Xest wrote: I'm not convinced that putting at risk people's anonymity and rights to freedom of speech just to protect people who put themselves in the way of insults only to get upset by them is a better way of life.
I don't think anyone has suggested this except you. I certainly haven't. You came up with this in one of your replies and are just repeating it as if it is something suggested by someone else.
You are trying to confuse two separate issues. One is that the internet currently allows anonymity, but that could change. As I said before, if it does so it will do so for government and political reasons, not because of online insults. If we lose anonymity then there would be minor benefits but we would lose a lot.
In the current situation, every online game and forum has its own community policing enforced in the end by the general opinion of people who run things and the people who take part in it. Because if a game or forum community gets in a state where people no longer want to be part of it they will leave and go somewhere more interesting and fun. Because the people running forums and putting in a lot of work usually do so because they want to help people have fun. If their forum becomes a place they don't like then they will quit running it.
The discussion about insults is about presenting things online. Its about how you say things and how people react to them. The question being whether adding a smilie makes everything inoffensive. I raised it because I've noticed people who are continually rude to others have started doing this, and are using it as a generic excuse. People did it to indicate that they were exchanging a friendly insult with a mate, and I think its got hijacked and is being used as a smokescreen by people.
I was interested whether this excuse was being accepted by the community. I could have picked forum examples, but I think its weak and discourteous to involve other people, so I involved myself. Obviously I don't feel threatened by an accusation of spying for a realm I don't play. The person who said it admitted that he had no reason to say it and knew it wasn't true. What startled me was that he felt he could say anything, provided he put a smilie, and people should just ignore it. This turns into some sort of weird game of ignore everything unless Simon says, or in this case Simon doesn't smile.
With respect Xest, you don't play these servers now. The game situation is strange at the moment. We had a community, who mostly knew each other, and knew what to take seriously. Now it mostly seems to be about two thirds Excalibur, and one third Prydwen, so you are dealing with a lot of people who you don't know, and who don't know what is a joke and what isn't. And that is why its important how people are interpreting things. In game is not just a forum debate, if a group or a battlegroup is going to achieve something it needs to work together. Things are getting very marginal. If we don't work together, Hib falls apart, people quit, and this forum dies because most people won't post on a forum for a game they used to play.
Part of the big point about being online is the interchange with other people. Whether they admit it or not, anyone posting online must care about other people, or why on earth bother doing it. Even Xest cares. If we all stop replying to him, he would pine away and cry.
I actually came out of it quite well. My insurance company tried to screw me and I counter screwed. So all in all I am in a better position now than i was before.
