Ugh. We need another thread with hugs or cookies or puppies or something. I blame this on all the political threads.
Yeah. I've hung back on saying anything real because I don't know what's really under discussion: gaming threads or OTD discussions.
If the former, than I can see how a newb asking, for example, a dreaded alignment question getting drowned in blue-skins isn't nice.
If the latter, then I think IGNORE is the word of the day. If you're one of those people who hates it when we blather on about politics, then ignore it. And if you're one of the people who spend all day in the politics threads (moi? couldn't be!) and all of a sudden your thread gets assaulted by sock puppets, then ignore it.
I'd say "Try it, it's easy" but apparently it isn't.
No, but we can now pee everywhere.
There's no rule saying we can't.
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She didn't say it in a Chris Hansen voice, did she?Are you sure you want to tell me that? Ask my wife about the time she told me to "have a seat".No, but we can now pee everywhere.I have no idea how this turned into a territorial pissing match, but it's ridiculous that it has.Damn! And we can't even +1 anymore!
Naah. I was visiting her cubicle at work one day. She gestured to the guest chair and said "Have a seat." So I picked up the chair and walked out with it. Brought it back a few hours later.
There's also the time she said "Bite me"......
Is this a very-special episode of FAWTL?
She didn't say it in a Chris Hansen voice, did she?Are you sure you want to tell me that? Ask my wife about the time she told me to "have a seat".No, but we can now pee everywhere.I have no idea how this turned into a territorial pissing match, but it's ridiculous that it has.Damn! And we can't even +1 anymore!Naah. I was visiting her cubicle at work one day. She gestured to the guest chair and said "Have a seat." So I picked up the chair and walked out with it. Brought it back a few hours later.
There's also the time she said "Bite me"......
Even Sebastian wouldn't be crass enough to call other posters out by name. Sheesh!
What?
I could totally flag this for threadcrapping........sigh.
I'm now sorely tempted to ask your wife about this wonderful "Couch Toilet" she has.ARRRGGGHHH!!! As an engineer, I now have to try and invent this! Damn you BOYCE!!!
shakes fist
Didn't Homer Simpson do that already?
*sigh*
I missed this whole thing, even when Sebastian practically broke down and blubbered about how much he loved everybody.
I'm ignoring this, and pretending like I'm flagging it for threadcrapping.
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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The problem is different people have different ideas about what is informational and what is just annoying. Most of the time I see people 'threadcrapping' or smruf bombing threads its because they feel the conversation is a waste of time and bandwidth. Threadcrapping is ultimately replying in-kind. Repetitive arguments that interrupt threads and never end to me are far more disruptive than threadcrapping because threadcrapping is easy to ignore. I'd rather see someone do a 2 page smrvf bomb than see a thread get derailed with 2 pages of "Wzzrd is better than fightor and you are dumb if you think underwize!" (You can make separate thread for that crap I can ignore).
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If we're still discussing flagging options, how about a ""?
OK then. The consensus seems to be the little blue guys generally have no effect than to further escalate tensions in a thread. Earnest calls for civility to the "serious" posters who are uncivil and disruptive are flat-out ignored, or criticized as somehow depriving posters ("CENSORSHIP!" "BOOKBURNING!") of their Right to Say Anything with Impunity... till the Paizo Peeps have to show up to put out the arson.
Fine.
I'll stay out of the political threads and immediately leave any other that turns into a GRARfest. Flag and self-police yourselves, or fling poo everywhere and let the Paizo Peeps sort it out (sorry Gary, Ross, Liz, Vic, and the rest)... I'm too tired to give sh!t anymore. The "serious" posters can keep having dozens of political/religious/human rights/etc. threads that do nothing but churn out bilious GRAR, leave flaming bags of poo for the mods to put out, and convince new Paizo customers that the boards are too toxic a community.
I already have a pretty decent not-Paizo place that I regularly visit when I want to read intelligent discussion with a minimum of axe-grinding, personal attacks, and trolls flinging poo. While on Paizo, I'll stick to the few humorous threads I frequent and quietly buy my Paizo products.
