The Daily Grind: Naming and shaming?
by Krystalle Voecks 
Oct 2nd 2009 at 8:00AM
Filed under: Opinion, The Daily Grind
Yesterday, a bit of a kerfuffle broke out on the Fallen Earth forums. One of the largest fan sites, Globaltech Atlas, was asking the community about whether or not they should consider adding in a "Honorary Douche-bag of the Week" award, which would allow members of the community to "name and shame" enabling players to nominate other Fallen Earth players who were "cheaters, scammers, liars and thieves and [deserving of] the oh so important 'poor sportsmanship' awards." Now ultimately, they decided to drop the idea, instead opting to warn the community about any scams going around without naming people. However, two forum threads had already started, hotly debating the various pros and cons.One side felt that by doing this on a single-shard game (much like EVE Online in this aspect) they could potentially stop people from being flaming jerks because the community would immediately be aware of what they were doing. Others pointed out that since there are members of the community who thrive on being jerks, there was a certain element that would likely step up their griefing just to get an award like this - considering it a mark of honor to actually get named. Some pointed out that screenshots and chat logs could be faked easily; others pointed out that anyone actually being a big enough jerk would be essentially blacklisted simply because enough people had it happen to them.
This morning we thought we'd put it to you - what do you think of "naming and shaming" people who are rude/scam/etc? Do you think that this is a good idea and can be a useful tool to dissuade players from being jerks? Or do you think this is a poorly-advised idea, offering little beyond a chance for drama llamas to compete for fame - or should we say infamy?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
MrGutts said on 8:39AM 10-02-2009
Absolutely, they should have this in all games. They should even have awards for being a resource thief , being a damn NINJA and it should go on your account for everyone to see. That is if everyone voted for you being a complete dick!
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TommyB said on 8:46AM 10-02-2009
There's a very good reason why this isn't tolerated in decent MMOs... it can be easily abused to harass innocent players.
Some jackass decides to post a lie about you, even though you haven't done anything wrong.. but there's virtually nothing you can do to prove your innocence.
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CindyL said on 11:02AM 10-02-2009
This is the first thing that popped to my mind too. Being this is the internet people don't really know unless you dedicate a lot of time trying to and in an MMO generally this doesn't happen.
You ninja someone's mob or node by accident, yes it can happen and all of a sudden you're labeled as a jack ass? There are newbies to MMOs all the time and a lot of them have no idea how the etiquette of MMO gaming goes I could see these people losing interest real fast if they happen to be labeled for something they didn't know was 'wrong'.
In general I think it's a poor and not so professional idea coming from the devs. If it comes entirely from the community then that's different.
Tom said on 11:58AM 10-02-2009
This was my concern as well.
I have always thought, however, that it'd be great if players could "rate" other players that they'd grouped with for, say, at least 30 minutes or more.
You could then score them positively or negatively based on that experience, but since you'd have to have grouped with them, the system couldn't be abused quite so easily.
Any system like this needs to work both ways, allowing players to both commend or downrate other players in a limited fashion.
Firebreak said on 1:30PM 10-02-2009
This happened to a buddy of mine on our WoW server. There was a name and shame blacklist thread that was kept up to date. My buddy made a couple of mistakes by accidently hitting need on the wrong thing, getting something he could not even use. They made up a few chat logs and he went on the black list. He eventually just quit as there was nothing he could do to get off of it.
InfamousBrad said on 8:47AM 10-02-2009
Not without some kind of a politically independent, tenured judiciary committed to finding out the facts, first. Without that it's just gossip, at best.
In an environment with as much anonymity as an online game, what's more important is for people to believe that cheaters aren't getting away with it. I firmly believe that online multiplayer games should publish up-to-date stats of how many people they've suspended or banned for cheating; not just counts of (disposable, trial) gold-spammer accounts deleted, but actual exploiters. But it's neither necessary nor desirable to name and shame them individually.
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OrganiClockwork said on 8:51AM 10-02-2009
It depends on the charges. Scamming, hacking, botting, all of those things should absolutely involve naming and shaming.
But in games like EVE, at least -- I know little of Fallen Earth -- lying, cheating, and stealing, and generally being a bastard is a completely legitimate playstyle. Of course, it's up to the community if they want to spread around the names of people who do it -- and they probably will, so people who do it will probably only have one real chance, so they better make it good. At the same time, however, people need to realise the above is true. Some of the most epic things you hear about from EVE are things like political assassinations, corporation subterfuge and invasion, and so forth. Again, I know very little about Fallen Earth, but if the game mechanics enable such things, then they're fair game. I'm not saying they're good sportsmanship -- or that I personally would do any of the above -- but it's the apocalypse. What do you expect?
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Vitamin Dei said on 9:46AM 10-02-2009
During the Champions Online open beta I encountered more than a few jerky players who would ninja my quest objectives while I was conveniently busy fighting off the mob that had been guarding them. It's annoying in any game, but Champions' relative lack of instancing made this especially annoying. I briefly played around with the idea of using the Twitter integration and hash tags to send out ninja alerts and hold people accountable. Ultimately I decided that it wasn't a great idea and wouldn't accomplish much aside from making me look whiny and petty. :)
I think as far as douchebags in online games go, you just have to learn about each one the hard way and make your own judgments.
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Satanis said on 9:59AM 10-02-2009
Yip complaining about cheaters, scammers and loot ninjas ingame is a waste of time, just call them a douche and move on as most of them are 13 year old with low self esteem looking for attention that their moms dont give them.
What goes around comes around
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Lateris said on 10:44AM 10-02-2009
Can we get an award for that here? ;)
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Evi said on 10:44AM 10-02-2009
It's too easy to fake chat logs and implicate innocent players. I say no. If someone is a big enough jerk, news will travel on it's own.
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Myria said on 10:47AM 10-02-2009
Such a 'naming and shaming' system would pretty much only be acceptable if it were possible for reliable evidence to be submitted to a fair-minded playerbase that agreed on objective definitions for all of the terms involved and took 'innocent until proven guilty' as a given.
In other words, never.
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torak said on 11:31AM 10-02-2009
It's an immature idea. With no proof it's just slander.
Who's gonna spend time reading that trash anyway, vindictive, immature players is who.
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seldom said on 12:09PM 10-02-2009
It's such a bad idea it's a wonder it doesn't happen more often.
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Pingles said on 12:27PM 10-02-2009
It's a great idea that is SO susceptible to abuse that to implement it would require a couple of full-time monitors who get to work immature-a-hole duty trying to investigate every false claim that comes in.
What a nightmare.
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Chris Schwarz said on 4:23PM 10-02-2009
I've heard positive remarks about CO adding the account name to the toon name; and I think this would help address the problem (can't hide by running another toon). The account name wouldn't have to appear on screen as long as a player could inspect you to find it out. Bad behavior tends to get passed along pretty quickly I think.
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Plastic Rat said on 11:33PM 10-04-2009
I like the idea.. however the major flaw, regardless of whether you're for it or against is, is the fact that it can be abused.
Look at the userbase that groups like 4chan or Goonsquad can leverage.
So you have a gigantic group of people, all with a maturity arrested at the age of 11 and an irresistible desire to fit in with the rest of their buddies. Then you point them in a direction.. at some random player who's pissed one of their celebrities off, or who happens to by sure bad luck to have made themselves a target that day.
Doesn't matter if they're guilty or innocent, they're going to suffer.
It won't be justice it'll just be a popularity contest.
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