Hi all
I have a couple of issues on my mind that I find a bit disconcerting.Yesterday as usual, I logged into the forums only to find that several are now inaccessible (specifically the ban appeals forums)
As staff on a reasonably busy channel,I regularly monitored them for a few reasons,to keep abreast of network policy in action,to be informed of various area bans (countries that are blocked for spam and abuse e.g.)and to keep an eye out for any users that may potentially cause issues in our channel. The move to put them all behind "closed doors" just feels wrong, as I think everyone should be able to keep informed of what is happening on the network.It also concerns me (and to a greater extent) that i saw no announcement, no forum post, no news post informing anyone of this or explaining the reasoning behind it or allowing feedback.
I also find occasionally that features I am used to just vanish or change, again without notice.An example of this would be the !topic command (to post the channel topic to the channel) I find out after the fact and by happening to read someone else's conversation somewhere, that it was annoying and removed.Well I happened to use that feature a fair bit and have done so for years (we have a daily schedule of several live shows, I used it as a convenient way to announce what show is up next when asked).Now grant it this is a small thing, however a more suitable solution than just removing it could have been found (such as limiting it to channel operators if that's possible) again what bothered me is that i had to find out "accidentally"
Of course I realize that the network staff are doing what they think is best and I'm not implying that every small thing ought to be open for debate, I just feel perhaps an eye should be kept out to prevent changes in policy and mechanics from seeming arbitrary
Thanks for your time
DAK
Chan Admin #CNETFans