Censorship?

HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

Simply put, stop accusing SV of deleting negative threads unless you can demonstrate it or know of actual threads that got deleted.

 

Its a FACT, not an accusation.  Here's one person that commented in one of the threads. http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/42016-point.html#post858193

As you can see he now only lists 1 post, zero infraction's ...Yet is banned.

 

Not only are they deleting threads, but peoples entire post history.

 

Its well within their rights, but stop saying it isnt happening.

 

Now please provide proof this isnt happening....  

Aethaeryn

So far all threads about the auto-renew have been closed - or moved to support.  This is not Censorship to an extreme but it still has not been handled well.

 

10th April 2010, 18:09	#231 (permalink)
Maerlyn vbmenu_register("postmenu_827695", true); Community Manager     Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: Germany Age: 30 Rep Power: 18	As I mentioned on the forums and the IRC before - I am fully aware of both the situation and the reason why some people feel upset about this. I brought this up with management and I expect to be able to give you an official statement/update about this next week. __________________ ~ Teh law ~ Counselor Program ~ In omnibus requiem quaesivi et nusquam inveni nisi in angulo cum libro. Nothing screams "owned" like the chilly autumn breeze on your buttocks at the priest stone... -Milarepa
vbrep_register("827695")

 

11th April 2010, 08:53

#261 (permalink)

Andreas Springare vbmenu_register("postmenu_828251", true); Level Designer     Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Malmö, Sweden Age: 23 Rep Power: 11

Talked to Henrik about this and not entirely sure what he said. Somethingabout that there was something when the system was first launched. But hesaid that he are going to send out a a press release or something soon to clear things out. I'm not sure when but should be in a day or to. I must clarify that we do not intend to charge people that do not want to playthegame. So I believe that all this is just one big misunderstanding. I don't knowhow it works so just wait for Henrik's statement. __________________

 

30th April 2010, 19:45

#360 (permalink)

Tazaterra vbmenu_register("postmenu_847010", true); Lictor     Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Moderation Town Rep Power: 7

Henrik already answered this. He simply stated that you are NOT being charged for ANYTHING until release, and the free month begins when the game goes live. Closed. Edit: I was corrected by a few people, and in response I have PMed the higher powers to receive an answer, I am hoping for a response early next week. Thanks for understanding. __________________ In order to post past this point you must have read the following threads! Quote: Please PM me if you have any issues with reputation related insults. Last edited by Tazaterra : 30th April 2010 at 21:09.

osmunda

Originally posted by Slapshot1188

 And this is supposed to prove that other posts are not deleted?  Or closed?   Why was the big long billing thread locked?Why was a subsequest thread which continued the question locked?  We haven;t gotten an answer to the long posed question...

It's a contemporaneous account of active thread critical of Starvault, showing that while there may be some posts that get deleted, it is not a widespread policy to delete all negative posts / threads as some people claim. 

I'm not disputing their rights to do so.  It's their fprum and it's their product.  They can manage it as they see fit, but all you are doing is showing that SOME negative posts are not censored and SOME negative threads are not deleted.  Want to talk about stifling open debate?  How about this lovely post from a moderator:

 

3rd May 2010, 21:03	#2 (permalink)
Tazaterra Lictor    Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Moderation Town Rep Power: 7	This is the best post I've read all month. I expect all posts below this to be appropriate. You will face consequences if you some how don't see the validity of the OP. Thanks, Taza

 

That's just lovely.   If you don't agree with the post you will face consequences.. so keep any disent to yourselves.  NICE! 

I believe this post has already been addressed in this thread.  Essentially, Taz iswarning people against flaming the OP.  All that the OP did was note that there are people who are arguing both that the game needs to be kept in development longer and pushing for the release of the next patch.  The OP points out the conflict between these two positions. Another poster later in the thread explained the reasons for the impatience and faced no "consequences"  Taz responded to that by stating that he understood that impatience and asked if that poster understood the point of the original post.

osmunda

Originally posted by HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

Simply put, stop accusing SV of deleting negative threads unless you can demonstrate it or know of actual threads that got deleted.

