In hindsight that was something quite natural to happen. None of the mods of old OGS stayed mod at NovaOGS (In my view the biggest mistake that happend concerning the takeover). Lots of information was lost. And many regulars of the old crowd didn't get the attention they deserved when pointing out issues (you, Uberdude, were basically the last one who got it when speaking up in the forum) or were simply misunderstood, because having never played on oldOGS, the new crowd had no idea what the old folks were talking about. I remember somebody becoming a mod only after a couple of months of picking up the game. And while he is a good mod, some non-stellar encounters were inevitable. Pushing the livegames, having the top priority of welcoming new players and neglecting the old tournaments, I got the impression that OGS became a server for DDK from DDK (for example mods were happily adjusting ranks from 21k to 24k if somebody asked for, but there are still handycap tournaments out there that are played without handy). The ubiquitous title "best place to play go online" only made me sigh when logging in. It got a lot better in meantime and I'm very happy about that. A good thing is that the old tourneys are finally managed by somebody who played in them before the merge. Some bugs and quirks still bug me, though. I haven't found my new home yet.

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If something sank it might be a treasure. And 2kyu advice is not necessarily Dan repertoire..

Trudodyr came in looking for a game.
Xylol accepted the game.
Trudodyr made it clear, find another game/opponent
All actions there after by xylol are summed up as xylol acting like a dick.
Trudodyr leaves the site without a game.

Crodger comes in, addresses the inquiry and situation.
Xylol continues to be a dick and draw things out.
Crodger kicks Xylol.

Crodger let things go too long.

To see this get turned around on a moderator or a website given the available chat logs is a joke. A joke being run by xylol.

Well played xylol.
Crodger, I support you and encourage you to hit the ban button sooner.
Any responses simply extend xylol's pointless petition.

You are missing the point. It's not the what, it's the how. When one volunteers to be a mod for a server, one becomes one of the public faces and voices of that server. Conflicts will always arise, and it's fine that mods make calls that not everyone agrees with as long as they remain open minded and polite. However when a mod ends a discussion by calling a reasonable request by a reasonable person "ridiculous" that influences how the server is viewed. It's nice that you are showing support for one of your team members, but it was his tone of voice that put him and the server in the line of fire, not some user who has "BeenBad."

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Patience, grasshopper.

Just an aside, if one volunteers to be a mod, perhaps one is not suitable to be a mod (N.B. I don't know how crodgers and calantir and the other NovaOGS admins became so). The KGS admins liked to make this point when some little oik asks if he can be an admin. I didn't volunteer to be an admin on old OGS, I was asked if I would be happy to be one after being an active and helpful member of the community for years. I actually rarely used my admin powers. Mostly it was fixing board states after server crashes corrupted them. I never used the thread locking feature as I don't like it: to me censorship is a greater evil than thread necromancy which was the problem it was supposed to address. And cordial disagreements over go server design aren't even slightly evil.

The title of this thread and your characterization are misleading. Your opponent did not offer you a game multiple times, but invited anyone to play a game. When you accepted the invitation, he said that he did not wish to play with you, and canceled the game. You continued to accept his invitations, thereby preventing, briefly, anyone else from accepting his invitation. That is harassment.

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The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

My two main guides in life:
My mother and my wife.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

I think that was probably the case for all mods at old OGS. I'd actually imagine that the new OGS mods are asked to become mods as well - I think there's just more drama at new OGS due to more users and more live games.

A lot of this could be avoided by keeping a better record - there was a limited access mod forum where we would document bans/warnings/other action with chat/message logs. This would serve to avoid a lot of he said/she said situations and also help with mod consistency/transparency.

I usually avoid threads like this one, but here it seems pretty clear what happened.

Let me give you some of my relevant background. I have been a duplicate bridge director (and am still certified), I have directed go tournaments, and I was a Helper, later Lead Helper, for an online conferencing service.

To become a bridge director all I had to do was to pass a test on the Laws, but I was fortunate enough to attend a director's training course given by some of the top directors in the world. I learned a number of things about running bridge events besides applying the Laws. One thing I learned is that the director is responsible for the atmosphere. People should feel welcome and well treated. I applied that lesson as a go director and later as a Helper. I was fortunate enough to run into one of the top American Contract Bridge Lead directors at an airport one time. He was not only a true gentleman, but the embodiment of social grace.



Arguments at bridge can become quite heated. I have even heard of a case where fisticuffs broke out. (Impossible online, thank goodness. )



Had anything remotely like that occurred while I was Lead Helper, the Helper in question would have been history. It is bad enough that users argue with admins, it is even worse when admins add fuel to the fire. IMHO, their job is to defuse the situation if possible. A soft answer turneth away wrath. Their model should be that of a gracious host, not a that of classroom monitor who asserts his authority.

And as for this email address: IveBeenBadButIPromiseToBeBetter@online-go.com

The attitude that it displays towards users is enough for me to avoid playing on OGS.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

My two main guides in life:
My mother and my wife.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

quietimes, calling me a dick is an insult for me, please consider stopping it.

