Notes: The Great Compromise

[conrad]

Hello!

There has been certain discussions about the perennial problem of how notes are perceived.

I myself in my short tenure had a note overturned, with the argument that a combination of the good faith of the person whose note I issue to combined with the fact the ban appeal is enough of a record of that (i.e.: accidentally exploiting a bug), was enough for me to lift the note.

The purpose of the note, initally, was to make future admins aware that the player knew about the bug, did it accidentally so that if they did it again in the future, those admins would know that, the second occurance, was not accidental. Were there evidence for the bug being exploited on purpose, that wouldn't be a note, that would be a ban.

This is an argument that I see a lot of admins and players taking instances on, usually opposed. Admins want to note, so that the culture of noting is fostered and they themselves can peruse records when a player gets bwoinked.

Players, however, usually have the instance that there are a lot of notes that are pointless, and serve no purpose other than staining their record.

Here's where I bring the solution: Minor rule breaks that warrant notes instead of bans, as well as notes that are kept as a general record, should have an expiry of 6 months. Only bans, and actual problematic rule breaks should stay forever.

The consideration here is that in 6 months, admins already see the notes faded away. Might as well remove them entirely, unless they are specifically problematic, and therefore worthy of being considered after such a long amount of time.

Here's my totally arbitrary list of rules that would, most of the time, have expiring notes upon breaking them:
Any rules besides 2, 6, 8, 9 and 11. I have not checked MRP and would appreciate an input on that. A reminder that bans for the unmentioned rules would remain as they are now.

I did not read the precedents for these so feel free to call me names and post what you think.

This serves two purposes:

It keeps the record neat and clean for admins;

It makes it so that players are not permanently marked for something they did that was minor.

Thoughts? Concerns?

Thank you for your attention!

[Cheshify]

Notes are logging tools and learning opportunities for admins and players, nothing else. People go overboard with being upset at their notes and people start to view them as punishments when they are not. Players do however choose to make notes punishments when they're given a chance to learn from their mistakes and continue the same actions that got them noted in the first place. I don't think we should be implementing expiries as a blanket for a large number of situations when admin discretion is important.

[zxaber]

Currently, admins can manually set the expiration date of notes, and we should keep that functionality. Additionally, we do occasionally use record keeping notes that aren't about player conduct (such as when a player changes accounts) that would need to be permanent.

Otherwise, I fully agree. Notes are helpful to guide players along the path set by the rules, and to document rule breaks, but these need not be permanent.

[Cheshify]

Notes already effectively expire at 6 months, I don't think obscuring it further would be helpful ^

[GPeckman]

People go overboard with being upset at their notes and people start to view them as punishments when they are not.

I think part of this is just the way that notes are talked about. Generally speaking, it seems like admins will specifically say "note history" or something else with "note" in it in ban appeals and such. If people just said "history" or other language that doesn't emphasize notes then I bet fewer people would see them as punishments.

[Fikou]

terrible idea

[Chadley]

Notes are not just a logging tool, they are undeniably a punishment.

People go overboard with being upset at their notes and people start to view them as punishments when they are not.

This is a silly statement, as long as admins use notes to inform, influence, or affect banning judgement, they are a punishment.

Being written up at work is a punishment as much as it's for company record, being written up at school goes on your record, but it's also how they punish bad behavior.


Admins should stop hiding behind the rhetoric that it's just for our record keeping, when it's most definitely used in more extreme punishments.

[Cheshify]

People go overboard with being upset at their notes and people start to view them as punishments when they are not.

I think part of this is just the way that notes are talked about. Generally speaking, it seems like admins will specifically say "note history" or something else with "note" in it in ban appeals and such. If people just said "history" or other language that doesn't emphasize notes then I bet fewer people would see them as punishments.

I feel that's just disingenuous, Admins do use note histories to justify bans, and trying to conceal that fact rubs me the wrong way. There needs to be a realization by people complaining about notes-are-punishments that by repeating actions they've been told not to do, they're choosing to turn those reminders into punishments.

[Cheshify]

Notes are not just a logging tool, they are undeniably a punishment.

People go overboard with being upset at their notes and people start to view them as punishments when they are not.

