CloudFyre

This has been discussed multiple times, and the decision has been that "bans will not be made public". The most prevalent issue is that the banning of a popular member seems to incite anger in friends/known associates/etc., and it creates a hurricane of backlash that simply isn't practical to deal with. Besides, some of the things people have been banned for were bad enough that people really shouldn't want to know why.

A year or two back, there was a terrible storm of users either leaving (one every couple of days), being banned (in which users started being generally unruly if it was someone they liked), or just were difficult to deal with. I remember talking to some of the mods/admins who were having to deal with it, and it was insanity.

It was part of the reason I left for 6 months+; the whole community just turned sour for a long duration of time.

This also leads into stuff like "well why was my friend X banned when user Y posted something similar?". In the end, it has to be a human that makes that call, and humans are inherently flawed. judgement calls are hard to make, and someone is bound to disagree with them.

As for me, I'm not sure where I stand. I probably tilt towards the "keep bans silent" side of the fence, since there's no real reason to promote ideas of negativity.

 

You know you've been in the college mindset for too long when you read the capital word "ME" as the abbreviation "Mechanical Engineering".

Back to the point: good post, and good advice. I'm a CSE student Junior, so I know what that can be like.

Rarity may be one of my favorite ponies, but even I have to admit that her slight lack of generosity is quite disappointing at times. I can think of a couple notable events that proved us wrong, but aside from those scarce events, the rest of the time I'm desperately wanting to see her show her Element more.

And, personally, my problem with the whole "banned" thing was that is was a shot down public apology.

 

I've noticed these things far too often around here for me to be comfortable with, and my opinion was not heard. That is why I posted this blog.

Perhaps, but "apologies" often show themselves in their true form of "this-is-why-I'm-technically-right-please-feel-bad-for-me" sort of threads. It creates more drama than is needed.

Now, if it's a true apology, then by all means they should be allowed to speak their mind. Unfortunately, the sins of the few have affected the many.

I'll have to side ghostface with this one...despite opposing opinions.  

 

Some Mods and Admins are power hungry, and make their titles an excuse to be complete jerks themselves...like sorta a "I'm right, you're wrong, i'm a higher rank than you, so what the hell are you going to do about it?" attitude.

 

Sometimes, I don't get logic around here. Member says something wrong, warning points, suspension, bans, what has you. Mod/Admin says something wrong, other way around.

 

Don't arrest me. I'm an innocent bystander sharing her right mind of the situation.

Oi, didn't I say not to worry about opinions? (I suppose disclaimers never hurt though.)

...Or perhaps I'm wrong, and I'm so far out of the loop that administration has totally changed hands.

*Checks mod/admin list*

Nope. All is well with the world. No major changes that I can tell.

If something like that really did happen, I'm half tempted to ask you to send proof. (I'd rather not open old wounds though.) On one hand, I'm prepared to take everything with a grain of salt. On the other hand, I'd like to actually see if these stories have validity to them. Maybe I've just had a bad string of logins, but every time I check back on this place, someone manages to start a civil war.

It's crazy.

I'm still blowing small amounts of dust off of my username, so please ignore the mess.

Now, as far as posts go, this is nothing new. In fact, in all the years that I've been here, I doubt any of the mods/admins would care. So first let me say: relax a little. It's your opinion. Don't sweat it. Opinions are good.


Now, as for the admins/mods in question: they're here to make life better. That requires a little lot of time, and no small amount of patience. Yeah, they get a lot of flak. Why? Because they're doing their job. It comes with the territory. It's impossible to make both sides happy. I'll take up arms when I see a rational reason to do so. Until then, I'll be one of the few to vouch for the staff. (I'll note that a vast majority of the time, people don't have 100% of the information about a given event, even when they themselves are 130% sure they do.)

As for bias: what do people expect? This is a forum. People write things. They display part of themselves here. If they have a track record of being in cohorts with the law breakers, people are going to think they're lawbreakers in general. Tough luck.

People getting banned is nothing new. In fact, the last time I logged in I was greeted with the overhyped fallout from someone else getting banned. It's life. People make mistakes. Mistakes have consequences.


And while we're on the subject of warnings and bannings, I'm going to give EVERYONE the chance to see the most valuable advice they could POSSIBLY receive for avoiding warnings/bans, written from personal experience:


Don't be an idiot.

