Crippling Developers & Roblox Communities - An Argument for the Reversal of the Blanket Discord Ban

I’ve argued so many times why discord was banned and lots of people reply with silly and utterly pointless arguments just because, I fear, they’re trying to “one up” themselves or make themselves look good in the light of the Roblox Staff team. However, the point remains that the ban was pointless and the sole reason behind the ban, in my opinion was due to the cause of the “beef” between the two companies. Coincidental that discord banned Roblox use of webhooks at the same sort of time that Roblox banned the use of discord.

Either way, I thoroughly agree with what has been said here and I think that if the ban was lifted against the use of discord and discord links on the Roblox site, the communities on Roblox would be able to grow in a much better manner. The matter of safety is a pointless argument that has many flaws of which I will happily debate with anyone that doesn’t agree.

Hopefully change is around the corner!

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Discord has also been incredibly important for two roleplaying groups I develop for. Outside of having a community, it has also been crucial for organization among staff members. In a way, both games rely on discord and wouldn’t be anywhere near as successful without it. With the discord ban, our growth is severely limited.

So I have full support for this.

(Could also make it so only members of the devforum are allowed to post discord links, or at least allow discord links in the bulletin board)

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Without discord I wouldn’t be here on the devforum. I would have never gotten that life-changing first commision. I wouldn’t be the robloxian I have become. I think we can be a bit more sympathetic to this cause. Discord is widespread to such a degree that preventing cooperation does more harm than good. Court-wise you would be safe. Safety-wise, you don’t have much to say to that. Criticism-wise the amount of wining parents will be squashed under the mountain of approval by developers and players who power your platform. Its time to change, that’s all I can conclude with.

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Honestly I don’t agree with that first paragraph. It implies a level pettiness that is just… really really bad. The staff of both companies would need to be unprofessional and pathetic to stoop so low.

Roblox has been getting negative PR due recently, as you should be able to see by doing a quick google search. Being protective and encouraging safety also makes sense in the current political climate.

The argument of safety is a real, important one, however Roblox’s execution of it is in my opinion what is flawed.

Discord needs to implement rate limits due to technical reasons. Discord banned Roblox since it seems 90% of ignorant developers on Roblox were abusing their system (Ok that’s an exaggeration, but you get the idea), no matter how many times they stated that they were not to be spammed.

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Love it!

Discord has been a great platform for communicating with Jailbreak players. People love talking to each other about updates. I see people making new friends, and forming communities through the server, and I love being able to jump in and talk to everyone. It’s a rapid medium of conversation that allows interaction not possible through platforms like Twitter, Roblox groups, etc.

Thanks for taking the time to write this @berezaa.

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I don’t like being the person to rain on everyone’s parade, but it’s important to remember why Roblox is imposing this Discord “ban” in the first place. It’s not Roblox’s intention to make it difficult for us to communicate with other developers and our playerbases.

This topic thoroughly explains why Discord is not allowed.

Again, I would totally love to be able to integrate Discord on Roblox, but it’s not fair to say that Roblox is crippling us for petty reasons. We need to understand that the safety concerns aren’t so easily bypassed nor ignorable as it seems.

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Yeah, but see all they need to do is implement some basic segregation (e.g. <13s can’t view discord links, or get told that it may not be appropriate).

According to the text in the preview of that link, to me it seems like the platforms Roblox already links to are worse than Discord, as like they said, they can view without logging in.

Linking children to websites like that is not a good idea - there should at least be a barrier of creating an account. So for that reason imo Discord is better than Twitter and YouTube etc.

It seems hypocritical (does this exist as a word?) at this point.

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You’ve mentioned this before, but there is no “beef” between the two companies. Discord webhooks were shut down because developers were abusing them and not obeying rate limits, despite numerous warnings from Discord – they have nothing against Roblox the company. The Roblox ban on Discord came long after the webhooks were nuked, and are in no way related to or in retaliation against the webhook ban.

If you’re going to complain, be careful with which rumors you believe. Inventing problems based on what you hear from users who aren’t affiliated with either company is just going to pollute the thread with noise and ruin it for everyone.

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@sircfenner @EmeraldSlash Please read the text I quoted. It’s Roblox’s words, not mine, I’m only trying to clarify their reasoning.

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I’ve read it, it seems to me like you’re assuming we didn’t without reading our responses lol

Like I said, segregation imo is completely fine, and would get rid of the issue in one of the best ways possible.

