Censorship at it's best!

[rognisea]

When the Comment section from articles written on Bengals.com was removed a couple of weeks back I e-mailed the webmaster of the site and asked what had happened to the comment site. The reply I received was that fans were being negative and rude in their comments and so they decided to remove the feature. I then e-mailed back asking if this was a way to censor the fans since quite a few of the comments were negative toward the coaches and toward the Brown family. And of course I received no reply to that e-mail. I even sent the e-mail again thinking that maybe it got lost somewhere!

My only conclusion can be is that the team and the Brown family are trying to censor their fans! I guess they forget who the fans who are making those millions of dollars for them! Maybe we need to create our own site where censorship would not be allowed? I would rather have fans who are passionate then no fans at all.

[34inXXIII]

It's kind of hard to believe they're censoring the fans considering the harsh comments found on this message board in the last couple of months.

It never really made much sense to me to have the Comments attached to the articles instead of directing people into the forum where the comments - like the other posts here - can be more easily administered.

[rognisea]

I think that the comment section was a way to discuss the articles that Hobson wrote. The comments were pretty negative.It would have been hard to direct those comments to the forum unless they somehow linked it to the particular article!

[34inXXIII]

I think that the comment section was a way to discuss the articles that Hobson wrote. The comments were pretty negative.It would have been hard to direct those comments to the forum unless they somehow linked it to the particular article!
And maybe that's something they should have worked on. Force people to register in the forums to post so there's some kind of accountability. From the few times I checked them out, many comments were not just negative but nasty. They needed to be either better monitored or eliminated.

[Joe F- Cincinnati]

When the Comment section from articles written on Bengals.com was removed a couple of weeks back I e-mailed the webmaster of the site and asked what had happened to the comment site. The reply I received was that fans were being negative and rude in their comments and so they decided to remove the feature. I then e-mailed back asking if this was a way to censor the fans since quite a few of the comments were negative toward the coaches and toward the Brown family. And of course I received no reply to that e-mail. I even sent the e-mail again thinking that maybe it got lost somewhere!

My only conclusion can be is that the team and the Brown family are trying to censor their fans! I guess they forget who the fans who are making those millions of dollars for them! Maybe we need to create our own site where censorship would not be allowed? I would rather have fans who are passionate then no fans at all.


First of all, I can’t speak for the webmaster but from my standpoint I was in total agreement with the “Comments” section being removed. If you’re upset at the loss of this feature, perhaps you should be venting your frustration at the countless people who chose to post ridiculous, hateful, misguided, pointless, unintelligible drivel instead of actually responding to Geoff Hobson’s articles. The general public was trusted in this situation to keep their comments clean and topical, but that didn’t happen.

The bottom line is that the comments section and this board for that matter are free services, and it’s at the provider’s discretion whether or not to continue the service. Had most of the people that posted responses in the Comments section behaved like mature adults, it would likely still be here today. Instead they chose to act like angry 5 year olds with the I.Q. of a rubber mallet.

[rognisea]

Well I certainly agree that quite a few of the comments were nasty, but, I thought that it was a nice feature to be able to comment or discuss Hobson's articles. I think that the fact that they were not favorable toward team management and the coaching staff is a big part of why they came down.
They should have a system where to comment you had to be a member of the boards so that they could monitor the people who were using vulgar language like they do on the boards. The technology is here to do these things and they should have made use of that instead of penalizing everyone for the people who couldn't control themselves! It also makes me suspect when I received no reply when I asked if it was because of the negative comments regarding ML and the team owners.

[rognisea]

Joe, you are probably right as far as the rubber mallet thing, but, it could of been handled in a different manner which still allowed fans who were trying to post reasonable comments to continue to use the feature.

[Bengals_Moderator]

Joe, you are probably right as far as the rubber mallet thing, but, it could of been handled in a different manner which still allowed fans who were trying to post reasonable comments to continue to use the feature.

We can count on one hand the number of people who used that feature responsibly.

[David From Cincy]

Well I certainly agree that quite a few of the comments were nasty, but, I thought that it was a nice feature to be able to comment or discuss Hobson's articles. I think that the fact that they were not favorable toward team management and the coaching staff is a big part of why they came down.
They should have a system where to comment you had to be a member of the boards so that they could monitor the people who were using vulgar language like they do on the boards. The technology is here to do these things and they should have made use of that instead of penalizing everyone for the people who couldn't control themselves! It also makes me suspect when I received no reply when I asked if it was because of the negative comments regarding ML and the team owners.


The technology is there? Yeah, someone somewhere could create a program to do it, but WE do not have that technology, it just is not an option.

People abused that feature beyond all reason, so why should we be forced to sit and babysit everyone so four people can make comments that are not disgusting?

You will not get a reply to every email you send, especially once they answer your question and then you continue to question it. Look in the Jungle Noise, look at all the anti-Marvin and ownership posts and threads there are, the removal was not related to that.

[rognisea]

Like I said before, it is a shame to lose a feature just because some people abused it. Anything that is done on a site needs someone to create the features and content for it. The people who did abuse it ruined a feature that was a useful way to discuss articles written on Bengals.com.
I just wonder that if they decide to take down the message boards because of abuse, then maybe people would have a different opinion on this matter!

[SouthernStripes]

Like I said before, it is a shame to lose a feature just because some people abused it. Anything that is done on a site needs someone to create the features and content for it. The people who did abuse it ruined a feature that was a useful way to discuss articles written on Bengals.com.
I just wonder that if they decide to take down the message boards because of abuse, then maybe people would have a different opinion on this matter!

No.
Because they can ban anyone who abuses the rules. I call it regulating. :wink:
That wasnt possible to do with the article comment section. You could post whatever as whoever.
It was getting out of hand.
We all remember kids in school who pushed the rules and we had play time taken away.
Or when your sibling didnt listen and nobody got ice cream.
Maybe when someone lets you use something for free and you take advantage of rules that should be an unspoken given .
Like you said, plain and simple : The people who did abuse it ruined a feature that was a useful way to discuss articles written on Bengals.com.