Yes yes, I know what you're thinking:


But there you have it. The single most valuable piece of information I could give. It's not hard really. Keep posts clean, friendly, and on topic. That's it - it's pretty much impossible to get banned at that point.

"Have you ever gotten a warning?" you ask? Yes, actually. Two of them. One was off topic stuff that was my own fault. The other was a misunderstanding on the staff's part. (And yes, I recieved warning points for something that was already sorted out the previous day.) But you know what? It didn't matter. It was an honest mistake, and nobody would benefit from fighting it. It didn't affect me, the warning points would disappear in a few weeks, and none would be the wiser.


I don't know what the atmosphere is like around here nowadays, but to all of the new forum members who might be reading this: don't worry. The staff are down to Earth Equestria people. They're doing their jobs - so go have fun! Just try and keep things clean and friendly, okay?

Sincerely,

-A veteran forum member.

Etherwood is one of my personal favorites.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution was one of the single best buys I ever made. A long, engaging story, great weapons, and a VERY high amount of detail. It takes a very, very long time to find everything that they've hidden in that game.

Enjoy it - I know I did.

Dimitri! It's good to see your contemplative personality once again.

I'd say that it's hard to really "overthink" something; we could use more people like you. I inherited my father's engineering mindset, and as such I have a tendency to think thirty steps ahead, and into possible futures/outcomes that will never come to pass, but I wouldn't call it a bad thing.

Is it tedious? In some cases, but more often than not, it's helped more than it's hindered me.


And as for your feelings about your late wife...you don't have to find the answers right now. Nobody expects you to. My parents both lost their first fiance's right before they were each going to get married, and they'll attest to the time it takes for people to come to terms with those events. It was terribly hard for both of them, so don't hear me wrong - but if things didn't play out the way they did, they wouldn't be in the wonderful relationship they're in right now.


As much as you may fear your past or your anger coming back to haunt you, I'd point to the fact that you wrestle with these ideas far in advance, before they even have a chance to happen. Your preemptive work has probably done all of the hard work for you.

Morality in and of itself is a huge topic to ponder on, and to be quite honest: if morality is defined by people, then we live in a scary world. If everyone is allowed to have their own standard (or even if the general populous gets to decide for you), then what's wrong for some is right for others, and chaos ensues. Whatever the case, you've seen firsthand what happens, and I think your experience alone is enough to keep you from returning to where you were.

I have faith in you. Now you need to have faith in yourself.

That first one would be interesting; it reminds me of the classic fic "Why Am I Pinkie Pie?!?" in which the main character has to convince the rest of the Mane Six that he is not their beloved friend Pinkie Pie, but instead is someone trapped inside Pinkie's head. (Of course, this coming from Pinkie Pie wouldn't actually be too far fetched - so it makes the task that much harder.)

Play around with it and see what you get!

It's funny that you mention this, as I started noticing myself doing the same thing a few months back, and seriously grasped the idea only a week or two ago. It's almost frightening. We live in a world where any information is freely available at the touch of a button, and we're slipping into a state of dissatisfaction: there can always be more.

I'd agree that escapism isn't necessarily bad per se, so long as it's in moderation.

...I still think it's scary that you mentioned robbing yourself of rest, reflection, and creativity. That's been haunting me for a while now.

I clicked play at the risk of getting upset. Surprisingly, I actually wasn't against it at all.

While I understand what you're trying to say Skullbuster, that sort of thing does happen - professors who have been given free reign over their classrooms can and *will* force their opinions on the students. I've been subject to one such professor. On a broader scale, higher institutions are trying to "kill" God whenever they get the possibility.

To give an example, I attended a community college in which all students were given complete liberty to meet as groups, whether it be for a club, gaming community, or a religious meeting - except for one very particular group: Christians. Christians were required to have the group both approved by the institution and have a staff member present to "oversee" what was happening. That being said, it didn't really affect me as I never joined any student groups whatsoever - but for a college that waved a banner of equality, that seemed very out of place to me.

And Chickenism, that's a very strong stereotype you're bringing to the table. If you're going to make a point of a "typical Christian's" stereotypical view of athiests, perhaps you should take a step back and review your own stereotyping of said Christians.

