Why was I banned from IRC #linode ??

http://sackheads.org/~bnaylor/spew/away_msgs.html

@derfy:

http://sackheads.org/~bnaylor/spew/away_msgs.html
Is this reason enough to ban a customer? I think they can get over the fact that I tell people I went home from work. That's policy where I work, and I'm not going to make an exception for linode. I think it would be better for them to not kick customers who, not intending to spam anyone with messages, tell people they are not at their desk (i.e. so ppl @ work will know not to come to your desk).

While this may be policy where you work, the opposite policy (namely that away messages and status nick changes are spam) is in effect on Linode IRC. The fact that the former has one policy does not mean you can carry it over to the latter.

If you want to set yourself as away, do so. But you do not need to automatically announce that to the channel. This way, if someone wishes to contact you, they can easily discover your away-ness, without the rest of us having to see that you went from "guyonirc-onthepotty" to "guyonirc-eatingabagel".

That said, I'd bet you've already been unbanned, or would be shortly if you email or ticket Linode.

@akerl:

While this may be policy where you work, the opposite policy (namely that away messages and status nick changes are spam) is in effect on Linode IRC.
Stated where?

@OverlordQ:

@akerl:

While this may be policy where you work, the opposite policy (namely that away messages and status nick changes are spam) is in effect on Linode IRC.
Stated where?
Well it looks like they won't budge on the issue, so I'll prob be taking biz elsewhere. A silly rule as now I can't get support from them, and this for the irc user's "convenience". Why someone would expect a personal response from someone named XXXXXgone or XXXXaway is beyond me, but it sounds like a personal preference of the ops.

That's too bad, I was about to write an article post on how to get a custom distro onto Linode (specifically targeting RHEL/CentOS) – the docs are a little out of date for that.

When you have a channel of many hundreds of people that already has a lot of scroll, having people that insist on changing their names & adding clutter to the channel instead of doing /away adds up. Plus 99.99% of the people don't care if you are there or not unless you are talking in which case a manual hey i'll brb to whoever you are talking works fine.

You could also just go in the channel when you need something or are there and leave if you absolutely refuse to stop the nick changes

@Daevien:

When you have a channel of many hundreds of people that already has a lot of scroll, having people that insist on changing their names & adding clutter to the channel instead of doing /away adds up. Plus 99.99% of the people don't care if you are there or not unless you are talking in which case a manual hey i'll brb to whoever you are talking works fine.

You could also just go in the channel when you need something or are there and leave if you absolutely refuse to stop the nick changes
So why dont you disable showing nick changes in your IRC client if you dont want to see them. You shouldn't punish users for a (retarded) policy that isn't shown anywhere.

@OverlordQ:

So why dont you disable showing nick changes in your IRC client
Nick Changes sounds like the name of a detective in a cheesy novel.

James

@tesmar:

Well it looks like they won't budge on the issue, so I'll prob be taking biz elsewhere. A silly rule as now I can't get support from them, and this for the irc user's "convenience". Why someone would expect a personal response from someone named XXXXXgone or XXXXaway is beyond me, but it sounds like a personal preference of the ops.
You are going to let a little thing like this become a big enough issue to take your business elsewhere? There are other official and unofficial avenues for support. IRC isn't the only means.

@carmp3fan:

You are going to let a little thing like this become a big enough issue to take your business elsewhere? There are other official and unofficial avenues for support. IRC isn't the only means.
Yes. I Was starting to feel like part of the community and now I have been shunned. I am not married to linode, but had heard good things about them on hacker news. There's not much they can do that others can't for a similar price.

Why not open up an actual support ticket with Linode so a staff member can actually answer this? Nobody that has replied so far is a Linode staff member, nor has anyone pointed to actual written policy.

I am away (meeting).

brb

I didn't know they had an irc channel, cool.

@tesmar:

I Was starting to feel like part of the community and now I have been shunned.
I suggest you sue them for the emotional pain and deep, deep agony they inflicted - all from the shunification you have endlessly endured. That will teach them! And your dad can beat up their dad, so there!

