Belegarth

I would like to preface this by saying that I appreciate you taking over the position of webmaster on such short notice. But of all the things you could do to improve the Belegarth web presence, censoring the forums and moving to change policy is not at the top of the list. I personally don't mind heavy moderation of public forums, but private forums should be exactly that: private. Free from outside moderation (except in the case of absenteeism or extreme neglect), and especially free from an automatic profanity censor. And if you are going to do these things, you should at least make a post in this forum and possibly General Mayhem explaining your actions--ESPECIALLY your termination of the "three strike rule." I feel like you are taking unwarranted licenses with your newfound position, and I don't appreciate it. It's trite, but I like being able to swear in my private forums, and I'm insulted that you've made these changes without even informing the public. Based on your current actions, I will vote against your changes to the "Online Community Rules" on simple principal, and I have at least 7 realms that will vote with me. If you want to make changes to the web board, present them to the people who use it, and the war council. We have a war council for a reason--we want a representational vote, and that is why we are not Dagorhir.

Madog, no offense, but i completely agree

I agree with everything Ralimar said. when this web board was set up, we decided that swearing would be allowed as long as it wasn't excessive. If someone swore excessively, they'd get a strike for it.

It's one thing to protect the board from bots, but this is a sport primarily for adults. I don't need someone to protect me from bad words, and I do not appreciate having my words replaced by some filter's version of them.

If you guys could help me find a mod to allow the word filters to not work in private forums, I would be glad to install it. we use a phpbb 2.0.XX and we are fully up to date with our install. The only mods we have installed are to change the word editors. Although I will be installing a 'spell check mod' before this board reaches its EOL.

I am very happy to see a filter. One of the things that I have always hated about this board is the profanity. I have always had an inner twinge when I would post a link to the Belegarth forums. To me it just screams immaturity and only makes us look bad.

Winfang says it perfectly.
One of the issues that Madog is tasked with is cleaning up the bigotry and all flaming that has been rampant on the boards in the past few months. This is in effort to make clean up our image and more friendly to potential new recruits.

I agree whole heartedly with Physic on this one. Winfang supports everything that Madog has done, and Winfang would have done it himself, if he had the time.

Profanity has no place on this board. All it does is make us look immature. I get the same impression reading this board as I get from dropping into a Yahoo chatroom with a bunch of kids talking about their favorite band.

Madog does not want to limit anyone's ability to exercise their 1st admendment right. He does however want to rise the maturity level of group and prevent unneeded legal hassle that could potenially happen. If the profanity WAS KEPT AT A RESONABLE LEVEL, I would not have told Madog to do this. With my decline participation on the board in the past 4 months, I noticed an increase in the profanity level.

If anyone doesn't like it, then have me removed as webmaster. Madog is acting on my behalf and I directed him to implement these filters.

Then it should be an effort on the part of the community, not the censorship of the voice of everyone in it. The beauty of this forum, and what brings people here, instead of certain other boards and sports, is the general openness and willing to let people talk/rant/chat/ask whatever & however they see fit within fairly open guidelines. Just because you don't agree with it all doesn't mean another doesn't have the right to express it under the current rules.

There is no excessive profanity, hell barely any profanity, within the public forums. It is only once someone starts accessing the private forums (General Mayhem is a PRIVATE forum, btw, everyone who is a member just happens to have access to it.) and has therefore already read the rules, warnings, etc. about the use of profanity on the boards. Even in General Mayhem, profanity is kept down to a relative moderation and the mods do what they can to manage the rest. If you don't agree with something within a private forum, then bring it up to that forum's mod, not install a board-wide censor. You stifle the community and will cause further unrest and drama among the game. I for one would much rather rant about something or someone in this digital soapbox than let it stew until an event and potentially be in the mindset to injure someone over something stupid, strictly because my outlet has been censored by someone who doesn't know me and understand the reasons behind the forums I belong to.

Yet this community is what really needs the work and update. If the community's mindset where in the right place, then things can be much more welcoming to new fighters. Currently, all this censorship is going to do is cause further chaos and unrest among the board and aim to lose ALOT of fighters (myself, my realm, and my unit included). There are much better ways to manage the board, and the community, than decisions based on the thoughts and opinions of one individual. If I wanted that, I would be in Dag.

The target should be the overall nature and stance of the community. You can't put a language filter on an event.