I already have a pretty decent not-Paizo place that I regularly visit when I want to read intelligent discussion with a minimum of axe-grinding, personal attacks, and trolls flinging poo. While on Paizo, I'll stick to the few humorous threads I frequent and quietly buy my Paizo products.
And don't forget to pet the kitty.
EDIT: Or kitties. Plural is good. Very good.
So, look all, and behold the terrible things I said that drove Mr. Ryan to forever be an exile of the community, lingering on the fringes, never to be included...
I'll simply note that there is a significant difference between being involuntarily forced into an outsider's postion and deciding that I don't care to be a member of a community that considers your type of behaviour to be acceptable.
Smurfing was confusing the first time I saw it, but it seemed to have the desired effect of a fire suppression system in that particular flaming thread. I found it an interesting way of community self-policing.
Except that self-policing is bad when those who do it need being put in place the worst.
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How about you learning to ignore the so called derailment of the threads ? It goes both ways.
When you turn your back for five minutes and then have to wade through 200 new posts that are all totally content-free except for trolling?
The signal-to-noise-ratio becomes unbearable. You have to look closely to find the actual posts beneath all the crap. A lot of people will just stop reading or posting because it becomes too annoying.
It's basically a bunch of children screaming at the top of their lungs while other people want to have a conversation. Sure, some of those other people might be other kids using curse words, or drunk uncles going on and on about what their in-laws said ten years ago, but the grown-ups in the restaurant have two options: hope that the kids parents or someone from the restaurant make the brats stop screaming or throw them out, or stop talking because you can't hear a thing.
If you think it's all a matter "just ignoring" something, we should exchange addresses, including work addresses. Then you can send me disparaging emails or letters while I send a bunch of kids with megaphones over to your workplace. :P
My takeaway from this is that intentionally disrupting a thread will not be moderated as long as you're cutesy about it, and that insulting people is acceptable conduct as long as you're passive-aggressive about it.
No, some people can actively do it.
It's sad that the thread has move away from the original message. That is that there is some "nonsensical" or "content-free" posting that actually contributes to threads and that these posts should not be lumped in with the self-proclaimed board vigilantes calling people dicks and derailing threads to get them closed because they themselves have decided that it is no longer allowed.
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My takeaway from this is that intentionally disrupting a thread will not be moderated as long as you're cutesy about it, and that insulting people is acceptable conduct as long as you're passive-aggressive about it.
Honestly, AMiB, this statement is needlessly inflammatory. We're gamers on the internet. Everyone is passive-aggressive. It's like, the norm. I can look through your post history (as you can look through mine) and find various examples of passive agressive insults. If I think (I don't, but if I did) that you're an asshat, it's against board policy for me to tell you "You're an asshat". So, if I want to get that message across anyway (I don't, but if I did), I would have to resort to passive aggressiveness to make the same point.
Some people are simply not going to agree on some things. The words "passive-aggressive" get thrown around a lot as though they're entirely a bad thing, but they're not. The behavior they describe is quite simply how most of mankind manages it's disagreements without resorting to physical violence or outright profanity.
Ross already runs around with his hair on fire deleting posts all the time. If he had to moderate passive-aggressiveness (otherwise known as "someone disagreeing with you"), he'd get nothing else done at all. That would work to nobody's advantage.
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I think a better question for this thread maybe do we really need political and religious discussions on a gaming website? I think some of the rules discussions get bad enough to drive away people from the boards, especially newbies, but I can't see any good coming out of the religious or political discussions.
That's right Sebastian, let a select few have the fun they have, no worries about chasing away any potential customers, because we know that Paizo don't care about those. What do they need them for anyway? It's not like they make a living off of them or anything.Right, it's much better to chase off the old costumers with a huge crackdown on forum rules. Chasing off your existing base worked out so well after all for Wizards with 4E and the Forgotten Realms! Right? Right!
