Annoying members: How do you deal with them?

[MagnusB]

I have a member on my site that really pushes my buttons. This weekend he got the idea that he would be a great staff member and is nagging me about it. I was being polite, and diplomatic and said no, but if he had something to contribute he should feel free to do so. Then he changed both his username and his custom title to something ridiculous, and has started posting allot of random posts.

I don't really mind the random posts, cause he keeps them in the offtopic forum which are for the random posts, and it keeps discussion going. But what really annoyed me was the fact that he put up a poll, asking if he should be on staff. I also suspect that some of the "dead" referral links I see (from forum posts that have been deleted) are from him as well. I really don't know how to deal, but right about now the discouraged link is very tempting, but at the same time, he creates activity on the site, even though it is mostly random..

 

[Slavik]

Pretty much like this

 

[MagnusB]

lol

I was thinking about that, but I don't want to ban people for annoying me personally, even though it is tempting. I am thinking discouraging is a better tool for that..

 

[DBA]

I've actually had a member (kid) that acted very similar to this guy, with the exception of the staff stuff. He'd troll a lot of the other members and just be an all around @%#$. However most members (including me) actually sort of like the guy, which complicated things. I ended up sending him a couple warnings and finally I set it up that you go into the penalty box (user discouragement) after so many warning points. After being in it for a day he changed his attitude. 10-20 second page loads aren't fun. Lol

Regarding the staff poll, I'd have deleted that right away.

 

[Digital Doctor]

http://xenforo.com/help/discouraging-banning/

 

[MagnusB]

However most members (including me) actually sort of like the guy, which complicated things. I ended up sending him a couple warnings and finally I set it up that you go into the penalty box (user discouragement) after so many warning points. After being in it for a day he changed his attitude. 10-20 second page loads aren't fun. Lol

Regarding the staff poll, I'd have deleted that right away.

Yeah, that is what I am thinking as well. I don't know how my members are reacting to it, if they are annoyed they hide it well. The poll was deleted pretty quick, which is probably the part that was really annoying me... Maybe I should start using the warning system more often

 

[Adam Howard]

Socially Uncensored is an uncensored community that allows people the unrestricted freedom of information and freedom of speech. This is what attracts people to our community & what I feel separates us from the majority on the world wide web.

However..... We had a large vocal (annoying) group of people join from a site known as Thoughts.com (don't go there & advertise your site, you'll be sorry) and their goal seemed less to be active members and more to be people who would complain about everything. Having a vocal group of people troll your site, claiming that the place sucks and that the site and staff shouldn't be trusted, doesn't encourage new members to join.

But telling them to cut the sh*t out and preventing them from trashing the place, which can be wrongfully viewed and twisted as a form of censorship; when your site is supposed to be uncensored, also does not encourage people to join.

Rock <<<---- ME ---->>> Hard place

 

[Isil`Zha]

http://xenforo.com/help/discouraging-banning/

haha, that Discouragement feature is pure win.

 

[Lord Squishy]

Socially Uncensored is an uncensored community that allows people the unrestricted freedom of information and freedom of speech. This is what attracts people to our community & what I feel separates us from the majority on the world wide web.

However..... We had a large vocal (annoying) group of people join from a site known as Thoughts.com (don't go there & advertise your site, you'll be sorry) and their goal seemed less to be active members and more to be people who would complain about everything. Having a vocal group of people troll your site, claiming that the place sucks and that the site and staff shouldn't be trusted, doesn't encourage new members to join.

But telling them to cut the sh*t out and preventing them from trashing the place, which can be wrongfully viewed and twisted as a form of censorship; when your site is supposed to be uncensored, also does not encourage people to join.

Rock <<<---- ME ---->>> Hard place

Why don't you just convince your readership that those people are wrong and you are right? Isn't that how freedom of speech is supposed to work? The best antidote to bad speech is more speech?

