Instead of wasting hours at thinking on how to express my reaction, I'll just go with "this".

Yep, I agree. I think GOG should:

-find a way to prevent spambot accounts creation
-find a new way to "level-up" users, since the actual rep system is faulty and it can be easily exploited

+1 to this also. Whilst I understand that this may be going on, moderation isn't the answer. Just look at any of the curated sites, which after many years are only starting to address some of the issues. You see the problem boils down to one simple issue (much like most things), freedom versus security. Sure you could make the forums safe by banning large numbers of accounts, but you would also then lose another large number of accounts for fear of getting banned for saying the wrong thing. So you might feel secure, but virtually nobody would feel free to post.

Another points is that various things affect people in various ways. I didn't actually even realise what the rep things was until recently, and most of the obvious nasty threads its easy to avoid. But if you do giveaways or participate in those things, then that will attract freeloaders and other (I don't know the terms, troll I think).

So yes, some thing needs to be done, and certainly their are options, new accounts having limited posting functionality for the first 3 months maybe, captcha before posting to drop bots. There could also be more buttons available, e.g. report post as abusive etc. These would be to curtail certain postings without actually stepping in and start banning everything.

Will be interested to see what the updates will be over the next few weeks.

Sorry to crush your dreams, but the way your OP is written, the only answer we'll get is a "Stop giveaways and scammers, leeches and downreppers will leave" from Judas. GOG made it pretty clear in the past that they don't give a damn shit about anything that is related to gifting or trading. It took two threads with very offensive titles (<span class="bold">edit: tried to pst the thread titles originally, but GOG seems to have implemented a filter!</span>) to make Ciris acknowledge that there is a problem (and I think she only "acknowledged" it to calm us down, but really doesn't give a shit at all).

We should show them that there is a REAL problem, completely unrelated to giveaways and trading. A problem that's a direct result of their inactivity. GOG is attracting users who love GOG because you can harass and insult people here without any mods banning you! Don't believe me? Read what monkeydelarge wrote:

"There is nothing that can be done other than moderators taking over and preventing freedom of speech. So that solution is worse than harassment. There are plenty of forums where there are moderators in control who prevent harassment and punish those who harass people. If people don't like harassment, they can go to one of those forums. There is no need to try to change GOG general discussion. This forum is like the Wild West of forums. How can you not appreciate that? Look at how boring, other forums are with everyone being polite to each like there is tea party going on."
http://www.gog.com/forum/general/tits_tits_tits_tits_tits_tits_tits_ass_ass_ass_ass/post123 - page 6, 3rd post from the bottom - linking doesn't work due to one of GOG's many bugs -.-

And here's a new user who left Steam and came to GOG, because he's seen that GOG forums aren't moderated... (just read the first three posts)

Forum boycott? Bad idea... I thought about this too, but when we leave and stop to complain, GOG will see this as a success and as a confirmation that they're doing everything right and that they don't have to do anything at all, because all problems will resolve themselves. They don't care for the handful of idiots on the forums. We leave, complaining stops, everyone's happy. Remember -> They listen to our feedback ;P No more feedback from us, everything's perfect.

No, Momo, don't leave. Do what moms do best and remember the kids to clean up their mess - every single day!

I simply ignore the phenomenon. I have scaled back on giveaways, and if I do one I do a "thorough" background check, but I won't stop using the forums because of a few rotten apples. If someone insults me, well it's hard to do I admit, but if they do, then I simply ignore them. I don't have time nor energy to give a damn about them.

It's getting harder to stay on the forums. Too much stuff that turns me off, too many old timers that went in retirement and semiretirement (Schnuff, Thespian, Spinorial are just a few names from many). I will probably follow their example and leave, eventually. We don't ask for much: transparency would be nice - see who upvotes/downvotes you. Or getting rid of an abused system. or a minimum moderation. But what do i know...Sure, i will continue to buy the games, but damn if i will use Galaxy and will probably stop coming on forums, too. Eventually, when all the old timers would go and the forums will be into a complete chaos, GOG will probably shut them down.

If they made it impossible to post on the forums before spending money in the store, the rampant alts (i.e. the major problem here) would dry up in a day. Alternatively, they could enable admin approval for every account before it's allowed to use the forums, like on NeoGAF. Or they could make it so that accounts less than 4 months old couldn't use the rep system.

There are all kinds of quick fixes to this problem that don't involve extra moderation. I agree with the OP (although I'm pretty new to the GOG forums) on most counts, but I don't think that boycotting the site until tighter controls are imposed is the best option. I've seen fun, freewheeling forums get gutted by the moderation-creeping approach in the past.

Tsk, I still remember (not that it would be hard, since it was just a few months ago) when even hinting about moderation was a sure way to get instantly downrepped and those kind of ideas -showing a certain foresight, btw- were unmercifully smashed by some of the same members of the community that now see it as a problem. How things can change!

Regardless of this little thing I had to say -because it just fair- the OP is undoubtedly right.
GOG didn't care for the state of their own site for months, and they now remind me a bit of Alexander the Great's empire: enormous, uncontrolled expansion with no solid structures to make it viable which eventually lead it to crumble for the same reason.
They'll deeply regret it in the end, probably not as much for the declining community as for their total lack of security and overly bugged website/client combo. I understand that they would like to expand as much as possible as long as it is so easy, yet if they don't do it with solid code they are just murdering their own business. Seriously, I think that the greatest menace for this site is neither Steam nor DRM, but GOG itself.

