Annoying member - how do you handle?

This is a long-time member who is following the letter of the rules, but who many other members find so annoying some are starting the change their forum visit habits to avoid them.

Does things like
- forever disagrees with certain members in every thread, always slyly implying the other member does not have good sense while not actually calling names
- takes threads downhill, a good discussion also includes increasingly personal back-and-forth bickering with this person (it can be like reading 2 threads)
- posts funny but edgy images a fair number of members don't like
- is on the board all the time - every day early till late - no relief from occasional absence
- bottom line: mod time and patience being consumed from the flow of reports & complaints that often have to be answered "I understand it's annoying but it's not a rules violation ... how to use ignore ..."

A fair few other members have this person on ignore but are complaining they see the posts when they are quoted. As well as the newer members who don't yet know about ignore. Overall the complaining members could buck up a little and control their own eyeballs. However, whatever they should do, the mods are having to spend time coaching them (rather than the annoying member.)

Not everyone is annoyed, just enough to wear out the mods. The annoying member does have some loyal supporters.

There are actually a couple more members that are more marginally in this category.

I do have some ideas from vBulletin community thread on a similar topic, but wanted to hear how people here handle this.

thanks!

 

Do you give them a reason for the loss of privileges ... how do you communicate with them what they are doing wrong? Assuming they will be complaining to members, to you explain anywhere what is going on? Just curious - thanks.

We have some established methods of dealing with member missteps, but this case is more one of chronic annoyance on the part of all.

 

Personally, I wouldn't do a thing as long as they are within the community rules. If people dislike this member enough, the natural occurrence of things will eventually shoo the member away. They will get tired of being ignored, will become bored and eventually leave.

I'm not you so I can't really get a scope of how severe or annoying it is but if it really is that bad you could consider tachy goes to coventry (if you're using vBulletin) which puts the user on global ignore. Nobody can see his/her posts.

I'd like to hear what action you decide to take and how it works out (or doesn't :o) for you.

 

How I wish. They have regularly been neg rep'd and taken to task by pm by assertive other members. They have been on this forum for over FOUR (4) YEARS. Actually the person I described is a prototype for a couple of members. Both at one point or another got an ultimatum from management for their more extreme behavior. They reacted with outrage - there were inside the rules, but on the boundaries - but adjusted - just enough. :deepsighicon

Our only real influence with them is that obviously they want to stay on the forum. These are hard cases who only seem to respond to ultimatums. We are recognizing that there is a tiny minority of members who are like this, who have undue influence over forum tone, and who can't be handled the way we handle everyone else and expect results.

TgtC or just ban 'em. We've stopped short of either as not consistent with our published terms of service. Thought about it, looked for the opportunity, haven't got there.

Because there are a small handful of others who trend the same way, and because we (the management team) were a little discouraged at the tendency of threads to go downhill after some members were provoked into bickering, we've started a broad discussion of overall tone and leadership. We do feel that how we manage these people on the edge who post so much influences overall tone. Members shouldn't care about these fringe individuals ... but they do, because the fringe does pull thread direction. No point in posting your insight if it isn't really going to be discussed.

I'll let you know where this goes. It is probably a bit of an evolution. We're walking between the raindrops of enough leadership without over-moderation.

I'm very interested in the experiences of how others have handled this. I'm sure it's a common situation.

 

Negative Rep and "Being Taken to Task" are just what Trolls are looking for. They crave the attention, good or bad, and will do anything to receive it.

This is a tough situation. Users should receive the recommendation to simply ignore people that get on their nerves and not contact them directly. If they have issues then they should report them to staff and have staff deal with them. This is the only way to kill a Troll. You need to deprive it of attention and it will go find more fertile sections of the Internet to hang out. Of course the recommendation should be generic and not directed at any individual.

Of course, you can always put the troll on global ignore and wipe their existence off your forums.

 

I believe you are right on. The only thing that really worked was when we quit explaining and trying to cajole cooperation. It was the shortest message ever sent to a member - one more and you. are. out. No discussion. Unfortunately they modified their behavior immediately and stayed (except in one third case that was banned.)

Coaching the other members has helped alot. We have gradually been successful at training the members to report it and let the mods handle it. And their use of ignore has helped tremendously. But that improvement has only gone so far. Our concern is that sometimes the other members just give the forum a break - that's the wrong result, we're stuck with the trolls and the good posters are surfing elsewhere. Attention deprivation helps, but can be subverted when the trolls are able to provoke the attention from other members.

We are recognizing the need for mod training that recognizes when the standard nice-and-polite member communications isn't getting results and it's time to take a different tack. We're trying to frame it in terms of mod guidelines and board policy, because this borderline-behavior is part of the human condition and it will happen again with new names.

I'm going to think seriously about these suggestions. It can be much easier to see answers on someone else's forum than on your own, when one gets too involved to see over the trees to the forest.

btw you wouldn't think you could have all this drama on a hobby forum. :lol It's because of the wide latitude in off-topic discussion, the same thing that keeps so many members so attracted to the forum.

 

If you allow Religious and Political postings then I can see a lot of drama. Even if there are two conservatives/catholics/whatever in one thread, they are going to disagree on something. No one sees eye to eye on everything.

I don't even talk politics or religion at family events. Though I am really really liberal in my political and religious views as long as they fall within the Constitution of the United States. Most of my family is Republican or Right-leaning Democrats so I am out numbered anyway.

 

If it was me, I would show them a few pictures and if that didn't help I would introduce them to a 3 day penalty box. But that is just me.

 

Miserable Users - vBulletin.org Forum

You can thank me later

 

Interestingly enough, I've never felt the need to use that hack. What does it do exactly?

 

Instead of banning users regularly where the get an error message when trying to access, this allows you to make them suffer in a variety of ways.

I have it installed here because we used to have so many spammers and they would always come back after they were banned. I use option #5 100% of the time and now I never see them on the Who's Online Page anymore.

 

That sounds like it's purely evil - and I love it.

 

Thats cool

 

That is evil. I like it - I've never taken the time to use it, but I definitely should have in the past.

 

I'm going to test it out on you Tyler. I'll give you the address to my forum and we'll see how it turns out...

 

Err, I don't think you need that. Isn't that the same thing as vB's Tachy Goes to Coventry?


Anyway, do you really want to know how to silence or handle an annoying member? Then read on.

1. Hire a ninja assassins.
2. Hire flying monkeys.
3. Have monkeys swoop in and take troubling member from their bed.
4. Have ninja assassins come in for the take and kill the member.
5. Sit back and enjoy the calm and serenity of your forum with a cold one.

Humane Method:

1. Capture member and put in wooden cage.
2. Feed food through bars.
3. Poke member with stick if they become noisy or restless.

 

Some very interesting approaches...

 

Yeah I'm aware of that hack. I considered it - it would work! I have no doubt. Decided that gossip in the hobby community that the forum has poor performance was too great a risk. Otherwise I would definitely do it.