Thursday 25 October 2012

More trouble with forums.

I have had more problems with forums. Although I started my own forum two months ago,I still post on other forums. But I am still having problems with other forums. Last year I was banned for life from Seven Forums and Expert Law forums. For doing nothing wrong. And in March this year I was banned from Windows 7 Forums.com and Windows 8 Forums.com,their sister site for life. But three months ago,in July,the ban on me was lifted and I am no longer banned. And I am back on both Windows 7 Forums and Windows 8 Forums.

But I am still having problems on some other forums. And it happened to me again on Saturday. I have been banned from posting on another forum. This time Neowin Forums have banned me from posting on their forum for ten days until 30th October 2012. That is my posting rights have been suspended on Neowin Forums.


 But I am not actually banned from the forum.I can log into the forum and read the topics,but I cannot post anything on the forum. Because when I try to do so I get a message saying my posting rights have been suspended until 30th October 2012. Here is what happened.

 I have been having problems with Neowin Forums for quite some time now. And Neowin Forums are very strict. I joined Neowin Forums in October 2011 and about a week after I joined, I got banned from Seven Forums. And I started my own thread about it on Neowin Forums in the general discussion section.

 But the moderators changed my thread from public view to private view, against my wishes.Meaning it could not be seen on the web or indexed in search engines. And could only be read by the other members who log into the forum. I got a few replies but then a moderator came along and locked the thread. And told me it was against the terms of service on Neowin Forums talk about being banned from another forum or to post about being treated badly on another forum.

 But a lot of other forums don't mind members starting threads or posting about being banned from another forum. And I have taken part on other forums on threads posted by other members who have been banned from other forums. So I don't see why Neowin Forums has to be different from most forums. Although of course there are some forums that do not allow you to talk about being banned or treated badly on other forums. But what is so shocking about my story about my being wrongly banned from Seven Forums for doing absolutely nothing? That would make a moderator on Neowin forums change my thread from public view to private view and then lock my thread?

And I have had other problems on Neowin Forums. Two months ago I wrote a really good tutorial on Neowin Forums about how to avoid the mandatory update to Windows Live Essentials 2011 and stay on WLE 2009, but it was spoiled by some of the members who made stupid comments about me. Then a moderator locked my thread. And then a started another thread about WLE 2012 and that thread was also locked.

 Then when a member started a thread in the off topic forum about rudeness of some people.I commented on the thread that I had written a really good thread the week before but it was spoiled by the silly comments of some members. And the moderators had locked it. That same day I had also posted on another thread about IE10 on Windows 8,started by another member. I just said that I don't have IE10 on my Windows 8 because I have uninstalled it. And I don't have IE9 on Windows 7 or Windows Vista and that I will never install IE9. I then got a rather aggressive warning from a moderator of Neowin Forums by private message, titled"about my code of conduct." And the moderator said in that warning that I had violated their rules by going off topic and talking about my thread being locked by the moderators in the off topic forum.

 And I was very angry about this because I don't see what I did wrong. And that moderator was making something out of nothing.Then there was another post I wrote on Neowin Forums on a thread about Windows 8 Release Preview. And I said that Classic Shell has now been updated so that you can boot straight to the desktop on Windows 8 RP,skipping the Metro start screen. But I got a private message from another moderator saying that my post on the thread has been deleted. Because it was off topic and the thread was strictly about Windows 8 RP and not about Classic Shell.

 But a lot of Windows 8 users are using software like Classic Shell or Start Menu 7 on Windows 8 RP to get the start button and Windows 7 start menu. And they see Classic Shell as part of Windows 8. So where is mentioning Classic Shell off topic and nothing to do with Windows 8 RP?

 I think the problem with Neowin Forums is that they have too many moderators.Which is 50 or more moderators, which includes supervisors,global moderators and moderators as well as administrators which are all part of the moderation team.I don't know many forums that have over 100 moderators. And some moderators abuse their powers and ban and moderate members for no real reason. And this is true on a lot of other forums,not just Neowin Forums.

