And here's a banning for you, and yes, one for you too...

April 4, 2008 1:12 PM

Are there different degrees of being banned on MetaFilter, if you do something inappropriate? Or is every banning pretty much permanent? I've been curious if those who have been banned are able to atone for their sins. Do their IP addresses get blocked so that they can't create new accounts, that kind of thing? (I have no personal interest in the matter aside from idle curiosity, by the way.) And also out of curiosity, what's the worst thing anyone has been banned for?
posted by SpacemanStix to MetaFilter-related at 1:12 PM (126 comments total)

I do see some of this was addressed in the FAQ. Sorry about that.
posted by SpacemanStix at 1:18 PM on April 4

The Dhoyt thing was probably most memorable.
posted by delmoi at 1:19 PM on April 4 [2 favorites]

Nope, "banned" means a permanent locked account you can't login with and you can't post anymore. We have timed 24hr and 7day temp bans we call "timeouts" but that's about it. There are no IP-based blocks anywhere, since those are so easy to circumvent.

As you might have seen today, someone signed up a second account in two weeks to get banned once again. If I see their name in the new signups again, I'll immediately lock the account and refund their money from here on out, but they are only the 2nd person to ever come back after being banned once just to do it again.
posted by mathowie at 1:20 PM on April 4

There are four degrees of bannination, maybe five.

- 24 hour timeout - usually if you just seem like you may need to "sleep it off" or if you're making AskMe a headache for me and won't stop, or if we think your account's been hacked.
- week off - usually for more problematic stuff or "maybe you need to spend some time to think about what you did" We rarely do this.
- open-ended - someone asks us to close their account for a while (almost never happens since the big red button), or if we need to look into something before we figure out what needs to happen. sometimes if something smells self-linky but we need to fish around we'll tempban an account.
- banned 4 lyfe - sort of a misnomer, most people who don't actively try to break/ruin the site can come back in either under their old account or by getting a new one
- IP ban - not only is your account banned but we'll try to keep you from even accessing the site. The old hack used to be to redirect requests to MeFi to plastic.com but I don't think we're doing that anymore. I've seen this maybe used 2-3 times ever

There's also the Big Red Button where a user can close their own account. If someone does this (unless they only did it to avoid getting banned) we'll re-open their account whenever they want. The worst thing... I don't even know. We've seen security exploits, people going bugfuck nuts with a bunch of accounts at once, goatse on the front page [yes? no? can't remember] and some pretty vicious savaging of other users. This was worse when the IMG tag was around because people could really kill a whole thread just by including some 5MB animated GIF or some really vile stuff. I don't think we have a Hall of Shame per se for really bad stuff, maybe other people remember better than I do. I think my shoddy memory helps make this job a lot more pleasant.
posted by jessamyn at 1:21 PM on April 4 [8 favorites]

And also out of curiosity, what's the worst thing anyone has been banned for?

Do NOT prank cortex, he doesn't play.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 1:21 PM on April 4

Oooh. Is Matt going to ban Jess for contradicting her? Stay tuned to find out!
posted by dobbs at 1:26 PM on April 4

And also out of curiosity, what's the worst thing anyone has been banned for?
posted by SpacemanStix to MetaFilter-related at 4:12 PM

Asking too many questions.
posted by Pastabagel at 1:27 PM on April 4 [8 favorites]

Him. Him! (don't ban me).
posted by dobbs at 1:27 PM on April 4

Him. Him!

Ed Wood presents: Matt or Maddy?
posted by cortex at 1:28 PM on April 4

I've been curious if those who have been banned are able to atone for their sins.

