Hi all,
Here's the full background of my Discord Ban, Appeals, and the timeline of events.
My name is Adam Gorman (namrog84) and I was permanently banned (or 2 years?)(Until Oct 2026) from Discord about 3 months ago for reasons I believe are related to an abandoned Discord server named Darker-Market I created for the game Dark and Darker.
The only official reason I've been given is "Fraud" and "Darker-Market" and lots of automated pre-canned responses.
I had abandoned participation in the server quite a while ago and I suspect that someone conducted fraud on the server at some point and the server was then banned and as the server owner, I am held responsible. Which I think is a fair that the server owner has responsibility in moderation and maintenance of the community. However I do not find a 0 warnings, permanent or 2+ year ban (until Oct 2026) as a just punishment for being an inactive moderator/server owner. Possibly just deleting the server, if it's believed its fostering bad behavior, and prevent a person from creating servers for a while with some warnings or something seems more fitting punishment in my opinion.
Discord is so much more than a place to hang out with friends or find pick up groups for various games. Many games post announcements, changelogs exclusively on their discord.
Since losing my discord account, I've now lost contact with a variety of people whom I have no other way to contact or arrange alternative communication with. I've been essentially been forcibly had numerous friendships ended. Closer friends are willing to experiment with alternative platforms for me, but this is very limited group of a much broader said of casual friends. This was especially heartbreaking for me as Discord was a primary communication platform for me.
Professionally, it's been a devasting impact as well since as I quit my job at Microsoft and decided to be a fulltime independent game developer, discord is one place where I was trying to grow a community, a brand, and a game studio business. I know I've read multiple posts even here on Hacker News and else where that building on top of other businesses without proper customer support is a recipe for disaster. And I could likely build adequately elsewhere without an official Discord presence here, but it's still feeling like I would have liked it to have been part of my longer term plans.
Lastly, and an extension of the professional. Many others chose Discord as their only form of communication. Fellow game developers, programmers exclusively share knowledge, questions, education, coworking/pair programming and other things on Discord. And what's worse is many things that I've purchased offer support and discussion exclusively through Discord. Sometimes even gatekeeping documentation, samples, or additional access of content behind Discord after being verified as an owner of a product. To lose access to that is a real blow as a developer, and it seems like I can't get the full value of things I've purchased now.
I just feel incredibly lost and sad because it feels like someone hit reply-all to an email I've sent and now I am forever banned from using any email anywhere.
Sometime after the playtest #2 of Dark and Darker, I decided to build a website and discord community to help players connect with each other because the in-game auction house was painful to use for many.
Initial declaration of me creating the website and discord Dec 15, 2022 Introducing darker-market. A place to connect buyer and sellers in game to make trading more enjoyable. : DarkAndDarker
I worked on it for several months, and ultimately abandoned the website in early 2023 because of various challenges I saw that I didn't think would be easily solved.
The discord community at this time had grown to around 100+ people and people were casually using it for a little bit of trading or finding others to play with. I appointed someone else as a moderator.
After appointing them. I had basically abandoned further desire and decided to spend all my time working on alternative projects.
Time stamped Proof that I had abandoned it:
- Oct, 2023 stating I had abandoned it. namrog84 comments on Some Improvements to the Market place System
- Oct, 2024 stating I had abandoned it 1+ year ago namrog84 comments on Introducing darker-market. A place to connect buyer and sellers in game to make trading more enjoyable.
They continued to build the discord community, adding additional moderators for many months. I don't remember the exact numbers, but I believe the discord had grown to many hundreds of people.
Sometime in late 2023 or early 2024, they asked to transfer ownership of the server to them. In hindsight I should have but I felt like I was protecting myself by not doing so. I cannot verify timeline as this was discussed and too place on Discord which I don't have access to.
Soon after that, Dark and Darker introduced better in-game solutions for trading items, and most of the moderators and community stopped using the discord server to the best of my knowledge.
There was no one at the helm anymore. Sometime since Early 2024.
At this point, I should have removed new invites or deleted the server, but I had thought a few people still occasionally used it and thought no harm in leaving it unattended. Big mistake in hindsight.
I received the Ban notice on Oct 21, 2024 and started the appeals immediately. Images of ban from app:
Banned until at least Oct 2026 (or Permanently suspended?)
Here is one of my submitted Initial Appeal
Dear Discord Trust & Safety Team,
I would like to respectfully request a re-evaluation of my account suspension by a human representative. I have held this account, "namrog84", since 2016 without any prior issues or warnings, and to my knowledge, this is the first offense.
