2019-06-06 22:35:19

The main thing I'm wondering is, if this rule goes into effect, who's going to have the unpleasant job of going through every old topic to make sure every link to pirated material is scrubbed from the records? You can't have it both ways; you can close topics, but if the links still stand, that won't be doing a damn thing, even if you crack down on the posting of such links in the future. So, who's to say that a 5-year-old topic won't have a link that still points to so-called unsavory content, and someone stumbles across it either out of sheer boredom, or through a Google search? I do agree, by the way, that this forum does show up in Google searches extremely easily. In fact, I've used that strategy quite a few times when I was looking for a topic whose name I'd forgotten, but typing in a few keywords with the adendum Audio Games more often than not gave me the result I was looking for.

My point is, I certainly don't envy whoever is going to have to plumb the depths of every single post on here, and to not do so would be hypocritical.

The glass is neither half empty nor half full. It's just holding half the amount it can potentially hold.

2019-06-06 22:36:23

It'll probably fal on me to do it. Lucky me.

Much less active on this forum than in the past.

Check out my live streams: http://lerven.me
follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/liamerven

2019-06-06 22:42:00

Also. heres the thing that everyone forgets. This is a longstanding rule. It's int he rules.
people are just mad that a rule that you agreed to that pretty much was never being enforced is now being enforced. Guess what? I can get behind that. the rule should have been enforced from day 0, but there was no effort to step up and actually do it. Of course now that we're doing our jobs, and.. ya know, moderating, people are throwing fits.

Sorry we're actually making you follow rules you agreed to.

Much less active on this forum than in the past.

Check out my live streams: http://lerven.me
follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/liamerven

2019-06-06 22:53:38 (edited by Ethin 2019-06-06 22:56:12)

@28, *toasts to you* Thank you for articulating what I haven't yet. big_smile

"On two occasions I have been asked [by members of Parliament!]: 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out ?' I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question."    — Charles Babbage.
My Github

2019-06-06 23:12:34

From what I read about article 17 I think that this goes as far to include links to news articles. I believe that it targeted Facebook for all the news links and that Facebook would be requiored to pay a subscription fee in order to be able to have links to news articles. Does this mean we can no longer post links to news as well? This would even go as far as you tubers not being allowed to make fan theory videos, and movie reviews because they don't have the copy right for it. So can we still talk about our favorite books, music, games, and books? How far will this go? All this article 15 and 17 bull shit is offal and I pray that it doesn't end up destroying YouTube or worse coming to the US. If it does it will turn us all into robots that just talk about the weather. If this really is just about not linking to described movies and TV shows though why not just email or PM someone the info? I do feel that this is taking things to far but I think 1 factor that comes to play here is that the form server is unforchanently in Europe and that's where a lot of the fear may be coming from? I don't know but I don't think this will stop anyone from finding described content if they want it. I just think it will be another punch in the balls as the result of censorship.

Kingdom of Loathing name JB77

2019-06-06 23:35:45

Okay, so if I haven't said it before (read: I have, multiple times) let me say this one more time.

This isn't about what we want. It's about what we feel we need.

If I had my way, and it were my site, I'd let the status quo stand. I'd respond to any take-down notices I got and would very strongly crack down on people straight-up hacking stuff. That's me though. I'm anti-capitalist and I think this whole copyright business does get a bit absurd.

So let that dissuade you from thinking there's some sort of "sinister motive" at work here. Would love to see what sort of idea you have on that, BTW. Money where your mouth is, and all that? The only thing being put forward here is the notion that we don't want to potentially get Richard and Sandor in trouble, even if that likelihood is very small and even if it probably won't be enormous trouble. And yes, even if it just means that when it comes, it'll show up in the form of a take-down notice with no further repercussions. We are not making sweeping changes to anything under the auspices of their nonexistent guidance. We are not justifying something really mean because we want to, while passing it off on two people who aren't here to defend themselves. So let's stop that train right there, shall we?

This is, as Liam pointed out, a rule you agreed to whenever you signed up, whether that was last year, last night or some time last decade. The rule was there, it just wasn't enforced. Now we're going to try with much more diligence to enforce it.

Point, by the way: we're human, and we won't catch everything. We'll try hard to make sure things get scrubbed to ensure safety, but a failure to achieve 100% efficiency is not hypocritical, it's merely evidence that we're human. Tell you what though. I'm going to call out the whole community here. There are only a few of us moderator/administrator types, and there are hundreds, maybe thousands, of users overall. Since this will be the stance going forward, and since thousands of eyes are better than a dozen or so, metaphorically speaking, perhaps you'd care to help the community instead of just sitting back, casting judgment or waiting for a proverbial axe to fall? Just sayin'.

