Question/Thought Regarding Off-Topic

[Pariah]

Hello all,

In light of recent events and those of long running history, I've been thinking about the off-topic forum. Generally, I think the forum is a good place for non-game related thoughts, but it's not necessarily free from restraint. Certain threads/topics have been locked/removed if controversial, etc. This has led me to thinking about the purpose of Off-Topic versus another potential option. What are your thoughts surrounding an unmoderated anything goes type forum? Want to have a heated debate about taboo topics, go right ahead. Want to rage about the player/staff member who told you the afk rules over public chat. Do it. Want to use colorful language to describe the weeping angels in the Dr. Who quest? Yes, please. Just observing the general pace/activity in the forums, plus the drama in various places, I'm wondering if having a Thunderdome style, no holds barred place to hash out your love, hate, indifference would be therapeutic and engaging for the community. Perhaps this could give staff an opportunity to observe player psychology as well. A great social learning experiment. There would obviously need to be some disclaimers or potentially verification to keep the younger players out and sensitive types aware and probably some loose rule set (no pornographic materials, etc.), but what are your thoughts (players and staff). I'm of the mind that with all the rules surrounding what can be said and not said in the forums as well as WC, etc., it might be a good place to blow off steam, talk about something a little too meta for Off topic, etc.

[+Nyx]

The staff have thought of and discussed this numerous times over the years, and always it ends up being rejected for several reasons.

First, it's a family shard and pretty much everyone wants it to stay that way. Adding what is essentially the antithesis of a family-oriented area would detract from that. Age verification is completely unreliable in any form that wouldn't take far too much of our time, and that'd mean that there would end up being kids with access and there's trouble for +C in that case. We would lose a lot of our playerbase if suddenly we were encouraging the shard to be less and less family friendly. We've discussed upgrading the codex from "mostly G with some PG-13" type rules to a more solid "PG-13 language and content" but it's still something +C isn't sure is good for the shard, and this sort of forum would be a slippery slope. I think many of the parents with younger kids here wouldn't like it existing even if their kids didn't have access, as it would show them a sort of trend with the decisions +C is making for the shard that leans away from what makes uoex a safe and fun place for people to play now.

Secondly, the staff are volunteers. Y'all aren't allowed to harass us because who wants to spend their free time taking a textual lashing from some dip with anger issues. Nobody. Honestly, if this was allowed, V and I would both quit and move on to other hobbies; and I'm about 99% certain so would +R and +M. None of us are the type of people with the type of personalities that would find it acceptable to volunteer our time if generalized abuse of the staff was allowed anywhere here. You might suggest we just don't read that forum if so, but we'd have to, for the same reasons that in-game chat must be monitored too - there are some things that even in a free-for-all area would still have to be checked for an removed for various reasons (whether legal or for the overall safety/security of the shard, etc). Y'all don't have to like us, and if you have genuine issues/concerns/etc, you can address them in an adult and respectful manner either with the staffer directly or via emailing +C. But talking "poop" (hey, even I don't speak this G-rated in real life, it's not easy for me to find the right non-cuss words sometimes either ) about the staff because one is having a temper tantrum just goes too far for tolerance by people already put through quite a lot of hassle for something that is their hobby.

Thirdly, it doesn't foster the right type of environment. This ties in a bit with both of the above, but think about how people react now when things don't go their way. They're free to go rant to their guildies on their private guild forums/in their own TS/IM/facebook; yet folks continually use the shard/forums to behave inappropriately. If there was a staff-sponsored forum like this, then it would bleed out far, far more often into other areas of the shard because people just can't help themselves.

Fourthly, there are already so very many easy ways for players to reach one another privately to do this ranting/share this kind of info. Guild chat and PMs aren't required to abide by the family-shard rules. You can't be utilizing +C's services in-game or on the forums to abuse the staff, cheat, steal, violate the "real world" laws, etc but besides that you've all pretty much got your own private free-for-all systems already. If those aren't quite good enough, it's easy to set up one's own chat channel/forum elsewhere that can be whatever you want it to be.

Fifthly, for the most part the staff members are all folks who believe people should be encouraged to be better than they are, and not supported in giving into the more base behaviors. Having a family shard and keeping true to that is the best way we can encourage people to not constantly behave like petulant children, anger balls, or vapid lowlifes. Granted, many have their own psychological issues; which we can 'study' just fine as it is (particularly considering that one of us IS a psychologist and another studied it) as we see a whole lot already. Those folks with psychological issues occasionally give into them and that will inevitably cause those players to behave in a bad way. A free for all forum won't stop that, because part of these behaviors is doing something they know isn't allowed. So we'd see a fair portion of it happening in world chat and other areas of the forum where it isn't OK, just because these folks want to be the rebel/get more attention/show how ubercool they are/etc.