This is a silly statement, as long as admins use notes to inform, influence, or affect banning judgement, they are a punishment.

Being written up at work is a punishment as much as it's for company record, being written up at school goes on your record, but it's also how they punish bad behavior.


Admins should stop hiding behind the rhetoric that it's just for our record keeping, when it's most definitely used in more extreme punishments.

They are punishments at the exact same point that someone chooses to repeat behaviour the note warns against, not before. It's not rhetoric, it's genuinely how notes are used.

[Cheshify]

Also, let's not equate this to a "write-up at work or school". It's a space game, there are no consequences but not having fun.

[Kendrickorium]

Notes are not just a logging tool, they are undeniably a punishment.

People go overboard with being upset at their notes and people start to view them as punishments when they are not.

This is a silly statement, as long as admins use notes to inform, influence, or affect banning judgement, they are a punishment.

Being written up at work is a punishment as much as it's for company record, being written up at school goes on your record, but it's also how they punish bad behavior.


Admins should stop hiding behind the rhetoric that it's just for our record keeping, when it's most definitely used in more extreme punishments.

you get written up at work or at school for the same thing enough times they fucking ban you from there too, you fucking dipshit

[Kendrickorium]

imagine being so fucking narcissistic you cant handle someone leaving other people in charge a reminder of your fuck up

get over yourself, jesus fucking christ

[Lacran]

I see this as a lose-lose.

Players get more complex records to be used against them short term, but recording keeping beyond 6 months becomes harder.

I think honestly the reputation notes have are so bad that stuff used solely for record keeping should use a different term.

[BrolyButterfingers]

Notes are logging tools and learning opportunities for admins and players, nothing else. People go overboard with being upset at their notes and people start to view them as punishments when they are not. Players do however choose to make notes punishments when they're given a chance to learn from their mistakes and continue the same actions that got them noted in the first place. I don't think we should be implementing expiries as a blanket for a large number of situations when admin discretion is important.

Objectively untrue, as openly visible in this appeal viewtopic.php?f=34&t=33374

Please put to bed the bullshit lie that notes are not a punishment.

[BrolyButterfingers]

That was a player who was ultimately banned for MY ACTIONS because of their note history. They were not particularly irresponsible, I gamed it hard as FUCK with passive healing, a modsuit I stole and an uplink to buy tools, and then spread the chaos as hard as I could as an antag, and Maia bit the bullet. The fire killed nobody and didn't even make the space uninhabitable.

[zxaber]

If a player's note drops off, and they've not had any other notes in the meantime, I don't mind them having a clean record. So maybe someone gets away with IC in OOC an extra time once a year, I won't lose sleep over it.

If a player does a banable action, they should eat a ban for it. Notes in the place of a ban would be due to special circumstances, like an event that helps explain why the player chose their action, or the player being new. In the former case, after enough time, the note isn't as necessary; either the player has been able to abide by the rules and stay in good standing, or they will have likely eaten a ban already. In the case of a new player, by the time the note expires, the player will likely have enough playtime to know better, and so will get the ban, note or not, the next time they pull the same stunt.

[iwishforducks]

Notes already effectively expire at 6 months, I don't think obscuring it further would be helpful ^

notes are more often than not looked at in discord admin channels these days, which do not have the same fading feature that in-game notes have

edit: notes can also be viewed in the database directly, which similarly does not have the fading effect. but this only comes to play ever-so-often. i know some admins prefer the database for notes though (mostly boomers)

[Chadley]

Notes already effectively expire at 6 months, I don't think obscuring it further would be helpful ^

They don't though, admins use those notes to justify further bans. Bans, notes, etc don't go away until they're appealed. They're held over you forever.

imagine being so fucking narcissistic you cant handle someone leaving other people in charge a reminder of your fuck up

get over yourself, jesus fucking christ

Assuming players are being seditious or maleficent for disliking having a record held over their head is bad faithing and takes away any power to the players. I learned to recognize the rhetoric of "suck it up" for every note is not a safe bet when those notes never expire.

