THE CYCLE OF TOXICITY


Mike Pappas, CEO, Modulate S Mike Pappas, CEO of Modulate


o, you manage an online platform, and are trying to ensure it’s safe and inclusive. You’ve identified a bad actor - not merely someone


who misspoke or had a bad day, but one of the rare (but sadly non-zero) folks who truly enjoy spending their time making others feel miserable, ashamed, or offended. What do you do, now that you’ve found this person? The simple answer seems to be “ban them.” But


this is more difficult than it seems, both for gated (paid) platforms as well as free-to-play or ungated equivalents. What makes this a complicated problem? And what should platforms do instead? Let’s answer those questions by breaking down the approach by platform type.


UNGATED (FREE-TO-PLAY) PLATFORMS When an ungated platform bans a user, they need to consider the risk of the user simply creating a brand new account. After all, it costs them nothing to do so, and it lets them get right back onto the platform with basically no repercussions! Some platforms attempt to solve this technically


- using IP addresses and other tricks to make a guess whether a new account actually belongs to the


46 | MCV/DEVELOP June 2023


previously banned user. These approaches are tricky at best, though, and the existence of VPNs and other tools mean they are far from foolproof. Inevitably, some of your banned users will get back in. This is especially problematic for online games,


especially those which rely on a skill-based matchmaking. Generally speaking, individuals who end up banned tend to have spent a decent amount of time in the game in question (if they hadn’t, the odds of them getting caught in time to be punished would be low in the first place.) But after being banned, they’ll create a fresh account, which will be matched with other new players. Those new players will then play their first game


with a teammate who is much, much better than them; and who also communicates in a highly toxic way. For some new players, this will simply drive them away; for others, they’ll be impressed enough by the banned player’s skill that they’ll subconsciously begin to model themselves after them - including their toxic communication habits. This is an insidious loop - not only did you fail


to truly get rid of your toxic user, you actually made sure your newest, most vulnerable users would get exposed to them - increasing your


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