Suggestions

[quote name="Ekon" date="2018-10-24 21:50:33" ] I think the language support could have been taken out of PMs and forums for moderation purposes. That being said I see no reason to not make this into a "on your own risk" rule. Using languages not supported by the site (so anything but english) is on your own risk. If a trade goes wonky or harassment takes place you will have to help yourself. [/quote] Popping in to say I am neutral on the actual suggestion, but I am firmly against the FR staff encouraging the sort of internet vigilante behavior that initially prompted the "No Blacklists" rule however-many years ago.

[quote name="Ridara" date="2018-10-25 05:27:57" ] [quote name="Ekon" date="2018-10-24 21:50:33" ] I think the language support could have been taken out of PMs and forums for moderation purposes. That being said I see no reason to not make this into a "on your own risk" rule. Using languages not supported by the site (so anything but english) is on your own risk. If a trade goes wonky or harassment takes place you will have to help yourself. [/quote] Popping in to say I am neutral on the actual suggestion, but I am firmly against the FR staff encouraging the sort of internet vigilante behavior that initially prompted the "No Blacklists" rule however-many years ago. [/quote] And since when is blocking someone "vigilante behaviour"? If it is so wrong to stop a user from messaging you when the last time they did it was to harass you why do we even have a blocking feature that includes PMs and profile comments?

[quote name="Ekon" date="2018-10-25 06:03:50" ] [quote name="Ridara" date="2018-10-25 05:27:57" ] [quote name="Ekon" date="2018-10-24 21:50:33" ] I think the language support could have been taken out of PMs and forums for moderation purposes. That being said I see no reason to not make this into a "on your own risk" rule. Using languages not supported by the site (so anything but english) is on your own risk. If a trade goes wonky or harassment takes place you will have to help yourself. [/quote] Popping in to say I am neutral on the actual suggestion, but I am firmly against the FR staff encouraging the sort of internet vigilante behavior that initially prompted the "No Blacklists" rule however-many years ago. [/quote] And since when is blocking someone "vigilante behaviour"? If it is so wrong to stop a user from messaging you when the last time they did it was to harass you why do we even have a blocking feature that includes PMs and profile comments? [/quote] I think they meant the 'no public blacklisting' instead of using site feature such as block system. Before that rule was a thing people are listing names on their profiles that they blacklisted and name-dropping in forums. If it's a 'on your own risk' thing this might happen again, probably offsite but still it might be a problem. What I don't understand is, I understand why you can use non-English languages in dragon bio and clan profile since, like gema said, they are passive and people have to go there to see, and it's less likely for anyone to use it as a direct harassment. But, we can also use non-English languages in both profile comments and CR messages, which are both like PM with the sender taking the initiative. If PM is not allowed for moderation reasons, then why this moderation isn't extended to CR and profile comments? And if it's okay in CR and profile comments, why it isn't okay in PM? This inconsistency is what irks me and I'd rather the ban itself be lifted rather than further restricted, because those who would use it for harassment purpose is few and far between and block system can solve that problem entirely. Also, if someone left me a message with a language that I don't understand, I'd just ignore, delete and move on. Maybe it's just me but what I don't understand cannot harm me, unless I actively seeking translation, then there's always block. Problem solved.

Here's a question... with the various recent updates that allow specific characters to be used in bios and comments... has that suddenly allowed the use of non-English characters to be allowed places they weren't before?

In OPs case, they're talking with special characters. Obviously different from the <3 that's recently been 'fixed' and can now be added to parts of the site it wasn't allowed in before. Granted in the case of the heart it didn't work previous becasue of the bracket being used in HTML. But an interesting side effect was that it broke the one item that the site has that uses a special accent. At least in bios it did. (that one wolf eating the sun familiar or w/e. You could never put the correct name into the item display bbcode but there was a work around that used some special characters that now, no longer works in bios)

It might be completely unrelated but the I guess the question becomes have you ALWAYS been able to write with non-english characters in comments and PMs or was that recent? If it was recent was it actually intentional at all or a side-effect of fixing comments (and the other parts of the site that pull from that same coding, which I'm assuming that CR's do)?

FR has always had an odd relationship with non-english characters from what I've seen or noticed, although I've not been paying much attention to be fair. However, when special characters are not concerned, people talk all over the forums and comments in different languages. Granted, they can sometimes get removed or moderated since it's not 'supported' or allowed. But you can still find threads for non-English speakers, people in the help forum will sometimes answer questions in native languages...

So is this a problem with special characters or is this a problem with language?

Even though I only speak English, I support this because people who don't have English as a mother tongue may struggle and might want to use their native language instead.

