Chat restrictions 1

Vote on the shard-related matters and/or give your arguments.

How often should world chat messages be allowed to be repeated?

Poll ended at Sat Jul 18, 2015 6:09 pm

1 (once) per 60 minutes (1 per hour)
35
49%
1 (once) per 30 minutes (2 per hour)
19
27%
1 (once) per 15 minutes (4 per hour)
8
11%
other (please explain in the comments)
9
13%
 
Total votes: 71

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+Requiem
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Chat restrictions 1

Post by +Requiem »

This first poll is to determine what you guys feel is appropriate for restricting world chat messages. How often can a message be repeated, before administrative action (chat ban/jail) is taken? If you have an opinion, you are free to express yourself as long as you can do so politely, with respect for your fellow players, and with no flaming.

This is just to get an idea of what you all feel and may or may not be implemented now or in the future.
If the rules do actually change, there will be an announcement, and Excelsior Daily posting about it.
Maze Scarlethart
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by Maze Scarlethart »

Well I picked "Other" because while I don't think that trade should be repeated more than once an hour, I think that people should be able to announce Champ spawns more for people who just logged on or the message got spammed out or whatever. Champs are only up for a few minutes, whatever JimBob is selling will still be there in an hour.
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Eos
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by Eos »

*raises hand* I am a Guy Fawkes behind the unpopular "other" because I don't think it should be regulated. *ducks and hides* Yes, I find some of it annoying, too. No, I don't announce things either. It's this:

I am not a victim in need of protection. Rules are for the protection of citizens.
Spam is annoying, but 'annoying' is not 'violence'.

If someone is bothering you, take a moment to do your best to gently educate them on better manners. Or, enlighten them with your more successful social or business skills. Or, turn world chat off for a bit. Or, put that particular person on ignore. You don't need others to police the world for you if you take personal responsibility for your own experience.

What's annoying about the spam rule is it creates a crutch. If there was no rule, it would fall upon to actually do something pro-active as a present community to help those members develop more successful approaches to accomplishing their goals (that goal being always, at heart, no matter what their announcement is, to find friends to play with.)

Thus, it seems unnecessarily cruel and negligent as a people,
to take the members screaming the loudest for our company,
and throw them into isolation tanks.
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+Requiem
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by +Requiem »

I see your point Eos, however the rules exist as much for us as they do for you. We have to monitor world chat for various reasons regardless of what is in there. Not only are are certain things annoying, as staff, we don't have the luxury of putting someone on ignore, or turning off world chat. It has to be monitored for language, and a variety of other reasons. These rules help keep order. If we didn't monitor it, the family friendly nature many find enjoyable would dissolve, and I think it would hurt the shard. This is about finding a good balance.

In a perfect world, I wouldn't have to chat ban people, or jail them for breaking the rules. In a perfect world, my job wouldn't exist.
Godsmith
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by Godsmith »

I (Elena Rae) Say other, UO has always been about buying/selling and trading Items. I also agree with Eos a bit. Either allow all on world chat (Minus the swearing) and and if someone gets out of control with the spam our community of players can talk to them or be introduced to the ignore list.

let the community control world chat with ignore or add a Trade chat or completely remove world chat and have everyone use forums or teamspeak if they feel they need to talk about themselves and sing for hours...
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+Nyx
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by +Nyx »

I personally vote for no change, which is once per 60 minutes. When/if we get a trade channel I'd vote for the ads to be more frequently allowed.

Eos and Elena, while it's a nice and idealistic thought, that's just not how online communities with such diverse cultures represented can work. This shard has always been a restrictive environment by virtue of its family shard style and design. Restricting chat less in the ways you've mentioned will interfere with that family shard nature. Y'all weren't here at the time, but we had much much looser chat rules a few years ago and it became such a source of problems for the staff that coli felt it needed to be changed. Going back to that would just bring about those same issues.

I do believe strongly in everyone taking personal responsibility for their fun and their actions on the shard, but that doesn't negate the need for rules to define expectations for everyone from staff to players.
Mystic
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by Mystic »

I voted other and think the rule should stay the same for identical wording (ctrl+q and ad macros) but should be reduced or removed for conversational spam.

Either that or the definition of what constitutes an ad needs tweaking.

I think updates about time sensitive events (player-run events like auctions, champ spawns) should be allowed, even if there is a token gap to prevent mad spamming (say 5 mins).

I know it has been said that not everyone wants to know about champs and people find the announcements annoying, however that could be said about everything said in chat, someone's finding it annoying.

I'd rather have a flowing chat channel full of annoying stuff than one where people are afraid to talk due to fear of retribution.