[Fikou]

notes are more often than not looked at in discord admin channels these days, which do not have the same fading feature that in-game notes have

edit: notes can also be viewed in the database directly, which similarly does not have the fading effect. but this only comes to play ever-so-often. i know some admins prefer the database for notes though (mostly boomers)

when is this used for administrative action?

[sinfulbliss]

If a player's note drops off, and they've not had any other notes in the meantime, I don't mind them having a clean record. So maybe someone gets away with IC in OOC an extra time once a year, I won't lose sleep over it.

If a player does a banable action, they should eat a ban for it. Notes in the place of a ban would be due to special circumstances, like an event that helps explain why the player chose their action, or the player being new. In the former case, after enough time, the note isn't as necessary; either the player has been able to abide by the rules and stay in good standing, or they will have likely eaten a ban already. In the case of a new player, by the time the note expires, the player will likely have enough playtime to know better, and so will get the ban, note or not, the next time they pull the same stunt.

STRONGLY agree with this. There is absolutely no downside to having notes expire after 6 months. There is no reason an admin would need to keep a record of something minor enough to not even deserve a ban for over that period of time.

If it’s serious enough that it really needs to be tracked and permanently placed on their record, maybe it should’ve been a ban in the first place.

The fact notes “fade” after 6 months is a moot point because admins still read them, and I am sure new admins go through all the notes of players that they know just out of curiosity. They factor into bans still, we’ve seen time and time again, and it sucks to have them looming over your head until the end of time.

[sinfulbliss]

I will go a step further and say that if notes expired, players would be incentivized to be a good boy until their notes expired so they get a nice clean note history. If they have 20 accumulated notes over 3 years, cynicism dictates they not give a shit about another minor “record keeping” note.

A system that rewards improvement? And encourages players to get better? Hell yeah man.

[Chadley]

Sinful is so fucking right!!!

[Cobby]

until it becomes a technical issue to retain notes, i dislike the idea they should be fully removed. Its becomes a slippery slope of what is considered minor and you dont know if down the line a "minor" note becomes relevant.

Admins misusing these notes is not suggestive the retention aspect is the problem (it's not), the visuals and/or the human aspect can be tweaked without suggestion all notes be deleted from existence after an arbitrary date. Why is it that no one suggests headmins should just push back on admins who use the sheer number of notes to justify admin actions? If headmins are doing that, why are you voting them in?

If notes are that detrimental that youd rather have people eat bans to justify the notes existence we clearly have a problem that tweaking the note retention aspect isnt going to solve.

I also hold the opinion expiration should not exist in its current implementation, admins should not be able to hard delete notes, there is rampant room for misuse there I dont think people talk about because they dont expect their friends to do that. Even deleting notes are retained...

[iwishforducks]

notes are more often than not looked at in discord admin channels these days, which do not have the same fading feature that in-game notes have

edit: notes can also be viewed in the database directly, which similarly does not have the fading effect. but this only comes to play ever-so-often. i know some admins prefer the database for notes though (mostly boomers)

when is this used for administrative action?

in my time in adminning i saw many folks use discord commands to look at note history in full rather than use in-game methods. when you'd ping supportmin and ask for advice, second parties (that you called upon, obviously) would use said command before giving their piece of the pie. which is to say, admin decisions are being informed by old notes. the way the discord command formats notes makes it really difficult to see how truly old notes are.

[iwishforducks]

we really shouldn't be removing things from our databases just because it's old; making an appeal and getting your note removed is obviously okay because you have an appeal that literally holds record of it.

the clear issue here is not that we hold this information but rather the way we present it. if we made notes fade in-game on the player side just as they do on the admin panel i think players would find it more agreeable. and also to make the discord command not fucking suck balls like you guys are off your knockers if you don't find the way we present the information on the discord command problematic

[sinfulbliss]

until it becomes a technical issue to retain notes, i dislike the idea they should be fully removed. Its becomes a slippery slope of what is considered minor and you dont know if down the line a "minor" note becomes relevant.

Can you give an example of a situation where a minor note, in which a ban wasn’t deserved, would be necessary 6+ months down the road? 8 months? 12?

Why is it that no one suggests headmins should just push back on admins who use the sheer number of notes to justify admin actions? If headmins are doing that, why are you voting them in?

