Admin and Mods Not Treating their Members Correctly
 

This is Not A Rant But a Point I would like to make , Moderators Feal free to delete this thread if it violates any rules My intent is not to cause trouble just to express my self among other Admins / Mods .

For a start , Im Fairly new to Owning a site but have been admin for a few years . And a member for over 5 years , Ive seen all sides of the Web Forum World .

Any Site with out a privacy Policy thats not Stock I would not Trust , Ive had My own and a ton of my friends email address get end up with a spam company , I know this to be 100% Fact Pm Me and i will go into detail for you , Upon this discovery We all found the site had no privacy policy and we were at our own risk , To be a Good Admin You should ensure your members that there private information is Safe and you wont share it , This is not an option for you , W/O a Privacy Policy you can lose alot of your Google ads, Auction Ad's ect By not holding up your end of the deal .

Miserable Users Mod - I know this is Pauls mod , I respect Paul A Lot and dont mean to take anything away from his great mods ect,,, However this Is Just Flat out Wrong Think about it Someone wants to view your site and you make it a PITA for them on purpose , If you dont want them there ban there IP address and Grow Up a little , I found my Friends on the Miserable User Group as he was complaing about speed and stuff , I investigated and There it was , (This was on another site) The Admin of this other site was showing on forum leaders the miserable user group , Once the word got out then back around to the members there was a Mass Exidios of members from that forum , Its Corrupt And An Abuse of The Privlage of Being an Admin in the first place .

Read PM's Is just Flat Out Wrong in so many ways and is a major Abuse of powers , As Admin we should hold our selves to a higher standard Of Good Morals and portray the same for our members .

Im Disappointed That many Admin Resort to these Tactics , And I run my forum a lot different than most as my rules are ...

And Were over 1500 Happy members Since March 2007

Treat Your Members Like adults and with respect and you will get it in return ,

Setting Auto Subscribe to default to all threads they post in and using the re-occurring Subscription Setting are Also Wrong

Be sneaking and intruding on your members privacy by reading there Pm's ,Selling there Personal Information and Throwing them in a user Group where the Site Bucks them at every turn ... And You will get yours in the end

My .02 Dont take it personal

DM

I think you need to check the history of MU ;) - it's not exactly mine, just the latest versions are released by me. MU was initially written for vb2 by someone called Zzed over four years ago. It was adapted for vb3 by someone else (Kirafire), and then ported to 3.5 & 3.6 by myself.

You may not agree with it (you are entitled to your view :)). However, if you look at the install stats for it then you seem to be in a minority. It is second only to "Who has visited Today" in both my 3.5 & 3.6 releases. :cool:

Thanks for not deleting my post

and i hear ya about installs just goes to show you how corrupt society is Today and how no One has Standards Anymore

DM

They are just tools that can be used for both bad and good. Just like anything else in this world. ;)

There are vaild reasons for using both of these modifications. The MU hack is good for stopping spam bots and trolls. The read PM hack can be helpful in cases where members are abusing each other via the PM system.

It's important that we don't label modifications like this as "unethical" imho.

If thats the Reasons for your Mods then Tell the members you have them

If your not using them for anything but good then you have nothing to fear

DM

Explaining the technical details of my sites back-end is of no use. Half of them won't understand what I'm talking about and the rest won't care or will start spreading FUD ("OMFG admins can read my PMs!").

Besides if they read the TOS they would already know that private messages aren't truely "private". It's just like their e-mail, IM convos, and just about anything else they use the internet for, nothing is truely private and there is someone a long the chain that can see and read anything you do.

As for the MU hack we don't use it but have something similar. How it works is no bodies business but my own. It's my cheap form of security...they aren't working on the source code for it so there is no point in passing it around. :p

Aside from all that why do you even care? If you don't like the staff team at a forum then leave it for a better one. That's the great thing about the internet...so many places to go. ;)

Thanks For Asking Why i Care ,

Not Addressed to You or Anyone in particular AND IF IM OVER THE LINE JUST DELETE THE THREAD I WONT BRING THIS OR ANYOTHER DEBATE EVER AGAIN I STAND TOO MUCH TO LOSE IN TROUBLE HERE ........