James

I felt bad for the ban until you tried to argue your point. There's 500 people on #linode, if everyone changed their nick when they went away all you would see are nick changes.

I've never been on a channel that welcomed nick changes on away, they suck.

It's fair enough if you didn't know the rules to be feeling upset about the ban, but now you know and you don't accept them. Build a bridge and get over it.

Even though you've had a rough start, the community really does rock, come back and don't change your nick on away and you will see what all the hype is about. BTW, the irc channel is community support, official support is through the ticket system.

~~http://www.exposay.com/celebrity-photos … lm-KSn.jpg">http://www.exposay.com/celebrity-photos2/tough-guy-wentworth-miller-wants-to-star-in-a-romantic-comedy-film-KSn.jpg" />

Nick Changes and the Shunifications

Stay tuned for their debut album.~~

@chesty:

I felt bad for the ban until you tried to argue your point. There's 500 people on #linode, if everyone changed their nick when they went away all you would see are nick changes.

I've never been on a channel that welcomed nick changes on away, they suck.

It's fair enough if you didn't know the rules to be feeling upset about the ban, but now you know and you don't accept them. Build a bridge and get over it.

Even though you've had a rough start, the community really does rock, come back and don't change your nick on away and you will see what all the hype is about. BTW, the irc channel is community support, official support is through the ticket system.
I perceive is as official support as (I think?) employees hang out there and answer questions. Sure, part of this is the "shunnification" but along with that is a perceived immaturity in whoever wrote the policy.

EDIT: Also, since I emailed support they should just say 'it is community support' and they should not have given me the response of 'change your nick'

If the policy is changed and I can just "hang out" in the channel and ask technical questions whenever I have a need I'll reconsider. I don't know if the policy has affected anyone else, but a change could save future frustration to anyone else in my predicament who doesn't want to make a special exception for the linode channel in his XChat window with a million other rooms that don't use the policy.

@vonskippy:

~~http://www.exposay.com/celebrity-photos … lm-KSn.jpg">http://www.exposay.com/celebrity-photos2/tough-guy-wentworth-miller-wants-to-star-in-a-romantic-comedy-film-KSn.jpg" />

Nick Changes and the Shunifications

Stay tuned for their debut album. Haha great one.~~

@zunzun:

@tesmar:

I Was starting to feel like part of the community and now I have been shunned.
I suggest you sue them for the emotional pain and deep, deep agony they inflicted - all from the shunification you have endlessly endured. That will teach them! And your dad can beat up their dad, so there!

James

:) I took off from work after falling ill with a fever. It may be weeks before I'm back on my feet. This message took 2 hours to type out with my feeble fingers.

@tesmar:

I perceive is as official support as (I think?) employees hang out there and answer questions. Sure, part of this is the "shunnification" but along with that is a perceived immaturity in whoever wrote the policy.

If the policy is changed and I can just "hang out" in the channel and ask technical questions whenever I have a need I'll reconsider. I don't know if the policy has affected anyone else, but a change could save future frustration to anyone else in my predicament who doesn't want to make a special exception for the linode channel in his XChat window with a million other rooms that don't use the policy.
I doubt that the policy is going to change. The person who made the policy and who dropped the banhammer on you (he of the perceived immaturity) is not just some support tech, he's the founder and owner of the company.

@tesmar:

I perceive is as official support as (I think?) employees hang out there and answer questions.
Yes, staff are there. Yes, they can help you. No, it is not "official" support. That's what tickets, phone, and email are for.

@tesmar:

Also, since I emailed support they should just say 'it is community support' and they should not have given me the response of 'change your nick'
They gave you the solution to your problem. Join the channel, sans status-nick.

@tesmar:

If the policy is changed and I can just "hang out" in the channel and ask technical questions whenever I have a need I'll reconsider.
Why do they need to change their policy so you can hang out? The other 499 people manage to idle without having an issue. Just don't use auto-away messages, and you'll be fine.