First of all this isn’t the main issue IMO with keeping notes around forever. The main issue to me is after enough notes, players just become “dirty players,” and it’s supported by their massive note history, so they play into that and stop giving a shit about the rules. I know plenty of players like this who just leaned into being shitty because their account histories said “you are shitty” and that stays forever.

But to answer your question the reason is that it’s a temporary solution to a permanent problem. Headmins come and go, policies have more sticking power.

If notes are that detrimental that youd rather have people eat bans to justify the notes existence we clearly have a problem that tweaking the note retention aspect isnt going to solve.

I would probably rather just an honest conversation, but if they really felt it was bad enough to note beyond that, I would rather the ban. Admins only issue bans when they’re pretty damn sure the player did something wrong — notes on the other hand they can slap on after essentially any ticket they feel like, so long as it’s factual. With a ban you get a fair appeal and the admin has to actually have a justification banning you. Notes need absolutely no justification aside from “it’s just record keeping, if it doesn’t happen again you don’t have to worry!”

[Vekter]

People need to understand that when we refer to "note history", 99% of the time we're referring to similar or identical incidents.

We're not going to ban someone who has 10 notes for very different reasons save for very specific situations (ie they've accumulated those 10 notes within an unreasonable amount of time, like a week or two).

A note is not punishment unless the player continues to repeat the behavior they were noted for. If the behavior is so minor that the player needs to worry about accidentally repeating the behavior, then the note has no merit.

I'm for the idea of them falling off eventually. There has been a lot of smoke blown over the idea of a player who comes and griefs once, gets a note, fucks off for six months, then does it again, but 1) It wouldn't be hard to factor in living hours between notes for this and 2) Hot take but I really don't care if someone comes and acts like kind of an asshole for a round once every six months, it doesn't happen often enough that I'm concerned about it.

Notes already effectively expire at 6 months, I don't think obscuring it further would be helpful ^

notes are more often than not looked at in discord admin channels these days, which do not have the same fading feature that in-game notes have

edit: notes can also be viewed in the database directly, which similarly does not have the fading effect. but this only comes to play ever-so-often. i know some admins prefer the database for notes though (mostly boomers)

I have asked both oranges (for the Discord bots) and MSO (for tgdb) to implement a hiding/fading system for notes over six months, the most I got was non-committal "maybe"s.

First of all this isn’t the main issue IMO with keeping notes around forever. The main issue to me is after enough notes, players just become “dirty players,” and it’s supported by their massive note history, so they play into that and stop giving a shit about the rules. I know plenty of players like this who just leaned into being shitty because their account histories said “you are shitty” and that stays forever.

Basically the issue is that some admins see players with a lot of notes and continue to note them for things they might not note newer players for. It's a cultural issue that headmins don't seem concerned with intervening in. Ideally, we would be handling players the same unless they have previous notes for identical or similar behaviors, but it's hard for people to steer away from the idea that "lots of notes = player bad" even when those notes aren't related to one another.

[Timberpoes]

There's a lot of room to change. An example would be for auto-purging notes that can be used when an admin is not leaving a note as some form of punishment and it's purely for temporary "if they do this again in the next X living hours played they're starting to form a pattern" record keeping.

Such notes would entirely leave the player's record and, as non-punishing notes, would be much harder to appeal since they're just a temporary record of player behaviour that automatically self-appeal and self-delete through passage of time. But the player knows as long as they don't do the same shit again, the note will naturally expunge itself from their record. No appeal needed. And it may save a lot of time in people feeling the need to appeal these notes if they just genuinely self-purge after time.

Or just being sensible about placing notes. If you don't intend to punish the player, is your note actually necessary? Is the decision to note and the wording you've used actually proportionate? Is your decision to note leaning too hard on the super restrictive note appeal guidelines that are intended to encourage admins to use notes over bans by making them almost impossible to get overturned without a disruptive headmin term being voted in?

[Vekter]

There's a lot of room to change. An example would be for auto-purging notes that can be used when an admin is not leaving a note as some form of punishment and it's purely for temporary "if they do this again in the next X living hours played they're starting to form a pattern" record keeping.

