Seems like a nice forum so I figured I finally get around to joining instead of lurking around it as a guest. I've been a long time forum goer on the now defunct IF/ZB network where I ran/owned/staffed various popular forums back then which is where I draw my experience from in regards to running/maintaining forums. I think I will leave it at that and let you all welcome me now. :P

Welcome to the community! [mention=83]Bluezone777[/mention]

It’s great to see you here.😏

Welcome Bluezone777! A pleasure to have you and looking forward to some good insights coming from you. :)

Welcome to the community!! :)

Hello there, a person I see on nearly every forum I'm on. :D

 

Welcome to the forum, glad to have yet another long-term forum enthusiast on board!

Hello, I know you :P

 

Welcome! :)

Welcome to the party! 🎉

Hey there, welcome to the forum! :)

Thanks everyone for the warm welcomes. :)

Familiar name, welcome to Administrata. Tell us what you're working on these days.

Hello and welcome to the community BZ, been a long time. I was a member of ZBC under another username among many other forums.

Welcome. Nice to meet you.

Welcome aboard. Glad to have you here. It's nice to have skills in maintining forums. But I am only good with Forumotion forums. :D

I haven't been the owner of anything in a long time nor have I worked on a forum in a long time. I think the last time I was staff somewhere was Forum Promotion till I got myself fired from there which was a while ago now. I will tell that story if anyone is interested.

 

ZBC eh? that's a name I haven't heard of in ages. It stands for Zetaboards Community for those who don't know which ironically was an Invisionfree forum of the general chat variety. lol

I haven't been the owner of anything in a long time nor have I worked on a forum in a long time. I think the last time I was staff somewhere was Forum Promotion till I got myself fired from there which was a while ago now. I will tell that story if anyone is interested.

 

ZBC eh? that's a name I haven't heard of in ages. It stands for Zetaboards Community for those who don't know which ironically was an Invisionfree forum of the general chat variety. lol

We did some crazy things back then that often made no sense at all. 😋

I will tell that story if anyone is interested.

Inquiring minds want to know.

This took place around seven years ago. Well long story short, a long ago banned member(we are talking years ago) wanted to come back to make amends for what he did way back then. He approached me with this on FP and I didn't say anything because I believe pms are meant to be private and I also genuinely believed he was telling the truth. Soon after, an admin approached me with this and fired me for it. I got the impression I wasn't wanted anymore and were looking for a reason to justify getting rid of me and I honestly didn't want to be working there anymore either but I just can't bring myself to quit staff position well at least not easily so this gave me a way out that I could take. I only took the job in the first place because two nice people in my estimation who were running the review team at the time were begging me to take it as they were in a rough spot and couldn't find anyone to take the job.

 

Things might be better now over there as no one on staff back then is staff anymore today with the exception of the owner.

Soon after, an admin approached me with this and fired me for it.

I assume they could read private messages sent between users?

That was my guess. I don't consider PMs on self hosted forums private anymore because of it. It doesn't matter what forum or who is admin of it. No one can promise that every single person who will ever be admin won't use/abuse the ability because you don't know who every admin of your forum is going to be nor what kind of person they are and that includes people who have not yet promoted but might one day get the job in the future.

I don't consider PMs on self hosted forums private anymore because of it.

PMs can be read on the non-self-hosted software, Jcink. However, there is a privacy warning that PMs could be logged or monitored even when disabled.

You should always assume the admin can access the PMs because they're responsible legally for what happens on the platform they run, self-hosted or otherwise.

That was my guess. I don't consider PMs on self hosted forums private anymore because of it. It doesn't matter what forum or who is admin of it. No one can promise that every single person who will ever be admin won't use/abuse the ability because you don't know who every admin of your forum is going to be nor what kind of person they are and that includes people who have not yet promoted but might one day get the job in the future.

Exactly. While we make it a point not to look through private messages—it’s none of our business, and we're adult enough not to abuse it—there are certain cases when we may need to, particularly if a member reports a violation.

 

Our Terms of Service make it clear: “Private Message (PM) Advertising: Unsolicited advertising through private messages is not allowed. However, if you have an ongoing conversation, an agreement, or explicit permission, it is acceptable. We reserve the right to review private messages if a member reports a breach of these terms.”

 

Source: Terms of Service

 

We’ve been transparent about this from the start to ensure everyone knows what to expect. But ultimately, if you truly need privacy, email or another private channel is always a safer option, as it’s completely outside our platform’s reach.