language filter

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dexter
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language filter

Post by dexter »

It has come to my attention that somewhat recently (?) a language filter was setup for the match servers and I'm just going to ask flat out: really?
Is this measure of censorship really necessary? I can see the sense in filtering public messages for obscenities even though with the filter it's not exactly difficult to swear. The biggest annoyance is that the filter applies to team and private messages too. So every other message during an intense match gets filtered.
Isn't one of the jobs of the admins -who seem to be omnipresent lately- to monitor public misbehavior and act accordingly? Just a thought...
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slime
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Re: language filter

Post by slime »

funny, i noticed this filter for the first time while trying to talk to you in pm during a match. was annoying having to retype my whole message and change one letter
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Re: language filter

Post by joevano »

The "Up arrow" is your friend ;-)
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Re: language filter

Post by Snake12534 »

GU added a filter system? This should be changed- i think players are responsible enough to know not to swear.
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Re: language filter

Post by blast »

dexter wrote:It has come to my attention that somewhat recently (?) a language filter was setup for the match servers and I'm just going to ask flat out: really?
Is this measure of censorship really necessary? I can see the sense in filtering public messages for obscenities even though with the filter it's not exactly difficult to swear. The biggest annoyance is that the filter applies to team and private messages too. So every other message during an intense match gets filtered.
Isn't one of the jobs of the admins -who seem to be omnipresent lately- to monitor public misbehavior and act accordingly? Just a thought...
cheers
Not quite sure I understand the problem. Is the issue that the filter is triggering on false positives? Or are you just upset that profane messages are being dropped?
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dexter
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Re: language filter

Post by dexter »

The filter works fine. The issue is that it is simply censoring the language that i use with other players in private messages (which are, as the name indicates 'private'), who I know don't take offense to a little "profanity". Sounds ridiculous but.. whatever, don't think this is gonna change anything:)
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Re: language filter

Post by kierra »

Dex, feel free to write Lang filter plugin that excludes pvt msgs.
dexter wrote:..... language that i use with other players in private messages (which are, as the name indicates 'private'), who I know don't take offense to a little "profanity"......
Just be sure they won't take offense at ur profanity in pms.
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Re: language filter

Post by dexter »

yaya.. so there is no debate as to whether the filter will remain in place?
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Re: language filter

Post by JeffM »

server owners can setup the servers they run however they wish.
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Re: language filter

Post by slime »

JeffM wrote:server owners can setup the servers they run however they wish.
Obviously. But without feedback they wouldn't know what's working and what isn't to keep players coming back to their servers. Also, keep in mind these are league servers, not public servers, so generally what is implemented on one is implemented on the others, sometimes whether the owner is partial to it or not.

All dexter is doing is providing feedback letting whoever implemented/wrote the plug-in know that perhaps, if they had the free time, they could alter it in such a way that team/private messages are not filtered, since it is now a hindrance during matches. *Or take it out completely, but I believe the other option would be listened to with more open ears.
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Re: language filter

Post by JeffM »

The league does not own the server, the owner is offering a game instance with a specific set of settings for league members to use. Those league settings only specify gameplay setup not social setup (ban lists, chat, etc..) the rest is left to the server owner.

I think what you are asking is for the league to have a policy on chat filtering. If it makes a policy on this it should look at all other non game settings as well. But really it's going to be hard to make a case that F-bombs to specific people are a critical component of inter-player communication

The owner would have had to turn the filter on for some reason, it may be a personal reason for the owner, or they received complaints. You should start by asking that owner. On a technical level the built in filter filters all chat, that's just what it does,
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Re: language filter

Post by slime »

JeffM wrote:The league does not own the server, the owner is offering a game instance with a specific set of settings for league members to use. Those league settings only specify gameplay setup not social setup (ban lists, chat, etc..) the rest is left to the server owner.
Understood. However, GU League admins determine which servers offered by the server owners are to be official match servers for the league. Not being an admin myself, I don't know all the criteria used in determining this; i would assume a strong one would be owner compliance with standards in the league i.e. language filter plug-in
JeffM wrote:On a technical level the built in filter filters all chat, that's just what it does,
I didn't know that. I guess my suggestion earlier is irrelevant then. I will still argue it is not needed on official match servers in the league, but I guess opinions are opinions.
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Re: language filter

