The state of NeoGAF

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Almost all forums says they can "technically" read your pm's... I mean you're agreeing to post information freely (not defending the ethics of it, again just stating how forums usually are). I'm just stating vBulletin (the forums) does not have that functionality built in.
It is not true. Reddit's privacy policy pretty clearly says only recipients of PMs can read your PMs. Can you tell us which forums say they can read your PMs? Many tech companies provide that they will only look at them in case of a law enforcement request. Can you please change the NeoGAF TOS to say that you will only read them in the case of a law enforcement request?
 
Oh cmon, like the people who crucified him here give a shit. Regardless how you feel about it, it's a dead horse and no one is changing opinions.

I don't know, maybe someone out there will see it and think they could have gone over the line a bit.

It's just one thing that's been on my mind for a while using NeoGAF and I never felt I could say anything until now. It's probably not relevant for this thread though, so I guess I'll stop.
 
Still haven't seen a satisfactory explanation as to why anyone would want to vIrTuE sIgNaL online, on a video game forum, on a completely anonymous account. Like who's thinking "damn, I really hope NeoGAF user 69ButtFartz420 will think I'm really cool and tolerant for saying women and minorities are people too"?
 
Although members are being banned every other minute, the numbers here keep growing. Seems like someone is approving all pending members at a frantic pace. This place is full of junior members. Yesterday this place had 195,418 members and i thought the Number would be dropping. Today NeoGAF has 195,698 members.

I believe that member counts go up even when they're not approved because you've still technically registered for your account and you can login / lurk if I remember correctly.

The influx of new registrants makes sense:
- People read about it in the news/videogame press and want to join to get in on it
- Trolls want to register to troll
- People want to register dupe accounts
- People who legitimately don't know how the approval process works think they can register and start posting, to either contribute to trolling or what have you.

For instance, what got me to finally join NeoGaf was the Red Dead Redemption OT. I had been lurking w/o an account for a while, but when the OT went up I decided I really wanted to chat about it. My account wasn't activated for some time after, but my registration date was still April 2010 or whenever that was.

*testing something*
 
It is not true. Reddit's privacy policy pretty clearly says only recipients of PMs can read your PMs. Can you tell us which forums say they can read your PMs? Many tech companies provide that they will only look at them in case of a law enforcement request. Can you please change the NeoGAF TOS to say that you will only read them in the case of a law enforcement request?

Again you're missing my point, I am saying... out of the box. vBulletin does not give anyone the ability to read the pm. You either need to modify the code or have direct access to the database. Don't care what the TOS says, stating forum functionality, which is all I can talk about.
 
Can someone explain why edit notifications no longer display on GAF posts?

BjkwMtm.gif
 
Again you're missing my point, I am saying... out of the box. vBulletin does not give anyone the ability to read the pm. You either need to modify the code or have direct access to the database. Don't care what the TOS says, stating forum functionality, which is all I can talk about.
Can you confirm that NeoGAF is just running vBulletin out of the box without code modifications? I thought NeoGAF had a lot of custom modifications to the code.
 
I was brought up to always try and take the high road. Its rarely the easiest path in life and has its own perils, but its important to try and keep morality and diginity intact.

What I will never understand is the handling of this matter. Why couldn't Tyler just apologize and admit he made a mistake and try to reconcile the situation. I do not feel fanning the flames or ignoring the matter in anyway helps resolve anything. Sometimes its not about whether you are right or wrong, but about how you handle things and use your experiences and mistakes you have made in life and try to learn from them and grow as an individual. No one ever said taking personal responsibility was easy.

Exactly. You cannot have fact based discussions on a forum if you hide the facts and kill all discussion.
 
Yeah, i can fully see that just by looking at what’s going on here at neogaf atm, it’s a complete mess. I’m guessing you made it in? I was just wondering is all. I’ll have to just keep my eye out for when they post about it.
Yes.I got in when no vetting was done. I also like to think that I am an established user. I don't know how you with 4 posts and a few months under the belt would fare. It's best to wait and look if the new forum can even handle the sheer amount of users that are sitting on Discord alone. And then join in when they open up for everyone.
 
Can someone explain why edit notifications no longer display on GAF posts?

