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Hi Ms. Netiquette,
Yesterday I went into Edit My Profile and in the Interests section I typed in: Music, walking, cooking, computer, having a laugh. When I submitted this I got a message saying: “Because this is a family site, such language may not be included on your profile” and parts of the words cooking and computer were blocked out.
When I changed the order of the words and put Computer at the end it was accepted. I would never use bad language and can’t see any reason why these interests would cause offence to anyone. Can you tell me what I have done wrong please?
Susi
| Dear Susi, You’ve done nothing wrong. Welcome to the world of the persnickety Pogo chat filter! In this world, seemingly innocuous words when used in a certain order trigger what seems to be a very touchy chat filter and whatever you wanted to say now has funny characters in place of some letters. In your case, the changing of the order of the words solved the problem. That will not always be the case. The chat filter is set to filter out offensive language. Knowing this, some players look for clever ways to work around the chat filter. We have attempted to thwart many of these work-arounds, thus sometimes perfectly innocent words get caught in the filter. If you run into this situation again and can not work around the filter yourself, then please let our customer support team know about the filtered word, or filtered succession of words. We can have the filter updated to exclude that particular word or sequence of words. |
Dear Ms. Netiquette,
I was under the impression that Pogo was careful when allowing screen names to be used. I have seen some pretty ‘suggestive’ screen names that have left me wondering who is NOT doing their job or if it just doesn’t matter to Pogo any longer about what names a person picks to use.
Is any name up for grabs now? Or is Pogo still trying to keep it clean? If they are, they should take another look around! And I don’t insult very easily!
Just wondering…
Deb
| Dear Deb, Who is not doing their job? Would it surprise you to find out that it is same culprit who is changing those innocent words into gobbledygook from the first letter? Yes, the rascally Chat Filter. There is no way that one person, or even a small army of people, could monitor every single screen name that gets created on Pogo. Thus, we rely on the chat filter to weed out offensive screen names, as well as offensive chat. But people are creative, and they will find ways around the chat filter in order to state something suggestive. And in many cases, they are eventually surprised to find out that their account has been deactivated for having an improper screen name. Players may be online for days, weeks, months, or even years before someone reports their screen name. Once the account is disabled, the player often loses tokens, badges, rankings, ratings, Mini items, and whatever other assets are connected to the account. Of course, we take each situation on a case by case basis, as there have been many instances where players were unaware that they’re screen name was offensive. Not everyone is up to date with all of the slang, and players have been quite surprised to find out that they’ve been sporting a screen name that many people equate to something suggestive. We work with these cases to transfer their tokens, badges, etc… to a new, non-offensive, screen name. So, when you see something that has successfully skirted our chat filter, then by all means, contact our customer support department and let them know. They can take it from there. |
Hello Ms. Netiquette,
I was in Shuffle Bump the other day and an argument was going on in the lobby. Apparently 3 or 4 players in the room had decided one player was a cheater because he had a high rating. He also had a high number of unfinished rated games. Two or three other players were defending the guy, so about 6 people were arguing going back and forth on whether or not this guy was cheating.
I decided to play a couple of non-rated games with him and we had quite a fun conversation. However, the 3 players who accused him of cheating came to our table and were harassing him about it. They “watched” us play to see which of us won to see if they could determine if he was cheating or not. During the whole game they kept calling him a cheater and when I won, they said he let me win because he was trying to discredit them.
When I asked nice if they would please leave our table, they turned on me, calling me names in the room for playing with a cheater etc, and told me they had every right to watch us play because I had the allow watchers box marked on options. I always allow watchers and don’t use private rooms with passwords because I have friends that like to come find me and play some games when they sign on and if it’s a private table or they can’t watch, they can’t let me know they are in the lobby and I don’t always watch the lobby.
I wish someone would tell these players on Pogo that:
- It’s not their job to figure out who is or isn’t cheating
- These are just games and should not be taken so seriously, it’s not like we are betting money etc.
- They shouldn’t be so concerned about people online that they don’t know, have never met, will never meet, who are nothing more than fonts on a computer screen.
- If they think someone is cheating, just don’t play with them and leave them alone; don’t make a big scene about it.
- Are you really going to lose sleep over someone beating you in a game?
I am sorry to ramble on to you, but I’ve been back to that same room 5 times now, at different times on different days because I like the room, and the same group of people are always in there, and always fighting… and they are always accusing someone of cheating.
I have finally given up and found a new room, but could you please tell me how to handle this in the future? For example do the people coming to the table to watch us have a right to go to any game, any table they choose to watch games? Should I just unmark that option to avoid it in the future?
Please sign me, A Non Cheater
| Dear Non-Cheater, Wow! I hardly know where to begin! Well, actually, I do. With a nice pot of strong British tea! Let’s start with your questions. Do the watchers have a right to go into any game, any table they choose to watch games? The simple answer is yes. If the person who set the table up allowed for watchers, then anyone can watch the game. That doesn’t excuse rude behavior, and accusing someone of cheating is rude behavior. Should you just unmark that option in the future? Certainly take it into consideration. If you are being followed by someone or a group of people, then by all means, make your table private. In some rooms you may not need to, while in other rooms it might be a wise choice. The best — and perhaps the most difficult– thing to do is to ignore the accusing players. Once you’ve been accused, you can say something like “I am not, nor have I ever, cheated in this game. I’m just really good.” After you’ve stated this, then ignore any further comments. You don’t want to protest too much, and you really don’t want to expend that much energy on your accusers. Say your piece and move on. As for your list of things you’d like to say to all players, well – there you go! You’ve said them! Nobody likes to feel as if he or she is playing against someone who is cheating. It is understandable that people get frustrated when someone plays so well, or has statistics that might indicate that the player is not completely on the up and up. However, we should not accuse anyone of cheating, as it is impossible to prove. If you suspect a player is cheating, don’t play with that person. |
