[Feature] Enable/Disable Showing a Users Activity/Custom Status

[Skillz4Killz]

Hello 👋

I was hoping to request the ability for bots to be able to enable/disable whether a user's activity or custom status shows in a server. I don't mean modifying or deleting the activity itself but a toggle to just set it so it does not display to users.

Use Case:

On an official game's servers, it's a bit silly to have users promote/advertise a competitor's game/server. Bots can already read and process user activities and custom statuses. They could be run through a filter and if it fails the test it could be disabled for that server. Basically it's like a nickname feature that can be used to hide a username. If a user tries to advertise through their username, bots can assign a nickname to hide it from other users in the server. Similarily, it should be possible to hide or assign a status/activity for that server.

Note: When I say disabled/enabled I don't mean modifying or deleting the activity itself(bots don't change a username for example) but a toggle to set the CSS to { visibility: 'hidden'} or something similar or assign something for that server(like a nickname).

I am sure this could be useful on other servers besides game servers, I was just using the example from where I was made aware of this issue.

Thank You

[GoldenAngel2]

Not really an API related issue.. however that feature was suggested here: https://support.discord.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/360054590271 🤷‍♀️

[Skillz4Killz]

I think this is a API request because I would want this controlled ideally through a bot which could filter those status/activities. You don't just want to disable everything. You just want to disable certain ones and imo thats best handled by each bot which can be customized per server on which statuses warrant disabling

[jhgg]

We have no plans to allow for the individual moderation of custom statuses. Either kick the user, ask them to remove their status or don't hoist them to the top of the member list if you don't like their status.

[Skillz4Killz]

@jhgg Could you please elaborate on why? I am really curious why this part is not moderated. I don't believe any of the three provided solutions are good.

Kicking the user for playing another game is not a good solution. Just because a user plays another game does not mean they are not a good/active/healthy user of this server. They should not be kicked because they played another game.

Asking a user to remove a status isn't really a valid solution either imo. What's the point of any moderation bot at all when you can just ask the users to moderate themself. Why filter messages for urls/ads/server invites when you can just ask them to remove that message. Why have manage nicknames? We could just ask the user to change bad/inappropriate nicknames/usernames.

Lastly the matter of hoisting. This was mentioned in the Discord and once again I don't believe this is a good solution. Mods/Staff who are hosted on the server should be able to play another game without jumping through hoops. The goal isn't to prevent a player from playing a game but to prevent that advertisement on the server.

At the end of the day, a user should not have to jump through hoops to be a member of a server without advertising on the server. This should be the responsibility of server managers possibly using bots or Discord themself.

[LikeLakers2]

My question is, why is it such a big deal that someone can't be shown playing another game? Why are we considering one game to be a competitor to another? I thought games were supposed to be fun, something to enjoy and share with others, not something that you're supposed to compare to one another like you would with sports teams.

And anyways, if you're concerned about games being "advertised" on the server, wouldn't you be better off moderating the text/voice chat, and weeding out advertisement there? I imagine word-of-mouth would generate more sales to a competitor's game than something as small as a status message.

[Mee42]

On servers I moderate, having an invite link in your username, nickname, status, or message (if the message is an advertisement) is all the same - either don't, or you get kicked/banned

I'm not sure why you would want to moderate on individual games, though. Maybe because of NSFW content in the RP?

[Skillz4Killz]

@LikeLakers2 Why does any server have rules against having other discord servers invite links? That same logic applies to that as well. Server are supposed to be fun, enjoy and share with others. When it comes to an official server for a game, it's business. Also, custom statuses/activities is word of mouth marketing.

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@Mee42 I don't really want to moderate an individual game but all games/activities/statuses on a user. For example, on X games server, you could filter all playing statuses to prevent advertisement of everything except "Playing X". This is healthy and can encourage other users to play the game. When it shows others it can cause users to go hey Mod "abc" is playing Y game lets go play with them.

The goal isn't to punish users for playing another game but to just hide it. I am curious whats the issue with this being moderated?

[SinisterRectus]

Just make your game the best one so that everyone plays it.

[Flamanis]

What a needless conversation to have. The cost it would take Discord to make this 'feature' is way more than it will ever be worth to anyone. If a server has enough members for you to have to scroll down to read them all, 99% of your users will never have their status read. It's silly to even ask for this. People play games, let them play in peace. If someone's on the server enough to even see that someone's playing a specific game a lot, they're already engaged with your content enough that you're not "losing a customer".

[Skillz4Killz]

@SinisterRectus That's not really a solution to prevent ads.

@Flamanis Please re-read the messages as this isn't an issue about reading every users status.

Once again I ask why is this something that isn't able to be moderated? None of us can know what the cost is to Discord unless a Discord dev confirms it. This would be a simple toggle of 1 CSS property.

[mr-tech]

Jake didn't say it wasn't possible, he said it wasn't planned. Furthermore, the stern first sentence should be enough of a clue that this is very likely not going to see any traction here. Could have just left it in limbo as well. I'd be glad there was any response at all so that you can plan more effectively for the future.

Also the way I see it, this is only specifically an API feature request after there's already a system in place to do the kind of status hiding that you want, which someone posted a popular one from the feedback forum earlier. Right now, it's asking for brand-new functionality that involves the UI (desktop and the various mobile devices) as a much as setting up the configuration stuff in the back-end, let alone API routes. You're not just asking for Jake or Night to spend a day adding a column to a table and a couple lines to a css file. Database design, API (rest and gateway) support, UI and UX design across the various platforms Discord supports, various ethical / moral discussions juxtaposed with the prevalence of use-cases the effort would solve, opportunity cost working on all of this versus other things that you probably also want more than this, etc.

I'd say bark up the tree of the design / UX teams trolling the feedback forums and let them figure out what they want to do, and after there's a shiny bell then ask if we can get some routes to automate ringing it.

[Mee42]

If you have a big enough server, you could possibly dehoist users with banned games while they play the game.

But again, what's the harm of people playing Minecraft on your Animal Crossing server?

[jhgg]

@mr-tech summarized it well. The effort to value ratio here is way off. This is easily a 2-4 week project and I don't think it's worth doing.

[Ponjimon]

Server owners, including the official Discord Developers server, have rules that disallow certain user names and if a user name violates such rule, the moderation will force change their user name.

If that's possible, force changing / removing a custom status should also be possible for moderation purposes. I don't want to have people in my server who use their custom status to harass people, for example.

Then again, of course there's always the possibility to kick / ban a user. But in my opinion, as soon as there's user generated content, there should be a way to moderate it without having to remove the user alltogether.