BjkwMtm.gif

Yeah... wtf. Just verified it, edited my post from hours ago, no notification.

These decisions being made are odd, the lack of communication is worse. Evilore posting a self-delusional "State of NeoGaf," statement, and then ghosting from the public, and then -- seemingly -- making these weird decisions to remove/change features without any announcement or anything like that.

At a time when people are suspicious of the ownership of this site, it's best to be transparent. Seriously, act with integrity.

Can you confirm that NeoGAF is just running vBulletin out of the box without code modifications? I thought NeoGAF had a lot of custom modifications to the code.

NeoGaf is not running vBulletin out of the box, for what it's worth. I think what Timan is saying is that, well, at least recently, this was not base functionality in the forum.

That all said, you should never have any expectation of privacy on a forum like this. By design, it's not private.

And it's also not strictly true that you need access to the DB to read private messages on vBulletin, but even if it were, there's scores of add-ons and functionality that allow you to read a user/s PMs without having some "Read PM" area of the admin panel. For instance, user spoofing, cookie spoofing, "Login as User," and so on. vBulletin isn't secure software anyway.
 
Still haven't seen a satisfactory explanation as to why anyone would want to vIrTuE sIgNaL online, on a video game forum, on a completely anonymous account. Like who's thinking "damn, I really hope NeoGAF user 69ButtFartz420 will think I'm really cool and tolerant for saying women and minorities are people too"?

Hey man.... don't pick on 69ButtFartz420. That guy has been through a lot.
 
Again you're missing my point, I am saying... out of the box. vBulletin does not give anyone the ability to read the pm. You either need to modify the code or have direct access to the database. Don't care what the TOS says, stating forum functionality, which is all I can talk about.

Well it's not like anyone with incentive to mess with PMs would have access to the database is it !!! Thank you so much for the relevant information.
 
Many splinter forums have seen increases in membership due to GAF refugees. But guess what? Think about how busy those sites were before the drama and think about how busy they will be two weeks from now. This membership flow is temporary and even perusing these offshoots it was fairly evident that a lot of posting action was strictly about the events here with vsry little contribution to normal everyday threads.

That interest is going to wane (and based on some of the long time users of those other forums) they are looking forward to the decrease in activity.

It's temporary.

How busy those sites were before has no bearing on their future. Unlike here.

You may have noticed that Toma created a topic about the appropriateness of account suicide.
 
Nah, we're good my friend. I've learned some good lessons this year...I won't try to convince some guy/girl who may be hundreds if not thousands of miles away from me. And even a few feet away, I don't mind. Imagine a guy in the jungle of South America insulted the favourite color of Sir Shitterly in Lancashire in 1523. Who gives a fuck. The Inet did not change anything in this regard.

I'm zen. Live and let live. To be honest, I'm not doing all of this for a greater cause, I'm doing it solely to stimulate my brain. I could collect stamps, wash my car every day, masturbate all day, etc. but posting on Gaf is better.

Haha this is where I'm at. This is all a bunch of 1s and 0s. I can write 10000 words about how your views are wrong and mine are right, shut down my laptop, go for a walk and absolutely nothing has changed in my life or yours.
 
Sorry but this is bullshit. The problem is and always will be bigots trying and failing to put a "just a political opinion" spin on their bigotry. Those people caught a ban and rightfully so.

All you have left is to call names. Everyone who disagrees with me is a "bigot," so I need not address the substance of what they say. This is a sure sign of an intellectually bankrupt ideology.

As long as people don't use slurs, or assert the inherent superiority of some demographic group over another, discussion on issues carried out in a respectful manner should be the goal. Not enforcing conformity through social pressure.
 
so who is '$30 Italian meal'? where did he come from and why is he a mod with 3 posts?

Are you really asking the people here? It's a newly registered account and thus probably someone from here that got a name change and a new account.
 
Boogie went out of his way to continue associating with a movement, by name, that was attributed with harrassing and doxxing people. They SWAT'd people. The hashtag was rife with misogyny and hate. Even if you feel there's some justifiable 'cause' there, about ethics in videogame journalism or whatever, I like to think that any rational person would distance themselves as much as possible from groups that do that kind of shit.

But that's easy to say now in retrospective.

