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[PATV] Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - Extra Credits Season 4, Ep. 11: Harassment

GethGeth LegionPerseus VeilRegistered User, Moderator, Penny Arcade Staff, Vanilla Staff vanilla
edited April 2012 in The Penny Arcade Hub
Extra Credits Season 4, Ep. 11: Harassment
http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/harassment
This week, we tackle the rampant bullying, misogyny and hate speech that occurs within the gaming community.

Ask Microsoft Support for the tools we need to stop harassment here!

Come discuss this topic in the forums!

Geth on
«1

Posts

  • RMS OceanicRMS Oceanic Registered User regular
    I still like the Jay & Silent Bob approach to trolls, but these could work as well.

  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    So yeah. Here's another option while we wait for mechanical functions:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persona_non_grata
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_rejection

    Mechanical functions to fix this problem are only really a bandaid to the problem though. And mechanics can be turned around and abused (see Blizzard's attempt to make vote-kicking a thing in WoW).

  • IncenjucarIncenjucar VChatter Seattle, WARegistered User regular
    Ehhh.

    Problems:

    * Trolls and bigots will abuse any and all automatic systems to mess with people they have a grudge against.
    * People who are just starting a game are often the people who need to connect with the community most, because they need to ask for advice or to make friends in order to establish themselves in a game.

    Now what might be nice is if you had the ability to selectively add mute or block lists from your friends and guild/clanmates. You could even add a feature that allows parents to automatically add their mute/block lists to their kids' lists.

  • HewnHewn Registered User regular
    Overdue episode, no doubt.

    I think the mute percentage playing a factor in default voice status is brilliant. The current rep system for Xbox Live, though, needs to be overhauled entirely. It's worthless.

    Steam: hewn
    Warframe: TheBaconDwarf
  • KingofMadCowsKingofMadCows Registered User regular
    The only way to truly win is with a massive unrelenting assault against all trolls simultaneously. If only halfhearted attempts are made or some kind of incremental measures are implemented, it will simply breed stronger, stealthier, and more cunning trolls. The weaker deterrents will simply inoculate them against harsher punishments.

  • DurkhanusDurkhanus Commander Registered User regular
    The only way to truly win is with a massive unrelenting assault against all trolls simultaneously. If only halfhearted attempts are made or some kind of incremental measures are implemented, it will simply breed stronger, stealthier, and more cunning trolls. The weaker deterrents will simply inoculate them against harsher punishments.

    8->

  • The CannonThe Cannon Registered User regular
    Those are for the people who are willing to put in that kind of effort. But for all the dumb ass bros who get on Xbox Live and say stupid shit just because, it would be relatively effective. There will always be people who go around, but it won't be an epidemic.

  • mekman 2mekman 2 a goober Registered User regular
    I've been waiting for you to do this episode, thank you. The video game (and video game development/private sector/Gawker, etc...) community is a discouraging place especially if you're not considered by the status quo, (or the Daily Show) a so-called model minority. Its not simply about throttling their voice, they usually have large wallets and consider themselves godly based on this or some other mutually accepted crass materialism. It's a problem coming from the emerging global society as well as the usual suspects. I'm all for chasing these types out of communities, but they still "tend to gather." Banning that one dude from PAX was a great start, but so many more were allowed in... These small minds always end up on the wrong side of history, but I'm all for plugging their progress, before they can do anymore harm to any random person they deem unworthy, for what ever convoluted reason they've crafted, "peer-reviewed" and published.

  • CapfalconCapfalcon Tunnel Snakes Rule Capital WastelandRegistered User regular
    Gotta say, the automuting idea kind of blew my mind. I think that's a pretty good idea.

  • jackaljackal Fuck Yes. That is an orderly anal warehouse. Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Trolls will spell out racial slurs in bullet holes if they have to.

    jackal on
  • 2 Marcus 2 Ravens2 Marcus 2 Ravens CanadaRegistered User regular
    The Cannon wrote: »
    Those are for the people who are willing to put in that kind of effort. But for all the dumb ass bros who get on Xbox Live and say stupid shit just because, it would be relatively effective. There will always be people who go around, but it won't be an epidemic.

    This.

    I definitely agree that whatever the solution, it can't be halfhearted, but it's simply impossible to put an end to all bullying ever. It's going to exist. Period. But much of the bullying itself is casual and halfhearted (although it may not seem that way to someone on the receiving end).

