Frostbyte
Offline
George wrote:

Where does it say that everyone posting should do so in a way that furthers the education of the general population on the topic of chipmusic?

Exactly. I honestly think its total garbage to expect a forum to be on topic 100% of the time. I don't get why it's so bad to have discussion on a forum. Who cares what the pace is? You realize that every other forum I've ever moderated, admin'd, or been a member of has had an off topic section or at least dedicated talk threads. I'd say 4/5 of them so had forum games.

It's a lot less fun to be here if there's no lively fun discussion or pictures or hedgehogs or jokes. Iight as well be a chipmusic school instead of the Internet.

spacetownsavior
Offline
San Diego, CA
Frostbyte wrote:

Exactly. I honestly think its total garbage to expect a forum to be on topic 100% of the time. I don't get why it's so bad to have discussion on a forum. Who cares what the pace is?

Ok, here's the thing. When a forum is off topic I actually stop reading it because it's really uninteresting to watch people be inane. The problem is, I would really like to spend more time here, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who would really rather have interesting conversations instead of image vomits and stuff. It might be a little pedantic but that's just the way it works for me.

That's ultimately the reason I would like this place to be less like it is now. It's not TERRIBLE, and again, I can't really tell anyone to act how I want them to--all I'm saying is that for me, inanity does not hold my attention very well, and I'm not the only person who thinks that.

Frostbyte
Offline

Right, and you're allowed to feel that way too. Which is the point of an off topic board haha. You don't have to visit it, and the people that would like to are able to see it.

e.s.c.
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IL, US

though its also a shitload more work for the staff and not something the site actually needs

Frostbyte
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how is it a shitload more work? Don't moderate everything. Put a disclaimer that the forum is unmoderated, and if you have a dispute, work it out yourself. I'd have to disagree with the idea that it's not something that the site needs, because obviously it's becoming an issue that there's no place to be silly

spacetownsavior
Offline
San Diego, CA

Well like, that place should honestly be the rest of the internet.

e.s.c.
Offline
IL, US

you really think shit in off topic wouldnt spill over into the rest of the forum? no way we'd open an unmoderated area on the site

Frostbyte
Offline

Eh, not really. At least not in my prior experience.

SketchMan3
Offline
NC in the US of America
Frostbyte wrote:

Eh, not really. At least not in my prior experience.

Eh... I've experienced it. But my experience level is probably lower than yours. But... it's not pretty when it happens.

Last edited by SketchMan3 (Aug 4, 2012 9:23 pm)

Frostbyte
Offline

I'd wager that the members here are mature enough to keep the garbage discussion in the garbage discussion area. The only reason it's thrown about now is because there's no place for it. And you can't just say that the place for it is off CM.o, because that's not really gonna solve anything. Just grumpy users and grumpy moderators.

chunter
Offline
Brunswick, GA USA

I decided to have a look at the Graveyard because I was curious to see how many of those threads are really and truly off topic, only to discover that our most recently closed threads haven't been put there (yet.)

So next, I went to General.

I looked for threads that prove an OT board would solve the problem (if I'm understanding) that junky threads keep getting bumped, so I categorized the closed threads from the first three pages.

Topic was resolved, but people got way silly:
"Someone please inform me, what is brk"
"What do you kids do liver"
"Chiptune is dead"
"New to this website"

Topic was open-ended but drifted:
"Is it worth spending time on a song"

Actual troll thread by poster who is probably suspended or banned:
"Blip Memorial thread"
"Melody driven chip" (the Lazare thread)

Closed for being a duplicate thread on the wrong board:
"File not found"

That was the first three pages of General Discussion. I'm sure you can all investigate the others if you want (and I may later since I really wanted "how do I drop the bass" to end up in the sort,) but it's enough data to make a mini-point. 5 out of 8 closed threads were closed because people kept bumping them with silliness. If I did the counting and math right, 73 out of 81 of those threads are still open, the sticky ones aren't counted.

If you participated in the silliness in those threads, why? Would an OT board really the thread from getting out of hand? My personal answer is, I don't know.

If you are a person who legitimately asked the question, "How do I make a drop in LSDJ?" and you saw an OT thread start up making fun of the guy who had the audacity to ask how to drop the bass, how would you feel? When I think about it that way I'm a bit embarrassed at some of my own thoughts about the thread, as ridiculous and basic as I though the topic was at the time.

Like the road to Hell, I have good intentions. Do what you want with that info, I'm sure stuff will happen.

Edit with content: This is still the only board I visit that doesn't have an OT board.

Last edited by chunter (Aug 4, 2012 10:24 pm)

Frostbyte
Offline

Very interesting data. I think I see it supporting my point, if in reading into it right. The only thing you said that I disagree with is the thing about starting a thread to make fun of someone that made a stupid serious thread. If you look at the post content after a while, it has nothing to do with being mad at the OP for stupidness, it just becomes a discussion involving pictures or jokes or whatever. And that's exactly the kind of material that most of us want to post. An off topic section wouldn't fix the issue totally, but it would help alleviate the issue. Mainly because instead of feeling like that's the place to pat stupid banter, those threads would die and the off topic board would thrive.


The only true way to tell is to give it a try for a little bit.

SketchMan3
Offline
NC in the US of America
chunter wrote:

5 out of 8 closed threads were closed because people kept bumping them with silliness.

That's the thing. If it's such a useless thread, just ignore it and let it slip off the front page. But everybody has to get their two cents in. I've personally decided to let all the older members handle that from now on. If all the new members did that, we could probably cut down on hyper-active-bad-threads by at least 1/3.

Edit: Looking at that and Frostbytes post, it seems like an off-topic board would be worth testing.

Last edited by SketchMan3 (Aug 4, 2012 10:57 pm)

Lazerbeat
Offline
Tokyo, Japan
e.s.c. wrote:

though its also a shitload more work for the staff and not something the site actually needs

A few mods seem to be inactive, if workload is an issue we could make some more mods?

e.s.c. wrote:

you really think shit in off topic wouldnt spill over into the rest of the forum?

With more mods they could keep on top of moving off topic threads to an off topic forum.

Cmo has been open since I think 2010? We haven't tried an it area as a solution to the silliness / off topic problem which seems persistent.

Note I don't want an off topic forum so I can post ot content, I want one so I can not got there ever.

Frostbyte
Offline
Lazerbeat wrote:

Note I don't want an off topic forum so I can post ot content, I want one so I can not got there ever.

And a lot of us want one so we CAN post silly stuff. It's a win win: you don't see our garbage, we post our own discussions.

Lazerbeat
Offline
Tokyo, Japan

My point exactly.