Some time ago, the proposal to do 'gang bans' was brought up, and I debunked it then.
I think that post has been deleted.
Hopebot bans:
It still gives the trolls the upper hand until 3 user's get together and ban them.
Correct.
I'm sure you can log the efforts of Bans by the users in case its abused but that adds to the confusion and work needed to manage this effort. Allowing anyone to group ban any user which will probably include voiced users is a short coming.
Correct again, twice.
Voiced users should have to ability to act with expediency
Regarding expediency - correct.
and be promoted to half ops.
You need to explain why half ops vs. ops.
(In your previous post about half ops, it was not explained there either)
All bans then should be registered in a forum post by the banner under a special heading with a reason why and with a log of what happened so it can be reviewed by Nathan saving him time and effort managing.
How sad, if it must be done this way.
Bans should only be lifted by Nathan to avoid confusion.
This is in regards to bans placed by others, right? Not one's own bans.
Rarely did I ever want to ban someone permanently or long term. I certainly wouldn't want to be bothering Nathan to take off a ban that I entered.
All along, common sense would dictate that one should not remove another's ban - if nothing else without discussing it first.
To do so, is to promote chaos, which is exactly what some people were doing. When they were doing such stuff, I could not help but wonder how loud the screaming and whining would be, if someone else had unilaterally just removed one of THEIR bans.
It is just stupid to go around, undoing what someone else has done, just because one feels like it. It should be discussed, first.
It is a shame that apparently it has to be spelled out, and probably the way you have worded it, is what we are down to - that bans other than one's own, can only be removed by Nathan.
just my opinion...