It can be done.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 1:31 PM on April 4 [4 favorites]

even if you say so yourself...eh?
posted by mds35 at 1:35 PM on April 4

It can be done.
posted by cortex at 1:51 PM on April 4 [2 favorites]

However, in order for it to work, those everyone else has to live and let live. Funny, a lot of times that's the bigger sticking point.
posted by absalom at 1:52 PM on April 4

Man. I'm so out of the loop on MeFi escapades. Half the time, it sounds like a new Robert Ludlum novel:

The Dhoyt Affair
The ParisParamus Flameout
The KayCeeNicole Episode
Solder, Sailor, wendell, GiveWell

posted by scrump at 1:54 PM on April 4 [15 favorites]

Redemption is possible. Have you heard about the Brand New Day policy?
posted by Meatbomb at 1:55 PM on April 4

Hasn't there been a case where someone was permabanned, but later allowed back under their original username? I seem to remember this happening once or twice but now cannot remember.
posted by slogger at 1:55 PM on April 4

As you might have seen today, someone signed up a second account in two weeks to get banned once again.

Seen? Where? Wha' happened?
posted by rtha at 1:57 PM on April 4

Asking too many questions.

I need some clarity on this, but I'm thinking a follow up question is not a good idea.
posted by SpacemanStix at 2:00 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

Hasn't there been a case where someone was permabanned, but later allowed back under their original username?

See this is the thing... except in rare cases there is no permabanning. We ban people who later come back after reconsideration or apology or AA or a walk in the woods or whatever.
posted by jessamyn at 2:03 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

FREE QUONSAR

Supplies are limited. First come, first served. Offer not valid in Hawaii, Oklahoma or Washington DC. By accepting this offer you accept all responsibility for any potential damage to the fish in your pants. Smock, smock, smock.
posted by loquacious at 2:05 PM on April 4 [6 favorites]

Round one.

Intermission: guy writes to us all "wha happen?!" and we're all "you totally self-linked and we deleted it and banned you" and he was all "o shi missed that wevs".

And then he signed up for a new account. And immediately submitted his shitty site as a spammy Projects writeup. Matt declined to post it. Time passed, and then...

Round two.

No "omg what now?!?!" email from him this afternoon, but I'm haven't given up hope.
posted by cortex at 2:05 PM on April 4

I'M HAVEN'T GIVEN UP HOPE, PEOPLE.
posted by cortex at 2:06 PM on April 4 [32 favorites]

As you might have seen today, someone signed up a second account in two weeks to get banned once again.

Seen? Where? Wha' happened?

I, too, was wondering what this referred to...
posted by dersins at 2:06 PM on April 4

Thanks, cortex.

That guy should be permabanned just for being so frakking stupid. We don't need more dumb around here.
posted by rtha at 2:09 PM on April 4

Wha'ppen? Not really. I much prefer I Just Can't Stop It.
posted by joseph_elmhurst at 2:09 PM on April 4 [3 favorites]

Now I'm curious and want to visit his site just so I can see how bad it is.
posted by loquacious at 2:11 PM on April 4

goatse on the front page [yes? no? can't remember]

We had goatse on MetaTalk during that whole Login debacle. Made for an exciting day at the call centre!

I didn't think my mouse hand could move that fast.

They call me the kid.
posted by ODiV at 2:11 PM on April 4

Never seen goatse. Don't wanna see it. Though, the vid of the eels was probably just as bad.
posted by Burhanistan at 2:13 PM on April 4

There were also goatses aplenty during that wiki April fools thing, if I remember correctly.
posted by soundofsuburbia at 2:14 PM on April 4

a walk in the woods

It is because of Metafilter that right here I immediately thought "in order to find porn."
posted by Skot at 2:17 PM on April 4 [12 favorites]

I'm kind of hoping that guy comes back and tries again. It's like some sort of SEO whackamole in real time. Maybe mathowie can raise money by taking bets on both how long it'll take the guy to come back and what he'll selflink when he does.
posted by scrump at 2:19 PM on April 4

and he was all "o shi missed that wevs"

And I was all like \m/ and he was like /v\ and I was like ? and he was like "wevs, geddit" and I was like, dude.
posted by scrump at 2:21 PM on April 4 [6 favorites]

I heard a quick way to bannination was to have a username containing a sex act. Some people are real jerks, y'know?
posted by waraw at 2:25 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

I once gave myself a six week timeout for this thread. Plus, I got this dressing down from Matt. I deserved much harsher punishment.
posted by ColdChef at 2:30 PM on April 4 [2 favorites]

"English, m-----f-----; do you speak it?"
posted by Lynsey at 2:30 PM on April 4

I heard a quick way to bannination was to have a username containing a sex act. Some people are real jerks, y'know?

