Adam Creighton, Computer and Video Gaming: Permanently banned from TeamXbox.com forums?

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Adam Creighton, Computer and Video Gaming (Subscribe)

Thursday, January 25, 2007

Permanently banned from TeamXbox.com forums?

UPDATED: You can read the forum comments to my post here (the post itself has been deleted, but you can read it below).

So, this is interesting.

I posted on the TeamXbox.com off-topic forum (which is probably one of the less-policed forums I've seen) today about my disappointment with a less-then responsible "news" story the TeamXbox.com ran about the Pope's recent statements about video games. (TeamXbox.com version; CNN version; The Star (AP) version.)

As I was unfortunately expecting (but hoped wouldn't happen), the comments to my post were negative, juvenile (or indecipherable), and had very little to do with the (what I thought was maturely presented) post's content.

I went to check just now to see if there were any updated comments for my post, I got the following message:

You have been banned for the following reason:
Snapple

Date the ban will be lifted: Never

Now, I don't think the content of the original post was offensive or worth censorship. Even the responses (none from me), though not reflecting well on our video game culture, didn't warrant a ban. And if they did, wouldn't they ban the commenters, rather than me for my original post?

And banned for reason "Snapple"? Now, there was one commenters who repeatedly wrote "Snapple" (and nothing else) in response to my post. So I wonder if s/he may be a moderator on the site, and is abusing resident power.

So, I'm putting the original post here -- you tell me if you think it warrants being banned from a Website.

I've also posted the content on my TeamXbox base page.

And I will pursue this elsewhere.

UPDATED: My request for clarification as to why I'm banned goes to forum@teamxbox.com, so I don't have much hope that this will get resolved appropriately there. I'm now waiting for a response from parent subsidiary IGN Entertainment's support and legal folks. If that doesn't happen in a timely manner, I'll go up the owning-company route for resolution.
Poor TeamXbox handling of "Pope Condemns Violent and Sexually Explicit Games"

By: adamcrei
04:09 PM PST
Views: 20

Crud.

I'm bummed to feel like I have to post this.

I'm disappointed with the treatment of the "Pope Condemns Violent and Sexually Explicit Games" pseudo news story ("pseudo" as portrayed on TeamXbox.com and other sites, but I'm posting here).

The lack of respect for a world political/religious leader and the acerbic commentary aren't needed, and are pretty irresponsible:

"The head of the Catholic Church wants you to educate your child like we were in the 19th century.
.
.
.
"We guess the Pope won't like Marilyn Manson or Grindhouse, the Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodríguez exploitation film.

"Will the Pope like Gears of War's Destroyed Beauty concept and the chainsaw executions? We don't think so."
Understand, I'm not Catholic. And I think this was probably one of those topical things that was fed as an agenda item and then included as part of the Pope's address, but the game culture and "press" handling of it -- including TeamXbox.com -- is pretty poor, and counter to painting a positive image of gaming and gamers.

Are all games bad? No. Are all games good? No. Are all violent games OK? No. Is there artistic merit in some pretty hardcore stuff? Sure. Is this hazy intersection of culture and morality easy, and is there a "clean win"? Heck, no.

We're at a tough place in gaming, and we're getting nailed constantly in the mainstream press and court system for being violently or sexually explicit. And now, our greatest advocate and president of the ESA, Doug Lowenstein, is stepping down.

Which means the rest of us have to step up.

Which means we can't willfully mishandle things like this, as small as they seem.

And the writer knows it. I noticed comments are turned off. There was either a flood of bad comments after the poor posting and unprofessional lead-in, or he turned off comments in advance, not wanting to face accountability or feedback on his lack of professionalism.

I'm all for autonomy for TeamXbox.com, but this is maybe where some IGN.com parental oversight could come in handy. Pull stunts like this a few more times, and I expect that oversight will be mandated.

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SOURCES: Gamespot.com, joystiq.com, kotaku.com, Xbox.com, IGN, GameInformer, Official XBox Magazine, CNN, gamesindustry.biz, and others.

Adam Creighton, Computer and Video Gaming (Subscribe)

Thursday, January 25, 2007

Permanently banned from TeamXbox.com forums?

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