But that's the point. That usually don't happen in real life. There's enough "context" in the situation to help us deal with it.
For instance:
1) the guy is dress in ragged clothes, dirty, smells bad... He is escorted out of the club immediately, no need him to say anything.
2) the guy is an old Japanese man, dressed in traditional clothes, raises a ruckus. It will take some time before someone asks him, humbly, to leave.

BTW, sabbath, or Shabat is the 7th day. Sunday for Christians, Saturday for Jews and Muslims. The Bible documents that someone was sentenced to death because he was gathering sticks for his fire on this day. Starting a fire on Shabat was a sin and a crime punishable by death.

I agree that calling someone a racist is a serious accusation. But there is no way to "fairly" judge this case, because your information about the matter is just that - your interpretation of the scenario portrayed in your own words. Admins on KGS are free to ban people as they like, but justification for their actions is subject to the interpretation of those present with the context of the situation that happened.

tl/dr: Of course a KGS admin that posts here will defend the admin's choice to ban. Likewise, they will defend the admin's choice to ban if you email to admin@gokgs.com. To quote wms from an admin complaint I sent some time back:


So when it comes down to it, it doesn't really matter who is "right" in these situations. Admins defend admin actions. They have the power to do whatever the h*** they feel like. And that won't change.

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be immersed

True. But - is there a need to really fairly judge this case? And if so, who is to be the judge? You cannot say 'The Community' because, as usual, the community will most likely be divided. So everybody has to judge for themselves.

On one side we have a biased complaint with very heavy accusation but ABSOLUTELY NO DETAILS. On the other we have possibly biased explanation with SOME SELECTED DETAILS. I would lean towards the side which at least try to give us something rather than just tossing buzzwords around. And I notice there is no more further posts from the OP - he is probably happily playing on KGS now and already forgotten this whole story. Or maybe not...

Personally, I really think this is too much hassle about such cases. Look - I was banned from IGS for YEARS when IGS was pretty much the only game in town. And in spite of various claims on rgg neither Tweet nor Tim seem to have a clue WHY I have been banned (and I did ask Tweet about it recently, we are friends now, he said they just don't remember.) And the ban was final, there was no recourse for me to argue my case - whatever it was. And on top of that - I have had a bunch of yoyos ganging up on me on rgg like I was the bad guy.

Compared to this, being banned for a day - A SINGLE DAY - for using bad language, making stupid jokes, flooding, whatever... or maybe even getting misunderstood by an admin in lousy mood - this is really not such a big deal. Just take a deep breath, play somewhere else for a day - A SINGLE DAY - and when you come back to KGS try to behave better.

All things considered - KGS is an extremely friendly place, even if, of course, things do happen.

I mean - I really don't know what else to say here.
Other than - wow, people really do hold grudges!

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

I think you are confusing the issues here. This is not about whether or not the admins are fair, but rather whether or not they are racist.

I personally have no quibble with what wms wrote above. It is a big difference however if someone does something to piss off the admins, or if someone is something that pisses off admins.

Were it proven that an admin had banned someone for being something that they have no choice about (i.e., not for being a jerk) I strongly doubt that the admins would stick together.

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Patience, grasshopper.

Kirby, I think you need to step back from your theoretical point about KGS admins and what we can ever know, and just meditate on those first three posts (by the OP). Are those posts credible? And if not, why are you raising this point here, now?

Edit: Clarification about which three posts I meant.

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Occupy Babel!

Hello,



Yes, this is an excellent point.

Admins on KGS are drawn from a quite diverse pool of humanity. I have no doubt whatsoever that if an admin deliberately targets any race, religion, nationality, ethnic group or sexual orientation for unfair treatment, the other admins would ensure that the person concerned would no longer have a responsible role on KGS.

Regards,
Doug

I'm sensing that you're suffering from pent up rage from past injustices. I think you need to let go of some of your hate. How about we try to have a group hug and start again.


