One of the sickest ideas I ever come across is that popularity trumps everything. viffer spammed the board, but that doesn't matter because he's viffer. limon refuses to comply with site rules and acts in a way that would get anyone banned, but that doesn't matter because he's limon. It's not on 2+2 to change the site to fit that. If you want to post here you have to follow the rules.

LOL, I love that precipitous drop from some imaginary number before the graph starts.

I believe traffic is down in the neighbourhood of 10-15% over this time last year, and I suspect that it has a lot more to do with the US online situation than anything else.

But since you posted it to make some kind of point, I'm curious what that point is. Limon was just banned, and I'm sure you're not trying to attribute a big drop to viffer's banning, so what are you getting at? Serious question.

I blame the Politics forum.

I personally think the site is over modded but more importantly it's inconsistently modded.

This is a site for poker players and gamblers, this isn't Disney and poker players and gamblers can be pretty damn crass.

Is that bad, I don't think so, we like to get to the point, we lash out when someone gives us a bunch of crap and we're some of the first people to come to the aide of someone else when we think they've been wronged.

I'm not trying to give you a lesson on how to run 2+2 but this shouldn't be a place for Mary Poppins to stick her nose into. We like to talk trash and sometimes it gets out of hand.
That's the nature of the beast and your life blood as it pertains to members.

There use to be so many well known and highly regarded poker players on 2+2 it was amazing. Where did they go? Why don't they post here anymore?
I can't answer that but it's something to think about.

I don't think I'm derailing this thread by saying this and I'm certainly not writing this to disrespect you or anyone else.

I just don't think some of the mods are qualified to be mods and perhaps that's because they haven't been properly trained or supervised. I know free labor is pretty hard to come by and it's pretty easy to over look things when that's the case.

Let me be clear, I am not calling out any one individual mod. I'm making a broad statement which I hope will be viewed as coming from someone that cares about the site and the betterment of 2+2.

I suggest that you back off in the modding of these boards, treat members as valued customers and be consistent in how all sub forums are modded. I also recommend that training mods to be consistent with their duties be a priority.

It just seems to me that compliance has taken priority over content and it's IMHO that we lose a lot more than we gain when that's the case.

allowing members to be insulted and berated isnt treating them as valued customers either. i dont care if it happens to me but in all my trolling i still dont make personal attacks on other users (especially mods) since Im smart enough to know that given the way the forum has been modded for ten years I would get banned. its not that hard to provide content without being a dickwad

The type of feedback you're giving is always welcome.

I don't agree with everything you're saying, particularly the parts about consistency. Each forum is a bit different, and we like it that way. It's also all very case by case when someone breaks the rules. Consistency and formula lead to bans of people who shouldn't be. It may seem 'fairer' that way, but it also ends up being ridiculous.

It's kinda like this when it comes to compliance: You're coming to 2+2's house. We do want you here. Everyone is allowed to tell the owners they're totally wrong about everything, but you're still not allowed to **** on the floor.

I don't think anyone in the thread has suggested anything of the sort. But I think that people shouldn't generally be banned when they are a net positive to the site, and especially not when there are utterly worthless posters like Greeeaar who do nothing but blindly insult everyone while spewing idiocy who are kept around because the mods are amused by him. Or posters like Thremp are given 482 chances because they allegedly provide some content sometimes (I've read a lot of his posts in the Sports Betting forum where he was supposedly a genius and rarely found a post that even attempted to be helpful).

It seems that pretty much all of the hating on limon in this thread is coming from people who had little or no idea who he was prior to this week. I think that's pretty telling.

I do. Several times even.

If greear were banned, what would happen to the detroit tigers thread?

if greear was put on the universal ignore i dont think his posting would change at all

I kind of want the tigers to win the WS just so his 20k posts in that thread aren't in vain.

One of the worst ideas I've come across is that propriety trumps quality.

I don't think it's a coincidence that the posters in support of limon are the posters who post the best poker content on this site. Guys like DGAF, mikech, DeathDonkey are here for the same reasons I am, and are judging limon based on the quality of his contributions.

I don't even recognize half the names lined up against limon. I have no idea where some of these guys post, but it's certainly not in the POKER forums that I read and contribute to.

I don't think it's a coincidence that community members who put poker content first want limon around, and those that put rules first want him banned.

Dude, you guys are power tripping and that's what this comes down to. You keep talking about rules and in your minds this truly does boil down to some "2+2=4" math problem. Poster broke the rules = poster gets banned permanently. Let me give you a real world example of how guys who have a TON more responsibility in enforcing "rules" actually go about doing it. Every once in awhile in athletics, be it amateur or pros, you will see some guy ****ing SNAP and body slam a ref, punch an opponent, or GO INTO THE STANDS AND START PUNCHING OUT CUSTOMERS. Now, as a commissioner, what could be worse than these offenses, or a more severe violation of the "rules", especially the last? And yet, almost w/o exception unless there's some international soccer incidents I may be unaware, though they get punished, the offenders never get banned permanently from the league. LOL! This is a much worse reflection on several of the mods polluting this thread that you guys just sit there like you're clint eastwood "go ahead, break the rules, I'll ban you!" I mean, do you not see how childish you seem?

But hey, you got to get your rocks off w/ your snarky "goodbye" and even post a clever little video song for good measure. Probably saw that go down in another forum and always wanted to try yourself? So you're happier even if lots of the site's members aren't.

