"The price of helping": Pokemon GO community fumes about Niantic bans regarding Wayfarer submissions

Pokemon GO players have been permitted to submit prominent locations as new Pokestops within the mobile title courtesy of Niantic's Wayfarer program. However, it appears that for one reason or another, trainers are now finding themselves on the wrong end of extended bans, allegedly for nothing more than submitting certain locations to be admitted as Pokestops.

Across social media platforms, Pokemon GO players have been sharing their stories of being banned by Niantic from the game and/or Wayfarer simply for submitting Pokestop requests. While the circumstances surrounding the actual submissions are unclear, trainers have continued to post about being banned just for making recommendations.

Since adding Pokestops to Pokemon GO is beneficial to the game in both the short and long-term, many trainers have felt burned by the developers once again.

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Pokemon GO players share their outrage at receiving bans for using Wayfarer

The price of helping. byu/blackcouchy1990 inpokemongo

One of the initial salvos in Pokemon GO's latest controversies began when a Redditor by the name of u/General_Secura92 shared an email they had received from Niantic stating they were banned for 30 days for their Pokestop requests. Even worse, the email contained a typo, and General_Secura92's ban was actually for 90 days, adding insult to injury.

Since then, even more fans have come forward with their own stories of seemingly being punished for just suggesting Pokestops on Wayfarer. If trainers weren't sharing their experiences, others were pointing out that Pokestop recommendations felt pointless due to Niantic's guidelines that turned down so many applications.

Pokemon GO players take Niantic to task for its Pokestop recommendation bans (Image via Reddit)

Although plenty of fans were upset, other Pokemon GO players pointed out that a large amount of misinformation may be afoot surrounding the controversies. Some trainers have reported that the bans seem to be contained to portions of Eastern Europe and the Netherlands.

Moreover, the same players pointed out that the stops being submitted and resulting in bans were far below Niantic and Wayfarer's requirements. When one player asked for examples of the stops that were being submitted, they stated that the stops equated to light posts with stickers on them, completely innocuous locations, and even players' homes, which is a violation of Niantic's terms.

Some Pokemon GO fans point out the lack of context in the ban complaints (Image via Reddit)

The fans make a good point, as many of the complaints that have appeared on Reddit and elsewhere have been suspiciously bereft of context surrounding the Pokestops being submitted. It can't be ruled out that players being banned are submitting stop requests that either violate Niantic's terms outright or don't meet their criteria.

In this hypothetical, it likely wouldn't be a stretch to say that Niantic is within its rights to ban players who are repeatedly submitting a massive drove of stop requests that don't meet the requirements. To this point, the full picture hasn't come into clear focus, and the bans that have been making the rounds on social media have been lacking full context and details.

Trainers wonder just how justified Niantic's Wayferer bans are without additional context (Image via Reddit)

This leaves questions as to whether the Pokemon GO players reporting their bans were simply submitting Pokestop requests to the best of their abilities or if they were flooding the zone with sub-par entries. Not much evidence has been relayed to this point, but the possibility can't be ruled out since no real context has been given aside from posts from players stating they were "unfairly" banned.

The truth behind the matter may become more clear in the coming days. Is Niantic really unjustifiably banning players for sending Pokestop submissions, or are they simply enforcing their rules against trainers who are abusing the Wayfarer system? For the time being, it's anybody's guess.