Based on what we’ve already seen these past few days and the many such posts currently residing in the moderation queue, it’s time once again to remind everyone to please stay out of ban threads.
Those of you that have been here more than five minutes know that bans are not discussed on these forums, now or ever. While we understand and appreciate that many of you are just trying to be helpful, non-official responses tend to only muddy the waters and lead to even more ban discussion that is not permitted. Please resist the urge to post in such threads and leave it to the professional moderation staff or myself in an emergency.
For those of you who need any additional reminder, I can arrange to have Dragnet drop by and ensure you understand. Painfully if need be.
For those of you posting here publicly demanding to know the reason for your game ban, please let’s not start our forum relationship by lying to one another. The game is rated so as to be appropriate for children, even those children not yet old enough to post on these forums. With that in mind, you know what you did wrong, Turn 10/Playground Games knows what you did wrong and we moderators know what you did wrong. There is no reason anyone else needs to know unless you really want the rest of the forums to know what it is you did wrong. Post here publicly demanding to know why you received an in-game ban and you will receive a response in due course and that publicly where everyone else can see it as well.
It probably would help if those banned where given a reason in message. it’s always good to associate reward/punishment with specific action or behavior and that would probably cut down the threads started.
The limitation on the number of characters which can be used for the in-game ban message prevent an “explanation” of the item(s) cited as violation of the Microsoft Code of Conduct. It has always been that way and remains.
The complaints “I didn’t get a warning” (in the Code of Conduct when people create their gamertags, read and agreed to already), “Why can’t they just remove it and send me a message?” (bogus, each person banned has been warned before their accounts were created) or “I see worse stuff all the time! Why me?” (there is a Report mechanism in-game, use it) are all just excuses.
Items which draw bans are all violations, all either depictions or words one would not show to a teacher, grocery clerk, minister or a policeman on the corner, let alone bring up during a birthday party, family gathering or in the office. And, they’re covered in the Code of Conduct.
Tho a message or explanation is a good idea (and also polite and respectful towards a customer), in most companies they don’t do it, basically to avoid endless conversations or debates, so they just lock or ban and that’s it (case closed). I’ve seen this policy not only here but on many other companies as well.
Unfortunately, people tend to ignore sticky threads if there are more than a handful and we have more than enough at present.
And make no mistake, sending a message with a reason for the ban is redundant as they already know full well what they have done to earn the ban. They come here playing stupid in the mistaken hope someone will believe their sob story and reverse the ban so they can avoid the consequences of their exceedingly poor decision making. Playing stupid is actually the one area where they truly excel.
This is simply not true, Riot Games, who has done more research on quelling toxic behavior than anyone else in the industry, has found that not only do players commonly not understand their toxic behavior is not acceptable, but when it is explained to them how it impacts others and given the opportunity to modify their behavior they do so. It is actually a much smaller population of players that go on to repeat offend. (GDC talk 2015)
The idea that you want to have a “forum relationship” to begin with is intellectually dishonest when you come into it with such an adversarial mindset.
The moderation staff here is paid? If so, props to Turn 10 for realizing that exploiting community members to get free work is not an acceptable way to run a community.
Our current bans for FH3 are all for content uploaded by the banned players This content is almost exclusively one or more of three problem areas.
Profanity - the game is rated as suitable for minors, does anyone old enough to have a grandmother not know that such language is not appropriate?
Discriminatory - does anyone seriously think this game is the appropriate place to brandish symbols of mid-20th century fascist politics?
Paedophilia-related - anyone who thinks this is funny needs immediate professional help.
I will maintain just as adversarial a mindset as I can muster, particularly in light of options two and three and not apologize to anyone for it. And I certainly have no intention of having any sort of relationship with those guilty of such repugnant behavior, much less spend any of my valuable time trying to show them the error of their ways. If one does not understand, a priori, that such content is entirely inappropriate for a game rated for children then none of us here is likely board-certfied and licensed to provide the help they so desperately need.
That does not mean they shouldn’t be told what they did wrong though. What may seem obvious to us as wrongdoing (no matter how deplorable whatever their action may be), they still should be told why. If anyone is ever caught speeding, chances are they knew they were speeding. The police officer still tells you why you’re getting a ticket though.
If you say that, I hear they give you a pair of shiny connected bracelets and a free room stay. How nice!
If I’m not mistaken, and I’m not, any Forza game in recent times (perhaps even as far back as FM2) comes with a warning message upon your first time entering the “Apply Decals” menu. Something stating (in essence) that “by using this, you agree to the terms listed in the Xbox Live Code of Conduct; failure to follow them will be met with disciplinary action.”
If it’s something that you painted on your car and you could get in trouble for it in real life, you could get in trouble for it in games too. “But I can do it in-” As stated by Hieronymus, this game is rated E for Everyone (PEGI 3), which includes children. Just because you did it in GTA V doesn’t mean it flies here too.
While this doesn’t apply to bans related to topics outside of the paint menu, often from what I’ve seen here in my time, all the “I’ve done nothing bad” people usually forget (perhaps “forget” is more apt) about their drug-covered or profanity-laced designs.
I hope that it sheds some light on the situation, and for those saying “there’s no ban warning or anything”, there is. You likely just ignored it and pressed “Don’t show this message again.”
You’re not mistaken. I saw the message last week when I fired up FH3 but what I’m saying is that while we know it’s against the rules (just like speeding), if you get in trouble for something, you should be told why you’ve gotten the ban, ticket, etc.
I agree, truly. It’d save frustration for all parties involved. They’d just need to make a personalized message for the banned players. “You have been banned for ## days due to: Inappropriate Design(s)/Trolling/Exploiting and Abusing Glitches/Intentional Ramming/etc.” or whatever.
Exactly! It would still solve the problem of people coming into the forums and asking why they’re banned, getting responses from people who may not know what they’re talking about and having nothing to do with their ban.
I agree that these users should be banned, and that they shouldn’t be coming to the forums seeking answers to their ban/looking for sympathy.
It is time for the moderators and everybody in charge to use a little common sense. Falling back on the, “you know what you did wrong, deal with it” statement over and over shows a lack of concern and lack of professionalism in your assigned job as moderator. Please read the following as this logic cannot be failed.
The following statement is true. We do not ALWAYS know what we do wrong in this life. PERIOD
The following statement is true. To EXPECT every human, 100% of the time (and that means without fail, every single person every single time) know exactly what they did wrong is just ridiculous. PERIOD
The following statements are opinions that I believe many agree with would help this forum. Giving them a simple one-line statement like was mentioned… “you’ve been banned for XX many days for the following reason” would be perfect and eliminate a bunch of wasted posts on this forum and wasted moderator time. The moderators need to quit acting like… “you know what you did wrong”. Look back through your entire life. I’m sure there’s been at least one moment where you’ve done something wrong and were told you did something wrong and someone had to explain it to you. Sure most of the time we do something wrong we know exactly what it is, but there is that occasion that we’re not quite sure and not sure what bounds we crossed. That’s why people do things wrong SOMETIMES; because they’re not sure exactly where the edge of the boundary is. This is especially true in younger people or people that are not as worldly or naive about the vast world around them. I think it’s completely fair to take just a few seconds and tell them where their mistake is. In many cases it will help them correct their actions and not do it in the future, and will save all of us the hassle of staring at their silly posts.
No, no you can’t. A professional is someone that earns a paid living from something. I mean come on, the word professional can find it’s roots in profession, which means… help me out here, I forgot what a profession is… The word you are looking for is “skilled”. You can be skilled at something without being paid. Even the adjective for professional mentions having that kind of manor in the workplace, so again, we are talking about something that is paying…
That being said, the few ban threads I have seen had moderators replying about the TC putting profanity or other nonsense on a car, and then acting surprised or ignorant when they get banned because of it. How simple is it to follow the rules? For example, the rule about not discussing bans on the forum…
