Recent Mishaps, Signature/Avatar changing and the like.

[Falsetto]

Hello everyone here at Nation,

For everyone who isn't aware, things went a bit awry yesterday. And it has something to do with either Beiber or Dragons.

To be exact it came to our knowledge that Hiccup had gotten a hold of Phunkie's account yesterday, and was making posts impersonating him; as well as using the abilities of a moderator to edit and modify certain parts of the forum. This includes the fact that he was changing people's signatures and avatars while illegally using a staff members account. Though it also came to our attention that Phunkie was switching accounts for a day just for the fun of it. Unfortunately it is absolutely not allowed for regular members to have access to a staff account; and Phunkie also failed to tell us. We've had to have had certain internal discussions dealing with this, and mainly I just wanted to convey this to all of you.

For anyone that was effected by this, I want to give my utmost apologies. While we won't be able to change the avatar's and signature's back, Hiccup has been banned as a result. Phunkie and Hiccup are close friends, and sometimes things like this happen, where we have access to things we definitely shouldn't... Needless to say never share your accounts with anyone, even if you think it is all fun. Because if anything is to happen, even while someone else is using it, YOU will be responsible. Please take this to heart, and I apologize once again for the inconvenience this caused all of you. If there is any problems or issues, feel free to PM me.

-Fal

Edit:I just want to let everyone know that Phunkie fully understands the mistake he has made, and had no bad intent by his little switcheroo. He stated that he understood if he had to be put on some sort of probation, which is under discussion now. Phunkie has been a wonderful moderator to everyone though, and we all make mistakes sometimes. I do not find that punishing him would prove much a point.

[TA]

Wow... I didn't expect that.

[Lycant]

HE'S GONE NOW!? D;

Poor Bwad!
Can't suspend him for like 2 months?
:T_T:

[Ruquion]

A perma ban for something of this sort sounds pretty extreme, IMO...

[Falsetto]

He is banned for a week, not permanently. Though that was the original complication before we had known it was Phunkie's idea.

[TA]

After getting banned like 2390432x, this results in a week ban?

That's not even remotely harsh enough imo.

I have nothing against him, but for something like this it should at least be like a 3 month ban.

[Trevor]

After getting banned like 2390432x, this results in a week ban?

That's not even remotely harsh enough imo.

I have nothing against him, but for something like this it should at least be like a 3 month ban.

I totally agree with this. I think he should have a longer ban and I don't have anything against him

[Falsetto]

This is mainly Phunkie's responsibility, as he had given permission to Brad to do most of these things. It is at this point that he is banned simply for the bad judgment on his part accepting the use of a moderators account. I am well aware the fact that he has been banned before, which is why I had no problems with a perma-ban before I was aware of the whole story.

[abc33kr]

*checks my sig.

i hope nothing changed to my profile...

[Moppy]

*checks my sig.

i hope nothing changed to my profile...

Super Mods can only change sigs, profile pictures, rep messages and avatars. Birthdays, passwords, game info and other stuff can't be changed by us.

[Cannibal]

I love Brad, but really? I understand Phunkie's part in it, but I honestly feel that if it were anyone else, we wouldn't be seeing that person around here by now.

[Hitaki]

Like Saani said, Brad's cool with me, but seriously. I would totally bring up a certain case that happened earlier these past months, but I bet the staff is pretty much sick of me bringing it up.

[Science]

My poor sig is still Beaverfied D8

HEY MOP WANNA DO ME A FAVOR?

/too lazy to change it myself

[Byte]

Like Saani said, Brad's cool with me, but seriously. I would totally bring up a certain case that happened earlier these past months, but I bet the staff is pretty much sick of me bringing it up.

Well... I know I am.


My poor sig is still Beaverfied D8

HEY MOP WANNA DO ME A FAVOR?

/too lazy to change it myself

Poor Panda... :[

[Moppy]

My poor sig is still Beaverfied D8

HEY MOP WANNA DO ME A FAVOR?