Winfang wrote:
Madog does not want to limit anyone's ability to exercise their 1st admendment right. He does however want to rise the maturity level of group and prevent unneeded legal hassle that could potenially happen. If the profanity WAS KEPT AT A RESONABLE LEVEL, I would not have told Madog to do this. With my decline participation on the board in the past 4 months, I noticed an increase in the profanity level.

What about strikes for those who are unable to kept the profanity reasonable? we have all these mods, why aren't there more strikes being given out for excessive cursing? does adding a letter or changing a word change the intent or make it any better?

At the very least, a bit of notice beforehand would have been nice.

At the very least, a little warning should have been the only requirement of this enactment. To go about it in this manner can only raise the hackles of the public.

Cyric wrote:At the very least, a bit of notice before hand would have been nice.

No kidding, then maybe I wouldn't have a strike. (who would of thought a strike from a private forum for men only... )

my only major quam so far is his overstepping Jinkata's responsibilties as the person in charge of the private forums. Or did noone notice he changed the moderator of the men's forum before jinkata could do anything. All be it that it needed done but it was Jinkata's job.

I have been busy with my personal life and not able to keep up. Strikes should have been given out, but where not. The mods where consuming most of their time with dealing with the bot problem in my absence. This is part of the reason requested Madog to act on my behalf.

Yes, changing a letter or two does make in better. Casey and myself don't allow Harlie to curse. If she wants to express herself in way that people would use profanity we give her other words to say without offending someone. So now instead of saying badass, she says awesome, and we don't get letter from the daycare.

When it comes down to it, profanity offends people. We want people to come here and we try to encourage them to discuss and communicate with others who enjoy Belegarth, to make the game better. When you talk to someone at a practice who has questions about what you do, you don't start dropping f bombs when answering their questions do you? I doubt it. You don't know what offends them, so you try to be respectful and courteous as possible. I feel the same attitude should be taken on the boards as well.

I'll agree. It was a little drastic, but I felt it need to be done.

savetuba wrote:

Cyric wrote:At the very least, a bit of notice before hand would have been nice.

No kidding, then maybe I wouldn't have a strike. (who would of thought a strike from a private forum for men only... )

That is not the reasoning behind your strike and I think you know it. Your strike is based on content.

I've banned people for less then what you posted Savetuba. Be thankful I didn't see it first or else you would have been out of here.

Physic wrote:I am very happy to see a filter. One of the things that I have always hated about this board is the profanity. I have always had an inner twinge when I would post a link to the Belegarth forums. To me it just screams immaturity and only makes us look bad.

Winfang says it perfectly.
One of the issues that Madog is tasked with is cleaning up the bigotry and all flaming that has been rampant on the boards in the past few months. This is in effort to make clean up our image and more friendly to potential new recruits.

I agree.

Xooyan wrote:

savetuba wrote:

Cyric wrote:At the very least, a bit of notice before hand would have been nice.

No kidding, then maybe I wouldn't have a strike. (who would of thought a strike from a private forum for men only... )

That is not the reasoning behind your strike and I think you know it. Your strike is based on content.

what I said has a valid point to it. note I did not give any links nor images and under the current rules of the web boards, or at the time I posted, none of it was against the rules. But I would rather discuss that in a more suitable location. However, under the new rule a person won't be able to discuss such without being threatened with banning or receiving strikes.

I feel that if you mods think a profanity filter is absolutely neceesarry, then you should make it the default setting for new users, but optional for those of us without a problem with it. That way, it's a win/win situation.

You should at the very least keep it on the time honored dash or asterisk system with the first letter still intact.

IE: F--- or D***

Fark and Richard are seem to have that "you aren't allowed to use big-boy words" feel to them.

On a side note:

6.1.1. President
o 6.1.1.3. Shall oversee the progress of all Officers and issue any web site changes to the Webmaster should any need to be made.

6.1.5. Webmaster
o 6.1.5.1. Will be in charge of the national web page, making any and all changes to the page that the President has mandated.
o 6.1.5.2. Report to the President so that the President may report to the WC any and all issues dealing with the page in question.

If I'm reading this right the Webmaster should have told the President that these were the intended changes. Then according to the by-laws the changes should have been submitted to the WC for a vote. If the vote passes then an announcement is made and the then the changes are made.

It seems this sudden change violates the by-laws.

other than the word filter what "new rules" are we talking about and were are the posted?