Im a member of my Site First and Owner Admin Second , Ive been Craped on on many forums , Been banned from more than 5 and pushed and proded my fair share by admin ,

Some read my PM's Thats none of there buisness Then denied it and Lied about it in the open . Others placed my friends in the miserable users just because they were friends of Mine They didnt do any thing wrong

Heres the thing rather you want to admit it or not , End Users Make "Your" site a home away from home , They settle in and have a since of security Gain alot of friends ect.... Then one Day you Ban them for what ever reason

Do you Know How it Feals ?

You Ever Been Pushed Around ?

Hated On For what ever reason ?

Are you So high and mighty as Admin that you dont really care what people on "your" site think Because your raking in the $$$$ ......There $$$ and Spending it on things other than what there paying to support

Theres alot of Curuptness on Online Communities Money Hungry Admin who could care less about there members other than Donations ,,,, Asking for donations for things that are free FOR THE SITE then spending the money on pizza and shoes insted .

IMO Admin have a responsibillity for there Members , Respect Them, Treat Them like adults

Spying and Pulling Sneaky Tricks on the members is Just Flat WRONG .IMO

My Opinion Dont Much Count on this issue , But there is some serious Moral issues on some Bulletin Boards That Angers me ,

True Colors Do Shine Threw and sticking a disclaimer amoung a policy is just more ways to say ... Ohhh You didnt know we read PM's ..., Well its right here

No Accountabillity , Getting out of things on technicallites

My Board is Strait Up , My Members Privacy Is Top Proity They can Feal Safe on my board and not worry about me just banning them because i want to , Reading there pms or MUin them for the hell of it , 100% of all Paid subscitions and Donations Go back into the site

Dont think good Morals and treating people Right Works ....

100 paid Subscribers in less than 5 mths and We have collected a total of $1154.72 since June 27th 2007

100% of these funds Are used for the server fees and sponsored search Ads Ect... all Site related

There Supporting the site not the fat guy on the coutch

I guess As i strolled into OwnerShip My outlook was alot diffrent then most ... I Didn t just pick a topic that i thought would make the most money I picked a topic Im Passonate About And Enjoy talking with others about that topic I have a Job i work in a factory 12 Hour Days swing shift I dont need my Members Paying my Bills , My Goal is to build a community That I would be Proud to be a member of ,,, Not one that makes me Rich

If Thats Wrong then I dont want to be Right

Sincerly
DM

Firstly, what's wrong about being a full-time admin? You then have a lot more time to improve your forums and that's good for your members and for the forums. And I don't think using money from the advertisements (or even from donations) for yourself is a bad thing, you have also put a lot of work there, which would cost if you did it for somebody else.
About MU now... A site is a privately owned area, and you should have the right to throw away members that you don't like there, as you would do with your house. A ban isn't always an acceptable solution, you can't ban somebody because you simply don't want him/her in your forums! Also, he might have friends that you would like in your forums, so banning him would result in them leaving as well. So MU could be of use in that situation.
It's not about ethics, its about simple logic.

Disclaimer: I am not a full-time admin (although I would like to be) and I don't have the MU hack (although sometimes I'm tempted to install it but I always say to myself "Try to bare this, and install it on a worse situation").

Okay, this is extremely likely one of those 'honour/privacy lunatic/democratic forum managing topics that ends up being locked after a multi page argument about every possible thing. But since it's a topic here, I'll still debate everything you said.

Erm, you shouldn't just disregard all sites with different privacy policies than stock, as that would take away the services of most major websites such as Google, Yahoo, eBay, Youtube, etc or those of Microsoft products (LOL). But agreed that those who send spam or sell personal information are in the wrong, and should preferably be taken care of with legal action or the like. And I personally don't give away member's personal information, and I don't suppose any vBulletin official sites would either.


