Penny Arcade Forums (aka Tydeus Doesn't Believe in Following Rules)
 

Hey y'all, I'm having a rollicking good time over at the PA forums.

Seriously, it's great. I've already got 120 posts there (55+ per day -- I need to sleep more), under this screen name. I highly encourage that other members of NPF adopt PA forums as well -- in particular the Debate and Discussion forum. Good group of people there. Not that you have to leave NPF, but you know, it'd be nice to be able to say hi, once in while, whereas currently Fifth seems hellbent on making sure I'm never able to communicate with this forum again, even briefly, just to say hi/goodbye/where to find me now

Anyway, feel free to PM me on the Penny Arcade boards (my name there is Aemilius) to say hi, or if you have a different screen name there than your one here. Hope to see you later!

There definitely are some advantages, mostly revolving around the speed of posting (which is greatly increased, but far from unmanageable), and the freedom afforded to the members. Mods there do not treat you like unruly children who must be kept strictly disciplined, like can occasionally happen here, and more importantly, you're a lot freer to speak your mind, even to a moderator. Also, the infraction system is clearly explained, and is very much understandable to every member -- you are well aware of where you stand. Your forum record is not simply lying about in Fifth's brain -- it's clearly visible to you and everyone else, and with time, you can redeem yourself. Infractions add up to a ban at a certain point, which is the same for everyone. Basically, instead of "fifth's discretion," it's a fair system which makes sure the user is always in the loop.

So, I hope to see lots of you NPFers make an appearance on PA! Oh, and it might be advisable to copy this somewhere, if you give enough of a shit to read it in the first place, 'cause it'll probably get deleted lickety-split. Becuase, apparently, calling one of fifth's posts "dickish" means that I never get to communicate with anyone on this forum ever again.

By the way, in case anyone missed it, this is Tydeus. :D

So, warm regards to all (excepting fifth, but you all knew that :p), hope to see you soon!

Ban dodging much?

Tydeus, seriously dude, I'll try to make this clear personally.

Fifth wasn't even mad at you when he banned you.

What you didn't seem to get that making an offensive statement that people decide to report, and is against the rules, after you've been warned and banned (Twice was it?) was just a bit too far.

What was a mod to do? Wait for the next time they have to punish you for things on the board?

And, like I said, fifth didn't find it too bad, and when I talked to him about it, you know what *I* said?

"He probably might've been able to come back if he hadn't done the rapid bandodging and followed the rules. How hard is it to send an Email to the admin and let them think about it if you actually think the action was too harsh?"

Look, I didn't even think it should've been a permaban, but you had a bad record on you.

I quite liked you posting around here (Well, in the early days, you seemed to overendorse your less-than sure homosexuality, but eh, nitpicking), but your latest courses of action after you got banned? It only has convinced me that you probably deserved the ban.

If you'd have taken the...mature option, I think things would be different.

Seeya.

Well, technically. But it's a ban that I still view as ridiculous. I mean, I called someone's post dickish. A post which I still in fact view as being dickish. But that's really not what I came here to talk about.

I mean, seriously, are you all going to side with fifth on this one? I mean, seriously? No one told me that I was piling up infractions left in right -- I thought I was on good terms with everyone, even fifth. No one told me that calling someone's post "dickish" was worthy of a freakin' IP ban. No one told me that fifth apparently had a bunch of sealed away loathing for me. So, I really don't think it was fair, and I tried to first plead my case on the forum, which didn't work, so then I tried to contact shiney over IM, which didn't work, so I eventually moved on, and realize now that I much prefer PA's brightly-colored forum, good-natured banter, and relaxed (but not inappropriately so) mods. Oh, and the post speed. I love the post speed.

Anyway, this is kind of not what I meant to talk about, but I have trouble controlling myself, I guess. At least I never did anything to anyone on this forum with any kind of intent to do harm. I've made mistakes, but they've always been just mistakes. That's why I feel wronged, I guess.

Anyway, PA is great, I recommend hopping aboard.

I was only banned once. And then only because of taking a joke too far. That's just social ineptitude -- not malicious intent.

And yeah, I probably should have just e-mailed shiney right off the bat, but you know, I was kind of pissed, right? I think I can be forgiven for acting a little rashly when I felt I had been blindsided by someone who apparently had just been waiting for an opportunity to ban me. (that's what it felt like, anyway).

And, honestly, if people enjoyed my posting overall, then was it really necessary to go so nuts over one, arguably unoffensive post? I still think it's not out of line, or flaming, to call a post "dickish." That's the difference between calling somone a bad person, and saying they did something bad. One's flaming, the other is a valid opinion.

