[SUGGESTION] Increase moderation for community chat

Sometimes, topics come up that even if they aren't inappropriate, some people may and do still have an issue with it. Or, people make a joke or prank, and a few people who don't understand or detect jokes/sarcasm well (including me) tend to become upset with it and that often leads to misunderstandings. For me, both of these things have recently gotten to the point that I've had to block community chat, and it has upset and annoyed me both personally and in sympathy for anyone else who may also feel this way.

I suggest making it so that if that arises and people don't stop when asked to do so nicely, that it should be punishable with a mute (not a perma mute), or in some worse/frequent cases, a temp ban. Discussions like this need to be moved to group chat, res chat (if on a private residence), into a PM, or stopped once people start getting upset and ask nicely to stop, but there's currently no rule or enforcement requiring it. However, hateful/discriminatory remarks should still be as punishable as they currently are, no matter where they happen.

I would suggest that if this is added, to please add this to the rules list on the wiki and make a front page announcement about it so that people are able to become aware immediately and easily. Also, please, even if you disagree with my suggestion, please don't be rude about it; I know this will probably be a fairly touchy suggestion, but rudeness is unacceptable and the opposite of what I'm looking for.

It already enforced when staff are online. Just take a screenshot and post the link in /report if no staff are present when someone is being disrespectful or is breaking chat rules.

EDIT: Here is when they announced it: https://empireminecraft.com/threads/rules-update-to-chat-limits.69506/

I wasn't aware of that. Thanks for letting me know. That explains why some people get away with certain things that annoy me but that I thought weren't against the rules where there aren't staff present, but are more quiet about it when there are. I'll try to decide which staff members to PM about it if this happens again while all in-game staff are on stage and/or hosting an event (or if there are none), since some are more active and not all can fit into one convo.

I have a question
Can you please specify in the chat that bugs you? I will be able to give more helpful feedback after knowing the kind of chat you are talking about

I didn't screenshot the chat in particular if that's what you're asking for. If you're asking me to ask them nicely to stop, the thing is, I did, and I only think it should be punishable if they don't stop then.

Ok I mean is the chat bugging you like people in the wild who aren’t using group or local chat? Or is it people who are just talking random stuff?

The latter, I know for sure. I'm not sure whether any of it is the former, and if so, how much, but I'm out in the wild over 99% of the time I'm in-game, and I use group chat or PMs to discuss things like that with MPO members and neighboring outposts because:

1. it might be something we don't want certain people to see.
2. I know it's annoying for others when they have to see stuff like that in an SMP-wide chat channel, or even supporter chat.
3. EDIT: I would personally be annoyed by people who were doing that too, and I try not to be a hypocrite.

If players in chat are not breaking the rules, why should they have to take their conversation to PMs just because someone else doesn't want to see it? It's called community chat for a reason. If you don't like what players are saying then /ignore them. Players should not have to take conversations to a different channel or PMs because someone doesn't like the conversation.

-1.

Ok
I believe that sometimes it is rather annoying to have people talking in global when it should be local, but some people do not know that. If it is just people talking or catching up I feel that it is fine. It is a case by case basis, but if it really bugs you just move to smp3 . We are quiet!
-1

I see this being very abused by players attempting to get other players they may not like muted or temp banned.
PS the 2 of us that suggested the convo should change only stated it as a suggestion not that it needed to.
nothing stops a player from interjecting and changing the topic when you dont like the convo in c chat which is what I do all the time. as a mater of fact i did it earlyer on 8 today changed the convo from one subject to about a potato needing to have mending on it

I do understand that, but if people are clearly abusing it, that could be made bannable too and the people affected (if still under the mute or ban) could be unmuted or unbanned early. Also, I understand that nothing completely stops someone from changing the topic or staying on topic without actually using force, but it has been kind of out of control the past few days (as far as I've noticed), and making it against the rules would still reduce the number of players who would in the first place. Someone once said that not everyone is ever going to be good, and not everyone is ever going to be bad, but that whether it's OK to do something or not will still affect the behavior of some people.

