MouthShut or Mouth Shut?. Review on Is MouthShut Justified in Banning Its Members

I am trying to be unbiased here and dont intend to offend anyone! If I do - you dont need to take from me so do whatever you feel like!

That out of the way, let me tell you that the experience you may have on this website is how the site and the users make it out to be. Now this is strictly a consumer review site and this has to do with first person opinions and views. Now, opinions are yours and solely yours - you can either convince people that its the right one or people can convince you otherwise. Its what you think and people change their thoughts instantly! This whole thing is very trivial if you see objectively. Most people claim that the reviews are too good and that the ratings are always good. Well maybe some are afraid of confrontation, others dont want to get into something that could spoil their experience here. For the record I dont give a damn who reads my review, whether its read, or what the ratings people give me. All I care is the comments I get and if it is valid and makes sense - hey all the good for me. Until you get all the perspective and points of thought/view , you cant expand the realm of your thinking. And this I believe is the core of MouthShut.

Coming to the topic of abuses - what is the need for it anyway? Sure we all do like to abuse sometimes - use a bit of sarcasm but there is a limit to it. The rule of decency is that of a very thin line and it requires better judgement to understand that what you find within bounds is in fact offensive to someone else. The website has the terms and conditions and I do wonder how many of you have actually read it - I for one can say I have not. But knowing how a forum based community works there are certain rules and regulations. Now there are cases were people claim the site is at fault and have banned them for no particular reason at all. I for one recently started taking an active part in this community and would therefore not be able to comment on it.

Now let me give you a classic example - Yahoo Chat. Yahoo chat was one of the best chat centres around and I was actively chatting on yahoo until people started taking advantage of it all. Abuses, cybering, spamming (on hasnt everyone been a victim of that?) to the extent that there was a case of paedophilia and that resulted in the shutting down of all user rooms on the yahoo server. Now to every one is monitored on yahoo and their IP addresses are recorded. Now is this something we want at MS or any other site where the things we say, our privacy is violated and our views censored? The whole experience of MS lies in being honest - and a bit of decency isnt that big a ask is it?

Now a piece of irony - here I am writing about MS and I get a mail from Ms. Ahuja stating that my profile picture was a violation of the TOS. You dont see me throwing a tantrum now do you? Well the thing is when I registered (I didnt read the TOS), I knew that I had just been initiated to a community and its guidelines were derived from its TOS. THE TOS IS SOMETHING YOU HAVE TO FOLLOW TO BE PART OF THE COMMUNITY. I cannot say it any simpler. Further there are particular things I have to just comment upon:

1. Learn to be more tolerant - not everybody likes you. If they did you would be the prime minister of India.

   
   




2. MouthShut - get some real time administrators. Sort of problems amongst members before the blow up!

   
   




3. People, if you do get banned, do the honourable thing and dont come back with a different id. If you are, let everyone know.

   
   




4. Try not to use abuses and always remember that you are writing here. Make sure your context and tone is clear and simple so people dont take it otherwise.

   
   




5. Its not easy to get accepted by a community that soon. Old timers give others a chance.

   
   




6. Most of it is trivial - dont take it to heart. Like I said - dont take from anybody UNLESS its a perfectly sane!

   
   

Finally IF you read this review (I doubt that very much) do let me know what you think - and hey its your opinion be honest!

AFTER NOTE: This is something I came across. A review on the same topic claims that the user has bad english and people have been rude to her and have commented to the same effect. In the same review she goes on to claim that she knows that her english is bad - and herein lies my question why dont you do something about it? Half the solution lies in identifying the problem and the other in rectifying it!