The GM team is completely ineffective.

[LianaThorne]

The problem herein is that what constitutes "spam" is subjective at best.

Examples:

1. The shouting of "YOOOOO" in the Gold Saucer when Yojimbo appears. Does this qualify? I'd say no, but I saw an argument yesterday evening in the Gold Saucer over this very thing.

I would love to have been a fly on the wall for this conversation.

[Jojoya]

I don't know if it's the team itself or the policies, but it's completely ineffective. Absolutely nothing gets done. I've taken to reporting spam again in recent weeks. It's all over the place, I've submitted reports for the same names (yes, it's always the same character) so many times and nothing is ever done about it.

This came to a boiling point last night when I actually got to speak to- what I assume was- a living, breathing actual human GM. I asked them to tell me, point blank, if what I was constantly reporting was actually against TOS. Their response was telling me they could not provide me with any conclusive answers.

This is, of course, entirely unacceptable. If anybody should be able to provide conclusive answers, it's a GM. This isn't even to mention how- if by some measure of bad luck- you actually manage to get suspended, you won't be told what you got suspended for. You'll be told what part of the TOS you violated, but you won't be given the specific incident, meaning you just have to guess at what happened.

Once again, this is entirely unacceptable. I can only be led to believe that the GM team is either incredibly overworked at best, or completely incompetent at worst. To be honest, I don't care which one it is. I want to see better from the community. I want to see actual courtesy, I want to see the GMs enforcing their own rules. The bottom line is, it needs to be better.

Have you placed the player that is annoying you on your blacklist yet?

Because that would solve your problem very neatly. You already know that you don't want to have to read what they're posting in shout chat. Putting that player on your blacklist ensures you will never have to read it again.

If the GMs haven't done anything about that player yet, then chances are good you are the only one that's been reporting them. They don't have reason to take action just because you say they must, especially when you have a tool available that would take care of your problem if you would use it.

[Kazmarek]

Have you placed the player that is annoying you on your blacklist yet?

Because that would solve your problem very neatly. You already know that you don't want to have to read what they're posting in shout chat. Putting that player on your blacklist ensures you will never have to read it again.

If the GMs haven't done anything about that player yet, then chances are good you are the only one that's been reporting them. They don't have reason to take action just because you say they must, especially when you have a tool available that would take care of your problem if you would use it.

The blacklist is not infinite. I am not the only one reporting them because I know for a fact there are other people reporting them. The blacklist is not infinite. They need to take action even if that action is telling us they're not taking action. The blacklist is not infinite. The GM team, bottom line, needs to be better. The blacklist is not infinite. Have I mentioned the blacklist is not infinite?

[Jojoya]

The blacklist is not infinite. I am not the only one reporting them because I know for a fact there are other people reporting them. The blacklist is not infinite. They need to take action even if that action is telling us they're not taking action. The blacklist is not infinite. The GM team, bottom line, needs to be better. The blacklist is not infinite. Have I mentioned the blacklist is not infinite?

I think we're all aware that the blacklist is not infinite. But that 200 cap is extremely generous. No reasonable person is ever going to feel so strongly about 200 other players that need to have that many blacklisted.

I've been playing this game for 8 years now and I've felt a need to blacklist maybe a dozen players during that time. After a few months, I take them back off my blacklist. There has only been one that I've had to add back to it. And it's not that they're a bad person. They're just extremely annoying with their emote spam during hunt trains. So if they start spamming during trains, I put them on my blacklist then take them back off later. Temporary problem has solution and stops being a problem.

That's not to say that there aren't players with legitimate reasons to keep certain players on their blacklists. There are psychos out there that focus on someone and don't let go. Those individuals are better on blacklists.

That is not your problem, though. Your problem is you look for reasons to be offended and outraged for petty reasons. You believe that others should do what you say for your convenience.

You are indeed a Karen even if you don't want to admit it.

Game advice: clear out your blacklist. Chances are good that 95% of those you've placed on it you'll never encounter again and 4 of the remaining 5% will turn out to be perfectly friendly people who might have been having a bad day when you decided to blacklist them. Repeat this at the start of every month if you continue to add players to it. Chances are good you'll discover that the number on your blacklist remains small and it's extremely rare that you need to re-add a specific player.

Life advice: learn to ignore the petty stuff. You're only stressing yourself out and stress is terrible for your health.

[Gokki]

I've stopped reporting spammers and RMTers because nothing ever gets done.

[Kazmarek]

I think we're all aware that the blacklist is not infinite. But that 200 cap is extremely generous. No reasonable person is ever going to feel so strongly about 200 other players that need to have that many blacklisted.

