I am honestly surprised a freetalk conan exiles subreddit never really emerged as you cant freely talk about anything across their controlled channels.
I believe that if i ever going to take a like from you i will ask from community to make it a badge āliked by Tephraā. Oh this i will wear, trust me!
(joke, do as you feel my friend, thank you for everything youāre doing in here, in discord and of course in wiki)
Iāve been silenced do to abrasive language, which is just me being me.
There is a lot you just donāt quit get. Iām not going to stop being me, I expect to get flagged and hidden, some times I weight if what I am about to post is worth a time out; I do actually discard posts and once and a while rethink after I post. What you see here and on the discord is as nice as I get.
Xevyr is basically a model citizen compared to me or YOU, that is why I was flabbergasted when I read about their ban.
OK i have let this sit for a bit. 1) to see if it goes deep in the downward spiral and 2) to get a pulse on the feelings on others before I taint with my personal perspectives.
So about all of this and moderation and this and that and censorship and blah blah blah blah.
1)We all need to come to terms that any and all efforts that FC does with resources (including this very forum and official servers ) must meet the practicality that itās done so in order to promote business. Any talk outside of that is, at least from their perspective, irrelevant to the goal at hand and they have full authority to remove.
2) Having open dialog is actually a great mechanism for feedback and getting customer perspectives but that doesnāt mean dealing with abuse and/or comments that serve no other purpose but to criticize without desire to correct.
3) Anytime you are removed from a situation, self reflection, empathy, and humility must be internalized to have any true meaning of maintaining a relationship. I personally had to deal with that once here on these very forums and gained a deep appreciation for the moderators that are just trying to salvage topics. This, in turn, created a new, better relationship I have with the moderators on this board.
4)We are all human and sometimes your little offense that may not be an issue individually becomes that last straw and the wraith comes down on you. Understand that these things happen and request reconsideration.
5) The length of time this thread has remained active shows there is something they feel is value added enough to continue so we should all pat ourselves on the back for keeping it positive.
6) It is not in the companyās best interest to silence folks here. The negative implications on other media would be harsh and they know that.
7) At the same time, this vehicle of feedback is one and one that isnāt as popular as others so donāt expect any special favor just because itās FCās message board. Content providers input far outweigh mine because I donāt have 20-50k followers. Iām one voice in a pool of a couple of hundred that can spin a good yarn. Thatās about it. Iām only as good as that.
Now many of you will find this as just white knighting but that isnāt it. Itās simply acknowledging the facts that FC is in complete control and we are only here because they, for some weird masochistic reason, feel its value-added.
I wouldnāt call it white knighting, because I agree on several of your points, in general. However, Iād say many of them donāt apply in context of this particular discussion weāre having here.
To refresh the context:
- @Rollotomozi started a discussion about whether blocking a certain specific bit of content would be against the rules.
- The discussion was civil, calm, and genuinely focused on the topic.
- The thread got summarily closed with a canned message referencing Zendesk and TOS.
- @Rollotomozi then opened this topic to complain about the closing of the original thread.
- I replied that opening this topic probably wouldnāt result in anything useful, given the way the forums are being moderated lately. I referenced @Xevyrās case as a way to point out the problems with moderation.
So, given that context, letās look at what you said:
If weāre talking about effort, it takes more effort to close a thread than to leave it open. On the other hand, it takes more effort to consider carefully before judging whether the thread should be closed or left open, than it takes to just skim it as superficially as possible and then close it because it fits some very simple criteria.
When it comes to promoting a business, however, the whole point becomes moot, because letās be serious here: the nuances of moderation on these forums will have no impact on their business whatsoever. All they have to do is make sure these forums are not a breeding ground for certain forms of speech that bring bad reputation and thatās enough to protect their business. Everything else is completely unnecessary and has no real impact on their bottom line.
No one here is disputing their authority to do so. They have the right to do a sloppy job, or to abuse the power of moderation, or to do whatever the heck they want with these forums.
Weāre just saying it sucks and it often makes no sense.
Agreed in general, but in this context? If weāre talking about the thread that got closed, there was no abuse or non-constructive criticism.
If weāre talking about @Xevyrās silencing, you could technically say that the joke at the end was āabuseā, but the rest of his comment was constructive criticism and the joke was clearly labeled as such and much, much less abusive than a whole bunch of other comments that had pure vitriol and no constructive criticism. And yet, heās the one who got a 7-day timeout for that.
Iāve been in contact with @Xevyr during his āremoval from the situationā, and I can assure you he took it with self-reflection, empathy, and humility. In fact, it was more self-reflection, empathy, and humility than I wouldāve displayed in his shoes.
None of that changes the fact that what happened to him was abuse of moderation powers and that the rest of the staff did absolutely nothing to rectify that.
And yes, I know they have the authority to do that. And I know @Xevyr isnāt making a big deal out of it. Itās still an injustice, no matter how much Tae Tae makes fun of the idea.
In short, I agree with you on this general point, but it definitely doesnāt apply in this case. The fault is with those who abused the power and with those who could have fixed that but didnāt.
True. Itās human to make mistakes like that. Itās also nice to recognize oneās own mistakes and work to undo them or make amends. Whoever did this had 7 days to realize they acted disproportionately and revert their decision. Likewise, others with the same power to revert it had 7 days to do so.
But I guess that brings us back to your first point about effort and business? 
I donāt think I could call this thread positive and keep a straight face. Hell, the thread that got closed and sparked this discussion, that was actually positive. Compare it to this one and tell me this one is worth keeping alive while that one needed to be closed.
