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(members: 100, guests: 900) Why are the guests not joining?

royox

Member
Hey! I've been wondering this, almost at every hour of the day we have like 100 members online and almost a thousand people lurking around without joining our community, why? What's stopping all this people from joining? The "private e-mail" thingie? They are slakers? Account suicided old members that still want to wander around as ghosts?

If you are one of those join us and tell us why!! We don't bite! (yet)
 
There aren't as many interesting threads for them, or to motivate them to join. I'm not that great at maintaining or creating new threads, so I'll take the bullet on this one. Sorry GAF.

Seriously though, my favourite old school thread was the one about pro life tips (read at least 30 pages of that). So new threads, a few more lttps and OT threads.
 
People who left in a flood of tears, swearing they were finished with this place for good. Yet can't quite bring themselves to look away.
 

JordanN

Banned
They're waiting for when the time is right. ;)

I first heard of Neogaf around 2010, but I didn't join until 2 years later.
 

hargwood

Banned
I lurked from 2013 to 2017. Was a lot more entertaining back then though. 2016 was the GOAT year. Loved the Brexit and Trump meltdowns. Only joined because the sjw's and soiboi's left after the Showerpocalypse.

Forum needs more content creators and interesting threads. I'd do that sort of stuff but know I'd be banned pretty quickly.
 

Gabbelgak

Member
I lurked for.. hell probably 8+ years before joining. I didn't have access to a viable email for the longest time. I didn't really feel the need to comment - I mainly just read it during downtime at work and didn't care to get that involved. I finally ended up joining I suppose in part because of the mass exodus of people that occurred. Topics don't move like they did before, I could read threads all night just refreshing between a few of them reading latest replies all night, that alone was enough to keep me entertained / occupied.
 
As mentioned there were alot of epic account suicides when the cancer left here last oct...there are probably quite a few people that are across the fence realizing that the new place is basically this place when it was a shithole but turned up to 10... pride is probably stopping them trying to rejoin and engage again.
 
Ice_Cream.0.gif
 

Senior

Neo Member
I think it might have something to do with information out on internet about how long it takes for your account to be approved on here. I am pretty sure I saw some online threads about how it takes like a month to get your account approved. I guess that will discourage some users but at the same time, I feel like this indicates that the account approval system is doing its job. This system, while inconvenient as you have to wait for a few days to get your account approved, effectively reduces the amount of trash on here. Those that sign up usually are commited to joining this community.
Quality over quantity.
 

Meowzers

Member
I joined up on June 1st last year and awaited confirmation to finally be a member. A year past and still wondered what was going on,
until a few weeks ago when I just decided to try and log in and was shocked that I've been a full member for about 16 months.

So I was lurking all that time not realising I could've just logged in.:messenger_grinning_squinting:
 

TwiztidElf

Member
For me, I only post when I'm on this one single device I'm on now, so I'm only ever logged in on this device.
Every other device I browse GAF on I don't bother to login, so I guess I'm contributing to the lurker numbers.
I'm probably not alone in this behavior?
 

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
Why does it sometimes link to the offending post and not others? Was the post deleted?

Bans aren't inherently a response to one specific post. When a specific post is relevant, mods can include the post ID in the ban field and it'll show up in the ban record there. Otherwise, if you're curious you can always check the user's most recent posts to get an idea of their behavior leading up to the ban.

Should you still have unresolved concerns about the legitimacy of the ban as stated in the public record, you're welcome to PM me with your concerns, send a support email, account suicide in fiery indignation, etc. :messenger_grinning_sweat:
 
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Papa

Banned
Bans aren't inherently a response to one specific post. When a specific post is relevant, mods can include the post ID in the ban field and it'll show up in the ban record there. Otherwise, if you're curious you can always check the user's most recent posts to get an idea of their behavior leading up to the ban.

Should you still have unresolved concerns about the legitimacy of the ban as stated in the public record, you're welcome to PM me with your concerns, send a support email, account suicide in fiery indignation, etc. :messenger_grinning_sweat:

Yeah no dramas, was just curious. If a user is permabanned it’s not possible to see their post history anymore so in cases where the offending post isn’t linked then there is a missed learning opportunity for the rest of us. For example, it would’ve been nice to know specifically what Do Make Say Think or ickythingz did/said to get permabanned as they were both fairly frequent posters here. Maybe they were just cases of accumulated offenses but there has to be one final post that breaks the camel’s back, right? Loving the transparency that the ban record otherwise provides.

Oh one other thing I would like to raise is regarding permabans in general. People grow, learn and change over time and, as intolerant as I am of BS in the short term, I try to be forgiving and not hold grudges in the long term. I’ve never been a fan of the permaban concept for this reason. In such cases, would it be more reasonable to just give a really long ban like say 6-12 months? Permabanning just feels like discarding a real person and not giving them an opportunity to change (even if they’ve already served multiple short term bans).
 

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
Yeah no dramas, was just curious. If a user is permabanned it’s not possible to see their post history anymore so in cases where the offending post isn’t linked then there is a missed learning opportunity for the rest of us. For example, it would’ve been nice to know specifically what Do Make Say Think or ickythingz did/said to get permabanned as they were both fairly frequent posters here. Maybe they were just cases of accumulated offenses but there has to be one final post that breaks the camel’s back, right? Loving the transparency that the ban record otherwise provides.

Oh one other thing I would like to raise is regarding permabans in general. People grow, learn and change over time and, as intolerant as I am of BS in the short term, I try to be forgiving and not hold grudges in the long term. I’ve never been a fan of the permaban concept for this reason. In such cases, would it be more reasonable to just give a really long ban like say 6-12 months? Permabanning just feels like discarding a real person and not giving them an opportunity to change (even if they’ve already served multiple short term bans).

