I have somewhat mixed feelings about this.
On one hand, I do agree that some Xbox fans are constantly bullied on this site and this should be stopped. There is no question about it. The same goes for games that are exclusive to the platform, and where discussions often degenerate into game/developer bashing and console cock comparisons. I get it why some people might not feel welcomed, and I will be entirely honest, I to have helped somewhat in a negative manner with some of my older posts. At least I hope that I managed to grow enough, so I will not insult anyone anymore with petty posts.
On the other hand, it does smell a bit of censoring certain grievances, just for the sake of keeping a larger number of users on board. Moves like these are often a slippery slope and the results are often questionable at best. It seems that a certain category of users will receive some extra positive attention from the mod team just because they are in a numerical minority. This might affect the quality of posts in the long-term and might alienate a certain segment of the community.
Just as an example, I use several MS products, both at work (SharePoint, Project Server, Windows Server, Hyper-V, Git, etc.) and for gaming (Windows PC, Xbox 360/One controllers), though I do hold somewhat of a grudge against the Xbox brand (and it's curent leadership/expansion mentality), as I do not believe that they are always beneficial to the industry. I wonder how quickly this new-found attention will result in some of my posts being mobbed, and the moderating team caving to the requests? I would like to think that the mod team is perfect in their judgment in what is considered trolling/flaming, and I do believe that the quality of the mod team grew in the last couple of years, but we have seen plenty of instances where moderation was patchy at best, or downright unjust at the worst.
With this thread, I do feel like there was a small bullseye put on my back, and I know already who are some of the other users that are targeted (no need to hide behind some kind of balanced profile/avatar image). I called this site my gaming home for the last 13 years+, it would be a shame if this decision will result in the opposite of what it is intended to do, ie. drive away certain people, who might not be perfect, but are still valuable members of the community.
I do hope that the ideas that CGI posted in the OP will be a healthy guideline that will help all of us interact in a more civilized manner, and make all Xbox fans feel at home, so I will try to look at it as a positive step, and that everyone sees this as a new start, where we can build up true community interoperability.
Cheers!
Vote the Mayor for Mayor!
