What would you think of a site admin who went into a user's account and activated filters/ignores without the user's knowledge or permission?
As with anything, that'd depend on the circumstances surrounding it. In any of the scenarios that jump readily to mind, I'd say the admin was appropriately using the necessary tools to do his job. The admins have a number of tools and implementing ignore in someone's account is but one, but a very important one where appropriate. If it'd been available to me, it would've easily cleared about 10% of my workload.
I know on iHub and I think on SI, I purposely designed it so the site admin could do specifically that. I added programming and storage specifically for this purpose because as a former admin myself, I had encountered many situations in which this would've been entirely appropriate and the single best solution to specific problems. Usually where two users who were otherwise well-behaved simply couldn't co-exist in harmony.
If memory serves, my intention with the iHub implementation was that if the ignore were implemented by the site admin, it couldn't be undone by the user. I don't think I finished that aspect, though.
I saw your related posts on iHub and see that the phrase "my account" is a key issue here.
Keep in mind that you use the sites solely at the pleasure of the Admins and even the purchase of a subscription doesn't buy ownership of anything, even accounts. The Admins regularly terminate, suspend, or otherwise limit even paying accounts when they must to enforce our Terms of Use and to keep things civil. Though in the case of accounts, we do consider it to be "yours" in most contexts, but the Admins can do anything and everything to accounts that they feel, in their sole discretion, they should or must. Including but not limited to suspension, termination, thread bans, ignores, or even changed passwords to deny even basic access.
In other words, the Admins do not need your permission or knowledge to do anything they feel is in the best interest of the site. And that very easily includes adding filters.
In a similar vein, though not directly related to what you're talking about, someone recently demanded that they were entitled to a portion of our advertising revenues because they purchased a subscription and had written 5 posts. Care to guess the length of the pier I suggested he use to embark on a long stroll? <g> |
