I'd like to add that while I've only been a member of staff for a very short period of time, I've been a part of the CraftyMynes server for nearly two years (maybe longer?). A lot of the infractions that staff deals with and that other players feel are harsh stem from people pushing the boundaries of the rules. If someone isn't sure if what they want to say or want to do is against the rules-- why do it? Why not ask first and avoid any trouble?

I understand that everyone's personal views on strictness and leniency are going to be different, and decisions made by staff members aren't always going to be agreed with by players, but in the end, just as R4 said, we are humans--and players-- too, and we are only trying to make our best judgements, given the situation. I'm all for having well thought out discussions and even debates on how the server is handled, all I ask from everyone is that there is mutual respect between players and staff.

I think it's rather unfair to make any blanket statements about the staff-- just as staff wouldn't (or shouldn't) make any blanket statements about the community of the server. It just wouldn't be accurate and it's definitely not constructive.

@R4iscool1 Post the chat logs if you wish, I never once stated that you were banned from saying harassment in chat.

Ahem. Read above.

@R4iscool1 So far I count 7 players, on a server which receives over a hundred a day. That's not a representative sample, as I said people with issues are the ones more likely to be vocal.

This post has received 290 views in 2 hours.

@NerdieBirdieYT Ahem. Read above.

This post has received 290 views in 2 hours.

The view counter on the forum isn't unique, so every time a new post has been made on this thread and people have refreshed to see it, it's added a view.
I don't see how views translate into opinions either.

Read above.

@R4iscool1 This post (https://forum.craftymynes.com/6425-overhaul-the-wishing-fountain/0/ ) received about 350 in nearly two weeks, and it was a suggestion that many people were actively chatting about.

We are now at 302 views for this post.

Just saying.

for the sake of r4's sanity I'm going to end his responses, now. Go to bed, R4. That is an order.

As for the grassling thread, I moved it to staff eyes only for the sake of preparing a response while I go shopping and wait for the admins to view it and share their opinions before making it public with a statement.

Nerdie - the views don't matter much other than indicated how many times a pages is opened/refreshed.

The views don't matter but I'm still waiting from a reponse to why a staff member used an alt account to back up his own argument and won't comment on the matter

@Blackened_Dawn

Still, views are still people, that's still a large amount of people who can read and have opinions, they aren't required to post, sure, some are just going to take a quick glance or not even read, or even if that view count is mixed with refreshing views, it's still people nonetheless. ( whenever it's opinions siding with players or staff )

@NerdieBirdieYT @Blackened_Dawn I know that. I am just using it comparatively to show that people care about the subject.

@GrandpaCarl00 @Blackened_Dawn
Still, views are still people, that's still a large amount of people who can read and have opinions, they aren't required to post, sure, some are just going to take a quick glance or not even read, or even if that view count is mixed with refreshing views, it's still people nonetheless. ( whenever it's opinions siding with players or staff )

The way staff handles a thread like this is a fascinating concept for our players, especially with a staff with diverse backgrounds and opinions, I have never denied this, players who are involved in the thread are responding faster than I can type, expect some slowdown and catching up from me here.

@Grassling The views don't matter but I'm still waiting from a reponse to why a staff member used an alt account to back up his own argument and won't comment on the matter

Not sure where the alt argument came from though I understand it, not an alt. Although the argument can be made that since I am part of said staff will make me unreliable, and no amount of confirmation will satiate that argument

Well, now that I've spent the last hour reading through this, I think I can gather some opening and closing remarks from my experience. And yes, I am staff. That does not make my opinion worthless on the topic of staff. I have been a player far longer than a helper and I became a helper because I like the staff and the community we used to be and I want to keep it alive. First off, a common thing I read here has to do with staff being rude. I personally don't understand why so many people can't understand sarcasm. Some staff are direct with their reasoning and responses, some are sarcastic. That doesn't make them wrong or unjustified, it just means they have a different approach. And with my time on the server, I've noticed that the players who often get themselves banned after a few months(or even a few minutes) because they subtly push the boundaries every once in a while are usually the ones that get the most heated about sarcastic staff. Sarcasm given to a troll can easily be twisted into claiming staff abuse. I've been on the server many times when a staff member responds sarcastically to a player. Would I have said that? No. Are they wrong? No. Every instance I can remember, the staff member is completely in the right. They may not be a model of customer service, but typically the person they're responding to is some form of trouble maker or otherwise shows signs that they won't be hanging around much longer. Sometimes people just need to learn to take a joke. We don't always want to put "lol" at the end of our sentences to show we're not serious or being rude. This more or less feels like The Big Bang Theory episode where Leonard has to make a "sarcasm" sign because Sheldon simply cannot process when Leonard is being sarcastic. That's pretty much what "lol" is, a sign that we're joking. We don't always put "lol", people. It doesn't mean we're serious. Granted, I don't know every situation, I could be wrong, this is purely from what I've seen over a few years.