I've participated in other online communities that had a 'flame forum', and overall for those places it sometimes worked and sometimes didn't, dependent on the attitude of the majority of the people in those communities. Let me tell you, I did enjoy my share of participation in the flame forums. I even met a man who later became my BFF, the person who knows and understands me best in life. Convenient that he ended up living so close that we were able to meet and hang out to form that friendship into what it has become over the past twelve years. Honestly don't know what I'd do without him, and people always find it so weird and funny when we explain that we met by flaming the everliving crap out of one another on an Everquest forum

tl;dr:
Anyway, +C has spent a decade of his life building uoex to be a family-friendly, tight-knit community and I think this is one of the communities that would suffer greatly from a change like that, rather than benefit. Though it would be fun in a lot of ways, and I would probably even enjoy participating most of the time; it's not something I personally would vote in favor for because I think it's against the spirit of what uoex stands for.

[+Veritas]

Having a forum/thread that is contradictory to our shard rules will essentially be making a double-standard. One of our goals as staff is to eliminate as many of those as we can, for simplicity sake. Having a free-for-all thread that would probably at some points be comparable to a 4chan thread would be more damaging than good.

Example:

JoeBob scams BillyBob and gets super mad. "I know...I am going to the UOEX flame board!"
BillyBob talks all sorts of crap and says what happened and maybe some additional things that didn't just for sport
People jump on and start talking about how they were scammed too, or maybe how that guy ran by them one time without saying "hi"...the jerk.
Now we have the population looking at a blacklisting that is essentially staff sponsored, where we have nothing we can do because it is allowed in THAT thread...nowhere else.

How about a player gets mad at me? I deal with it most the time by ignoring, unless they are spreading complete lies or are being generally disruptive to everyone else. So now, they post what happened and how sad it makes them feel and how they didn't know they weren't supposed to do whatever it was they did...and out come the axe grinders. So people grind their axes back and forth enjoying their axe grinding social party, while people who had good or no experience with me read it. Am I suppose to be okay with flame fests on me that are ready to be observed by anyone? Is that part of my volunteer job to be working on the facet I am making while knowing there is a flame fest on me that is full of people who are just mad that they were caught doing something they shouldn't have been...but they feel empowered because there are other people who also got caught doing stuff that they shouldn't have been doing? I 100% guarantee it wouldn't be a thread about being mad about being punished, it would turn to a general bash and cry-your-eyes-out mad at +V thread. Actual events and truth about what happened would be irrelevant after a while.

Call it fear on my end, whatever. I just think it would disenfranchise many social safeguards this shard has to offer and would ultimately be more work and more of a hassle than its worth. I also think that the people who would enjoy themselves the most on a forum/thread of this nature would ultimately become a victim of it too and wouldn't appreciate it much after that.

That isn't a jab at you Pariah, truthfully. Anyone who could support something like this wouldn't enjoy a bandwagon bash fest on them that is protected and sanctioned by the rules of the shard.

Just my opinion.

+V

[Pariah]

I think you guys are overly focused on the flaming aspect. Re-reading my post, it was probably too concentrated on this. However. in my opinion, this happens already and it either leads to a banning, rage quit, etc. I'm not saying a lawless place where anyone can do anything they want, but an opportunity to come back and say "I don't think this rule is fair and I feel ..." without feeling the pressure to prove the validity of your argument because other players and staff are going to jump all over it. People are getting into spats over the forums, wc, etc. regardless and it seems it rarely leads to a mutual understanding or beneficial outcome. It comes back to having a safe place for a dissenting voice without fear of reprisal, shouting down, etc. There can still be a language filter or rule against naming players, etc. Honestly, this wasn't really the point. More about allowing people to engage with one another about all topics to expand their minds. Write ten paragraphs about metaphysics and allow other people to say you're crazy. Talk about your favorite version of the Milgram experiment (he had 19 variants but people only usually remember the 1). Allow arguments and disagreements on new studies, old religions, etc. For staff, this may be an opportunity to reduce your stress. Imagine a player coming to a forum and saying "I hate such and such and they did this to me and it's so stoopid!" Instead, the community can engage this person, understand, provide guidance on approach, potentially come to a peaceful resolution or new idea. They likely already have a history with staff which will color their view of staff and vice versa. Most of this is me thinking out loud as I believe the community here, myself included, could be more engaged on the forums and with one another.