I've been playing this game for 8 years now and I've felt a need to blacklist maybe a dozen players during that time. After a few months, I take them back off my blacklist. There has only been one that I've had to add back to it. And it's not that they're a bad person. They're just extremely annoying with their emote spam during hunt trains. So if they start spamming during trains, I put them on my blacklist then take them back off later. Temporary problem has solution and stops being a problem.

That's not to say that there aren't players with legitimate reasons to keep certain players on their blacklists. There are psychos out there that focus on someone and don't let go. Those individuals are better on blacklists.

That is not your problem, though. Your problem is you look for reasons to be offended and outraged for petty reasons. You believe that others should do what you say for your convenience.

You are indeed a Karen even if you don't want to admit it.

Game advice: clear out your blacklist. Chances are good that 95% of those you've placed on it you'll never encounter again and 4 of the remaining 5% will turn out to be perfectly friendly people who might have been having a bad day when you decided to blacklist them. Repeat this at the start of every month if you continue to add players to it. Chances are good you'll discover that the number on your blacklist remains small and it's extremely rare that you need to re-add a specific player.

Life advice: learn to ignore the petty stuff. You're only stressing yourself out and stress is terrible for your health.

Yes, me being frustrated with the terrible GM policies means I'm looking for reasons to be offended and outraged. You couldn't be further from the mark. So let me give you a bit of advice as well, since we're doing psychological evaluations of each other now.

Nothing's ever going to get done just by thinking about it hard enough. If you want something done, or changed, you have to push for it. Ignorance is not always bliss. I imagine your life is a very happy one.

[Yan-Dere]

"This is, of course, entirely unacceptable. If anybody should be able to provide conclusive answers, it's a GM. This isn't even to mention how- if by some measure of bad luck- you actually manage to get suspended, you won't be told what you got suspended for. You'll be told what part of the TOS you violated, but you won't be given the specific incident, meaning you just have to guess at what happened."

They are specifically trained to only answer what they are allowed to answer. Because there are people who will try to social engineer their way into getting information they aren't supposed to get. PirateSoftware explains it well. He works as a game dev, and offensive security expert. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAWwtjtRM98

[Myrany]

I think we're all aware that the blacklist is not infinite. But that 200 cap is extremely generous. No reasonable person is ever going to feel so strongly about 200 other players that need to have that many blacklisted.

I've been playing this game for 8 years now and I've felt a need to blacklist maybe a dozen players during that time. After a few months, I take them back off my blacklist. There has only been one that I've had to add back to it. And it's not that they're a bad person. They're just extremely annoying with their emote spam during hunt trains. So if they start spamming during trains, I put them on my blacklist then take them back off later. Temporary problem has solution and stops being a problem.

That's not to say that there aren't players with legitimate reasons to keep certain players on their blacklists. There are psychos out there that focus on someone and don't let go. Those individuals are better on blacklists.

That is not your problem, though. Your problem is you look for reasons to be offended and outraged for petty reasons. You believe that others should do what you say for your convenience.

You are indeed a Karen even if you don't want to admit it.

Game advice: clear out your blacklist. Chances are good that 95% of those you've placed on it you'll never encounter again and 4 of the remaining 5% will turn out to be perfectly friendly people who might have been having a bad day when you decided to blacklist them. Repeat this at the start of every month if you continue to add players to it. Chances are good you'll discover that the number on your blacklist remains small and it's extremely rare that you need to re-add a specific player.

Life advice: learn to ignore the petty stuff. You're only stressing yourself out and stress is terrible for your health.

in 5 years I have blacklisted maybe 3 between all 10 of my characters.1 for some serious griefing and the other 2 for really disgusting sexually explicit requests that also caused me to delete my Lalafel character.

[alpineth]

the title of this thread is a bit disingenuous since there are times when the gm's actually do their job. i had a weird stalker and reported racially disparaging comments, both users got deleted. maybe they just take action on more pressing issues rather than what this thread is really about: gm's inability to tackle a venue's advertisements taking up a good portion of pf. not saying that it might not be pressing to YOU, but maybe to gm's, they're just like ...yeah, ok, and....?

[Jojoya]

I've stopped reporting spammers and RMTers because nothing ever gets done.

When it comes to spammers, we're back to subjective opinion. The game's definition for spammer seems to be someone who fills the chat window completely with rapid repetition of a specific message so that others are unable to converse. Repeating the same message once every 5-10 minutes isn't going to be considered spam under that definition.