Actually, admins have been sacked for their actions in the past, so your point is demonstrably false. In this case, I did (I imagine) much the same investigation as BigDoug yesterday. The action of the admin who chose to ban the user was in no way racist, and entirely justified. Indeed, as already described, the ban was actually sought out.

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North Lecale

What I think Kirby and many others find troublesome is that the KGS community exists entirely at the pleasure of a single individual - WMS. If Bill decided to pull the plug on KGS tomorrow, it would be gone. Yes, his contributions to the KGS community are obviously fundamental and incredibly generous, but at the same time he's also demonstrated through his own words/actions that KGS is his toy and he can do with it as he pleases; if anyone doesn't like that...well, too bad.

Exactly! But I don't think anyone is denying him such prerogatives. How could they? We all have prerogatives, and I exercise mine by trying to avoid entering into those type of community situations if at all possible, which unfortunately is very difficult to do these days especially online.

On principle, I don't believe a community should be beholden to the whims of a single individual under any circumstances simply because he or she controls the technology or space through which that community interacts. Again, it's difficult to generate such alternatives but not impossible. L19 is a testament to at least some part of that possibility.

Anyway, I think the above is one reason why many are looking for an alternative that is more community-based, more tolerant of community concerns and suggestions, and with far less of the "if don't like it, you can leave" attitude that seems to permeate in these types of situations from the top down.

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"This is a game that rewards patience and balance. You must think like a man of action and act like a man of thought."
-Jonas Skarssen

All true.
But the same can be said about pretty much anything - even L19. If Jordus decides to pull the plug tomorrow, who is there to stop him? If IGS folds, or Tygem? Sensei's library can fold whenever it wants... GTL too. And so can every other resource out there.

What I mean is that - as much as you are right - it is all just toys in the hands of their owners/creators. The only solution to that would be to create some open-source project, as SpongeBob suggests, and have it be truly owned by the community. But democracy has its pitfalls too (just look at the US senate lately) and we might just be replacing with a different set of problems.

From my point of view, the system we have does work, sort-of. When IGS got to be bad, NNGS appeared... then KGS... now you see attempts to build something better with Kaya, Nova, etc. Eventually something will succeed and KGS will get pushed back. Same with forums... we have replaced rgg with GoDiscussions, and when this faltered, we got L19. Now maybe L19 needs overhaul or replacement, but as long as there is need somebody will probably fill it. I think eventually we will end up with paid services, at least for most part, because this is the most viable path ion the long run, and the most stable.

When you look at things historically, we as a community not only exist and thrive, but grow and are being gifted with better and better toys. It is the agile way. A huge community project might end up like IGS - too big and too heavy to switch to more modern technologies easily.

But maybe not... It would certainly be fun to have a community-developed and maintained server. Even if I personally do not believe it can be really successful. Bue hey, I was wrong before.

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

Sensei's could fold tomorrow, but there are regularish data dumps. The code would be gone, but it would be possible to host the files as a static site. This is certainly a good thing.

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Occupy Babel!

Arno has all the content licensed in some way, doesn't he?

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North Lecale

Oh, that's good news.
Are the dumps public?

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

The venues (technologies) in which these communities exists and interact are "toys in the hands of their owners/creators," but the communities in-and-of-themselves are not. The KGS community is not the product of Bill Shubert, the L19 community is not the product of Jordus, Sensei's Library is not the product of Arno, etc., and they would never make such a claim.

Nevertheless, these communities are necessarily tied to their respective technologies, but nothing prevents the community itself from having control over the venue. We transitioned from GoDiscussions to L19 for these sorts of reasons. As I said, it's difficult to do but not impossible.

The problem is that "the community" is always enthusiastic and participates in the larger project in the beginning, but over time that enthusiasm and participation slowly diminishes eventually leaving only a few to mind the store. And that's why such projects are difficult to maintain - "as long as I can login and do my thing, I could care less what the wizard behind the curtain is or is not doing..."

