Just want to address some more recent points that have been made + some recurring points!
On the AI ban, I am still firm on it being entirely possible. There are several communities that have banned the use of AI art entirely - Bulbagarden as someone mentioned, Flight Rising, and Chicken Smoothie are just a few examples. I don't think it should be an actual punishable offense unless 1) it is recurring or 2) it is used to deceive/scam other users, but it can be implemented similarly to the signature height limit - no formal warning, but removing the image(s) and giving the user a notification of the removal. Sure there isn't a ton of AI use here, but it does spike every event, especially when there's a reward for having a themed avatar/signature. If you want an artist-friendly community, there needs to be a firm stance against AI that isn't just limited to event entries.
I do have more to say about political discussion since there's still a belief that everything goes so long as discussion is "unaggressive". The issue with this mindset is it's just unrealistic and unfair to expect people to remain calm when someone is advocating for (or defending) taking away peoples rights, denying their existence, or other forms of oppression, regardless of how unaggressive they may be. I am not interested in hearing people justify why they disrespect me or my friends; it is not a pleasant experience to hear people say "love the sinner but hate the sin", or "I don't really believe trans people but I'll refer to them with the correct pronouns", or "I had a bad experience with a black person so now I'm scared of them", no matter how nice or innocuous it may seem it's still hurtful.
Things like sexuality, gender/gender expression, race, and body autonomy shouldn't be topics of debate to begin with, it's basic humanity. Aside from that, with all due respect chances are we've all heard every so-called argument against all of these topics by now and most of them come down to using religion as a scapegoat and/or pearlclutching over situations that don't actually exist, such as the very false idea that letting trans women into women's restrooms will "enable assault" (shocker - assaults have already been happening in women's restrooms for decades and it's from cisgender men, not trans women) or that abortion clinics are "mutilating babies".
It is very easy for people to advocate for letting everyone share their opinions and expecting everyone to remain calm and "civil" (a word that's basically become a RW dogwhistle which I know many of us have started to roll our eyes at) when they haven't experienced the same discrimination or they're part of privileged classes (cisgender, white, man, straight), so when discussing these topics and how to moderate them please try to put yourselves in the shoes of the most vulnerable people you can think of, who are already active targets of oppression, having to read posts that are against their freedom or mere existence in any form. There isn't a need to completely ban political discussion if there's a firm stance against bigotry of any kind.
Aside from that, there's the same handful of collectibles that have been rotting in everyone's selling threads for months or even a year+ so I don't think peoples' pricing is even the issue. It's that the economy sucks and has lead to certain collectibles being worth 10k and over. Artificial scarcity is fine to an extent but TBT has long surpassed that.
Since you have no personal experience with it I'll use my own recent experience an example. Months ago during the mushroom event I got a warning for posting "I promise you guys you can find event-themed profile pictures without resorting to AI art" in What's Bothering You and despite thinking it was vague and encompassing enough since I saw several AI avatars, I got a warning for "posting about other members" because "Posting about other users [in What's Bothering You?], whether directly by name or indirectly, can result in hurt feelings" (quoted directly from the warning) and my post was deleted. Meanwhile I've reported other posts that were more clearly about individual or very specific members and no action was taken. There is someone who has repeatedly vagueposted about a server I'm a part of for years. Several users vent about their partners or exes who are members of the forum and it's fine. So where is the line drawn? There needs to be clarity and consistency.
Another instance of note was the 2023 Christmas fiasco. I hate to bring it up again but it's relevant here: one user had their entry removed from a favourites poll and everyone noticed, but others who broke the same rule wer dealt with quietly with their entries still left up to avoid people taking notice and targeting them. This was probably the most blatant instance of inconsistent rule enforcing I can think of, and despite several users pointing out the unfairness, staff defended their actions. Which brings me to another staffing issue that I've been hesitant to bring up but I will go further into in the next point - accountability.
If we don't want delegating certain staff to certain events, just loosen the "effort" requirements altogether. So long as someone did better than drawing a single square or something it should just be accepted for participation. A pickle with toothpicks in it won third place in an event years ago, keep that energy.
That being said, if someone suggested limiting which staff could host art events months ago I might have gone "I'm not necessarily against it, but why?", but after the whole effort debacle that started here and goes on for pages, I do think it's still worth considering. Sorry to sound like a broken record and sorry to now link it directly but after almost a month there still hasn't been any accountability, address, or apology for this, despite insulting several TBT members including all of the prominent artists on this forum. After a direct link like this is when I'd expect a staff member to jump in to say "Please take up issues with staffing in the Contact The Staff board", but as time has shown, having all issues with staff funneled into CTS rather than being able to have a public discussion only serves to further avoid change and accountability.
As someone who has been in the CTS board countless times, especially in the past: it genuinely feels like a pointless endeavour. You can try to be as informative and careful with your posts as you possibly can, but chances are the ultimatum you'll receive is "Here's why our actions were actually 100% correct. Also we will not be apologizing to anyone who felt hurt". Sometimes there's a "Looking back this might not have been the best action to take, but now it's too late because we already did it". There's just an overall refusal to go back on any decision or apologize to anybody, even if it would make the most sense or be beneficial for everyone involved. I really don't understand it, and aside from the right-wing enabling this is probably the biggest issue with TBT imo.