And going back to an earlier, smaller topic about the views here, now at almost 700. It really doesn't show opinion, guys. You want to know why it's so high? It's drama. It's juicy gossip that almost no one can resist. It's like turning on the tv and finding out two big celebrities are calling each other out. Most people are gonna stay tuned and watch the crap out of that news channel. A lot of the views are from people that honestly couldn't care less. If they did care, they'd post something or otherwise make their opinion known. Yes, some people just are too afraid to post and get barked at for speaking, but a lot is just drama watching with no intention of making their opinions known. I know, I've been that person many a time.

I'd also like to point out that staff do care about what you guys suggest. We do read your posts, even if we don't comment on them. We do think about them. I love reading suggestions, sometimes putting my two cents in, sometimes storing it in memory for a later date when that topic becomes important again. The players of this community are what make us necessary, for better and for worse. Without the community, Craftymynes is just an empty server. So we do care and we want to make you happy. That's why we spend so much time making fun stuff for the server and trying to keep it as clean as we can.

And if there is anything here that I feel should be stressed, it's that staff are human too. It was mentioned a few times, but not enough. We're just people. We have lives, we have friends, we have closer-than-friends. We date, we live, we get upset, we make mistakes, we learn, we do better. That's what human is. Don't expect us to be perfect. This isn't a job for us, it's willingly sacrificing our time to allow you guys to have fun. We do make mistakes, and I have seen many times when staff have apologized and resolved a situation because they knew they were wrong. I'm not saying that we should be absolved of our mistakes, but understand that we have a right to defend ourselves if we think we don't deserve this kind of complaint against us. In some situations, it can be a complete grey area, which makes for a very difficult justification on either end and the only resolution is that staff get final say.

In Vene's case, if someone knew my real name and said it in open chat, I would be upset too, especially when I never said they could. This isn't real life. This is the internet. We chose our names here and expect to be addressed by them. Vene wants to be addressed by the name he chose for you to see, not the one someone said and you picked up on. Whether for the sake of his choice in name, or for the sake of respecting staff, you should never call someone by any name other than what they have approved of. Just because someone can say something doesn't mean everyone can. And it has nothing to do with staff. If someone learns you're name and is calling you out in open chat with it and you told them not to, that's disrespectful and feel free to talk to staff about it. This shouldn't be blown out of proportion just because they are both staff, because anyone has a right to keep their name private, or at least have it not be used. I think the ban was justified, for many mini reasons that added up to be a big reason. Maybe that's why some people are arguing over technicality of the ban. The reason chosen was not the entirety of it, but a small part of a bigger whole. But like I said, it's a lot of grey area between personal info, respect, and previous issues. None of us are going to learn exactly what was going through their heads when it went down or afterwards. I don't know the full story, but from what I've seen, this is my best opinion of it and until visual proof is given to show otherwise, this will remain my opinion.

Edit: Also, may I point out how because we are human, we are far less likely to take into consideration your opinions when put into a thread full of insults towards staff. Some complaints are legitimate, but a few of them are just jabs at staff for no reason other than annoyed kids who got in trouble for breaking rules. If you want your opinion heard without backlash, please, please, PLEASE, do a pm to staff and not create another witchhunt. What this is is a few upset people standing on a soap box in a public place and shouting complaints to the general public instead of taking it up with the people in charge themselves. Much like a public group of upset people, these threads always turn more into a riot than a resolution. You know how riots end? With those in charge suppressing the riot and no change is made. If you want change, get off your soap box and talk to the staff personally, not to the itching crowd waiting for a bite of action.

Please don't take any of this with ill will. This is my opinion and what I believe. If you have a rational reasoning for otherwise, feel free to think otherwise. We're all just human here.

@Grassling @Dennari43 you say we need to stop taking jabs at staff but you explicitly just called me an angry kid which I see as a jab in itself.

I was not referring to you. Not all vague comments are directed at you personally. I mentioned you near the end of my speech and that was I I have to say about you. You are not the topic I'm concerned about.

The reason you were banned? I don't know exactly, like I said. But it appears to be many little reasons that add up to be a big reason, like a swarm of bees attacking you versus a giant dog biting you. One is many little things, the other one big thing, both do harm. That's about as simple as I can explain it.