 Anyway last Tuesday I was reading a thread on Neowin Forums started by another member, said he had invented a software that could disable the Metro theme on Windows 8. That same member had started another thread a few months before on Neowin Forums about this. But the software does not work. He provides the software but he does not provide the files. So when I tried it it did not disable the Metro the ,it did not do anything. All I got was a command prompt. So the software did not work.

And now that member had started another thread on Tuesday saying that he had updated the software and that he was going to charge users money for using it. And I thought it was quite funny because this member says he invented a software that could disable the Metro theme on Windows 8. But of course it does not do anything. And I had tried the updated software and it still did not work. And so I replied to the thread on Tuesday. Here is what I said on the thread at Neowin Forums.


Andrea Borman, myself, said on Neowin Forums.
That man and his silly software,that does not work,makes me laugh. He says he is a software developer but he does not even have his own website. Why not I wonder? And I wonder if his avatar is what he looks like in real life.



Then I got a warning from a supervisor by private message,as they do on Neowin Forums..


Supervisor of Neowin forums said.
Your warning level has been increased because of this statement:Insulting other Neowin members is against the rules here. Please refrain from comments like his in the future.Neowin Supervisor.



So I replied back to the supervisor on Neowin Forums by private message saying that I was sorry. And I was not laughing at the member I was laughing at his software,that does not work. And the supervisor told me my apology was accepted.

But then a few days after that on Friday I found out from reading some posts on the web that Windows 8 that is due to be released on sale on 26th October 2012 on Friday is only going to be sold as an upgrade installation DVD. And not as a full installation, as Windows 7 and the other versions of Windows are. This means that Windows users who want to install Windows 8 will only be able to do an upgrade install from Windows 7,Windows Vista or Windows XP. And not a clean install as they can do with Windows 7 and the other versions of Windows.


And the next day on Saturday I telephoned PC Word a computer store in England where I live. And I spoke to customers services on the phone and they confirmed that Windows 8 is only going to be sold as an upgrade install and not a full install as with Windows 7.

And so I posted on the same thread on Neowin Forums where I had posted on Tuesday what I had found out. Here is my comment on the thread.


Andrea Borman-myself said, on Neowin Forums.
I have got some bad news. Windows 8 is only going to be sold as an upgrade. I have read on the web and I have just come off of the telephone from talking to PC World that confirms this.And of course Windows 8 RP expires in January 2013. And a lot of Windows users including me won't want to do an upgrade install.
Which means that most people won't be able to install Windows 8 like they can now with Windows 8 RP.So most Windows users will have to go back to Windows 7 or whatever version of Windows they had before Windows 8.
So it looks like your software is going to go out of business chum.


I have a sense of humour and it shows in some of my posts. But the moderators did not see the funny side of it. And I got another warning from another moderator on Neowin Forums by private message. Here is the warning I got.


Moderator on Neowin Forums said-
Your comment on this thread.
Has been removed, and you have been warned as well as restricted from posting for 10 days as per Cleaning up the Community also stop spreading false info, Windows 8 is not being sold as an "upgrade only".
This is in violation of the following rule: Trolling.Found at the Board Rules page, please review them.
Global Moderator,Neowin Forums. 

And I replied back to the moderator by private message.  Here is my reply to the moderator.


Andrea Borman,myself,said in reply to the global moderator of Neowin forums by private message.
 Well I have just spoken to PC World a big store in England were I live, on the phone just now and they confirm that Windows 8 is only being sold as an upgrade. And it says so on the web if you look. And on the Microsoft website it says that OEM is only for shops selling computers. Which does NOT APPLY to home computer users like us. So it is true I am not lying. And I am just as upset about Windows 8 only being sold as an upgrade as a lot of other people are.
By the way,chum means mate or friend. 



But the moderator did not respond to my message and when I tried to post on Neowin Forums I got a message saying my posting rights have been suspended until 30th October 2012. 

But I am NOT spreading false information, as that moderator put it. I have been told by all of the stores I spoke to that Windows 8 IS only being sold as an upgrade. And it says so on the web and on the Microsoft website. And the OEM version is only for computer makers who are building their own computers to sell in shops or stores. 

So the OEM is not for ordinary home computer users. So where am I lying? And that moderator was very nasty to me and called me a troll. But in real life there is no such thing as a troll except in a fairy story. But Neowin Forums is not the only forum I am having problems with.