Ah yeah that's apparently a function of user-selected profile privacy settings, not whether they're banned. You can still search post history using the search tool though.

Re: permabans, we share a lot of common ground there. The flipside of it is our limited amount of moderation resources (and sanity) to address each individual user. Some folks skirt the line as long as possible, and don't respond to moderation action by moving inbounds so much as improving their aerodynamics on that same line. ;b
 

Papa

Banned
Ah yeah that's apparently a function of user-selected profile privacy settings, not whether they're banned. You can still search post history using the search tool though.

Re: permabans, we share a lot of common ground there. The flipside of it is our limited amount of moderation resources (and sanity) to address each individual user. Some folks skirt the line as long as possible, and don't respond to moderation action by moving inbounds so much as improving their aerodynamics on that same line. ;b

Are you sure about that? I've never been able to see anyone's profile once they're permabanned. It just says "Oops! We ran into some problems." even if their profile wasn't on private beforehand. I will try using the search function in future though.

Cool. Not trying to tell you how to steer the ship but maybe just give some consideration to the idea of replacing permabans with longer non-permanent bans as a kind of future olive branch to the banned party. Plenty of other places do the unpersoning thing and I'm not convinced it works.
 

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
Are you sure about that? I've never been able to see anyone's profile once they're permabanned. It just says "Oops! We ran into some problems." even if their profile wasn't on private beforehand. I will try using the search function in future though.

Cool. Not trying to tell you how to steer the ship but maybe just give some consideration to the idea of replacing permabans with longer non-permanent bans as a kind of future olive branch to the banned party. Plenty of other places do the unpersoning thing and I'm not convinced it works.

Definitely not sure, no. Probably a default XF2 permissions thing without a 1:1 from vb3 if that's the case. Checking, will adjust over to reflect user preference if possible, stand by.

Edit: appears this may be default XF2 behavior unless I override profile visibility to "on" system-wide.
 
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bitbydeath

Member
Are you sure about that? I've never been able to see anyone's profile once they're permabanned. It just says "Oops! We ran into some problems." even if their profile wasn't on private beforehand. I will try using the search function in future though.

Cool. Not trying to tell you how to steer the ship but maybe just give some consideration to the idea of replacing permabans with longer non-permanent bans as a kind of future olive branch to the banned party. Plenty of other places do the unpersoning thing and I'm not convinced it works.

I like this mindset.
Create a place, let’s call it purgatory. Where banned members are forced to only talk to each other for a year. Straight text only. No pictures or links. And a completely separate section so they can’t even try interact with anyone else but each other.

They can groove about how they’re getting out soon to the real world.
 

Cunth

Fingerlickin' Good!
I think it would be funny instead of banning them just make all their posts invisible so that nobody even knows they are posting and they are left wondering why nobody ever responds
 

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
I like this mindset.
Create a place, let’s call it purgatory. Where banned members are forced to only talk to each other for a year. Straight text only. No pictures or links. And a completely separate section so they can’t even try interact with anyone else but each other.

They can groove about how they’re getting out soon to the real world.

When you get bounced from a bar or club over conduct violations, there's a convenient place called "outside" with even more stuff to do and people to meet. :messenger_moon:
 

Papa

Banned
I like this mindset.
Create a place, let’s call it purgatory. Where banned members are forced to only talk to each other for a year. Straight text only. No pictures or links. And a completely separate section so they can’t even try interact with anyone else but each other.

They can groove about how they’re getting out soon to the real world.
I think it would be funny instead of banning them just make all their posts invisible so that nobody even knows they are posting and they are left wondering why nobody ever responds

Ha, these ideas would be funny but ultimately counter-productive.
 

Scopa

The Tribe Has Spoken
I’m pretty sure GAF has always had way more lurkers than logged in members.

Even in the nutcase era.
 

K1Expwy

Member
I used to have an account on Gaf during the 6th gen era when I was gaming the most. Being honest, even before the cancer-Gaf era, posting on forums hasn't been a pleasant experience, so I left and didn't come back til now. I just lurk to catch up on gaming news, and to check the OT to see which celebrity passed away. I'll continue lurking, but if it's allowed I might promote the indie game that I've been working on.
 

FireEmoji

Banned
Are you sure about that? I've never been able to see anyone's profile once they're permabanned. It just says "Oops! We ran into some problems." even if their profile wasn't on private beforehand. I will try using the search function in future though.

Cool. Not trying to tell you how to steer the ship but maybe just give some consideration to the idea of replacing permabans with longer non-permanent bans as a kind of future olive branch to the banned party. Plenty of other places do the unpersoning thing and I'm not convinced it works.

The post count in the "pop up" is clickable, it's a link to the search for the user's posts.

Copy that link and add a "&content=thread" to go to their thread posting history.

Search for our banned friend in this thread's posts:
https://www.neogaf.com/search/member?user_id=745154

And for his threads (there are none):
https://www.neogaf.com/search/member?user_id=745154&content=thread
 
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Redneckerz

Those long posts don't cover that red neck boy
A lot of webcrawlers, a few unlogged lurkers, permanent Cunth Cunth , and sometimes little ole me.

Its my intent to write even bigger post novelles than EviLore EviLore does. I think i am halfway there, though i remain cautious of claiming victory. Tyler may have an ace up his sleeve. ;)
 

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
It's not webcrawlers to any significant degree, no. NeoGAF has always been lurker central. That's been the goal from the start: curated discussion worth reading, standards for participation.
 
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I think it would be funny instead of banning them just make all their posts invisible so that nobody even knows they are posting and they are left wondering why nobody ever responds
Somethingawful when it was good used to run banhanner challenges where lowtax or a mod used to set a ridiculous challenge in order to not be permabanned......these threads were pretty entertaining as it used to encourage others to join in on the challenge.
 
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