@tesmar:

a special exception for the linode channel in his XChat window with a million other rooms that don't use the policy.
Even if it's not specific policy on other channels, auto-away messages are generally either frowned upon or not regarded at all. So what harm is it to just not use them, if you're so against having specific settings for #linode?

@akerl:

Even if it's not specific policy on other channels, auto-away messages are generally either frowned upon or not regarded at all. So what harm is it to just not use them, if you're so against having specific settings for #linode?
Nick swapping shouldn't be a reason to ban a paying customer from your officially unofficial support medium. We seem to have a disagreement so, unless the policy changes, we'll part ways.

tesmar has thrown his toys out of the pram

Dr_Zoidberg has left the building

tesmar has left Linode (Quit: Leaving)

back

what did I miss?

@pclissold:

tesmar has thrown his toys out of the pram

Dr_Zoidberg has left the building

tesmar has left Linode (Quit: Leaving)
Pretty much sums it up. Except this baby was whining that the pram was being thrown out of the window.

@tesmar:

[…] since I emailed support they should just say 'it is community support' [..]
The fact that, to get from the Linode front page to the page containing information about connecting to their IRC channel, you have to click on a tab link named "Community" might have clued you into that, though.

@tesmar:

I don't know if the policy has affected anyone else, but a change could save future frustration to anyone else in my predicament who doesn't want to make a special exception for the linode channel in his XChat window with a million other rooms that don't use the policy.
I wouldn't exactly call the #linode channel policy a "special exception" - I've used IRC a lot in the past, and I would guesstimate that about 60% of the channels I've been in have had a similar policy. Not bothering your fellow IRC participants with unnecessary nick changes and public away messages is just good netiquette.

The thing that saddens me here is people have to resort to childhood antics to reply to someone.

To the OP in the end you have the power of the purchase, feel free to take your money elsewhere if you feel that being able to set an away message on an irc channel is that important. Honestly I'm not sure why this is such an issue to you but I try to see both sides and could see why if you are part of more important channels why you would want to set yourself away.

While I feel the policy is a little bit on the strong side and hope linode/caker really take a look at the importance of it I'm sadden that this drives you away. The IRC channel is heavily supported by Linode customers (not saying that staff doesn't play a major role) so essentially it is a free resource of information and support. If you feel that strongly in your beliefs than goodbye, Linode cannot fit all needs. However I would question you and ask what other provider gives you replies usually within 10 minutes if not less, a phone/sip number to call, an irc channel to help you with and multiple locations all at a starting price of $20/month.

I've said my piece and I hope you chose wisely, at the same time I hope some people grow up in their replies as this is getting a bit ridiculous.

@zunzun:

Nick Changes sounds like the name of a detective in a cheesy novel.
You mean like Nick Castle? Close enough.

The IRC channel is what you go to when the servers are down.

Otherwise use the support tickets.

There's too many idiots on that channel anyway.

I gotta agree.

Support needs to be done through a ticket system, it's the only way the issues can be properly tracked.

irc / twitter / etc. might be OK for a quick question but then so are the forums. Actual support though needs to be done through the support ticket system, and Linode is incredibly fast to respond. I do not think I have ever seen a tech support system as responsive as Linode's is.

The only IRC channels I've been in that have this policy state it clearly on the website. If it is clearly stated, I have no problem leaving the channel before I change my nick for away status. This policy doesn't really make sense, though – I can understand banning someone who changes every few minutes, but for someone like me who's actually away (as in, I won't be there for a few hours or a few days or whatever), it shouldn't be considered spam. According to the logic, people should be banned for having a storm blow through and messing with there Internet connections. The only time I've seen channels ban for this is if they keep reconnecting for several minutes, then they unban shortly after.

I can understand banning someone for changing nicks just for brb status, but if they are actually leaving their computer for several hours or longer, I don't see a problem.

EDIT: If there aren't any rules stated on the IRC page (http://www.linode.com/irc/), people won't follow those rules because they won't know they exist. The rules for the IRC channel should be clearly stated.