Bring Playmaker back ?

Playmaker has been an insolent at times rambuncious dude, but he has contributed to the Lenovo forum, creating the FAQ thread, the deals thread, clean install etc.
He has recently been banned.
Would you like him back ?

Mod: Please dont move the thread, as playmaker's contributions were mainly in this forum, and since only the Lenovo FAQs etc will be hit.

 

I have been banned from a board before (jokes are hard to make in cyberspace doh) and I learned from it that talking on the internet is different from meatspace. It turns out that was a timesaver since I didn't waste time on that board anymore. I think that for all that Playmaker contributed, he should have received warnings (did he get one?) but not a ban. However, there is the chance he may benefit, in a way, from moving on.

 

I think he rightly deserved a ban since he became increasingly insulting towards other members, especially new ones who had valid concerns/questions regarding the thinkpads. Instead of genuinely trying to help them, he would resort to name calling and act like some kind of a self-appointed moderator. Sad part is that some of his sidekicks also started bashing other members like him so kudos to the mods that put a stop to this before it got worse.

Im sure he had knowledge regarding the thinkpads but this forum is not owned/operated by him and he shouldn't have acted like he could insult anyone and get away with it. A lot of times I have seen other members asking him to back off with the insulting attitude but he never listened. Hopefully he will learn from this and have a more positive attitude than before.

 

huh? what th hell is going on?

 

soap opera.

 

well there arent many knowledgeable people on this board. at least with him questions are answered

 

Regardless of how much knowledge he may have he is extremely arrogant and is the perfect mirror of the so-called internet warrior. I have obviously offended him as well as Sideswipe by asking them to be more respectful of other members. This is what I honestly feel and do not care if that makes people think I am a troublemaker. I think many people don't dare to interfere as they are afraid of all the other internet warriors coming out for their rescure. I really cannot respect people with 100 ton of built-in anger that they just need to let out on the internet. Work with yourself - don't take it out on others who do not deserve it.
Could I have told them in a different manner? Probably. But I think people should communicate to others in a decent manner. If they do not I get upset and I know I am not the only one. People come to these boards to ask for questions or help others. There may be some stupid questions every now and then but that doesn't give some people the right to start flaming them and acting like jerks.
Having written 1000000 posts and helped 5000 people still doesn't give you the right to treat people badly.
For those of you who do not know how obnoxious and rude Playmaker could be, here are some examples from the 3 mails he sent me via PM:

"Excuse me, but who the f*ck are you to come scolding me about my activity on NBR? You just showed up! I've made more contributions to this board then you ever have with your 5 questions. In fact, look at your sixth post, it seems you have a knack for criticizing members of this board. Maybe when you get half the reps I do, you can confront me in the threads. Until then, you go piss the f*ck off".

"...you are a pain in the ass and until you can give the same kind of help to other ThinkPad owners as I have, you can't even touch me".

"Crawl back into your hole yet, dumbass? Huh?"

Please note that I never responded to him but he still kept writing these mails to me.

 

Yowza, did not know about that.
You know a funny thing ? A few weeks ago, Playmaker made a thread about how someone said something similar to him (in that playmaker was a newbie, had not contributed much etc). And he made a long post on how power goes to ones head etc.
Oh the irony

 

Im sure there will be people who can fill his shoes. It is not as if he was the Lenovo rep or something.

Anyway I dont know him and I dont browse this forum much. However Iv been on numerous hardware forums and the general rule is that if someone doesnt want to get along he can say bye-bye no matter how important he is. Dont see what makes it different in this case.

 

What did he even get banned for? Was it a specific post, or an accumulation of sarcasm?

Frankly, I think his removal from the board hurts the community you guys have here. He's made a ton of helpful contributions to this subforum -- many of which eased my decision to purchase a T61 instead of another Dell laptop, and for that I thank him! I'll agree with you guys that sending whiny-ass abusive PM's is sorta over the line, but a lot of his posts here didn't really seem like too big a deal.

You see a crapload of questions in these forums that could be answered with simple Google searches, and it irritates me everytime I click on that vomit and have to make a mad dash for my back button. Then again, I guess it's a discussion forum and if that's the type of low-brow content the webmasters/administrators want to cater to, it's their perogative.

 

In my opinion:

Yes he has made valued contributions (which I thank him for) but his behavior seems to have become increasingly unacceptable.

Due to his contributions maybe a temp ban is in order but maybe not an outright full ban. However, I cannot support a immediate 'unbanning'.

