Okay before I start I guess I better declare that I am a bit of a bleeding heart liberal!
I really don't like the solution number 1. As you mention yourself who polices the police plus who decides what is suitable behaviour? Also doesn't this infringe people's right to free speech? It could be argued that as everyone pays their subscription if someone wants to be a dickhead thats their choice. However I do feel that if people are being truly offensive e.g. racist or hounding people that this obviously breaks the code of decent behaviour so they should be banned no question. This already seems to happen or maybe I am being naive?
EQ already has solution 2 built into it to some extend. You can report players to GMs. So if someone says something offensive you can type /report. The text is sent to a GM and they intervene. GMs then approach the person to talk to them. I know this happens becuase when I have reported people GMs have let me know they have spoken to them. I assume if this happens a lot they get banned?
Sorry to go over old ground but how widespread is this problem in your experience? As I mentioned previously it is a minor problem in my experience. I am always subscribed to one MMO or another. I have being playing them constantly for 9 years and I can honestly count on one hand the number of times that I have considered another player's behaviour to be totally unacceptable. That isn't to say that other players haven't annoyed me but being annoying (in my opinion) isn't something you can ban people for because it is subjective. Now the majority of my experience has been in EQ and EQ2. I think if I had been playing WoW all that time maybe my experience may have been different?
Anyway the point of my ramblings is are draconian measures to tackle this just like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut?
Okay before I start I guess I better declare that I am a bit of a bleeding heart liberal!
I really don't like the solution number 1. As you mention yourself who polices the police plus who decides what is suitable behaviour? Also doesn't this infringe people's right to free speech? It could be argued that as everyone pays their subscription if someone wants to be a dickhead thats their choice. However I do feel that if people are being truly offensive e.g. racist or hounding people that this obviously breaks the code of decent behaviour so they should be banned no question. This already seems to happen or maybe I am being naive?
EQ already has solution 2 built into it to some extend. You can report players to GMs. So if someone says something offensive you can type /report. The text is sent to a GM and they intervene. GMs then approach the person to talk to them. I know this happens becuase when I have reported people GMs have let me know they have spoken to them. I assume if this happens a lot they get banned?
Sorry to go over old ground but how widespread is this problem in your experience? As I mentioned previously it is a minor problem in my experience. I am always subscribed to one MMO or another. I have being playing them constantly for 9 years and I can honestly count on one hand the number of times that I have considered another player's behaviour to be totally unacceptable. That isn't to say that other players haven't annoyed me but being annoying (in my opinion) isn't something you can ban people for because it is subjective. Now the majority of my experience has been in EQ and EQ2. I think if I had been playing WoW all that time maybe my experience may have been different?
Anyway the point of my ramblings is are draconian measures to tackle this just like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut?