Things to fix for the forums

[Brassow]

Wow, lots of problems coming to light with the community in these past few weeks.

So here's a thread for suggesting ways to fix it.

 

My thoughts/ideas.

-We really need some more forum staff. This should be obvious.

-People need to stop being so rude to each other. If you want to criticize, do it in a civilized manner, think of how others will perceive your thoughts, and don't just respond with a picture.

-The whole point of the lounge is for off-topic conversations. Don't attack them because they live up to their names.

-People need to stop overreacting. I'll admit, I did this myself and I'll certainly make an effort to calm down in the future.

-There should not be singling out of members in new threads, leave that to PMs, others don't need to get involved with your beef.

 

Those are my humble thoughts. If you have any additions/suggestions, please feel free to contribute.

[Guest Anonymous]

I agree with all of this. Thanks! Seems like simple things to do. :-) In fact, it would solve the mod shortage problem partially as they will have less to police really, when you think about it. I am already considering how I will behave and react from here on. Oh but I will be writing! LOL In the lounge and elsewhere I will be writing about tulpas and about things that have nothing to do with tulpas (yes in the lounge).

[Yuki]

-We really need some more forum staff. This should be obvious.

-People need to stop being so rude to each other. If you want to criticize, do it in a civilized manner, think of how others will perceive your thoughts, and don't just respond with a picture.

-The whole point of the lounge is for off-topic conversations. Don't attack them because they live up to their names.

-People need to stop overreacting. I'll admit, I did this myself and I'll certainly make an effort to calm down in the future.

-There should not be singling out of members in new threads, leave that to PMs, others don't need to get involved with your beef.

 

How do you see more staff working out? What would they be doing? Your second point seems to be the third or fourth instance of you sharing how offended you are publicly, rather than talking to the people involved. How about you talk to him directly, rather than complaining so indirectly? People do overreact, and seem to be too easily offended by anything and everything. I don't think we need to be less rude, we need thicker skins.

 

-There should not be singling out of members in new threads, leave that to PMs, others don't need to get involved with your beef.

 

and don't just respond with a picture.

 

Consider playing by your own rules in the future.

[Guest Anonymous]

How do you see more staff working out? What would they be doing?

 

Good question. We won't really need more mods if we can just learn to get along. :-)

 

Your second point seems to be the third or fourth instance of you sharing how offended you are publicly, rather than talking to the people involved. How about you talk to him directly, rather than complaining so indirectly? People do overreact, and seem to be too easily offended by anything and everything. I don't think we need to be less rude, we need thicker skins.

 

I can certainly see that over reactions were part of my own issues and I have seen it in others too.

 

Consider playing by your own rules in the future.

 

I think that is the plan Yuki.

[Brassow]

Consider playing by your own rules in the future.

 

This is kind of the intention, to establish guidelines and follow them. As for more staff, they can be there to keep people from stepping too far out of line and going ballistic, something that has recently been happening more than it should.

[AracnidsGrip/Rick]

I agree with that points.

~L. ♠️

[Vos]

-We really need some more forum staff. This should be obvious.

 

We currently have one active forum moderator and one active administrator. It's true that we need more staff, but that's not the biggest issue the forum has at the moment - you can add as many as you want, but that won't really stop all of the conflict.

 

-The whole point of the lounge is for off-topic conversations. Don't attack them because they live up to their names.

 

I don't think that people have a problem with the off-topic threads, it's more about how some people are making dozens of threads about how they're different from everyone else.

[Guest Anonymous]

I don't think that people have a problem with the off-topic threads, it's more about how some people are making dozens of threads about how they're different from everyone else.

 

Noted. Thank you Vos.

 

EDIT: It isn't the being different that is so much the issue I think as was repeating it over and over and making drama filled "self justifying" blog threads. That is what people were complaining about the most. In my case the self justification was sometimes the reason for the thread, but sometimes it was sort of a flow of thought writing that helped me sort things out and learn. It still came off as trying to be pretentious and different and that is what is important I think. I have to realize that the complaints were legitimate in how those threads were perceived by others.

[STeeK]

-"How fix the forum?"

We need more activity

-"How we get more activity?"

