Staff Misunderstanding, or Main Chat Rules are Unclear.

[GreaterPepe]

"Harassment, including, but not limited to disrespect of staff, players, distributing personal information, racism, and general flaming and cussing; depending on the severity of the case, you will be temporarily banned or even permanently banned."

"The derogatory phrase was directed at __________.  In the screenshot you have presented, you are on a Professor (visible via a zoom in and seeing that the Health and SP bars appear under a female professor."

"Because you, as a third party have no standing, I will close this ticket and the appropriate party will have to bring the claim forth."

Nowhere in the rules does it state that third parties can not report Main Chat for obvious infractions of the rules.

Either the rule should be amended to state: "Reports are invalid unless the person being harassed or insulted is the one to report the infraction", OR third party reports should be made valid. Since Main Chat is a public chat-room, of course multiple parties are going to witness infractions. Why should reports be restricted to the person these insults are aimed at?

[Fidelis]

Why's that in feedback, though? You could've reopened the ticket, or posted in General Questions?

[GreaterPepe]

Well as it pertains to Staff, I thought Feedback would be a better place than Questions or Suggestions. The subject is a bit of a gray area.

I don't see why it matters, but if it'd fit better somewhere else, move it...

[slurpyninja]

I agree that in some reguards they are quite fuzzy... and probably need to be cleared up. However, the main thing i've found... is people never read the rules in the first place .-. Fix the rules all you want... its not gonna make people read them <.<;

I have some ideas how to fine tune the rules if its open for discussion. If not i'll chill with things the way they are.

[Fidelis]

I don't see why it matters, but if it'd fit better somewhere else, move it...

Keepin' the forums nice and clean!~
Feedback is actually not the place to ask things directed at GMs. You can also ask your questions here or in General Discussion. Or simply send a PM if you do not want to involve other people in the discussion.

Anyway, as for the question: No, harassment is not allowed, and it can be reported by third parties. However, as I'd interpret this case, who is the one who defines what is harassment and what is not? Usually the person who is getting harassed. Well, there are more obvious cases when it's clear that it's disrespect or harassment, but in your case, I'm not sure if the person the comment was directed at regarded this message as harassment, although such behavior is not welcome in main chat, mostly due to it stemming from a WoE or PvP situation. Therefore, maybe at least giving a warning to the offending player would be appropriate.

I agree that in some reguards they are quite fuzzy... and probably need to be cleared up. However, the main thing i've found... is people never read the rules in the first place .-. Fix the rules all you want... its not gonna make people read them <.<;

I have some ideas how to fine tune the rules if its open for discussion. If not i'll chill with things the way they are.

It's simply because I am not yet completely sure which other things I want to add to the banned list. However, I don't really see them as "fuzzy". It's clear that no harassment is allowed, and no trading posts of any kind, the only thing that is not mentioned yet are free leeches and giving out free items - but isn't that some kind of trading as well?
As for players refusing to read rules - it's their responsibility. I am trying to add something like an hourly reminder in main chat (basically a server announcement only shown in main chat) to read the rules and respect others, but that's all I can do to remind people to actually read them.

[slurpyninja]

It's simply because I am not yet completely sure which other things I want to add to the banned list. However, I don't really see them as "fuzzy". It's clear that no harassment is allowed, and no trading posts of any kind, the only thing that is not mentioned yet are free leeches and giving out free items - but isn't that some kind of trading as well?
As for players refusing to read rules - it's their responsibility. I am trying to add something like an hourly reminder in main chat (basically a server announcement only shown in main chat) to read the rules and respect others, but that's all I can do to remind people to actually read them.

The free leeches and a last night 'find me and get a kaho' were the main fuzzy ones. There's also been a lot of 'Does anyone have ___ i can have?' They're asking for free items. isn't that basically just the flip of giving away free items? Like a couple were 'i need liek 360 (or whevers) coral reef for this quest.'

