Staff Dabs abusing merit?

[malevolent]

If i pm'd any random user asking them for money for X or Y reasons and I get reported, what punishment would I face?

Depends on the context, but generally speaking if you started PMing random people asking them for money, I think you'd be temp banned at best.

Anyone can report a PM, either whoever received those PMs didn't think it warranted reporting, or Admins didn't think it warranted taking any actions against Dabs.

You guys diverting the topic on another way. No one bothered to open thread about begging coin or DT1 manipulations. You should open another thread regarding another issue. But this thread should serve as merit abuse.

Self-scratching as a whole has been already discussed in other thread(s?), but the alleged begging is a new thing.

[Sancho18]

Self-scratching as a whole has been already discussed in other thread(s?), but the alleged begging is a new thing.

Sir, is this not enough for a clear understanding of what happened?

If a staff member such as Dabs sent a pm to anyone asking for money and then rewarded merits to  the people that gave him money it would be an abuse.
In fact are staff members allowed to ask members for money via pm?
It would be very difficult to say no for fear of retaliation from staff.

I've asked personal friends for coins. Some said yes. Some said no. Got nothing to do with the forum although I understand you feel it may.

You should really stop doing that. You sent me the same PM because I donate to a charity years ago. I don't know you and out of the blue you asked me for money, making me think that your account was compromised. I think it's really inappropriate for a staff member to send (unsolicited) begging for money.

I was asked for money and I don't know Dabs so it could be op is connecting some dots.
I told Dabs I would like a btc addy to send to. I then spent a few hours for a few days reading his posts. I decided to not send coin.
I think Dabs should not ask me or anyone else such as thenewanon135246 for coin via pm.
I think no staff admin mod or even theymos should ask for coin via pm.

By this I mean rule 29 as stated by LoyceV

I am not looking to report staff, admin, mod or theymos for breaking rules simply because I do fear retaliation.  

I agree that this is already far beyond the scope of the topic, but I do not see a more suitable topic and it seems wrong to let it go on the brakes. To the merit source there are complaints about the correct distribution of merit. To the member of the DT1 list there are complaints about self-scratching. To the Staff there are complaints about the violation of the rules of the forum. And all these claims are to one person. To the outside disinterested observer, whom I am, this looks at least worthy of a thorough investigation, as minimum. Thanks.

[TheNewAnon135246]

If i pm'd any random user asking them for money for X or Y reasons and I get reported, what punishment would I face?

Depends on the context, but generally speaking if you started PMing random people asking them for money, I think you'd be temp banned at best.

Anyone can report a PM, either whoever received those PMs didn't think it warranted reporting, or Admins didn't think it warranted taking any actions against Dabs.

You guys diverting the topic on another way. No one bothered to open thread about begging coin or DT1 manipulations. You should open another thread regarding another issue. But this thread should serve as merit abuse.

Self-scratching as a whole has been already discussed in other thread(s?), but the alleged begging is a new thing.

I reported his PM to make sure his account wasn't compromised.

[malevolent]

Self-scratching as a whole has been already discussed in other thread(s?), but the alleged begging is a new thing.

Sir, is this not enough for a clear understanding of what happened?

I don't know how the message looked like, so I don't know if it was begging, or a business offer, a misunderstanding, or something else. But TheNewAnon135246 above says he has reported the message so perhaps it shouldn't have been sent...

P.S. No need to call me 'sir'

[Sancho18]

Self-scratching as a whole has been already discussed in other thread(s?), but the alleged begging is a new thing.

Sir, is this not enough for a clear understanding of what happened?

I don't know how the message looked like, so I don't know if it was begging, or a business offer, a misunderstanding, or something else. But TheNewAnon135246 above says he has reported the message so perhaps it shouldn't have been sent...

P.S. No need to call me 'sir'

Got it. Any news? I would like to know how this story will end, because regardless of the content of the PM, the fact of its mass sending to the list of recipients who did not request it is a violation of the forum rules. The severity of punishment depends on the content of the PM. I hope you consider the issue and make a fair decision. Thanks.