Is a fact that circlejerk and pointless drama scares new people, so we need to get rid of them

-"How we end circlejerk and pointless drama?"

We delete "Lounge" entirely

Nope, thats not a joke

 

Since people here seems they can't ignore things they don't like (like everywhere), we need to purge the source of those things entirely.

Lounge is an off topic board. Why a scientific-oriented forum should have a pointless section? There is a ton of places for you to discuss non-tulpa related things better than this place and if you just want fun, then go to the forum games.

Also, half of those thread easily fit in General Discussion because they are still tulpa-related

 

This forum should have a strong NO-FUN-ALLOWED policy were moderators aren't friendly and doesn't care about the cute feelings of us instead of the quality of the thread.

Also, I agree with short-time mutes and closed/deteled threads in case of rule-breaking without further justification or reason

Quality must be forced to appeal more neutral viewers because we can't make it ourselves

[waffles]

Wow, lots of problems coming to light with the community in these past few weeks.

So here's a thread for suggesting ways to fix it.

 

I'll be curt. I don't think that these problems really came to light in the past few weeks, and I think your ideas are very much a stock response. People were slightly rude and moderation took like ten minutes longer than it should to lock a thread, or whatever. It's easy to respond with

-We really need some more forum staff. This should be obvious.

-People need to stop being so rude to each other.

-People need to stop overreacting.

-There should not be singling out of members in new threads

These are obvious responses. But at the same time, what are you trying to solve here? Sure, banning discussion of the kind that went on in the other thread will stop that kind of discussion, but it isn't going to do any more.

 

 

-People need to stop being so rude to each other. If you want to criticize, do it in a civilized manner

-There should not be singling out of members in new threads

 

'Harassment' is not a problem here. Mistgod eventually said that he didn't like the thread and felt scared and so on. That's where it became harassment, not before, and at that point the mods closed the thread. So that's not an issue. People should be free to criticise others (yes, publicly; Mistgod really is the whole forum's problem/saviour). And being rude is far more effective than you give it credit. Yeah, some people will ignore you if you're rude. But being polite is also a good way to get ignored. It depends on who you're trying to get through to, and I would peg Mistgod as someone who doesn't listen to polite criticism.

 

Sorry to talk about you as if you're not here, Mistgod, but really. In your stay here you haven't changed a bit, as many threads as you've started promising to. And as much criticism as you've received. That's you either genuinely trying and failing, or only half-heartedly acknowledging your detractors and then going on your merry way.

 

Anyway, from what it seems like to me, the forum is too sensitive at the moment. There's being harsh, there's bullying, there's harassment, and there's being overly rude. What I've seen so far is none of those things. Maybe all the really bad posts got deleted before I saw them, but going on what's still there, heated? Slightly above room temperature, maybe. For example:

You are like one of those cartoon charcters that is written to be stupid. The ones that go though life grinning like a moron while they cause bad things to happen to those around them.

Like OK, it's not super civil, but so what? Next sentence, Jake goes on to support his views. At that kind of low level, it's really just punctuation, emotional expression, what have you. It adds colour and interest to the discussion. And it really does drive resolution in a way that polite and gentle criticisms over tea and scones doesn't tend to. The fact that I'm posting in a secondary thread dedicated to resolving issues that the 'rude' post started a ten-page discussion on is testament to that.

 

 

-The whole point of the lounge is for off-topic conversations. Don't attack them because they live up to their names.

 

I don't agree with Jake and Yuki that there are rule violations; maybe there are, but that's not the important thing. The rules are not constitution or scripture, they are the minimum that should be required of posters. What I level against Mistgod is a nebulous claim of 'etiquette violation', where etiquette are the higher, uncodified expectations of what should be posted. Sure, it's kind of subjective how far this goes, and what the etiquette really is. I'm not really here to answer those, just to point out that if you really want to have a discussion, it should be about that.

 

Maybe what I mean by 'etiquette' is really "What I want to see posted." I'm not trying to act entitled here, like everyone should post to my standards. And I'm not really suggesting that these should be moderated, either, in any form. Maybe the best I can do is really to make my own posts that meet my standards, and hope it raises the general standards that I like.