RMT activity is handled by the Special Task Force and not the GMs as a rule. The ad spambots do get banned on a weekly basis. But there's no way to stop RMT from making new accounts and characters to continue the spam.

Yes, me being frustrated with the terrible GM policies means I'm looking for reasons to be offended and outraged. You couldn't be further from the mark. So let me give you a bit of advice as well, since we're doing psychological evaluations of each other now.

Nothing's ever going to get done just by thinking about it hard enough. If you want something done, or changed, you have to push for it. Ignorance is not always bliss. I imagine your life is a very happy one.

What terrible policy are you referring to? That they don't immediately ban someone just on your personal say so?

Just because you want something to be done does not mean that it should be done.

Adding someone to a blacklist doesn't mean you're living in ignorance. You should know that with your personal extensive use of the blacklist to the point you don't have room to add this one character to it.

Learn which battles are worth fighting and which aren't. You may not agree with this other player and the message they're sharing but nothing you've said makes it sound like it's mean-spirited or damaging in any way, only that it could be annoying.

And yes, my life did improve immensely once I taught myself what battles are worth fighting and what can be safely ignored. I wouldn't say I'm very happy but I'm a lot happier than I was when I was obsessed with petty stuff and things that can't be changed. People will be people. Some will end up an annoyance depending on your personal preferences but they're rarely causing any actual harm to anyone.

Instead of investing your energy into trying to fight this particular battle, put the player on ignore and invest the energy into playing the game. Or don't and stay angry because you can't get others to see things your way. Your life, your choice.

in 5 years I have blacklisted maybe 3 between all 10 of my characters.1 for some serious griefing and the other 2 for really disgusting sexually explicit requests that also caused me to delete my Lalafel character.

Sorry you felt that you had to delete your character. With the improved blacklist coming in Dawntrail, hopefully no one will feel that's a necessary step ever again.

But your situation was very different from what the OP's situation is. The OP is way overreacting here and refuses to use a simple tool that would remove what's annoying them from their chat.

the title of this thread is a bit disingenuous since there are times when the gm's actually do their job. i had a weird stalker and reported racially disparaging comments, both users got deleted. maybe they just take action on more pressing issues rather than what this thread is really about: gm's inability to tackle a venue's advertisements taking up a good portion of pf. not saying that it might not be pressing to YOU, but maybe to gm's, they're just like ...yeah, ok, and....?

Venue ads might be spam or might not be. Are they annoying to those not interested in the venues? Sure, but they're also easily ignored if you're actively playing the game instead of using all your time to hang out in Limsa.

The OP's complaint doesn't seem to really be about venues, though. They seem to be about one particular player who has posted a message with a religious overtone in shout chat on multiple occasions (they had mentioned this is in a bit more detail in the other thread they mention was deleted by the moderators).

People tend to skim past the following statement in the Prohibited Activities policy:

Communication can take place in a variety of styles. As such, we do not prohibit specific words or sentences. Instead, we look at the whole picture in order to judge the intent and meaning of the communication, in conjunction with how the person on the receiving end perceived it, to determine whether or not the exchange falls under prohibited activities.

While discussion of topics that tend to prompt sensitive reactions are discouraged, they are not outright prohibited. What is prohibited is discriminatory speech that is intolerant of differing points of view or intended to begin arguments between players.

As an example, someone saying "Remember Jesus loves you, I hope you have a great day!" isn't prohibited. Unless other things were said to give it a different context, it comes across as friendly and caring. Regardless of your personal spiritual beliefs, there's not really anything offensive to be found in what the player said. The GMs have no reason to take action against that player.

If what they had said was "If you don't love Jesus, you're damned to Hell", that would be considered discriminatory and inflammatory. The GMs probably would choose to take action against the player at that point.

Are some players going to be sensitive to religious references for any number of reasons? Yes. But all they have to do is put that player on their blacklist, along with any other players that might choose to turn that into a discussion, and they won't have to listen to it anymore. Personal issue, simple solution.

So the OP reports the other player for putting a religious reference into shout chat, GMs review what's said against what's in the Prohibited Activties policy, finds it's not actually prohibited and so don't take action against the player. OP gets mad that the other player can continue to post a religious reference into shout chat and decides to try to get them silenced for "spam" or "nuisance behavior". They refuse to put the player on their blacklist because They Must Know! what the other player says so they can report it. Again, GMs review and don't find what the other player is doing to be prohibited under the policy. OP starts to rage and takes it to the forums, where they get very little sympathy because few people like someone trying to shut down another person's ability to express a non-discriminatory opinion.