If someone is not able to set game restrictions correctly or as they fit his needs, maybe he should practice the server mechanics on free games.
We are talking about ranked games here.
On other servers it is unusual / punished to abort ranked games with no restrictions (i.e. automatch KGS), therefore I was stubborn an repeated accepting these games. Afterwards I asked questions about how it is handled on OGS and why it is handled like this.
I copy pasted Admin chat and got kicked for that, I'am ok with that.

After all this talk I realize I did my opponent wrong and should not have proceeded in accepting his game offers as it is not the usus on OGS to do so. On the other hand I wasn't to familiar with the server myself and still I'am the only one who got insulted and kicked.

This are my impressions I collected on OGS. Thanks all the people in here for taking their time.

Hi Bill, I've noticed for some time. Threads like this and others.

I was surprised (maybe even a bit shocked) to see your post here.
But thank you for your background perspective.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

My two main guides in life:
My mother and my wife.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

Speaking of tempers flaring at bridge, I have remembered that there was a famous murder/justifiable-homicide case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridge_Murder_case

It was straight out of Hollywood, including the line, "She got me."

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

My two main guides in life:
My mother and my wife.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

Xylol's comparison with KGS automatch is an interesting one. In that game seeking mode a player chooses some settings (blitz/fast/normal time, ranked/free, rank difference from self, humans only/bots ok too etc) and KGS then pairs them with the first available matching player. It is symmetric, no concept of game offerer and challenger. It is frowned upon in KGS to resign a game before playing, partly for the discourtesy to your opponent, and partly for the skewing of the rating system (all automatch games are ranked, whereas regular challenge games are not if resigned within 10 moves and white chooses not to save the game). There is no concept of cancelling a game as there is on OGS, which ends the game with no rating effect. On automatch you can come across a player who doesn't want to play you for whatever reason (maybe they are a sandbagger looking for easy games for example) and instantly resigns/escapes. IF you then automatch again and they do too you can be paired with them again and again and again. They are rude one in insta-resigning. You or they can avoid being paired together by censoring the other, but perhaps you don't want to censor them as you are happy to play (or talk to) them later if they get over their dislike of you, but eventually you do so you can be paired with someone else.

On OGS there are two varieties of insta-cancelling. The first is the person who goes around accepting many peoples open challenges and cancelling them. This is frowned upon by OGS (and me) and prompted the addition of the censor someone to block their challenges feature. The second is someone who makes the game offer and then when the challenger joins cancels the game, as Xylol's opponent did. This is annoying for the challenger who thought they were getting a game. However, OGS deems that a user who makes a game offer has the right to choose their opponent, which contrasts with KGS automatch in which the philospohy is "You want a game? You play who we give you!" (but is the same as regular KGS challenges, but there the decline happens before you join the board). Once Trudodyr made clear in chat he didn't want to play Xylol, Xylol would have been polite to desist his challenges. However, if OGS added an automatch feature (I see one is requested) which paired you with compatible open challenges and Xylol had used this to find his opponent rather than making the conscious choice to pick Trudodyr's offer, then in my view Trudodyr's behaviour becomes the impolite one (unless he uses the censor feature to avoid playing Xylol).

What actually seemed to get the ban was not his persistent unwanted challenges, but the subsequent interaction with the admins, which we can't see. If crodgers tone was anything like his in this thread or Herman's vaction post I can quite understand the problem getting worse rather than less (see calantir's early post for an example of good tone) and ending in a ban. Was crodgers aware of the etiquette surrounding KGS automatch? That might have helped to see things from the user's perspective. To call Xylol a troll is not productive. Admins should remember that it is best to describe or criticise a user's actions and not the user themselves. Perhaps "Xylol treated OGS challenges with similar etiquette to KGS automatch and was persistent when his opponent didn't" or "Xylol behaved rudely", not "Xylol is a troll" or "Xylol is a dick".

This got me thinking, what is the real-life analogue of this behaviour? Maybe Trudodyr sitting in a public park (or would it be a private members club) with a go board in front of him and sign saying "Anybody want a game?". Xylol comes up and says "Yeah, I want to play". Trudodyr says "I don't want to play you" (or "Sorry, I don't want to play you, you are too strong for me", or "Go away!"). Xylol goes, comes back and says "I want to play" again and Trododyr says no again and they repeat, presumable getting less polite. Probably most people agree this is harassment from Xylol, but is it severe enough to get arrested? Xylol insists that if Trudodyr's sign said "Anybody weaker than 10k want to play?" or "Anybody (except Xylol) want to play?" he would leave him alone, but as he didn't he views the sign as a public contract, an offer of services.