I don't think we need any fear-mongering either, thanks kindly. We are not going to censor opinions, or discussion of your favourite books/movies/TV shows/whatever else. We are not going to ban you if you mention the audio vault or Game of Thrones or the Harry Potter series you happened to torrent six years ago. We are simply not going to provide links to stuff that could get the site in trouble. It's really no more or less simple than that.

The thing which sparked the discussion of this issue on list, by the way, ultimately came down to a point where it is awfully hard to justify a sometimes-on sometimes-off stance. Do you really want a rule 3 that is seven pages long? Because that's probably what it would take. And who gets to decide where to draw the line? Is Crazy Party okay because it's free and because it's not too easy to take the sounds/music out of it, or is it bad because it uses a ton of sounds from content in a way not intended by the creators of that content? What about audio described movies, especially old ones that are otherwise hard to get? Music? Books not available on Audible? All sorts of stuff. Where do you draw the line? We can't go around grandfathering x and y, while outlawing several others, and just pretending seventy-seven cases don't exist so we don't have to deal with them. Put bluntly, this sort of discussion has essentially been the elephant in the living room that no one's done anything about because we didn't know how. Now that we've decided how to do it, many of you are freaking out. And to some extent, I get it. You're afraid it's a slippery slope. It's not. You're afraid that the forum is going to become a whole lot less welcoming. It's not. We just decided it was better on the whole, both ethically and legally, to take a stand that didn't involve a hundred and forty-three arbitrary sub-clauses based on personal bias. It was, in essence, either all or nothing. And nothing is safer. Nothing is the better option.

Check out my Manamon text walkthrough at the following link:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/z8ls3rc3f4mkb … n.txt?dl=1

2019-06-06 23:55:32

@30, Article 17 does not have any regard to news articles and links -- that's a completely different article and has its own limitations.

"On two occasions I have been asked [by members of Parliament!]: 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out ?' I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question."    — Charles Babbage.
My Github

2019-06-07 00:27:48

Jade, I feel your jab at my post was quite unnecessary. I was posing a legitimate question. Users didn't sign on to comb through the entire forum to make sure that no copyrighted material remains. That is, for better or worse, the job of the moderation team. Now, if you're saying that you, or the team as a whole, would like to promote some users to some sort of temporary mod status, perhaps as news posters to help clean up the place, that's one thing, but expecting us to volunteer is another. We would have to be promoted anyway, we couldn't just go around deleting posts willy-nilly, nor would I trust the vast majority of the current active userbase with such a task. Furthermore, my question was just that, a question, not an attack, and I really don't appreciate being pegged as a shit starter for no legitimate reason. Yes, I do feel that not deleting every offending post would be hypocritical, I'm not backing down on that, because you can't have a rule in place without doing everything in your power to make sure that rule stands with just cause.

There's another aspect to this which I doubt most people have considered. The Internet Archive exists, if someone wanted to prove that this site, and by extension its owners, was privvy to the sharing of illegal material, all they would have to do is drill down a bit and find the old posts before they were deleted. In addition, we've seen how vindictive certain members of this community can be. If someone got mad enough at the administration, they could easily file a DMCA complaint using said evidence.

Now, why am I pointing this wildly unlikely scenario out? Because there is just so much speculation in this topic already, from dire predictions of the site going down, to doom and gloom predictions of censorship, that obviously every angle should be considered. I am in favor of this rule being enforced if the mods feel it's the right thing to do to keep the site balanced, and no one can argue that the rule has been in place since day one. However, the condecension needs to go.

The glass is neither half empty nor half full. It's just holding half the amount it can potentially hold.

2019-06-07 00:31:02

+1, this guy and his attitude is grating on my nerves.

Facts with Tom MacDonald, Adam Calhoun, and Dax
End racism
End division
Become united

2019-06-07 00:58:07

Turtlepower, the "attack" you cited was more aimed at the person who was talking about so-called sinister motives. I really don't think that sort of jab was necessary, but that was not you. It was not my intention to attack you.