Frankly, the reason the Miserable Users mod exists is to annoy a troll until they leave. You want them to keep re registering under different names and IPs, and more bans having to be issued? No, it shuts them up basically. Besides, if anyone don't like it, there's always Tachy Goes to Coventry (puts trolls on global ignore to all other members and stops any of their posts or PMs being seen or read). I personally feel that the second one is even better, as instead of trying to use Capital Punishment online, I belief forced solipsism will shut up a jerk. Heck, I even wish the second option was possible in real life, cutting all human contact or living contact to criminals to make them feel like the only being in the universe and taking away all that would bring enjoyment. And that seems to work online quite well. Besides, do you think Miserable Users is the only version of this in existance? There are tons of mods for all forum software that are based around the same troll punishment concepts.

As for Reading PMs, it has legitimate uses. And non legitimate ones. No one says reading PMs for fun is a fair or honest idea, and in fact very much like spying on people's private lives. However, there are uses. For example, illegal activities in PMs. Many don't report the PMs because they like to take part for the promised benefits, and if you didn't take action, couldn't you be kind of in trouble legally? And PM spammers/flamers. PM spammers or advertisers use PMs to draw people to competing sites. Would you rather want an empty forum where everyone has left to go to a competing site? And flaming. I recently caught someone who sent a PM with like hundreds of personal attacks and insults, with profanity to someone they disliked on the forum. That goes un noticed without stuff like this. Yes, reporting PMs is also useful, and I also use this personally, and think it should be default. To add and conclude, this has legit uses and basically just does what was possible for ages in all forum software for many years by reading the database. Heck, XMB even had the option in by default ages ago.

Auto subscriptions I never even knew some people used. Seems dishonest to me.

As for your rules

No idea, although could you expect good faith from a troll/known jerk/spam bot?

Fair enough. I agree and think this myself.

Erm... this is the internet, and while I kind of agree, you can exaggerate and invent things online. Besides, a LOT of members on some forums I visited would disagree with you, or whatever. Or they could be telling the truth. Who knows.

I wonder how you would respond to these then:

Admin Log in as User

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=122989

Show latest PMs on forum home

Auto post as user (automatic posting from fake accounts or something)

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=155086

Mass create fake members (create 1000s with predefined fake e-mails in a few minutes)

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=154637

Fake community stats (make it look like 1000s online at once and millions of registered users)

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=117933

Just a footnote, I run 2 R\C sites, which means typicly there are alot of younger folks on there as it is usually a young hobby. I had a porn spammer come on and start sending PM's with porn links in them. If it werent for PM workbench (version for 3.6.8 PLEASE!!!) I wouldnt have known for a while. I use the hack only for good. If I see a member join the site and within an hour is PMing alot of people, I find out why.

Morality is in the hands of the Admin, and for the most part this authority is not abused, however there are some sites where it is. For those who use their site in a bad way, there's karma. For the rest of us, these are useful tools.

Im Not here To debate anyone on rather i think this behavior is acceptable ,

I Know what it is and what its about More than you do Cause Ive been the One Having these things done To Me Personally ,

Dont tell me what there about or try to justify the use of them , And if theres nothing wrong with using them then tell your members strait up that you can resort to them tactics your just waiting for a reason .

As for the other mods you listed , I hope that these sites sponsors discover they have Thousands of fake members .

As for doing this for a living , Try working for a living see how that goes , Lifes not Easy and chances are your not going to make it though life sitting on your Rear

DM

I tell it straight. Note how it's on my rules here:

http://dsultimate.net/Board/upload/m...plate=rulebook

FAQ, TOS on registration and I even said so in the forum, which was actually greeted by cheers from members rather than insults, complaints or moaning. Oh, and please don't constantly go on and on, you remind me of someone from another forum I read who, like you seems to try and act as the 'Morality Police' and tell people what to do and not do online for morality in every aspect. Besides, what about if the forum creator was a nihilist, who wouldn't therefore believe morals, right/wrong or anything as such existed/exists or like myself, doesn't believe Democracy is some god send solution for online forums/everything?