/too lazy to change it myself

Nope.

[Science]

Dammet :c And I thought we were bonding yesterday </3

[BobYoMeowMeow]

A perma ban for something of this sort sounds pretty extreme, IMO...

Not at all
it's very light for all the years Brad ran his mouth over in the forums.

[Compass]

How many times will Brad be banned before he's perma-banned?
I agree with what Saani says and Brad got it way to easy.
but whatever. :/

[Trevor]

"No impersonating any other person on MabiNation."

Wouldn't this apply against brad anyways or no?

[Falsetto]

While I'm not too keen on discussion banning matters publicity on the forums, rest assured there is little left for Brad to stand on.

I'm pretty sure every single person on the staff can vouch for that. I've already taken a beating for being so nice and forgiving.

[Arsik]

I say no, and here's my argument:

If Brad is to be permabanned, then to be fair to him, then we have to demote Phunkie, at the least, since they are equally at fault here. Brad has only been banned once well technically twice, but one of those bans wasn't officially sanctioned by the staff, so it doesn't count, and that one time was because he requested the ban so that he would leave the site and not have any reason to come back, not because he did anything wrong.

Yes, Brad causes problems, but officially, he only tiptoes on the line of being within the rules and being out of them. But while he was masquerading as Phunkie, he never did anything without Phunkie's say so. Yes, Brad did use Phunkie's account and abused the powers, and yes, both parties should have known that they shouldn't have done what they done. But honestly, did anyone really notice that Brad was Phunkie until everyone got themselves a Bieber signature?

So basically what I'm saying is: If you want Brad permabanned, then you also are requesting that Phunkie should be demoted and banned as well, since it also states in the rules that "any actions that occur while someone else is using your account is your responsibility." Even though we all know it was Brad who did it, officially, it was Phunkie who changed all of your signatures, banned one member as a joke and banned one of Phunkie's alt accounts. And honestly, the two reasons as to why these guys are in trouble is because of a regular member having access to things he's not allowed to have by having a staff member give it to him, and because he also gave out some unreasonable infractions, which while Brad probably didn't know, but each infraction leads up to a person getting banned passively. So really, if Brad didn't infract or ban someone, there really wouldn't have been a problem, since there's a certain admin known for changing other people's signatures for fun.

/coughs

[Byte]

What a great cough that was Arsik. :)

[Phunkie]

I think it's time for a public apology.

I'm sorry about what happened yesterday. It was just good fun that got out of hand rather quickly. I've seen people switch accounts here before, so I didn't think it could be so horrible. Indeed I am a moderator, so I forgot this role-switching fun could've posed some trouble and I was irresponsible for letting it go on so far.

I did wrong. Brad did wrong.

I shouldn't have lent him my account for that day. He shouldn't have gone infraction-crazy, nor edited your signatures and whatnot. If you want to blame him, please blame me as well for letting this circus go on in the first place.

Also, I write this message to you because I feel like you all have the wrong idea of him. In fact, I've seen it over and over again and it bothers me slightly.

I know I am not in the position to speak, but he isn't the bad person you all believe him to be. Well, how do you know, Phunkie?, you may ask, but please listen to me for a second.

He's reported quite a few posts in the past. His reasons: this should be locked, this thread has been dead for awhile, this guy's being a little rude...

A person who has no care whatsoever for the rules or for a silly forum doesn't care about necro'ed threads or slight flaming.

And didn't we slightly antagonize the Bieber-head for the longest when he changed his name to Bieber? EWBIEBER or GTHOBIEBER, tell me you didn't see these remarks around the forums during that time. It became borderline annoying at one point. I remember even seeing a person post, I'm not gonna listen to you because your name is Bieber.

He is a person who likes to joke around (yes Mozendo, your lips are not ugly!), who has only been banned once (not 2390432 times, Tasha) and who I feel we all resent for no real reason.

Yeah, he's not Jesus, and yeah, he does have trouble with the staff, but I feel like you guys have never really given him a chance.