The threads that I usually see spammed and trolled by people trying to shut them down are usually "attacked" by the same small group of people, so it's really a small subset of the whole paizo community that's, IMO, behaving like children.
And if Paizo lost that very, very small group of customers just because they can't run rampant with their "self-policing" then I'd say that was pretty sad (not sad for Paizo, but because of the reason they'd leave).But like I've said before, I don't want anyone to leave. I just would like some of the, mostly "old" customers, to knock off the annoying threadcrapping and just ignore such threads.
But if they can't do that, I'd say it's more evidence that they're intentionally trolling, since it would require less effort of them to ignore the threads than it takes to post there as various sock puppets, or to fill the thread with little blue men (and I'm still unsure whether Paizo can actually use them legally, I'd hate for them to get a lawsuit over using someone else's IP).
I think a better question for this thread maybe do we really need political and religious discussions on a gaming website? I think some of the rules discussions get bad enough to drive away people from the boards, especially newbies, but I can't see any good coming out of the religious or political discussions.
Seconded. Although I don't think taking the political religious discussions away is the solution, frankly, those kind of conversations are always dangerous territory. Moderating them would require time and resources from the staff and ultimately fail at civilizing the forums, due to their subject matter.
I don't mind the occasional "real" topic thread smurfing out if things get bad. It is a lot easier to weed out smurf posts from a conversation than it is to find the quality posts in OTD religious/political threads.
This whole conversation of late seems to me like changing the design of all toilets because a single 2-year-old keeps pissing on the floor. The toilet's fine, people use it, but the OTD needs to be potty trained.
I must say that if y'all are talking about the same trolls here that I imagine you are, that I often find the off topic posts of the crotchety old timers WAY more hilarious than the on topic ones, and the board would be poorer for it if these people were medicated, er, moderated.
IMnsHO.
Of course, one person's hilarity is a nother person's off-topic threadcrapping.
I think a better question for this thread maybe do we really need political and religious discussions on a gaming website? I think some of the rules discussions get bad enough to drive away people from the boards, especially newbies, but I can't see any good coming out of the religious or political discussions.
Some people enjoy it and would rather have them in a setting where they feel comfortable and where they "know" and to some degree respect the other participants. Can it get heated? Yes, but apparently so can the rules discussions threads, and they don't even pertain to real life situations! So overall I don't think they are that bad.
You also have to pretty much actively seek them out to engage in them, since they are in the off-topic section, so anyone feeling insulted, provoked or whatever pretty much only have themselves to blame for reading it and always have the option of leaving/ignoring the thread.Besides, not all political or religion threads dissolve into flamewars, that's a false argument (I'm not claiming that you said so, but others have inferred it).
Most other places where these kind of discussions take place are heavily skewed in one or the other direction, so you're basically "discussing" issues with people who agree with you and how enlightening and thought provoking is that?
Besides, not all political or religion threads dissolve into flamewars, that's a false argument (I'm not claiming that you said so, but others have inferred it).
Well, when you're using an absolutism like 'all', then of course it's a false argument. I'm too lazy to indulge to compile statistics, but I feel safe in saying that if someone took the trouble to do so, the majority (which is at least over 50%, but I feel comfortable to posit that the percentage is higher) of those related to those discussions eventually fall into flamewars and have had to be moderated with at least a post deleted, a thread locked, or an electronic scolding of behavior.
Most other places where these kind of discussions take place are heavily skewed in one or the other direction, so you're basically "discussing" issues with people who agree with you and how enlightening and thought provoking is that?
Like Pathfinder and 4e here? ;-)
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You also have to pretty much actively seek them out to engage in them, since they are in the off-topic section, so anyone feeling insulted, provoked or whatever pretty much only have themselves to blame for reading it and always have the option of leaving/ignoring the thread.
One thing I thought I would point out is since the FAWTL threads are in Off Topic (along with the Ask JJ thread), if you want to post in some of those threads you have to dig through all of the religious and political discussions to find them. Maybe we are back to looking at needing a serious off topic and a not so serious.