And just to be clear - thank goodness for those who are left minding the store!

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"This is a game that rewards patience and balance. You must think like a man of action and act like a man of thought."
-Jonas Skarssen

I understand that.
The claim was that wms can fold KGS any which moment he pleases. The community will be there, but the toy will be gone.



L19 as a technology is community property now?
So tell me - how come we need Jordus to deal with the timeout issues.
If he decides to fold, L19 is gone. And if the one or two admins who still care delete their data backups, guess what... And even if they don't, what do GD backups give us after all these years but headaches?

No no... I rather think of L19 and most other stuff as somebody else's toys which this somebody graciously allows me to play with. For now. Less disappointment this way.



Fully agree with that.
This is why I ultimately believe more in motivated individuals than community efforts. And ultimately - in paid services, because this is the logical extension of this path.

I actually had much more hope in Kaya as developed by its creators than if it ever becomes community-owned effort.



Amen to that!

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

I strongly disagree with . We like to beleive that, but we hit the ground the second we are banned. I've been banned a couple of times and I've seen friends being banned for some obnoxious reason. What usually happens is that the owner delegates the power to moderators and wash his hands since. The moderators then proceed on "taking care" of the "other kid's toy" with extreme rigor.

BTW, I'm not saying that KGS is or not like that, I've only played over there a couple of times, also let's keep in mind that we drifted very far from the topic's subject title.

I do agree with . Have seen it happen, and took part of it. NOT EASY though. In the case of KGS, IGS or other Go game server, I would say that something like it could happen on an individual basis, i.e. a group of discontent people would move somewhere else, to another Go server. The idea of a large group disbanding AND creating another Go server just for that sake sounds very unprobable. Lot's of technology behind it. OTOH, creating a GO server because you believe you could do a better job for yourself is another story. The driving force would be a different one. I don't know what motivated Kaya, for instance, but don't think it was a "community" issue (just guessing over here).

Where? In what capacity? That's the dilemma. The community qua community is distinct from the technology but nevertheless dependent on the technology for its existence, which is why leaving control of the technology to the whims of a single individual is in my estimation foolhardy. But then all of that presupposes a community that sees itself as a community, which is too often not the case - "as long as I can login and do my thing, I could care less what the wizard behind the curtain is or is not doing..."

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"This is a game that rewards patience and balance. You must think like a man of action and act like a man of thought."
-Jonas Skarssen

My point about KGS is not theoretical. It's based on something that happened.



In my opinion, any objection against KGS is credible. I don't know what happened to the original poster. But I will take his side instead of KGS's any day.

The email I linked to, whether others think it was appropriate or not, happened something like 10 years ago. Before that time, I never complained about KGS. All of the negative posts I've made about KGS over the years - from my dislike of the ranking system, escaper policy, and the like - they *ALL* stem back to this email.

I do not feel that I was banned appropriately, but wms wouldn't give the time of day to read my email, as he indicated. Since that day, I have hated KGS at least to some degree. I play games on KGS still - I use the software. But wms and admins are my enemies. Wms didn't have to do anything for me 10 years ago. But he could have been nicer in his response. And because he wasn't on that day, I will forever be against aspects of the server in some way.

It's not rational, yes. But I hate how he responded that day, and will never forget it.


Yes.



No.

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be immersed

Well, that's a point where we differ.



Someone *is* a reflection of *what* they do. To think otherwise is a fixed mindset. People aren't *smart* people. They are people that may have some smart ideas on a regular basis. But a person is able to change what they do - they are not fixed to *be* a particular thing.

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be immersed

That explains a lot - thanks for sharing!




Well, exactly. Racism is an example of such a fixed mindset - one that takes no consideration for *what* somebody does.

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Patience, grasshopper.

With regard to the topic of this thread, the "someone *is*" refers to the race of a person which as far as I know is not something you can change just by changing your mind. And punishment based on this factor is what the admin of KGS is being accused of with regards to the "ban" imposed.

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