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Question and concern using the blocking feature.

A topic by DioShiba created Sep 16, 2023 Views: 1,571 Replies: 17
Viewing posts 1 to 8
(2 edits) (+8)

Given some of the stuff I had to deal with on Itch.io I have a question concerning how the blocking feature works.

Obviously, the blocking feature prevents users from seeing other people's posts. HOWEVER, what I don't understand is why on earth users who are blocked can still interact or using the follow feature on the users who blocked them.

Now I have no idea why this hasn't been addressed concerning the privacy of users or who allows for what interactions, but I find it rather strange that users are not able to prevent communication from the people they have blocked and I don't see how this is helping reduce conflicts throughout the site and I doubt that I'm the only user who has had this concern in the past since any of us who chose to block another user can still receive notifications from the people they blocked on the statuses they post via their blog on their profiles while using itch.

Don't get me wrong, I get that it's possible for us to ignore those users. But even if that is the case I would like to know if the blocking feature at any point in the future will prevent those who are blocked are prohibited from following or contacting them? Or if that idea was considered to begin with?

Edited for clarity.

Pinned ReplyAdmin (2 edits) (+1)

Thanks for the feature suggestion. We agree that this is an oversight with how our block system works and will be addressed this in a future update to work as expected. I don’t have a timeline at the moment. We’ve deployed a fix for this, see below.

In the meantime, if someone posts something disruptive please use the report tool.

Please do not try to collect personal information about other accounts to claim they should be banned based on a technicality. Trolls will lie to you to get a reaction out of you. It’s not your job to try to police the age of users on our platform.

Reports will bring the account to our attention so that we can take a site wide action to the account if necessary. Based on this post though we’ll review the account in question.

Thanks

(1 edit)

While I appreciate you looking into this I will say that frankly I have my doubts that he is just a random troll and if he is he’s managed to be pretty convincing that he is 11.

EDIT: With the above stated most trolls I have encountered are generally more coherent no matter the kind of troll it is. There are nuances to that kind of problematic user but I do know that, someone who is more experienced at doing that kind of thing would at least try to put the effort into making sentences that at least make some sense no matter if they are the kind of troll out to offend someone or if they are the kind of troll that's doing it for shits and giggles. Just throwing that out there.

I will continue to abide by your requests as you are looking into this. However for the time being I will be off of itch.io. This whole deal has been frustrating me to no end and honestly, I just need the break.

(3 edits) (+1)

The reporting tool is useless if the people responsible simply don't respond. I had a similar case a few days ago where one of our users posted SPAM under my comments of other developers and despite asking twice, there was no response. The user has still not been deleted and his email address has not been blocked, so he can continue to cause trouble. His posts are still there and he can probably still see all the activity on new posts in my dashboard. Is this in the interests of the developers and the fan community? I don't think so!

(1 edit) (+1)

While my issue is resolved and personally I would hate to bother bumping this thread, I do think you raised a valid concern.

From what I had noticed the user I had an issue with (Probably not the same one you dealt with per say) tried to make an alternate account a few months back. For the most part I did ignore him and just reported him to the mods but what did bamboozle me is how the hell he managed to get away with being able to do so under the same username.

Personally in hindsight I realize there is some importance to ignoring some people but even then, the fact that people are allowed to do this is problematic. Then again I haven't really been on here too frequently compared to some other communities I frequently go to just because the whole incident did raise more concerns than nothing else and it makes me hesitant to really be on here when I got shit to do.

I'm not sure both your concern and mine come down to a staffing issue, because I did have to make multiple reports in my situation but needless to say sometimes you really have to pester the mods... which realistically you shouldn't have to do that.

Pinned ReplyAdmin(+2)

We’ve deployed a quick change to address the most common case: posts created by users blocked by the community owner will go into the pending queue instead of being immediately posted. This will enable community moderators ignore, report or moderate the the post as needed.

(+3)

It should also be worth pointing out that, most other websites and services are generally prevent communications if one person decides to block another user.

This helps prevent communities from becoming toxic. Very likely if this isn’t resolved then it will push people away from Itch.io since it could be seen as negligent to user safety by some.