Nevertheless, you brought up a valid point, so I responded to it in kind. You are saying that it would be hypocritical not to do our level best to enforce this rule. You're quite right. So what I'm suggesting is that if you (or others) truly believe that this may be the right thing, and you're saying you'd support us, then why not do what you can to back that up, where you're able? We're volunteers, too, you know. We don't get any special perks for this. I'm not whining, merely stating facts. I don't mind the difficulty, and some can't stand it, so that's a YMMV situation if ever I saw one. The point is, you wouldn't need special status in order to report posts, and I'm essentially saying that any member of a community who wants to see it improve has at least some level of moral duty to try and help that happen. As leaders of that community, as it were, it's more on us than on anyone else, but that doesn't mean you can just sit back and criticize. If it is in your power to do good, and you do nothing, then there is at least some onus on you, as a collective group I mean. If this sort of calling-out is something you can't stand, it might be wise to rethink your position.

Check out my Manamon text walkthrough at the following link:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/z8ls3rc3f4mkb … n.txt?dl=1

2019-06-07 01:12:02

Also, if you truly believe that that the mods are going to suppress your ability to talk about things you want to talk about, you always have the option of creating another forum to talk about it. In the US where there's hundreds of millions of people, the government will have plenty of bigger fish to worry about than you. I wouldn't be surprised if that's exactly what happens. It's probably the best thing to do anyway. If what you make is good and worth using, people will use it.

I like to sleep, Sleep is good,
This is how I do it: Lie on a nice warm cozy bed, and dream dreams about how to rule the world!
Follow @TheGreatAthlon5 on twitter for humorous facts and game updates!
If you like my posts, thumb me up!

2019-06-07 01:53:18 (edited by flackers 2019-06-07 01:54:53)

Ethin, I wasn't suggesting anyone flout rules after a takedown notice had been issued. I was saying rules are there to be bent if you can get away with it. If we all agree the audio vault isn't immoral, then my view is what's wrong with being a bit flexible.

2019-06-07 02:07:54

There's nothing wrong with my position. The fact of the matter is, enforcing the rule is understandable. It didn't come out of left field, it's been there ever since I can remember. Making grandiose statements that you're going to wipe the forum of any wrongdoing, in this area at least, is shaky at best. By you, I mean the moderation team as a whole. I think it's a pipe dream, and that in itself sends mixed messages, much as the argument that brought this about in the first place has.

In regards to creating another forum to discuss audio games, I seem to remember tons of people throwing a fit when the concept was broached. In my opinion, which I'm positive I've stated previously, it wouldn't hurt to have another similar forum, or hell, even two or three. It wouldn't cause fragmentation, people would be drawn to the community or communities that have the best atmosphere, and the rest would fall by the wayside or have a select core of diehard participants. I truly don't see anything wrong with that scenario.

The glass is neither half empty nor half full. It's just holding half the amount it can potentially hold.

2019-06-07 02:21:15

There is little grandiosity in what we're attempting to do here. It is a statement of what we intend going forward, and as for the however many years of backlog? We will do our best with it. We won't ignore it, but if any of you good people want to give us a hand there, thwt will certainly help the cause.

Check out my Manamon text walkthrough at the following link:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/z8ls3rc3f4mkb … n.txt?dl=1

2019-06-07 02:32:30

I can imagine that the mod list is quite a buzz of activity that Richard and Sander don't keep an eye on. If it's their safety you're worried about, have you actually tried sending a direct message asking them about this? If not, that makes a whole lot more sense to me. Why have the discussion, put in all the effort, lose all the info which most people don't have a problem with if the people you are attempting to safeguard haven't given their opinions? Also, the site and forum faq states that a general rule of thumb, in case of audiobooks/movies/whatever is that if it's commercially available then it isn't tolerated. ZUnder this guideline, it can be argued that the audiovault meets those criteria because many of the content there is not available to most people, only to a select group in a specific area. So if audiovault links will not be tolerated here, the site and forum faq does need an update, negating the argument that you're just going to enforce a rule which wasn't enforced before. Now presuming that Richard and Sander don't mind audiovault (they haven't complained about movies so far, and it's been going on for some time), the only reason besides moral reasons for copyright to carry on with this is if we're worried that the entire site is somehow going to be taken down due to a few topics. If this has actually happened with another site in the EU, then that is reason enough to examine this closer. But it hasn't to my knowledge. So all arguments for this substantial change in moderation are wild speculation. I'm not going to suggest sinical motives, but one can't help but think that personal opinions on this issue (not jade of course) had some say here.

Roel
golfing in the kitchen

2019-06-07 02:36:28

Given that many of the other members of the staff team seem to have similar views to mine, I doubt that. I can't speak to individuals and won't point fingers or throw anyone under buses, but I am not the only one who feels this way, to my knowledge.

Richard and Sandor have let tons of other things slide, some of them arguably more pressing and important than this one. This wouldn't be the first time, and unfortunately is not likely to be the last. Obviously we would and will take their opinions as guidance when and if they're offered. No one has any particularly easy ways to get hold of either of them beyond what has already been attempted, as far as I am aware.