Post by dexter »

The only reason I bring this up at all is in line with slime's argument. The server owners have rarely or never implemented any changes of significance to official league servers without there being a discussion between admins and or players before hand. To my knowledge, this wasn't the case here and I'm asking if this change is really necessary. I'm not aware of foul language in public being that big of a problem? Not to mention, it's not exactly rocket science to by-pass the filter if that's what your intention is.

The argument isn't that dropping the f-bomb is a crucial part of game play but let's get real, there's nothing wrong with swearing with your friends and teammates (who couldn't care less) during an intense match. Or using the same colloquial (and yes, sometimes foul english) you would normally use with buddies in private mesasges.

The point has been made and I hope admins/server owners will rethink the implementation of the filters on official league match servers.
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Re: language filter

Post by blast »

The plugin doesn't do the filtering. The server has had that built-in for years. So the built-in filtering is used. It doesn't differentiate between public and private chat, so to "fix" that would require modifying the server. The plugin simply drops messages that contain profanity instead of just letting the server censoring the bad stuff out.
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Re: language filter

Post by Snake12534 »

Is it still consider being ban if you cussed using the short version. Like the f bomb, shorten in to 3 letters that is of course recognizable.
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Re: language filter

Post by kierra »

Disguising it with letters like 'wtf', f*k, fu, etc - makes no difference, everyone knows exactly what you mean to say.....it would be banable language.
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Re: language filter

Post by Zelgadis »

dexter wrote:The only reason I bring this up at all is in line with slime's argument. The server owners have rarely or never implemented any changes of significance to official league servers without there being a discussion between admins and or players before hand. To my knowledge, this wasn't the case here and I'm asking if this change is really necessary. I'm not aware of foul language in public being that big of a problem? Not to mention, it's not exactly rocket science to by-pass the filter if that's what your intention is.

The argument isn't that dropping the f-bomb is a crucial part of game play but let's get real, there's nothing wrong with swearing with your friends and teammates (who couldn't care less) during an intense match. Or using the same colloquial (and yes, sometimes foul english) you would normally use with buddies in private mesasges.

The point has been made and I hope admins/server owners will rethink the implementation of the filters on official league match servers.
Thanks.
It is not "rocket science" but it makes it more difficult..I am - for example - too lazy to type the same message twice. (yes, even using arrows/editing it.) The lang filter stays until further notice..
kierra wrote:Disguising it with letters like 'wtf', f*k, fu, etc - makes no difference, everyone knows exactly what you mean to say.....it would be banable language.
Exactly.
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Re: language filter

Post by blast »

And my personal view (not to be confused with the view of the GU admins) is that evading the filter on purpose should result in a harsher ban. ;)
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Re: language filter

Post by macsforme »

JeffM wrote:The league does not own the server, the owner is offering a game instance with a specific set of settings for league members to use. Those league settings only specify gameplay setup not social setup (ban lists, chat, etc..) the rest is left to the server owner.
The language filter settings are specified by the GU admins for all official servers to use. Sometimes there is a delay in updating server settings so there are occasional inconsistencies. We also generally recognize the right of server owners to implement their own additional restrictions (their own banlists, additional restrictions on language) for servers they host. However, in order to be official, match servers have to conform to official GU settings and have the blessing of the admin team.

Tolerating bad language between two players who mutually agree to it is a practice we have had for some time. However, the language filter was implemented to counter a very real language problem, and I'm not sure it is feasible to ask every server owner to patch their bzfs to implement non-standard behavior of only filtering public chat. I imagine many server owners use the same bzfs to run both GU league servers and other servers.

