Feel free to correct me if I am wrong. Who, precisely, suggested the name?
Me. Approved by Annorax.
What does what our discussion area is called have to do with absolutely anything? Don't worry about answering, this question is rhetorical.
Some people are offended by the art of Triumph of Ferocity. That doesn't make the card illegal to play. Wizards issued a public statement acknowledging that maybe it can be seen as in bad taste but that the product is out there and sorry if you were offended by it but that wasn't the plan when we printed the card. Some people wept blood for days on both sides of the argument, but at the end of the day, Triumph of Feorcity is a good limited card and occasional Constructed sideboard card and I haven't heard discussion about it but in those contexts since.
Really, there are a lot of parallels that can be drawn between the Gutter and Triumph of Ferocity.
Sure. I can understand that. Why, though, is it necessary to use immature language to do so? And, more importantly, why does the staff need to kowtow to a small (less than 200 users) group of people who demand, stridently and incessantly, a special set of rights to do things that do not comport with the general culture of the site?
The Gutterites want to be free to say just about whatever they want, however they want, so long as it falls short of actual hate speech, and they're trying to maintain a group of users who are mature enough to be trusted to do that. That's about the size of it.
If the lattermost post does not succinctly, fully answer your questions then your questions will simply never be fully answered.
Tormod: I actively participated in the unban request threads for KCW and Xenphire, against and for respectively, based on their appeals and their contents. As pointed out above, threads related to unbanning are raised in the staff lounge and discussed there. There is real dialog that happens in there and it's not just a cut and dry y/n usually. I say usually because I didn't read every unban request thread, so I can't speak for every instance of a request being raised.
That's honestly ridiculous, the amount of times people (including staff and including myself) speak/spoke about things suspended users have said is very high.
I know when Xen was suspended, things he had said were posted all the time, not at his request but because they were relevant to something or other at time.
Suspension evasion is 1 thing, posting a joke that a friend told you is another.
I truly hope there is more to this, as if not I'm rather disgusted with what I would see as a blatant misuse of staff power.
afaik, that's the whole story. i would post the full, non-paraphrased story, but i would both be leaking gutter contents and "posting for a suspended user" (laffo) and as much as i would like to air how ridiculous a breech of trust and abuse of power the suspension is, it seems as though the staff's lynch streak has my thumbs in a bit of a vice on this one.
Thank you for the context. What you are saying it appears that (N_S) made a comment that under one interpretation could be on behalf of a currently suspended member and on another could just be a member joking around about a conversation he had with a friend that happens to be suspended. If (N_S) appeals sounds like he may have a case of faulty interpretation on behalf of the mod. Either way I hope he does nothing foolish and gets himself banned from this site.
Literally he copy and pasted text from AIM and posted it like this:
Quote from Suspended User »
Suspended User's screen name: lead into joke Suspended User's screen name: punchline
the lead was one word, the punchline was 3-4. none of the words involved a request to post that to MTGS.
it's a very liberal interpretation of the rules and a downright overreach on whoever handed down punishment, but that's my subjective reading of what happened.
Not entirely sure what you are claiming here, but posting on the behalf of a suspended/banned member has always been an auto suspension offense. Heck in the current batch of rules it appears that the staff would also be justified in banning the person that (N_S) was posting on behalf of, something that does not appear to have been enforced here.
He posted something funny a currently suspended user said to him on AIM while talking about the ongoing discussion about the Gutter between Gutter members and Staff. This was neither a message "for the rest of us" from him, nor was he asked to post it. It was just two funny lines of dialog he'd encountered in a conversation he was having with a member who also just happened to be suspended.
I'm curious. How does a photo verify anything besides ownership of a camera? When I was 16 I looked well over 18. And if I looked 12, I'd grab someone else to take a picture of.
Most of the people applying to join in the Gutter are well over 18, and that is apparent from their application photo.
There really is no way to absolutely assure anyone that you are 18 or older on the Internet. IDs or birth certificates (which we would never ask for, but for sake of example) can be faked or shopped or just borrowed from someone older than you. Your age in your profile can easily be modified. You can be a 2 year-old and hold up a piece of paper saying you're 28 and with enough make-up and possibly a fake beard, you can look like you're Benjamin Button.