Call me cynical, but I think this thread is being kept alive because the wiser among the mods and community managers know that it will eventually either run out of steam, or cross a line that justifies closure, whereas closing it prematurely would only risk spawning yet another one in its image.
Why? Why do people honestly believe this? Like I said in my reply to your first point, I donāt think these ānegative implicationsā would do anything to Funcomās bottom line.
In fact, other companies suffered much bigger blows to their reputations, for much more serious reasons, and yet theyāre still happily in business, because too few consumers actually give a shŃt.
That said, Iāve finally come to the belated realization that Iām not heeding my own advice. I started my participation in this thread by saying it wasnāt going to produce anything useful, and yet Iām spending my time here being pointlessly quixotic about something that wonāt have any impact.
Iām not saying Iām going to stop participating here, Iām just saying Iāll try 
True but the point is made for those used to passive maneuvers. There is a new stance that goes with the new rulingā¦take it up to Zendesk and itās no longer tolerable here. When in doubt, report and let the chips fall as they may.
As far as @Xevyr , I didnāt get to see it all go down but I would like to think I know his character and I am like 90% sure it wasnāt in malice but definitely someone found it bad. Which is why I brought up my own story since it seemed similar. But none of that matters since to quote Army of Darkness; āGood? Bad? Iām the guy with the gunā
If it was just us, you have a point. But the content providers are the key since they move opinion. Itās a symbiotic relationship but even they have their limits (ie firespark who is practically a ghost in the shell now that you can sometimes see in Wak vids)
Yeah, I understand that, Iām just not convinced even content creators can impact the bottom line unless theyāre talking about in-game stuff.
Sure, if Firespark or Wak or Kiah come out and say ādonāt buy XYZ from the Bazaar because itās an absolute pile of shŃtā (but not in those words, of course), that will impact the Bazaar sales of XYZ. I can also imagine they could impact the Bazaar sales in general with commentary about Bazaar, to a certain degree.
But if they make a video criticizing Funcom for āsilencing people on the forumsā ā just as an example ā how many of their viewers will care enough to stop giving Funcom money? Sure, there will be some, but will it actually make any perceptible dent in their bottom line? My bet is āhell noā.
People get outraged easily ā myself included ā but few will put their money (or their time) where their mouth is. Myself included 
Sometimes it helps nothing, but it feels good putting it out, @CodeMage . I never really cared about hurting funcom, even when they screw up. I always hope things get better, eventually. I write to get it out of my system, basically, without expecting changes because of it. But I feel good about speaking up when I think itās needed. If they donāt listen, there will be a point where Iāll just stop playing and forget about it. Like me, many others.
In the end, itās very complicated. The corporate world is complex. The power dynamics between players and studios are completely messed up, currently.
All in all, even if the game has some serious flaws that need attention, funcom seems much more benign than most of the companies out there.
Iām re-evaluating my views on moderation here. Maybe you should also do something similar and re-evaluate your own views a bit and ask yourself whether your theories hold water at all before you decide to drag politics into a discussion where thereās no place for it.
No it hasnāt. I read your hid post, you might have tried, but that was real political and YOU brought it with you.
Your name means nothing to me, unless I read a name a few hundred times itās just a word. But I bet can guess your politics, itās blatantly obvious. And we really donāt need any more rhetoric here.
Now I just canāt remember who went on about the failings of the flag system in a few threads, but this is beyond that.
My opinion funcom is trying to run all of Conan with a skeleton crew. I think there might be all of 4 or 5 people trying to run all of customer service, that is moderate this forum, handle zendesk; actual customer service, and server admin/moderation. You just can not operate a game effectively that way.
I was told they let their volunteer mods go. I only see one reason for this. When you are ā ā ā ā ā ā ā ā up bad enough all your volunteers are complaining, there is 2 things a game developer can do, listen to them or let them go so they donāt have to.
Seems funcom is just further distancing them selves from us players. Now Iāve been here a few times, I feel like we are about to be ghosted. Weāll go to log in after the age of war to the age where the hell are the public servers. And the content will be a closed forum.
TAEMIEN. It seems to me theses post are getting you worked up . With everyone of them. And evidently it is big a big deal to you or you would have just moved on
In general, you must be more active on the forums than playing the actual game xD
I can be here, on the discord, and play the game 
Itās called multitasking.
To be entirely fair, we all have our pet peeves, and it is not for this one to publicly speculate as to the reason for such pet peevesā¦
Tae Tae has been very civil, in their (his, her? This one does not know the correct form of address) own way.
This one has seen what this one considers to be either peak Tae Tae pique, or peak Tae Tae troll job in other threads. Either way, very expressive.
Besides, isnāt that what the internet is for, other than prawns, to type furiously and decide one has won arguments against strangers?
Oh, and politicking.
I heard there is a new crm out, āthreadsā. Itās new, but Iām comparing it if it has merit.
You are right we all have our pet peeves. However I stand by my post.
Guys, when it comes to silencing, when I enter someoneās profile and select āignoreā it says that I wont see their content. But are they going to see my posts? Iām tired of some folks following me here on the forum and downvoting my posts until they get hidden. I know whoās doing this and I wonder whether ignoring them will make me invisible for them or not?
The drama on the forums is terrible.
I donāt block anybody. Most of that chatter is just hype to get votes, or to scare away voters.
Oh I know I see posts by people that have me blocked. But no one is following you around ādown votingā your posts. People flag your post and have to give a reason for it. You have the option to edit and repost it. If it gets multiple flags again, you can reedit it but a forum mod will have to ok it to be unhinden.
Which does actually happen.
Now in 20 years online 
Iāve blocked 5 people. But they found my buttons and enjoyed dancing on them.