No, that's the quick way to getting exempted from the "we don't change usernames, cough up another $5 and lose your posting history" policy that applies to people with less puerile usernames. Squeaky wheel, etc.

only a little bitter
posted by enn at 2:31 PM on April 4

IP ban - not only is your account banned but we'll try to keep you from even accessing the site. The old hack used to be to redirect requests to MeFi to plastic.com but I don't think we're doing that anymore. I've seen this maybe used 2-3 times ever

Whoa, does MeFi have beef with plastic.com?
posted by ignignokt at 2:33 PM on April 4

only a little bitter

Seriously. Behind The Modding psychic anguish stuff. Lemon on a paper cut.
posted by cortex at 2:37 PM on April 4

someone signed up a second account in two weeks to get banned once again.

Time to raise the sign-up charge?
posted by timeistight at 2:37 PM on April 4

Whoa, does MeFi have beef with plastic.com?

We have corndogs with them the first Wednesday of every month, but otherwise, no.

I heard a quick way to bannination was to have a username containing a sex act.

You asked for it, we allowed it. I don't think anyone gets banned because of their username, but they may get a coupon for one free mandatory name change.
posted by jessamyn at 2:39 PM on April 4

even if you say so yourself...eh?

Be patient. My SEO business just needs that extra push over the cliff.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 2:41 PM on April 4

Hold on a minute. A Blazecock Pileon isn't a sex act?
posted by ODiV at 2:49 PM on April 4 [3 favorites]

With the exception of certain annelida, no.
posted by y2karl at 3:00 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

A Blazecock Pileon isn't a sex act?

Only if you define "sex" as "a mob-pile of sweaty, angry nerds pointlessly arguing with each other".
posted by loquacious at 3:00 PM on April 4

I don't think we have a Hall of Shame per se for really bad stuff, maybe other people remember better than I do. I think my shoddy memory helps make this job a lot more pleasant.

PONY REQUEST!!!! MEFI HALL OF SHAME!!!!
posted by Fuzzy Skinner at 3:01 PM on April 4 [3 favorites]

Hey, I noticed
fandango_matt's account has been disabled. What's up with that?
posted by furtive at 3:02 PM on April 4

Big red button, needed a break while he spends some time on real life stuff. Hopefully he'll find his way back with more photoshoppery in the by and by.
posted by cortex at 3:11 PM on April 4

You mean there's a real life?
posted by furtive at 3:13 PM on April 4

I read about this new game called Outside.

on kottke
posted by jessamyn at 3:15 PM on April 4 [25 favorites]

Hey, I noticed fandango_matt's account has been disabled

I noticed that, and e-mailed him- life is busy, he's taking a break for awhile.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 3:16 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

I read about this new game called Outside.

I'm still figuring out how to hack the popcorn.
posted by loquacious at 3:16 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

I heard a quick way to bannination was to have a username containing a sex act.

Oh, great, now Tony Danza will never join MeFi!
posted by lore at 3:20 PM on April 4

Whoa, does MeFi have beef with plastic.com?

One of the rolling taglines used to be "The plastic.com it's okay to like."
posted by empath at 3:34 PM on April 4

pretty_generic was banned for, if I remember correctly, brute force hacking people's accounts and posting shit pretending to be them.

quonsar, again if I remember correctly, was banned basically for being quonsar. but he got better.

davy was banned for being kind of a nut.
posted by shmegegge at 3:35 PM on April 4

Suddenly, I have an urge to display myself.
posted by not_on_display at 3:36 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

It hasn't been made public yet, but I am actually the 6th degree of bannination. The admins try not to use me, because I'm illegal in 12 countries and prohibited under numerous human-rights treaties.