Pretty much all of the stuff in the audio vault would fall under copyright law, as far as I understand it, as most of it can be bought from someplace. For some things, that's not true, but it's difficult to cherry-pick, and thus we circle neatly back to the all-or-nothing debate.

Check out my Manamon text walkthrough at the following link:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/z8ls3rc3f4mkb … n.txt?dl=1

2019-06-07 02:36:33

@40, considering that Sander and Richard haven't been very communicative, its hard to get their opinion on anything these days, hence the mods having to take up the duty. The only reason sites haven't been taken down with Article 17 yet isbecause it hasn't gone into effect yet. That in no way means that you shouldn't prepare for it, though -- EU states have 2 years to implement that article as EU country law.

"On two occasions I have been asked [by members of Parliament!]: 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out ?' I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question."    — Charles Babbage.
My Github

2019-06-07 02:50:23

I might have been a bit too quick to judge in my previous post. All I know is that Richard and Sander do tune in here sometimes (with the steam games discussion at least, when they're asked directly). Having some more background info (methods tried of reaching them) would be nice. Also, this issue has been here for years. If they take 2 or 3 weeks to respond to a message, what's the problem?

Roel
golfing in the kitchen

2019-06-07 03:05:53

It's not as if this was a decision made over night. it has been in discussion on the staff list for quite a while actually.

Much less active on this forum than in the past.

Check out my live streams: http://lerven.me
follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/liamerven

2019-06-07 03:05:58

I was trying to figure out what it is about this topic that was making my skin crawl, and now I think I've managed to nail it down. It's true that Richard and Sander haven't been doing their duties as admins. However, at least one of them dealt with an issue recently which caused the main page of the forum to be unreachable. This begs the question of why they can fix an issue like that, but can't be bothered to comment on the running of the site which they own. I'm highly uncomfortable with a change as drastic as altering posts en masse if they won't, and I say won't because they are clearly alive and well and providing barebones input to keep the site up and running at least, provide a stance on how they want this issue to be handled. It doesn't have to be done publicly, although that would be preferable, but I would feel 1000% better about the whole thing if they would at least stand behind whatever decision the mods make. I wouldn't like that amount of control being taken from me if I owned a website. Yes, they've brought it on themselves by being passive, but in the end, it is their choice to allow whatever content to be hosted on their domain that they want. They have agency in that, it's not like they're incapacitated in some way, at least not to my knowledge.

The glass is neither half empty nor half full. It's just holding half the amount it can potentially hold.

2019-06-07 04:34:00 (edited by flackers 2019-06-07 04:36:49)

The vault is just mp3 recordings  of audio described video that is of no use or interest to anyone but a tiny minority of blind people who are just ttrying to access as best they can something aimed at the sighted. Blind people have precious little entertainment made with them in mind, so in my view, anyone who would take down the audio vault in the name of copyright infringement is a pretty lousy human being.  The vault owes its very existence to the discussion on this forum. It's still a very active thread, and is an important aspect of the resource itself. I don't buy this idea of a sudden need for zero tolerance. I personally would rather make a stand for what I view as correct and see how it pans out than have this strict adherence to the rules. Not one person has tried to make the case that the vault is immoral, so why are we suddenly so keen to adhere to a rule that in that context has no moral worth? Laws are just formalised principles. If we don't agree with the principle, and no one is forcing this upon us, why force this law on ourselves?

2019-06-07 05:22:32

Hi,
@flackers has articulated what I would have said, and done it far better than I ever could have.
Thank you,flackers and everybody else.
tldr;

flackers wrote:

The audio vault isn't losing anybody any significant amount of money. I don't think any right-minded person would view it as immoral. It's no big deal.
This site is hardly likely to appear on any radar, and if it does, it won't get pulled without warning. And most of all, the AG.net owners don't seem to
care. Why stick to the letter of the law when no one's being harmed, or even cares? I only found out about the movie vault thanks to this forum, so all
this will really achieve is potentially depriving future users of an audio description archive. I'm struggling to have any respect for this decision.

