TMO Russian Roulette
 

There've been some complaints about the recent rampant disregard for the one rule this forum has. I don't have the time or interest to babysit the little ones showing up, so let's treat everyone as a major... let it be known that violators i do discover may find themselves banned with no warning.

So, announcing a new game for the N900 kiddies: TMO roulette.

Ask yourself this "Am i feeling lucky?"

Unlucky people:
Daywalker (One week ban)

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

As much as this thread's seriousness.. the last thing you said made me smile! :)

All seriousness now though, lots of users gotta start following the rules.. They're basic and easy to follow!!

But it sucks for me.. I am pretty an unlucky person... :(

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

I totally agree.

Maybe we should just shoot the next stupid person here based on general principle and see how the others react. :)

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

As much as I appreciate someone willing to take action on this. I would as a new user appreciate a sticky somewhere listing the forum rules comprehensively and probably a penalty system that goes along with it.


Something like this in fact.
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=40160

I suppose banning users straight away with no explanation isn't a very helpful solution. Sure it'll be fun but it wont count as an improvement.

An example of another forum(not 110% relevant though) that I'm a part of has all these rules clearly listed which helps. The associated penalties that go with flouting the rules helps even more.

@flandry
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/announ...on-system.html
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/announ...etiquette.html

Yes I do think the above forum is a little less tolerant than it should be at times. But I'm sure something in between, suitable to T.M.O can be cooked up :)

PS: I also think we desperately need more moderators to handle the increased user load.

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

I would apply to be one but I have no idea where to do that here.. I am on this website at least 4 times a day! and I have forum experience whether it's IPB (that's what I use for my site) or vBulletin (which this site uses).. :D

Maybe I have to try to contact Reggie?? hmmm.

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

There's really only one official rule in Games and that is indeed listed in a sticky thread (yes the one that's only been viewed
1,266 times since January; compare it with week-old threads with 10x the hits). It's a common sense rule, such that violation thereof is generally either an act of stupidity or naivety. And as is usually the case with common sense rules, those who most need to read them aren't going to and perhaps don't care.

So what's a moderator to do when much of the traffic is by spoiled adolescents, many of whom appear to be only partially literate?

Well, on the one hand it fortunately wouldn't be much of a loss to the community if they were banned; however, it needn't end in carnage: if you see someone breaking the rule, feel free to send them a message reminding them of the rule and suggesting they edit their post. That way everybody is happy and nobody has to get gruesomely killed.

If you're not that nice, you can still help out by reporting offending posts so that they can be dealt with.

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

As much as i would appreciate the noise reduction that'll come with this. I wouldnt want the moderation attitude to go down this path.

Yes the type of users now coming to this community is way different than what was before. Some for the better and some definitely for the worse.

Not everyone can be helped, but yeah I think some can be.

I do what I can in the limited time I have. But I am sure I can find more places to help.

But we seriously need to not get worked up so quickly.. for every little reason.

This is a good start i think.
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=48200

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

i broke the rule when i first joined, and a mod inboxed me to let me know. thats how it should be. remember, alot of users have come from other forums with different rules. you cant just go round baning people left right and center and naming and shaming them! thats not in your unpaid job description lol

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

Well, i could...

It's not going to become a habit. One individual was especially "unlucky" in picking a time to come on and make his second post a brag about pirating a product released commercially to the community and extolling that behavior as a way of sticking it to Nokia for their Ovi failures, missing completely the fact that it's a third party being hurt by both Ovi and their theft. That's just not cool.

Hmm. Where is that, anyway?

Look, there's a rule and there is a community, and we're all responsible for the conduct. Anyone has the ability to warn others and see that the rules are known.

There are however certain things an average community member doesn't have power to do. When people come to me to complain about disregard for the rules, it's because the normal means available to all are failing, so i will employ the tools given me to remedy the cases.

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

il make it my duty to warn users from now on then. in most cases a warning is all it takes (for me anyway)

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

good topic title though. this will imform more people of the rule than the other sticky post. i thought it was a great new ovi game lol

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

I really appreciate the more restrained tone in last your post :)

Off topic - but
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=48464

This is just one thread as an example. I couldn't see a rule against making fun/belittling a newbie for a genuine question, but shouldn't that be implicit for everyone. Sure I could pass it off as friendly banter.. But that's not what it is.