But one day, I will get deployed. It will be glorious.
posted by quin at 3:43 PM on April 4

Do NOT prank cortex, he doesn't play.
posted by Brandon Blatcher

I've pranked cortex. He plays.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 3:43 PM on April 4

I heard a quick way to bannination was to have a username containing a sex act. Some people are real jerks, y'know?


Oh, shi
posted by The GoBotSodomizer at 3:43 PM on April 4 [3 favorites]

Since the example of the guy today happened... isn't it possible to game MeFi so that any links to a particular domain automatically redirect back to MeFi? For instance, if Example guy comes back and posts again to his site than no one will ever hit it before admins see it? I imagine that even though he got banned the first time, his returning means he managed to get $5 min worth of hits or he wouldn't have done it again.
posted by dobbs at 3:51 PM on April 4

Or it means he's just kind of exceptionally dumb.

I mean, I hear you. I can imagine a spammer skimming some nominal (approximate, at least) monetization out of a link that manages to stand for a while. But this guy's first post was nuked really damned quickly—username matched sitename and so on; we didn't need to do a bit of research before pulling the plug; no one even had a chance to snark in the thread and it may not have made it onto the (re-cached every few minutes) front page.

If he's got a system that can turn that into more than $5, I hope he keeps coming back long enough for us to figure how it works so we can all become incredibly rich in short order.
posted by cortex at 3:57 PM on April 4

I heard a quick way to bannination was to have a username containing a sex act.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you... fishfucker.
posted by timeistight at 4:01 PM on April 4

A Blazecock Pileon isn't a sex act?

Not without $20 it isn't.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 4:13 PM on April 4 [4 favorites]

What if I'm out by the nunnery?
posted by boo_radley at 4:20 PM on April 4

Jessamyn, so you're the reason Plastic's overrun with trolls? I want my 132 karma back.
posted by Metroid Baby at 4:31 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

Oh dobbs, we cleared out his personal site and replaced it with example.com. example.com is a domain specifically setup by someone (ICANN?) eons ago to be used as a placeholder for testing out programs and sites and connections. It's the web's hello world, foo bar, lorem ipsum test site.

Basically, I've grown tired of some dorks purposely spamming mefi and wanted a way to take away their link even after it is deleted and nofollowed, to take away any incentive they may have to do it.

Also? We recently added a new checkbox to the posting form. It requires that people click it before they make their first post and says basically "[ ] I swear I don't have anything to do with any URL I am posting".
posted by mathowie at 4:34 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

I want my 132 karma back.

Is that like a favorite? I gave you one favorite.
posted by jessamyn at 4:37 PM on April 4

Only if you define "sex" as "a mob-pile of sweaty, angry nerds pointlessly arguing with each other"

And who doesn't, really....
posted by dersins at 5:06 PM on April 4

There should really be posted exchange rates between various online reputation systems.
1 Digg = 24.3 positive Ebay feedbacks = 45.4 MySpace friends = 132 plastic.com karma = 421 MeFi favorites
You've got some more favoriting to do Jessamyn.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:11 PM on April 4 [2 favorites]

No, it's like an icy cold diet coke.
posted by SassHat at 5:12 PM on April 4

1 Digg = 24.3 positive Ebay feedbacks = 45.4 MySpace friends = 132 plastic.com karma = 421 MeFi favorites

1 Gold Star? Priceless.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 5:13 PM on April 4 [3 favorites]

Only if you define "sex" as "a mob-pile of sweaty, angry nerds pointlessly arguing with each other"

MetaFilter: "sex"
posted by Sys Rq at 5:17 PM on April 4 [8 favorites]

Only if you define "sex" as "a mob-pile of sweaty, angry nerds pointlessly arguing with each other"

10 IF newsletter
20 THEN subscribe
30 GOTO 10

END
posted by jessamyn at 5:24 PM on April 4 [7 favorites]

1 Digg = 24.3 positive Ebay feedbacks = 45.4 MySpace friends = 132 plastic.com karma = 421 MeFi favorites

I think your math is just about exactly backwards, and then some. I don't think I'd trade 1 MeFi favorite for 500 Diggs.

