OWG Crew Rules

[Binnatics]

Hello friends,

I've tried to avoid the subject of crew rules, because I don't like rules in general and I know that all of us overhere at OWG agree upon the same general behaviour towards one another which makes a list of crew rules unnecessary. However, recent events have proven me wrong.
The GTA Online game world is filled with sociopathic maniacs, cheaters, warmongers and other scum. Amongst them are nice people with whom it is good hanging out with and play together.
Having a crew and meeting new people makes it evident that you introduce new people to the crew. In an environment so full of s#!t it is good though to have some simple rules of general behaviour to stick out of the crowd.

I don't want to make a list so long that it is worth a study, but I could come up with 3 general rules of behaviour that I think we can all agree on;

1. Never cheat or use hacks in GTA Online.
Feel free to cheat as much as you want in single player. Everybody has his own way of enjoying a game. Modding and using cheats is one of them, and certainly not wrong. Using cheats and hacks in multiplayer though, influences the gaming experience of other players, making the game unfair. If you want to fly a hydra, earn your in-game money to buy it. Don't fool around with cheaters to get it the easy way. Cheating online will result in removal from our crew.

2. Don't kill crewmates.
GTA Online is a competitive game full of deathmatches, kill challenges in public servers, GTA races and many many more game modes where it's the purpose of killing eachother. Feel free to do so. But never kill your crewmates in free mode, not even when they have a bounty on their heads. We are a crew, and we stick together. We help eachother, and don't kill eachother.
Recently it happened a few times that, right after completing a cooperative game like a heist setup or finale, one of our heist crew gets killed by his team mate because he had a bounty on his head or worse, just for no reason; unacceptable!
Of course you can kill eachother by accident. No problem. It's a game after all and we are having fun! A simple apology shows your good intentions.

3. Treat eachother with respect.
We all join GTA Online to have fun together. Like in any society it's important to treat eachother in a way we want to be treated ourselves. As soon as your fun is spoiling the fun of others, it's time to stop and do something else.
In a game so full of swearing, it would be odd to not allow swearwords. In fact we swear a lot ourselves. However, we don't allow abuse. There's enough ways of communication to solve anything in a proper way. No need to ballyrag. If you disagree, you probably fit better in a different crew.


If we all stick to these general rules of good behaviour, we will all have a lot of fun together. :)

[PZ]

Good rules, Binn +1 for promoting proper mature game play.

[Binnatics]

Thank you PZ :)

[OWGKID]

1+ :-X It sucks that some crewmembers ruins some other members' fun :'( >:((

[Art Blade]

I can see where this came from. Good job, Binnatics +1 :-X

All three rules are good. Everyone who knows me will know how much I appreciate this one:

2. Don't kill crewmates.

^-^

[fragger]

Nice Binn, perfect code of conduct +1 :-X

[PZ]

2. Don't kill crewmates.

Truly a sad state of affairs when we need to make rules like this.  Lots of mean people, and fewer individuals with what was formerly called simple common courtesy.  Now we need to rephrase to "uncommon courtesy"

[Art Blade]

heh, yes.. reminds me of my signature: common sense isn't that common anymore.

[PZ]

Indeed - seems like many positive characteristics that were formerly considered common are now very uncommon, the most disturbing of which is intelligence.

[Art Blade]

stupidity combined with a remarkable lack of good manners, a devastating couple.

[PZ]

Now, that, is quite common

[Binnatics]

Well, that makes us pretty uncommon; something I feel pretty well about ^-^

[Art Blade]

aye :-D

[PZ]

Well, that makes us pretty uncommon; something I feel pretty well about ^-^

Indeed - notice that the membership in the unsavory forums is gigantic, and our membership is limited to the "uncommon".  I guess rude and stupid is now the "common"

[Art Blade]

yes, and increasingly so.

[fragger]

Yep, rude is the new cool, apparently.

This is why I can't be bothered posting in any other forums or in places like the comments section on YouTube. You only have to express a passing opinion or an observation about something and every belligerent grub who disagrees with you starts sniping from cover.

There have been stories in the news about the harmful effects of cyber-bullying on sites like Facebook and Twitter. I don't get how people can claim to be victims of that. Seems to me that the best way to avoid that is to stay away from sites that allow it. Cyber-bullies can't harass you if they have no conduit to you. But so many of these young folks seem so addicted to their social media sites that they'd rather endure personal abuse than give them up.

Keep your head down and it's less likely to get whacked.

[Art Blade]

The difference between us (OWG crew and site) and most other virtual places is that we have a great hard core of mature members and a staff who actually care about their members. Usually discretely in private rather than noisily in public when it comes to solving problems. Heh, on the forums the only exception I can think of that I actually love to do as publicly as possible is to throw out spammers >:D

[fragger]

:-D :-X

[Binnatics]

There have been stories in the news about the harmful effects of cyber-bullying on sites like Facebook and Twitter. I don't get how people can claim to be victims of that. Seems to me that the best way to avoid that is to stay away from sites that allow it. Cyber-bullies can't harass you if they have no conduit to you. But so many of these young folks seem so addicted to their social media sites that they'd rather endure personal abuse than give them up.

Keep your head down and it's less likely to get whacked.

The problem is, Fragger, that if you happen to be 12 years old, or so, and are going to school, all your friends and potential friends have their smart phones, whatsapp accounts and all the rest of that crap. Nowadays, as a youngster you have to participate in that s#!t if you want to have a social life. For children of that age it isn't so easy to just say; I don't participate.
I teach my kid to participate in a way that she actually enjoys it and benefits from it, and doesn't suffer the side effects of that social media s#!t. Quite a challenge though; a matter of trial and error, and a lot of talking ;)
And still, like always, most important is to choose your friends with care. It's the rotten apples that do the cyber-bullying. Not Twitter or whatsapp.

[fragger]

You're a good dad :)

Good points Binn. I know it's easy for me to have the view that I have, being the age I am and remembering a time when the world had no home computers, let alone anything like an internet. I hear about kids who have been victimized online and the first thing I think is, "why do you look at it then?" Not having had kids myself, I tend to forget that a whole generation has grown up online and that the natural need for youngsters to fit in and be deemed socially acceptable naturally extends to that realm, and that they'd face an even greater level of ostracization if they didn't take part. You can never minimize the power of peer group pressure, or the normal desire for kids to have what all the other kids have.

I could live just fine without the internet if I had to (I didn't even get online until about seven years ago), but I admit I would miss it if it disappeared for some reason. Apart from interacting with OWG (which represents the entire extent of my social networking activity) I would miss the easy access to info and convenience that the net offers. Had I and all my friends grown up with it we too would probably consider it an indispensable part of life. We'd probably take it just as much for granted too.

When I was a kid someone gave me a calculator for my birthday. It was brand-new technology, and the thing was about an inch thick, weighed about half a pound and only performed the four basic arithmetic functions plus a square root. It didn't even have a memory function. But at the time I thought it was an astounding piece of futuristic technology and I played with it for hours. At that time, if somebody had told me that within forty years home computers would be commonplace I would have thought they were delusional. And the internet? Nobody foresaw anything like that back then, not even sci-fi writers or anyone in the the scientific community, and even if they had, it would have been thought of as 22nd century stuff :-()

[Binnatics]

Yeah indeed. And thank you.  :)

Indeed development took a flight skyhigh in computer business. I remember something similar, slightly different though. My uncle, whol lived and worked in the US for a couple of years, came back to Holland and brought my dad a calculator as a present. Not such a huge one, but a calculator the size of a credit card with solar cells on it for power. I was shocked back then. I think it still works, btw, being probably a 30 year old calculator. Funny :)