Back in March this year,after my ban from Windows 7 and Windows 8 Forums. I saw a thread on Windows 7 Forums.com started by a member who said he got a long email from the owner and admin of Windows 7 and Windows 8 forums explaining why he had banned me and the three other members.

And on that thread the owner and admin of Windows 7 Forums said that he had banned me because he found out I was friends with Hezbollah Milita. And he posted what was a lot of nonsense on that thread saying that Hezbollah were terrorists, which they are not, and he mentioned my name which I think is very insulting. But that was not the real reason why the admin banned me from both Windows 7 and Windows 8 Forums.

 I was banned to be honest because I was being stupid in my posts about Windows 8,calling it Nightmares Preview. And saying that we should should go to the European Court Of Human Rights and get them to ban Windows 8. I have a sense of humour in my posts and it was just a joke, but some they did not see the funny side of it. And two of the members were nasty to me on the threads I posted on.But I did not respond back to the members despite this. And the admins solution was to ban me and the two other members. And the admin also banned a third member for a different reason.

I can understand the admin of Windows 7 Forums saying he banned me because of my silly posts about Windows 8.Which was true. But to say he banned me because he found out I was friends with Hezbollah Milita,which he was obviously using as an excuse to ban me,is stupid,if not
bizarre.

 I have now been reinstated on both Windows 7 Forum.com and Windows 8 Forums.com. So I can post on those forums again. But two weeks ago on Windows 7 Forums, I put my foot in it again. When I replied to a member on the thread about banned members. I said banning someone's IP address is a violation of human rights. And this set the admin off.

He responded by saying that I need to take a different attitude when using his sites or will have to take action against me again. He means ban me again.  Then the next day when I went back on that thread  it was locked. The admin had locked the thread and they seldom do that on Windows 7 Forums or on Windows 8 Forum their other forum.

One of the reasons I started my own forum was because I was fed up with the way I was being treated on some other forums. My threads were getting locked or deleted for no real reason and I was getting warnings and bans. And I was fed up with the stupid rules and stupid and ignorant attitude of forum moderators on many forums like Neowin Forums.

And a lot of the forums treat us adults like children. It is true to say that I have been made to feel very uncomfortable on some forums. And forums like Neowin Forums serve as a good example of how some forums over react and the forum get worked up over nothing. In fact Neowin Forums is an online prison,with their stupid rules and ignorant moderators.

And the attitude of the owner and admin of Windows 7 Forums.com which he displayed in his posts about me on the forum. Is not much better than that of forums like Neowin and other forums that have banned me for no real reason. And although the admin has now unbanned me from Windows 7 and Windows 8 Forums,he has not lifted the infraction he placed on my account.For my posts about Windows 8 called it Nightmares Preview which was a joke.

But now that I have my own forum. I am now wondering if it is worth going back to those forums again. It seems like it is a waste of time. And the admins and moderators of forums like Neowin and other forums are the type of admins or people I don't want to be.






















2 comments:

  1. Actually, the rumor is that Windows 8 will be available for full install in the way or OEM or System Builder licensing, see: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4864603&CatId=7700

    An article on CNET semi-confirms this rumor here: http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-33642_7-57471786-292/windows-8-the-end-of-the-full-retail-version/

    While I'm not a big forum user and sincerely Google searching bystander who has stumbled upon these postings here and on Neowin, it appears that moderators are not necessarily concerned with the content of your message, rather, it appears that it's the seeming antagonistic tone these posts appear to have.

    You appear to have a great passion for many things and to be a great source of information and constructive criticism, it would just be a shame to see good-natured positive contributions become overshadowed by a tone that turns other people off.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Well I have just gone out today and bought the upgrade version of Windows 8 Pro.Which I am going to install on one of my Windows 7 netbooks.

    But PC World,the store where I bought my Windows 8,told me there is no full install version of Windows.There is only the upgrade version.And they even looked on the Internet for me in the store.And they found there is nowhere that sells Windows 8 as a full install version.

    And you cannot buy the OEM version either. It seems it is only being sold to computer makers, who are building their own computers, to sell in shops. So OEM is not for home computer users.
    Andrea.

    ReplyDelete

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