Naming banned members

[Martee]

If a member on your forum was banned and this particular member was one who was fairly popular within the community, would you tell your community why this person was banned or would you just let them find out the hard way?

I would probably tell them, just to keep things calm.

 

[dojo]

You won't keep things calm, believe me. It will turn into a 'why have you banned x, he's such a cool guy' fight. All you do as an admin should be backstage. You don't advertise your problems, you don't hold 'parties' when someone leaves. You can respond privately if anyone asks, but don't make a fuss in the forums

 

[Martee]

I'm sure it would depend on the member and what they did but invitably yeh, you will get people saying what you've typed but for myself I'd rather have that than people finding out hes banned and the banned person getting his version fo events across. Obviously, I'm not going to tell them every member that has been banned. I meant people like staff and veteran members who have done alot for the community and only then, extreme circumstances.

Thats just the way I think myself and I appreciate your opinion and where you're coming from though. I suppose privately is a more preferable option but I'm an 'open' kind of guy. I like to make things public rather than keep things secret if you get me.

 

[flame]

i have been in a situation where i have had half the members screaming for someone to banned then half screaming when he was banned - and half of them screaming on both sides

damned if you do damned if you dont - i take it on a case by case basis

 

[xpl0iter]

I guess I will update the status of the banned member with the reason why we banned him/her! Thats it!

 

[flame]

i think also it depends on how long the ban is for - and why it has occurred. i mean if the member is know for constantly pushing one particular rule and getting warned for it then a weeks ban does not need to be advertised

if on the other had the perfectly polite gentleman has suddenly sent naked pictures of himself to all female members then maybe some explanation might be needed - especially as some may have got the pictures not reported them and be worrying about it

 

[Hotmess]

If a member on your forum was banned and this particular member was one who was fairly popular within the community, would you tell your community why this person was banned or would you just let them find out the hard way?

I would probably tell them, just to keep things calm.

To add to what Dojo said, the poster will most likely announce it on their own on another medium. Talking about it openly on the forum board will most likely ensue in pissing contest involving your board and twitter/facebook or wide reached social platforms like that. You don't want that kind of negative reputation for your forum/blog

 

[Sam1]

I would do what xpl0iter would do, update his status. I wouldn't announce the whole thing, although i'd put something in the staff area...

If the poster announced that they'd been banned through Nother account: I'd reply and ban their IP...

 

[Martee]

To add to what Dojo said, the poster will most likely announce it on their own on another medium. Talking about it openly on the forum board will most likely ensue in pissing contest involving your board and twitter/facebook or wide reached social platforms like that. You don't want that kind of negative reputation for your forum/blog

I replied in more detail below that post by the way

I would do what xpl0iter would do, update his status. I wouldn't announce the whole thing, although id put something in the staff area...

I'd still announce if it was a staff member gone bad though. Not a full blown explanation or an announcement but maybe slip it in somewhere.

 

[Sam1]

Well you could just say the staff member had a major disagreement or something- I personally think its unfair to give a full explanation when they cannot reply....

 

[Martee]

I can see I'm obviously being overruled here but nevertheless! xD What I'm trying to say is, my persona is to be open with people both in real life and on the forums I frequent. If I was running a forum and a staff member went bad, I would feel duty bound to tell them part, not all of the reason why they were banned. I feel it is in the best interests of the forum in some cases.

Take the Runescape forum I help run for instance. On Runescape forums with 'Black markets' for selling game items like ours, scamming is an everyday problem and over at RSK we regularly ban people for market related offences. We did though, a while back have a staff member scam some users and whilst the proof that was held against this moderator was plainly obvious that they did it, the members did not believe it and were up in arms saying 'Oh why did you ban him, he was awesome!!!" but once a member of the Admin team posted an announcement dealing why and why action was took against them whilst showing the proof against this person, the community quietened down.

I guess you could say my approval to this stems from that experience and just my natural persona. Each to their own though!

 

[xpl0iter]

Staff member gone bad is entirely another scenario. I agree with Haze completely about this. An announcement will be required for that! People will notice a staff member ban and they are more likely to start threads by their own if there was no announcement topic from the forum team!
So its better to start one thread as announcement and tell your members all the related stuffs should be posted under the announcement thread.

 

[Hotmess]

Staff member gone bad is entirely another scenario. I agree with Haze completely about this. An announcement will be required for that! People will notice a staff member ban and they are more likely to start threads by their own if there was no announcement topic from the forum team!
So its better to start one thread as announcement and tell your members all the related stuffs should be posted under the announcement thread.

That is exactly why I have Staff accounts that I assign to people I want on my Staff.

Look at it like a uniform if you will, once they are done with it or I am done with them, I take it back, change the password and re- assign it. If one goes bad, they'll leave without a wimp

The Staff only post "official things" other than that you won't even notice us. When we are not performing administrative duties, we are just regular members