    I know a lot of people who don't really play a lot of games, but quite enjoy getting on Call of Duty to shit talk everyone. They do it because it's easy. If you put any kind of meaningful barrier to prevent that, they simply wouldn't do it. They wouldn't put forth the effort. Some people will, absolutely, and those people will be shitty no matter what. Some people just suck.

    Mechanics themselves won't solve the problem, but they will almost certainly help. I really like the idea of mechanics encouraging social behaviour, like with the guild reputation system. The mechanic will make the players encourage themselves to solve the problem. Talk to the bully. If that doesn't work, kick them out of the guild. People will do it.

    This was a really great episode! Logical, easy to implement ideas that could really go a long way to combating easily one of the worst parts of gaming culture. Brilliant!

  • El SkidEl Skid The frozen white northRegistered User regular
    In an environment where starting from scratch hurts your play, the idea of taking in environmental info and using it to decide whether the person can be heard, their comments seen etc by the world at large is a great idea. They COULD just make another account to continue spewing, but that costs them time/effort/whatever causes starting from scratch to hurt. And they get to get muted again if they continue. It's a great motivation for people to act better, which is great. Won't work for determined trolls, but at least it causes them pain, which is good.

    The idea of making a reputation that has in-game concequences for guilds/clans etc is fantastic. I know that when I played WoW alot of guilds were cognizant of their reputation regardless (since it hurt recruitment to have a bad rep), but making an incentive to gameplay for this is a good idea. You can be a goose, but you're hurting your group/guild by doing so, and it's likely to get you booted if you don't stop. Now, you have to have a way to stop people from using this reputation system to spite their rivals, but I like it in principle.

    Having the ability to talk be turned off by default.... meh. You'd have to implement it really well to avoid hurting the general community more than hatemongers.

    Very interesting episode, with the potential to cause real-world changes. Nice! :^:

  • Snarkman3Snarkman3 Registered User regular
    Yeah, the whole auto-muting thing is so practical and makes so much sense, it begs the question of why it hasn't been implemented earlier.

    I specially liked this episode for its focus on making a better, more accepting community. Brilliant, as always.

  • 3lwap03lwap0 Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Snarkman3 wrote: »
    Yeah, the whole auto-muting thing is so practical and makes so much sense, it begs the question of why it hasn't been implemented earlier.

    I specially liked this episode for its focus on making a better, more accepting community. Brilliant, as always.

    Probably because someone, somewhere, debated what implementing the anti-bully feature would do to their bottom line, and decided not to implement it. I think you can always boil it down to "What does it cost me (money wise), and what will I gain from it?". In the case of XBOX Live, I can especially see this being the case.

    I hope I'm wrong mind you, but after having been introduced to the cold world of bottom lines and business development and continuity, it's hard to see things in any other light.

    3lwap0 on
  • CasualCasual Wiggle Wiggle Wiggle Flap Flap Flap Registered User regular
    3lwap0 wrote: »
    Snarkman3 wrote: »
    Yeah, the whole auto-muting thing is so practical and makes so much sense, it begs the question of why it hasn't been implemented earlier.

    I specially liked this episode for its focus on making a better, more accepting community. Brilliant, as always.

    Probably because someone, somewhere, debated what implementing the anti-bully feature would do to their bottom line, and decided not to implement it. I think you can always boil it down to "What does it cost me (money wise), and what will I gain from it?". In the case of XBOX Live, I can especially see this being the case.

    I hope I'm wrong mind you, but after having been introduced to the cold world of bottom lines and business development and continuity, it's hard to see things in any other light.

    The video specifically addresses that point though. Given that these arsewipes are a vocal minority it's far more likely that they're actually losing money by allowing these guys to go unchecked.

    Put it this way, I'm a white, male, heterosexual under 30, so I'm the demographic that gets the least shit, but I cancelled my live subscription years ago and have never looked back. It would be an exaggeration to say the toxic attitude I found on there was more than I could take, I'm not that emotionally fragile, but it was certainly more than I was willing to put up with on a service I paid for. If I went to a restaurant and a guy at the next table spent the whole night shouting racist slurs at me, that place would never see me or my money ever again, I would not just assume that the owner is making more money by keeping that arseholes custom.

  • KalTorakKalTorak One way or another, they all end up in the Undercity.Registered User regular
    3lwap0 wrote: »
    Snarkman3 wrote: »
    Yeah, the whole auto-muting thing is so practical and makes so much sense, it begs the question of why it hasn't been implemented earlier.

    I specially liked this episode for its focus on making a better, more accepting community. Brilliant, as always.