As most Christians will only see the loud, vocal, and sometimes rude athiests, I'm sure that the reverse is true as well, and that the world only sees the loud, vocal, and sometimes rude Christians. In reality, 99% of both sides really are quite nice people, but someone else is giving them a bad name.

You and pretty much everyone else. XD

Yeah, I see what you're saying I guess. I think that War Z needs to leave for a myriad of reasons, but that's just my take on it.

I don't suppose you have any copies of Dota 2 left, do you? I've never bothered with it until now, but if you have that many extras, I'd like to try it

Okay, I don't know what to call it, but I have a sudden urge to remix this. I really like it, but I don't know why! XD

Mirror Pool - something? It has a very liquid sound to it, judging from the little droplet effects...

Samples are a musician's best friend, that's for sure!

I personally don't like most of the default sounds that FL Studio gives me, so I just Googled various drum samples, and downloaded 10+ GB of them. Here are some of my personal favorites (most of which are royalty free from various artists, and compiled by musicradar) :

http://www.musicradar.com/news/tech/free-music-samples-download-loops-hits-and-multis-217833

From that page, there are 127 different packs you can download, all of which are AMAZING quality. My personal favorites are #72 (Trance) and #73 (Breakbeats). (If you want to jump to a specific page, just type /4 after the link to jump to page four, /72 to jump to page 72, etc.)

Here are some pretty good kicks as well: http://howtomakeelectronicmusic.com/tag/markus-hakala-kick-drums


I hope those help. If you need more, just give me the high sign.

Very nice! I love the craftsmanship that goes into these kinds of instruments.

You posting this reminded me of a photo I saw a while back; I think you'll enjoy it:


That's what the inside of a violin looks like with the correct lighting. It's almost like a really fancy/rustic house.

I think it's awesome.

Official Beatport artist here, and just from an initial walk through your YouTube page, you do far better than some other Brony artists I've seen. Ignore the other person's comment. Completely.

Alone in a Frightening Tranquility and My Coronation have very solid foundations - to give up now would be silly. It took me a couple of years to get the hang of "music" (with years of a musical background), and even now I'm not totally confident in myself. Just don't give up too fast.


It sounds like you're using FL Studio, and if so, I can give you some general tips if you'd like. It took me literally hundreds of tries to get a working system, and you seem to be on the right track - I think if you gave me one hour, I could help show you how to polish virtually any song to a high degree.

Long story short: I vote you not give up so early. You've already invested a considerable amount of time into it, and from one artist to another, I think it would be a shame for all of your talent go to waste.

You'll invent melodies that only you will ever hear, all inside of your own head. If you don't create them, nobody will.


Hit me up on Skype some time! I'd love to chat with you. "cloudfyrebrony"

Hah, this is pretty neat! I don't read blog posts that often, but THIS is a blog post that I think is worth reading.

Does it have any practical value to me? Erm, eh, I guess not...but that's not the point! I think this is a cool way to view the changes over time, almost like time lapse photography. I haven't seen anyone do that yet, and thus, I deem this blog post "cool". XD

I think I liked #4 the best, even though it's still a bit "girly". :3

Hey! That's me up there! XD

And it looks great! I'm definitely looking forward to playing around with it some more!

Aww, I feel for you...One of my good friends is a counselor, so I can attest to their value (assuming they know what they're doing).

On the other hand, sometimes the best course of action is just to vent to someone. The seemingly simple cognitive act of sorting and voicing thoughts can help tremendously. "Besides, if *everyone* in the world recommended counseling, one would be left with a simple problem: there would be no one left to talk to."

If you ever want to chat sometime, feel free to hit me up on Skype. (Search for cloudfyrebrony, it will show up as "CloudFyre".) I'm always happy to chat.

There are always some abstract rumors that fly around about various people leaving the show. A week or two ago, it was Ashleigh Ball, a while before that...I don't quite remember.

It's pretty safe to say that nobody is leaving.

So much Dawwww...

Nope. Futtershy is the most attractive, hands down.

As I heard it said before: "She cooks, she cleans, and she's good with kids." (I'd also add cute and kind to that list.)

Honestly, what more could you ask for?

Yikes, that sounds terrible. :/

And now that I know you're in the same area as me, I have to ask: is that the Panda Express by Costo? (Not going to drop a specific street/address for obvious reasons.)

I've never been there, but I've heard good things about the food.

Anyhow, I hope you get feeling better!