1.Ban system.
Works fine. People report stuff (openly) on the profiles, and the ban is kept where it belongs. Sending a ban via email seems to be unnecessary, because the reason for the ban is displayed when you try to log in anyway.
As for appeal: We would not be mods if we couldn't handle the "
ower" of choosing whether a user should be banned or not. So logically, our judgements are fair. We don't go about banning left and right, and for most parts, unless you are a repeat troll or a spam account (both types of account where the user doesn't care if or why they are banned anyway), you will most likely get a warning beforehand. Of course, there might be issues where the ban falls promptly (a user making a thread and links to scam sites, exploits the site, breaks the TaC), but otherwise, a user would have been warned, and the ban would be because they continue to break the rules.
Besides, if you were banned, no matter how fair it was, you would still appeal to get a fair trial, wouldn't you? Breaking the rules after the warning is either conscious (thus, ban should be issued) or really, really thoughtlessly done (and a ban should be issued to get the user to understand the rules).
2. De-Merit system
AP is a measure of activity on the site. You loose points when your comments or posts are deleted, but otherwise not, because it is a display of your activity.
If such a system was to become a reality, the point system should be entirely redone.
3. Rules
1. The stickies are being redone in order to make the information available and to make them more precise.
2. The help-page and "rules and guidelines" should be redone as well.
As for the 30 seconds rule: It at least limits the damage. And pissed off spammers are better than happy spammers, because happy spammers can spam more.
4. Spam/Flaming section
No.
Spamming is against the rules on the entire site. Same goes with flaming. It should not happen. At all.
This means a section for crap would be heavily moderated, and people would get banned even if they are doing it only in that section. This is the internet, people are idiots, people will take flaming serious and be offended, people will go "But it is allowed theeereeee".
To give you an example: There was a thread made for flaming for fun. Most of the participants got banned because they were flaming. There is no "for fun" in swearing at other people or calling them names.
To recap: As long as spamming and flamming is against the overall rules, such sections, threads, comments, you name it, will be acted on and removed, and the participants punished.
5. A search Bar inside the forums
Had that, didn't work. Most searches don't, because they are of the "quick'n'dirty" type.
Use the custom one.
Also having a page with all the members when you want to find someone with ease.
If you know their username, you can find them a lot easier than looking on a list.
Besides, as said, people are idiots. The active userbase is rather limited, and a list would give a wonderful source for spammers to find un-used accounts and gain points by spamming those.
1st Infraction - Warning
2nd Infraction - Week Ban
3rd Infraction - Month Ban
4th Infraction - Warning
5th Infraction - Year Ban
No, please.
Say your first - crime is to post links to scam sites. By that one, you should only be warned. Then a moderator find that you have been flaming someone in a fit of anger. This would give you a week. Then you have been seen necroing a few threads. Congratulations you just got a month.
Or you spam about a bit, being a newbie. You are warned. You end up in a conversation, and spam again. A week. You get back, and a mod find out you have been less than good at writing comments, and thus spamming. Say hello to a month.
You get tired of mods being incredibly unfair, create and alt account and post a lot of porn links, porn images, and everything you can find on the Offended-page. You get a warning....
Just saying there is a reason mods are humans, and not robots. The users are humans too.
Lalalalalallalaaa.