Such notes would entirely leave the player's record and, as non-punishing notes, would be much harder to appeal since they're just a temporary record of player behaviour that automatically self-appeal and self-delete through passage of time. But the player knows as long as they don't do the same shit again, the note will naturally expunge itself from their record. No appeal needed. And it may save a lot of time in people feeling the need to appeal these notes if they just genuinely self-purge after time.

I feel like this is definitely the solution, though I also think there should be a setting for date as well as living hours, just because those exact hours can be kind of nebulous while some admins might prefer to just go "okay well as long as they're not doing this again in a month we're gucci".

[sinfulbliss]

There's a lot of room to change. An example would be for auto-purging notes that can be used when an admin is not leaving a note as some form of punishment and it's purely for temporary "if they do this again in the next X living hours played they're starting to form a pattern" record keeping.

[…]

Or just being sensible about placing notes. If you don't intend to punish the player, is your note actually necessary? Is the decision to note and the wording you've used actually proportionate? Is your decision to note leaning too hard on the super restrictive note appeal guidelines that are intended to encourage admins to use notes over bans by making them almost impossible to get overturned without a disruptive headmin term being voted in?

The issue is I don’t really see any incentive for admins to do this, aside from the odd note appeal they might avoid. I’m not sure how the internals of it all work, but it’s an extra step at least I imagine to set the note to expire, and if they decide not to there’s really nothing anyone can do about it. It seems like a divisive issue among admins so it’s pretty safe to bet the group that aren’t in favor of it are never going to set their notes to expire if they can help it.

[NamelessFairy]

I don't see any admins complaining about notes being untidy so for that aspect you seem to be trying to fix an issue that doesn't exist. Furthermore it seems like it'd be a much more effective option to just get categorizing tools coded to help organize notes on players. I also don't see any reason why a note not being permanent is a benefit, if the note is unimportant then it wont be used again so no harm is done. If it gets used then it clearly wasn't unimportant and should be recorded. Removing notes in general only serves to benefit bad faith actors who want to knowingly break rules that they have broken in the past. Or accidentally bad faith actors in admins misremembering what a now deleted note said and banning players for far longer than they deserved due to not having a accurate note history to refer back to.

[iwishforducks]

something i think that needs to be added as well is that by definition notes are MADE to be unappealable. they're not "a punishment", they're an unappealable punishment. i get the reason behind why note appeal policy is the way it is: it'd be really fucking annoying to have to handle an appeal every time you make a minor note on someone. but as it stands players do not feel that notes are used as "admin documentation to make sure nothing slips through the gaps"- because it fucking takes admins MONTHS to finally permaban some of our worst players. notes are clearly not what gets shitters to stop.

with that said, 6 months for a minor note is still way too much honestly. tying it to alive hours, as timber and vekter have pointed out, is definitely the best approach here. maybe also making it so there's a minimum time frame as well because some people play like 10 hours a day.

making it more obvious to players and admins that notes have been faded will go a long way.

[sinfulbliss]

I also don't see any reason why a note not being permanent is a benefit, if the note is unimportant then it wont be used again so no harm is done.

Ignoring the whole issue of bans based on “having a large note history,” Vekter mentioned admins are more likely to note/whack people who already have a bunch of notes than someone who doesn’t, because they’re categorized as a “problem player” merely in virtue of having a note history, even if they never repeat them and have full intention of improving.

Removing notes in general only serves to benefit bad faith actors who want to knowingly break rules that they have broken in the past. Or accidentally bad faith actors in admins misremembering what a now deleted note said and banning players for far longer than they deserved due to not having a accurate note history to refer back to.

1. Serious issues receive bans, minor issues receive notes
2. If only notes fade, then only minor issues will fade
3. Even minor issue notes remain for 6 months

So like… I really struggle to see how this can be abused by bad faith actors? Is someone gonna say “(:” in IC chat 6 months later and maybe get whacked slightly less hard? I really don’t get how this is abusable in any capacity.

And admins shouldn’t be trying to remember what deleted notes said, if in theory they’re implemented, keeping your own personal collection of deleted notes and enforcing based on them would probably be a conduct violation.

[conrad]

I don't see any admins complaining about notes being untidy so for that aspect you seem to be trying to fix an issue that doesn't exist.