    Probably because someone, somewhere, debated what implementing the anti-bully feature would do to their bottom line, and decided not to implement it. I think you can always boil it down to "What does it cost me (money wise), and what will I gain from it?". In the case of XBOX Live, I can especially see this being the case.

    I hope I'm wrong mind you, but after having been introduced to the cold world of bottom lines and business development and continuity, it's hard to see things in any other light.

    Isn't that why they're telling people to contact Microsoft, i.e. make it show up on their bottom line analysis?

  • Good Looking Fat GuyGood Looking Fat Guy West Hartford, CTRegistered User regular
    The only problem I see with the solutions presented here is having to earn the right to speak. That's condemning and judging someone before they've done anything wrong.

    In society in general, people need to commit crimes/faux pas before they are punished.

  • JaleinJalein Registered User new member
    edited April 2012
    Extra credits swings and it's a complete miss.

    First of all women are not the only people on the internet who get harassed, what about homosexuals and minorities? They pull far more piss and bile then women do on the internet and usually have no one to defend them. Women atleast get the one off white knight every once and a while. Heck how many times have you heard the word "faggot" throw around directed at some one homosexual or not?

    But pretty much being human is enough to make you get harassed on the internet, The internet is pretty much equal opportunity on harassment. Focusing singularly on women is woefully neglectful and made this episode feel more like misguided feminist non-sense then actually trying to address a real issue.

    Second of all those so called "solutions" were terrible, I can easily see them only causing more people to leave a service or being abused to the point the become useless then actually solving anything.

    The mute thing was the worst, whats preventing that from being abused, or wrongfully censoring some one? I can see people intentionally muting people regardless if they are saying inappropriate things or not and how would you even get it ratified if I was wrongfully muted? How do I prove to XboxLive customer service I wasn't saying bad things? Not to mention the load this would put on Customer Service reps who have to deal with all these calls from people asking how they can be unmuted would be enormous, The system would become useless with in a month if it ever got implemented.

    Again the unread message thing is pointless, what's the difference between an a regular old message that didn't get responded too and one that didn't get responded too because of harassment? and again how would we rectify this? It would be a pain trying to clear this up with Customer Service.

    and lastly muting everyone under a gamer score level is still pretty dumb, what happens to people who don't really care about their gamer score, or only log on occasionally? Also nothing pisses off a new user more and potentially losing new customers then having to jump through hoops in order to get the full experience.

    Forcibly censoring all users because of a few bad apples is never a solution it's like DRM it only pisses off the people who have legitimate reasons for using your service. What really needs to happen is people need to do buck the fuck up, take the harassment with a grain salt, learn the tools available to them (such as muting, blocking, blacklists) and report offenders and companies need to take investigating reported incidents more seriously.

    And finally they topped it off with a double standard you generalized and dehumanized people who harass people, How do you know they are people who need attention? How do you know some thing went wrong with their life? All people who say some thing nasty online have deep seeded issues now?

    Jalein on
  • 3lwap03lwap0 Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Casual wrote: »
    3lwap0 wrote: »
    Snarkman3 wrote: »
    Yeah, the whole auto-muting thing is so practical and makes so much sense, it begs the question of why it hasn't been implemented earlier.

    I specially liked this episode for its focus on making a better, more accepting community. Brilliant, as always.

    Probably because someone, somewhere, debated what implementing the anti-bully feature would do to their bottom line, and decided not to implement it. I think you can always boil it down to "What does it cost me (money wise), and what will I gain from it?". In the case of XBOX Live, I can especially see this being the case.

    I hope I'm wrong mind you, but after having been introduced to the cold world of bottom lines and business development and continuity, it's hard to see things in any other light.

    The video specifically addresses that point though. Given that these arsewipes are a vocal minority it's far more likely that they're actually losing money by allowing these guys to go unchecked.

    Put it this way, I'm a white, male, heterosexual under 30, so I'm the demographic that gets the least shit, but I cancelled my live subscription years ago and have never looked back. It would be an exaggeration to say the toxic attitude I found on there was more than I could take, I'm not that emotionally fragile, but it was certainly more than I was willing to put up with on a service I paid for. If I went to a restaurant and a guy at the next table spent the whole night shouting racist slurs at me, that place would never see me or my money ever again, I would not just assume that the owner is making more money by keeping that arseholes custom.

    And your analogy is spot on. To take it even further, the guy shouting racist slurs at you isn't getting tossed out of the restaurant. He's there almost anytime you eat there, hurling abuse at you, and they won't toss the guy out. Eventually you don't go there anymore, and take your business elsewhere.

