Suspension without communication
My wayfarer account was suspended recently and I have received no communication about it from Niantic. Is there any way to get information about the reason for the suspension? Or about the duration? The wayfarer site states "Please visit the help center more information about your account", but the helpcenter only contains generic information. I did not receive email communication (apart from all my outstanding nominations being rejected at once).
I always try to keep up with the AMA's and acceptance criteria and I think I am doing a good job being a good wayfarer contributor. Evidence for this are a high acceptance percentage and the highest possible wayfarer rating (although this rating has fluctuated wildly in the past - not sure why). But evidently Niantic thinks I did something wrong here and I think it would be helpful to know what it is.
The only hint I have as for what the reason for suspension is, is one waypoint that has vanished from all Niantic games. It was accepted a few weeks ago. As far as I know it was perfectly eligible, but now I think about it, the title may be seen as inappropriate when google translated into English.
But this is guessing. I would find it helpful to know if this suspension is temporary and if so what the real reason is, so I can take this into account in the future. I would like to keep contributing in the future, as I enjoy doing it and it is appreciated by other players.
Comments
Before Giffard and other staffs will respond with a generic, unhelpful response, let me ask you something.
What did you nominate that you suspect it as the reason your account got suspended? And what's its description and supporting information? And if it was rejected several times before, how many times of resubmission did it take until it got accepted?
To add to @patsufredo-PGO ’s comments, did you ever make location edits and then add something in the description to say “please choose upper left location for POI to appear”? Others have been suspended for that.
Thank you for your reply. I do not expect Niantic to revert their decision and am not looking to discuss openly how I think their decision is wrong. If it is this disappeared waypoint, I can kind of see how they interpreted it and although I do not agree with it, I can live with it going forward. I just would need to be more careful and think about what happens in translation.
I am only looking for information so I know what to expect. Will I be able to submit waypoints again in the future and if so when? And am I correct in making the assumption it is about this disappeared waypoint or am I missing something? I am posting my question here to hopefully get a response from Niantic. That is all. I read about 30 days and 60 days suspensions here, but I received no communication.
To satisfy your curiosity; it was a decorated electricity box. Pretty standard waypoint I think. It was approved on the first try, fairly quickly. The description and supporting info were pretty standard as well, providing some background info on the image and describing that there is plenty of space to stand and come together on the sidewalk there. All true and no hints at inappropriate stuff. I just did not think about the direct translation into English. Stupid mistake I guess.
@PkmnTrainerJ-ING , no I read on this forum that that is not allowed. I actually got a location edit approved during the mass rejection.
You can also be suspended from Wayfarer if one of your game accounts has been suspended or deleted.
That is fortunately not the case.
If I'd recall correctly, you can still able to nominate even if your Wayfarer account suspended, provided that your GO account doesn't affected with the ban.
However this might change in the near future after submitter test release..., who knows?
Wasn’t one like this was it?
I saw that one on Reddit, I think. I have 1 starred many similar nominations. I do not know how often they get through, but especially when they are Pokemon related images they annoy me. Anyway, we are lucky enough to have a lot of decorated boxes in our city. I think it is done to discourage those ugly graffity tags.
Without seeing what you have done its all speculation. I doubt Niantic would ban somone over 1 thing. It's usually would be something that was done incorrectly over and over again. Make sure you check your spam folder to see if it got placed there.
Again, I am not here to discuss the details of the case. I am here because I am looking for a way to contact Niantic and find out what it is that they think I did wrong (so I can learn from this to avoid it in the future, regardless of whether I agree with their decision) and how long the suspension is. I did check my spam folder but did not find a notification.
I only mentioned the removed waypoint because I have a suspicion (it is the only thing I have to go on) and, secondarily, if anyone reading this can avoid getting into the same situation because my story alarmed them about a possible reason for suspension that is a bonus.
Sometimes people have got a ban for a nomination or an edit that they made many months ago.
@NianticGiffard (or any other Niantic staff) is there any way I can get some kind of answer? I just would like to know how long the suspension is and if possible also what the reason is. I do not wish to get into any kind of discussion. I would just like to know what to expect.
I'm sorry to hear that, @Zwompert-PGO. For this matter, I would suggest you to contact our concerned team directly through Pokémon GO in-app support. They should be able to shed light on your query and provide you with further guidance if you require any. I appreciate your understanding.