When I first started visiting 2+2, I probably only knew who David Sklansky was. One of the first threads I read was started by him and christ, you would not believe the abuse he was taking in that thread. And he ****ing owns the site?! But I couldn't have been more impressed that he seemed to realize, hey, this is the internet and these are my customers and this is how they talk.

The fact that several of you STAYED in this thread to keep the flame burning instead of just locking it up once the initial decision was overturned says everything about what motivates you (and it isn't the interests of 2+2).

Exactly.

The rules you mentioned had their consequences laid out. Ask Pete Rose how his popularity helped him when he violated a rule with the permanent ban consequence clearly laid out.

One's subjective ideas of quality trumping another's don't fly so much with me.

If you don't like the rules of this site you are free to argue against them or not post here. You are not free to break them.

Once upon a time, after reading in the B&M forum that someone received a death threat while playing a game of cards, a certain future mod fast-tracked his ranks by stating how he would have "derived great pleasure" in hearing that a death threat was in fact carried out.
In response to the above post, a certain poster quotes the aforementioned disgusting thought and provides us with this gem.

Can you tell who is a mod and who is banned? What if I told you that one person banned the other person, would you be able to tell me which one was which?

The point I am trying to make is that without this piece of history and putting everything in context, we don't have this thread and Limon would never have been banned.

You can talk all you want about rules are rules but there is no doubt the aforementioned post at the top is far worse than what Limon wrote against two people who were obviously trolling him. Who in this case appears to be above the rules? I know that Limon has many infractions against him and that will be used to judge whether he ever posts here again or not rather than his good posts. I am just simply pointing out the optics.

I just wanted to say that Limon was just being Limon. Telling us what we wanted to hear and what we didn't want to hear, but always the truth nevertheless. At least that should count for something.

That's a pretty well-documented fact - is it really that big of a problem? It allows for people who like a BBV4L-type "almost anything goes" community to have a forum they like, and people who like a Lounge-type "mellow" community to have a forum they like, etc.

Is this true? I'm not a good judge of this, but it's easy to get caught up in memories of "the good old days" which often aren't as good as we remember them.

But if it is true, what is driving them away? Are they being pushed out by modding? As they become better players, do they outgrow the forums in some way - IE players are less willing to share strat at the higher stakes, too busy playing, etc? Is the squeeze on US online players moving more of them to live and taking away from their time to post?

Treating members as valued customers doesn't always mean letting people do whatever they want. Are there customers who would rather we cut down on the berating, trolling, etc.? There have been numerous ATF threads that would seem to say so.

I hope you would agree, though, that there is a point where even the most valuable of posters cam push it too far.

Seems like a real poker content vs. other content tone to your post. While this forum was obviously based on poker, are you aware that there is a massive amount of non-poker content here? I think it's important that poker content is kept as high-quality as possible, but I wouldn't be too dismissive of those who don't post a lot, or any, poker strat.

Wow, holy overreaction, Batman!

There are so many things I disagree with in this post, but I'll just address the last paragraph - you seriously believe that this thread stayed open to "keep the flame burning"? We have "Free Poster X" threads that stay open past a ban reversal all the time. I don't think I've ever seen the banned poster come back in shortly after the overturning to call everyone names, so I hardly think that was the hoped-for result.

Serious answer: The number of posters who are both willing and capable of contributing to good poker discussions, both strat and otherwise, is in decline. Limon is one of the few good ones left, in addition to many of his supporters ITT.

Here is another analytics graph, without the precipitous drop. The largest decline in traffic is fairly recent, and it's a lot more than 15%.

As a business begins to recede, one of the first steps they must do is focus on their core strengths. While sports, political, and tv discussions, etc. are neat to have around, and drive a lot of traffic, this site is about POKER. We can't stand to lose any more good posters.

Maybe this ban is touching something deeper in some of us: the decline of a community that we really love.

It did - it got his ban reversed.

It's more than a "tone." These are the "Two Plus Two Poker Forums."
Ask any business owner what happens when you lose your base customer, even if he no longer makes up the majority of your bottom line.

I think this is a good topic for a serious discussion - whether this is truly accurate, and if so, what the reasons are for it.

Is it? If the base of that graph is 0, I can guarantee you it isn't accurate. So I would assume that it isn't 0, in which case I have no idea what % that represents. What I can tell you is that the numbers I quoted you come from our own Google Analytics numbers.

Sigh. These are poker forums? Really??

As I acknowledged numerous times, I'm well aware of the fact that this is primarily a poker site. What I'm saying is that one shouldn't be so dismissive of those who don't post strat, as if they have no value to the site. Perhaps I'm overstating the tone, but I hope my point is clear.

Don't get me wrong here, I think it's a shame that Limon is gone if he was valued by so many, which is the reason he got another chance. But a valuable poster can't be allowed to stay no matter what they do here.

Axe grinder doing work

Don't casually toss around the phrase "so many." He was valued by your poker customers.

His supporters and detractors fall neatly between professional/serious poker players vs. "others."

Maybe it's about time you guys got together and came up with a mission statement. Maybe it doesn't even involve poker, I dunno. You can vote: the forum with the most views and revenues takes over the site: Two Plus Two News Views and Gossip Forums, maybe?

Off to the Borgata. Gotta go play some 5/10NVG.

(seriously, I'm gonna go play 5/10nl if anyone wants to say hi.)