[quote name="AlphaSobek" date="2018-10-25 16:02:57" ] Here's a question... with the various recent updates that allow specific characters to be used in bios and comments... has that suddenly allowed the use of non-English characters to be allowed places they weren't before? In OPs case, they're talking with special characters. Obviously different from the <3 that's recently been 'fixed' and can now be added to parts of the site it wasn't allowed in before. Granted in the case of the heart it didn't work previous becasue of the bracket being used in HTML. But an interesting side effect was that it broke the one item that the site has that uses a special accent. At least in bios it did. (that one wolf eating the sun familiar or w/e. You could never put the correct name into the item display bbcode but there was a work around that used some special characters that now, no longer works in bios) It might be completely unrelated but the I guess the question becomes have you ALWAYS been able to write with non-english characters in comments and PMs or was that recent? If it was recent was it actually intentional at all or a side-effect of fixing comments (and the other parts of the site that pull from that same coding, which I'm assuming that CR's do)? FR has always had an odd relationship with non-english characters from what I've seen or noticed, although I've not been paying much attention to be fair. However, when special characters are not concerned, people talk all over the forums and comments in different languages. Granted, they can sometimes get removed or moderated since it's not 'supported' or allowed. But you can still find threads for non-English speakers, people in the help forum will sometimes answer questions in native languages... So is this a problem with special characters or is this a problem with language? [/quote] Let me dig up my memory a bit.... As far as I can remember, when the site first opened, there was no restriction for using non-English characters at all. Not in PM, not in forum, and certainly not in any other places such as bio and profile/comments. Then years later (not sure how long), the forum was revamped and the ability to post in non-English was removed. I think around similar time it's removed from PM as well (but I'm not sure which comes first). I believe the reason we were given at the time was for easier moderation, so I can only assume there had been incidents where people got harassed or a discussion got heated with non-English languages that the mods had a hard time to understand what was going on. CR, when it was back in 2013, there was no comment section. But after the CR revamp a few years back when the message section was added, it was added with the ability to use non-English characters, and it's the case still today. Dragion bio and clan profile, as well as profile comments, had always been allowed for non-English characters. This had not changed at all and we're still able to do that now. None of the non-English characters allow/not-allow happened recently. Certainly they have nothing to do with the recent update on comment fixing. The example you mentioned with skoll (with accented o) had always been a problem and it was fine before with the html code, but this workaround was disabled with forum/pm revamp. So it is a problem with language, not special characters.

[quote name="hat17" date="2018-10-25 18:38:02" ] None of the non-English characters allow/not-allow happened recently. Certainly they have nothing to do with the recent update on comment fixing. The example you mentioned with skoll (with accented o) had always been a problem and it was fine before with the html code, but this workaround was disabled with forum/pm revamp. So it is a problem with language, not special characters. [/quote] I'm mainly asking because I think that, in the sense that some languages USE special characters if that's more of an issue then just the fact it's a different language. Again there are already people talking in other languages - those languages just don't use special characters. I recall recently even a post in the help/bug forum popped up where someone screenshotted their error and since it was an internet connection error and not an FR specific one it appeared in another language. Another user noticed this and replied to them in their native language just fine. So we CAN talk in other languages but we CANNOT use special characters. The reason I brought up Skoll was because the fix for the problem of it not showing up in the item code was to USE some special characters - Granted those characters aren't exactly 'special' enough I don't think to be barred from use. Same thing as all the other odd characters like @ and # and * and all those. But those can be made with an English keyboard and found in English font packs and all that good stuff... So what's the difference between those and the Chinese characters that OP can't type with? And is that difference the reason that the language is not supported or is it just the fact it's a different language? Because I imagine if I reported that help/bug thread post with the other language it might get removed due to not being in English... but they could write it in the first place so it's not like the language itself was blocked. I guess in the grand scheme it doesn't matter to the suggestion itself but rather the solution. Since 'allowing special non-English based characters' is a different can of worms then 'allow other languages'

I see what you meant now, and to be honest and a tadbit selfish I always feel a bit irked about others able to post/pm in non-English just because their lanuages use romania alphabets, not because they are easy to moderate. Anyway, on topic I really doubt there will be any more or less incidents with harassment through pm just because some languages/characters aren't allowed. We can certainly keep forum English-only since it's public and do need lots of moderation.

One thing about the inconsistency could simply be this:

The site is undergoing a revamp.

The Crossroads has already gotten a revamp and special characters were allowed. The forums were revamped, but special characters weren't allowed probably because the forums are supposed to be 'English Only'. I do not know if the profile page itself has been revamped or not, so I don't know whether or not being able to use special characters is a feature of that.

However, I am pretty sure the PM system HASN'T be revamped. Which means, if/when it does get a revamp, they may allow special characters (and thus the ability to use languages that use different characters would be allowed) to be used.

That could be the reason for the inconsistencies.

I feel that keeping the Forums english only is fine, because that does make it easier to moderate, and also, it makes it easier for most people to read/reply to various threads (I am not talking about the ''Nationality' come here!' type threads that were in the GD, but I am talking about things like suggestions, help and bug reports and other areas of the forums) if it is in one common language.

However, for the other areas of the site, unless it does become a problem, then I see no reason why it shouldn't be allowed.

My issue is that harassment or other, worse things could slip by if the moderators don't speak other languages. It would be easy to slip by the filters with no punishment, unless someone had very concrete proof. no support