Faced with such a suspension or ban, what approaches are most likely to be effective in getting it reversed? Are there actions one can take that most users might be unaware of?
Appeal denied within 2 weeks, most likely automated, no ability to recourse anywhere. And with the near monopoly on ads google has, I'm either out of pocket on server costs from now on, or have to go to a lower quality network that may distribute malware and get further impacted by Google SEO. My answer so far has been to try to not think about it, because there's no recourse unless you have friends at Google, which I don't.
Want to talk to someone? Try our help section. Clicked the right links to find a contact form? We’ll reply in 7-10 business days. Didn’t resolve your query? This email was sent from a no-reply email address. Pissed off? Even if you’re not we’ll repeatedly send you an unsolicited feedback request form for the next 3 weeks. Submitted your feedback? Psych! We sunk your time! It’s actually a multi-page form: now spend more time answering questions on inf-1 dimensions that our agent served you.
There has to be a better way. I’m not convinced that software is it.
• Don't rely on platforms you have no control over in the first place. PayPal can close your PayPal account, but nobody can close your self-custody Bitcoin wallet. Self-ownership comes with some risks, but it negates some others. The solution is to use both (and others), which brings us to our next point -
• If you must use some platforms you have no control over, have functionality redundancies in place with other providers, to eliminate single points of failure. You can encourage customers to use alternative payment mechanisms by offering price incentives to lesser utilized mechanisms. Obviously you don't want to lose too much money, but there is a case to be made that getting 100% of your potential profit, but getting it from one payment provider is riskier than getting 90% of your potential profit, split across two payment providers. This works for ad buys too, rather than just receiving revenue.
As far as reactive techniques go, getting in contact with customer service and saying your account was hijacked because your computer got hacked and you had your password saved can be effective if there was a specific behavior/condition you are confident that caused the ban, which you are also confident you can avoid in the future. This excuse is particularly good because it offers an explanation not only for the behavior, but also for almost all of the metrics/identifiers that would be used to validate it was you - IP address, useragent, etc.
Stripe
- Comment on one of the Stripe founders threads with your issue, email them too
- Make a well written HN post about your Stripe issue at the right time of day and share it with your friends
- Have Googlers you know file an internal ticket on your behalf
- LinkedIn search Google employees and email them (first & last name @google.com iirc). Poke enough employees with a positively written ask for help and they might file a ticket
- If your domain gets flagged by Google Safe Browsing, remove all outdated DNS entries and drop all traffic from Google's ASN on remaining servers, then have them rescan your domain in Google Search Console Tools.
Note that Google silently proxies any users that click through the Safe Browsing warning in Chrome, so blocking their ASN will break this workaround for Chrome users
However your third point advocates lying, which many great moral/religious thinkers have explicitly warned against, and for good reason (it rots the soul).
If you are not aboveboard, then just keep climbing back on using various tricks, as you won't really care.
I do not think that word is appropriate in this context.
Platforms should be clients, not silos. Effective moderation is super necessary. And building a community is really hard. You need a level playing field for platforms to actually figure out and compete on the basis of how well they can solve these problems instead of figuring out how to maintain their status as gatekeepers. The fediverse is a step in this direction but (currently) it's still too siloed and fragile, since server admins can delete all your data on a whim, effectively resetting whatever equity you have built around your social profile.
You should check out a blogging platform called Satellite. The goal is to start building a universal, interoperable data layer that other apps can fork or built on top of by signing all the data and publicly releasing an archive/snapshot of the total network state every 28 days.
Satellite -> https://satellite.earth
Discloser: I'm the developer
Realistically, I feel like the Tech Companies are losing against their more traditional peers, except maybe Amazon. Maybe social media is a big part of your life and you got banned, but I think it's pretty much on the way out. Nobody can make money with social media, it seems. AirBnB seems to have whipped traditional hotel companies into shape; better rates and less nickeling and diming. Now it's AirBnB that surprises you with a $200 "cleaning fee" because you didn't wash the coffee pot with soap and water. Paypal? Just make your customers pay you with Zelle. The incumbents caught up to the tech disruptors, and the incumbents are actually regulated.
