Stricter Forum Enforcement

Busy day over at the SWTOR site.  Hot on the heels of Joveth’s “status update” about the Community team “going to be more active”… we got our first taste of that increased activity… with a post telling us they’re going to swing the Banhammer faster then before.

Ummm.. guys.. I love you.. but that is soooo not the way to start repairing the ‘rift’ between the community and the SWTOR team.

Post, and one follow up comment and answer from Allison are below the jump

Here is Allison’s initial post:

As a result of the recent changes (discussed in Joveth’s note), we’ll be enforcing our forum guidelines and Rules of Conduct more strictly than before. If you are being rude, disrespectful, and insulting towards others and are not civil and constructive in your posts, you will find your posting privileges removed more quickly than in the past.

Note that this doesn’t mean we’re going to shut down legitimate criticisms and feedback, but it does mean we will be making an effort to remove members of the community who prove that they do not want to contribute in a constructive way. We encourage you to provide feedback regarding the game (even about things you don’t like!), but we ask that it is detailed, specific, and constructive. Also, while disagreements are fine, insults and rude posts will not be tolerated. We expect community members to respect each other and differing viewpoints.

You may find that threads that are not constructive are removed or closed without warning. Here are some things we consider unconstructive:

  • Long lists of gripes with few specific details and little useful feedback
  • Threads that bash the game or BioWare
  • Threads about quitting the game
  • Callouts towards specific developers
  • “Haters” vs “fanboys” arguments/unconstructive community commentary

We strongly recommend brushing up on the Rules of Conduct, as violations are generally more serious now.

We do need your help, though! If you see someone you think is breaking the rules, please use the “Report Post” feature! The best advice we can give is to report and move on – responding in kind to someone who is breaking the rules only makes flame wars and other disruptive behavior go on longer. If you just can’t agree with someone and feel like they may provoke you into breaking the rules, please use your ignore list. Remember: there are people out there who just want to make you mad and get a rise out of you. Don’t give them what they want!

We appreciate your help and are looking forward to creating a friendly, welcoming community!

 

And her follow up response that answers a couple of questions raised:

Quote:
Really? It’s no longer allowed to post a list with things I do not like, unless someone over there judges it as ”specific enough” or ”useful”?

The intent here is not in any way to silence complaints or criticisms, but to ask that players that have them take the time to be specific, provide details, and be constructive. It’s not “long list” that’s the problem, it’s long lists that don’t take the time to be constructive. So, in short, if you take the time to provide thoughtful feedback, you don’t have anything to worry about – that’s the kind of thing we value.

Quote:
So Joveth says the Community team will be more active with the Community… And the first taste of that interaction we get, is a “we’re going to swing the banhammer faster” post?
One of the most common criticisms we see is that the forums are ugly and that trolling and negativity drive away players who DO want to contribute constructively. We want the forums to be a friendly place to discuss the game, and we want to protect players that want to use them that way. That doesn’t mean we want to eliminate negative feedback, but we do want to cut down on the insults, hostility, and other behaviors that sometimes make the forums inhospitable. We want to encourage people to provide us with useful feedback that we can take to the developers. We also want to remove people who are just here to insult others and bash the game for entertainment.
I’ll agree with her that the forums can be a hive of negativity, I’m not sure saying they’re going to be enforcing the guidelines more strictly is the best way to start cleaning them up.  Perhaps, just enforcing the guidelines at all would be a better start (though, I guess technically, going from zero enforcement to some enforcement is ‘more strictly’).
My concern is simply that these new ‘stricter enforcements’ will lead to constructive criticism being squashed as ‘negative’.. which won’t help the game, or the players.  For any game to succeed, the developers NEED to be open to criticism from the player base.. it’s the only way they’re going to learn what the Community thinks is right (and wrong) with their game..