Now let's switch this up to Trododyr with a sign saying "Bakery". Xylol walks in and says he wants a cake that says "Support Gay Marriage", but Trododyr doesn't want to make a cake that says that and refuses. Or maybe Xylol wants a cake with the confederate (battle) flag. Recent court cases in both the UK and USA have found the bakery to be in the wrong* in the first case (will we see some cases for the second?), and the person refusing service, not the one (repeatedly?) asking for service the other doesn't want to give is the one who gets arrested. To what extent is opening a bakery an offer of services to all with no power of the bakery owner to choose customers? (or what choices are allowed? based on attributes of the customer? based on attributes of the requested good?). To what extent is making a game offer an offer to play anyone with no power of the offerer to choose opponents? (I don't play stronger than 10kyus? I don't play Chinese players? I don't play gays? I don't play Xylol?). Perhaps not such a simple comparison. Ho hum...

* though I am not sure I agree with it, and certainly not how the UK case was prosecuted on the basis of illegal discrimination against the customer based on his sexual orientation, as the bakery objected to the requested good not the customer: had a straight man asked for a cake with the same message he too would have been refused, and had that gay man asked for a cake that said "Happy Birthday Fred" they would have made it. But nor do I think the bakers behaviour should be treated in a different manner because their reason for refusal was a religious belief. But perhaps this is for another thread...

Interesting comparison, Uberdude. I think the analogy breaks down because Xylol did not propose to play a racist Go game, or a Go game that could be considered by some to be morally unsound.

Indeed, I wasn't suggesting Xylol's case was directly comparable to the gay cake cases, but to point out that in some situations such as KGS automatch or running a bakery business you are deemed to be making a public offer (to play a game or make a cake) and are supposed to accept all-comers, and if you refuse service based on sensitive issues like sexuality then you come up against various equality/discrimination laws. Xylol's case of repeated challenges is perhaps more like a gay rights activist who, after being told by the bakery they won't make his cake and point him to another bakery down the road that will, repeatedly insists on that first bakery making his cake to make a point and stand up for his rights. Would he be arrested for harassment in real life?

I wonder what would happen if the National Broccoli Association asked a bakery to make a cake in the shape of a giant broccoli floret, and the bakery refused because they really don't like broccoli. Is anti-broccoli discrimination allowed because it is rare and has no history of injustice? Would the NBA representative wanting his broccoli cake get arrested for harassment if he insists on his cake?

I think you ought to lay off the broccoli.

The OGS challenge / accept system puts me off playing there actually. If I want to play without handicap, then I don't really want to play somebody nowhere near my rank. Still miss it as the ultimate correspondence server

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North Lecale

You can restrict rank on OGS when you create games.

I also think the challenge/accept system needs to be implemented. On KGS I can check my opponents games list to see if he's an escaper/sandbagger or not, I don't want to waste time playing against someone that will cheat at the end. This is a big plus with KGS.

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My go YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/DragonfistGaming
My website: http://learnbaduk.com/

I suppose the idea on OGS is you can check your opponent's history once the game has started but before playing, and then cancel the game with no rating penalty if you decide they are an undesirable. Downside is it could be considered rude to your opponent to sit there doing nothing for a minute, plus the cancelled game clogs up your game history (and other people may indeed have a negative view of you as a serial-canceller).

I think that your analogies are alright, but fundamentally, I think all of these cases come down to what people subjectively view to be "rights".

For example, in the bakery illustration, there are at least two sides that could be considered to have "rights". As the court decided, the person buying the cake has the right not to be discriminated against based on their orientation. However, it's entirely possible that the baker would have the view that, as the bakery owner, he has the "right" do sell the cake to whoever he wants to.

I don't think either position is wrong in an absolute sense. I think this depends on who you ask, and perhaps what society, as a whole, thinks at this particular point in history. Maybe 500 years from now, society will have a different viewpoint of what "rights" a person has. So related to the discussion at hand, it's easy to sympathize with one of the parties. Some may have the view that, as the admins of the server, the admins have the "right" to enforce the rules on the server with whatever rhetoric they see fit. Others may have the view that, users of the server have the "right" to try to get people to play games with them repeatedly.

My personal view, then, is that both parties should be aware that both viewpoints exist. Therefore, the best strategy is to act in a manner that acknowledges the other person's "rights".

That is to say, if you are a user of OGS:
* Understand the admin position that they have the "right" to kick you off of the server.
* If being on the server is important to you, act in a manner that increases the chance that you can avoid being kicked off.

If you are an admin of OGS:
* Understand the users' position that they expect to be treated well if they are to continue to use the server.
* If maintaining users on the server is important to you, act in a manner that increases the chance that users keep using your server.

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tl/dr: There is no absolute concept of "rights". Admins can kick people off the server. Users can misbehave. If users want to stay on the server, try to be sympathetic with the admin viewpoint, even if you think they are wrong. If admins want people to keep using their server, try to be sympathetic with the user viewpoint, even if you think they are wrong.

I'm generally more sympathetic with users in almost all cases, because if somebody has gone through the trouble of developing a server, I think it's in their best interest to keep the users happy by treating them nicely.

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be immersed