 Its a FACT, not an accusation.  Here's one person that commented in one of the threads. http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/42016-point.html#post858193

As you can see he now only lists 1 post, zero infraction's ...Yet is banned.

Not only are they deleting threads, but peoples entire post history.

Its well within their rights, but stop saying it isnt happening.

Now please provide proof this isnt happening....  

 I'm sorry that I was unclear. It is not my contention that they are not deleting any posts, just that it is not being done as widely as claimed.  The language you used in the other thread indicated that you felt all (or most) negative posts were being deleted.

'Seems they've also "disabled"  the ability to discuss issues.  The amount of deleted threads/posts and bans have increased 10x.(M0 forums)  It appears SV is circling the wagons.'

As to that particular poster, the account was created on May 11th and the post that you are pointing to was made 11 am that same day.  From the context, it's clear that he made the (now deleted) second post in the thread and that the post consisted of him complaining about the inability to make bug reports and a "long list of other issues".  If you compare his post to those of Aezreal in the same thread, its pretty clear that Aezreal is being critical of the game and and Joshers is just flaming (remember, this is his most polite post).  Flaming an online forum within 11 hours of joining it is a bad policy and it should not be surprising that it results in a banning.

Additionally, there is a very good chance that this was a sock puppet account.. Otherwise, he registered a new account with the forums, set up a new account, installed Mortal Online, started playing, came up with a laundry list of bugs and started flaming on the forums all within an 11 hour window.

osmunda

@ Aetheryn:

Fair point.  Ironically though, the people most likely to be affected are the least likely to be helped by an answer to the issue. http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/3530994#3530994

Aethaeryn

Originally posted by osmunda

@ Aetheryn:

Fair point.  Ironically though, the people most likely to be affected are the least likely to be helped by an answer to the issue. http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/3530994#3530994

Ah this is very true.  I guess I am looking for them to say that they will not auto renew anyone who purchased the game before a certain date.  An answer on the forum etc though is sure not going to help for sure.

HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

Originally posted by HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

Simply put, stop accusing SV of deleting negative threads unless you can demonstrate it or know of actual threads that got deleted.

 Its a FACT, not an accusation.  Here's one person that commented in one of the threads. http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/42016-point.html#post858193

As you can see he now only lists 1 post, zero infraction's ...Yet is banned.

Not only are they deleting threads, but peoples entire post history.

Its well within their rights, but stop saying it isnt happening.

Now please provide proof this isnt happening....  

 

  From the context, it's clear that he made the (now deleted) second post in the thread and that the post consisted of him complaining

  Obviously that wasn't one of the DELETED threads.  Guess I need to FRAPS the MO forums....

 

If they aren't trying to hide anything, why delete people entire post history. 

 

Sales are laughable and SV is trying to do something about  it.

Gruug

I am often amazed when people go nuts because ANY mmo company deletes a thread. I suggest that you look up forums (including these) as someone else's house. You won't go to someone else' s house and expect to start throwing dirt on the walls without the owner taking some form of action. All forums have rules of conduct. Have you read the one's of MMORPG?

Most forums are willing to accept critisim as long at the TONE of such is not out of bounds. Many that post what they consider "logical" posts do not consider how the tone of the post might be taken. Posts may have some valid points, but if made with any amount of emotional connection to them they will reflect that tone. Remember, the people that read them are people to and not some automatron with emotion. You begin to be emotionally critical of "their baby" you are likely to get an emotional response.

I suggest that if you have some to say, remove the terms that show emotion of any kind. Only posts the facts. If you don't have facts, make sure to say so. In fact, being somewhat submissive when posts critical posts doesn't hurt. Being self defacing can often soften lighten the negative impact of such posts. Never attack anyone including devs. Understand, developers WANT constructive feedback. They don't want emotion or something that automatically paints their entire product in a negative light.

osmunda

Originally posted by HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

 

Originally posted by HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

Simply put, stop accusing SV of deleting negative threads unless you can demonstrate it or know of actual threads that got deleted.