Asking for a photo with application provides some reasonable metric to judge whether a person is of-age and requires people to put in at least some non-zero effort to make it into those hallowed halls. Also, honor system if you look like you're 18 but are 16 (though many of us are young enough to be able to tell a joey from a roo).
First, I'd like to see some citation of that, please. If you're going to make accusations, Kijin, have the accuracy to back them up somewhat. My first Gutterban came as a violation of Gutter rules, which was legitimate. My second came from lurking, especially when I was called out for lurking and refused to post in the Gutter. Please, please post something showing my leaking Gutter material out. I'd love to see it. Until then, my impression of your honesty takes something of a ding.
Second, I note the use of your "most" there, in my bolded text. Clearly, there's some shenanigans with what you're saying.
Harkius
I'd love to help you out, dude, but I think someone deleted all of your posts prior to the activation of someone's "Celsus1" account. It's weird that someone would delete all of your posts, but there's nothing I can do about that. I'm sorry I can't be of more help.
edit: "most" is in regards to exceptions made for users who were previously Gutter banned (though I believe this policy is changing), are under 18, who cannot provide photo evidence of themselves, or members who were previously allowed in because of the "auto-allow Staff" clause to Gutter admission but are now off staff or the like. But feel free to imply things without evidence in a post while chiding me for also not supplying evidence. How very forthright of you.
If anyone is so up-their-own-rears about the secrecy, etc of the Gutter, there is nothing stopping them from applying to it by sending a join request and a photo to verify that they are 18+.
We ask that you not post unless your posting is going to contribute in some non-awful way (and unless you've spent a significant amount of time lurking, I will assure you that it will not), but most everyone is free to lurk so long as they put forth some of the most basic of expended efforts to gain Gutter access. It is also merely expected that Gutter contents remain in the Gutter, which is why users like Harkius and LogicX have had Gutter privileges revoked in the past.
What are you referring to here? Are you willing to just admit that you were wrong and made up facts about my IP?
No, I won't, because I didn't.
What you're talking about happened months ago and I know this comes as a shocker to you, but there are a good many things more important in my life then remembering what gimmick account names were attached to your IP address during a Gutter closure from over half a year ago. Namely literally everything else in my life. Sorry to break the bad news, but you factor into these threads and then nothing else; you are a nonentity to me outside of the grounds of this conversation, and the fact that you hold yourself in high enough esteem to think otherwise is insulting to the both of us.
Please stop derailing this discussion further, we're making something resembling progress finally.
I have been lurking long enough to know that, along with plenty of other laundry that has been aired out on this and other drama bomb threads. It does make for good lunchtime reading. I'm not trying to disparage anyone, or take sides. As I said, I don't really care what eventually happens as it will have no effect on how I enjoy the site. If he spent so much time doing such work he should understand quite well then that with the responsibilities come just a few rewards. I just didn't like that question going unanswered especially since I've dealt with similar questions.
Your answer to the question is "Mods shouldn't be held to their own standards, as representatives of this site, because mods." That's not helpful and provides a very dark double standard.
@ Kijin Yes, I'm saying exactly that an all volunteer squad should get the opportunity to curse and swear and rant about the people they serve, behind closed doors. If the attitude spills out, then it needs to be handled. But judges at a tourney or convention get a room where only they get to go, and there they complain about people who don't wash or ask repetitive questions etc... We are all human and I'd rather they do that kind of venting somewhere like that than get bitter and start acting out against the people they are supposed to serve. I hope the person you want to answer does and that this all gets resolved eventually, I really do, but it does seem like there are a lot of personal issues that can't be extricated from the site ones.
Comparing real life, physical spaces with virtual ones is risky business because your analogies, but I return to my previous comment:
If there's a back room where the boss can curse and scream and punch a pillow, why can't I, the guy at the venue go in the bathroom and lock the door and do the same? Or why can't I go in the alley next to the venue? Or some other sequestered space that isn't in the middle of the public portion where the rest of the people are, particularly when those spaces are already there? Are we closing off the roof, or the alley next to the venue, or the bathroom because someone might curse in there? Or because people might come out still upset after doing their business there?
