appealing ban from home appliances

anuprising

would like to appeal ban given to me on home appliances by the moderator poor uncle Tom

I corrected him on gas safety and I get my post deleted and a ban and he cited ' personal attack '

can you look into it and please reverse the ban

regards
anuprising

randylonghorn

A few points:

A) Boards is a discussion forum, it doesn't set itself up as offering professional advice in the area of gas installation, any more than it sets itself up as offering professional advice re: adoption, taxation or virus / malware removal. While we would certainly hope that readers would get good advice here in the specialist forums, and would always seek to raise the standard of that advice, it is each poster's responsibility to decide what is good advice or not, and to seek professional advice where appropriate.

This is covered in the site's TOC / FAQs and quite often in the Charters of individual forums.

For example, from the Home Appliances' Charter (bolding is mine):

Home Appliances charter wrote: »

HOME APPLIANCES FORUM CHARTER.

1. This forum is intended for discussion of issues connected with Home Appliances by fellow users, and as a place to exchange tips and advice. It is not a consultancy service and it is strongly advised that you always verify any advice or information from an independent professional. Be aware that being an open public forum you may not always agree with a poster's response, if you don't like or agree with any poster's response do not argue on-thread.

2. If you feel a post is insulting, do not engage that poster on-thread, use the report post function (bottom left hand side of each post) or send a pm to any one the moderators listed at the bottom of the forum page.

3. Common sense and good manners are to be observed at all times. You are expected to refrain from posting personal abuse, bad language, shilling, advertising and spammming. Any failure to observe these may warrant a ban.

4. While advice might be sought or given, posters should make every effort to verify any advice expressed by appointing an independent professional.

5. The advice and opinions expressed on this forum are not those of Boards.ie Ltd. and the management accepts no responsibility for what is written and posted here.

...

8. If you are not happy for any reason with the moderation of the forum then you should send a Private Message to one of the moderators and if this does not address your concerns you should then follow the Dispute Resolution Procedure.

So I'm really not sure what the point here is ...

anuprising wrote: »

i have told the mod that i intend to forward the thread to bord gais and rgi to get thier view if its bad advice or not

... but by no means let me discourage you if you have the time to spare.

A final point on this: moderators are voluntary individuals who have been trusted to keep a forum running smoothly and without unnecessarily confrontational posting. They are not required to be experts in the field, and they are not Customer Services Reps for Bord Gais, Calor, Hotpoint, Niele, etc. etc. ... or indeed for Boards itself.


You will notice that, apart from the bits relevant to the point above, I also highlighted the bit about "common sense and good manners". I have always found that when these are used, the point being made comes across much better and validates rather than detracts from the professionalism of the poster.

This, for example ...

anuprising wrote: »

to be 100 % clear on this

heat marks are ok but if soot appears shut it down

if you can rub your finger on a pot and black soot comes off you have a problem

... is a clear, helpful, courteous post, the kind of post I, as a layman in the field of gas appliances and their installation, will pay attention to without feeling that I am being hectored or spoken down to. Indeed, I notice it was thanked by both the forum moderators; they obviously agree.

Some of the other posts on that thread do not reflect so well on those who posted them.

In fact, looking at that thread and some others which I had a dip through in looking at the background to this, and on which the same posters keep popping up, I am reminded of a group of grumpy old men in a corner of the pub with a particular interest or POV which they want to promote. They may well be right and far more knowledgeable on the subject than those around them; they may well have the best of intentions; but their attitude and tone is such that in the end no-one listens to them and indeed people start to avoid that corner of the pub altogether.

And that would be a pity, as I actually agree that Irish people tend to be quite cavalier about safety when it comes to gas (and electricity and many other things for that matter).


C)

anuprising wrote: »

i got banned from the home appliances forum for airing my views...

No, you weren't. You were banned for the confrontational manner in which you aired your views, and the way you insisted on picking a fight even when no-one was interested in fighting with you. There's a big difference.


D)

anuprising wrote: »

i am concerned about a posters safety and gave professional advice only to be ridiculed by a moderator

No, you weren't ridiculed by the moderator or anyone. That said, I'm not convinced that you abused anyone either; you certainly were unnecessarily confrontational and did yourself no favours in putting your point across, but abusive is overstating the case imho.


E) I still have no idea at the end of all this whether there was actual soot on the OP's pots, or whether s/he was simply using "sooty" as an adjective to describe the colour tone of the black marks. I don't think it really matters at this stage.




Right, here's the deal ... I am going to lift your ban as a gesture of goodwill and pour encourager les autres.

However ...

... I do not expect to see this kind of unnecessary contretemps brought to my attention here again, and if it is, either by you or by one of the others so apparently anxious to stick their 2 cents worth into that thread and heat the situation up further, I will not be so patient nor will I be wasting nearly two hours reading around related threads or framing a reply here.

... I do not want to see either Home Appliances or Plumbing and Heating become the corner of the pub which everyone avoids.

So, my advice to all concerned would be to post civilly and calmly, and avoid starting unnecessary and largely artificial arguments, and you will get your point across much better, and people will be grateful that you take the time to share your knowledge and expertise, rather than getting annoyed with the way you go about it.