too. Mark starts wondering why everyone is picking on him, so he starts reporting posts. And then once again, forum users who didn't know what they were stepping into when interacting with Mark, decide they'd rather leave the forum than see him posting everywhere.
Well, that is where the health and well being of the forum suffers, is it not? When one user is causing the exodus of other users, that's bad. When that very user has been banned multiple times before, I believe the phrase is "don't let the door hit you on your way out".
I want you the general users of the forum to know that we Mods to not swing the ban hammer for our mere amusement. We joke that way sometimes, but still. The forum is yours. There are a few rules about proper decorum, but for the most part it's just common sense. We don't put up with egregious trolling. We are not here to settle petty squabbles. You are welcome to your opinion, and others are welcome to disagree. In general, we don't want the place to become a zone of negativity, seeing as how this is actually a 'fan' site. That is not to say you have to love everything about TPA or how the game is managed. Far from it. The game is far from perfect, and we all know it.
What I'm ultimately trying to say is, do not fear being banned. Unless you are truly being a jerk. Even then you'll get a warning. The only reason I'm sharing this particular time regarding Mark is because I feel the forum can benefit from it. We don't mind teasing, I'm not offended by sarcasm (shocking, I know), and differences of opinion are to be expected. It's a blurry line to cross that gets you in trouble, but spamming and ignoring Mods is a sure way to be shown the exit.
Enjoy the forum. I continue to enjoy what members bring to it. I hope this particular thread sheds some light into certain decisions that have been made.
See, these forums are alive and well because of you, the forum users. Without your comments and the creation of threads, there is no forum community. I view the job of being a moderator as making sure the community is healthy, alive, and lively. That does not mean I expect a 'hive mind' nor do I expect everyone to play nice with each other at all times. The forum would be quite boring if this were the case.
That being said, now and then a forum member like Mark shows up. He actually had many well thought out posts. More often than not, he tried to bring something to these forums. So why is he getting banned then? Do we moderators strike just because we don't like someone? That accusation has certainly been made before. Or that we're hypocritical and ban people for things we ourselves do. The short answer is no. So allow me to make an example of Mark and explain why he was detrimental to the forum and needed to be removed.
This is not the first time Mark has been banned, it's at least his 3rd. See, he used to post under the name Pinball Lizard, but for reasons prior to my becoming a moderator, he was banned. Then he was allowed back, and this time used Mark Wyda as his name. He was banned once more, because he was being abusive and offensive via private message, facebook, and the chatroom, to a number of people including moderators. When I say abusive and offensive, I mean vile hate speech that simply has no place in society. On top of that, he was spamming the people with it. The moderator in question had over 75 messages sent to him in less than 24 hours. Users were saying they were going to leave the forum because of Mark, and so once more he was banned.
He tried to come back various times under various user names, but he was easily found out each time and banned under all these pseudonyms too, just on principle. Finally he made a plea to come back, that he would change his ways, and promised to not rile any feathers again. And for a while, he did just that. Old habits are hard to quit though. Mark does not take criticism well. My own interaction is this regard came in the form of him siting 'sales numbers' for the various tables, despite not having actual facts that could be shared. Many times in the past, and most recently, he has been told that unless he can show proof, quit stating such things as fact. Simply stating in his posts that he was making educated guesses was all he needed to do. This seemed to be an affront to him, as he was never wrong (if you spend any time going through his post history, you'll see he likes to take a stance and speak as if he's an authority, even if it's obviously just an opinion).
This escalates into Mark becoming a problem. Soon us Mods are getting PMs about him sending abusive messages to other users, and this spills into the public posts too. Mark starts wondering why everyone is picking on him, so he starts reporting posts. And then once again, forum users who didn't know what they were stepping into when interacting with Mark, decide they'd rather leave the forum than see him posting everywhere.
Well, that is where the health and well being of the forum suffers, is it not? When one user is causing the exodus of other users, that's bad. When that very user has been banned multiple times before, I believe the phrase is "don't let the door hit you on your way out".
I want you the general users of the forum to know that we Mods to not swing the ban hammer for our mere amusement. We joke that way sometimes, but still. The forum is yours. There are a few rules about proper decorum, but for the most part it's just common sense. We don't put up with egregious trolling. We are not here to settle petty squabbles. You are welcome to your opinion, and others are welcome to disagree. In general, we don't want the place to become a zone of negativity, seeing as how this is actually a 'fan' site. That is not to say you have to love everything about TPA or how the game is managed. Far from it. The game is far from perfect, and we all know it.
What I'm ultimately trying to say is, do not fear being banned. Unless you are truly being a jerk. Even then you'll get a warning. The only reason I'm sharing this particular time regarding Mark is because I feel the forum can benefit from it. We don't mind teasing, I'm not offended by sarcasm (shocking, I know), and differences of opinion are to be expected. It's a blurry line to cross that gets you in trouble, but spamming and ignoring Mods is a sure way to be shown the exit.
Enjoy the forum. I continue to enjoy what members bring to it. I hope this particular thread sheds some light into certain decisions that have been made.
Good of you to give an informative post on the subject, something that is not easy to do. For us old members this story about Mark is nothing new but even I got a bit surprised about how extensive his doings her had become with all the pms. 