[malevolent]

Got it. Any news? I would like to know how this story will end, because regardless of the content of the PM, the fact of its mass sending to the list of recipients who did not request it is a violation of the forum rules. The severity of punishment depends on the content of the PM. I hope you consider the issue and make a fair decision. Thanks.

I haven't seen the message and it is not up to me to decide. At least one user has reported the PM, so all Global Moderators and Administrators should have seen it by now — if the admins didn't act on the report then I can only assume Dabs didn't break any rules. (or they may have well acted on it but aren't sharing any info.) There's nothing more for me to add here, really.

[TheNewAnon135246]

Got it. Any news? I would like to know how this story will end, because regardless of the content of the PM, the fact of its mass sending to the list of recipients who did not request it is a violation of the forum rules. The severity of punishment depends on the content of the PM. I hope you consider the issue and make a fair decision. Thanks.

I haven't seen the message and it is not up to me to decide. At least one user has reported the PM, so all Global Moderators and Administrators should have seen it by now — if the admins didn't act on the report then I can only assume Dabs didn't break any rules. (or they may have well acted on it but aren't sharing any info.) There's nothing more for me to add here, really.

I received a reply saying that the account wasn't compromised and that he wasn't sending the PM to masses of people, thus not breaking the 'unsolicited spam' rule.

[Sancho18]

Got it. Any news? I would like to know how this story will end, because regardless of the content of the PM, the fact of its mass sending to the list of recipients who did not request it is a violation of the forum rules. The severity of punishment depends on the content of the PM. I hope you consider the issue and make a fair decision. Thanks.

I haven't seen the message and it is not up to me to decide. At least one user has reported the PM, so all Global Moderators and Administrators should have seen it by now — if the admins didn't act on the report then I can only assume Dabs didn't break any rules. (or they may have well acted on it but aren't sharing any info.) There's nothing more for me to add here, really.

I received a reply saying that the account wasn't compromised and that he wasn't sending the PM to masses of people, thus not breaking the 'unsolicited spam' rule.

I can’t say that I am surprised, but slightly disappointed. Violation of the rules was obvious and no punishment followed. Interesting story.

29. Sending unsolicited PMs, including but not limited to advertising and flood, is not allowed.

Apparently, I do not fully understand this rule.

[LoyceV]

I can’t say that I am surprised, but slightly disappointed. Violation of the rules was obvious and no punishment followed. Interesting story.

29. Sending unsolicited PMs, including but not limited to advertising and flood, is not allowed.

There's also this:

NOTE: This is meant to serve as a reference/educational/informational thread, NOT a rock solid list of rules.

I don't mind that a veteran user (or even Staff member) who has contributed to this forum gets away with more than a spammer who creates a Newbie account and starts asking for money.

Just like I appreciate that I get away with posting more than once in a row once in a while. It's always at a Mod's discretion what to do.

[Sancho18]

I can’t say that I am surprised, but slightly disappointed. Violation of the rules was obvious and no punishment followed. Interesting story.

29. Sending unsolicited PMs, including but not limited to advertising and flood, is not allowed.

There's also this:

NOTE: This is meant to serve as a reference/educational/informational thread, NOT a rock solid list of rules.

I don't mind that a veteran user (or even Staff member) who has contributed to this forum gets away with more than a spammer who creates a Newbie account and starts asking for money.

Just like I appreciate that I get away with posting more than once in a row once in a while. It's always at a Mod's discretion what to do.

This selectivity of the rules confuses me. About 100% of all my incoming PMs are unsolicited by me. I perceive each of them to one degree or another, depending on the content, as an invasion of my personal space. I thought the rules of the forum protect me from this, but it turned out that this is not so. I would like to know better in what cases I should report to the administrator, and in which not to do. Please tell how you solve such collisions, so that I can take an example from your strategy as a guide. Thanks.

[LoyceV]

I would like to know better in what cases I should report to the administrator, and in which not to do. Please tell how you solve such collisions, so that I can take an example from your strategy as a guide.

Don't worry too much about it. If you think it violates the rules (such as spam or malware): report it. That's it. Leave it to the Admins to decide.