He's not a bad person.

Didn't he upload that video for Arsik two days ago because our lovable Admin was having trouble uploading it himself? People who don't care don't do favors like that.

They troll. Like Maximus, like Kraken, like all those other people we've banned before for flat-out disrespecting and insulting others.

While I don't agree with the silly infractions he gave out yesterday and the many signatures he changed, I still don't think he's a bad guy. Banning Randomcheese didn't go through without my permission and that lasted for like 1 minute; a joke to which Cheese didn't complain at all. And the Bieber signatures were another joke as well.

Had it not been him, had it been a completely different person, it still would have been someone I completely trust, not some newcomer or stranger. And I'd still vouch for that person, had it been Brad or someone else.

But of course, this won't happen again. And I apologize if our antics freaked you out yesterday.

[MrpewX2]

He didn't edit my sig QQ, I feel left out.

[Kazuni]

Except Brad disregards the staff more than most members, and he doesn't seem to know the boundaries between what is okay and what is not okay.


I do think that a 7 day ban is being light on him, but if he returns, he'll be on his absolute last life.

[Okami]

Except Brad disregards the staff more than most members, and he doesn't seem to know the boundaries between what is okay and what is not okay.


I do think that a 7 day ban is being light on him, but if he returns, he'll be on his absolute last life.

amen

[abc33kr]

Can we turn the wheel of ban to determine how long brad will be banned?

[Hitaki]

Eh, personally I don't think a few people are fit to be staff on the site. As well as my own view of the situation.

Byte is too anxious with his moderating. In the form of a metaphor, he's the type of guy who'd blow his whistle a billion times over a small foul.

Phunkie is a good moderator overall, but he showed in this minor incident that he isn't too serious about how he uses his power.

When you become a moderator, it's a common thing where you have to come to an understanding that you now hold responsibilities. While it is important that you handle your responsibilities carefully and rightfully, that doesn't mean you shouldn't handle them strictly and anxiously. From my perspective, Byte and Phunkie are two sides of a coin. One is good, yet lenient with his powers while the other is haughty and strict with his powers. I'll be honest when I say I like Phunkie and think Byte is a ****.

Now then, I believe that some people can think of a dozen of counter statements to prove me wrong, but hold your wenis, that doesn't mean I'm saying they should be removed from their positions. What I'm saying is that they should learn a thing or two from each other really, and from the rest of the staff as well. Out of all of the current staff members, those two stand out the most to me because of how they deal with situations and use their powers (But I would totally not mind if Phunkie stays as lenient as he is. Too many staff members have to act like tight asses in my opinion).

Moving on to another point as to why neither should surrender their powers nor why Brad deserves to be permanently banned, is because this forum is a rather small forum. Compared to other forums, it is actually around medium size. Since there aren't too many incidents in which people should be punished and etc, that leaves room for the staff to hold less tight of a hold on the forum. The amount of people who post regularly are manageable as it is, so there's no need to enforce more rules. Rather, there never was a need to begin with, and you people kept deciding, "Oh, well this sh*t just happened so I guess we better tighten our hold on them." Well you know, sh*t happens every once in a while and there's no avoiding it. Like what happened right now, it isn't even that big of a deal. Oh damn. My signature has Justin Bieber in it now. I'm going to get Diabetes. It's a joke. Now I'm the kind of person who can't stand it when people joke about me, but I don't want to be a dick and say, "Shut the f*ck up." all the time. I admit I did lose it in that Nation Family thread, but I can't really say I'm sorry about that. I don't like being called a Marill and being the son/daughter of someone I believe is a punk.

Now then, let's compare Brad's status with Jordy's aka Virtue. Virtue's last ban was for his own personal dispute with Fal and their friendship. While there's no point in arguing why it's wrong since Fal is the motherf*cking Queen of this place and doesn't give a sh*t about what I'm going to say to back him up since her word is law in this monarchy, I'll hop off on that. Brad's ban was for taking control of a moderators account and simply changing the signatures of members to have Justin Bieber in it, as well as impersonating a Moderator. Think about which one is more serious. It's obviously Jordy's ban because nobody ain't gonna talk sh*t on our Queen.

