There is an admin log, visible to all admins. And we discuss the actions of other admins amongst ourselves to keep accountability. Some actions do get overturned during that process.

Once you ban everybody, the server becomes peaceful and tranquil, right?

But seriously - I don't really care where or for what or how KGS admins ban at the moment.
What I am arguing for here is that when a ban does happen, at least these two things should be made clear to the offender:

• what exactly is he punished for (I think this already does happen), and
• what exactly is his punishment (which certainly involves the duration of the ban)

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

IMHO, it is better to think of banning, not in terms of crime and punishment, but in terms of preserving a certain decorum, a certain atmosphere. If you are a host and a guest is spoiling the party for other guests, you ask him or her to leave. If you are a guest and the host asks you to leave, you do. There is no trial or question about whether the punishment fits the crime.

That said, I do not see the point of indefinite bans. How do they help preserve decorum? They increase the frustration of the person who is banned, but what good does that do? It may even be counterproductive.

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The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

Reason and duration seem good.

The actual admin probably should not be disclosed for reasons already stated.

I am fortunate never to have been banned on a go server, but likely that is because I just play or watch without kibitzing. What are the most common reasons for banning?

1) From what I know the duration of the ban is omitted on purpose, to make the whole thing more annoying to the banned person. I won't cite sources, sorry.

2) Again from what I know, admins may be able to see which other admins banned whom, but will usually not speak up against other admins or to wms. Admins considered "nice admins" will also omit that topic when users ask them about "nasty admins" (not based on personal experience, but from what a nice person on KGS told me when attempting to bring this up). Last but not least, wms will ignore this topic too if it is brought to his attention (but he is a nice guy in general, it's simply that he ignores most topics by default, like a stone buddha).

3) An admin who needs to prevent revealing to a user that he/she is the one responsible for a specific ban is not cut out for a professional admin job, but I guess it works acceptably well for one or two "special" KGS admins (along the large number of decent KGS admins) who are actually hated by a lot of people for reasons.

4) mw42, if you want a shot at finding out who banned you, you should review the specific game in which you made that sexist remark and check the comments written in it as some admins will participate in commenting or write something along the lines "good game, thanks both players" in the end.

5) Handicap stones are for women, and also for men, if the strength between the players differs. :-p

Firstly admin jobs aren't professional, they are volunteers. Also as was already noted in the thread, harassment and stalking is a serious issue. Other than that I agree with most of what you say.

#1 far and away is abuse directed toward an another user (usually making abusive remarks toward an opponent, or harassing another user via PM).

Distant second is inappropriate comments (swearing/sexual innuendo/etc) - though honestly this is a bit hazy, because often people are banned for "swearing" when that swearing was also a form of abuse directed at a single user.

If you want to lump inappropriate usernames in with inappropriate comments, then those reasons above account for about 2/3 of all bans.

After that you have a potpourri of other little reasons (Flooding, "Trolling", Refusing to properly score a game, etc).

Don't forget about "non-game related" kibitz when an admin tells you to focus on the game.

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be immersed

Any person who feels that he or she has been banned without cause can write to admin@gokgs.com and the matter will be investigated. In most cases, the exact wording will be provided to the complainant (provided that he or she was the person banned, not a third party -- note that some exceptions are made for parents of children who were banned).

KGS policy is not to identify the length of the ban period, so this information is not provided.

I would have to agree with others that the main purpose of a ban is to improve a situation for KGS and it's users. The banned person is also one of the users, and in most cases, one who we expect will return to enjoy the server. It would seem to me that by not informing him or her of the extent of the punishment, KGS is adding an element of cruelty to the already irksome situation of not being allowed to play. By so doing, KGS runs the risk of creating animosity where there may have been none before. What is the advantage to this policy?

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Patience, grasshopper.

Trouble maker.

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- Brady
Want to see videos of low-dan mistakes and what to learn from them? Brady's Blunders

To be honest, I don't see anything cruel about a person not being told about the length of a ban period. If a person has broken the rules, then the person isn't allowed to use the server for a period of time. One goal is that the person will realise that misbehaviour is counter-productive and will therefore not repeat the inappropriate behaviour.

Maybe at least a "minimum ban time" should be told the banee: at least from keeping him from checking every 30 minutes if he can log in. It may prevent him from creating new accounts, too...

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Geek of all trades, master of none: the motto for my blog mostlymaths.net

Far out.


I see, so not telling the bannee (is that a word?) the length of his (or her) "sentence" is a means of making the punishment more severe in order to prevent future misbehaviour. Have I understood this correctly?

If so, then I don't see how you have addressed the argument that this practise may cause more resentment than is necessary and thus add to a poisonous social atmosphere in KGS. (Which clearly is something to be avoided, right?)

A hypothesis (I don't even know if I believe it): tell a troublemaker* that they have a 2 hour ban, and there's a good chance that they'll log back in right at two hours. They'll have been stewing and they'll have a hot head. They make trouble again.

Give them an indeterminate ban, and they can't just wait it out and log in that second. They go off and do something else, and eventually they log back in. Hopefully they've cooled off.

* Not you, lovely people. You just got banned once because you said something silly and got out of hand. I mean the habitual idiots.

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Occupy Babel!

You don't give habitual idiots 2 hour bans for this reason. That they're habitual about indicates your 2 hour bans aren't working. You escalate, with the warning that the next ban within X time will be longer until they cop on.

Actually I expected all bans to be at least 24 hours. If someone can stew for 24 hours, then it's a problem

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Geek of all trades, master of none: the motto for my blog mostlymaths.net

If someone feels wronged they can stew for far longer than 24 hours.

What I see as cruel about the policy of not telling a person how long they are banned (is it an hour, a day, a week?) is that it is a form of psychological torture. Of course this is over-dramatizing, but the point is that you are not just keeping someone from the server, but also causing them pain. If you don't recognize this, try imagining the difference of being for example stuck in an elevator when you know that the repairman will be there in half an hour or if you don't know when you will get out. Adding this element to the punishment seems counter-productive, because the reaction to expect is that the person will become more angry at KGS and less likely to view the punishment as just. Who benefits by this? I realize what the purpose of a punishment is, but I don't understand why KGS feels it's not enough to tell a troublemaker that they have lost the privilege of playing on the server for a certain period of time. What extra benefit does KGS gain by this double-punishment?

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Patience, grasshopper.