Letter to Miiverse Event Review

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - I wouldn't unban me based on this, but maybe they will.

Yesterday I got banned from Miiverse. I have a Wii U. I could just make an alternate account. But I want to do things the honest way. Part of that includes waiting.

The other part is contacting Nintendo customer service.

I still haven't heard back from Nintendo from my e-mail after this article was published, but hopefully this is more critically considered than that one. Turns out I have a lot more to say than just wanting to be unbanned.

Dear Nintendo customer service,

My NNID is "PrinceOfKoopas". Yesterday, PrinceOfKoopas was banned for two weeks for repeated violations of the Miiverse Code of Conduct over the past year (I've counted 12 total). 

Looking over my alleged history of misconduct, many of the things I've gotten in trouble for are absolutely silly, and are definitely not worth banning for, even when added together. Things like bemoaning that Arzest was announced to be the developer of Yoshi's New Island as giving away "strategic information", noticing that the Triforce is embedded within the Star of David, and asking a user (disapprovingly if the answer would be yes) if, when she said she liked to fight people, if that included stealing lunch money from young children.

Other offenses include providing screenshots of Mario clearly doing heinous acts to in-game characters and calling him a murderer for it, which is not against the Code of Conduct to do. Believing that Mario is evil is part of my belief system, especially as a Koopa. (Hence, PrinceOfKoopas)

The last violation I had was wishing that the attention span of Miiverse users was longer to keep talking about Super Smash Bros. content on the Super Smash Bros. community instead of talking about things like Shrek.

These haven't seriously offended anyone or ruined anyone's time on Miiverse (and even if they have, their hypersensitivities shouldn't be held against me), and I think I am a net positive contributor to the greater Miiverse community. My posts are perceptive and intelligent.

I ask that my ban be overturned, and I also inquire — and this is my journalist side speaking — how Miiverse's moderation is handled. Much of it seems to be robotic, or ran via computer algorithms. How much human oversight is truly in the Miiverse adminship? Is it ran by volunteering Nintendo employees like the old Nintendo NSider Forums, or outsourced to another company? (Perhaps one that doesn't deal in videogames or levity at all!)

There are many horror stories posted on a frequent, hourly basis on Miiverse about how people are "report-bombed" by malicious folk and the algorithms Miiverse uses bans them even though they have posted nothing wrong. Maliciously reporting (false reporting) is against the Code of Conduct, but that is the part that does not seem to be enforced. It's unfortunate that Miiverse now has a reputation for totalitarian authority that destroys any fun, because I think Miiverse should reflect Nintendo's greater mission statement of putting smiles on the faces of people.


Thank you for spending the time to read through this feedback, and please read it carefully and take it into consideration.


Mii: Ludwig
NNID: PrinceOfKoopas

Now, to make this not just self-serving, recall how in the Super Smash Bros. 4 Direct Masahiro Sakurai said a Miiverse-like system would be in place where you could report other players. This has worried a lot of people, because Miiverse has a very big reputation of having its reporting features misused and unpunished for that. I do not think Sakurai knows how the inner-workings of Miiverse...works. I think he asked Nintendo if they have any information systems in place that could handle reporting players for misconduct, and they said they have a robust algorithm they have for Miiverse that they could modify over to work for Super Smash Bros. 4. So I do not believe that Sakurai understands the implication of his statement in that part of the Direct.

Therefore, the moderation system needs to be fixed before Super Smash Bros. 4 is released this summer (on 3DS) before bad things happen. Imagine if some punk reports your NNID on there. They can look you up on Miiverse and not only get you in trouble on Smash 4, but also in Miiverse too. That'd be pretty bad.

Ludwig's NNID is PrinceOfKoopas, as you should know by now. The only way he can interact with you on Miiverse is by Following you (and then Unfollowing you so he can do it again). So it's a lot better to talk to him via KoopaTV. Go ahead. He reads every comment.


Ludwig gets some answers to his questions here.