 Its a FACT, not an accusation.  Here's one person that commented in one of the threads. http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/42016-point.html#post858193

As you can see he now only lists 1 post, zero infraction's ...Yet is banned.

Not only are they deleting threads, but peoples entire post history.

Its well within their rights, but stop saying it isnt happening.

Now please provide proof this isnt happening....  

  From the context, it's clear that he made the (now deleted) second post in the thread and that the post consisted of him complaining

  Obviously that wasn't one of the DELETED threads.  Guess I need to FRAPS the MO forums....

If they aren't trying to hide anything, why delete people entire post history. 

Sales are laughable and SV is trying to do something about  it.

 As I previously noted, that account was created on May 11th.   Join Date: 11th May 2010

 

Joshers Banned
	Last Activity: 11th May 2010 15:16

http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/members/joshers.html   This person's post history was 15 hours and 15 minutes at the absolute maximum. How many posts did he make in that time?  Deleting most of someone's post history doesn't mean a whole lot if they've only made 3 posts. (e.g. the one that you are pointing to, the one that got deleted from earlier in that thread, and the one where he reposted the deleted post despite having gotten a warning the first time.)

HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

Originally posted by HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

 

Originally posted by HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

Simply put, stop accusing SV of deleting negative threads unless you can demonstrate it or know of actual threads that got deleted.

 Its a FACT, not an accusation.  Here's one person that commented in one of the threads. http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/42016-point.html#post858193

As you can see he now only lists 1 post, zero infraction's ...Yet is banned.

Not only are they deleting threads, but peoples entire post history.

Its well within their rights, but stop saying it isnt happening.

Now please provide proof this isnt happening....  

  From the context, it's clear that he made the (now deleted) second post in the thread and that the post consisted of him complaining

  Obviously that wasn't one of the DELETED threads.  Guess I need to FRAPS the MO forums....

If they aren't trying to hide anything, why delete people entire post history. 

Sales are laughable and SV is trying to do something about  it.

 As I previously noted, that account was created on May 11th.   Join Date: 11th May 2010

 

Joshers Banned
	Last Activity: 11th May 2010 15:16

http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/members/joshers.html   This person's post history was 15 hours and 15 minutes at the absolute maximum. How many posts did he make in that time?  Deleting most of someone's post history doesn't mean a whole lot if they've only made 3 posts. (e.g. the one that you are pointing to, the one that got deleted from earlier in that thread, and the one where he reposted the deleted post despite having gotten a warning the first time.)

How have you become an expert on this persons post history?  How do you know they received a warning??? I see no infractions...How to you know how many posts he/she made, it clearly states only one. 

Either you are making this all up, have mod powers or now suddenly remember this person commenting in the Deleted threads..

 

Would a post history of a few hundred count.

 

As Ive already stated this is just ONE example.

 

/yawn

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Slapshot1188

Originally posted by HanoverZ

How have you become an expert on this persons post history?  How do you know they received a warning??? I see no infractions...How to you know how many posts he/she made, it clearly states only one. 

Either you are making this all up, have mod powers or now suddenly remember this person commenting in the Deleted threads..

 

Would a post history of a few hundred count.

 

As Ive already stated this is just ONE example.

 

/yawn

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Ahh... things are becoming clearer now.  This is starting to look more and more like a DnL situation all the time.

osmunda

Originally posted by HanoverZ

Originally posted by osmunda

 As I previously noted, that account was created on May 11th.   Join Date: 11th May 2010

 

Joshers Banned
	Last Activity: 11th May 2010 15:16

http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/members/joshers.html   This person's post history was 15 hours and 15 minutes at the absolute maximum. How many posts did he make in that time?  Deleting most of someone's post history doesn't mean a whole lot if they've only made 3 posts. (e.g. the one that you are pointing to, the one that got deleted from earlier in that thread, and the one where he reposted the deleted post despite having gotten a warning the first time.)