On the AI ban, I am still firm on it being entirely possible. There are several communities that have banned the use of AI art entirely - Bulbagarden as someone mentioned, Flight Rising, and Chicken Smoothie are just a few examples. I don't think it should be an actual punishable offense unless 1) it is recurring or 2) it is used to deceive/scam other users, but it can be implemented similarly to the signature height limit - no formal warning, but removing the image(s) and giving the user a notification of the removal. Sure there isn't a ton of AI use here, but it does spike every event, especially when there's a reward for having a themed avatar/signature. If you want an artist-friendly community, there needs to be a firm stance against AI that isn't just limited to event entries.
I do have more to say about political discussion since there's still a belief that everything goes so long as discussion is "unaggressive". The issue with this mindset is it's just unrealistic and unfair to expect people to remain calm when someone is advocating for (or defending) taking away peoples rights, denying their existence, or other forms of oppression, regardless of how unaggressive they may be. I am not interested in hearing people justify why they disrespect me or my friends; it is not a pleasant experience to hear people say "love the sinner but hate the sin", or "I don't really believe trans people but I'll refer to them with the correct pronouns", or "I had a bad experience with a black person so now I'm scared of them", no matter how nice or innocuous it may seem it's still hurtful.
Things like sexuality, gender/gender expression, race, and body autonomy shouldn't be topics of debate to begin with, it's basic humanity. Aside from that, with all due respect chances are we've all heard every so-called argument against all of these topics by now and most of them come down to using religion as a scapegoat and/or pearlclutching over situations that don't actually exist, such as the very false idea that letting trans women into women's restrooms will "enable assault" (shocker - assaults have already been happening in women's restrooms for decades and it's from cisgender men, not trans women) or that abortion clinics are "mutilating babies".
It is very easy for people to advocate for letting everyone share their opinions and expecting everyone to remain calm and "civil" (a word that's basically become a RW dogwhistle which I know many of us have started to roll our eyes at) when they haven't experienced the same discrimination or they're part of privileged classes (cisgender, white, man, straight), so when discussing these topics and how to moderate them please try to put yourselves in the shoes of the most vulnerable people you can think of, who are already active targets of oppression, having to read posts that are against their freedom or mere existence in any form. There isn't a need to completely ban political discussion if there's a firm stance against bigotry of any kind.
Suggesting that others sell (and buy) at a lower price has been attempted for years and years and sadly it's just not reasonable to expect it of everyone. Overall I've seen people are more lenient on tier 4-8 collectibles, which is great, but it still doesn't get people enough to buy higher tier, more sought out collectibles. People aren't going to be inspired to sell star wands for 5k just because they were asked politely, and frankly I don't expect them to nor can I really blame them.
Aside from that, there's the same handful of collectibles that have been rotting in everyone's selling threads for months or even a year+ so I don't think peoples' pricing is even the issue. It's that the economy sucks and has lead to certain collectibles being worth 10k and over. Artificial scarcity is fine to an extent but TBT has long surpassed that.
Of course everything is addressed on a case-by-case basis, however, rules still need to be enforced equally across the board.
Since you have no personal experience with it I'll use my own recent experience an example. Months ago during the mushroom event I got a warning for posting "I promise you guys you can find event-themed profile pictures without resorting to AI art" in What's Bothering You and despite thinking it was vague and encompassing enough since I saw several AI avatars, I got a warning for "posting about other members" because "Posting about other users [in What's Bothering You?], whether directly by name or indirectly, can result in hurt feelings" (quoted directly from the warning) and my post was deleted. Meanwhile I've reported other posts that were more clearly about individual or very specific members and no action was taken. There is someone who has repeatedly vagueposted about a server I'm a part of for years. Several users vent about their partners or exes who are members of the forum and it's fine. So where is the line drawn? There needs to be clarity and consistency.
Another instance of note was the 2023 Christmas fiasco. I hate to bring it up again but it's relevant here: one user had their entry removed from a favourites poll and everyone noticed, but others who broke the same rule wer dealt with quietly with their entries still left up to avoid people taking notice and targeting them. This was probably the most blatant instance of inconsistent rule enforcing I can think of, and despite several users pointing out the unfairness, staff defended their actions. Which brings me to another staffing issue that I've been hesitant to bring up but I will go further into in the next point - accountability.
If we don't want delegating certain staff to certain events, just loosen the "effort" requirements altogether. So long as someone did better than drawing a single square or something it should just be accepted for participation. A pickle with toothpicks in it won third place in an event years ago, keep that energy.
That being said, if someone suggested limiting which staff could host art events months ago I might have gone "I'm not necessarily against it, but why?", but after the whole effort debacle that started here and goes on for pages, I do think it's still worth considering. Sorry to sound like a broken record and sorry to now link it directly but after almost a month there still hasn't been any accountability, address, or apology for this, despite insulting several TBT members including all of the prominent artists on this forum. After a direct link like this is when I'd expect a staff member to jump in to say "Please take up issues with staffing in the Contact The Staff board", but as time has shown, having all issues with staff funneled into CTS rather than being able to have a public discussion only serves to further avoid change and accountability.
As someone who has been in the CTS board countless times, especially in the past: it genuinely feels like a pointless endeavour. You can try to be as informative and careful with your posts as you possibly can, but chances are the ultimatum you'll receive is "Here's why our actions were actually 100% correct. Also we will not be apologizing to anyone who felt hurt". Sometimes there's a "Looking back this might not have been the best action to take, but now it's too late because we already did it". There's just an overall refusal to go back on any decision or apologize to anybody, even if it would make the most sense or be beneficial for everyone involved. I really don't understand it, and aside from the right-wing enabling this is probably the biggest issue with TBT imo.
