Banned... No good deed goes unpunished

I just got banned by a pissy mod because I posted that I am sick of hearing about all these awards that the raspberry pi keeps winning when a lot of people are still waiting to get theirs from that other company.

he called me a troll and a whiner

I just got banned by a pissy mod because I posted that I am sick of hearing about all these awards that the raspberry pi keeps winning when a lot of people are still waiting to get theirs from that other company.

Interesting to see that many of the awards are product of begging to the fanbois and cult members to vote for them.

Billy Thornton wrote:

 

Those RS bunch coulnd't organize a piss up in a brewery, but the other guys are OK.

I'm sure RS will be delighted to hear from you about how they can fill orders at a rate faster than Broadcom can supply them with BCM2835 devices.

"Behave like a prat, get treated like a prat."

Someone has to say it. Can we please stop calling people names? Over the weekend there were posts with someone calling someone else a jerk. I don't read some other forums because the mods take to name calling. Its a choice I make.  Here, it's just some people, not mods that are doing the name calling. If you don't like something, no need to get emotional and call people prats, because people will respect you, even if you have the opposite opinion.

"It a rule some of you lot need to learn!"

It's not; if you call people names and your peers were of the same frame of mind then you'd get treated exactly the way you're

advocating. At work, if something doesn't suit your world, do you call people names? Maybe you do, I suppose. I don't know. Most keep it professional. Where in life does one call people prats? (unless one is 16 years old).

I want to read some intelligent discussion, but every other post seems to be name-calling.

Sarcasm and humor is understandable, but name calling is not even a form of wit.

However, I hope you don't get blocked or your posts deleted - just so that people can read the whole of your contributions and make their own minds up if they like your contributions or not.

I joined this forum because I (as others) tend to use Farnell regularly. Maybe element14 should restrict

membership to forums unless one has contributed or responded on a technical issue.

@Dinova So, RS fail to order enough stuff, and that's Broadcom's fault? How come Element14 managed to organise themselves and don;t have a problem? Seems to me this is down to RS prediction management and nothing else.

@shabaz. Prat? What word do you suggest I use dude? "This first time posting person behaved in an incorrect manner designed to cause offence, and was treated accordingly." Better? Sometimes, name calling is an effective way of getting across a point. And to be honest, there are plenty of much better terms that apply in this case, I chose to use the most inoffensive. I don't care whether people like my contributions or not, but something has to be said about the people here and their continual bad mouthing of the moderators there, which as far as I can tell is just sour grapes. 'Over there' is a much more succesful forum than over here, with more users, better technical advice and all better information, and no bad mouthing (because the moderators ban people like that, unlike here). That what these alledgedly terrible moderators have produced. Live with it people.

Billy Thornton wrote:

 

Sometimes, name calling is an effective way of getting across a point.

No it is not.  Name calling belongs somewhere else, not here.

This forum expects people to express their opinions in a polite and professional manner, and asserts that participants are entitled to being treated with respect.

Please read this explanatory post by Element 14's Sagar Jethani explaining their Term of Use in a very approachable manner:

http://www.element14.com/community/message/58739#58739/l/about-our-terms-of-use

Morgaine.

So Billy (if that is actually your name),

after all this rant in multiple installments, what is your point ?

Haven't got anything in particular mate. Just don't like to see the bad mouthing of a *successful* charity going on here, when they don't deserve it, and I reckon some of the people doing it here need to be taught a short sharp lesson. Just because you get banned from somewhere for doing something wrong (persistently in many cases I reckon), doesnt mean that somewhere is being run badly, you may think so, but you don't run the Raspberry Pi foundation, and you don't run the Raspberry Pi Foundation forum. Now, you may not like the way its run, but that nothing to do with you. Looking at it - they are pretty successful, winning awards, selling hundreds of thousands of devices and have a succesfull forum, and yet all you people here do is whinge at them for 'doing it wrong'. I'm thinking, maybe they are not the ones doing it wrong.

It's actually William, but I prefer Bill. That was until Billy Bob Thornton came on the scene, which rather urinated on my fireworks and imediately got  me a new nickname. Hence BillyBob.

@Dinova. You a mod here then? Or just run the place? You don't treat the Raspberry Pi foundation with respect. Why should I treat you any different?

Good for you, point taken, and I'm not your "mate."