Question tho. You can use mainchat to promote player events, like DB. to which i've also been using to promote guild mini games which so far has been fine. I've wanted to do something a couple times but havent 'cuz i was unsure about it. There have been a buncha times where theres been a lot of people who just say 'i'm bored' followed by a buncha other bored people. Would doing a spontaneous 'lets play hide & seek' followed by a clue (1 clue not total spamage of the chat) be allowed or does that fall under the free items things since they normally get a couple OBB or whatever i have on me from it. Or is it considered promoting a game?

i think... that was it for the fuzzyness that i can think of >.>
EDIT: a hourly (or whatever) reminder to read the rules would probably help...

[Fidelis]

You are allowed to advertise your own events, even if they include prizes.

[GreaterPepe]

At the time I'd simply thought that any sort of infraction of the rules, be it name-calling, instigating or obvious trolling, was reportable by anyone as a "Main Chat rule infraction", not a "Harassment Case".

I know that Harassment cases are trickier because the person involved may not think of it as harassment, but by reading the Rules for Main Chat, it appears to say that any sort of insult to another player is against the "Main Chat Rules" and therefore grounds for a mute/ban. I didn't think that Harassment over Main chat was an infraction of the Harassment rule, not the Main Chat rule, even though it says in the Main Chat rules that it's against the Main Chat rules...

...Yeah, that's really confusing. /spin

RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRUUUUURRUUS.

[DreamerP]

So I should send in the ticket with the SS >.>;

[Fidelis]

RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRUUUUURRUUS.

So I should send in the ticket with the SS >.>;

Well as I said, the player is going to get a warning. Maybe I should make it more clear in the rules that any name calling in main chat, especially stemming from PvP and WoE situations, is undesired, and will lead to punishments upon disregarding the warnings.

[DreamerP]

 

[GreaterPepe]

Well, you DIDN'T say anything about that in the Rurus. But I guess it doesn't matter. I just wanted to know what the deal was with the "Third parties can't report" bullcrap.

...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J548XM9-jKU

[Zidane]

I responded the way I did for various reasons. 

Normally, a "random" onlooker is allowed to report an issue - be it main chat or not.  Ie: Someone catches an individual exploiting a bug - totally OK to report!   Two people having an altercation and you getting involved and reporting either of the individuals, not exactly.  Either of the afflicted parties need to report the damage they have suffered themselves in order for it to be valid.  This is the way that law prosecution functions in real life and further should logically here because we are enforcing player-relation rules.  So if X is fighting with Y in the Mainchat, you can ask them to take it to PMs, or let them finish it out - no need to get yourself involved in their issue since its theirs. 

Now, if you didnt agree with what I said above, then lets look at the situation in dispute.  The rule specifies the term "harassment".  Let us use a widely accepted source of definitions, Dictionary.com.  According to Dictionary.com, harassment is defined as: "

1. to disturb persistently; torment, as with troubles or cares; bother continually; pester; persecute.

2. to trouble by repeated attacks, incursions, etc., as in war or hostilities; harry; raid.

In both defenitions of the word, there is a sense of repetitiveness.  In the image (screenshot) you presented in the report, you showed us a single instance; thus failing to meet the "repetitive" requirement for it to meet the harassment requirement.

Now, the rule further mentions that "flaming" would be punishable as well.  If we would to consider the fact that someone says:  "Player X is horrible at the H class" as "flaming", then we would be overwhelmed with reports of "flaming".  Now, does that mean that you can go calling it out repeatedly in public chat, or main chat?  Not exactly, as doing it multiple times or persistently in different occassions would then fall under the category of disrespect and harassment.


I hope that you understand the rule a little better now in regards to submitting report tickets.

[GreaterPepe]

I was not reporting Harassment. I was reporting an infraction of the Main Chat rules.

Insulting another player over Main Chat is against the Main Chat rules.

That's that. It's not a harassment report at all...