Another is that there aren't many European companies that are internationally dominant. Customers and partners get banned from Booking.com (a Dutch company), so there's that.
It's all just symptoms of the decline of US society.
Those who live like mobsters against others like them fear those who know how to use the society against them, not easy nor cheap in all cases, but mostly works well.
Essentially I treat them for what they are, in a calm and merciless manner. Beside that your personal option is ZERO. At a social level the option is MANDATE BY LAWs certain practices to sanctions mobsters and bully enough they decide change their attitude. Actually however most people do the very opposite, acting a soldiers fighting for their enemy demanding even more platformisation and corporatocracy... Witch means avoid the need to fight as much as possible is the sole protection for now.
If, however, you find yourself excluded from a monopoly provider, there are a few strategies you can use.
Argue with them. You might get lucky and find a customer support agent who is sympathetic (or apathetic).
GDPR them. Send a Subject Access Request and ask for information they hold about you. They should also give you the opportunity to appeal against any automated decisions.
Go to their regulator. Most companies are regulated by another institution.
Sue them. If you think your exclusion is illegal (if they've banned you for being disabled, for example) then you may be able to to take them to court.
Speak to your local democratic representative. Explain to them what problems this ban is causing. A letter from an MP usually receives a bit more attention than an email from a suspended customer.
Finally, go to their competitor. If they have no competitor, speak to whoever regulates monopolies in your area.
Personally, I think a lot of these platforms, at this point, are utilities. Without them, a person can't really interact with the larger world.
I know a lot of people will disagree with me, but that is just how I feel about it.
I think just the EU has a right to have a basic banc account.
I do not believe there is a great or universal answer for this. In my utopian vision, people would just leave platforms that have been tainted in this manor and let their wallets to the voting. Some have started to leave PayPal after their recent malfeasant behavior.
Short of that, one would need to:
- have friends working at that platform that could effect change
- convince a wealthy person or company to acquire the company or make a new platform that is so enticing that people leave the old one, accepting it will also become tainted with time and still will not please everyone.
- be an influencer with a significant number of followers or have an influencer friend that will speak out on your behalf.
Many people have become reliant on platforms
Perhaps this is the root of the problem that really needs to be addressed and I do not have a good answer that could apply to the masses. I believe each person would have to reflect on the reasons why these platforms have become critical path for them individually and find alternate paths even if they are less optimal. These platforms are not going to change. For good or bad we have all just witness what was required to make changes at Twitter and even then, the outcome will not make everyone happy.
A better question would be how to reduce your risk of getting there in the first place? Some examples below.
1) The best thing to do is to avoid such platforms altogether. I know it sounds difficult, but think of it:
* post on your own blog, rather than twitter, dev.to, hashnode etc
* own a domain name - if your provider bans you, you can find another one; if gmail bans you, good luck appealing that
* back up your data regularly and store it on external device
2) Don't put all your eggs in the same basket:
* list your property on airbnb, booking etc
* use multiple cloud storage providers to store copies of the same (ideally encrypted) data * use a variety of ad networks combined with affiliate marketing and directly sponsored ads
* use multiple email addresses for various things (trivial stuff, personal, programming, business, freelance etc)
3) Think risk management and always seek to understand the implications of getting banned on a particular platform as well as the steps you can take to avoid that and, if it does happen, to mitigate the impact.
Of course, every user will cry "unjust ban" while still advertising casino coins or spreading lies. So there are some questions about how such openly documented cases should be reported and how readers can get a full picture, but to me it still seems useful.
Love me, hate me, or anything in between, but I don't think I violate the guidelines any more than those people who are still in the site's good graces. Since I have no idea exactly _why_ I'm so severely rate limited here, I have no idea how to get out of the dog house, either. Emails have gone unanswered, so I can only assume nobody really cares about my problem.