Ive said what i wanted to say and wont continue to debate this , As Right and Wrong as everyone has there own opinion on it ,

If 1/2 of the true blue Corrupt happening on alot of Boards was to be told to the memberbase , They would Jet ,

As a warning to you admin who resort to things mentioned I sure hope your using a different user name on here then you do on your board , All your members have to do is google your name and they will see your posts here ,

As well as links to your forum in your signature

If your doing something wrong they will find out sooner or later and you may not like the outcome especially if your trying to make a living off of VB

Thanks

DM

I use the same account here and the like that I use on my own forum. Heck, I even posted my modifications at my own forum, and several such articles, asked what mods here to add and all the like.

Besides, if the topic creator would stop the circular arguments and answer other member's criticisms, then I would treat them more seriously. Yes, you have a LOT of answering to do.

Fire Away I have Nothing to Hide

All my members on both forums know about PMWB and Miserable users. Most of them let me know when it would be useful to use them lol. Nobody is jetting.......

wow, someone is getting a little too emotional. As I am sure its been mentioned above, its the internet.. not utopia. The moment your on it, you assume risks and drawbacks. You seem to have the "Ive been picked on too many times and this is the last straw" mentality. I think your just a little "over the top" and you really need to separate the internet from reality. Sure, we all own forums, and there are certain "standards that must be met".. but majority of these owners are not running a business, they are running a hobby, and so have the right to maintain, disallow, and manage it however they so choose. Whether its a miserable users mod, or reading PM's to make sure some perverted A&% isn't stalking your members.

Basically... my underlying point is this.
deal with it.

Threads: 54, Posts: 97, Members: 10, Active Members: 10

You Have a Ways to go

Lost my database yesterday, started from scratch, just opened back up last night. Why did you even make this thread? Nobody agrees with you, and all you are doing is getting worked up and trying to make people mad. I think I see why you are having these problems on other forums.

Wow... really mature using someone's forum stats as a put down. Besides, remember that real arguments will always beat/expose some kid using flames, personal attacks and other stuff.

Guess I was expecting too much, wanting a proper, decent and intelligent debate about how to or not run a forum. Besides, just because your site may be bigger than someone else's; does not mean you have some great debating or natural advantage when it comes to discuss how to or not run a community.

I Guess i Just Care How Groups OF mass Quantities are treated by someone who decided to start a forum .

On My Topic Diesel Trucks there all kinds of Corruptness that would damn near turn your stomach as i watch others Just Like me Being lead to slaughter like Mindless Sheep when all there after is comradely and a place to call home online and have fun doing it .

I first Entered the diesel Forum World as a Newbie and Made a ton of frineds on a site and at 400 posts i got banned for tring to hook the members up with a good deal on heatshields , I lost all contact with my friends , This Site has Thousands of members and could care less about 1 , Like Swatting a Fly ,

I went to another Diesel Site and asked if any of my friend were there The Admin from the first site followed me and posted all sorts of stuff , I then moved on to another site 2000 Posts ,,,, Started my own Database Of Information ,,, Sold it ,,,, Starting Admining a new diesel site that is really pumping now ,,, the owner is Hoging all the funds and parts and showing off all his stuff to the members that they paid for , Said he was going to make it a pay site and quit his job

I got Sour and started my own up in March , At Current Growth We stand to destined to be a permeate stable of the online Diesel World

And i can garentee you We will do it On Good Values and Morals .

As Ive seen the other Side form all aspects , You Haven't

DM

Was not ment to be that way at all , Im not over confident in my board or flaunting my stats did i post them ..>NO

Someone pipes up ITs working on my board and they have 10 members Thats the Point not that my boards bigger , Dont try to look for something and run with it

DM

Ment no Disrespect ,

Nobody Agrees With me that willing to speak up

Im not worked up really Its just that there no better way to try to shine some light to admin that they dont have to be Money Grubbing < Sneaks To Have a Successful Forum , Im not using mine as an example tho someday i hope it to be .

