Dear all,
we'd like to open up another point for discussion with everyone here.
CFC has now existed for a long time as a forum, and we have users for more than 20 years. With such a big and long standing user base, also unfortunate things happen.
It sadly recently occured again that two of your well known members have passed away (Zkribbler and Cavlancer; last year Rah), and we will certainly miss them.
Since such knowledge will not be common for everyone, we would like to ask what you think we should do with their user accounts (and any similar cases in the future).
Our first thoughts were that we should give them a black and white avatar and change their user title to "deceased". We have also been pondering about sending a condolence email, in case one of their beloved ones has access to the email account. In addition we could also "deactive" their user account, so that no messages could be posted from their account.
We have not decided about any of this yet, and we would like to hear some input from the community, what you think is best.
Please share your thoughts with us.
Avatars: Leave them as they are currently. People choose their avatars for reasons that are usually very personal, whether it's a real photo of them or a loved one, or something that is meaningful to them. Zkribbler's avatar is a South Park version of his real self, as far as I know. He did show me his RL photo once and the similarity between that and his avatar is remarkable.
Condolence email: Only if you are 100% certain of your information and reasonably sure that the intended recipient would be receptive to receiving it. After all, the incident with Lemon Merchant is a lesson in what can happen if people are given the wrong information and simply assume it's true.
Over the years on various forums, I've seen cases where the family member was grateful for all the condolences and memories people shared. One in particular comes to mind of a man whose mother was a remarkable and gracious woman who was young at heart (if not in age) and she mentored many of the younger RPG gamers on that forum both in matters of gaming and personal issues. No less than four forums went into mourning when she passed.
On the flip side... sadly, some people go on forums to escape a stressful home life and their family would likely not be receptive to this sort of email even though it's sent with the best of intentions. In my case... there would simply be no one to read it, as the only family I had who would have cared have already died. So it's a nice idea, but proceed with caution. Be extremely sure your information is correct.
How to indicate that someone has died: This should be unobtrusive and respectful. I absolutely do NOT recommend changing the avatar, for the reasons already stated.
What I would recommend is an "In Memoriam" thread either in Site Feedback or in whatever forum the deceased person was most active in. This would allow a list to be maintained by staff, with links to any memorial threads that exist. Do NOT lock these threads, as it's very possible that someone who hasn't been active for a long time may return, see that someone has died, and want to leave condolences, or some thoughts about that person. This is the custom at TrekBBS for some of the long-time members who have died. The threads have been pinned for years and there are still people who turn up and leave comments.
What I suggest as a possibility: Staff could (I assume) either add a note to the deceased person's sig that they have died, or if it's possible to add another field to the area under the avatar that would indicate that the person has died, this would be adequate to inform, but not be overly intrusive. I am not sure what wording would be best, or if a small icon would work. As we're a diverse group on this forum, we're also diverse in what sort of imagery we might want associated with our passing.
Changing the usertitle? That depends. For people who have never bothered with a custom usertitle, that would work because for whatever reason, a custom title wasn't important to them. For those of us who do have custom usertitles... I can't speak for anyone else, but I would not want mine changed. A usertitle is part of some people's identity, as is the location.
Maybe the easiest solution would be (if possible) to simply add another field below the usertitle and put the word "Deceased" there.
Question: Would deactivating the account prevent people from dropping "likes" on their posts or searching their posts? I realize it's pointless to "like" the post of someone who will never know, but by this time it's become ingrained to "like" posts even if they're old ones. And there are times when something a person said contains useful information or a funny story or some other thing that others would like to re-read.
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I'm not sure we can implement this :/.
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