    But, as I'm learning, idealism and pragmatism have a wide gulf when money is concerned. Microsoft is well aware of the harassment and bullying epidemic on XBOX Live. This is hardly new to them or the long history and many years of XBOX Live. I honestly think MS has had more than a few meetings as to how to control the problem, and every solution would have been a Godsend, but was outvoted by someone with more loyalty to share holders than to the gaming community. And because the market is something of a niche market, with few competitors, MS is in no hurry to innovate it's system with regards to bullying.

    I pray I am wrong with all of this. I would love for a community groundswell to implement some of the solutions proposed in this episode. To go a night of CoD or ME3 without having to hear some 13 year old lunatic vomit profanity and slurs every 5 seconds would be a welcome relief.
    KalTorak wrote: »
    Isn't that why they're telling people to contact Microsoft, i.e. make it show up on their bottom line analysis?

    Darn skippy. The guys at Extra Credit even highlight it in their episode - female gamers have some great reasons to leave XBOX live given all the abuse. But it's all a matter of metrics - if gold membership takes a serious nose dive, I imagine MS will have to really examine why. And you can bet your lunch money that they have those metrics down pat. They know who leaves, and to a reasonable degree, why. Knowing those things is what keeps them profitable, so they stay on top of it. And if the profits aren't taking a hit...then are they really compelled to do it? I try and put myself in their position, and ask myself the same thing. I don't much like the answer.

    3lwap0 on
  • JaleinJalein Registered User new member
    edited April 2012
    All of extra credits solutions stand to push more customers away then the harassers do. Blanketing everyone with censorship will solve nothing, I rather put up with some one spewing profanity (because I can simply act like a normal person by ignoring them and muting them ) then be forced to jump through hoops in order obtain the service I paid for and having to deal with Customer service every other day because their blanket system is being abused into just another form of harassment.

    Jalein on
  • ToreTore Registered User new member
    I support the auto mute, even if it is only to stop bullying it is also a much more effective tool to stop people from speaking/spamming foreign languages in team chat, it polutes the teamchat for the rest of the players trying to communicate and work together.

  • gtrmpgtrmp Registered User regular
    Jalein wrote: »
    And finally they topped it off with a double standard you generalized and dehumanized people who harass people, How do you know they are people who need attention? How do you know some thing went wrong with their life? All people who say some thing nasty online have deep seeded issues now?

    Ah yes, the people who harass people are the real victims of harassment. Makes you think...

  • DraygoDraygo Registered User regular
    Jalein wrote: »
    Extra credits swings and it's a complete miss.

    First of all women are not the only people on the internet who get harassed, what about homosexuals and minorities? They pull far more piss and bile then women do on the internet and usually have no one to defend them. Women atleast get the one off white knight every once and a while. Heck how many times have you heard the word "faggot" throw around directed at some one homosexual or not?

    But pretty much being human is enough to make you get harassed on the internet, The internet is pretty much equal opportunity on harassment. Focusing singularly on women is woefully neglectful and made this episode feel more like misguided feminist non-sense then actually trying to address a real issue.

    They used women as an example. I dont think EC needs to name every possible category of people that actually get harrassed to get their point across. I dont need to watch an episode that is 30 minutes longer just to cover all the groups. Fact is, if you can be put in a category (and white, under 30, male is one of them, for example, 27y/o virgin living in his momma's basement etc) you have had shit thrown at you. As a percent of the population there are more women than homosexuals, so picking one of the biggest groups that gets bullied is a good example.

    I really only support the automute, and auto restriction based on messages. When you send a message to people often you will want a reply. So if 95% of your messages are getting no reply, or even better the system had a 'report' button at the top, and 80% of the people you are messaging are mashing that report key. An auto restriction makes complete sense. Same thing with mute. As long as a 'no voice chat' option is somewhere so you can mute everyone by default and it doenst affect the metrics if someone is getting muted even 20% of the time, it is a good idea to turn that guy/girl off by default. It is a really good idea and I hope some major publishers implement things like this.

  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    The only problem I see with the solutions presented here is having to earn the right to speak. That's condemning and judging someone before they've done anything wrong.

    Which they noted after saying it and also said the idea train doesn't stop with them. They weren't speaking with authority.

  • FramlingFramling FaceHead Geebs has bad ideas.Registered User regular
    3lwap0 wrote: »
    Casual wrote: »
    3lwap0 wrote: »
    Snarkman3 wrote: »
    Yeah, the whole auto-muting thing is so practical and makes so much sense, it begs the question of why it hasn't been implemented earlier.