Also, isn't the loss of the ability to use bad language in mutually acceptable PM overshadowed by the benefit of stopping people from using bad language in PM to people who don't want to hear it?
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Re: language filter

Post by blast »

Constitution wrote:Also, isn't the loss of the ability to use bad language in mutually acceptable PM overshadowed by the benefit of stopping people from using bad language in PM to people who don't want to hear it?
Not to mention that there isn't alternate communication methods that a team could use. For instance, voice chat through Skype, Mumble, Teamspeak, etc. Also, on Windows, BZFlag can integrate with the XFire gaming IM client which supports text chat from within the game client, if I recall correctly.
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Re: language filter

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Constitution wrote:The language filter settings are specified by the GU admins for all official servers to use. Sometimes there is a delay in updating server settings so there are occasional inconsistencies. We also generally recognize the right of server owners to implement their own additional restrictions (their own banlists, additional restrictions on language) for servers they host. However, in order to be official, match servers have to conform to official GU settings and have the blessing of the admin team.

Tolerating bad language between two players who mutually agree to it is a practice we have had for some time. However, the language filter was implemented to counter a very real language problem, and I'm not sure it is feasible to ask every server owner to patch their bzfs to implement non-standard behavior of only filtering public chat. I imagine many server owners use the same bzfs to run both GU league servers and other servers.
Thank you for clarifying those points.

Constitution wrote:Also, isn't the loss of the ability to use bad language in mutually acceptable PM overshadowed by the benefit of stopping people from using bad language in PM to people who don't want to hear it?
Here is where I would disagree. I believe what this is doing is punishing players who have never had a problem with offensive language because of a few troublemakers in the league. As it has been said numerous times already, it is not rocket science at all to change one letter and bypass the plug-in. So if these same people want to harass others in pm with offensive language, this will not deter them.

Here is possibly a very real situation. During a tied match with only a minute left, I died in the fight for defending my flag in mid. Being the highly competitive player that I am, and with teammates I know don't care about language, in teamchat I say, "s**t ours!" Now, that message does not go through due to the plug-in. My teammate never sees it, and never knows it is in danger until it is too late. Yes, I am aware I can retype a short message just as quickly, but sometimes I would not notice it didn't send until it was too late. At the very least, can you see how something like this can be very frustrating, especially in the heat of intense matches?

I already forget if the match servers were using the built-in filter system before this (perhaps only a few were?) but I personally would much prefer that over a plug-in that stops the message altogether. If people are going to use offensive language to harass, neither option will deter them much. However, the built-in filter would punish those who have followed the rules for years a lot less.
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Re: language filter

Post by Iskskskks »

Maybe someone could arrange the plug-in and make it so on PMs the server would PM you and say "someone" tried to send you a message with offensive language in it would you care? Do /chat join "someone" or something like that. But, it would be like that on team chat too. Just not on send to all chat. Any thoughts?
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Re: language filter

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Jon- wrote:Maybe someone could arrange the plug-in and make it so on PMs the server would PM you and say "someone" tried to send you a message with offensive language in it would you care? Do /chat join "someone" or something like that. But, it would be like that on team chat too. Just not on send to all chat. Any thoughts?
The plugin API doesn't support such things at the moment. The event for message filtering only has the ID of the player who sent it, not the recipient. That also makes it impossible to detect if it was a public, team, or private message.
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benji 13
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Re: language filter

Post by benji 13 »

It happens quite often to me that when I write in German the filter cancelles my whole msg because of words from which I don't even know in which language they should be a swear word and of course not what it means.
"vor" is a good example and it's just too annoying to have to edit so many msgs because of swear words which no one understands as being so.

I agree to the statement that since we don't really have that language problem on our servers the filter is not really necessary, and if one really is dropping the f-bomb you can be sure that there's at least one player who thinks that this was tooooooo insulting and sends a screenshot to the admins.
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Re: language filter

Post by benji 13 »

BibapBadapo wrote:"vor" is a good example and it's just too annoying to have to edit so many msgs because of swear words which no one understands as being so.
lol, vor works. maybe it was another word or vor was only on public. whatever.

Edit: Vor doesn't work on one of the european servers, I think it was bzf.
Last edited by benji 13 on Mon Jan 07, 2013 2:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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