Bannage.

[Carnival Forces]

Problem:I think that as this forum has exploded after the upgrade, more and more new people are joining. This is a good thing, as it expands the knowledge base of the forum, and helps more people learn (as noobies learn from veterans). However, it seems like many noobs take their title to give them a sort of immunity; a sort of "i'm stupid, don't punish me" mentality...leading to many, many, !!!!!!/girl posts in the Vid Card forum, in the nVidia forum, and in the ATi forum. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if gangs formed around nVidia and ATi and many cheezes started sporting their ASCII gang symbol in their sig...Also, it leads to many, many, Doom]I[ posts, effectively turning the Games Forum into nothing but a Doom]I[ forum. It's like M$'s massive advertising campaign; the majority of end users don't know what "Linux" is, and barely 51% know what "Mac" is...Kind of like the domination Intel holds over AMD in the CPU market: There is no "AMD Inside" jingle...It's out of control.

Solution:Failure to:
A)Post in the correct forum (mods/admins/supermods can use discretion on this, if it's a tough call, then that's cool...but if there's another HDD post in the Forum Help & Feedback forum...)
B)Read an FAQ or a Sticky, resulting in posting a thread that is answered by aforementionned FAQ or Sticky
C)!!!!!!/girl comments
D)Rude and idiotic flames like this one: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?p=1026443738#post1026443738

will result in
A)First offense: Warning
B)Second offense: Temp-ban for 1 week
C)Third offense: Perma-ban
Note: the Perma-ban can only be earned if the user fails to follow these guidelines repeatedly, in a short amount of time: perhaps he or she earns 3 infractions within the space of 3 weeks...

i think this is a good idea because it will cut down on redundant traffic; let questions that maybe don't do w/ DoomIII get answered, and as a whole, increase the worth of these forums greatly.

thank you.

 

[lorcani]

It's my firm opinion that intentionally posting anything replaced with !!!!!!!'s should be a immediate, no-questions-asked ban. People who start flame wars, constantly flame, and are just generally ignorant of the rules should also be banned.

However, accidents happen: you can't just ban people for posting in the wrong forum!

Doom 3 is huge. HL2 is going to be huge. From now until probably October time (or whenever HL2 gets released and the fervor dies down), the Gaming forum is going to be very popular indeed. We are just going to have to live with it until then.

The other thing you need to think about is that, you joined a public forum. These n00bies also joined a public forum. As such, they have the right to post whatever they want within the boundaries of the rules Kyle made. You have some good ideas, but they are a little too extreme for my tastes.

 

[Falls Included]

there already is a 3 strike rule forming/in effect... on the third strike, thery're out, and you dont come back for the next inning. i agree with you on the noobs getting out of control, as i made a similar post in genmay 2 weeks ago or so.... all it resulted in was me being called a noob, by those whom had been here longer than me. i think what may be the easist method would be to "deputize" a few civilians for the time being, just to conrol the influx of garbage in the video card forum and the gaming forum. someone with a lot of knowlegde would also be inclined to create a doom 3 faq, as that would aleviate alot of posts. and last but not least, have the vBulletin man create a form that has to be read (with the rules on it) that the user sees before each post, up to a certain number, 10 lets say. if you pound the rules into thier heads, it might stick... hmm... maybe kyle should read the rules into a mic, and have the rules played back to those who have under 10 posts everytime they log on... thats quite a good idea actually, maybe a hit on bandwidth, but its better than 10 goat se posts a second.

for the most part, those that join just to spam are most likely from genmay, and are banned as soon as possible, and the posts are deleted, and i've seen posts go away in the time that it takes to click the post button and type "lock and ban", and poof, its gone

 

[Lethal]

Carnival Forces, there's a lot you don't see here. The mods/admins already have guidelines we follow regarding bannage. There's a process in place, but with some leeway according to circumstances. I banned two newbies today whose first posts were referral links/site pimpage. They don't get the benefit of the doubt when they reg solely to promote their own agenda.

vBulletin3 allows us a system of "user notes" so we can document offenses, warnings and temp bans. You can't see that. And you can't see the "Administrative Offices" or the "Trash Bin" (where we dump bad threads to get them out of public view) or the behind the scenes discussions we have regarding problem posters and other issues.

So let the mods/admins do their jobs. Feedback is always welcome, but the tail ain't gonna wag the dog here.