 

Hover over his REP POWER and you'll see a pretty funny comment.

"Playmaker is really nice"

Haha

 

Playmaker is a very helpful and humane poster and provided a lot of fun, too. This forum seems a bit boring lately without him. Hope he can come back soon to continue helping people and make us laugh

(I still have no clue for what reason he's been banned )

 

I think the world is a better place without him on the NBR boards, personally. He's gone, but questions are still getting answered. It's not like he was the all-knowing guru of the Thinkpad. It also seemed like he was looking for an argument in most threads, insulting and disagreeing with everyone.

 

Arr. I know Playmaker has contributed to this forum. But if someone please tell me why he was banned ????

 

Regardless of PM's occasional moments of acerbity, I for one, very much appreciated the efforts he took to educate and inform on this site.

Speaking personally, as someone who's been here less than a month, I would not presume to influence decisions regarding the banning of members since that's a job, I think, for mods, senior members, etc.

However, I do find it abhorrent when the contents of private emails & IM messages are released and used against a banned member when that member is (obviously) not here to defend him or her self. Such behavior, irrespective of how it's spun for public consumption, smacks of kangaroo court-ism, and is repulsive in the extreme.

 

It is clear even some who agree to have Playmaker banned admit that he made great contributions to this forum. I say let him come back to continue his contributions. Read his posts that are helpful to you, ignore those which you may not like.

(And again, why has he been banned in the first place? )

 

I posted a question he answered it. I'm a newbie here, he never slammed me. He simply answered the question and moved on.

As another poster stated, PMs, IMs and emails should not be brought to a public place where someone cannont defend themselves.

On another note, the messages were thought to be private. I guess my opinion is that since the name calling and such did not occur on the open forums, that he should not be banned for that. Perhaps a temporary ban is more appropriate? But hey what do I know? I don't know all the details and I certainly don't know the truth about what really happened.

Just my two cents.

 

I say bring him back.

He wrote the latest FAQs and he clearly took the time to research everything. He was impatient with noobs who didn't RTFM first, and I suppose that's understandable, but all of us were noobs at one time! He should definitely tone it down a little if he's allowed back, but on the flip side one shouldn't really take online flames too personally.

 

Exactly. 95% of the new posts in this forum are stupid easy questions or rants/opinions. The fact that he was so active doesn't mean he was of any value. And, ya, he typifies the kind of insecure jerk who posts just to see himself post. And, yes, his childish antics ranged from arrogant remarks to some actually very profane insults.

So, really, I'm very sorry you've lost one of your message board buddy, but, there are plenty of people who will step up and get the questions answered....not the least of which is "Search" who's actually been around a long time.

 

My $.02

Sometimes newbies posted a common question, and he would answer and move on. But, sometimes he would go into a flaming tirade about how they should automatically know forum etiquette (maybe he's bipolar). He tried to be an enforcer without the authority to do so. I'm certain he would have been very pleased to have been a moderator, but he was not. I wish I had kept track of the number of new members who never returned after receiving one of his scoldings.

why he got banned:
probably because:

1. He acted like he was a mod. and went way overboard trying to enforce etiquette

2. He was often, but not always, rude and sometimes very rude to other members.

3. He felt that because he had some rep. that it entitled him to act the way he did.

4. He felt completely justified venting his anger anytime it pleased him.

Use the advanced search feature to find posts by him. It will not take long to find many good examples.

 

Internet drama is great.

 

I still don't know what caused the ban of Playmaker. But let me tell you why I'm supporting his coming back. I was also once annoyed by his "mod-like" postings and complained about it. His response to my complaint earned my respect and gratitude. Take a look at the following page and I hope you understand what I mean:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=147569&page=3&highlight=hard+drive

Of course this is not the only place where I find him helpful. Playmaker, thanks for being kind and helpful.

 

Here's one of him being "helpful and courteous" to a noob. well not quite so noob at the time of the writing.


http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=154543

 

I have been on this board for a short period of time, but it didn't take very long to realize that Playmaker went out of his way to ridicule and belittle other posters in an effort to make himself feel good . It's pretty easy to tell that he doesn't have a lot of friends, simply by the way he treats people here. He fits the perfect profile for a Cop.. justifies his existence by throwing around his perceived authority-thinking that people really do like him. Meanwhile,the opposite is usually true (is). I would guess he chased a lot of good people from this site, we will never know. I think people just put up with him because they wanted answers from the other participants and figured they had to. Unfortunately, the bad outweighed the good and his time was up.

