NationStates Jolt Archive


Mods flip-flopping?

Mouth of El Sabah Nur
02-02-2004, 10:43
All the quotes in this post were taken from pages 1, 3, and 4 of this thread:

http://www.nationstates.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=112789&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

A few weeks back, I sent political telegrams to LadyRebels endorsers that contained information about LadyRebels that wasn't exactly true. I know it was wrong and kinda evil of me, but I was in a heated campaign with her for the South Pacific delegacy, and I guess I let my lust for power get way out of hand.

Shortly after sending out these telegrams, one of the moderators posted the name of my puppet who had been sending out the political telegrams on the South Pacific Civil HQ. I was shocked that the moderators would seemingly interfere in gameplay, so I started the thread posted above.

In the thread, Neutered Sputniks seems to tell me that my nation was basically ratted out because I had mass TG spammed the region:

mass TG spamming of this region.

Shortly after this, he appears to change his mind and say I was warned because the telegrams I sent out were defamatory towards LadyRebels:

When did I EVER state that it was not content but volume?

I merely cut and pasted from Savage Lands Reloaded own post when he asked what he'd done wrong.

My last post makes reference to the fact that the Telegrams were indeed defammatory...

These next quotes appear to say that only defamatory political telegrams are illegal:

Funny...how would you know those players werent warned Francos?

And your telegrams contained offensive/defammatory/malicious libel?

As I recall, any reports of defammatory or mailicious spam against Francos resulted in a warning if indeed it was found necessary.

Not to mention there is a large difference between the Francos incident and this issue. Mainly, for those who will argue they're the same issue, the diffierence is that Francos was a very hostile ruler whereas in the case of the South Pacific, this libel was an attempt to have LadyRebels removed from power unfairly. In other words: Francos was being all the things he was accused of being. LadyRebels was not.

Now for the past week or so, The twoslit experiment has been leading a crusade against the delegate of the Pacific, Francos Spain. The twoslit experiment charged Francos Spain with being undemocratic, and a dictator. These allegations annoyed me, as I knew that The twoslit experiment had recently ejected two nations because they both had accrued enough endorsements to challenge him for the North Pacific delegacy. By my own estimation, he was being hypocritical.

I then decided to send political telegrams to The twoslit experiments endorsers, so they would know about his political ejections. Here is a copy of the telegram I sent out:

"Hello North Pacific neighbor! I've telegrammed you because I have grown concerned over the actions of our delegate, The twoslit experiment.

Recently, The twoslit experiment ejected two nations, Nootroughsis and Domocolees, simply because they had a lot of endorsements and were challenging him for the delegates seat. These actions do not seem very democratic to me.

In fact, the only nations that The twoslit experiment deems worthy of challenging him for the delegate seat are his hand-picked best friends.

These very undemocratic actions have caused me to unendorse him, as I would like to have a truly democratic delegate who would let anyone challenge him/her for the delegates seat.

Please consider removing your endorsement from our current delegate, The twoslit experiment, for a truly free and democratic North Pacific. Thank you for your time."

Now, in my own estimation, I had not said anything defamatory in this telegram because The twoslit experiment DID eject two nations because they both had enough endorsements to challenge him for the North Pacific delegacy. After all, it was Neutered Sputniks who said this:

As I recall, any reports of defammatory or mailicious spam against Francos resulted in a warning if indeed it was found necessary.

Not to mention there is a large difference between the Francos incident and this issue. Mainly, for those who will argue they're the same issue, the diffierence is that Francos was a very hostile ruler whereas in the case of the South Pacific, this libel was an attempt to have LadyRebels removed from power unfairly. In other words: Francos was being all the things he was accused of being. LadyRebels was not.

After sending out the political telegrams to The twoslit experiments endorsers, I wanted to make absolutely sure that my actions were legal, so I started this thread:

http://www.nationstates.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=120418

In this thread, the moderator, Sirocco, basically tells me that my actions were legal, just as long as the telegrams aren't aimed at the person behind the nation:

Many thanks, Sirocco. You can lock this thread if you so wish....
I'd like to see this topic remain open and a few more mods weigh in. King Siroc had most of it right, but this line ...
"He's a region crasher who only cares about power."
... is opinion, not fact. He may be a proven region crasher, but his motivation may be interpreted entirely differently depending on which side of the argument he represents. I think this ruling opens the door wide for abuse.

signed,
Frisbeeteria (a player who is more interested in keeping the game fun for its own sake than getting involved in regional conspiracies and takeovers)

That's what makes it political Frisbeeteria. :wink: I should have elaborated on that. Politicians use these kind of comments all the time; the motivation is often twisted around in any case. Giving misleading motives of opponents has been around ever since two cavemen decided to have a democratic election. As long as the comments aren't personal, it's fine.

For example:

He's a region crasher who only cares about power

This is OK, there's nothing to get offended at here; it's politics. People can testify against being power-mad if they wish or they can go along with it. Who knows? It may be the true reason.

He's a prat.

Not OK, this is a personal remark.

The men in his country live under fear of their oppressors!!

This is OK. Better than OK really as it has an RP element.

Don't endorse him! He ejected me because I'm gay/liberal/red-haired!
Not OK. Even if it's true, it's not a good idea to introduce personal disputes to your argument. Keep things strictly IC.

Don't endorse him! He ejected me because my country's people are gay/liberal/red-haired!

This is semi-OK. You should only use things as controversial as this if you can back it up.

Any questions?

Satisified that my actions were legal, I stopped worrying about it. But then earlier today, my two oldest nations and my UN nation were deleted by the moderator, Scolopendra:

Actually...

You were warned on 8 January 2004 for telegram spamming with puppets.

Goodbye.

--Scolo

I'm not sure how my actions could be deemed as "spamming" when I only sent one telegram to each nation. This quote from Sirocco seems to support my view:

When sending political telegrams (i.e. telling someone not to endorse someone because [whatever])

1. Make sure what you're posting doesn't break the rules in the ToS or the Etiquette section of the FAQ.
2. Only send one telegram unless the recipient replies with queries.
3. Any usings of 'true things' should be strictly NS related and have nothing to do with real life. This means that you may use things like "He's a region crasher who only cares about power." but not things like "He's a fan of Gary Glitter" and suchlike.
4. If someone doesn't want you telegramming them, then don't.

There may be other things, but that's what I'd work on.

I would just like to know why the moderators are seemingly flip-flopping on the issue of what's legal and illegal regarding political telegrams? Why were my two oldest nations deleted when my telegram was not aimed at the person behind The twoslit experiment and were not defamatory?
Dettibok
02-02-2004, 15:25
don't you already have a thread or two about this?
02-02-2004, 16:55
don't you already have a thread or two about this?

Read the whole thread and you would have seen this is differnent, he was giving context.

If this is all your TM said, I can see no reason what-so-ever why it should have been ruled illegal.

Have you e-mailed the admin? If you do, make it much shorter then this thread.
02-02-2004, 17:29
Pff this is as extreme as our case. This is unreal indeed, it is a case, where no one is sure if what you do is legal, so it is quite certain that you do not intentionally break the rules. So logically there should never follow such a hard punishment.

I guess then you just have to be lucky about the mod you encounter, and the time of day he reads it...

I certainly hope this aberration will as well be corrected, and this man given his rights. It is a game, you know. This game isn't meant to make us all fill out our daily issue and log out. The mods are starting to ruin this. Too bad.
Sirocco
02-02-2004, 17:42
Sirocco
02-02-2004, 20:18
This can be discussed here: http://www.nationstates.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=120418