You can go now and teach your lesson across the universe if that makes you happy, it will not change my opinion about the Raspberry Pi Foundation, some of its members and its forum. If you don't like what you see here, just leave, you have not contributed anything significant and I'm pretty sure that nobody will miss you, at least I won't.

Billy Thornton wrote:

 

@Dinova. You a mod here then? Or just run the place?

Please don't personalize this.  I just quoted from an Element 14 admin's explanatory post and you're attacking the messenger.  We can have a perfectly rational discussion about the behavior of RPF "moderation" without attacking fellow members here.

Billy Thornton wrote:

 

You don't treat the Raspberry Pi foundation with respect. Why should I treat you any different?

We describe accurately the banning and name-calling and harrassment of people who express valid concerns over there, and it is not a matter of dispute because it's in the forum history.  It is not disrespectful to describe accurately what is happening, it is simply factual.

If an accurate description of their actions is not to their liking and they cannot ban it, perhaps they should stop doing what they're doing.  Alternatively, if they take pride in acting as they do, then our reporting it accurately should be to their liking.

You describe nothing accurately as far as I can tell! What you do is take what's happened, emphasise the bits that make you look good and ignore the bits that make you look bad. That's not describing thing accurately in my book.

As far as I can tell, any forum is alowed to remove post or people that critisize them or make them look bad (whether deserved or not - I'm thinking, judging by commenters here they were right in at least some of the bans). That because its their forum and they need to maintain their brnad. It's why Apple contunally remove critical posts from their website. If you critisize Element14 here, in the way you have been critical over there, I would expect you to get banned from here as well. And you should not be surprised! That goes for most of the people complaining about banning! That what I don't get people - why are you surprised when being continually critical on their own website gets you banned from it?

You describe nothing accurately as far as I can tell! What you do is take what's happened, emphasise the bits that make you look good and ignore the bits that make you look bad. That's not describing thing accurately in my book.

As far as I can tell, any forum is alowed to remove post or people that critisize them or make them look bad (whether deserved or not - I'm thinking, judging by commenters here they were right in at least some of the bans). That because its their forum and they need to maintain their brnad. It's why Apple contunally remove critical posts from their website. If you critisize Element14 here, in the way you have been critical over there, I would expect you to get banned from here as well. And you should not be surprised! That goes for most of the people complaining about banning! That what I don't get people - why are you surprised when being continually critical on their own website gets you banned from it?

Billy Thornton wrote:

 

That what I don't get people - why are you surprised when being continually critical on their own website gets you banned from it?

I think, amazingly, you've hit the nail on the head there, Bill.

The problem is there's no real way of knowing what will be taken as a criticism and what will be taken as fair comment. For instance, I suggested that they shouldn't ignore calls for a response to the RS situation from a journalist. Doesn't sound like a criticism, but apparently it was enough that they locked the thread and banned me. They could have PMd me and told me they were removing the post, they could have replied and just said "We will respond to it" or they could have replied in a sarcastic, unprofessional manner. They chose the latter, didn't like the answer they got in response and banned me. Fair enough, but the only guidance they provide is "Be nice to each other." The original post was 'nice' enough, their response to it (not the ban, the sarcasm) less so.

I'd previously posted about the unclear situation with regards to the Pi being a "beta" release. Liz took exception to that one and locked the thread, again with the sarcasm in her response. A PM and deletion of the post is far more appropriate. This is Wordpress and low-maintenance forums we're talking about - it's not that difficult to do.

If I remember correctly, their guidance/T&C about not criticizing the Pi or the Foundation in any way was changed so that it was just a 'be nice to one another'. I'm happy to 'be nice', tend to be in fact, and expect the same in return. They don't deliver on the idea of a friendly community, simple as that. I have no problem with the amount of technical knowledge over there (except a slight reliance on "It must be the power supply") it's just that every other post from a mod or admin is to do with moderating the forum rather than contributing to it. And these are smart guys - most of them have large amounts of technical knowledge that they are bypassing in order to keep everyone in line.

As for commenting about Element 14/Farnell - I think the only criticism I have of them is that they have two websites with two sets of stock and two sets of stock levels. I would have ordered from Farnell if they had Pi stock, but they didn't. I hadn't realised that CPC is a different part and that _they_ had stock. Bad way to run stock control, but not the end of the world. Their website is sufficiently easy to use that that kind of thing doesn't ruin the overall experience.