That doesn't make a lick of sense. Just as if I walked out of the bathroom still ****ting everywhere, if I came out still cursing and shouting and shoving people, I'd be removed from the venue.
I'm one of the 99% of the Community here that just checks out the relevant boards I lurk in and occasionally post to (Commander and Cube) and I don't really have a dog in this fight. Burn the Gutterites with fire, storm the castle of the Admins/Mods, whatever. I'd just like to respond to this very specific point as a person who does plenty of RL volunteering for similar styled organizations to this site. They get to have these forums the way they want because they spend the time to make the site work, without reward or even thanks most of the time. Without them doing what they do the place would devolve into what many other places on the internet become, cesspools of trolls with a terrible signal to noise ratio. So if they want to vent in a way that others aren't allowed to, or create new standards Forumites need to follow, they earn that right by their efforts to make this place we all enjoy work in a reasonable fashion.
So, essentially, your claim is "because mods have bold tags under their names, they can act against their self-proclaimed-interests of the site despite removing an area of the site for the same that, as evidenced by your response, has a mostly invisible impact on the entire site (versus the impact of, you know, staff on the site)."
As someone who was staff of this site for 7 years, I can tell you that that's a lot of bologna. When you stand as a presumed representative of a site to all of its members, your input on the site, be it public or private, sends a message of what is and isn't acceptable to the rest of the users of it. If part of the message you send is that, "Every now and again, people get upset and need to vent, and there is a place where you can do that while still on this site without repercussion," while acting as part of a body that is tasked with policing people who publicly act out of line with the standards of the forum, not giving such an option to your userbase is disingenuous, particularly if "not giving that option" involves revoking an option that same userbase previously had. Carrying this decision on a banner of, "These are a spontaneous new set of standards we are now holding the entire site to that we dictate and enforce singularly," is doubly so.
However, this discussion is irrelevant between you and I because my comments were addressed from one former staff of 7 years to another staff of 7 years. As you have no staff experience at this time on this site from which to speak, nor are you the person my comments were addressed to, I will politely ask that you let the person I was speaking to respond.
Me. Approved by Annorax.
What does what our discussion area is called have to do with absolutely anything? Don't worry about answering, this question is rhetorical.
Some people are offended by the art of Triumph of Ferocity. That doesn't make the card illegal to play. Wizards issued a public statement acknowledging that maybe it can be seen as in bad taste but that the product is out there and sorry if you were offended by it but that wasn't the plan when we printed the card. Some people wept blood for days on both sides of the argument, but at the end of the day, Triumph of Feorcity is a good limited card and occasional Constructed sideboard card and I haven't heard discussion about it but in those contexts since.
Really, there are a lot of parallels that can be drawn between the Gutter and Triumph of Ferocity.
If the lattermost post does not succinctly, fully answer your questions then your questions will simply never be fully answered.
So your argument is because you don't like the toys someone else is playing with no one else should be allowed to play with those toys? Seems legit.
afaik, that's the whole story. i would post the full, non-paraphrased story, but i would both be leaking gutter contents and "posting for a suspended user" (laffo) and as much as i would like to air how ridiculous a breech of trust and abuse of power the suspension is, it seems as though the staff's lynch streak has my thumbs in a bit of a vice on this one.
gg, staff!
Literally he copy and pasted text from AIM and posted it like this:
the lead was one word, the punchline was 3-4. none of the words involved a request to post that to MTGS.
it's a very liberal interpretation of the rules and a downright overreach on whoever handed down punishment, but that's my subjective reading of what happened.
He posted something funny a currently suspended user said to him on AIM while talking about the ongoing discussion about the Gutter between Gutter members and Staff. This was neither a message "for the rest of us" from him, nor was he asked to post it. It was just two funny lines of dialog he'd encountered in a conversation he was having with a member who also just happened to be suspended.
Most of the people applying to join in the Gutter are well over 18, and that is apparent from their application photo.