    I specially liked this episode for its focus on making a better, more accepting community. Brilliant, as always.

    Probably because someone, somewhere, debated what implementing the anti-bully feature would do to their bottom line, and decided not to implement it. I think you can always boil it down to "What does it cost me (money wise), and what will I gain from it?". In the case of XBOX Live, I can especially see this being the case.

    I hope I'm wrong mind you, but after having been introduced to the cold world of bottom lines and business development and continuity, it's hard to see things in any other light.

    The video specifically addresses that point though. Given that these arsewipes are a vocal minority it's far more likely that they're actually losing money by allowing these guys to go unchecked.

    Put it this way, I'm a white, male, heterosexual under 30, so I'm the demographic that gets the least shit, but I cancelled my live subscription years ago and have never looked back. It would be an exaggeration to say the toxic attitude I found on there was more than I could take, I'm not that emotionally fragile, but it was certainly more than I was willing to put up with on a service I paid for. If I went to a restaurant and a guy at the next table spent the whole night shouting racist slurs at me, that place would never see me or my money ever again, I would not just assume that the owner is making more money by keeping that arseholes custom.

    And your analogy is spot on. To take it even further, the guy shouting racist slurs at you isn't getting tossed out of the restaurant. He's there almost anytime you eat there, hurling abuse at you, and they won't toss the guy out. Eventually you don't go there anymore, and take your business elsewhere.

    But, as I'm learning, idealism and pragmatism have a wide gulf when money is concerned. Microsoft is well aware of the harassment and bullying epidemic on XBOX Live. This is hardly new to them or the long history and many years of XBOX Live. I honestly think MS has had more than a few meetings as to how to control the problem, and every solution would have been a Godsend, but was outvoted by someone with more loyalty to share holders than to the gaming community. And because the market is something of a niche market, with few competitors, MS is in no hurry to innovate it's system with regards to bullying.

    I pray I am wrong with all of this. I would love for a community groundswell to implement some of the solutions proposed in this episode. To go a night of CoD or ME3 without having to hear some 13 year old lunatic vomit profanity and slurs every 5 seconds would be a welcome relief.
    KalTorak wrote: »
    Isn't that why they're telling people to contact Microsoft, i.e. make it show up on their bottom line analysis?

    Darn skippy. The guys at Extra Credit even highlight it in their episode - female gamers have some great reasons to leave XBOX live given all the abuse. But it's all a matter of metrics - if gold membership takes a serious nose dive, I imagine MS will have to really examine why. And you can bet your lunch money that they have those metrics down pat. They know who leaves, and to a reasonable degree, why. Knowing those things is what keeps them profitable, so they stay on top of it. And if the profits aren't taking a hit...then are they really compelled to do it? I try and put myself in their position, and ask myself the same thing. I don't much like the answer.

    I think you're ascribing a lot more nefarious moustache-twirling than is really warranted.

    (I want to be clear, right up front, about what I'm going to talk about here. I work for Microsoft. You probably wouldn't recognize the product I work on. If you did, you still probably wouldn't recognize the feature I work on. I'm no where near Xbox, except that sometimes I walk past their buildings because they've got a couple of pretty good cafeterias over there. All of the following comes, not from insider information about Microsoft, but from my experience in software development, and my experience working with other people who work for Microsoft.)

    Microsoft has a vested interest in producing a good product, and in building a good community. They have this vested interest in part, yes, because that's how they make money. But it's not as though a good community and a good product are somehow at odds with making money; those goals are usually aligned, and as it happens in this case, they are exactly aligned. This isn't DRM or software patents or some other issue where an argument could be made that Microsoft's interests are at odds with the end consumer's interests; you and Microsoft both want the same thing: a good gaming experience. Whether Microsoft wants that because it will get more money, or because it just loves you so much, or because the entire company has been taken over by alien shapeshifters, driven by mysterious religious dictate, the bottom line is, Microsoft wants you to be happy.

    I don't work on Xbox. I can't say with any authority what specifically happened to create the world we live in, where this feature is not a part of Xbox Live (and if I could, I still wouldn't, because I want to keep my job). But I do know there's only so much time in the day. You can't implement every feature. Presumably, the reason that this hasn't been implemented (assuming that anyone actually thought of it [which seems likely, but again: I do not work on Xbox; I have no actual idea]) is simply because when it came time to finalize the list of features that would make it in, they looked at the amount of work involved and risk introduced from making this change versus the overall benefit to the product, compared it to all the other features that they wanted to implement, and other features won.

