In the specific, I think that Otto has used inappropriate language in some occasions. This said, I think that he undestood that that was a mistake and apologized in one of the recent threads. I think that his contributions were part of the attraction of this forum and I sincerely hope that we can continue to exchange our problems, opinions and tips together.

i support Otto's suspension. my opinion on Otto was that he used inapproapriate offensive language on many occasions when it was uncalled for. he was unable to accept the fact that he is not always right and would get defensive and abusive and subsequently say sorry to save face. this is unacceptable. respect in a basic requirement for human coexistence be it in society, within the family, in the workplace or wherever. i sometimes felt threatened, abused, humiliated and angered by Otto's comments and am sure i do not only speak for myself. so am not going to lie that am not celebrating his depature - at least for a while.

I always suspected Otto was Dan B in disguise!

well golfpro, since you addressed me directly, i'll reply briefly. just to make clear my main point, in the rajastan case problably no-one at all would have ever answered the original post if it hadn't been for otto's first, and i agree, totally useless reply.
in the end, the person seeking advice got their advice, which they likely wouldn't have without otto. so it is not all bad. also, otto apologized; unlike jojo who thinks this is just superficial 'saving face' i believe it is honest (what reason would otto have to save face anyway?) and quite brave; he did actually admit doing wrong in several cases which i haven't seen many other people do.

In general [not refering to Shani's previous post] I often think this forum would benefit from a specific 'agony aunt' section, where posters can air their particular concerns re the stresses of PhD life. In my specfic case perhaps a trained mental health practitioner would be more appropriate . Maybe thats not such a silly idea as it sounds.

Just to clarify a few points.

The final straw of Otto's temporary ban was telling somebody to f*** off. He had previously been warned for posting irrelevant threads and registering multiple accounts. The offending threads have been removed.

Piglet - crap, bugger and bloody are fine - calling somebody a tosser is not.

We do not always give a warning when banning people - the person that Otto was insulting was banned permanently with no warning. We did not disagree with Otto's sentiments, just the way he chose to express them.

So basically Otto lost his temper and swore (after a few other occasions of bad language).

Are we allowed to know what this other person said to get banned? (or context)

Otto come back, the only thing wrong you did (in my eyes) is use too much bad language.

jojo, how did you feel threatened by otto? To be fair, from what people post on here, I think they are total idiots and I'm sure other people think the same about me. You can't really get a good feel of someone's character just from a few posts.

' the only thing wrong you did (in my eyes) is use too much bad language'.

A bit more than that, but yes I agree he should come back. There was no need for a 'toys out of the pram' reaction on his part.

I appreciate his straight forward and honest view on things, even if it isn't always the same view as mine. There is nothing wrong with having a good debate but it is a shame to have to resort to name calling.

Thanks for the clarification, PGFT!

H and shani - i think i have made my point. i'd rather not go into elaborating these matters. i do not need to go thro the stress of reliving them again. later.

hey jojo,
i hope you didn't misunderstand me. i wasn't critizising you. i was just saying that i personally have a different impression. (i am a bit unsure and clarifying because i felt your last post has a somewhat defensive tone. please ignore if this is not the case)
i hope you understand that this doesn't devalue or question your own opinion in any way. i read some stuff that otto said one way, you read it another way. i think there is nothing wrong with that. i grant you that your impression is as true to you as mine is to me, and hope you grant me the same!

as for the whole discussion: i guess it is a bit meaningless to discuss the rights and wrongs of ottos suspension, given the fact that the most 'offensive' things have been deleted. i confess i AM curious to that other person who was banned...

The other poster who was banned was 'dattaswami'. He is a prolific spammer of forums with religious dogma, cut and pasted into forum after forum. Try searching Google for:

dattaswami banned

thanks PGF team!

It looks like so many things have happened here while I was away.

Otto, please come back. PostGradForum Team has to take these actions and it's understandable. We don't always have to have the same opinions and I think your opinion and advice counts on this forum, whether we agree with it or not. As long as you stay within the forum rules, you have every right to have a complete opposite idea about everything said here.