And Your Probably right about why i have problems on other forums , When you see Admin Begging for donations for the

3.6.7 to 3.6.7PL1 Upgrade Thats completely Free .... Its Kind of hard Not to say Something to the unknowing member base .

Thats Just Me , I cant turn a Blind Eye to people being intentionally Mis Led For Financial Gain

DM

Stats from a particular forum are completely meaningless (how do you know he doesn't run 20 more large forums ?)

People run their forums how they want, members make their choice to join/stay/leave. There is no right or wrong way, esp as not everyones idea of "good values & morals" is the same.

I Made a comment that , If the members Really Knew and you posted it out in the open they would jet ,,,,,

The Come Back was

All my members know

This forum has 10 members

Thats all i was saying

DM

Allthough you carefully choose not to name forums, this thread seems to be turning into your personal crusade against some forums/admins who you have fallen foul of.

I don't see many sites where the Admin "begs for donations", nor are the vast majority of forum admins "Money Grubbing < Sneaks" as you seem to portray them (us !).

Understood And I didnt mean to Attack any of my fellow Members here on this site , Theres alot of Good Forums Ran Right ! On Here , and like anything else you have the other side ...

Thanks For the opportunity For me To State My opinion Sir

DM

Like I said, I lost my database. Doesnt mean I dont know what I am talking about.

I guess what it boils down to is how you define your Vbulletin Board as Successful Rather its $$$$ Or A Good Community Where People just Like Helping Others and spending there spare time ,

It can Go Hand in Hand , But once the $$$ starts Flowing Some Admin Shift there Visions of there board from a Helpful Community to a Cash Cow

To Each There Own

DM

seems like you sow sour grapes for whatever reason. I don't know why you bothered to post a discussion and then decide you won't engage in the discussion. seems more like a troll post than anything else.

and what a martyr post, "I may be banned here for speaking my mind..." what a cop out. Speak your mind if you are so honest, not try to garner emotional logical fallacy support.

the site that I'm a mod with is over 5 years old, we have over 50,000 members we read PMs, we read private journal entries. We're upfront about it. It is our responsibility to the community to be aware of what our members are doing to other members. It attracts members that donate, there is no advertising allowed from members site spamming. With 50,000 members we don't have time to read them all, we only get involved if we see there is a problem that can crop up.

So far we've been able to ditch many people from pedophiles to plain aholes. We use the simplest method, plain banning and manning the stations when someone decides to try to fool the admin/mods. We're good at vetting out underages (our forum is 18+).

What is great about this is that we have choices. If you don't like them, pick up your marbles and play somewhere else.

I would like to say that I appreciate people like Paul M who spend their free time to come up with solutions to problems. I have not installed the "Miserable Users" mod, but I might in the future. I did install the "Members who have visited in the last 24 hours" mod and it is great.

I've got miserable users and the swedish chef(enfranchizer(sp?)) mod. The former tends to be taken with good grace.

Wait until your members start threatening each other via pm or pretending to have received threats. Then you'll have to read pms.

It's not like it's a difficult thing to do through mysql anyway. Once you tell your users about it they'll presume you're reading ALL their pms.

I am considering hiding ips from mods though.

I am sole owner/admin of my board. It's a very small, private, and exclusive community. I don't ask for donations, and if anyone tried to offer, I would say no thanks. I'm not doing this for a profit. It's simply a hobby.

I have the Miserable User mod and the Admin Log On as Member mod both installed. The MU is used if a member tries to start trouble, and the other is used for members having trouble with something on the board...I don't use it to read PM's, but I'd consider it if it meant protecting my members. People aren't always what they seem...how well can you really know someone you meet on the internet?

To the OP, you sound like a disgruntled member that has gone through a lot, it's much easier to just click the "Log Out" button on a site if you don't like what's going on. There are so many places to go and you can even start your own as well.