I understand the suspension appears to be related to a server I created, "darker-market", a community for the game Dark and Darker. It was always intended to be a legitimate space for players involved in the game. I had largely abandoned this server since I stopped playing the game a long time ago, and was unaware that it was violating any guidelines.
I fully acknowledge that, as the server creator, I am responsible for its moderation and any content within it. I sincerely apologize for this oversight and deeply regret any problems it may have caused. In hindsight, I should have locked or deleted the server to prevent any misuse if I was no longer going to be active in moderating it.
Discord is an essential platform for me, both personally and professionally, especially in my work within the game development community. Losing access to my account significantly impacts my life, my ability to communicate and collaborate with both colleagues and friends.
I kindly request deletion of the server that is in violation, if it hasn't already been deleted.
Additionally, I ask for consideration of alternative actions on my account rather than an immediate 2-year suspension, such as alternative restrictions on account and/or reduced suspension period.I am committed to adhering to Discord's Terms of Service and Community Guidelines and will take all necessary steps to ensure compliance with my account and any servers I am the owner of. If there are any actions I can take that would help, I would gladly do them.
Thank you for considering my appeal.
Sincerely,
Adam Gorman "namrog84"
Following this, I generally received what appeared to be a variety of automated messages.
On Dec 26, 2024, they just permanently closed the appeal without the ability to reply/re-open anymore.
Following this, I've since opened various additional appeals with various attempts, generally being closed with frequently no response, not even from an automated response.
During the appeals process, it was unclear to me if I personally was permanently banned or if just that 'account' was banned as I read conflicting things online. I did log into a secondary account slideysquare on 11/28/2024 and then received a ban evasion ban on 12/3/2024.
I do not want to go down this path of trying to evade bans in perpetuity, because I want to build legitimate relationships, a brand, a company, and leverage much more on Discord. Although plenty of people might be more okay with this (evading bans), this isn't something I consider viable for me.
Concurrently to all of the above, I researched to see if maybe I knew anyone at Discord or at least had some mutual connection with someone there.
I understand that the vast majority of bans are justified and most people are lying that they "didn't do a thing" or "it was just a joke", but occasionally people fall through the cracks or perhaps a punishment is a bit harsh. I had 10+ mutual connections with Discord Employees, but either through a mutual connection I didn't feel comfortable enough to ask to reach out on my behalf, or the discord employee appeared perhaps to not be the appropriate person to contact (e.g. they work in AI department) and felt inappropriate to ask.
I did find 1 person who seemed to be the appropriate person and cold messaged them on Linkedin.
Hello, I saw a quote from the VP recently that resonated with me and thought maybe you could help
"Our goal is to help people act better... People don't always know that they're doing bad things, and giving them a warning can help them to improve."
I've been a dedicated Discord user since Jan 2016 and understand the importance of proper moderation. However, I received a 2+ year permanent ban, without any warnings, apparently for failing to moderate an abandoned server I had initially set up for the game, Dark and Darker. I'm still not entirely sure if that's the reason for the ban but I recognize my responsibility in allowing things to go unchecked. I’ve tried the standard appeal channels, yet I’ve been unable to get clarity or resolution.
Discord is a crucial tool for me as a game developer, both professionally and personally. If there's any possibility to have my situation reevaluated under the constructive approach mentioned by the Vice President of Product. I'd be extremely grateful for an opportunity to make things better or to clear up any misunderstanding.Thank you for your time and consideration, and happy new year.
Sincerely,
Adam Gorman (namrog84)
This was the one and only cold message I emailed to anyone on Linkedin, as I felt incredibly uncomfortable even doing that 1, but I was feeling hopeless and frustrated in the moment I sent it.
Being here on hacker news and all, we hack and build things. So I started looking to see, maybe it's time I just build a discord alternative or something. I know Matrix and Revolt are 2 open source projects, and there are variety of other established players from TeamSpeak, Guilded, and mores. And while using them can solve 'some' issues eventually, it doesn't really help with the all the software documentation, samples, peers that currently exist on Discord. At the end of the day, I'd rather try and build games instead of trying and build a chat app or dislodge millions of people to an alternative platform.
I've exhausted basically all options that I have at this point and my final consideration is to ask for advice from Hacker News.
Perhaps I gain some new insights on this situation, like from the Parable of a Chinese farmer and the horse, the son, and weather certain unfolding events if they are good news or bad news, and that it's too soon to tell.
Perhaps someone at discord can see this post and reach out and help me resolve this in some way, I'd love an opportunity to make this right.
Perhaps, others can gain some valuable lessons or insights from my situation and make different choices.
Thank you for reading my journey!
Adam namrog84 Gorman LinkedIn