Negotiations for chat ban removal are now open (in fact, re-opened)

[illwieckz]

This is the formal opening for negotiations for chat ban.

This follows the chat ban of Sweet that was discussed there:

• forums.unvanquished.net/viewtopic.php?t=2518

This also discusses Freem chat ban.

To remind the situation, on May 1st of 2025 Sweet has been banned from the Unvanquished chat (and nothing else) for repeated violations of the channel rules. This is explained in the first post in the previous link.

This ban followed a previous temporary quieting for the same reasons, that previous quieting had been automatically lifted. Temporary quieting are mentionned as a way to let people cool down, so it's a good idea to verify that such cooling down happens.

So I stated at the time that negotiation would open on November 1st of 2025, hoping this would give enough time for disputes being things of the past.

It happened that starting with this date, Sweet did not reached me for any negotiation. I'm not making a moral judgement there, I'm just stating the facts. This explains why the ban had not been lifted on November 1st of 2025, while It could have been.

Following more disputes on GitHub, I proposed to Sweet on January 15th of 2026 to reopen negotiations on May 1st of 2026:

• github.com/Unvanquished/Unvanquished/issues/3467#issuecomment-3756256808

This date was chosen to make sure the 0.56 release was already published before negotiations open, so all the struggle, pain, and fatigue of making the release would be behind us and would not interfere with negotiations. It was also guaranteeing that those negotiations would not delay the release.

The 0.56 release is now behind us, there is no need to delay the negotiation opening more.

---

I take this opportunity to answer some questions and other unanswered topics that has been brought:

This is not an abuse of authority, it is me obeying to the orders I have received

Who ordered this?

I answered in private to those who asked me in private, but I have not found time to provide the answer there.

No individual people ordered me. The orders I talked about are the generic duties that comes with admin roles. We have chat rules with actions to do, I was made admin, I follow the rules. Nothing else.

In the same way, it explains why none of those actions are driven by hate or opinion. To make it explicit: I don't hate Sweet at all. Those actions are just me doing generic admin stuff.

Then, I have seen people having used in some places some wording like « banning developers », and it can give the false impression that Sweet was banned from development. Sweet had not been banned from development. The ban only applied to the chat. We kept GitHub contributions open to him, we kept forums open to him, and we can verify this with actual posts by him, for example here on forums and GitHub:

• forums.unvanquished.net/viewtopic.php?p=19723#p19723
• github.com/DaemonEngine/Daemon/pull/1675#issuecomment-2963760567

People may have believed that Sweet was banned from something else than the chat, if people believed that, let's reassure them: it's not true.

---

The last thing to mention is that Freem also got a chat ban at the time, because of chat rule violations as well. On the contrary to what has been said by some people, it was not me who banned Freem.

What I did, though, is that I proposed Freem a negotiation as well.

I wrote an email to Freem saying that he has right for negotiating his ban lift as well. I told him that it was justice that he got this negotiation because if Sweet can have this right, Freem should have this right as well. I also told Freem that since he was banned because of breaking rules in a drama he did not started, it would also be an added injustice not propose a negotiation if even those who started breaking rules before him can get it.

So, negotiation is opened for both Sweet and Freem.

We don't have to wait for May 1st, that date was chosen to make sure the 0.56 release was behind us, in case unexpected release delay would happen.

The negotiation can happen in public or in private according to their preferences.

I can designate someone from the team if they don't want to negotiate with me.

[illwieckz]

Negotiations with Sweet succeeded and Sweet's chat ban has been lifted. I have done what I assume was needed to remove the bans on the platforms, if that doesn't work just send me a message. There was no other active bans than chat so now everything is lifted up for Sweet.

[illwieckz]

Negotiations with freem succeeded and freem's chat ban has been lifted. I have done what I assume was needed to remove the bans on the platforms, if that doesn't work just send me a message. There was no other active bans than chat so now everything is lifted up for freem.

[illwieckz]

As a side note, I want to add a some clarifications as people asked some questions about it:

Our chat is subject to rules. When participating in the chat, you are deemed to have accepted these rules.

By participating in the chat, you accept the rules and therefore consent to the related sanctions. When you choose to act in a way that violates rules punishable by a ban, you are effectively choosing to be banned. Thus, you not only consent to your ban, you decide upon it.

An admin may choose to overlook certain infractions (exercising a degree of tolerance, etc.). However, if this happens in your case, the decision not to ban you (and to go against your choice) rests with the admin. By engaging in ban-worthy behaviour, you are choosing the ban itself.

That is why we may require you to express the will to be unbanned, particularly if you have already been banned once before. Repeating ban-worthy behaviour removes any doubt regarding your will to commit those bannable acts, prompting us to ask for your explicit wish to reverse the ban you effectively chose for yourself.

[illwieckz]

Those rules are very stable, they already existed this way in 2012 when they were copied from a Google Doc to the wiki.

In 2023, I added the rule prohibiting death threats, wishing death upon someone, or encouraging suicide, this was in fact done to protect freem at the time, especially.

I had also added at the time a clarification about insults, this was not a new rule in its core (see the existing “flaming” rule). I may fuse those two bullet points because they are the same rule but with more details.

I'll probably add such kind of clarifications to the chat page in a close future.

I might also add to the page after the rules some definitions for certain terms, since some people have requested definitions. Again, these won’t be new rules : it will simply be a matter of clarifying the terminology so that we can speak the same language and understand one another.

[illwieckz]

Now that I removed those bans on the chat, with the shared will of the related people, I now ask for something for myself in return.
I ask that people doing actions discouraging me to play and or discouraging me to join some server stop as well. Please don't suppose the people who acted that way are the ones who were banned, you may be wrong. Who is who is not important.

For example when joining servers I have seen some people put pressure on others to not interact with me, for example to not even chat with me.
Outside the game I also received some private messages telling me to not join some servers.
Actually, such message may have been sent to me so I can protect myself from something, but even in that case, it means there was ongoing harm.

So I ask for myself that such action stops as well so I can play again and not be afraid to join any server and enjoy a nice game.

I said here that everyone needs reconciliation: viewtopic.php?t=2615
I said at the time: “The solution is not technical but a matter of will. I invite everyone to adopt that will and to make such reconciliation their top priority and heal.”