@Grassling When staff were addressed with in this forum originally by berdie i believe he also said the problem was a bunch of things but he was asked to explain in order to effectively communicate an understanding. Maybe you could try do so yourself unless you just decided to communicate in a conversation you lack knowledge of and are therefore not defending an argument but instead a side.(staff)

The amount of rudeness makes it hard not to be sarcastic, but I'll refrain from that, as it seems it's too much for most to understand. I mentioned many topics, not all of them are answers, I did not mention every topic. I spent an hour reading this mess of a mosh pit and I forgot some things I wanted to say when I got to a point I could start typing. So I am very sorry if I did not mention everything you wanted me to. I touched on the topics I had something significant to say on. Nothing more. And there is no real argument here. There's your situation, which you, yourself, have said this is not about, so you're case doesn't matter from here on out. The rest of this is, as I said, a small group of upset people calling out staff. The only options here are to say "yes, I think staff are bad and toxic and should be fixed" or "i think staff is in the right here". So there really only are the two options of which "side" you want to believe. I chose mine. And if you're issue is that I'm not being specific, remember, I spent an hour reading this. I got to the party late. I didn't get out my note pad and start sketching out my essay with each comment in mind with a full rebuttal and everything. It's 3 AM and I don't have the time to note everyone's views and whether I agree or disagree with them all. I said what I wanted to say. And considering almost everything I said has more to do with character and less with physical facts, I don't have to be specific or site evidence, as it is from my experience learning and hanging around staff and this server. There is no direct evidence for me to site, as I'm noting personalities and mindsets, not moments in time. My post is not intended to resolve the situation, but give my opinion in hopes to lead to a resolution, which is apparently hopeless considering your immediate harsh response to it. You're just encouraging the soap box metaphor.

@Grassling i want my opinion to be heard without "backlash" because if staff members expect respect they should be exemplary.

How can we be exemplary when we have customers like you? Rude, insulting, saying they want a resolution but all they do is stir up more heat. We're human, just like you. Did my comment sting? Did it make you upset? I feel like it did. It should. I'd be upset if someone called me out in such a mean way, which you did. That's all this is. While Nerdie is trying his best not to devolve to this state and reduce this thread to insults and fighting, which I do respect, that's what it will end up being.

And staff deserve respect because they already earned it. That's why they're staff. They showed they can hold the server's interests at heart while maintaining chat and doing everything else staff do. That's how we get picked, get promoted, become admin. We prove that we deserve it. Staff already deserve respect from players, especially the admins and mods. They do so much for this server just to have trolls and hackers and utterly terrible people come along and mess with what they've done. None of us are perfect. You can't expect us to be exemplary. We do the best we can, sometimes we mess up. I'm not denying that. But if you want a staff member to be perfect, then just go ahead and quit minecraft, cause you're never going to find a perfect staff member(that's not an AI) anywhere.

@Anonymous What a wonderful conversation.

I've been watching and reading everything since it started and I have to say

I've never seen quite a staff like you bunch before.
You prefer to argue with your players instead of actually want to resolve the problem at hand and continue to make the problem worse
by your behavior shown. At first, it was fairly tame and full of good points, but now look at what it's devolved into because you
can't even manage a simple thread on your forums.

Now, who the fuck am I?
I'm an anonymous person who's been watching the entire time, I don't play on the server but I do know a very good amount about CraftyMynes and how it works. Trust me on that. I've also moderated Minecraft server forums before, and this is in no way shape or form how any
staff should handle a thread like this AT ALL.

(OMG ALT ALT ALT isn't true at all. But have fun with saying that.)

The only real person I see who is actually trying to remedy the situation is rnc2011, and I applaud him for that. THAT is how you handle
this, not act like R4, Vene, or almost every other staff member that has replied to this dumpster fire of a thread.
R4 and Vene's behaviors are the real issue here, R4 seems to want to argue over the littlest shit just for the sake of arguing, and Vene
is overreacting way too much to his FIRST NAME being posted.

Okay I'm not sure why you would be anonymous if you aren't actually involved or write this long post but staff have opinions too and they should be allowed to express them. We aren't robots and are entitled to our views like any other players. It's through expressing these views and finding a solution a problem is actually solved.
I'm sorry you think I argue for the sake of it but the fact you posted here despite having no connection seems to suggest the same about you.
I can agree with Nerdie though if it devolves to post like this then the thread will have lost its purpose.
This thread isn't supposed to be managed

@Anonymous First names are pretty much public information, people. If you post it online, it stays online. If you don't want people to use your
name in a specific place online, DO NOT POST IT. Vene seems to have done quite the opposite by making his first name public to this
server and people using it is entirely his fault. Now, removing his name and asking people to no longer use it is perfectly fine, but he
brought it on himself.

I've seen this argument quite often, and I'm going to shut it down right here and now.

"If strangers used my name, I'd be uncomfortable." No you wouldn't. It happens all the time, have you ever worked a job where you had a nametag?
Have you ever had someone call you for a job interview?
Have you ever met a stranger and told them your name?
Have famous people ever freaked out when a fan approached them on the street because said fan knew their name?
Does Kim Kardashian lose her shit every time a stranger who writes for a magazine uses her name in an article?