If you are asking about my post, I said new rule, like a new ruler. Not new rules and/or guide lines/laws, ect.

So if you think that I, or Madog acting on my behalf, have over-step the limits in the bylaws then contact the President.

Peregrine wrote:other than the word filter what "new rules" are we talking about and were are the posted?

Currently there are no rules, other than what you see in the upper right hand corner of the board, Which BTW Savetuba, have never been approved by warcouncil, so you might as well start by fighting them.

ok cool, keep up the good work.

Winfang wrote:So if you think that I, or Madog acting on my behalf, have over-step the limits in the bylaws then contact the President.

I would, but unlike the by-laws that I found in less than 20 seconds, I'm having a slightly harder time finding out who the current President is.

SirMADOG wrote:

Peregrine wrote:other than the word filter what "new rules" are we talking about and were are the posted?

Currently there are no rules, other than what you see in the upper right hand corner of the board, Which BTW Savetuba, have never been approved by warcouncil, so you might as well start by fighting them.

So then, by what rules shall you enforce?

Kyrian is the president.

Thanks Winfang.

Xooyan wrote:At the very least, a little warning should have been the only requirement of this enactment. To go about it in this manner can only raise the hackles of the public.

My main problem.

Winfang wrote:I've banned people for less then what you posted Savetuba. Be thankful I didn't see it first or else you would have been out of here.

That's because you're never on AIM. Where is my winfang!

i'd just like to see the realms page fixed on the main site.

After 10 minutes of searching I found this http://www.phpbbhacks.com/download/3971 It disables the filter for private forums

Winfang- Do you think it counterproductive that you gave Maddog control of the boards so that you can do what you need to in your life but have had to spend an insane amount of time defending his appoint by you? Just a thought. Also If you would be so kind as to maybe explain why you choose him in particular. No offense to anyone I just haven't meet Maddog or Winfang so I don't know any of their references.

Argyll wrote:i'd just like to see the realms page fixed on the main site.

I agree. That needs to be updated, a lot of people go there first before asking questions on the forums.

Here is another question I have:

I noticed that an identical thread was started in both Humor and Religious Discussion asking if we wanted to go public. Was this a blanket effort, or just a select group of forums that were possibly legitimate candidates for public view? Though I appreciate that it was a request, the sudden move to try and do away with private forums concerns me.

Elebrim wrote:Here is another question I have:

I noticed that an identical thread was started in both Humor and Religious Discussion asking if we wanted to go public. Was this a blanket effort, or just a select group of forums that were possibly legitimate candidates for public view? Though I appreciate that it was a request, the sudden move to try and do away with private forums concerns me.

It was selected discussion groups, but the offer is available to any private forum group.

Jikanta has requested that I do something about all the private forums, in the fact that there is just so many of them and it is really hard to manage them all from a Webmasters standpoint. To you guys they just magically happen to us, we are really lost in the disorganization. I personally believe a move to making some of the forums more public can benefit our community. For example the Multi-realm forums I think should be public. I can not imagine the waiting time for some of the realms.

SirMADOG wrote:I can not imagine the waiting time for some of the realms.

It would be awesome if there were something like the pm counter to tell you when you logged in if someone was petetioning you're usergroup. Makes me wish I could write code.

Big Jimmy wrote:

SirMADOG wrote:I can not imagine the waiting time for some of the realms.

It would be awesome if there were something like the pm counter to tell you when you logged in if someone was petetioning you're usergroup. Makes me wish I could write code.

The board E-mails me notifications. I have G-mail so it just pops up in my task bar.

Yah, yahoo basically does the same thing for me, and that's why I don't have a problem getting someone into my group in a timely manner, but if I catch the E-mail and forget to accept them for more than a couple of hours, it might be awhile before I just check on a whim to see if anyone's applied.

SirMADOG wrote:I personally believe a move to making some of the forums more public can benefit our community. For example the Multi-realm forums I think should be public. I can not imagine the waiting time for some of the realms.

I might agree under certain circumstances (History/Tactics and Fitness were good ways to start), but I am thankful you left it to the forums themselves to decide. I appreciate the confusion and disorganization of the situation and would fully embrace a way that could rectify the situation for both the forum members and the mods; however, a few of the forums need to stay private for the sake of content or design.

I could accept adding the realm conferences to the public view with restricted access to the usergroup only if need be. Kind of hinders realm privacy, but if it needs to be done there are worse things that could happen.