Just because something isn't an issue, doesn't mean we can't make life better.

[Fikou]

I don't see any admins complaining about notes being untidy so for that aspect you seem to be trying to fix an issue that doesn't exist.

Just because something isn't an issue, doesn't mean we can't make life better.

deleting database information from admins after an arbitrary time passes is a retarded idea, a fucking pain in the ass and would not make life better for me in any way

[sinfulbliss]

I don't see any admins complaining about notes being untidy so for that aspect you seem to be trying to fix an issue that doesn't exist.

Just because something isn't an issue, doesn't mean we can't make life better.

deleting database information from admins after an arbitrary time passes is a retarded idea, a fucking pain in the ass and would not make life better for me in any way

would you like to expand upon why it’s a retarded idea instead of just repeating that it’s a retarded idea mr. fikou

[conrad]

I don't see any admins complaining about notes being untidy so for that aspect you seem to be trying to fix an issue that doesn't exist.

Just because something isn't an issue, doesn't mean we can't make life better.

deleting database information from admins after an arbitrary time passes is a retarded idea, a fucking pain in the ass and would not make life better for me in any way

This isn't what I suggested. I'm suggesting it going forwards. Admins can already place notes with an expiry date as of today.

Calm your tatas.

[Fikou]

This isn't what I suggested. I'm suggesting it going forwards. Admins can already place notes with an expiry date as of today.

Calm your tatas.

what does that even mean? youre not suggesting it but youre suggesting it? i know admins can place notes with expiry dates, but they dont without good reason.

the changes to how we work with notes youre proposing really piss me off so obviously im not gonna pretend like im a fan of them.

[iwishforducks]

I don't see any admins complaining about notes being untidy so for that aspect you seem to be trying to fix an issue that doesn't exist.

Just because something isn't an issue, doesn't mean we can't make life better.

deleting database information from admins after an arbitrary time passes is a retarded idea, a fucking pain in the ass and would not make life better for me in any way

i dont think we should be deleting things from the database (right now even expiry notes delete themselves from the database which is really bad). but notes should definitely be expiring in some formal way. as said before, players aren't even aware of the fading effect notes get because their notes are always visible. discord command bot doesn't fade out notes either, nor does the database. this is an issue that can be solved without resorting to wiping things from the database.

[conrad]

This isn't what I suggested. I'm suggesting it going forwards. Admins can already place notes with an expiry date as of today.

Calm your tatas.

what does that even mean? youre not suggesting it but youre suggesting it? i know admins can place notes with expiry dates, but they dont without good reason.

The suggestion is that admins place notes with an expiry for minor issues or small log reports that one would expect to grow out of in six months. I'm not suggesting mass db deletion of notes that are over six months old or anything like that, nor that coders do anything that isn't already there.

the changes to how we work with notes youre proposing really piss me off so obviously im not gonna pretend like im a fan of them.

You can show grievances without calling me retarded, did you know that?

[Fikou]

The suggestion is that admins place notes with an expiry for minor issues or small log reports that one would expect to grow out of in six months. I'm not suggesting mass db deletion of notes that are over six months old or anything like that, nor that coders do anything that isn't already there.

yes i read your post, i know what you mean, you do not have to repeat this multiple times
as a player, i liked seeing my notes to saw how i improved with time, and to be able to reminisce on the stuff i did ages ago.
as an admin, specific players with notes are useful to bring up in certain situations, like discussing some rule breaks, precedents etc.
there are players that do stuff that would certainly be considered minor by some admins and not minor by others. more bureaucracy in seeing what should or shouldnt be expiring is a pain to work with
there are also players that repeat a certain behavior consistently after some time periods, and if each time after 6 months was treated as the first time, nothing would ever happen (see athath)

this is a non issue, a player that doesnt repeat the same thing again wont get punished for it, the only problem here is the presentation, which player side and bot side doesnt do anything to fade notes.
the solutions to this are stuff that ducks mentioned, which is a code issue, and not a policy one. trying to work this in with current tools is a terrible idea

You can show grievances without calling me retarded, did you know that?

i did not in any way do that, i called the proposed change that, those are very different things

[sinfulbliss]

The suggestion is that admins place notes with an expiry for minor issues or small log reports that one would expect to grow out of in six months. I'm not suggesting mass db deletion of notes that are over six months old or anything like that, nor that coders do anything that isn't already there.