See? I told ya @Zwompert-PGO
Oh well, I tried. Niantic folks here and in-app support point at each other. :) I will just have to see what happens. If I learn anything useful, I will let you guys know.
Someone in our community was banned on Wayfarer for trying to influence move edits, e.g. "please choose this marker" sort of thing. It was a 30 day Wayfarer ban, they could still submit from Pogo/ingress but just no access to Wayfarer. They were informed though that one more strike and it would be a permanent ban. HTH
@Zwompert-PGO You said "It was approved on the first try". Does that mean you nominated it multiple times? Spamming is against Terms of Service.
@MargariteDVille-ING I would parse that statement as, "I submitted it once and it was approved so I didn't have to try again."
No, spamming ineligible nominations will leads into ToS violation. And we didn't know if he nominated the Wayspot multiple times, since his got approved on the first try might means he doesn't need to renominate it again.
Besides, if the OP nominates below-average Wayspots but meet acceptance criteria, would it be fair for him to being suspended with no reason, even if the submitter only nominated once?
My guess is, somebody reported the said Wayspot directly to Niantic (either in this forum or via support chat), and after investigation Niantic decided to "take action against the Wayspot and the Wayfinder". That's the only way a submitter got suspended even if he did the mistake only once.
It is indeed possible that you are banned for approving merely 1 wayspot which has its title including inappropriate words (if translated into English)
Nominating the same valid wayspot 40 times, each with the exact same pictures and description, IS SPAM. If the first passes, and its identical 39 are marked duplicates, the nominator is bogging down the review system - and bogging down the wayspot network by making it store and display 40 of the same picture on the wayspot.
@patsufredo-PGO is just off-base saying it's OK to make the exact same nomination 40 times, if it's valid.
But he said that it was approved on the first try, so any reference to multiple nominations (why stop at 40? why don't you ask if he nominated it 1000 times?) is only in your mind.
@WheelTrekker-ING Spammers nominate 40 duplicates, all in one sitting. The don't know if the first one will pass or not. But they REALLY want this sofa stop.
People on this forum have admitted to nominating 40 of the exact same thing (photos & words) all at once. We've seen their screenshots.
Your mind can't wrap around this, because it is a pretty nutsy thing to do, and something you nor I would have thought to do. But people do it. And it annoys reviewers. And it gets the nominator banned, without an email why.
This nominating something 40 times (or more if they have multiple accounts) really grates me. I was reviewing a few days ago, and every other review for ten nomination was the exact same thing. Same wording, same photo. Reported as abuse on it.
As you say, they really want a Wayspot they can interact with from their sofa and just hope it’ll be brute forced through. Sadly I’ve seen it work once or twice.
It's really offensive to call someone an spammer for the actions of other people.
You should write those messages on the thread of someone that claims that it has posted the same nomination multiple times. In this case he says that he has done it once so you should stop insulting him.
It was nominated only once. I always try my best to make good quality contributions and keep up with the rules and best practices. I cannot login right now to check, but I think the ratio between accepted and rejected waypoints is relatively high too.
Anyway, thank you all for your suggestions. I was finally able to contact someone at Niantic about the suspension. I promised to come back here when I did. However, the answer was even more disappointing. I got this answer: "As per our policy, we will not be able to provide any specific information related to this warning. We have thoroughly reviewed your submissions and found that you have been submitting PokéStop nominations that do not meet our criteria".
I disagree with that last statement of course. But, again, I am not looking for a discussion on that or to make Niantic reviewers look bad. Apparently Niantic's policy is not to tell you what they think is wrong with your submissions. I find this strange and I cannot think of a good reason for this policy. But hey, it is what it is.
My best guess is still that it is about this one Waypoint submission that has an inappropriate title when (and only when) translated into English. My bad, I will try to avoid that in the future.
I'll try to condense my overall outrage into three bite-sized nuggets:
Also, banning individuals without saying why - only stops that one individual. It does nothing to prevent 900,000 other Explorers from making the same mistake.
The response he got from Giffard is not unhelpful. He was told to contact the POGO team, which is not something the wayfarer team usually say if I remember correctly. If I was the one getting this response, I would think I was banned due to POGO violation and not a wayfarer one.