However, if you can figure out a way to trade favorites for cash and/or valuable prizes I'm all ears. Baby needs new shoes.
posted by loquacious at 5:26 PM on April 4

/me invokes RULE 34.
posted by loquacious at 5:34 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

Time to raise the sign-up charge?

metafilter for the middle classes.
posted by mattoxic at 5:36 PM on April 4

pretty_generic was banned for, if I remember correctly, brute force hacking people's accounts and posting shit pretending to be them.

To be fair, he himself did not brute force hack open anyone's account, but merely benefited from someone else's work. And I think it was just once.
posted by youarenothere at 5:43 PM on April 4

To be fair, he himself did not brute force hack open anyone's account

To be fair, he fucked around on the site using multiple accounts he'd procured from whoever on Thanksgiving and never fully admitted it or apologized and continued to try to sign up for accounts claiming to be other people sometimes going so far as to argue with us about why we'd banned the new accounts. The fact that he has a sort of under-the-radar account now is only because the other mods are nicer than I am.
posted by jessamyn at 5:55 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

My name is Larry Glick, and I'm a long time listener, and first time self-poster. There, I've said it. Hugs? huh?

Hey, where ya going? Hugs? Free hugs, they're free y'know!
posted by not_on_display at 5:56 PM on April 4

If I see their name in the new signups again, I'll immediately lock the account and refund their money from here on out

Please, by all means keep the $5. Or donate it somewhere. Call it a bullshit tax.
posted by kuujjuarapik at 6:25 PM on April 4

Not refunding the money means no end to the OMG PAYING CUSTOMER horribleness that is SEO spammers on a crusade over a few bucks. I'd pay them double to just never come back.
posted by jessamyn at 6:27 PM on April 4

How did I miss that Larry Glick post? That was cool. I remeber the big iron gates on his house in Southboro...
posted by kuujjuarapik at 6:28 PM on April 4

To be fair, he himself did not brute force hack open anyone's account

That's the story he told anyway. Why anyone would actually believe that is beyond me.
posted by puke & cry at 6:31 PM on April 4 [1 favorite]

To be fair, he fucked around on the site using multiple accounts he'd procured from whoever on Thanksgiving and never fully admitted it or apologized and continued to try to sign up for accounts claiming to be other people sometimes going so far as to argue with us about why we'd banned the new accounts..
---
That's the story he told anyway...

Oh dear. I was being tongue-in-cheek. Agreement all 'round that the whole thing was all kinds of fucked up.
posted by youarenothere at 6:47 PM on April 4

metafilter for the middle classes.

Damn straight. Keep out the riff-raff.
posted by timeistight at 6:56 PM on April 4

PONY REQUEST!!!! MEFI HALL OF SHAME!!!!

Oh Good Lord No, please do not encourage the sort of behavior which would get someone into that hall. Despite the frequent minor skirmishes this place is one of the most civil general interest sites on the net. People have strong opinions, and they express them, but their is a generally high level of respect. That is pretty cool.
posted by caddis at 7:03 PM on April 4

Ho about a foyer of ennui?
posted by Sys Rq at 7:23 PM on April 4 [6 favorites]

w
posted by Sys Rq at 7:23 PM on April 4

I'm intrigued by the idea of a crime against Metafilter.
posted by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America at 7:37 PM on April 4

Color me surprised.
posted by kuujjuarapik at 8:01 PM on April 4

Atrium of Apathy.
posted by ColdChef at 8:09 PM on April 4

Not without $20 it isn't.

BLAZECOCK! GOD DAMN IT! Get back to work!
posted by tkchrist at 8:26 PM on April 4

Dumbwaiter of listlessness.
posted by BeerFilter at 8:33 PM on April 4

Not to start shit, really, but...