I'm not trying to change your mind or say that it necessarily is a good or a bad idea, though. Everything has its pros and cons.

or it would just make way more work for staff and more banned and muted players just turning people away from emc. or making people afraid to talk in chat. im not saying this is bad compleatly but this is one of those fine line things where you go a sliver on the wrong side and it posib could have devastating effects in the end

My own thoughts:
From what I can gather, you're asking for greater moderation of topics in chat that annoy you but don't necessarily break the rules. That would be really problematic because it would see a leap of moderation actions targetted towards events far beyond those commonly accepted to be bad for the community. Can you imagine if staff started muting/banning people at the behest of every player's subjective interpretation of a joke or conversation (which you say is sometimes even due to misinterpretation). While I know it can be frustrating to be ignored or be upset, staff aren't going to mute people or compel them to switch channels if their chat isn't inappropriate/against the rules/etc. Your suggestion might be better suited as a modification of the rules to encompass the issues that inspired this, but even then, my personal view is that if those aren't already against the rules, they don't need to be.

I typically steer clear of these types of situations. There are things that make chats weird, awkward, or just uninteresting to others. I have one of the strangest senses of humors.....Sometimes, people don't know if I am joking. But being me, I am very very rarely if ever, rude blatantly to any player. I get that everyone wants to discuss topics in CC and that is fine. Hence it's community chat, so therefor, unless it is market related, we can't really ask them to move to another channel just because we don't like the subject they are discussing. I had this occur once with a mod. We were discussing migraines....and how they affected us. Apparently some didn't like that we were using Town chat at the moment. So out of respect for them we took it to private. But we didn't have to as we weren't really breaking any rules. If something is that bad that you feel it needs to be moved to another chat, perhaps ignoring would be more sufficient. I always want the players of EMC to feel comfortable and safe. And a lot of topics I have seen are pretty funny. To others I understand they may not find it humorous. But lets say I am talking about trees which I am really passionate about in RL as well as in game, and someone decides well Im sick of Skitzie talking about Trees, and reports me and I get temp muted? How is that fair? I wasn't breaking any rules. But I annoyed someone with my topic. There really aren't any pros to this unless, they are breaking chat rules. So I give a -1. I see people getting muted and temp banned for no reason other than someone else didn't like the content of their chat. But I still love ya as a friend We3 even though we may disagree

Isn't /ignore a thing?

Question: did you tell those players that it might be better to use local chat (residence, local or group)? Or did you just get upset about the whole thing and then started to ignore it?

You see: you don't need staff for this I think. Just start by telling those players "Gee, sorry guys but could you take this to local chat please? It's getting a bit spammy". Just be friendly, and see what happens next. Sure, no guarantees but at least they will know that they're bothering someone. Most will then act to that.

OR... it may attract more players who feel the same way. "Yeah, please use local chat guys!".

That's what I've seen happening a few times. As such my counter question: what else other than ignoring did you do?

Speaking of which: if it's only a few players you can also easily /ignore them. A friend of mine on SMP4 got a bit annoyed with (at that time) town chat and also mentioned this, only to get ignored. So then they simply ignored the whole bunch and... the problems were over.

I'm definitely not in favor of that because it'll only be a matter of time before that system gets abused.

How long before a group of players bands together to troll / annoy another by claiming that their chatter is "unappreciated"? We have rules for that, and I don't think we need more.

And just because you don't like certain chatter doesn't mean that also applies to others. Quite frankly I'd rather see an active community chat than a dead one. Even if I don't really care about the topic.

There's also something as live and let live. As said: just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's also actually annoying or such. Instead of ignoring (or opposing), why not try to join the chat?

I've used /ignore. Also, if the issue arises again, I will ask them nicely to take it to a different channel, and if they don't, just /ignore some of the players involved and block community chat.

Why must you ask them to stop? Community chat is for the COMMUNITY to talk!

I don't feel there's enough problems for this to happen, BUT... It would make us peasant members staff... So...

It's a -1 from me.

Whatever the work is for the mods doesn't matter, it's the fact that at that point, as Alex said, you are getting into the subjective part of what people are saying. What many people consider a harmless joke, one person might not appreciate, and while that one person might not appreciate it, muting the person based on that one person disliking the joke is not appropriate, especially if the joke was not something against the rules. All that would do is make people afraid to chat, and cause more friction between player and staff (and believe me, there is enough of that already). It appears you have found a solution already. You are welcome to hide (and unhide) community chat at any given point in time, and are able to /ignore and /unignore players at any point in time.

I hope you find some balance with this and that it doesn't hinder the fun you can have on EMC. Some annoying chats should not ruin your day, but as always, if you ever think something might be too much, even if you're not sure, please feel free to /report. If there's any misunderstandings, the staff are happy to clear up the discrepancies.