Deleted 1 year ago
Moderator(+3)

Please don't butt into someone else's topic if you have nothing to say.

Moderator

With apologies for the belated answer: unfortunately there are two definitions of "blocking" used on social media services. Older apps simply muted (or "ignored") the offending account, while in newer ones it means "this user can't get updates from me anymore, or interact with my posts, and they're also muted for good measure". Itch.io follows the older definition; I seem to remember running into this before. No idea what it would take to fix it, but maybe you can make a good case for it? I found the privacy implications difficult to explain convicingly.

(3 edits) (+1)

While I am not a web developer who knows HTML on a deep level, I would assume that this could require a massive update to the site to change the definition from the old one to the new one.  As for how the extent of those updates would take I can't really give a solid answer.

Far as what prompted to make this thread, I won't go into a whole ethos argument, but I will explain it as is.

The user in question has followed me after the fact that I blocked him a second time a little before I was advised to ignore him by support and the admins. Seeing that we're following the old definitions I still receive notifications from him posting on my news posts through my creators profile. It crossed a very personal line for me the moment the user we are talking about decided to bring his problem with me on a post I made concerning an art piece I made about 9/11 which I feel is an escalation of the situation on said user's part, even if it's inadvertent.

The way I look at it, it's bad enough that the user I have a problem with is still attempting to contact me despite my efforts to block him on itch.io. And while I don't feel it would be entirely appropriate to talk about in detail publicly, I will say for the record that the user has attempted to contact me outside of Itch.io on my own wordpress website several times which I am willing to back up if need be. Might not be an issue that itch.io has to deal with since that is some what of a personal matter, but it is related to the ongoing conflict.

I'm choosing to not give any further written response the user in question upon informing him that I would be banning him from future newspost, and I may contact support in regards to that matter since, even though the admins see this as just a case of trolling, is indeed a case of harassment for no justifiable reason other than a unsupervised brat wanting his way and I have a hell of a lot more to say how I see this outside of my concerns with how this whole situation is being handled.

TL;DR Version: Blocking and ignoring this user has been ineffective and I do not want him contacting me any further.

Moderator(+1)

This is still going on?! D: If it helps, you should be able to ban someone from commenting on your games (one game at a time) including devlogs. Worst case, it's possible to disable all comments on each devlog post. And I've reminded our admins about this issue again.

(+1)

Yes, and I have been banning him from my news posts, I'll see what I can do to disable the comments on those as well as my dev logs.

Right now it's on the back burner of my mind since right now an issue has come up with a project related to Newgrounds that I've been a part of that's a bit more concerning than I want to admit, but that's another story all together.

(7 edits)

I’m just going to leave this here.


You can tell leafo that I refuse to be a part of the community here since he has failed to uphold his side’s end of the Terms and Service he set in place, itch.io is in violation of US law by ignoring this kid’s age  and not taking immediate action to resolve the problem despite the evidence being provided alone is enough for a legal case.


My actions in this don’t matter as much as itch’s inaction. I am done.

Moderator

I apologize for my failure to handle this at the right time.

Admin (6 edits)

Please stop posting the names of our staff members everywhere. Based on what I see, you’re having a dispute with this person on itch.io and other platforms. I’m sorry this person is disrupting your life, but itch.io is does not exist as a mechanism for you to punish people you are having disputes with. Posting the personal information of our staff members to try to push us to take action against someone you are fighting with is not the kind of behavior we want to endorse, and may end up in getting you banned, regardless of the behavior of the other account.

I also want to reiterate:

Please do not try to collect personal information about other accounts to claim they should be banned based on a technicality. Trolls will lie to you to get a reaction out of you. It’s not your job to try to police the age of users on our platform.

As I have advised to you elsewhere, please use the report tool to on this other account’s posts to highlight their activity to our team so they may take action if necessary.

Thanks

(1 edit)

Fair enough.

EDIT: That stated, I sincerely apologize for my conduct on that end. With that stated I will work on redacting the information that was posted from the said posts and ensure on my end that it won't happen again.

Admin

Thank you for understanding and responding reasonably. I’m sorry we didn’t have the moderation tools available to you to deal with the troll.

Deleted 345 days ago
Moderator(+1)

Please read the topic before replying to it.