Turned into a long post after all that.

Billy Thornton wrote:

 

You describe nothing accurately as far as I can tell!

Please point to any innaccuracy in what we have described.  In the absence of that, you are merely arguing for effect, and that holds no sway here.  So far you have not singled out a single innaccuracy.

As far as I can tell, any forum is alowed to remove post or people that critisize them or make them look bad

They're "allowed" to do so in the sense that there is nothing to stop them, but that doesn't make it right.  If they acted like moderators then they would moderate, and seek a balance among many shades of opinion while allowing polite discourse to proceed.  That they do not do.  They "moderate" by exterminating one side.

Since you support what they do, I recommend that you go back there among your people.  I doubt that you read the post that I linked from Sagar Jethani about Terms of Use here, because if you had, you would know that this forum does not operate by the methods that you and RPF espouse.

Morgaine.

Michael Horne wrote:

 

the only guidance they provide is "Be nice to each other."

It's completely misleading though, because being polite does not stop you from being banned.

As far as I can tell by observation, their actual unstated guidance is "Do not engage us in  suggestions for improvement, critical analysis, unbiased appraisal nor description of problems, because all of these things will be construed as direct criticism and taken personally, and we make up reasons to ban you no matter how accurate and polite your contribution."

In other words, they don't accept accurate and uncoloured feedback, the kind that is totally normal in the engineering process.  Iterated improvement is stillborn if you cannot discuss and analyse problems because their mere mention gets you banned.  This is a well respected process that is used throughout all of the engineering professions every working day, and I'm totally puzzled why RPF does not understand how it works.

I do believe mention of the word "unprofessional" got me banned.

The lack of response from the forum email address and the developer in question, says it all.

The MagPi editor seems to have nothing to say either.

Michael Horne wrote:

 

Fair enough, but the only guidance they provide is "Be nice to each other."

Actually, the phrase liz used is: "Be good to each other".  YMMV but to me there is an important distinction between "good" and "nice".  I think "nice" is well understood, meaning to say things in an inoffensive, friendly way and help foster a happy community.  OTOH, "good" makes me think of phrases like "good for you" and "this is for your own good".  Nobody ever says "this is for your own nice".  So now we enter the realm of "what is good?" and "what's good for the community?" versus "can't we just all be nice to each other?"  JMO/YMMV

So I try to write nice comments which are good for the community.

Billy's persistent whingeing keeps reminding me of one of my favorite Monty Python lines:

Michael Palin says:

 

I would like to complain about people who hold things up by complaining about people who complain!  I think something should be done about it!  [16-ton weight drops on him.]

Michael Horne wrote:

I'm happy to 'be nice', tend to be in fact...

No, you're not. You have very selective memory Michael. Do you remember saying things like:

"Everytime I post on the Foundation website, I feel a little sick when Liz responds... It's becoming like Pavlov's Dog now..."

[http://www.element14.com/community/message/56481#56481]

Of course, this is the least of your personal abuse against Liz Upton and the RPF  -- one of the posts  that didn't get censored.

So keep tilting at those windmills by all means Michael - but don't delude yourself that you are "nice". Or blameless.

Eigen Ket wrote:

 

Michael Horne wrote:

I'm happy to 'be nice', tend to be in fact...

No, you're not. You have very selective memory Michael. Do you remember saying things like:

 

"Everytime I post on the Foundation website, I feel a little sick when Liz responds... It's becoming like Pavlov's Dog now..."

[http://www.element14.com/community/message/56481#56481]

 

Of course, this is the least of your personal abuse against Liz Upton and the RPF  -- one of the posts  that didn't get censored.

 

So keep tilting at those windmills by all means Michael - but don't delude yourself that you are "nice". Or blameless.

As far as I know, I've never had anything censored... Mind you, I wouldn't know as they don't tend to tell you when they have. I wouldn't call the Pavlov's Dog comment abusive, or anything like that... Unnecessarily sarcastic, perhaps, but taken in context at a time when there were a lot of knee-jerk responses related to USB, power supply etc, it still makes sense, even if the metaphor is a bit stretched. The funny thing is I actually love the Foundation's work, I really do - the Pi is a fantastic product. I just get frustrated when the public face ranges from "We've done this and aren't we fantastic" (which they are, considering what they've managed to accomplish) to sarcasm, bans and a general kneejerk reaction to uncomfortable questions.