SGS Censorship

[Vie]

Actually, its not quite that way. When users register on our forums, an admin goes through and manually approves them. Imagine what we first thought when a person tries to register with the nickname =TelkomRocks=. The first thought is that the person is obviously trying to be sarcastic, and would use the nickname in posts to further reinforce this. In the end, we thought the person was up to no good and were protecting ourselves.

Superjuice is chatting WiseCrack right now with regard to the nickname.

 

[MaD]

Try mentioning 'Hellkom', it gets changed to Telkom South Africa or something

 

[Vie]

Try mentioning 'Hellkom', it gets changed to Telkom South Africa or something

You love that one MaD? Out of necessity, and on a personal reluctance, that had to be implemented I'm afraid.

 

[WiseCrack]

Well.well.well..the powers of MYADSL
Thank you for letting me register Vie and Superjuice.

Only problem now is I dont know what to post in my first post

peace
TelkomRox

 

[Vie]

Dominic, I was a gamer. I didn't get in from knowing anyone at Telkom. Hell, when I first got approached to help out, I wasn't even aware of the fact that Elyzium worked for Telkom. I was approached because I was actively trying to help the community out, nothing more.

 

[superjuice]

Yea pretty much what Vie said and hard work.

 

[Toxin]

Hellkom = Telkom of Southern Africa

Yeah, I started a thread on SGS about this. superjuice thought I was worthy of getting a couple of "warning" blokkies after that.

My sig on SGS at the time had nothing to do with it I swear: "Try typing Hellkom or Tellscum in a post and see what happens."

PS: superjuice, stop killing me so many times on BF2. It got seriously irritating.

 

[Sneeky]

Yup I’m firmly on the side of freedom of speech here, even if you don’t like what is being said. It’s a fundamental part of us all and the country that we live in. Any medium that does not allow freedom of expression in our country today is doomed, eventually. At SGS though, it has to be in a civil manner no doubt as members of all ages frequent the site.
Even companies online have sections where you can post your thoughts / compliments / complaints, its par for the course. I mean deleting a cartoon about a 3 gig cap is like banning ‘Shapiro’ from the press, very anal.
SGS is a great service for the local gaming community. It’s ‘free’, or at least that’s what it appears to be, but in the bigger context you are paying for it, just look at your monthly Telkom bill with a box of Kleenex nearby.
The File Vault as James highlights is a great service as well and only requires registration. Very neat, great service for local gamers but also very much to the advantage of Telkom themselves. We know local traffic costs F'ALL or very close to that.
If the 'File Vault' wasn’t there everyone would be pulling the stuff down from overseas sites, Telkom would have to cover the cost of that bandwidth, THE HORROR, so make it local and they save money, and ultimately then they don’t have to extort even more from the poor abused and financially assaulted CONSUMER.
If it wasn’t for port shaping, idiotic bandwidth constraints, and excessive pricing of various connectivity options, the SGS service would not be as popular, not to mention equal competition.
I’m in favor of SGS, and think as much as it benefits Telkom, it benefits the local gamer more. I myself play on the servers often.
That said though, the attitude towards criticism and the ‘admin is always right’ stance (which is not always the case) leaves an acrid odor in the air.
As James says its good advice not to sh*t where you eat, but if you are forced to live in a sh*thouse you have no choice where you eat really.
As with Telkom, when the public have a choice, they will probably move to something that offers a bit more maybe, time will tell.
Is the SNO gonna offer a gaming service with a few servers, would’nt that be neat. Maybe we need to ask em.
Till then though, I will be in the sh*thouse awaiting a viable alternative.

 

[Astro]

I don't think the Sgs forums should be used to complain about Telkom prices etc. There is absolutely nothing they can do about it.

SAIX offers a great service to the gaming community. Yes there are a few rules that needs to be followed, as with everything else in life.

My only gripe would be the actual people that's put in positions to enforce those rules. I have met some admins that will bend backwards for the gamers out there. Sadly, i have seen some very bad ones too who likes to quote those rules yet fails to abide by them.

 

[superjuice]

Sneeky,

I disagree. If Local b/w is free, or next to nothing like you say then having FV does not makes sense. Essentially it would be a better idea to take it down and give users no other option but to d/l it internationally and use up their caps, which in turn would force users to buy extra accounts.

 

[WiseCrack]

Yea pretty much what Vie said and hard work.

Yeah right like drinking beer and playing games the whole day is hard work

PS Im only joking SJ I know you work hard

 

[Vie]

I've already dealt with the feedom of speech argument above.

Further to that, the only comment I will make is that we've made it quite clear where users can voice their concerns in a non-prohibitive manner, and where their voice will be heard louder and solutions can be found, ie. this very forum we're all reading now.

Astro, some of the ones that would be great admins, aren't always the people that step up for the job. We have had one or two rogue admins previously, and adopt a zero tolerance stance against them.

SJ drinking beer, believable. SJ working, too hard to swallow.

 

[Sneeky]

Sneeky,

I disagree. If Local b/w is free, or next to nothing like you say then having FV does not makes sense. Essentially it would be a better idea to take it down and give users no other option but to d/l it internationally and use up their caps, which in turn would force users to buy extra accounts.

Telkom are already facing a mountain of criticism and official 'please explain hearings' about costs of telephony, internet access and bandwidth.
Taking the FV and SGS away is certainly viable for them and would, as you say, force people to spend even MORE on connectivity, but it would also just provide more ammo and an extra army of troops in the fight for more affordable and effective internet access in SA. Telkom need more happy users, not PO'ed ones.

 

[Astro]

As i said, you already got some great ones in your group.

I can however point you to a post that was made by a member of your group. Other members of your group read that post, yet failed to even comment on his clear breach of the roe.

If you are interested, i will give you all the details in private. To be fair, i have not had any dealings with you in the past, yet i am very doubtful even you will apply a zero tolerance towards this member. Although he is not that popular with the average Jo, he is very much liked by most of your group.

 

[WiseCrack]

Also I would like to ask Vie, if in fact he can answer this, because it's not official yet. What would happen to the service SgS provides if Telkom decides to cap local and start charging per gig? Would the service continue as ussual?

 

[superjuice]

Yea Astro plz do. You can mail me: superjuice@sgs.za.net

 

[Sneeky]

Also I would like to ask Vie, if in fact he can answer this, because it's not official yet. What would happen to the service SgS provides if Telkom decides to cap local and start charging per gig? Would the service continue as ussual?

The service would still be there primarily for dial-up and isdn users and only for the local speed, as it always was in the past.
ADSL will just fall by the wayside as a viable gaming options for even locally based servers/vaults due to connectivity costs.
No brainer, the world moves forward we go back

 

[onionpeel]

As a SGS forum moderator, I have tried to keep a balance between healthy discussion and trashing the topic (like graffiti on newly painted wall). I do allow a little slack so that the deeper issues can be explored, but if I sense the topic getting out of hand, I will take action.
Gestapo like measures, taking action based on personal "colouring" of the situation and on what people might be said tend to bring about the negativeness which has manifested itself in this thread. The counter argument may be that moderators may be saving forum members from themselves

 

[James]

Astro, some of the ones that would be great admins, aren't always the people that step up for the job. We have had one or two rogue admins previously, and adopt a zero tolerance stance against them.

Snakestyles???

 

[Vie]

No, that was not a reference to Snakestyles whom I must add now that you've brought his name up, took it upon his own free will to leave the SGS adminship quite a while ago. We actually wanted to see him stay, but understood that he didn't want the responsibility anymore.