    Maybe it would have impacted a lot of other systems, making it high risk. Maybe they misjudged the benefit it would provide (I'm not gonna lie, Microsoft can be kind of a dude-heavy company, especially in the engineering groups). I have absolutely no idea. But I can confidently tell you, most folks here want to make cool things, things people will love, and use all the time, and rave about to their friends. It's just a reality of software development, that you will come up with great ideas that would blow everyone away, and you will have to cut them because you only have X people to do the designing and creating and testing, and only Y months to do it.

    By all means, make noise about it. Speaking as a gamer, as the spouse of a woman who plays games, hell, as a human being who believes in the importance of human dignity, I think this is a great idea and I'd love to see it (or something like it) happen. The more noise people make, the greater the perceived benefit, and the more likely the feature is to survive the cut and end up in the product. Just please don't imagine that every decision is made strictly on the basis of how many yachts the executives will be able to buy this quarter. People want to make good things. Yes, partially because good things make money, but also in large part because it just feels good to make good things. It feels good to point at the good thing you helped make, and say "I helped make that."

    Wow, that... got really long.

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  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    Jalein wrote: »
    Extra credits swings and it's a complete miss.

    First of all women are not the only people on the internet who get harassed, what about homosexuals and minorities?

    It was an example, not a declaration of fact and omission of other groups means they're doing fine. You're reading too much into it.
    They pull far more piss and bile then women do on the internet and usually have no one to defend them.

    Citation needed. It's not a contest. Catching any amount of hate speech is wrong, it doesn't matter who has it more frequently than anyone else. The message was that it all has to stop.
    Second of all those so called "solutions" were terrible

    Yes, they recognized the quality of their suggestions wasn't the best if you paid attention to the episode. But it's ideas only, and if you have better ones, send them into Microsoft, Valve, etc, as the EC crew suggested.
    Again the unread message thing is pointless, what's the difference between an a regular old message that didn't get responded too and one that didn't get responded too because of harassment? and again how would we rectify this? It would be a pain trying to clear this up with Customer Service.

    Let me provide an example of what I think they meant by this - In WoW, I get whispered guild recruitment messages constantly that usually come along with the random guild invite. I don't read this. I close the boxes. It is spam, easily identified. Generally, people will read messages from people they know by name. If a name shows up in your inbox that you don't know, are you really going to read it? Especially if it shows up more than once? The idea is that harassment is going to persist and people who engage in it sometimes send message after message after message. If someone has a high message-sent-but-those-messages-aren't-read count, they're flagged as a spammer or harassment dickwad. But that's my interpretation of the solution suggested, I may be off on my guess there, but it's also just another idea thrown into the mix of "how do you curb harassment before it happens."
    And finally they topped it off with a double standard you generalized and dehumanized people who harass people, How do you know they are people who need attention? How do you know some thing went wrong with their life? All people who say some thing nasty online have deep seeded issues now?

    Okay then, let's armchair therapy. What reasons do people have to constantly pursue the harassment of individuals?

  • KalTorakKalTorak One way or another, they all end up in the Undercity.Registered User regular
    Just out of curiosity, does Microsoft have the ability to read messages sent between players? Messages that aren't reported for abuse I mean (I assume that's an option?). If so that would give them the ability to look at players whose unread/unreplied message ratio was high enough to earn an automatic curtail of their messaging abilities, and determine if they actually were doing something wrong.

    That's the problem with voice-chat; it seems very hard to review someone's voice chat record. That's why a different approach (like automuting) makes sense.

  • AthenorAthenor Battle Hardened Optimist The Skies of HiigaraRegistered User regular
    KalTorak wrote: »
    Just out of curiosity, does Microsoft have the ability to read messages sent between players? Messages that aren't reported for abuse I mean (I assume that's an option?). If so that would give them the ability to look at players whose unread/unreplied message ratio was high enough to earn an automatic curtail of their messaging abilities, and determine if they actually were doing something wrong.

    That's the problem with voice-chat; it seems very hard to review someone's voice chat record. That's why a different approach (like automuting) makes sense.

    I'm sure they do. I mean, I assume everything I post online is stored somewhere, and someone can access it at any time. I post with that in mind. A lot of people don't.