Ultimately your data is your data you have the right to privacy as I pointed out. Yes if you put your name on a name tag then you are consenting to other people using it. That's how data law works, sometime you might be required to do so for your job too, if you consent that's fine. If you don't consent however that is an issue just like Vene didn't. Whether they put it in the public domain or not as I pointed out is irrelevant to that right.
In response to your argument about Journalists, Journalism is in the int rest of the public and sometimes privacy is disregarded for the sake of public interest, that doesn't make it a free rein to do what you want with data however.

@Anonymous Dictating to people whether or not they can use your name or not and requiring them to ask permission is utterly stupid and going so far
as to ban Grassling over using Vene's first name is petty. It seems that staff reiterating that staff had already banned Grassling
multiple times beforehand makes it look like they were looking for any reason to perm ban Grassling, and they got one because
Vene made his name public.

Shut the hell up about whether or not it's legal or not to use a first name, because the majority of first names are impossible to track
back to the specific person that you're referring to. If Vene's name was Bob, you couldn't just type "Bob" into Google and you'd immediately
find Vene's Facebook account, that's not how it works.
And so what if people know your first name in a Minecraft server? Either get over it and learn to live with it, or throw a complete
tempertantrum and get someone banned because of your own mistake.

I'm sorry you think it's stupid but as we pointed out we value you privacy in CM here, our staff don't deserve to be treated differently to players and they have a right to privacy, if you think that's stupid I'm sorry but that's just it.

The only reason we mentioned his multiple bans is people kept saying we banned him without warning or that was the sole reason and he should have got more warning before Perma.
That wasn't the case so we supplied more info for their benefit so they could come to a proper judgement.

I think data law is quite relevant here despite your complaints it is isn't either.
We know what he did isn't illegal, no one ever said that.
What we did talk about was how far privacy extends and how it's currently enshrined in the law. An interesting topic for me at least.
Whether or not that data links directly back to you isn't relevant either to the right to privacy, if they don't want you calling them by their real name then don't.

@Anonymous Come on.

And then, the very handling of this thread is entirely fucking unprofessional. There are MULTIPLE ways staff could have handled this
and they were all ignored just for the sake of arguing the point that they are not toxic. (Ironic, if you ask me.)

If the staff TRULY AND HONESTLY cared about improving the way they handle themselves on the server, they would have made it very clear in
the first place, but clearly the majority of them just want to make the situation worse by arguing. There's only been about 2 staff members
that have shown true caring for the growing hostility between staff and players, the rest of staff don't seem to give a shit.

How could have this been handled then?

Let's list all of the possibilities.

1. Say "Oh we're so sorry you feel this way! Please tell us why you think we're toxic assholes and we'll try our best to work towards
being better towards our players and not spend hours upon hours arguing with them! If you do have evidence of a staff member being rude
like R4 has been for the majority of this thread, please submit it so we can make sure it doesn't happen again!"

Or something along those lines that is neutral, yet remorseful and hopeful of a better future on the server.

2. Lock the thread and have staff reply to it asking that if anyone has a problem with staff, they should take it up with them
privately and not blow this already fucked situation way out of porportion. In other words, "Take it up with crafty."

3. Have an open discussion with your players about why they feel like staff have been rude constantly and saying shit like "Rip you" when
a player dies to a server related issue, apologize, then go into staff chat and have a discussion with other staff members about
their behavior and how they can improve. If they don't improve, you can actually demote them! How crazy is that?

4. Don't argue with people.

5. Don't argue.

6. Don't. Argue.

Oh look, you went and argued.

So congratulations to the CraftyMynes staff and R4 for proving that there is indeed a problem with them and they aren't willing to change,
they'd rather argue with you for 18-20 hours just because they don't like that they're being called out!

Good job! Let's all throw a party with ice cream and cake over the failure of staff!

1. I asked multiple times for evidence of a staff member being rude to be submitted and said we would delay with it if the complaint was valid. So did clutch.
Clearly you haven't read the whole thread if you missed that.

2. We were doing that with the original thread, having a public discussion is much more beneficial however with the view of change as people can see what others think and there can be no accusations of censorship.

3. We have been trying to do that and it has been asked multiple times why they think staff are rude and in what situations this occurred. We then addressed the concerns in the thread.

4. I'd like to think this was a discussion not an argument for most of the time. People with clashing viewpoints will talk about their views and try to convince each other.
What did you expect, one person would say we were rude for any reason at all and then no one even if they were not staff would challenge it if they had a different view....

As you can see we actually did most of what you said, so I don't think this is very valid criticism at all, if you think otherwise we would be glad to have an explanation as to how we didn't and how you think we can do better.

We'd much rather solve a problem, personally the fact we have been talking this long shows we actually care. If we didn't we would just ignore it. It's posts like yours that are condescending that lead to the issues and take away from that process.