But not repeated shop ads. Although, I'd rather more ads with a variation of content than the same identical abbreviated ads that abide by the chat rules, just.
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moonsongtx
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by moonsongtx »

I voted "other" too. I think that once per hour on vendor ads is good to leave as it is. But calling out champ spawns, or asking for others to come to gauntlet or something needs to be seen as just random chatting. As for "talking about ourselves or singing for hours"... some of us use UO as a portal to get to know other people. Some of us don't play the game just to make gold or get the biggest guild or get that best piece of armor. Some of us enjoy just talking with other people who we may or may never meet in real life. Honestly, General Chat here is really one of the things that makes this shard a favorite for most of us. I can count on one hand how many people have problems with what is said in general chat. I can't, however, count on that same hand how many new players come to the shard and after a few days exclaim how great Excelsior is because of the comradeship of its player base.
lestatzero
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by lestatzero »

I know I don't Play often @ all any more but I voted anyway. I voted for Keeping it the same to 1x per hour.... I do not see any need to do it more than that with the number of chat log scripts available as well as Portal. People can see messages that others have posted even if they had not logged in prior. (Thanks to portal)...

For those who don't agree .. Well Use portal ! ... It's a great tool.

I also think that it should be against the rules to post scripted automated messages or Adverts IMHO. Again because your messages can be read on Portal. If you want it to be displayed elseware then use the Forums as well.

Just my 2gp

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Muolke
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by Muolke »

The 1 time per hour for actual "ads" which refers to buying/selling items, vendor announcements, joining guilds etc. An announcement such as "champ spawns" and others should be excluded from this rule. It makes no sense to say I can only announce a champ spawn once per hour since they're not even up for that long. It's a small online community and at times there's very few active players on (AM hours for example) and I don't see any issue with someone posting about a champ spawn 2-3 times to get other players involved.

Some people might find it annoying, but others might feel new players asking questions is annoying as well. Are we going to limit that to 1 every hour as well? I hope not. Let the players play...
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AcidBern
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by AcidBern »

I am going to throw my stone in the bucket for other. I do occasionally announce things for sale and also inquire if I am looking to buy something specific. I think it is very annoying to see someone trying to sell their Blaze or Bonecrusher over and over in chat, and it clogs up my journal. BUT, I think 60 minutes is a bit long to wait before announcing again. I think within 30 minutes the group of individuals online has changed enough to make another announcement beneficial.

On the other hand, I think only being able to announce a champ spawn or other boss once is a bit excessive. Maybe limit it to 2 or 3 announcements in a short span for the same boss? Player run events I feel are in somewhat of the same boat.

In other words, what I am suggesting would be a ton of work and revising to the codex to make happen.

Just my opinion anyways.

Thanks for listening
Allynne
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by Allynne »

World chat used to look like a rolling billboard, imo. It made my eyes bleed frequently with all the spam. Any real chat was frequently buried in the spam.

I like the current anti-spam changes. I think they have cleaned up chat a great deal. I'd look favorably on relaxing restrictions on champ spawn announcements a bit as that may encourage more participation, but overall I'd rather watch people conversing than carrying on commerce. Many times the trade spammers weren't even at their keyboards to reply so... 12 hours later you may or may not even get a reply, assuming they even still had the item(s) they were advertising.

Portal is great for people who want to see ads. The vendor site is great for people looking for things to buy, assuming the seller is willing to pay a few gp to list their items there.

A trade-only channel might be nice for people who do want to see ads all day long as well (I don't), but don't know how realistic that is any time soon. Just my 2 cents. :)
Mystic
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by Mystic »

" Many times the trade spammers weren't even at their keyboards to reply so... 12 hours later you may or may not even get a reply, assuming they even still had the item(s) they were advertising."

This is a good point and maybe using chat should be put into the "no afk macroing" category.
ambivalence
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by ambivalence »

other:

1. champ spawn/group formation should be omitted from restrictions to encourage group play & inclusiveness
2. general chat should not be policed by GM's with better things to tend to

why:

1. it's extremely frustrating running to multiple champ locations to see piles of gold on the ground and upon asking why it wasn't announced in world chat only to be answered with "can't announce more than 1 in 60 mins". that rule, in my opinion, discourages people from including non-guildies, randoms, pugs, etc and promotes an environment of selfish play & exclusivity.

2. the general population already polices world chat. just last night there was a dude that was trolling & tryin to skirt the 'no-cussing' rules by using "@" and he was QUICKLY pounced upon by multiple people. the players were less tolerant than the GM's on at that moment. the shard appears to be mature enough to auto-regulate itself and if someone's being bad there will surely be pages. on a side note, i don't mind seeing a random line of song lyrics or "take-it-to-pm" type convos in world chat, it adds personality and flavour to the shard and the names & it's easy to see (and report) obvious trolls & obvious spam. to illustrate, i think "♪ all i want for xmas is my 2 front teeth ♪" adds more personality to the shard than ".....LAVA shop...." (no offense)

seems like yall're creating more work for yourselves. but i'm noob
MhBlis
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Re: Chat restrictions 1

Post by MhBlis »

New Player here.

I went with Other.

I agree with either a full trade channel or as is working the 1 once per hour rule.

Time sensitive events or group formations really could be a bit more relaxed. this comes from the part where I've just reached the point where I can contribute to these events and the scrolls are actually useful for me. How many times have I had to hump out to a champ only to not get their in-time or be unable to actually recruit people other through through PM. this really detracts from the experience. I could have spent my time far more productively had people been able to update us on where the spawn was at.

I still agree there should be some limit. Like 4 an hour.

The community I have found is pretty good at self regulation and these update types wouldn't really add much to the over all volume of chat since people would still need to feel the need to update.
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