No hashtag or group, or forum community is a monolithic block of consensus. And every hashtag, because it's just a public hashtag, is liable to being hijacked and used against itself.

No one right now could ideally prevent that some group took possession of #metoo to turn it on itself, and if that group was organized and widespread enough, that hashtag would cease to have the meaning it has right now.

So, in the same way you cannot swear loyalty to an hashtag, you also cannot condemn it prematurely just because at some point someone abused it.

This to say that when things were brewing up it wasn't exactly transparent to see what GG was becoming. It wasn't obvious as you say that you could bag all of it into misogyny and hate. These are always simplifications and the more they are nourished the more we miss sight of the problem.

The problem isn't an hashtag in itself, the problem is the misogyny and hate it contains. And so we shouldn't condemn an hashtag, but, again, the misogyny and hate within.

Otherwise you're just adding fuel to these tribalistic internet wars that just help making everything degrade.

This desire to "keep it simple" and just paint convenient targets is exactly what fuel this age of hate and unreason. Don't point to people as target, don't point to groups as targets. Point at arguments and behaviors. Point at those things that are specifically wrong. Stop the generalizations. Stop the superficiality.

This is what wrong. And it's why it will get worse. People like simplification. People love shortcuts. We're just doomed to see things getting progressively worse because the masses despise complexity.
 
Are you really asking the people here? It's a newly registered account and thus probably someone from here that got a name change and a new account.
The question is why it got a special rank. ,What even is this.

"Oh dear, people are upset about our lack of transparency and arbitrary mod decisions without accountability. What could possible the best way to go...?"
 
I'm really curious at the justification behind suddenly making everything ninja edits. That seems like an idea that's only going to go badly.

I mean, to be fair, it doesn't just "seem" like that. That idea will go badly. There is no way around it.

The question is why it got a special rank. ,What even is this.

"Oh dear, people are upset about our lack of transparency and arbitrary mod decisions without accountability. What could possible the best way to go...?"
If you look at the responses and behavior so far, doesn't it fall in line with everything else? So this shouldn't really surprise anybody...and it's the reason why I'm not baffled or anything.
 
I'm really curious at the justification behind suddenly making everything ninja edits. That seems like an idea that's only going to go badly.
People discovered that m0dus is still a mod still editing things through it, that's probably why. Can't have transparency on here, no sir. What a dumb fucking idea after the Amir0x debacle (when he got demodded because he was constantly editing other people's post to make his arguments look better). They didn't even need to make edits invisible, just supply the mods with new accounts with random names not related to their main account. Done.
 
Haha this is where I'm at. This is all a bunch of 1s and 0s. I can write 10000 words about how your views are wrong and mine are right, shut down my laptop, go for a walk and absolutely nothing has changed in my life or yours.

See, now there's two of us. If there are more like us, maybe we can start something that will rival the school of Hedonism (minus the pedo stuff).

On a second thought, tho...this sounds like a lot of work. Nah, let's keep it as it is and enjoy video games.
 
so who is '$30 Italian meal'? where did he come from and why is he a mod with 3 posts? was he found on craigslist?

We'll be detailing more things a bit later but I'm just a humble dinner that God's Beard bought.

I'm really curious at the justification behind suddenly making everything ninja edits. That seems like an idea that's only going to go badly.

It's to protect the mods from being harassed and doxxed. It happened quite often in the past. With how things are going right now, anyone modding now is going to be targeted even more.

We're still adjusting things right now so it's likely to change once we get settled and running smoothly.
 
It's to protect the mods from being harassed and doxxed. It happened quite often in the past. With how things are going right now, anyone modding now is going to be targeted even more.

We're still adjusting things right now so it's likely to change once we get settled and running smoothly.

I hope you understand, considering the actions of GAF mods in the past, why this update is being heavily questioned.

I'm still firmly in the camp that thinks a lack of transparency and accountability is the absolute worst direction to go, especially right now.
 
I hope you understand, considering the actions of GAF mods in the past, why this update is being heavily questioned.

I'm still firmly in the camp that thinks a lack of transparency and accountability is the absolute worst direction to go, especially right now.

Questioned by the people leaving anyways?
 
I hope you understand, considering the actions of GAF mods in the past, why this update is being heavily questioned.