For those of you who think that posting those PM's was bush league...I think we all understand that any message we send can be forwarded to others, therefore should not be considered "private and confidential". The fact that he's not here to defend himself is nobody's fault but his own.

I changed my Avatar in remembrance of Playmaker.

 

I rep'd PlayMaker for his great source of discounts and inside scoops on pricing and deals. Heck his research and effort alone helped me order the very laptop I'm eagerly awaiting for today. (And with a sick discount.)

But if there's one thing that should be noted is that he is a hot head. He would publicly berate people in NBR's forums for the weirdest reasons & at the weirdest times. Despite someone's talents and abilities, they must respect the laws that everyone else must abide by. You can't make exceptions for people who do good deeds and turn around and insult you for the questions you ask or the helpful comments you try to make.

Permitting double-standards like that, while it may not always hurt to let it go sometimes, will make you feel victimized the minute you are insulted and the culprit is let go because he/she is a 'helpful' and 'kind' person to others.

 

Johnny is ok in my book.

 

Playmaker was often brash and obnoxious. I wouldn't ban him, but I'm not unhappy to see him go. Johnny always seemed cool though, don't know why he would have been banned. I'm sure Playmaker still lurks around under a new name. If you're an average user, there's very little damage that can be done by getting banned.

 

I'm sure if he is indeed lurking around here, he's finding this thread wholly hilarious. Banning really doesn't do anything. This isn't Hooters where they can post your picture up on a wall. This isn't even necessarily indicative of real life. I've been on multiple forums before although I just showed up here, and people go crazy on forums because they know there's no real accountability. That's why, as one of the posters here said, Playmaker seemed "bipolar." I bet if you ran into Playmaker on the street, he'd be totally normal and you wouldn't even recognize him to be the author of his asinine posts.

 

I understand that many questions can be answered by doing a simple search...being a newbie, I am guilty of asking questions without first doing a search...but that doesn't mean he has to rip my head off

 

In Playmaker's semi-defense, he has said some things that I wanted to say but restricted myself to putting into nicer terms. For instance his post on:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=154543

I felt like saying the same thing, but I would have just said "I think some different laptop sizes have different port configurations". Even if I did find it annoying that the newbie created a new thread to announce his discovery. But it's not wise to discourage people from posting things like that. If someone does indeed find something odd, they may not post it out of fear of being flamed.

 

He should take time to read this thread and realise that while bashing other people might be fun for him, its not fun for the people getting bashed.
We should strive to help people, not make fun of them for their ignorance.

 

Anyway I highly doubt he will be back at least for awhile. Iv modded and admined a couple big forums (all clan forums for RPG though). Mods go through a "checklist" of sorts to determine a ban and if a ban is placed it is not lifted unless for very good cause (aka banned wrongfully). If mods go about banning then unbanning really quickly their authority erodes very fast.

 

I think pretty much all of us here are adults and, as such, are well beyond having our feelings hurt by anything posted on a message board forum. I do, however, believe that we should expect a certain degree of courtesy from anybody expecting to partake in a community. Beyond keeping things productive I also believe it to be a measure of someone's character whether they are in possession of the facilities to conduct themselves civily and, since they feel obligated to post a reply to every other post in the forum, having to read their blog while skimming through posts gets somewhat annoying and counterproductive to what the forum is meant to serve as.

If you miss him so much add him to MySpace.

 

Dude was cool and posted in like every Lenovo thread. IMO, you could depend on his replies as a safe source, and with such an active user, it's so much faster for people to get replies (especially for those who want to buy their notebooks asap).

 

The board will continue with or without him. I agree he did help organize the FAQs, but the info is there for anyone that knows how to do a search. While organizing the info was helpful for noobs, it shouldn't mean he gets a free pass to belittle anyone that had a question, stupid or not. You don't see him pulling these shenanigans at the thinkpads.com forum as Johnny_1987. This forum is a place of discussion for all lenovo/thinkpad owners, new and old last time i checked. Sure I was entertained by some of his posts, but some of them did come off as rude and arrogant. As for the PMs, wow those were pretty uncalled for.

 

He's had three chances, he was banned last year as filabusta and again this year as johnny_1987 and again this year as Playmaker. He threatened members via PM and there were various other issues behind the scenes. That's a long history and three strikes = out. It's a shame somebody can be helpful and then at the same time create so much work for moderators and admins of this board. This thread is closed.