This isn't a great solution IMO, because the admins that don't want to do this before the policythread will continue to not do this after the policy thread. They'll make all their notes permanent regardless of if headmins try to shift the paradigm and encourage temporary notes. Maybe like a small handful of the admins that read this thread and care enough about it to change how they note will do it, which on the bright side would include Vekter who handles 50% of all tickets on the gameservers anyway.

There would need to be some code change, i.e. make 6+ month old notes completely inaccessible via in-game player panel, and from the admin discord command system, but perhaps can still exist somewhere in the database. Failing that the next best thing would be policy preventing admins from referring to or using 6+ month old notes in enforcement, not including actual ban notes of course.

I suppose that's all you could ask for in a policy thread, but even that doesn't seem like an awesome solution because the admins that enforce based off of players' very old histories will stay that way so long as those histories are visible, and players with lengthy note histories will continue to see those note histories and be unable to move past them, unless they stop caring and just say "fuck it," which many players do and end up banned or QC banned over some minor issue that otherwise wouldn't have happened if they had a more tangible road to improvement.

[CMDR_Gungnir]

there are also players that repeat a certain behavior consistently after some time periods, and if each time after 6 months was treated as the first time, nothing would ever happen (see athath)

But nothing would've changed for those people. The people who its bad enough would be given non-expiring notes. Someone like ATHATH would still be dinged because those notes would still be there because his actions were major enough.

I have a note because as an asiimov borg, I killed a lizard who kept empty hand punching me, after having previously been killed by me for attacking with an actual weapon, and who had been actively interfering while I was trying to prevent Human Harm, and the AI told me not to. I admitted that I honestly didn't see the AI saying it, but that I probably would've ignored it because my Laws take priority over the AI's orders.

The note is a minor recordkeeping note that says "While the kill was valid, player is reminded to pay attention to their Master AI's orders."

Is this something that should be there forever? I can't appeal it because it's factually correct and an admin reading it wouldn't punish me harder than someone who saw the actual situation. I wouldn't care to anyway, because it's so unbelievably minor, but is that something that should be there forever? Is that going to help you catch the next ATHATH?

You keep saying that you keep reading what Conrad's posting, but what he's suggesting is simply making it policy that literal minor, functionally non-important things are expected to expire. The kind of thing where "Honestly, 6 months later, if they did this again without doing it up until that point, they probably just forgot/it's an accident."

[Not-Dorsidarf]

i dont want my note from nerolat to expire

[Constellado]

I am going to add a tiny wrench to this discussion.

How about positive notes?
Do we want positive notes to expire in the same way as all the others?

[conrad]

I am going to add a tiny wrench to this discussion.

How about positive notes?
Do we want positive notes to expire in the same way as all the others?

No.

[Vekter]

I am going to add a tiny wrench to this discussion.

How about positive notes?
Do we want positive notes to expire in the same way as all the others?

Presumably any theoretical system that includes expiring notes would have a method to ensure a note doesn't expire. For instance, we use notes for things like tracking when a player has changed BYOND account names or if two players live in the same home. We wouldn't want those to expire.

I do want to encourage other admins to give expiring notes more often for minor transgressions (OOC in IC or the inverse, copypasta spam) or for things we would consider less severe unless done multiple times in a short period (excessive greytiding). We don't necessarily care in the long term if someone references a meme IC, but doing it too often in a short period of time is a problem.

We could also, in all honesty, just ignore this problem. We don't really have to adjust how notes are kept and could just do what we can to explain to players that we aren't explicitly "out to get them" if they get a note, but I don't think ignoring it is the right move. I don't like that players feel like they can't trust us and that there's an adversarial relationship between admins and players. I don't think that's something we should have to live with and, if we can solve the problem, we absolutely should.