 

[Adam Howard]

Why don't you just convince your readership that those people are wrong and you are right? Isn't that how freedom of speech is supposed to work? The best antidote to bad speech is more speech?

Not always as easy.

At the time, they would go about posting and telling anyone that there was no privacy on the site and that we were reading people's personal conversations. At the time, that wasn't true, but proving that isn't so easy. It places doubt and mistrust.

We later were forced to install a modification that allowed us to do just that, because there was a debate over who was spamming people in private or not. And when it was known that we finally did have that option... It was kind of like a "I told you so from the start" thing.

There was also false claims that we were selling people's info for spam. Which of course wasn't true, but how do you prove that?

There is also the false claim that our site has hidden spyware, which we proved isn't true; but that always leaves that underline fear and doubt. Most guest even read that title and leave. Why take the chance?

And of course we'd argue the point, but that only drew more attention to it and if we removed or locked it, that only brought up the argument that we were not uncensored. And banning those people also only added fire to that idea, that we were censoring people and perhaps had something to hide.

Rock <<<---- ME ---->>> Hard place

EDIT: Of course it is worth noting that today, we no longer put up with that kind of sh*t. And I personally rather remove X user from the site than allow someone to continue such degrading bullsh*t. And I rather deal with the fallout from doing so.

Live and learn.

 

[Forsaken]

Socially Uncensored is an uncensored community that allows people the unrestricted freedom of information and freedom of speech. This is what attracts people to our community & what I feel separates us from the majority on the world wide web.

However..... We had a large vocal (annoying) group of people join from a site known as Thoughts.com (don't go there & advertise your site, you'll be sorry) and their goal seemed less to be active members and more to be people who would complain about everything. Having a vocal group of people troll your site, claiming that the place sucks and that the site and staff shouldn't be trusted, doesn't encourage new members to join.

But telling them to cut the sh*t out and preventing them from trashing the place, which can be wrongfully viewed and twisted as a form of censorship; when your site is supposed to be uncensored, also does not encourage people to join.

Rock <<<---- ME ---->>> Hard place

Be an ******* and troll them back .

I had a similar issue, though my competitor would send script kiddies and wannabe hackers to our forums to threaten us, and try to lower our reputation by releasing malicious programs (It was a bot development site for Battle.net). Once they learned that I'm a bigger ******* than they were, and that their threats couldn't scare me they lost interest.

 

[dojo]

I don't like people going rogue on my forums, so this warrants a perma-ban. Don't allow them to change usernames, this should be 1. not permitted and 2. even if permitted, done by YOU only. Otherwise, if people changed names often, no one would know who they're talking to. Such behaviour is not OK, so ban him and get rid of such a trouble maker.

 

[Ranger375]

Discourage them and redirect them to your competitor's site

 

[MagnusB]

I don't like people going rogue on my forums, so this warrants a perma-ban. Don't allow them to change usernames, this should be 1. not permitted and 2. even if permitted, done by YOU only. Otherwise, if people changed names often, no one would know who they're talking to. Such behaviour is not OK, so ban him and get rid of such a trouble maker.

I allow username changes, maximum up to five. I don't care too much about username changes, but I know when it goes unchecked, it goes wild. Five changes should stop most people for re registering due to small changes. It also frees me from the typo correcting. I much prefer this over having one person having multiple accounts.

Discourage them and redirect them to your competitor's site

I am tempted, but again, I don't really know if it is mostly me that is annoyed by him, and not my members. Also, he actually stays active, and meets and greets new people, so it isn't all bad. He just annoyed me a bit too much lately.

 

[dieketzer]

i couldnt care less if somebody starts a poll asking about moderatorship or changes their name or whatnot. why would i?
just yesterday somebody started a thread suggesting i should resign as admin. i care so much i havent even replied to the thread, let alone sent a pm or moderated it in some way. i think its better to remain detached from the drama bait and let the members reply in my stead. if i am doing an ok job they will make it known.