This is not going to be a gripe session thread.

BasicWiz's questions were not posted with the intention of being directly answered, they are meant to be informative, and attempt to give an understanding of how this forum works from a moderator's perspective.

 

 

I'm not going to spend 30+ minutes on each of your novelette-length posts trying to decide whether this or that violates tos or strays too far off topic or if I'm being unfair by deleting all of it or just part of it or whatever. 

I'm not your personal editor. If anything in any post seems the least bit disruptive or dead horsey or inappropriate in any way, in this thread or any other, I will delete that post. If you don't agree with that for whatever reason, you're welcome to sitemail me and we'll discuss it privately. It won't get your post undeleted, but it will help give you a better understanding of how to approach similar posts in the future.

Openly discussing issues on reasons why action was taken against you is also inappropraite and will only result in more action taken against you.

For those members that you don't enjoy hearing from, there is an ignore button on every post.

LEARN HOW TO USE IT.

The incessant arguing and nit-picking back and forth skirting the ToS, wording things as though you're a victim being attacked when in fact you were the actual instigator and always insist on getting the last word in to the argument which YOU caused YET AGAIN is called disruptive behavior. I don't care if you think you should have the last word. If you want suspension go ahead and reach for that last word.

Stating your opinion as fact when its clearly obvious that it's your opinion and the only reason you're saying it is to cause hostility, and you know that it causes hostility because the last 50 times you stated that same opinion it lead to 50 other versions of the same argument, THAT is being disruptive, especially when you've been called out on it numerous times in the past by other members and admin alike.

Most arguments that spring up here could EASILY be avoided if everyone simply prefaced their posts with something along the lines of "It's my opinion that..."  

Your opinion about how or why vendors do what they do is not a fact. 

Your opinion about why this or that software is better or worse is not a fact.

Your opinion about why this or that figure is better or worse is not a fact.

Constructive criticism happens when clear examples can be demonstrated and backed up with more demonstratable examples for why this or that would be better. And even then it is still mostly an opinion and should be stated as such, because there are many ways to accomplish the same end results in any given project. 

 

I've been too lax on several threads, because I've been trying to let mature discussions from all angles on various topics carry on for the few pieces of useful information that is gleaned from it. Clearly that's not the way to go about this. 

I've been asked to moderate this forum with as heavy a hand as needed, so that is what I plan to do. 

 

~Shane