The GM team is completely ineffective.

[Jeeqbit]

Well spam is a vague thing. It can be a problem in certain circumstances and your definition of spam may be different to theirs, so that's most likely why they couldn't just give a conclusive answer.

But if you reported it and it didn't stop, then most likely it's because it's fine.

[Kazmarek]

But if you reported it and it didn't stop, then most likely it's because it's fine.

Then that's something they should tell us, no? Something as simple as "We've reviewed your report and determined the actions do not violate Terms of Service" or something like that. It'd give everyone a much, much better understanding of the rules than the guessing game we have to play to this day. Now, of course, that's not on the GMs, that's on the policies; which are probably a big part of why it feels like the team is completely ineffective.

[Jeeqbit]

Then that's something they should tell us, no?

Well again, the context may take some investigation and confirmation (since, your report could be a lie for all they know and they need to check), so I doubt they would just tell you on the spot.

Something as simple as "We've reviewed your report and determined the actions do not violate Terms of Service"

Well you see, that would confirm they took no action on the user. They don't want to confirm or deny if they took action on a user for privacy reasons.

Why does the privacy matter? Laws aside, it presents a big problem if they give you ammo to publically say "this person got successfully reported" in a mocking way, and likewise if the person receiving the punishment knows who or what prompted it then they may go after them and create a feud of some sort. For all these reasons they keep it vague.

It'd give everyone a much, much better understanding of the rules than the guessing game we have to play to this day.

You could, like, read the rules. Then it wouldn't be a guessing game. I've always fully understood them, but a while back they provided examples for people who struggle to interpret them. The examples are in line with the understanding I have always had: that you just need to be kind and considerate and that's really it.

Now, of course, that's not on the GMs, that's on the policies; which are probably a big part of why it feels like the team is completely ineffective.

They are constrained to a degree. When this is the case, they usually direct you to the official forums. Which of course is kind of a dead end because there is a language barrier, but it's the only thing they can do because SE's policy is that "if you want change you can post about it on the official forums".

why I'll probably never touch WoW again is the fact that they entirely gutted their CS team and replaced it with a copy/paste bot

The truth is that in customer service, you are answering the same questions over, and over, and over again. It gets to a point where you are repeating the same thing every single day. You are virtually writing out templates that exist in your head. At this point, you may as well write actual templates and optimize them to come across polite and navigate all the social rules and political correctness rules. So that's what they do! It also saves a lot of time. Of course, I think they can go off-script if they feel it's necessary but I think in most cases they don't need to because they had a script for your exact scenario.