Moving on, I really don't have anything more to say. Or at least, I dunno where to pick off from that. I pretty much wanted to take what I thought of this in my mind and drop it in this little post.

[Byte]

As I said before, me and Phunkie should do the Fusion Dance...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0M-aZzPvx3Y&feature=related

[Phunkie]

As I said before, me and Phunkie should do the Fusion Dance...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0M-aZzPvx3Y&feature=related

FUSE WITH ME MOTHAF-

*dances*

Bunkie or Phyte? What's our fused name?

[Science]

Except Brad disregards the staff more than most members, and he doesn't seem to know the boundaries between what is okay and what is not okay.


I do think that a 7 day ban is being light on him, but if he returns, he'll be on his absolute last life.

Don't tell him where we keep the 1UPs ;D

[Byte]

We might get in trouble for copyright due to Bungie... but we can go with Phyte. Sounds like Fight. :D

[Hitaki]

FUSE WITH ME MOTHAF-

*dances*

Bunkie or Phyte? What's our fused name?

Neither of those. You become Phunbyte. Because it's pronounced FUN•BITE.

[abc33kr]

*gets on the derailing bandwagon. :D

[Science]

*gets on the derailing bandwagon. :D

DEM MUDKIPZ.

I HERD U LIEK.

[Phunkie]

Neither of those. You become Phunbyte. Because it's pronounced FUN•BITE.

That's perfect actually. Since our fused form is fun, but can still bite! :awesome:


On a more serious note,


Except Brad disregards the staff more than most members, and he doesn't seem to know the boundaries between what is okay and what is not okay.


I do think that a 7 day ban is being light on him, but if he returns, he'll be on his absolute last life.

We can keep communicating to him when he does wrong.

Look at Emomutt. He's completely different now. But it took a ban and constant reminders to tone him down.

[abc33kr]

weeee.

*so derailing is to forget about this whole incident?

[Science]

Who wants to change my sig back2normalz? :D

[abc33kr]

Who want to change my sig to be bieber-proof?

[Okitaru]

Who wants to make my signature.

[TA]

Well, to hop back on track...

Personally if it were my forum I was running I'd probably give Hiccup a 1-3 month ban and revoke Phunkie's mod status. A 1 week ban doesn't quite say "that was bad" like a 1-3 month ban does. And at the point you get such a length ban, you know the next one isn't going to be a temporary ban. Which is, of course, the kind of message you need to send someone after something this naughty.

When people have to spend such a long time away from a forum they usually visit all day every day, they realize they need to get their act together because being permanently banned would suck. Either that, or they act out while banned with sockpuppet accounts and do get permanbanned. Or, they throw a supreme hissy fit tantrum when they get back, disrespect the staff and actively try to get permabanned just to lash out.

But, in my experience... 1 week never has any results. That's just way too soft. It's barely a minor inconvenience, really.

And while Phunkie may generally be a good mod, on most forums an extremely stupid action like this will do more than lose you your mod powers. I've seen one forum Admin (who founded, ran the site and made it popular) who was partnered with Curse, basically be forced to step down and leave the site after a much less serious incident.

So yeah, this is extremely lenient. I wouldn't have gone this route if it were me personally. But, it's a small site and you run it, so you'll do what you do. I just wanted to share my thoughts on the matter.

Oh and uh... no harsh feelings meant towards anyone referred to above.

[Kazuni]

Who wants to change my sig back2normalz? :D

You can do it yourself.



And @Pika

If you've been getting info about Jordy's ban from Jordy, then you're going to be seeing only one side the whole thing. Yes, I've tried to explain to him why he was banned, but look how well that turned out.

I don't want to explain it for the thousandth time.