Hasn't there been a case where someone was permabanned, but later allowed back under their original username?

See this is the thing... except in rare cases there is no permabanning. We ban people who later come back after reconsideration or apology or AA or a walk in the woods or whatever.

I thought ParisParamus was banned for various nefarious activities, only later to ask for re-entry under his original username, even though he seems to be a "lovable guy" (28:05 in the podcast).
posted by slogger at 8:33 PM on April 4

Sunroom of Seppuku.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 8:36 PM on April 4

MetaFilter: People going bugfuck nuts
posted by terrapin at 8:59 PM on April 4

PONY REQUEST!!!! MEFI HALL OF SHAME!!!!

Oh Good Lord No, please do not encourage the sort of behavior which would get someone into that hall.

His spirits crushed by having no Hall of Shame to showcase his achievements, Fuzzy Skinner slinks away into a dark corner of MeFi, never to be heard from again.
posted by Fuzzy Skinner at 9:02 PM on April 4

Dark Corner of Ignominy.
posted by kuujjuarapik at 9:16 PM on April 4

Spittoon of opprobrium.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 9:17 PM on April 4

Broom closet of tedium.
posted by Rangeboy at 9:29 PM on April 4

Kitty litterbox laundry nook of ennui?
posted by Burhanistan at 9:36 PM on April 4

That guy in the corner.
posted by not_on_display at 9:37 PM on April 4

Metafilter Timeout Playroom.
posted by Fuzzy Skinner at 9:52 PM on April 4 [2 favorites]

I heard a quick way to bannination was to have a username containing a sex act.

Oh, crap.
- Navy Dreamslap
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:00 PM on April 4

The futon of absolute bliss.
posted by dirigibleman at 12:17 AM on April 5

The carpet sample of hope.
posted by dirigibleman at 12:17 AM on April 5

There should be a form of banning under which the banned individual may still log in and make posts, but no one else can see such posts.
posted by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America at 12:21 AM on April 5 [2 favorites]

The mechanic's waiting room of Oh Shit, I Actually Paid Extra to Put Nitrogen In My Tires.
posted by dirigibleman at 12:23 AM on April 5

There should be a form of banning under which the banned individual may still log in and make posts, but no one else can see such posts.

The belly-itcher of pitching.
posted by dirigibleman at 12:24 AM on April 5

The antechamber of schadenfreude.

I thought ParisParamus was banned for various nefarious activities, only later to ask for re-entry under his original username

Paris is an exceptional mefite, but not necessarily in a good way. I don't think he ever wanted to come back to mefi so much as have the satisfaction of somehow getting his account re-opened, which is pretty much missing the point by as far as is humanly possible.
posted by cortex at 12:49 AM on April 5 [1 favorite]

What about the ban where you come to the house and set the computer on fire, put Bondo in the cable and phone jacks, and cut off the offender's fingers? Or are we not supposed to talk about that one oops...
posted by louche mustachio at 3:34 AM on April 5

There should be a form of banning under which the banned individual may still log in and make posts, but no one else can see such posts.

Ha ha, that's a good one. Right, guys? Guys? Hello?
posted by Nedroid at 5:58 AM on April 5 [2 favorites]

I thought ParisParamus...

Yep, rare case.
posted by jessamyn at 6:04 AM on April 5

Changing spammers' URLs to example.com means that the Mefi squad of detective ninjas can't see previous self-linkers' sites and therefore have a harder time detecting future self-links. This puts all of the burden of finding self-linkers on the admins, which seems counter-productive.

Why not just eliminate the SEO gains from deleted posts by using rel=nofollow instead?
posted by matthewr at 6:20 AM on April 5

I once gave myself a six week timeout for this thread. Plus, I got this dressing down from Matt. I deserved much harsher punishment.

I swear to God, I scanned that thread for a full minute trying to find the part where Matt gave ColdChef a dressing gown.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 6:53 AM on April 5 [3 favorites]

"[ ] I swear I don't have anything to do with any URL I am posting".