As I have already stated months ago and as many are saying again right now, I think the best short-term solution would be to prevent accounts with no purchases to post in the General Discussion and in the subforums of games they don't own. The current spammin' troll would "die" the same day.
Yes, there might be some good users who would be unjustly blocked for this (like those people who cannot find a payment method accepted by GOG and end up obtaining games by trading), but as a temporary solution while implementing real security measures and "sanction" options it would be certainly better than allowing the floodgates to remain open, especially since the limit would consist in just a few cents.

In any case, I don't see trolls and scammers as the biggest problem: if you check the “hot” threads you'll see that the vast majority of the real troublemakers and harassers are not new users, and none of them made great effort to limit themselves or to keep a bit of decency around. They could have kept things civil, but they didn't. GOG is at fault for not stopping them, sure, but they certainly didn't start any fire.
The situation of this place is not far from the critiques I move every day to my country: when nobody enforce the rules, homo homini lupus. It has always been like that from the dawn of times, no matter the context.
People will never get along by good will an morality alone... besides, there can be no moral if there is no order, as even the best person in the world will simply bite back if bitten first.

Also, I think Judas was right: giveaways on a big site means just asking for trouble, no matter the level of moderation. After my “missed the freebie” thread last summer I think I have grasped the full extent of this, with people ignoring any kind of rule, trying to scam on every occasion, harassing me because I didn't allow them to get “THEIR game” (like I owed them anything!) and freely spitting on others' kindness.
I have no intention of ever hosting another giveaway; now I just gift to people I know... and I get to know them simply by browsing the boards. Still plenty of great folks around. Don't let anyone know that they can gain something for free, ot they will come in hordes. Simply give when you feel like it, to people you individually choose based on your own preferences, no luck involved. I would invite everyone to do the same, especially since the only open giveaway I though was really working -the BBBBoB- now is not running.

For what concerns the boycott, I agree with real.geizterfahr. Quoting:
This will accomplish nothing, because all the community together won't reach 500 units, with over a million (if stats are to be trusted) of active customers. Even if everyone agreed with your views, our numbers are insignificant and can be easily ignored, especially when silent.

One last thing, to the nice guys who are reading: learn what “freedom of speech” means.
Being free to speak is directly tied to freedom of opinion: you should be able to voice your opinions without fearing repercussions. It does not mean "being able to say whatever I please".
The problem is: opinions are not positive knowledge, but they must be based on something, they need to have a grasp on certain aspects of reality that tie to your visions, beliefs of judgments of them.
Insults, swearing, harassment and similar are NOT opinions, hence are not protected by any right and can -and should, since there is nothing to gain from them- be limited. By twisting the definition to justify your repulsive and abusive behavior you are just proving what you are: a simple -speaking a language even you could understand- shithead.

-Rep 867, now I want to see what happens.

I don't give a rat's ass about attention whores and their mutual masturbation clique. But the problem is way bigger than that, and even though it can be argued that the clique encouraged its growth, GOG's lack of infrastructure shares the blame. More importantly, no matter where the blame lies, no one can do shit about the situation as it stands now except GOG.

GOG, however, has their head firmly lodged in its ass. Consider what Ciris wrote: Seriously? Seriously?
You can't fucking ban a person, fuckign impotent fuckers. THAT'S EXACTLY THE PROBLEM.
I mean, it's intellectually offensive on a whole new level, way beyond the furry terrorist or the brainless undead or the sex-starved manchild we all know. It's mind-bogging how mentally confused one should be to write something like that.

Spoiler alert, if an activist long-term user decides to strongarm GOG into improvement by jizzing all over General Discussion, GOG will be even less equipped to stop them than they are capable of stopping the current offender (who is evidently developmentally challenged and barely verbal). And once the necessary infrastructure is in place, the alleged need for those hypothetical activists to continue shitposting will obviously disappear.

Good read, thank you. I especially agree with your last statement. I really think that the ones who are the most vocal about how moderation would be an awful thing, are just mostly worried about not being able to call other people c*nts anymore.

I got an email scam via chat from someone called 'CLEMUMERIA' I guess I should report it to Judas or something...

I just want to post this in support of Momo (I think it's quite possible I was the beneficary of that secret santa gift Arx Fatalis?).

I dont buy stuff here anymore because I have all the older games I need, so I cant support you in that way, but I do agree 100% with everything you say in your post.

This place has gone to shit and since last xmas, I very rarely interact with this place anymore, so I just lurk.

I would suggest getting rid of rep, but then how do you know of a persons standing in this community without it, but you cant even trust rep-count anymore because of the down voting.

I do remember another forum where a similar problem occured with the "official" forums, with similar lack of moderation, so the main forum members started up their own forum, so they could pick and choose who had access.

I know it reeks of elitism, but when I see some of the abusive crap being posted and PM'd here, it seems like the only way to weed out the malcontents.

I dont know how much it costs nowadays to do something like this but it was pretty inexpensive back then because we hived of part of a forum that a member used for another game.

Anyway, basically I just wanted to add a /signed to this thread and went off on a bit of a rant, sorry 'bout dat :)

If people stopped giving away Steam bundle keys on the GOG forums, the majority of the problems people are having here would end, but the small clique of people that are giving and receiving those keys don't want to hear it.

If you really want to make the GOG forums a better place and contribute to GOG's success, the answer is to take those Steam bundle keys somewhere more appropriate and give them away there instead. Don't kid yourself that you're doing a good thing for GOG's business or GOG's forum community by making Steam key giveaways here.

A rep system that really mattered would be great if GOG doesn't want the rep system removed. Limit it to 5 down/ upvotes per day and create a new type of thread topic called ''Debate'' or ''Arguments'' and use it for the debating so people don't use their mouse to debate rather than their keyboard.

03-08-2015 : 153 REP