I'm still firmly in the camp that thinks a lack of transparency and accountability is the absolute worst direction to go, especially right now.

I do understand. The change is likely to be reverted as the moderation team agrees that transparency and accountability is very important. We just need everyone to be a little patient until things become stable.
 
We'll be detailing more things a bit later but I'm just a humble dinner that God's Beard bought.



It's to protect the mods from being harassed and doxxed. It happened quite often in the past. With how things are going right now, anyone modding now is going to be targeted even more.

We're still adjusting things right now so it's likely to change once we get settled and running smoothly.

Yeah its not as if you could do something as simple as have it shown as "edited by modbot" or anything in order to protect yourselves. How stupid do you think people are?
 
We'll be detailing more things a bit later but I'm just a humble dinner that God's Beard bought.



It's to protect the mods from being harassed and doxxed. It happened quite often in the past. With how things are going right now, anyone modding now is going to be targeted even more.

We're still adjusting things right now so it's likely to change once we get settled and running smoothly.

Why not just have it say "edited by $30 Italian Meal"?
 
We'll be detailing more things a bit later but I'm just a humble dinner that God's Beard bought.
If you think you're cute, you're not. It's like you guys want to look silly and condescending.

The lack of transparency and accountability was one of the main issues people had. Way to reinforce that.
 
Yeah its not as if you could do something as simple as have it shown as "edited by modbot" or anything in order to protect yourselves. How stupid do you think people are?

Modbot's functionality can be somewhat limited at times, making it difficult to do certain things. There is also the fact that Modbot's account isn't a mod in and of itself as far as I know. So it cannot edit other people's posts.

Why not just have it say "edited by $30 Italian Meal"?

Actually, you can see my edits now I believe.

Edit: I guess not, weird. I saw it earlier. I'll make sure to get it fixed once we get situated.
 
Again you're missing my point, I am saying... out of the box. vBulletin does not give anyone the ability to read the pm. You either need to modify the code or have direct access to the database. Don't care what the TOS says, stating forum functionality, which is all I can talk about.
You don't have to modify the code. vBulletin always had plugins like that that easily offer the function to read PMs via admin control panel.
It's not exactly complex to install either.

I obviously got no idea if it's the case here.
 
Just been unbanned after a three week period and this is what I return to. Good lord.

Well, on the plus side, at least Roboleon isn't a mod anymore. That was some bullshit weak reasoning he pulled to get rid of me.
 
We'll be detailing more things a bit later but I'm just a humble dinner that God's Beard bought.



It's to protect the mods from being harassed and doxxed. It happened quite often in the past. With how things are going right now, anyone modding now is going to be targeted even more.

We're still adjusting things right now so it's likely to change once we get settled and running smoothly.

I think it's very wrong to dox mods and make people's lives difficult who are trying to improve a community, and I don't think many people sign up to be a mod without an earnest interest in improving the community (because lord knows none of you can possibly be being paid enough).

But you all really need to talk amongst yourselves and start coming up with intelligent decisions here. The lack of transparency, weird unannounced changes to the site, Evilore's lack of accountability and self-delusion, is not good for the mods, ownership, or the community.

Make decisions in the sunlight. You'll find that the more decisions that are made in the sunlight, the better decisions you make, and the less threat there is for people to attack mods and try to ruin the site. Every decision has been made the wrong way, so far, but it's never late to change course and make your decisions under scrutiny, where you'll get feedback that will give you more opportunity to make the right decisions.

I do understand. The change is likely to be reverted as the moderation team agrees that transparency and accountability is very important. We just need everyone to be a little patient until things become stable.

I don't think the mod team or the owners are in a position to ask people to be patient. "Things becoming stable" was the excuse Evilore used to not address these concerns when they first came up. "Chaos ensuing," and so on. You guys need to start making the right decisions. THe ownership has very little integrity, and the more decisions that are made that to trick people "in the interest of making things stable," the less integrity you earn, and the faster this place goes down. It's already been a disaster because of lack of transparency.

Also, this post was edited by me, The Albatross, at 2:25 on 10/25/2017. Reason: quoted you and added a comment.
 
With people getting invites and stuff is everyone moving to Discord? Seems there is Steam discord ....so all the OT's are kind of becoming fractured?
 
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