    I love the idea of the automute, because it saves me from having to do some button clicking. :) but seriously. I find I only want to voice chat in 2 situations - when we are doing squad based exercises (where the bile already detracts from the goal at hand) and when I'm chatting with friends I know, Like the PAA communities. So having your rights taken away if you annoy the crap out of people is a good thing - as long as there is a way to reverse it. It needs to be time based, lest someone with a crappy mike get banned accidentally and have no recourse to fix it.

    He/Him | "A boat is always safest in the harbor, but that’s not why we build boats." | "If you run, you gain one. If you move forward, you gain two." - Suletta Mercury, G-Witch
  • Blademan916Blademan916 Registered User regular
    While I do feel the automute is a good idea, I'm afraid that trolls will just mute as many people as possible to increase the chances of them getting automuted.

  • 3lwap03lwap0 Registered User regular
    Framling wrote: »
    I think you're ascribing a lot more nefarious moustache-twirling than is really warranted.

    Awesome reply. *brofist*

    I don't dispute your points on interests coinciding with that of the community. On this issue, there's such a large degree of overlap, it often makes me wonder why it hadn't been done sooner. I think Microsoft wants it, and the community wants it, and they've wanted it for some time. So it makes me wonder: Why hasn't anything really been done? This isn't a new issue. XBL has been around for what...8 years? 10? A long time. And as long as it's existed, trolls have been around to...well...troll.

    To clarify, I'm not keen on tossing anyone from MS under a bus, but I think the consensus would be that, outside of EULA's and policy enforcement, the technical controls on XBL are lacking greatly. I believe it was a conscious decision made by very senior management to not ratchet anti-troll technical controls up further, to say, an auto-mute. So, taking your experience working for MS, and I respect that, I fall back on my project and program management skills I have with Uncle Sam to reach my conclusions.

    Feature driven development isn't cheap, and usually must be justified with say, metrics or something you can show senior management. If I can't justify it with something tangible, odds are I'll be shot down, and I know it. So I equate that to middle management at XBL, who certainly desire it, and the green eye-shade guys who don't see a need to pay for it if it isn't hurting them. I don't suspect it's a nefarious plot to poison or ruin anyone's experiences with XBL. It could be a mix of apathy, no desire to spend money, and engineering hurdles that prevent something better.

    I realize that I'm being a terrible arm chair quarterback. It'd be great if Major Tom, or someone from XBL or MS approached the community based off of this EC episode, and maybe explained why and how what they have today works, and what doesn't work and could be better.

  • Snarkman3Snarkman3 Registered User regular
    Alrighty, how about we do this:

    If someone has enough messages reported as abuse, they are automuted and have their message privileges taken away.

    How 'bout that?

    Can't be exploited since if a message is reported as abuse, It has to be reported with the offending message, so you can't report a message that says "Brohoof!", no matter how much you may want to do it.

  • DedwrekkaDedwrekka Metal Hell adjacentRegistered User regular
    I think there's a basic problem with automate and limiting their messaging access. They're still there and it simply acts as a soft slap on the wrist to mega-trolls (there are plenty of fairly benign trolls, the screamers are an altogether different breed). I think temp bans followed over a long line of repeat incidents by permabans is preferable.

  • KalTorakKalTorak One way or another, they all end up in the Undercity.Registered User regular
    I thought they did that already (temp/permabans based on behavior)? The problem is that individually reviewing each user is too slow to keep up with, so some sort of automated, less severe system needs to augment the ban system.

  • GezzerGezzer Registered User regular
    This is kind of a hard one.
    First off I have to say I abhor abuse in any form. I've had/seen more then my fair share of it and have distanced myself from social situations like online gaming because I just couldn't stomach it.

    With that said and out of the way. Though it's very easy to show examples of people getting way out of line, I don't think it's always "hate" talk. The problem is that there's a very old concept in anything competitive call "trash talk". It's most often used to try and put someone "off" their game, and it works. In fact it works really well. There's a reason why you don't get to hear a lot of the "on field" talk in pro sports when it's broadcasted. The exchanges between say the defensive and offensive lines in a pro football game when they line up can be (but not always) a bit on the vile side. It's just part of the game and something a player has to learn to deal with as they progress in their career.
    The problem with "trash talk" is some people, especially less mature ones, don't understand when and how it can or should be used, and can often cross lines they shouldn't. While it's fine with buddies you've grown up with and that know you, there by knowing it's not personal, it can be very offensive when directed at a complete stranger in a casual game. What makes it even harder to deal with is the fact for some people online interactions are actually a very large part of their socialization which makes it easy for them to forget there are real people with real feelings behind those avatars and user names. Then add to all this the people who find messing with other people a strange form of entertainment, or the sore losers wanting to extract a bit of revenge and it's not surprising that there's a problem.
    Will things like auto mute help? Maybe. Standing up for yourself and asking them to stop? Again maybe. Often the message that the abuser gets isn't that their out of line, but that their getting to you. So if they think it's working all they'll do is turn up the heat. And if there's a way around the safeguards or a way to "game" the system people will find it and exploit it. Because of this preventative measures can often become draconian and seem worse then the problem they're meant to fix, take DRM for example.