How have you become an expert on this persons post history?  How do you know they received a warning??? I see no infractions...How to you know how many posts he/she made, it clearly states only one. 

Either you are making this all up, have mod powers or now suddenly remember this person commenting in the Deleted threads..

Would a post history of a few hundred count.

As Ive already stated this is just ONE example.

/yawn

 e.g. = exempli gratia = for the sake of example  =/=  i.e.= id est = that is

As in, I made it up. I don't know that person's posting history any more than you do.  I was just giving an example. It's also entirely possible that the person only made one post (the one you reference) and that the moderators realized  it was a sock puppet account and banned it. Another possibillity is that they made 2 posts (the one you reference and the 2nd [now deleted] post in the thread) The one that got deleted may have been flaming Starvault and using several racial and sexual insults, such that the moderators deleted the entire post and banned the account as soon as they saw it.

Simply put, I don't know the person's posting history any more than you know the reason their posts got deleted.  My contention is not that they never delete posts.  My argument is that it is not their policy to delete all posts critical of the game and suppress such opinions ('disable criticism" as you put it) and that there has not been a tenfold increase in the number of deleted threads/posts.

As to whether a post history of a few hundred would count, it probably would. Being a member of the forum for a longer period of time allows someone to establish a history of making at least somewhat constructive criticism (or rack up several infractions if they are not being constructive). However, the account that you reference was less than a day old when it got banned, so its safe to say they did not have a few hundred posts.

NightCloak

I'm just gonna toss this out there:

What if the user post history automatically gets edited with a post deletion. So user XYZ posts 2 posts and 1 gets deleted. Post count gets auto-reduced to not count deleted post and history no longer shows that deleted post. Now user XYZ appears to have 1 post. Maybe it is SV policy that the user history be modified to reflect deleted posts as never happening?

Is this possible or even likely?

The best chance to resolve this arguement would be for someone to post SS of thier own history before and after an edit.

osmunda

So far in this thread, I've given 14 examples of threads critical of / negative towards Mortal Online. Of those, one has been locked and referred to a previous thread on the same subject.

As for the examples given so far trying to demonstrate censorship, we have posts deleted and threads locked for making accusations of cheating, a thread that got merged, merging and moving of the threads about the billing situation and a user who was banned within 1  day.  I have conceded that billing issue has not been handled well, but it does not become a significant issue until a month after the game launches and if you are reading the forums you can figure out how to avoid the charges very easily (click the do not renew button on the account management page).  The people for whom it is most important are the ones who aren't aware of the controversy.  That being said the thread is still available and not censored(although closed).  As to the others,  accusing people of cheating is against the forum rules, there is nothing wrong with merging threads and pulling out a flamethrower within 11 hours of joining a forum generally will get you banned.

As for FRAPS'ing negative threads, I have no idea what you mean http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraps .  You could simply open a notepad file, cut and paste the url for the thread, cut and paste the url for the OP (to allow checking for merged threads) and cut and paste some of the text (cause god knows some posts just deserve to get deleted). If you go back and check the url's it will be pretty clear whether the thread got deleted or not.

P.S.

Hanoverz and slapshot, are you trying to imply that I am a MO board moderator?  If so, you are totally of base.  Here is my username on the MO forums....

 

lonicera Member

the user name Lonicera was already taken on this forum, but note the use of the same avatar

 

P.P.S. I believe you are correct nightcloak

Slapshot1188

I am certainly not implying anything.  As for board names... well all the mods there have main board names as well so I'm not sure what having another name would show... or did you think all the moderators joined the forum 2-3 months ago?

