banana, you hit on the thing I see every day, and perhaps is the point HTC sees as well.
The more you define specific behavior that is acceptable, the more loopholes you build. You would be amazed at the number of disputes I see every day from kids who skillfully argue they have avoided violating the specific rule, despite having broken the spirit of the rule by a mile. No one is smart enough to write an all-inclusive-every-possibility-accounted-for rulebook. It just won't happen.
Some of you seem to think this is the first time someone has been kicked out. It isn't. Remember about a year ago, a little screenshot that got posted with someone going off on private with Hblair? Ask him about it if you don't trust my memory. HTC doesn't stand up and say "Hey, guess what, we just banned so-and-so!" No online business does. What I find amusing is that no one (to the best of my memory) defended the person- then again, he wasn't such a hot pilot or big name.
The one point I see as valid here is whether the procedure is being applied equally. That is difficult to say, as Nath was given a large amount of rope to hang himself (as was Towd- funny, where are all the Towd defenders?
). It could be there always was a process, it is just that it takes a long time to receive a ban. It could be that people have to travel so far down the pipe before decisive action is applied. Maybe not. Still, we have to trust HTC to do it right.
Think of it this way; even the jerk has rights, and HTC has to be careful to give even the jerks every chance to do the right thing. When enough evidence is compiled, the jerk is gone. I don't think I ever heard that one bad screenshot is enough to ban anyone. Lucky for us, huh? Everyone has bad nights, everyone loses it a bit on the channel, that is human. I feel HTC tries to look at people on the balance, getting a full picture before decisions are made. Yes, I feel there are people in the game that are pushing their luck right now- there are always those that will. If history shows us anything precious few will receive the ban, but those that do will have thoroughly earned it.
