Are moderators and admins subject to higher standards?

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Originally Posted by Illusions

Email address? No idea. Haven't cared enough to check. IP isn't detailed, at least not for most ISP's that serve NY it isn't, unless you consider an area the size and population level of Manhattan to be detailed narrowing down of a person.

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Assuming you are not completely incompetent, and Dreadnaught is more than a little honest, you could find a great deal of information about him using the information required for registration on the board. That you don't recognize why a willingness to do so to prove a point could be unnerving to members here is more than a little concerning.

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Law? No, from the discussion it seemed he was alright with Facebook outting their users' private data, in general, as if it wasn't a big deal. Apparently it is a big deal now...

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Yeah, law. You know, what the discussion was about? That little thing that Dreadnaught time and time again returned to? Yeah, that law.

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Originally Posted by Enoch the Red

Assuming you are not completely incompetent, and Dreadnaught is more than a little honest, you could find a great deal of information about him using the information required for registration on the board. That you don't recognize why a willingness to do so to prove a point could be unnerving to members here is more than a little concerning.

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It must be my long history of being an intolerable asshole with the desire to win at any cost, and rampant abuse of power that must fuel this concern.

This is my view of how you're making this out:

Enoch: We should all be concerned that Illusions is an axe murderer. Look at his violent streak, its worrisome!
Me: I flicked Dreadnaught's ear when he wasn't expecting it, and at an inappropriate time.

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Yeah, law. You know, what the discussion was about? That little thing that Dreadnaught time and time again returned to? Yeah, that law.

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I really wasn't interested in that part of the discussion, so I discussed the part I was interested in. His views on censorship and privacy.

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Originally Posted by Illusions

It must be my long history of being an intolerable asshole with the desire to win at any cost, and rampant abuse of power that must fuel this concern.

This is my view of how you're making this out:

Enoch: We should all be concerned that Illusions is an axe murderer. Look at his violent streak, its worrisome!
Me: I flicked Dreadnaught's ear when he wasn't expecting it, and at an inappropriate time.

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So, just so we're clear, your position is that because you did some digging using your Admin privileges, came up with a morsel that you thought would prove a point, and then posted it, that we shouldn't worry that you might do some digging in the future to prove some point or satisfy some curiosity at a later date?

Or, to use your massively flawed analogy, you're saying we shouldn't try to get help for or confront someone exhibiting sociopathic tendencies until they've already bloodied the axe.

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I really wasn't interested in that part of the discussion, so I discussed the part I was interested in. His views on censorship and privacy.

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You extrapolated his views on censorship and privacy based on his views of the law. Surely you can see a difference between the two.

I closed the thread temporarily because it fit my general rule-of-thumb for when things are getting out of hand, IE one thread's arguments are spilling over into another thread. Khend making a thread to argue about a thread right next to it suggested things needed a brief cooling-off, so I temporarily closed it. The thread is now re-opened.

I also closed it because I wanted that last point to Illusions to remain front-and-center for a bit. I want people to trust the moderators/admins here and I felt that thread contained a violation of trust. I'm only thankful that it was directed at me and not someone else. But Illusions, I have to re-iterate that was over the line.

As I've said before, I don't think IP addresses are personally identifiable. I browse the Web comfortable with my IP address being plastered in the logs of every site I visit. But this site still restricts access to those logs. That means people expect us to keep a tight circle around that info and only use that access in appropriate ways. Using your access to those logs to try and make a [really nonsensical] point is absolutely not an appropriate use of your admin privileges.

Let's return to the example I cited: For years, Gentry claimed to be posting from a variety of cities around the globe. Gentry has always made herself into something of a mystery. But RandBlade and I have always been able to theoretically see the city and country she was actually posting from at any given time. Even though Gentry is a compulsive liar/prankster on a number of fronts, it would still not be appropriate for us to access her IP and start replying to her posts with hints over whether she was being honest in her status updates.

If you want to have a discussion over whether IP addresses are personally identifiable, very well. But vaguely threatening to post people's IP addresses (which are otherwise in a "locked" server log) is not the way to do that, or to maintain people's trust.

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Originally Posted by Dreadnaught

I'm only thankful that it was directed at me and not someone else. But Illusions, I have to re-iterate that was over the line.

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If you honestly believe I would use these privileges against someone else, as a moderator ban me, and put in a request to Wraith to have my admin privileges revoked.

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Using your access to those logs to try and make a [really nonsensical] point is absolutely not an appropriate use of your admin privileges.

