Have the chat rules changed? (in General)

Back in the "golden age" when I was a chat op and an upstanding pillar of the community not just a strange beast roaming wild imploding with strategy ideas.

Anyway, back then when Jon actually talked to me other than just to tell me to shut up or you're forum banned :p There was an initiative to get rid of all the AFK rooms, where people would go afk and make a room like "Im AFK leave a message" or "I am leaving the computer on tonight come in and make offers on stuff". We were told to see if the person in the room was online, if not, to kick them.

About 6 months ago, Di started coming into Valinor and kicked anyone afk, which led to a lot of arguments and her eventually just deciding to kick people AFK in new players.

Now, its happening again, and we may be afk in Valinor some of us, but its not AN AFK ROOM. It's not made for people to go afk in...

So have the rules changed, if we afk anywhere but carnage are we now to be kicked? Personally I dont see the difference if say 5 of us in Valinor are afk in carnage or valinor...

I see a problem with being afk in a user created room. I have been kicked myself after nodding off or just forgetting to log out. Personally, I don't see a big deal with being kicked for being afk in a room that is not New Players or Carnage. If we didn't we would have a zillion rooms.

I will not kick people for being idle in new players or carnage. (Unless Jonathan, Saint, or Bartjan say otherwise)

I will kick if I see a single room with 1-2 players idle in it. If they aren't idle and just missed my PM's well they can always log back in.

Edit: That doesn't mean if you have 3 or more idle players in it I won't kick.

If I see someone being afk in his/her own room then i will kick that player. if it are more then i will kick all to remove the room.

but if the room contains at least 1 active player then i don't see reason to remove those players because the room keeps existing.

I pop into rooms and say "hi". If I get a response then I leave, if I don't get a response then I send the folks in the room a chatmail asking them not to afk in user created rooms and close it down by kicking the individuals. As long as I get a response from someone in the room then I don't bother to check if everyone is active.

Generally it's no big issue and hardly anyone ever complains.

But then that is not good for when you happen to be afk that moment. Every time I have to do something, I do not log out. I just say "afk" or the likes and come back whenever I can. Sometimes it is a quick bathroom break, or a longer affair(aka cleaning up after dog vomits on floor. Real nice.) But I can see the point to it. So it is a two-edged sword.

type /join carnage

You don't have to log out

So...Being afk in carnage is acceptable but not in new players or user-made rooms?

No, I said it is and has always been a policy to kick players who are afk in user made rooms.

If you read my statement over you will see that I do not kick for being idle in new players or carnage.

Dang..I must need new glasses. Or a brain transplant. Maybe both.

If I'm in Valinor chat and don't respond to people talking to me, it's most likely just because I'm being unsociable and don't like you all that much :)

What's the big issue with being afk anywhere, at any time? Server resource usage?

Trillian - all of us were wondering, thanks for proving it.

Moe - Having open connections to the server for no reason is partly why it is enforced.

What's the other part then?

I don't see why this is a hard concept to grasp....
If you are AFK and get kicked, you're not missing anything. If anything was THAT important to you they would chatmail you about it instead of leaving it to chance that you get back and read hours of chatlogs of people joining and leaving the room.
Jon makes the rules. Ops and admins enforce the rules. People complain about the rules.
It's how the game works, get over

Should rename carnage to: Afk room, and new players to: Active room, because that's all people do, is go to carnage and sleep.

Well the majority have all given nice thought out responses all failing to answer the question. HAVE THE RULES CHANGED? I had the direct memo from Jon, and this was not the rule, have the rules changed? Or did Di just decide it and everyone else followed.

Secondly no one has explained why being afk in Valinor is any different to being afk in carnage. Tell me the problem with that.

And to just Jonathan I'd like you to never EVER listen to Bast when she claims to be *speaking* for me, she copied exactly what she said to me in chat, none of which I had said or even remotely believe.

And finally Meoman, it isnt a big deal it's people like you trying to inflame an argument that make it as such, this post started off in a light hearted manner and simply asked a question the only bad feelings have come from people posting against it.

Myth, the entirety of my conversations with both you and Brandon are already available to Jon and his staff of admins -- and have been since yesterday. They don't have to substitute my judgment for their own. :)

Read what Max said again, Myth:
I see a problem with being afk in a user created room. I have been kicked myself after nodding off or just forgetting to log out. Personally, I don't see a big deal with being kicked for being afk in a room that is not New Players or Carnage. If we didn't we would have a zillion rooms.

And this:
Having open connections to the server for no reason is partly why it is enforced.

Also, no the rule doesn't appear to have changed, it's been like that for a long time, but really, assuming you have been unlucky and you've walked away from the computer for a minute and been /kicked for afk, how hard is it to create the room again if you intend to keep using it?

Chuckles, I respect you man, infact I respect everyone whos posted in here bar one, but still its quite simple answer this one question :

"Secondly no one has explained why being afk in Valinor is any different to being afk in carnage. Tell me the problem with that. "

Saying "Its no big deal, stop moaning about it" is not an answer. It's not in my opinion good to enforce a rule that 1) does not exist 2) has no reason for being, and not expect someone to complain about it, and then when they question it the only retort is to say "well whats the big deal?".

Valinor is a room that is almost there 100% of the time, and if people AFK in it, at least they are not cluttering up the other rooms, I really dont see what the difference is to either the server or to anyone if we go AFK in Valinor as compared to Carnage.

We've never asked for anything, either for Valinor to be made into a permanent room, to get lumpbot or for our own chat ops, for about a year we've just been quite content now suddenly people will come in and kick us all out.

"Have the rules changed?"

No, the rules have always been, "don't go afk in a one-person room."

"Secondly no one has explained why being afk in Valinor is any different to being afk in carnage."

I guess you're not really up on this reading comprehension fad, because in the very first reply Max explained why.

I'm not questioning your rule or anything, Jon, but I've noticed that while Max's explanation said it wouldn't be a problem if there were a zillion rooms, but no one in this thread has identified a problem as of yet. If it's wasting bandwidth or resources beyond those that would've been wasted in Carnage, please, let me know.

Thank you for the reply Jon, hope your chat ops will stop coming into Valinor and kicking 4+ of us out.

Chat Blender 3.1.7 starting...
Existing rooms:
  Severswoed: 3 users
  Valinor: 7 users
  at school: 1 user
  buy me a penguin: 1 user
  i beat spid today: 1 user
  dating mushu: 1 user
  open for closing: 1 user
  loans: 1 user
  none of your business: 1 user
  nonsequitur: 1 user
  where is SNK?: 1 user
  nobody's fool: 1 user
  playing WoW: 1 user
  sleeping: 1 user
  carnage: 51 users
  new players: 58 users 

Get the picture, Brandon?

and Myth, if there is nobody in the room then they should all be killed. so start saying hi back to GB :P

Don't get me wrong Jon, I'm not trying to be impolite or anything other than curious, but I don't see how, aside from being a nuisance to look at when you type "/rooms," it's a problem.

If it's being looked at as a bandwidth problem, wouldn't it make more sense for people to idle in rooms where less data has to be passed through the server? Another problem could be with socket connections, but that'd be the same no matter what room players are in.

Jon, I'm not arguing with your decision to make things the way they are, I would just like some sort of explanation for it, even if it just consists of "It's my game, deal with it."