 

osmunda

Originally posted by Slapshot1188

Originally posted by HanoverZ

How have you become an expert on this persons post history?  How do you know they received a warning??? I see no infractions...How to you know how many posts he/she made, it clearly states only one. 

Either you are making this all up, have mod powers or now suddenly remember this person commenting in the Deleted threads.. 

Would a post history of a few hundred count. 

As Ive already stated this is just ONE example.   /yawn 

 Ahh... things are becoming clearer now.  This is starting to look more and more like a DnL situation all the time.

Slapshot: "I am certainly not implying anything. As for board names... well all the mods there have main board names as well so I'm not sure what having another name would show... or did you think all the moderators joined the forum 2-3 months ago?"

Sorry if I read too much into that post, but Hanoverz clearly states "have mod powers" as one of the options and "things are becoming clearer now" is incredibly vague. What is "becoming clearer now"? I thought I was pretty clear in stating that I had made up (as an example) the details of how joshers' account went from creation to being banned within 1 day. The total of my knowledge about joshers is the single post that is on the forum, the context of that thread,and his user profile.

If you are "certainly not implying anything" why immediately undermine that statement by pointing at the possibility of multiple forum accounts?       

Slapshot1188

Originally posted by osmunda

Sorry if I read too much into that post,

 It's OK.... you're forgiven!

 

MO is going to launch in 3 weeks!!!  Censorship won't matter...

osmunda

Since the accusations of banning anyone critical of the game continue.....

http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/48681-before-buying.html#post951943

here's Sebastian reacting to such a critic,

Slapshot1188

1.  I don't see anything about censorship in the post you linked.  Perhaps it was by mistake?

 

2.  Try and find these posts from the Dev Tracker (hint.. you won't find them.. because they and the posts he responded to have been censored by the Mortal Online moderators.. not locked.. but deleted as though they never happened):

 

 

protesters sit-in the 14th of july	Sebastian Persson	document.write(toLocalTime(1278264540)) Sun, July 4, 2010 at 1:29 pm
Now sir, you need to see this from my point of view. We have a guy flagged as a hacker, apparently (and as he himself admits) trolling the forums. You (that would be me in this case...man this turned...
protesters sit-in the 14th of july	Sebastian Persson	document.write(toLocalTime(1278262560)) Sun, July 4, 2010 at 12:56 pm
Never sounds like to much time to wait. I'm sure the GMs have read this and if not I'll talk to them about check that email to make sure their claims of you hacking is legit. Now... trolling the...
protesters sit-in the 14th of july	Sebastian Persson	document.write(toLocalTime(1278261660)) Sun, July 4, 2010 at 12:41 pm
Now I don't know all of the details on your case. Really I know none of the details, but IMO the GMs are doing a good job. There's more behind a ban than "some random

osmunda

Ok, not the best example.  I should have re-read the thread before linking it.  My intent was to demonstrate Sebastian engaging in discussion with a critic.  

"Most of you comments make me sad WTS Brownwood.



We did have issues with flagging-expl but they are fixed.

Now Monster-exploits? Could you clarify what you mean with this? 



2/3 of the game..ok now that's just silly sir. If monster-exploits are indeed a "exploit" that puts some people at an advantage (question from OP right?) I would not consider PVE-fighting to be 1/3 of the game. But that's just my humble opinion.



We all know there's been and still are some issues but we are fixing them as soon as we can. And if think that even WTS can agree that the game is indeed moving in the right direction. It's probably 10 times better today then it was 2 weeks ago."

 

Since then, WTS Brownwood has apparently made other statements that resulted in him being banned. He has had a fair number of his posts deleted (100 out of 185) but it can be instructive in terms of what the moderators leave in place even after you've been banned..

Btw, my argument was never meant to be that they don't censor at all, just that they don't censor people simply for being critical of the game (your example apparently were from someone banned for hacking, so removing his posts were likely justified)

Chirugai

Please do not necromance old threads. Thanks!