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You could have used multiple channels to discuss this with me, but have not.

What Illusions posted was less information then what I could gather if I linked to a picture (even a hard to spot 1x1) from my Brighthouse supplied server space.
Their are dozens of sites that provide that ability, largely do to tracking myspace and facebook users. There are hundreds of signature scripts that do this as well are on more liberal boards.

Courts have ruled an IP does not equal a person; and no, considering how small this place is, being logged out at the time doesn't do shit towards that (Loki, Aimless).

Basically, its a non-issue, and if it wasn't, its a personal opinion that extends beyond the protections of what the US, or any country AFAIK, provides.

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Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer

What Illusions posted was less information then what I could gather if I linked to a picture from my Brighthouse supplied server space.
Their are dozens of sites that provide that ability, larger do to tracking myspace and facebook users. There are hundreds of signature scripts that do this as well are on more liberal boards.

Courts have ruled an IP does not equal a person; and no, considering how small this place is, being logged out at the time doesn't do shit towards that (Loki, Aimless).

Basically, its a non issue, and if it is, its a personal opinion that extends beyond the protections of what the US, or any country AFAIK, provides.

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I don't think there was anyone here arguing that.

I'm not talking about laws here, nor am I talking about simple hacks to harvest information.

I'm talking about the users of this site expecting their admins and mods to not release registration and IP information they have unique access to.

When it comes to content hosted on this site, access to IP logs is restricted. The few people who do have access are not supposed to be dangling the release of IPs and associated host names to make a point.

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Originally Posted by Illusions

If you honestly believe I would use these privileges against someone else, as a moderator ban me, and put in a request to Wraith to have my admin privileges revoked.

You could have used multiple channels to discuss this with me, but have not.

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I have no idea if you would have done this to someone else. At this point I'm confident it won't be a problem again given all this hubbub.

The reason I didn't PM this morning is I felt people's sense of trust may have been violated in a very loud and open way. So I wanted to leave a loud and open response in the ~20 minutes between waking up and walking out the door for work .

there is no unique access or information, there is no hack. you can't restrict the logs of who accesses or views the pictures I host on my own site that I then post here. Server logs are not protected or expected to remain private.

<Point made and proven better than I was expecting. Tracker removed.>

By viewing this post I now have the information Illusion only hinted at. This one is polite, it can be done with any picture, any emoticon, of any size.

I said content hosted on this site. Not those goofy "here's your IP!" images all over the Web.

Though the mods have never had a discussion about whether we would ban things like that. Probably not because, as you said, any image could theoretically do it.

Once again, please look at the bigger picture for once.

Quick things responses follow. Mostly not quoting because I'm very tired and kinda lazy, and typed this out the long way once already only to have my browser crash.

Nobody here get's paid well enough to work for the site and not participate or censor themselves.

Criticism of countries isn't trolling, and shouldn't be off-limits. They can't be, because that's the majority of what we do in D&D. One shouldn't take criticism of one's current country of residence as a personal attack. It usually isn't meant as one.

Illusions: I agree with Dread that posting ISP information was going a bit far. You were making public what was previously privileged information. If Dread feels he needs to call it out publically to make sure that people know that we as a site are going to routinely do that, I fully back him.

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Originally Posted by Illusions

If you honestly believe I would use these privileges against someone else, as a moderator ban me, and put in a request to Wraith to have my admin privileges revoked.

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It's the first time it's happened or come up, and I'm sure you didn't do it out of malicious intent, and I'm sure Dread knows that too. No bannings or stripping of admin duties is likely to be forthcoming.

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Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer

What Illusions posted was less information then what I could gather if I linked to a picture (even a hard to spot 1x1) from my Brighthouse supplied server space.

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I don't think you'd be able to tie the information definitively to a user on this board, though.

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Originally Posted by Wraith

I don't think you'd be able to tie the information definitively to a user on this board, though.

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It works perfectly on a site this size. If I can tell who is viewing the page and when they are viewing, I can pin them to a location and IP. I've already got hits from New York (holy shit let off the F5), Netherlands, and Washington. If people are hitting it to fast for me to tell who is who I'll throw up a picture when I've having a discussion when only one of them is logged in. Since we only have a handful of users who don't show logged in, its easy enough to track them through what pages guests are viewing.

This is not privileged information.