[+Nyx]

It's a nice idea, but really - think about human nature. Do you think the people who already come to the forums to flame would behave any better if it was OK to do so in a specific area? Do you think the unreasonable people who hate on the staff or their fellow players for perceived injustices would suddenly be more reasonable because they've got a forum to go to? That's what our forum is already for. People already have a way to come to us and discuss things they don't like. You yourself have posted threads requesting/suggesting changes that have been successful and peaceful - because you approached the topics as such. You were respectful, thoughtful, and helpful in your approach and that's what you received in return from your fellow players and the staff. Those who aren't capable or willing to do so won't change because of any special forum being made for it, they'll still behave the same way (or worse).

As for topics that are a bit taboo, again, then you've got people getting pissed off and offended left and right - and it goes against what the shard is and has been all these years (a place where certain things are kept out of public mediums out of respect for those more sensitive/etc). It'd be a similarly affecting type of change as if we suddenly removed imp pets from the game, or decided to eliminate relayers (or to require them, etc). These changes go directly against the flow of the shard, which has been steady for nearly 10 years now. Doing an about-face in any way, on any large chunk of the game doesn't make enough sense to be a wise decision, know what I mean? There are lots of players (and staff) who come here and stay here because the shard doesn't allow these kinds of topics, takes everyone into account, etc.

*shrug* overall, I completely get what you are trying to say and I appreciate the idealism behind it. I just don't personally think it's a smart choice for our particular shard given the type of shard it has always been and what our players expect of it.

[Alpharius]

The answer is quite simple.

A totally separate forum that is in no way officially associated with the Excelsior. There's a billion places out there to create a free forum. If it's that much of an issue, I don't see any reason why a dedicated user couldn't create and maintain their own forum with whatever rules they see fit to enforce. That way the staff of Excelsior can insulate themselves from it, have no official connection to it and face no repercussions from it. The user who maintained it would be solely responsible.

[Wil]

The answer is quite simple. A totally separate forum that is in no way officially associated with the Excelsior.

If a player did create an external fan site containing such a forum, would staff accept its URL being occasionally posted here, in world chat or referenced in the wiki? Or would such postings violate codex 2d?

[+Veritas]

The answer is quite simple. A totally separate forum that is in no way officially associated with the Excelsior.

If a player did create an external fan site containing such a forum, would staff accept its URL being occasionally posted here, in world chat or referenced in the wiki? Or would such postings violate codex 2d?

Good question.

It would be considered a violation of section 2.D. of our codex.

+V

[Pariah]

Yeah, I didn't want to suggest a separate site due to the potential rule violation as well as the opportunity to be fully transparent. I know that staff here is rational, generally responsive, and open to suggestions. I suppose the major aim would be to create more of a community within the forum to connect with one another beyond the limits or constraints of the game world. I understand +Nyx's concerns about human nature and I suppose the idea is a bit too altruistic. However, I also thought of the dual purpose of a "safe place" for someone to "have a bad day" or a "contrary opinion" or even a "difficult personality." That's not to say a place without boundaries, and perhaps I'm a bit too optimistic here, but I would think the community can police itself. It would be super helpful to be able to down vote, collapse, etc., but I understand there are limitations of the forum we need to handle. Either way, I will try to be more engaged here with content as well and perhaps other people will do the same. Perhaps not.

[+Nyx]

I also thought of the dual purpose of a "safe place" for someone to "have a bad day" or a "contrary opinion" or even a "difficult personality."

I get your meaning, but the forums and shard already essentially allow for that. People can come and talk about their rough day or about how they don't like this quest or that, but they have to do so within the codex. It's not a lot to ask that someone express themselves in a manner that does not blacklist, harass or abuse fellow players or the staff, or include much in the way of cursing. Other than that, anyone's free to talk about their life or thoughts. I mentioned before, if someone's unwilling to do so in a way that stays within the codex, that's their decision.

I too would like it if a community this large could police itself, but as I'm sure you've noticed over the course of your time here - it doesn't and can't. There will always be those who choose to take things too far, or who choose to violate the codex for whatever reason. Otherwise +C wouldn't need the rest of us to do anything besides answer pages and make events. I'd sure enjoy it if so much of our time didn't have to be spent on moderating or punishments but that's just how it goes.

The staff have mentioned before adding a sort of +1 -1 type voting for posts as well as for shard ideas submitted by players; but that's still a ways from being implemented. Once it is, though, I think it'll make moderating a lot easier for us, as any posts that are greatly irritating to the larger portion of readers would be more obvious.

In the mean time, though, I think we can safely encourage folks to share more of their non-game lives with one another here on the forums. I'll do what I can to contribute on that front.