I think I’m right. I don’t know for sure, but I don’t think I have really seen my arguments shut down properly by anyone else, working for Roblox or otherwise.

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Please help me understand. You can see nasty things on twitter, facebook and youtube without needing an account. You can also see nasty stuff in Discord, but you need an account to see it. Why is that the issue?

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Because I gave you evidence and you responded with the same 13+ argument.

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Your reply quotes arguements that are directly refuted in this post. I specifically address the issue of “hidden information.”

Besides that, the main argument of this thread is that the existing reasons given by Roblox are overshadowed by lasting damage caused to Roblox communities and new developers. You reply by simply quoting those same reasons. Your post is worded in a way that suggests that you are opposing this feature just for the sake of opposing it, and it doesn’t add to this conversation at all. For this reason, I have flagged your reply.

I encourage you to spend more time on your replies and ensure you are actually contributing to discussion with your own viewpoints or arguements.

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Could you please explain to me how it disproves my argument? I don’t really follow how it does rip

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Let’s take this issue and turn it into a feature.
You can suggest improvements to the Discord team though their dedicated server and website. Just head there, suggest the idea and maybe it’ll be added.

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As already pointed out:

  • Discord is a powerful tool for developers to hang around with each other and with their fans. The was it is designed allows the developer to be in close contact with them, and vice-versa. It does a quite good job in aggregating the community together!

  • Roblox, as of now, is waaaaaaaaaaaay too far from the “social media” concept it alse aims for. The filter and strict rules, even when we’re talking about a 13+ to 13+ conversation, makes it impossible to have a normal conversation. Developers and players wouldn’t be able to communicate, whether it were serious development matters or just memes!

  • And, as stated above: Discord is the perfect place to get feedback for your projects. The place where you can get a response in a meaningful time.

Yes, I do understand that Roblox doesn’t want to be crushed by overzealous parents’ complaints (some are likely pointless though) or, even worse, by social media. But, for accounts being 13+, the system must to be more lenient! In a long shot, it’s your profit that is at stake!

Well, what can the platform do?

Make Discord links available for 13+ only. If an user is really 13+, there shouldn’t be a legal hassle. If he or she lies about it, the responsability shouldn’t go to the platform’s end. If the law says otherwise, that’s pretty strange.

It’s simple: filter scans the text; a discord link is identified.
create a <13 version where that link is filtered out and a 13+ version where that doesn’t happen.

Depending on the account age, either version is shown. If it’s that simple, and if it is a doable solution, then it is subject to generally please both sides: the parents and the older playerbase.

But this opens another hassle: what if links are posted inside the game?! It does count as developer text and therefore is not filtered. We could eventually add a feature (api-wise) that tells if player x is <13 or 13+ (without specifying birthdate) and hide the link based on the result. But not every developer will respect that, so, on that matter, yes, Discord links should be banned in-game but not necessarily in the site, as long as we can split the younger playerbase

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My exact argument from the thread of them banning Discord links:

Discord is private and 13+, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Twitch, etc. are also 13+… but public. Anyone can go to a public social media page and scroll through posts without having to log in, so requiring users to register is even safer because then, unless they are breaking ToS, children under 13 cannot view chats that may be inappropriate for them. Meanwhile anyone can link to a post on social media that is NSFW and it won’t get taken down until it’s reported and this is a greater threat to children because there is no requirement to be logged in.

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Plus it exposes the children to the existence of sites like this in the future so at any time they can decide to view inappropriate content… with no knowledge at all of this on their parents’ end.

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While the “pettiness” may not even be there, or at least it may be so subtle it is unnoticeable, it certainly feels like a lot of people are arguing for the sake of it.

I agree that safety is a huge thing, however in the many debates that I have had with people over this specific issue, none of the points made by the opposing parties have given any enlightenment to support the ban against the use of Discord within Roblox.

I am also not saying that the developers that used discord as a development tool were perfect and so Discord had every right to deal with them in a manner that suited their preference however this is straying away from the point I had made and could be seen as a different issue completely; though it does coincide with the coincidental timing of the ban against using Discord and the ban against using webhooks from Roblox to Discord.

I admit that I could have worded my point in the said post a little less “harshly” however, my point stands and I believe it is a valid perspective.

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Another idea is to possibly allow it somehow not display for users under 13, such as a new API or system that just outright won’t allow those users to see the link, and require developers to use this system in order to display it at all.

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