So, it didn't seem against the rules to me.

Again, I'm honestly not that interested in coming back at this point -- I'd like to keep in contact with most of you, but it's not worth it to feel like I'm stepping on eggshells all the time. But, I just wanted to say where to find me to everyone. And, since you brought it up, share my side of the story, which I think is reasonable enough.

Edit: Oh, and, uh, the double post was actually not intentional, funnily enough. I've stopped caring about DPing since moving to PA, where that isn't a big deal so long as you don't make it a matter of course.

It's not a matter of siding with Fifth. I disagreed with Fifth. Well, I did up until the point you took the account hopping path to get your message out to the masses about the tyranny of Fifth.

You pretty much were on good terms. but, the point is, you did have those infractions and you were aware of them I'm sure.

You knew you had those bans, those warnings. Etc.

I, again, thought WHAT he banned you over was a bit of overreacting, but this doesn't take away from the fact that you DID have a more-than-usually-accepted amount of rule breaking throughout the forum.

It is in the rules that flaming someone, or their post, is worthy of a ban. Explicitly in the discussion forum. Pending that you've already got 1(2?) bans and a warning in discussion under your belt, well let me put it simply.

You seem to cause too much trouble and never take a hint.

in that last thread you made, you even said "I'm not gonna change." And that's what solidified it for me, Ty.

He didn't. He wasn't even mad. He was acting as a mod and nothing more, and what you did was strongly against the rules, topped off with your previous discussion errors.

Ty?

That's not the way to solve it.

You don't ban dodge first then try to get your problem solved. You send an email and be patient for a reply. You take it to other mediums than the forum you were currently banned from.

That last part would probably be a good indicator, Ty.

The point is, you never went about proper nor considerate actions to right these mistakes.

I've been banned twice. Since then I've apologized, and considerably acted in exact opposite as I did when I got banned after learning my lesson.

You? You were banned for literally PMing nudity to a mod and afterwards, you didn't say "sorry, that was ajoke. Learned my lesson." you repeated it over and over again, after Fifth gave you more than one hint to leave it be.

You had discussion warnings and a ban (I believe) and instead of curbing it, you continued to flame on the forum, instead of taking the appropriate actions. You think Fifth's post was diskish? Talk to him about it in PM. Don't take it on the forum and say "Hey I think that's dickish"

Let's also not talk about the difference between calling someone dickish and calling their POST dickish. And the -ish suffix hardly changes the message, just the wrapping paper.

You're a creditable drafter!


Edit-- just to show, most of what you said was answered in this post as well.

But:

It's kind of hard when you keep forgetting to not drop the eggshells in front of you.

The mods don't ban people just-cuz-they-don't-like-them. I mean, they just don't Ty. If you don't get that, then I'm sorry.

Well, honestly this all makes me more confident that I made the right move. I guess I fundamentally just don't agree with the rule structure here. I feel it's a little too stifling. And just so you know -- there's no way to tell when you've made up for past wrongs here. With PA, it's a legnth of time thing, and you jail sentence ends, and so you know for sure. Here, I just assumed that my posting history, being overall appreciated, was proof enough that I wasn't actually a dick. I guess that's what I figure forum rules are for -- rooting out the dicks and removing them from the forum. But, you know, if someone is generally a welcome presence on the forum, then an occasional violation here or there? What's really the harm?

But, that's my view, and not the official view here. Hence, my leaving. I think it's reasonable to prefer other rule strucutres than those advocated at NPF, and I don't think I'm necessarily immature or discredited for preferring other structures. I think it's reasonable to beleive that there are different merits to be found in PA's structure, and in NPF's, but I guess I prefer what I see at PA. Which is a generally more accepting, holistic view of infractions, and a more explicit punishment system when you do fuck up.

I don't think that I'm somehow less anything for preferring an alternate structure to NPF. And at this point, ban dodging is really the only way of telling people where to find me.

... who died and made you mod? o_0
That sounds awfully like YOU call the shots here. But, who am I to judge.

No one. But I disagreed with him being permanently banned until he said he wasn't going to change. Solidifying it for me doesn't mean I'm calling the shots...It just means I disagreed with it up until he did that.

Sorry if it came off as authoritarian.

Ty -- Okay, have fun at PA. I really don't need to say anything else, but atleast now you know something of it all.

Yeah, and I appreciate the information. I hope you still view me as somone you like to post with -- even if I view the purpose of forum rules a little differently, and I hope you'll consider a PA account, along with everybody else (not at the exlcusion of NPF, of course). After all, I think you'd all make fine additions to just about any board, but definitely PA's, given the similar nature/nerdiness/snarkiness of it all.