The vast majority of people who come to this site come to play Diplomacy online, some come for both the game and the forum, and a few individuals come only for the forum. The forum, however, is not apart from the site; it is a part of the site, and it is a representative of who we are and what we hope to do as a site. As a site, we hope to provide the best online Diplomacy gaming experience. That is the main purpose of the site, and that is our most important goal. It is not our only goal, but it is the most important goal. Since I became co-owner in June, the mod team and I have been working tirelessly to make site improvements, to make game-features development, and to encourage GR games and tournaments. In the span of those 3 months, we made coding changes, site changes, and updates that needed to be done and were not done in YEARS, from a small thing of moving the “save” and “ready” buttons apart, to updating the rules and rulebook, adding the Ghostrating link, giving credits where credits are due under “Credits,” updating the registration email so that the multi- and meta-gaming rules are visible so newcomers don’t make the mistake of violating those 2 rules, and as we speak, we are trying our best to implement the Preview and colorblindness features from Vdip. We have cut down the number of outstanding or ongoing cases from 70+ to 20-30 at any given time. For the most part, we have responded to cases and emails within two or three days instead of weeks and at times we have been able to respond within hours or even minutes for live games.

The mods and I have worked our collective asses off and late through the nights to make these changes and improvements so that our members can play and enjoy Diplomacy because that is why we exist as a site. The forum is a part of the site, but it is not a main component of the site.

Some of you will argue then for the mods, Kestas and I to then just mod games and leave the forum completely alone. This does not work. We have tried it for YEARS and it does not work. The laissez-faire attitude on the forum bred malcontent and hostility. It created an environment where it seemed acceptable for member to attack each other endlessly, where users have little to no respect for other users, the mods, or the owner. The bickering, ad hominems attacks, the hostile environment did not happen overnight, but they developed slowly but surely over time. This was an environment where it was deemed acceptable for users to threaten each other physically, to abuse each other on the forum and in PMs, to throw epithets around as if they don’t have meanings, to threaten or try to bring down the site because of a game or disagreement with a mod member, to abuse site volunteers on the forum and in emails when they have a disagreement, to sue the owner for giving out old site data for a research project, and more. This environment could be seen in the forum and in the mod emails where people would be as irrational and disrespectful about games and game-modding as they were on the forum. How people acted on the forum mirrored on how they acted in games and in game-related things. Mods were getting burned out faster than we could recruit them. Cases were not getting done, there were ongoing cases that went back several months, and given the volume of cases at points, they were done hastily, which resulted in games being ruined or cheaters getting by. Moreover, users would then attack mods in the forum and created drama after drama for game-related stuff. For a gaming site such as ours, it is not possible to separate the forum from the game. We then tried having abge be the forum mod and the mod team takes care of just games. Despite abge having some success with the forum, it was not sustainable without him, and eventually even he got tired of dealing with the endlessly hostile environment the forum presented.

In July when I laid out our updated rules and forum philosophy and when we did a site-wide survey, we received a lot of feedback and support for what we were doing and were trying to do. Since then we have tried our best to be consistent with what we do and what we say, implementing policies behind the scenes to ensure all moderators are on the same page, and while mistakes do happen we are actively working on reducing them. For us, it is not acceptable to continually attack another member or his family or laugh at tragic deaths whether or not it was claimed to be satire. When krellin went over the line, he was silenced. We had our disagreements but since then he saw that we were trying to maintain the integrity of the site, that we are being consistent and has said so in the forum. When Putin attacked krellin and his family in a thread where krellin was celebrating a new job, I told Putin that was not acceptable and asked him to change that, but he believed that I was singling him out, then he went from thread to thread to complain that special rules were being applied to him despite being asked to discuss his issues and concerns in the mod emails. When ssorenn attacked members, I PMed him to ask him to stop or dial it back, and he knows that I am willing to silence him if he doesn’t stop when he’s asked. Some of these behaviors have existed for years and cannot be changed overnight, but people should be willing to listen and try to modify their behaviors. I am sorry if some of you think it is okay for mapleleaf to make fun of tragic shootings or 9-11, but it isn’t for me. I silenced him each time he did it. If there is another Diplomacy gaming site that would allow that kind of stuff, then I would like to know which site that is and see how they maintain a strong active user base and have such a forum. Show me that it can be done and I will see what we can do to make it work here on our site.

In my opinion, we cannot have a gaming forum where anything and everything is acceptable and have an excellent gaming site at the same time. If Kestas and I have to choose one or the other, we would choose the latter each and every time, and I believe so would the vast majority of our members. The mod team and I are not advocating for a game-only forum, but we are advocating for a forum where people are free to discuss and disagree with each other and where we are free to express ourselves, but not a forum where people can continually abuse community members, which also includes volunteers, the moderators, and spew whatever vitriol that comes to their mind. This has to be a forum where members can feel safe to speak up and have some reasonable expectation of respect. Respect should be the norm, not the exception. And in the last few months, in addition to the site development, that’s what the mods and I have tried to do. Have we been perfect? Hell no. We have made mistakes. However, we have tried to be consistent with what we think is reasonable, and when members have crossed that line, we have informed them in the forum and through PMs or emails and we have asked them to modify their behaviors. Moreover, to keep the unnecessary forum drama down, we have also asked members to email us with concerns and disagreements (a fairly standard practice on gaming sites). We are still learning how to do that well.

The short and long of this is that we are a gaming site and we are aiming to bring the best online Diplomacy gaming experience that we can. That is our philosophy.

zultar
Co-Owner