There really is no way to absolutely assure anyone that you are 18 or older on the Internet. IDs or birth certificates (which we would never ask for, but for sake of example) can be faked or shopped or just borrowed from someone older than you. Your age in your profile can easily be modified. You can be a 2 year-old and hold up a piece of paper saying you're 28 and with enough make-up and possibly a fake beard, you can look like you're Benjamin Button.
Asking for a photo with application provides some reasonable metric to judge whether a person is of-age and requires people to put in at least some non-zero effort to make it into those hallowed halls. Also, honor system if you look like you're 18 but are 16 (though many of us are young enough to be able to tell a joey from a roo).
I'd love to help you out, dude, but I think someone deleted all of your posts prior to the activation of someone's "Celsus1" account. It's weird that someone would delete all of your posts, but there's nothing I can do about that. I'm sorry I can't be of more help.
edit: "most" is in regards to exceptions made for users who were previously Gutter banned (though I believe this policy is changing), are under 18, who cannot provide photo evidence of themselves, or members who were previously allowed in because of the "auto-allow Staff" clause to Gutter admission but are now off staff or the like. But feel free to imply things without evidence in a post while chiding me for also not supplying evidence. How very forthright of you.
We ask that you not post unless your posting is going to contribute in some non-awful way (and unless you've spent a significant amount of time lurking, I will assure you that it will not), but most everyone is free to lurk so long as they put forth some of the most basic of expended efforts to gain Gutter access. It is also merely expected that Gutter contents remain in the Gutter, which is why users like Harkius and LogicX have had Gutter privileges revoked in the past.
No, I won't, because I didn't.
What you're talking about happened months ago and I know this comes as a shocker to you, but there are a good many things more important in my life then remembering what gimmick account names were attached to your IP address during a Gutter closure from over half a year ago. Namely literally everything else in my life. Sorry to break the bad news, but you factor into these threads and then nothing else; you are a nonentity to me outside of the grounds of this conversation, and the fact that you hold yourself in high enough esteem to think otherwise is insulting to the both of us.
Please stop derailing this discussion further, we're making something resembling progress finally.
Your answer to the question is "Mods shouldn't be held to their own standards, as representatives of this site, because mods." That's not helpful and provides a very dark double standard.
Comparing real life, physical spaces with virtual ones is risky business because your analogies, but I return to my previous comment:
If there's a back room where the boss can curse and scream and punch a pillow, why can't I, the guy at the venue go in the bathroom and lock the door and do the same? Or why can't I go in the alley next to the venue? Or some other sequestered space that isn't in the middle of the public portion where the rest of the people are, particularly when those spaces are already there? Are we closing off the roof, or the alley next to the venue, or the bathroom because someone might curse in there? Or because people might come out still upset after doing their business there?
That doesn't make a lick of sense. Just as if I walked out of the bathroom still ****ting everywhere, if I came out still cursing and shouting and shoving people, I'd be removed from the venue.
So, essentially, your claim is "because mods have bold tags under their names, they can act against their self-proclaimed-interests of the site despite removing an area of the site for the same that, as evidenced by your response, has a mostly invisible impact on the entire site (versus the impact of, you know, staff on the site)."
As someone who was staff of this site for 7 years, I can tell you that that's a lot of bologna. When you stand as a presumed representative of a site to all of its members, your input on the site, be it public or private, sends a message of what is and isn't acceptable to the rest of the users of it. If part of the message you send is that, "Every now and again, people get upset and need to vent, and there is a place where you can do that while still on this site without repercussion," while acting as part of a body that is tasked with policing people who publicly act out of line with the standards of the forum, not giving such an option to your userbase is disingenuous, particularly if "not giving that option" involves revoking an option that same userbase previously had. Carrying this decision on a banner of, "These are a spontaneous new set of standards we are now holding the entire site to that we dictate and enforce singularly," is doubly so.
However, this discussion is irrelevant between you and I because my comments were addressed from one former staff of 7 years to another staff of 7 years. As you have no staff experience at this time on this site from which to speak, nor are you the person my comments were addressed to, I will politely ask that you let the person I was speaking to respond.
i'm saying the words are on screen but you're still singing the wrong lyrics somehow.