[wubli]

if you want a perfect example of recordkeeping look at 2beard, he's been banned over and over and i'd say it's relevant that for the past decade basically he's been requesting to be unbanned again just to get banned in less than a month

should you hold it against him that he was a shitter a year ago? obviously not. well, that's what every admin who unbanned him thought before he immediately went to do something stupid again lol

why are people so afraid of their old notes? if you were a shitter 2 years ago and today you make a mistake, no one will bring up your history from hundreds of playtime ago. now, have you been racking up notes for 2 years non-stop? then yeah, your notes years ago are relevant, because you have not improved a single bit.

that said i do like expiring notes. if i see someone who's making one too many ic in ooc mistakes i'd rather give them an expiring note to see if they keep up the habit of "accidentally" doing it. that's because ic in ooc is often an accident, you can normally tell the difference between someone saying something in OOC that's like "this fucker killed me again" as opposed to a clearly IC message.

the real question is why is it so bad that even minor notes are kept? like my ooc in ic note for saying "pweasy uwu", why is it so terrible? because it ruins my otherwise unblemished record? if you're not actively a shitter, why do you care about your old notes still being around? if someone bans you because you did something similar to another thing you did a year ago do you not think you'll absolutely win in appeals

[iwishforducks]

the real question is why is it so bad that even minor notes are kept? like my ooc in ic note for saying "pweasy uwu", why is it so terrible? because it ruins my otherwise unblemished record? if you're not actively a shitter, why do you care about your old notes still being around? if someone bans you because you did something similar to another thing you did a year ago do you not think you'll absolutely win in appeals

well the question becomes “why do admins need to keep this note” - if the note has no tangible effect on players and administration- as you have stated -, why keep them around? what purpose do these old notes serve? your example of 2beard is hardly applicable because it was a permanent ban. notes clearly had nothing to do with him, and if they did they failed at stopping him: which is to say it was an administrative management issue.

there is nothing inherently wrong with keeping the information on hand. i trust many admins to not take old dumb notes into account because i hear personal accounts from them ignoring old dumb notes. i don’t sweat it that much because i personally trust a lot of admins. with that said i certainly do not trust that all admins are doing this, because i’ve seen admins use said discord command and have zero discussion about when said notes transpired.

this is hardly about solving a real tangible solution but rather trying to improve the trust in notes and the general experience. to players, notes are unappealable permanent stains that are used to get you closer to a ban. ive seen many admins use notes as really petty ways to flex their ego/power over players whom dare try to appeal. in the past year i’ve seen way too many notes that had to get removed by headmins because of said Admin Bus.

but like i said… making notes fade on the player side will go a long way. because, as is, if you view your own notes they do not have the same fading effect. oh and also to make the discord commands and database have fading

[NamelessFairy]

1. Serious issues receive bans, minor issues receive notes
2. If only notes fade, then only minor issues will fade
3. Even minor issue notes remain for 6 months

You've made a mistake in point 1 here. Demonstrable malice, repeat offences and utterly abhorrent acts receive bans. (Some admins might draw different lines but I'm sure a lot get where I'm coming from here)
A player can get away with just a note for a lot of shitty behavior, not just stuff like OOC in IC like you suggested. Poor escalation, abuse of powers as security, destroying peoples projects and even flat out unjustified murder can all result in just a note in the admin feels that its not beneficial to overall server health to issue a ban. You will usually see bans not utilized for players with demonstrably good history or potentially if the situation seems accidental. So this means serious issues can receive notes, serious issues that received notes with the intent of ensuring those serious issues aren't repeat behavior. You can get away destroying the SM and ending the round once if you claim you've never done it before and your history supports that, you'll just have to sit through an admins explanation of how to set up the SM. If notes auto purge after 6 months all of a sudden you can do the same thing, ruin the round for everyone and get off with a slap on the wrist. Maybe next round you can overdose several medbay patients and claim you didn't know the thresholds. You need to realize we have extremely bad faith players who we can't just permaban because they work around loopholes in our enforcement, they're not stupid enough to miss the opportunities that note purges would provide them to inflict misery on players where possible. And if trying to memorize expired notes would be a conduct violation it'd be even harder to protect the community from malicious actors because they could just accuse the banning admin of memorizing notes and whoops now we have admins afraid to lay a finger on the people we all know are going to inflict misery but its suicide to attempt action.