Some friendly suggestions for Games Radar
Return to J Nash's Unimpressive Games Radar Adventure

This is an edited version of my reply to the banning mod's eventual PM (private message) to me justifying their deletions and insta-bans. The changes are to remove the private elements, rendering the whole more a big list of bare facts. I attached the friendly notice that I'd be sending the edited version to another random mod who was around, just in case Future's flaky sys managed accidentally to lose all my excellent suggestions, hence the tenor.
Hello, random mod. I'm J Nash. (If you can access the Mod Room, apparently my deleted threads are in there.) This is an edited version of a reply I gave to a different mod's deletion-justifying PM, just so I know the suggestions therein will be read; and you happened to be online.

Quick bit of background: as you may know, I registered ("J Nash") to start a serious, straightforward thread about recovering Drivergate info which I naturally assumed was instantly deleted either by mistake or the notorious "rogue mod" prob,* so reposted and was insta-banned in contravention of the Warning/Ban Sys thread to the extent I couldn't even *read* the forums without awkwardly using a proxy. I then re-registered ("J Nash Returns") to find out what the heck was going on and was insta-banned before I could even ask, then re-re-registered ("Constable Dan's Hat" -- quick to realise what's happening, me) and managed to get some polite, reasonable questions up and a reply from a mod, who then deleted that thread too. (What's apparently a mod PM is locked in my original account, but which anyway was sent by Future's e-mail sys roughly 25 minutes *after* I'd been banned.) This has led me to think of a couple of suggestions.

SUGGESTION 1
INSTA-BANNING DOESN'T REALLY HELP

I'm not quite sure if mods can appreciate the bewildering rudeness of being insta-banned even from saying "Eh?", on two separate accounts. I suspect this is the reasoning behind the warning sys thread. You may not know that when you're banned it says this: "You have been banned from this forum. Please contact the webmaster or board administrator for more information."

How does someone who is banned contact those people? I suggest at least an e-mail address in that message would diffuse the hurt confusion. A better suggestion would be for mods to prevent disputed posters from posting -- something I believe is quite easy in phpbb -- while leaving their accounts still able to send and receive PMs. And, of course, able to read the pesky forum.

SUGGESTION 2
DELETING ANY MENTION OF DRIVERGATE EVEN WHEN POSTED IN A STRAIGHTFORWARD, SERIOUS MANNER DOESN'T REALLY HELP

I'm told the reason for this is to prevent criticism of Future on a Future forum and that Drivergate threads devolve into a bunch of unsuitable shouting at the company which is why none of these exists (which makes it especially bonkers to excuse deletion with "Oh, we've been over this hundreds of times." As the most thorough search will display to any visitor, No, you haven't).

Might I suggest if posts criticising Future are prohibited then those posts be looked at and the prohibition made clear in the T&Cs, rather than deleting entire topics on a hair trigger? Surely the people who set these policies can see that deleting and insta-banning any *mention* of Drivergate in a straightforward, serious manner is merely going to increase puzzled suspicion among even the most loyal of your readers. I searched high and low for solid Drivergate info before posting but could find only throwaway joking and/or fearful one-liners. You must be able to recognise that forums and censorship do not sit happily together. I'm baffled in fact why Future aren't tremendously proud that their own forum broke a valuable news story -- Babel's deception and all that entailed; saving Future's rep from damage by professional shills -- with brilliant investigative skills and unembellished reporting, but instead it seems they're determined bizarrely to suppress the scandal even four years on.

Of course, it could be that these policies are set by an officious busybody who has deceived the mods by decreeing unilaterally Future must be protected. Perhaps Future have no idea of the ridiculous censorship achieved in their name. In my experience, the company's been cheerful enough with criticism in their own mags, preferring to laugh it off or argue the facts rather than suppress it. Probably someone ought to ask.

SUGGESTION 3
INSTA-BANNING DOESN'T REALLY HELP DISCOURSE

Currently, my re-re-reg Constable Dan's Hat is still active, so technically can receive PMs (for example from readers wishing to defend Games Radar's popular and well thought-through censorship policies). But as both J Nash and J Nash Returns have been banned and Constable Dan is totally unassociated for obvious reasons and his one appearance has also been deleted, how is anyone supposed to contact me? Still, I keenly anticipate the objective inspection of the topics in the mod room will put everything right.

* A bizarre series of random vandalisings by an unknown perpetrator with mod powers which, I believe, is still unresolved. See Games Radar topics 118001, 118044, 118070, 118236, etc etc. Back.