[JayJuanGee]

Got it. Any news? I would like to know how this story will end, because regardless of the content of the PM, the fact of its mass sending to the list of recipients who did not request it is a violation of the forum rules. The severity of punishment depends on the content of the PM. I hope you consider the issue and make a fair decision. Thanks.

I haven't seen the message and it is not up to me to decide. At least one user has reported the PM, so all Global Moderators and Administrators should have seen it by now — if the admins didn't act on the report then I can only assume Dabs didn't break any rules. (or they may have well acted on it but aren't sharing any info.) There's nothing more for me to add here, really.

I received a reply saying that the account wasn't compromised and that he wasn't sending the PM to masses of people, thus not breaking the 'unsolicited spam' rule.

Thanks for the update, NewAnon.  I have reported a lot of posts in the past and even a PM or two (not necessarily referring to Dabs in this regard), and I don't recall ever receiving any response from Admin regarding the nature of my report, even though there had been times when I thought that the reported content was fairly egregious and worthy of a response.  In the situation that you mentioned, NewAnon, I would think that there would have been a little bit of looking into the matter, beyond your more narrow suspicion that Dabs's account had potentially been compromised.  I have personally interacted with Dabs quite a bit over the years, so I understand why you might have considered a kind of unsolicited request for money or any thing of value might have come off as out of character for him... and reporting does seem to be like a better practice maneuver.... seems like a better safe than sorry kind of situation, in case you had not been the only member contacted in such a manner.

P.S. No need to call me 'sir'

hahahahaha...... I like this response.  

I don't mind that a veteran user (or even Staff member) who has contributed to this forum gets away with more than a spammer who creates a Newbie account and starts asking for money.

Just like I appreciate that I get away with posting more than once in a row once in a while. It's always at a Mod's discretion what to do.

That is completely true, Loyce.  Longer term contributory members are going to get a decent amount more leeway in matters because ultimately we (and I am even hesitant to put myself even in the same semblance of the level of your technical and substantive informational compilation category) don't tend to violate too many of the forum's rules (only in small ways, from time to time).

[JayJuanGee]

I would like to know better in what cases I should report to the administrator, and in which not to do. Please tell how you solve such collisions, so that I can take an example from your strategy as a guide.

Don't worry too much about it. If you think it violates the rules (such as spam or malware): report it. That's it. Leave it to the Admins to decide.

Actually, you have complete discretion regarding how to report your PMs, and if you have any doubts, report ever single one.  On the inside, you likely already know that some of them are not really worthy of reporting because they don't really rise to any level of harm. 

So, in your own personal judgement, you should really already have sufficient common sense tools to understand when there is any kind of justification for the PM that you received, for example, if the member is responding via PM to some kind of idea that you brought up in your post, and maybe you have had some interaction with the member previously, then you would likely consider messages like that to be more worthy of leeway (in your not reporting them). 

Even if a you had never ever heard from a member, but the member solicits some kind of value or conduct from you (like asking you to join some club or group or to review some of their post contents), you might also give them some leeway if you believe that it is less strong of a solicitation (surely the discretion and common sense of members is going to vary to the extent that they believe a PM crosses the line and is worthy of reporting, and probably, like I mentioned in my NewAnon response above, if there are any doubts, then it is probably better to be safe than sorry and to report the post, especially because you know that admin members are going to have more tools in their quiver (I love mixing metaphors  ) to be able to figure out if there might be some pattern or behavior that you are not readily capable of assessing.

[malevolent]

This selectivity of the rules confuses me. About 100% of all my incoming PMs are unsolicited by me. I perceive each of them to one degree or another, depending on the content, as an invasion of my personal space. I thought the rules of the forum protect me from this, but it turned out that this is not so. I would like to know better in what cases I should report to the administrator, and in which not to do. Please tell how you solve such collisions, so that I can take an example from your strategy as a guide. Thanks.

Feel free to report unsolicited PMs if they annoy you, the more people report someone, the higher the likelihood that something will be done about them sending unsolicited messages. You can also add them to your ignorelist in 'Personal Message Options' in your profile settings.