Can I expect a friendly reminder from mods in situations like these too? Or does this not fall inside Russian Roulette :p

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

I really don't understand the fact that maemo.org

a) bans people asking for/distributing copyrighted game rom images and at the same time
b) distributes plenty of copyrighted home computer rom images via its main repositories

Can somebody please explain to me why one is a big no go and the other one is just ok? .

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

It is illegal to swap and share roms. It's arguably legal to use roms on a different device if you own them and have an appropriate licence.

The images you refer to are showing the latter, and not advocating anything illegal. They are showing single images from those roms which is legal under the 'fair use' laws, which allow a certain percentage to be published (is it 5%?)

If maemo.org were seen to be promoting, encouraging or even allowing the sharing of roms, the relevent companies would initiate lawsuits to shut the place down. It's not worth it, given that there are plenty of other places on the net you can have those discussions (they keep moving to avoid prosecution).

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

Oh no! He's on to my sneaky plan! ;)

I and the other mods will give warnings and/or bans to people that are especially vulgar and/or offensive, and make a note of it in the moderator forum so we all know the user has had a problem already in case it comes up again.

Again, it's a case where everyone is welcome to ask others to not be rude. If they respond to that in a rude way, it's probably time to notify a moderator.

It's a good question and i actually posted in the calculator emulator thread asking if it was really a good idea to be distributing the ROMs from the repos. I was told nicely to go soak my head, so i left it alone. I would prefer to not see anything in the repos that is illegal, even if it's not something likely to draw legal action.

The shift of emphasis in this forum has me questioning spending more time working on the MAME emulator, and i will probably redirect my focus back to FOSS games that everyone can enjoy without needing to buy or break the law. This post in another emu thread states the idea in a similar way to my new feelings on the matter. Emulators are awesome, but it seems to be where all the interest and effort is being directed, and i don't think that's healthy for Maemo.

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

The vice emulator (being just one example) is distributed by maemo.org incl. the complete set of rom images of the entire family of commodore 8 bit home computers incl. all rom images used in peripherals like the floppy drives. We are talking about the entire machine code of an entire generation of computers from the 80s.

Just out of couriosity: Where do you have your "knowledge" from? Who speads this "this is only 5%" nonsense?

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

Last time I looked, which admittedly was a while ago, maemo.org was distributing emulators but not roms.

It appears that this is no longer the case, which it seems our even games mod himself is uneasy about:

I confess I share his reservations. One can only hope that the relevant copyright owners will not be too bothered.

The principle of ‘fair use’ is an element of the copyright laws, and covers how much of someone else’s material you may legitimately quote (appropriately attributed). It is the law under which your blog post about the film you saw last night may contain images or a short clip from the film, but not the entire movie. I thought I had made it clear that I think the rule of thumb generally used is 5%. In reality, use of much less might still constitute an infringement, depending on how significant the material is.

Where did I get this information? 8 years as a moderator and admin in a Star Trek Community. And yes, Paramount are very hot on suing if they feel their copyright is infringed. ;)

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

My question wasn't where you got the 5% value from (although it's interesting that you refer to yourself as the source of that number). My question was why you think that only 5% of the rom images are being used. What exactly are 5% of a rom image and how do you expect emulators to work with 95% missing? This really sounds like you just made this up which is a strange thing given the fact that you derive legeal advise from this.

Anyway: I'd suggest t.m.o to
- stop shouting at/banning people for asking for roms while maemo.org is actually distributing them
- you tag all related threads with "hipocrisis" so one can easily ignore these "what others do is wrong, what i do is necessary" threads

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

I'd suggest you go and raise this very legitimate issue in the Community section of t.m.o. where it can be discussed and acted on by those who have power to do something about it. It's got nothing to do with people pirating Rovio's software and is outside the scope of this thread at this point. This thread is about enforcing existing rules on t.m.o. Games, not policing what goes into the repos.

Edit: Did it myself.

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

I don't want to stop them distributing roms. That's just their problem and i don't care if they do or not. I want to stop you from banning people for asking for things that maemo.org is actually doing itself.

Re: TMO Russian Roulette
 

I know, mentioning the proprietary stuff in the repos was just a crutch for your agenda as i mentioned in the thread about it. See, the difference in our positions here is that i'm seeking to uphold established policies (because, well, that's what a moderator does) and you're using one violation to try to excuse another because you don't like the policies or my approach.

Your opinion is noted. Please avoid hyperbole in describing what's actually going on here, though. It doesn't make you more persuasive.

_________

With a formalized infraction system on its way that covers specifically piracy, this thread is no longer needed. Unsticking.