No need to question the way others do business on there sites, each site is the private property of the owners, something that most people don't understand is forums are not all public. I have had people tell me that they are posting on a public forum and they can do what they want too... lol I then inform them of the truth.

hum, why bump a thread that old... really not needed to shake that old tree...

Didn't realize how old this thread was.

DieselMinded,
I understand where you are coming from with what your saying and if your post ever got deleted (unless it just turned into name calling etc) I would never come back to this forum because this is a discussion board which to me means people are entitled to discuss what is on their minds.

I have been working on a Sports Website for almost two years, and finally about to launch it into the public eye after numerous style changes etc to get the right feel. I like you did not select a topic that I thought I could make money out of I had always grown up as a sporting person and loved my sport and am very passionate about my sport however 3 years ago I dislocated my neck and was told I could not play sport any more which is why I thought about and eventually started to create my sports website.

I agree with you that you should be passionate about what your site is about and not in it just for the money...

However over the past two years I have invested over $7000 into my website, taking into account the hosting, domain name, website design, news system, vbulletin forums, vbulletin styles etc etc as you would know the costs just keep mounting not to mention added on extras that are not for the website however are used for the website eg: new phone lines for adsl, and stuff like that.
And when you have a now 7month old son its not always easy explaining to the MRS why you need another $1500 for this or that when there is stuff to buy for the baby however my son will always come first.

My website is now at the point as to we have a steady number of visitiors coming to the site (and once it officially launches we hope that number will grow) and we signed our first sponsor. Now after me personally investing $7000 I am not prepared to invest any more and its going to be riding on what we can earn - however when you look at it that way I am $7000 out of pocket so what I do with the website is any money earned through sponsorship, or advertising etc I will take 10% to slowly pay me back while 90% goes back into the website to improve it - however any donations that are made 100% goes to the website as people are donating to improve the website not to give me my money back.

So I guess what i am trying to say is in some ways it is ok for admins to take a little cut especially if they have forked out there dollars to get that money back. I dont agree with someone making a donation and me going out to get a new pair of nikes however with advertising money if someone paid $1000 from that I would get $100 it looks legit on the books and once that $100 is mine i can then do what i want with it.

2 years? 7k? Pheeew!

1 year - 3.5k :)

Anyone that runs there own website and pays for it has every right to do whatever they want with it. Make it a porn website, make it a I hate Obama website, make it a KKK White Power website.

Therefore if the content in itself can be whatever they want it to be, any modification of that website, including forum modifications can be what they want as well.

Any attack or questioning of morality and good conduct based upon the modifications from vBulletin.org that an admin chooses to use is entirely irrelevant. What one person sees as invasive and wrong another can defend with the reason why it's used.

For example : Miserable User - most people use this when they have a troll who's been banned 20 times and keeps making accounts.

I don't even use the mod, but I had a guy make 12 accounts in one day, should I babysit my website all day long while at work with a member like this? Or do I have the right to add that modification and let it take care of them by itself?

....Oh yeah I pay for the website I can do whatever I want. So can everyone else.

The closest one to unethical of that you listed is the Read PM one as reading other people's mail in the US at least is a Felony 10K fine, etc. However we do use that, for one purpose - and only in this scenario - if a new user joins and all they do on the WOL page is "send pm's". We double check to make sure it's spam, and then ban them.

It's not like we're reading people's love letters to each other, and since I'm the only one who can read them or admins can and they don't even know the modification was added, I don't consider it unethical at all.

P.S. The real issue here is that you're arguing the morality and justification or unjustification of other's choices and that's the point entirely, none of us have to be moral or justified in anything we do. So the whole complaint, while I hope it made you feel better is irrelevant to everyone but you.

:D Nope, the real issue is that this thread was originally posted in Aug of 2007 and someone bumped it out of obscurity.

I read that above.

The point remains, and no I'm not defending Pauls' mod or anyone elses, I'm just saying what someone sees as unethical another could see as totally advantageous for reasons of protecting there forum.

I believe every website owner has the right to choose and is beyond question from anyone else. I know I am, because I don't care what anyone else's opinion is, unless your paying my bills.