    One thing I think might help is instead of having a system where someone needs to earn the right to be heard (so to speak), have one where you can have sub communities. Kind of like putting others on your friends list. Everyone starts out with the general chat and friend/in game chat options. But groups of users can band together as a sub community, say everyone in a certain city or state/province, what have you. Then if you want to join a sub community you have to ask, and be excepted by the group. If you get out of line or cause drama, well so long and thanks for all the fish, because your out of there. Perfect, of course not. But at least there's a default for those that have poor social skills and areas/groups for players that don't want to deal with those players. You could even let players decide what group/s they're in when they log in and what group/s they'll except game requests from.
    Just a thought.

  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    Snarkman3 wrote: »
    Alrighty, how about we do this:

    If someone has enough messages reported as abuse, they are automuted and have their message privileges taken away.

    How 'bout that?

    Can't be exploited since if a message is reported as abuse, It has to be reported with the offending message, so you can't report a message that says "Brohoof!", no matter how much you may want to do it.

    The problem is that even when context is provided, the authority can entirely pass it by and just respond to multiple reports. If not just the one report. Take a look at YouTube, for example. All it takes is one person - WITHOUT PROVING THEIR IDENTITY - to bring down videos for copyright infringement. YouTube doesn't look into each and every report.

    I can understand to some extent that it takes a lot of man power to look over every report that comes in on a medium where reports can fucking flood your system, but I mean, America needs jobs right now, so fucking hire people!

  • GezzerGezzer Registered User regular
    On another topic. I hadn't seen the Cross Assault video till it was mentioned in the video so I took the time to watch it and.......
    Well I'm more then likely going to come off as a major perv here, but anyone ever seen a Bang Bus video?
    Because I could swear that the Aris guy who was giving Super YAN the hard time sure sounded like Sanchez from the BB videos. If it's the same guy it makes the whole thing a bit easier to understand. The guy's pretty much a pig. But he's one for a living and pretty good at it. So.... make of that what you will.

  • Billy ChenowithBilly Chenowith Registered User regular
    I feel automute would have unintended effects for minority groups identifiable by voice. Like robots.
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  • El SkidEl Skid The frozen white northRegistered User regular
    edited April 2012
    While I do feel the automute is a good idea, I'm afraid that trolls will just mute as many people as possible to increase the chances of them getting automuted.

    The stated idea was for 80% of people to have muted someone to get automuted.

    So...this is pretty troll-proof. Even if the trolls make a concerted effort to create multiple accounts to try and mess things up, there's no way they push someone completely innocent over the edge. And if people get muted generally more often than I think, you could probably up that to 85% or 90% and still have it work... I don't imagine many people listen to the type of offenders we're talking about for long before muting them.

    El Skid on
  • agoajagoaj Top Tier One FearRegistered User regular
    People also do not use the report tools they have at their disposal already.
    I had a guy call in to dispute his banning for vulgarity. He talked about how the people who reported him had started it and that he had to defend himself. I asked why he didn't report them.
    Because reporting never works, he said.
    Then why are we having this conversation?

    Does Xbox keep audiologs when reports are filed?

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  • AkimboLegsAkimboLegs Registered User regular
    El Skid wrote: »
    While I do feel the automute is a good idea, I'm afraid that trolls will just mute as many people as possible to increase the chances of them getting automuted.

    The stated idea was for 80% of people to have muted someone to get automuted.

    So...this is pretty troll-proof. Even if the trolls make a concerted effort to create multiple accounts to try and mess things up, there's no way they push someone completely innocent over the edge. And if people get muted generally more often than I think, you could probably up that to 85% or 90% and still have it work... I don't imagine many people listen to the type of offenders we're talking about for long before muting them.

    Yeah, I was going to make this same point. Vocal minority comes up massively. It would be SO much effort to try and get someone you dislike muted all by yourself - probably impossible, really. Whereas someone who is constantly screaming bullshit is going to get muted by a lot more people.

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