[nige1]

Vampyr, on 2013-May-31, 10:04, said:

Seriously? Can't civil behaviour be assumed, and penalised without having signed a contract?

If you made Vampyr's assumption, you would have been disappointed, in practice
Frankant hopes behaviour might improve if people signed up to what is expected of them

[barmar]

This discussion is all well and good, but the real problem is how are we supposed to enforce it? We have 10's of thousands of users online every day, and a small handful of yellows and CS people to monitor them. We'll take steps to ban people for repeated, eggregious behavior, but it's not feasible for us to deal with everyone who calls their partner an "idjit".

[Scarabin]

Perhaps frankant is suggesting that a publicized statement of a zero tolerance policy and a stated will to enforce it (coupled perhaps with encouragement to report abuse) might decrease abusive behaviour. Since sanctions are rightly private it is all too easy to feel no one ever is reproved for abuse, and most of us come from cultures which discourage snitching.

[ronniem]

My wife and I have been playing on this wonderful forum since, I think, 2007. After BBO mobile downloads have been enabled, we have become even keener participants. We have learnt a lot but, with Bridge, the learning never ends!

In the last 1 year, I notice that the abuse being spewed over this forum has become practically unbearable. Often they are ethic, religious and nationality based and, frequently, my wife and I have thought of exiting this forum permanently. I realise how difficult it is for BBO to monitor ALL chats and take appropriate measures but I would to offer a suggestion which BBOu may or may not have looked at earlier.

The organisation I used to work for had a system of monitoring specific words and swooping on employee if any of those words were found in our email following which we would be warned of dire consequences. This was NOT done manually; but once an electronic flag was raised, the follow up by checking that flagged email was done manually. Actually, after the warning was sent out, the firm had to deal with very,very few cases anyway. I do not know the technicalities involved but a similar system with the threat of a ban for initially, say a month followed by a permanent one for a second offence will suffice. The offenders ID could be publicised so that other players can mark that ID as an enemy if they so wish. Once the system is enabled, BBO can post a warning of the consequences alerting all of the need to follow BBO's published guidelines of behaviour on the forum. I appreciate that any banned player will probably simply create a new registration for free and carries on. Perhaps BBO can think of a way to control that as well - I don't have any suggestion on that. I suggest BBO could be in danger of legal consequences if a few miscreants continue their vile abuse on the forum without adequate control.

I think a lot of players need help to keep this forum something which we can all enjoy.

[PhilKing]

Forum?

[ronniem]

I meant BBO in the last paragraph and not this forum.

[TylerE]

I prefer to not live in a police state, personally.

[RunemPard]

I reject any idea of zero tolerance on BBO...

[barmar]

RunemPard, on 2013-June-13, 04:51, said:

I reject any idea of zero tolerance on BBO...

Are you saying you'd have zero tolerance for it?

[RunemPard]

barmar, on 2013-June-13, 09:05, said:

Are you saying you'd have zero tolerance for it?

Why didn't I think of that...it appears I took the finesse rather than the squeeze...