After a two-month hiatus, a Valley man is back on the hunt for Pokemon.
David Summers let me know that he was permanently banned from his Pokemon Go account after being flagged by other players for offensive nicknames.
Summers admits that the first one was “slightly PG-13,” but says that the two that followed did not warrant having his account blocked. He had recently reached the highest level possible—level 40--and believes a jealous rival repeatedly reported his account in order to get rid of the competition.
“So even a wholesome name like pokebeaterupper got flagged," he said.
David says he wanted to explain the situation to someone. But with no public phone number talking to a real live person wasn’t an option.
“I was getting like the same template emails over and over,” he said.
Convinced that replies to his concerns were automated, he let me know.
We contacted Pokemon Go parent company, Niantic several times. The company finally responded the day our story aired saying no comment would be available in time for the airing of the story.
But that same evening David got the response he had been hoping for.
“Upon further decided to reinstate my account,” he said.
But according to the email this time would be the last. He never did get to speak to a human being, but he was back in the game.
“It was just one line that said ‘thank you for choosing [a] nickname that's not offensive,’ he said.