To be pedantic, some self-links are okay (in comments or answers). So this wording might be a bit confusing for people not yet too familiar with the community, who might come away thinking that no self-links are tolerated ever.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 7:01 AM on April 5

To be pedantic, some self-links are okay (in comments or answers).

Anyone who takes five minutes to read the FAQ or familiarize themselves with the community will figure that out. The wording of this checkbox is actually this

[ ] I am aware that if I am linking to something that I created, had a part in creating, or something that was created by a friend of mine, my post will be deleted and I will be banned from the site with no refund. (More Info)

Where More Info links to the faq selflink tag. It's pretty explicit and only appears when people are making their first post ever to the Blue. If we weren't getting a few self-links a week and then a bunch of "wtf, why did you delete my post?!?!" emails to answer, we'd be a little more nuanced in explaining this, but this is a triage-level weed-out-aggressive-spammers move, not a user-education program.
posted by jessamyn at 7:11 AM on April 5

> This was worse when the IMG tag was around because people could really kill a whole
> thread just by including some 5MB animated GIF or some really vile stuff.

I know it was dreadfully abused but I really really miss it. One day there'll be utilities that can parse .pngs and .jpegs for content and auto-delete the pissing elephants or whatever without troubling the admins. Get to work, coders!
posted by jfuller at 7:14 AM on April 5

Alright, jessamyn, that makes sense, thanks.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 9:48 AM on April 5

I got a guy banned - You can too! Detailed drama, pix or it didn't happen, live "girls on the internet!" 1-976-BAN-HARD
$3.95/minute. Must be over 18.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 10:28 AM on April 5

The watercloset of weltanschauung.

Will someone build the virtual MeFi house already?
posted by ikahime at 2:57 PM on April 5

I am aware that if I am linking to something that...was created by a friend of mine

We're not allowed to post links to web sites if we know the people who created the site? That's news to me. I'd do it — but only if I thought the site was truly interesting in its own right, and not to get traffic for a friend.
posted by orange swan at 6:34 PM on April 5

Paris is an exceptional mefite, but not necessarily in a good way.

I always wondered if Dr Steve HowsYourFather Elvis America was PP's current username.

There should be a form of banning under which the banned individual may still log in and make posts, but no one else can see such posts.

They do this on Groklaw. I believe that John Gabriel -- yes, he of the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory -- was the person who originally discovered it when he realized that PJ had cast his posts into the void. He realized that he could read them from his own account/IP, but if he logged in from another account or IP, they magically disappeared.

FWIW, Gabriel wasn't actually being a Fuckwad. He was just one of a long string of people who happened to disagree with PJ about something or other.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 8:26 PM on April 5

the BozoFilter (aka "looks like you're posting but only you see your posts") thing was a standard feature of the arsDigita forum package back in the .com days, and may still live on in the shambling remains of OpenACS... just like telling everybody to not feed the trolls, but enforceable... I've wondered why nobody else seems to have picked up on the technique...
posted by russm at 5:31 AM on April 6

goodnewsfortheinsane,

Dressing gowns are handed out as part of the fifth and highest level of banning.

Our lawyers advise this is necessary under international humanitarian law.
posted by the Cabal at 7:36 AM on April 6 [1 favorite]

We're not allowed to post links to web sites if we know the people who created the site?

Pretty much not, no. I mean if it's some giant site and your friend is one person who works at some huge corporation, we're not going to ban you but generally speaking no, don't link to friends' sites. This is in the FAQ and we've said it often enough in MeTa. The argument is that you're often not a good judge of whether a site stands on its own as a good link when you're thinking "well my friend made it and I like my friend" etc. There have been exceptions I'm sure, but in a general sense it's something that it's a good idea not to do.
posted by jessamyn at 7:50 AM on April 6

The argument is that you're often not a good judge of whether a site stands on its own as a good link when you're thinking "well my friend made it and I like my friend" etc.

I've been asked before to post stuff by my friends and have said no.
posted by orange swan at 9:23 AM on April 7