We have 55 guests right now. We get crawled pretty aggressively, and from all over the world. You can't definitively attach any IP address to a user, and you are going through a bit of effort to collect this information. I think people have to be able to trust that the people who have casual access to the information, and more, won't abuse it. Taking even minor leaks seriously is a means of safeguarding against larger leaks.

I wouldn't call it to much effort, but also not casual. The bots crawling can sometimes make fuzzy results for a day or so, but if I'm only looking for a base (home, work, etc) it only takes a few days. and the bots search everything, aimless seems to stick to the newer threads, loki does too but he does do some digging, hardest to watch is of course Cain. I seriously think he opens his links in new windows and then refreshes his CP.

I understand the trust angle, but the larger picture here is that Dread is flipping out over Germany's over the top privacy stance, when he himself is currently taking a stance thats more than what US law protects.

I really haven't been following that thread. I've been very busy elsewhere lately. But there's not necessarily a contradiction.

true. thats why i asked him about what parts of the complaint or law he is taking issue with. but thats a wait for the original thread.

Once again:

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Originally Posted by Dreadnaught

I'm not talking about laws here, nor am I talking about simple hacks to harvest information.

I'm talking about the users of this site expecting their admins and mods to not release registration and IP information they have unique access to.

When it comes to content hosted on this site, access to IP logs is restricted. The few people who do have access are not supposed to be dangling the release of IPs and associated host names to make a point.

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I've managed to ID everyone who has viewed this thread except Baltimore and Indianapolis, and thats cause I was on the crapper when they came by.

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Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer

I wouldn't call it to much effort, but also not casual. The bots crawling can sometimes make fuzzy results for a day or so, but if I'm only looking for a base (home, work, etc) it only takes a few days. and the bots search everything, aimless seems to stick to the newer threads, loki does too but he does do some digging, hardest to watch is of course Cain. I seriously think he opens his links in new windows and then refreshes his CP.

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First time I hit this thread after your image post was a couple minutes before this post, so you're probably misattributing traffic to me that's from some bot(s) or guest(s). Kinda makes Wraith's point.

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Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer

I understand the trust angle, but the larger picture here is that Dread is flipping out over Germany's over the top privacy stance, when he himself is currently taking a stance thats more than what US law protects.

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Do you seriously not understand the difference between law and voluntary agreements? There's no contradiction, or hypocrisy in thinking it's absurd to force everyone into a given legal framework, but simultaneously allow people to make the same (or different) choice if they want to.

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Originally Posted by Illusions

I would like to hear more, from other people then. Dread, Enoch, and yourself aren't the whole of the community, nor unbiased when it comes to privacy.

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Publicly posting information that you garnered because you had admin access *for entirely unrelated reasons* to make or demonstrate a point was, at the very least, dirty pool. It was a misuse of the admin privileges you were accorded to help Wraith be lazy.

These justifications after the fact are not very good.

:confused:

Gosh, I'm always the last to arrive at the party. :p

Dread, you used an unfortunate choice of words for your thread, and I piped in there to say so. "More German Anti-Tech Lunacy" implies all sorts of things that weren't even relevant to the thread. <Germans being anti-tech, and lunatics too, with More of the same!> Sounded more anti-German than anything else.

Khen wasn't being an overly sensitive German, IMO. Your title reminded me of Lewk's "More proof that South Africa is a cess pool" or "Another gun wielding Christian hero saves society by shooting a criminal!" type stuff. You could have changed the title once it was brought to your attention, and moved on, instead of digging in your heels for being "more right" as a moderator than as a fellow member.

Thread title creation isn't always as simple as it seems. Everyone knows how frequently I've managed to fuck that up. :p But guess what....even moderators can *cough* make mistakes! ;)

(Not sure how Illusions or Wraith got dragged into this, though. :confused: )

I stand by everything in that thread, from title to subject matter. If you read it more carefully, you can see how Illusions and Wraith got involved.

As far as I'm concerned, this discussion died-down five days ago and everyone moved on.

And Khen hasn't posted since. How nice of you to notice. :donkey:

Have you read both threads?

He seems to believe both he and I posting opinions here is somehow mutually exclusive. This is plainly not the case and I hope he returns.

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Originally Posted by GGT

And Khen hasn't posted since. How nice of you to notice. :donkey:

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Jesus wept.

No, no. God weeps. Baby Jesus cries.

God, what is this I don't even. Some members manage to stoop to my level of maturity. :haha:

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Originally Posted by CitizenCain

No, no. God weeps. Baby Jesus cries.

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"Jesus wept" feels more satisfying, though