Rules and laws are general principles to be followed specially in cases like these where nobody is being harmed or affected, where not following the letter of the law would do more harm than good, and where the solution when and if the problem arises is truely more simpler than all the discussion on here.
I wouldn't want to get Ag.net into trouble either, and if richard or sandar do recieve a notice (however unlikely) that is, I'd be happy to get rid of the links myself. Until then though, all you guys would end up doing is deprive many blind people from knowing about audio described content who don't already know about it, and there by get access to ADV which they wouldn't have otherwise.
  All I am saying along with many others, being a little flexable and letting sleeping dogs lie won't do much harm, and this is nothing but a discussion forum so I don't think it'd get into any trouble at all the most that may happen is the owners might be told off to clean up the links which then would be very easy to do.
I usually keep quiet about mods decisions on here, even if I disagree with some of the wornings/ bans they have given out recently, but I couldn't this time feeling the way I do.
As flackers pointed out, the thread in question is  active, and is an important part of the audiovault, not just for other blind users to find it/ know about it, but for others to help/ contribute as well.

I feel quite strongly about this, otherwise I wouldn't have gone and kickstarted the audiovault at all, as it takes time not just mine, effort, money, but why me and others do what we do is because we think it to be the right thing to do.
 
In the end, Why create much ado about nothing when most users seem to feel the same way, the same has been around for years and years without any problems.

And as for rule 3 being seven pages long?
Most rules I feel as posted under the rules topic are far too long, and for most forums and users the general 10 point rule as we seem to have/ had? on registration Suffices. I.E don't be a dick, treat others as you'd like to be treated yourself, and don't post links to porn pirated content etc, there being a few exceptions as we have had for years and years without it causing any problems at all.
All this of course, goes without saying is for most users and the ones that don't tend to nitpick and pick every word apart looking for a loophole
Grryf

Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these, ‘It might have been.
Follow me on twitter

2019-06-07 05:29:44

My title hasn't been changed yet, but it will be so nice to be able to not have to deal with this as a moderator anymore.

Much less active on this forum than in the past.

Check out my live streams: http://lerven.me
follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/liamerven

2019-06-07 05:48:49

Not trying to persuade any of the mods which side to take, but here's something to think about as far as audio description *specifically! audio description* is concerned. Until there is a unanimous decision by all streaming providers, distributors and studios to provide and centralize audio description, I say let links to hosted content remain until we're actually provoked. The reality is that there isn't enough agreement and commercialization of described content on an internet-wide level. With region-locking, and 1 streaming service/content producer breakup after another leading to further streaming decentralization, it's only getting worse. The FCC almost had a thing going for more firm regulations on more described tv hours in the US, but the current so-called administration of the FCC has pushed back those requirements and seems to be going nowhere fast in that department. This leaves streaming providers, movie distributors and production studios to regulate themselves, and we all know what happens when pretty much any organization will self-regulate themselves...i.e, cut every corner, make the most money possible and keep a majority of customers happy. There are certainly exceptions to this rule but not so much in the entertainment industry. Netflix is moving considerably faster than others in the description department, but doesn't have the latest Black Mirror episode described (a Netflix exclusive might I remind you.) Disney, Warner Bros, and who knows who else have all broken up with Netflix, so a lot of the shows are leaving the platform, and new platforms are being created. This means that it is going to be next to impossible to regulate audio description. If we think region locking is bad, this is 10 times worse. Now let's talk about audio description.
I forget who or what mentioned this so do please correct me if I'm wrong, but distribution of descriptive movie audio tracks falls under a copyright exemption clause. At least in the US, we have the *Government-funded* NLS distributing some described content. Serotech made a profit (if even indirectly) off of described content by making it part of the Sero subscription, yet they've dealt with who knows how many state agencies purchasing their screen reader package that clearly advertises Sero as part of the mix if one desires. Blind Mice did it for those who had a membership (until people started mirroring their links) yet is a successful business. Therefore I believe it is extremely doubtful that the forum would actually face any serious legal complications over allowing the distribution of described content alone. Indeed, while I certainly am not a fan of the mainstream media's general attitude using us visually impaired folks as inspiration-porn/putting our blindness first, one advantage to that is it allows one or two things to happen. Either they'll look the other way because we're not a powerful market force, or *slightly unrelated* the entertainment bizz starts a brouhaha over a small site that does next to no harm and tons of good, and the NFB will be on their ass in no time and the war for universal audio description will be in full force, as the NFB has plenty of money to counter-suit.
So there's my stance, again for audio description only.

2019-06-07 05:55:53

I'm on the outside looking in now, but if someone could provide actual proof of a legality exception and none of this, people should have access to it stuff, then maybe the mods could be swayed to make an exception.
I believe entertainment is a want and not a need, but that's a whole separate topic. Either way, links to roms and cracked software have to go. I think that is something we can all agree on? yes, no?

Much less active on this forum than in the past.

Check out my live streams: http://lerven.me
follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/liamerven