- Dec 17, 2015
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I have very bad experiences in forums recently. I have been banned twice. First forum that I was banned from was Tom's hardware, the 2nd was Linustechtips. Reason? First time was for "fanboying" I said AMD offers the best products at the low budget range and Intel is my least favorite company because they overcharge their newest chips while barely made a 5% improvement over the previous generation. Majority of the users, all whom have enthusiastic rigs that, naturally, run on the latest i7s, called me AMD fanboy, and pointed out my user name as proof. I said I like AMD products for a reason and a flaming debate soon followed. You should note that no insults were fling. I was polite and the ones I argued with, although very antagonistic towards me, did not say anything more than that I was an AMD fanboy. Later a mod came, and banned me for "fanboying". The reason explicitly stated that my comments reeked of fanboyism and i should stop. It was only a three day banned. However I did not find my posts conflicted with the terms of services or any of the rules. I decided that I was simply not welcome on that forum and left.
I then switched over to Linustechtips Forum, this time I learned better than to outright speak in favor of AMD. I tried my best to contribute. I helped out members with troubleshooting, regardless if their rigs are intel, amd, or nvidia. I offer suggestions when someone asked what to purachse, as objectively as i could. I even recommended i5s and i7s to several forum members if budget isn't their concern. However, i adamantly believe AMD offers the best value for a budget build and pointed out in one of my recommendations which i said if one's budget is limited, it's better to grab an AMD cpu and used the difference for a better graphic card. That's when several members, whom like the last time were enthusiastic builders, began posting that AMD cpus are terrible because of ipc and such and such. One even had an avatar that has the caption "Want to hear a joke? AMD cpu" under it.
Soon a flaming debate occurs again, this time, vastly different than the the last time in tom's hardware. They weren't simply antagonistic but outright insulting. One mention that an amd rig with 6300, motherboard, and cooler cost 300 dollars, which simply isn't true. I tried to offer rebuttal by posting the components i built my own rig with and they outright belittle me by posting they wouldn't recommend these components even to their worst enemies. One was worse than the others; he yelled insults like "dumbass, "idiots", ect ect. Note, I still refrain from throwing insults back at them and did nothing more than to tell them be civil because i don't argue with immature kids who calls names. Mods came and then closed the thread. I figure that was over and done with, only to log back in a few minutes later and discover i was banned. Reason? "Trolling" The mods said my name was provocative and my posts equally so. No warning, no nothing. It was a permanent ban.
I tried to appealed the banned by creating another account because the one that was banned wouldn't even allow me into the site. I contacted the mod, apologize for creating a second account and if my posts offend anyone. I message the appeal to several mods, not just one. only one repled and all he said was that " this occurrence with you is under internal discussion" Normally, a ban appeal is display transparently in the corresponding discussion which all parties can view. This wasn't the case with me. They spoke in a separate discussion wich i could not see. Two days later, i found my 2nd account was ip banned as well. This time, they gave no reason at all or replies. I was very frustrated by this point. I could guess why. The ones i argue with are many. It was like 4 or 5 of them vs just me. The one who yelled out insult was quite popular there. He had like one thousand followers and 2 thousands posts. Mods sided with them.
I believe forums should not ban members because of the various opinions they offer. If disagreement are there, there are ways which we can discuss civilly and constructively. I don't understand why there so such antagonism simply from arguing for a consumer brand. Many take it so personally and it became an interpersonal conflict that should never have been. If a senior member yells insults at someone and a mod sees it, the mod should take a harsher action against that member than a newcomer because you'll expect better of a veteran than a newbie even if he happens to be popular. Anyway that is how i think and feel.
What do you guys think? Do you believe my username is truly too provocative? Do you believe I should keep my mouth shut and keep my opinions to myself because they are not popular? I am thinking of starting my own forum at this point. This way i can discuss my opinion openly with my friends and others without the fear of an ip banned. I've been subjected to quite a few mean comments and harsh bans that i found to be very hurtful. :'(
I then switched over to Linustechtips Forum, this time I learned better than to outright speak in favor of AMD. I tried my best to contribute. I helped out members with troubleshooting, regardless if their rigs are intel, amd, or nvidia. I offer suggestions when someone asked what to purachse, as objectively as i could. I even recommended i5s and i7s to several forum members if budget isn't their concern. However, i adamantly believe AMD offers the best value for a budget build and pointed out in one of my recommendations which i said if one's budget is limited, it's better to grab an AMD cpu and used the difference for a better graphic card. That's when several members, whom like the last time were enthusiastic builders, began posting that AMD cpus are terrible because of ipc and such and such. One even had an avatar that has the caption "Want to hear a joke? AMD cpu" under it.
Soon a flaming debate occurs again, this time, vastly different than the the last time in tom's hardware. They weren't simply antagonistic but outright insulting. One mention that an amd rig with 6300, motherboard, and cooler cost 300 dollars, which simply isn't true. I tried to offer rebuttal by posting the components i built my own rig with and they outright belittle me by posting they wouldn't recommend these components even to their worst enemies. One was worse than the others; he yelled insults like "dumbass, "idiots", ect ect. Note, I still refrain from throwing insults back at them and did nothing more than to tell them be civil because i don't argue with immature kids who calls names. Mods came and then closed the thread. I figure that was over and done with, only to log back in a few minutes later and discover i was banned. Reason? "Trolling" The mods said my name was provocative and my posts equally so. No warning, no nothing. It was a permanent ban.
I tried to appealed the banned by creating another account because the one that was banned wouldn't even allow me into the site. I contacted the mod, apologize for creating a second account and if my posts offend anyone. I message the appeal to several mods, not just one. only one repled and all he said was that " this occurrence with you is under internal discussion" Normally, a ban appeal is display transparently in the corresponding discussion which all parties can view. This wasn't the case with me. They spoke in a separate discussion wich i could not see. Two days later, i found my 2nd account was ip banned as well. This time, they gave no reason at all or replies. I was very frustrated by this point. I could guess why. The ones i argue with are many. It was like 4 or 5 of them vs just me. The one who yelled out insult was quite popular there. He had like one thousand followers and 2 thousands posts. Mods sided with them.
I believe forums should not ban members because of the various opinions they offer. If disagreement are there, there are ways which we can discuss civilly and constructively. I don't understand why there so such antagonism simply from arguing for a consumer brand. Many take it so personally and it became an interpersonal conflict that should never have been. If a senior member yells insults at someone and a mod sees it, the mod should take a harsher action against that member than a newcomer because you'll expect better of a veteran than a newbie even if he happens to be popular. Anyway that is how i think and feel.
What do you guys think? Do you believe my username is truly too provocative? Do you believe I should keep my mouth shut and keep my opinions to myself because they are not popular? I am thinking of starting my own forum at this point. This way i can discuss my opinion openly with my friends and others without the fear of an ip banned. I've been subjected to quite a few mean comments and harsh bans that i found to be very hurtful. :'(
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