Also, since when did taking control of a moderator's account become okay? Yes, you can browse and post and have fun, but abusing the features of a mod account isn't acceptable.




I agree with Tasha on some points.

[Hitaki]

Also, since when did taking control of a moderator's account become okay? Yes, you can browse and post and have fun, but abusing the features of a mod account isn't acceptable.

I never stated it was okay to begin with, just that it's acceptable because of the conditions it was on and the kind of forum this is. Mabination isn't a huge forum where you have daily trolling and flaming to the point where a handbook of rules and regulations is required and that the word is law. As for Jordy's ban, I'd rather be a bro than some stickler.

[Kazuni]

I never stated it was okay to begin with, just that it's acceptable because of the conditions it was on and the kind of forum this is. Mabination isn't a huge forum where you have daily trolling and flaming to the point where a handbook of rules and regulations is required and that the word is law. As for Jordy's ban, I'd rather be a bro than some stickler.

First, there are people complaining about how we deal with things too case-by-case, and now you're saying that we follow too closely to the rules.


We try to be lenient here, but it's difficult to be fair to everyone. If we keep giving chances to one member, then what do we do about the rest? To keep it more fair, we have to stick as close as we can to the basic rules.


And honestly, I think a 1 week ban was far too short. Considering Brad's personality, I find it hard to believe it'll affect him at all.

[Okami]

As for Jordy's ban, I'd rather be a bro than some stickler.

Pikar, just stop while you're ahead.

[Falsetto]

I appreciate everyone's viewpoint, but allow me to be clear.

Brad will be banned for a week, and when he comes back it will take but one tangible offense before it is permanent. That is the way it is, he doesn't need 2 months, 5 months or a year. It's only going to take 7 days for him to get his act together, and that is it. This is not a issue of public discussion. And while everyone's viewpoints matter, this is not an organized way to go about it. These are decisions for the staff and only them. If you have opinions on the matter of bans or any other member related issues, then you need to write a message to an admin. I'm going to close this topic, as it's focus was to apologize and convey our response to the problems. So I thank you all for your activity in the matter.

And let's stop with the Jordy-drama shall we? I'm getting a little tired of the childish pissyfits that he brings.

[Arsik]

I never stated it was okay to begin with, just that it's acceptable because of the conditions it was on and the kind of forum this is. Mabination isn't a huge forum where you have daily trolling and flaming to the point where a handbook of rules and regulations is required and that the word is law. As for Jordy's ban, I'd rather be a bro than some stickler.

Pika, you do realize that a majority of the staff were friends with Jordy, right? Yes, he had a fight with Fal, and he let it spill onto the forums. This, along with his past behavior being kind of dickish towards people he doesn't like got him banned. However, his ego and /b/tardism is preventing him from moving on. I was a neutral party in the fight between Fal and Jordy, and you know what? Jordy blocked me because what I assume is because I wouldn't side with him. Which honestly is kinda funny when I think about it. He gets in a fight with Fal because how she's was being a bad friend because he couldn't always talk to her when he wanted to, and how he thinks Fal doesn't take friendship seriously, and yet he just goes and throws away a good number of friends because he can't let his ego get damaged to see that he drove them away by being stupid and continuing to cause problems, not just for the staff, but for everyone. Hell Pika, where do you think Jordy used to go to get advice for things going on with his life? Up until this year, it certainly as hell wasn't /b/, and he's willingly threw that away because he thinks he deserves an apology. While yes, he does, but he's done so much more damage than Fal has done to him. The entire staff, especially those that were friends with him, are extremely stressed about this issue, and you're not helping matters much.

So I would kindly ask you to stop defending Jordy without knowing the whole story, and stop bringing him up from now on. Just because you want to try to cause chaos on the forums and he's done that while you haven't, doesn't mean you should look up to someone that's /b/tarded. We're trying to forget about the guy, and you keep defending someone that doesn't need defending since he obviously can do it on his own.