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This is Peregrine, posting in reference to this thread in which motyak blatantly abused his authority as a moderator. The story:

The thread very quickly started a discussion on what is and isn't constructive criticism after several people posted negative feedback on the OP's models. This tangent continued for a while and involved several people (including me), and eventually motyak posted a warning to take it to PM. This is appropriate and I have no problem with this.

After the warning I did not post any more on the subject of "what is constructive criticism", but did continue to discuss airbrushing styles and how they apply to the OP's models, including specific details about those models. Motyak later came in and deleted a bunch of posts, claiming that they were off-topic and threatened to ban anyone who continued the discussion. I can't remember the exact content of the other deleted posts, but I know none of mine contained anything related to the off-topic tangent and were entirely related to the OP's models.

After these posts were deleted I sent motyak a PM objecting to this, as I felt that my deleted posts were entirely relevant and should not have been deleted along with any potentially off-topic posts made by other people. Following an exchange of PMs on the subject motyak gave me a temporary ban for questioning his decision. This is completely inappropriate as a moderator, for three reasons:

1) The objection to the deleted posts was entirely justified, especially given the fact that at least one of the posts I was responding to (which discussed the exact same issues of painting style that mine did) remained intact. In fact, it seems like posts that were praising the OP were allowed to remain, while posts that were critical of the OP's work were deleted more aggressively. This makes it seem less like an attempt to end an off-topic tangent and more like an attempt to suppress legitimate criticism of the work the OP posted.

2) The original warning was incredibly vague and simply said "take it to PM" without any explanation of just what exactly was off-topic. A reasonable person would probably assume that "it" referred to the tangent about constructive criticism, which was off-topic, not general discussion of the OP's painting style.

3) The ban has nothing to do with keeping an organized forum or any legitimate moderation purpose. The discussion of motyak's actions was conducted entirely by PM, and so this is nothing more than revenge for questioning his decision. If a person can't handle criticism of their decisions (in a private conversation) then they have no business being a moderator.

So, given that motyak has demonstrated that he does not have the responsibility to refrain from abusing his moderator powers, please remove them. Don't let him continue to settle personal grudges by deleting posts and banning people.

Looking at that thread, I absolutely hate people bashing actual constructive criticism in favour of useless posts like "awesome work". Leaves no room at all for improvement. But let's not get off topic here.

This seems like something that should be in PM with another one of the mods.

In support of my point #1, posts that were at least as off-topic as mine and made after motyak's warning but were not deleted:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/651593.page#7888200 is one of the posts I responded to, so presumably if my response was off-topic and worthy of deletion and warnings then this one must be equally off-topic. The only difference I can see is that this one is praising the OP's work while mine criticized the OP, which is the origin of my concern that motyak was suppressing legitimate criticism that he disagreed with and not simply removing off-topic tangents.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/651593.page#7895873 contains discussion of "what is constructive criticism" along with relevant comments about the OP's work (motyak claimed that my on-topic comments were deleted because part of the post was off-topic)

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/651593.page#7888087 is more of the same, off-topic discussion combined with on-topic comments.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/651593.page#7888357 has nothing to say beyond "lol guys don't argue".

So clearly he was being very selective in which posts he deleted for being "off-topic", and I think that certainly justifies starting a private conversation about it.

 n0t_u wrote:
This seems like something that should be in PM with another one of the mods.

I agree.

It doesn't help your case when, after getting a temporary ban, you create a second account for the sole purpose of publicly airing your grievances over something that really isn't a big deal, considering that you are breaking another forum rule in doing so:

For disciplinary and site administration purposes, all users are expected to maintain only a single user account on Dakka. Secondary, or 'sockpuppet', accounts are not permitted. Users found with a sockpuppet account (especially those created specifically to break further site rules) will typically have their access permanently suspended

Let it go, man.

 n0t_u wrote:
This seems like something that should be in PM with another one of the mods.

I would, but I doubt this account will be unbanned long enough to read any responses I might get.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:
something that really isn't a big deal

I disagree with this. Banning people for disagreeing with you in a private conversation is blatant abuse of moderator authority, and that's a big deal.

motyakabuseshisauthority wrote:
I disagree with this. Banning people for disagreeing with you in a private conversation is blatant abuse of moderator authority, and that's a big deal.

Right, and of all the injustice you must face in this world, Motyak rendering you a temporary ban must be the harshest.

Seriously, you obviously did something to draw his ire and now you're facing the consequence. Just own it and move on.

In future, please contact moderators and/or administrators by email. Please do not register any further duplicate accounts. The staff will certainly discuss and respond via email. Thanks.