Number of Suspensions Before Elimination from FT
 

Hey Randy,

How many times does it take for someone to get suspended before they are eliminated from FlyerTalk? I see a frequently-suspended person in my perferred forum (who just happens to be a FT Evangelist :confused: ) who has been suspended probably 3 times in the last 6 months, and continues to be a hassle... Just wondering if there was a 3-strikes-policy a-la California and their felons here at FT.

Thanks for all that you do. ^ This is truely a great place, and most informative, and most time-consuming for a commercial airline nerd such as myself. Best of luck with the future. ^:-::D

tbf

I am also interested in this answer. As well, what activity would constitute a suspension?

A question with a multitude of answers. Now, if we were to just look at this in black and white, i can easily answer that it tales 3 violations of the members TOS before their privileges are eliminated from FlyerTalk. As you and hopefully everyone else knows, the suspension procedure for FlyerTalk was created not because we ever wanted such a system, but because there are just some people in the world who don't believe in peace and harmony in others eyes, only their own and that can be different than the way you and I see these things. So, as with virtually every other Web site, organization and entity in the world, a basic foundation of rules of fair play were established for members and these are agreed to be each and every member to gain posting access on FlyerTalk. The good news is that 99.9% of our members continue to act in accordance with these basic rules and in fact, never have to alter their presence on FlyerTalk to be within them. This TOS is a guide to playing well with others.

Now along the way, just as with other Web sites and organizations, comes a group of volunteers who happen to love FlyerTalk and have gained enough from FlyerTalk that they don't mind giving back to FlyerTalk beyond the value of the information that is exchanged. These volunteers, Moderators, are charged with trying to interpret the TOS - the basic rules. For the most past, they didn't invent them and might not always know what was in the mind of members such as myself when they were put forth as "the rules." But, with different perspectives, just as you see things different than others, they try and interpret what is in the best interest of FlyerTalk.

If we were to refer to the TOS, we see that our system of suspension is a progressive one. As one of the earliest travel communities in the Internet, it seemed a reasonable way to go about this - remember, there was no "Dummies Guide ..." to starting a Web site or business model for something like FlyerTalk when this was all adopted. The reasoning behind a progressive system of suspensions is that it allowed members to make mistakes but hopefully learn from them. If not, then their posting privileges would be terminated. This is opposed to some of the more current models that assign a value of suspension based on the "crime" itself. Frankly both could be debated til the end of time and no one would be better than the other. The other type of system allows professional "tapdancers" to interrupt our members in just such a minor manner that they would never be totally suspended from FlyerTalk but would always be a thorn in the .... The progressive system somewhat prevents this from happening totally puts the responsibility to learning what "No" means on the member themselves.

As mentioned, we have a progressive system of suspension and here it is defined from the TOS:
Progressive Discipline
If a moderator or administrator deems it effective, progressive discipline may be imposed for a rules violation. In general, progressive discipline has the following levels and each level need not be used if the moderator or administrator deems the violation to call for a different progression:

Warning. The moderator or administrator identifies the member's improper conduct and notifies the member that future violations of that or other rules will result in suspension or revocation of membership.
Suspension for one week. The moderator or administrator suspends a member violating the rules for one week and notifies the member that future violations of that or other rules will result in suspension for one month or revocation of membership.
Suspension for one month. The moderator or administrator suspends a member violating the rules for one month and notifies the member that future violations of that or other rules will result in revocation of membership.
[b]Revocation of membership.]/b] The moderator or administrator revokes membership privileges for repeated or serious violations of the rules.

We also have a Summary Revocation of posting privileges when things go very bad, very fast and there is not the patience of our members to go through the normal warning/7 days/one month/revocation progressive system.
Summary Revocation
A moderator or administrator may revoke membership privileges as a first discipline if deemed reasonably necessary to prevent immediate and serious disruption in one or more forums. Examples of rules violations which may result in summary revocation are: posts from members which constitute "spam" or unbridled commercial posting, repeated cross-posting to multiple forums or posting obscene, fradulent or defamatory material.

So, all these things (TOS violations) can lead to a suspension. OK, so a member gets suspended and comes back and is still a real PITA. If it leads to a revocation of posting privileges, they can do two things - wait at least 6 months and then apply for renewal. This can happen when a member really seems to exhibit a "rebirth" of the responsibility of playing nice with others. There are examples of members who have returned as better after being away for at least 6 months. Then of course, there are some that, well, said they repented their old ways but really once back on FlyerTalk reverted to the old ways and were sent off again. And then of course, there are some that file an appeal and after a review were granted a stay of their suspension from a different set of eyes and were released back into regular posting privileges on FlyerTalk. Again, some did learn from the experience and unfortunately some did not and were soon back on the treadmill toward suspension. Generally speaking, members are given some slack no matter the situation unless they are in the spammer first class ranks or have proven to be reincarnations of simply members that no matter the situation do not play well with others - and i suspect you know a few of them.

At the end of the day, the Moderators and myself will try and work with any member, but no matter how flexible we try to be, there are some members that bite the hand that try's to help them. For instance, and I almost feel embarrassed to point this out, one member we have tried to work with has ben issued 7 warnings, 3 other types of suggestive warnings, served 4 7-day suspensions, 2 30-day suspensions and while does have some valuable information for our members, has pretty much worn out the welcome mat. There are an abundance of warnings and smaller suspensions because we try and redo some of the progressive steps of our policy if there is enough input in trying to "reform" the member, such as suspension from posting in a particular forum, etc.

It is really a difficult situation for our volunteers. If we use the progressive system in black and white, they can be accused as being to hard - though of course they did not invent the system. If they elect to try and work with the member and it does not work, then how many other members have this member now made made or how many threads have been diluted from the members antics, etc. It's really a tough job. In this case, you see this member as a hassle and perhaps the member has been given too many second chances. But of course the member in question does not think so.

The reason i like the progressive policy is that a member should know that if they keep messing around, they will lose their posting privileges, regardless of the infraction. As for the other method, it leaves far too much responsibility for the volunteer to determine the level of the infraction and assign the point violation and of course, it allows the "tapdancers" to continue to tapdance without repercussions.

I'm afraid that there is no formal 3 strikes of anything and you are out. The system we have is flexible enough to work with just about any member who values FlyerTalk and as noted, it does have a side of it that is so flexible that some members do become problems for our other members and that's really not fair.

At the end of the day, I'm very comfortable that our system is the best that it can be for FlyerTalk and while we have a few failures along the way, I'm fairly proud that our successes are far greater in number.

Thanks again for the question and as you can see, it can be a struggle to explain in a general sense.