One thing I thought I would point out is since the FAWTL threads are in Off Topic (along with the Ask JJ thread), if you want to post in some of those threads you have to dig through all of the religious and political discussions to find them. Maybe we are back to looking at needing a serious off topic and a not so serious.
You have to dig through the thread titles man. Ever considered investing the Iron Will feat?
I check the Ask JJ thread every day, and somehow I never manage to misclick into FAWTL or the trainwreck religious/political threads.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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I'll simply note that there is a significant difference between being involuntarily forced into an outsider's postion and deciding that I don't care to be a member of a community that considers your type of behaviour to be acceptable.
Noted. You dumped us, we didn't dump you. Continue your vigilance from your perch on the moral high ground. I'll be down here, getting my phreak on in the mud.
The problem is different people have different ideas about what is informational and what is just annoying. Most of the time I see people 'threadcrapping' or smruf bombing threads its because they feel the conversation is a waste of time and bandwidth. Threadcrapping is ultimately replying in-kind. Repetitive arguments that interrupt threads and never end to me are far more disruptive than threadcrapping because threadcrapping is easy to ignore. I'd rather see someone do a 2 page smrvf bomb than see a thread get derailed with 2 pages of "Wzzrd is better than fightor and you are dumb if you think underwize!" (You can make separate thread for that crap I can ignore).
Really? Maybe I haven't been keep up with the March of the Little Blue Guys as much lately, but I would have thought that by far they invaded when people were over-heating the jerkitude.
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Noted. You dumped us, we didn't dump you. Continue your vigilence from your perch on the moral high ground. I'll be down here, getting my phreak on in the mud.
I'll simply note that there is a significant difference between being involuntarily forced into an outsider's postion and deciding that I don't care to be a member of a community that considers your type of behaviour to be acceptable.
You spelled vigilance incorrectly. Please release a new pony errata.
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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You spelled vigilance incorrectly. Please release a new pony errata.Noted. You dumped us, we didn't dump you. Continue your vigilence from your perch on the moral high ground. I'll be down here, getting my phreak on in the mud.
I'll simply note that there is a significant difference between being involuntarily forced into an outsider's postion and deciding that I don't care to be a member of a community that considers your type of behaviour to be acceptable.
You've sunk to a new low, you iron-hearted, tin-plated fiend. To quote my post and then intentionally mis-spell a word is low, even for you. All anyone has to do is look to my original post and see that I spelled "vigilance" correctly.
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You've sunk to a new low, you iron-hearted, tin-plated fiend. To quote my post and then intentionally mis-spell a word is low, even for you. All anyone has to do is look to my original post and see that I spelled "vigilance" correctly.You spelled vigilance incorrectly. Please release a new pony errata.Noted. You dumped us, we didn't dump you. Continue your vigilence from your perch on the moral high ground. I'll be down here, getting my phreak on in the mud.
I'll simply note that there is a significant difference between being involuntarily forced into an outsider's postion and deciding that I don't care to be a member of a community that considers your type of behaviour to be acceptable.
Hey, careful now. I was going easy on you since you just got dumped.
(Pst... misspell doesn't have a dash.)
Besides, not all political or religion threads dissolve into flamewars, that's a false argument (I'm not claiming that you said so, but others have inferred it).Well, when you're using an absolutism like 'all', then of course it's a false argument. I'm too lazy to indulge to compile statistics, but I feel safe in saying that if someone took the trouble to do so, the majority (which is at least over 50%, but I feel comfortable to posit that the percentage is higher) of those related to those discussions eventually fall into flamewars and have had to be moderated with at least a post deleted, a thread locked, or an electronic scolding of behavior.
I don't have any statistics either, but deleted posts happen all over the board, nothing out of the ordinary it would seem.
I would also posit that some of the threads that descend into locked territory do so after the sock puppet brigade has invaded it and apparently some people take that as a cue that it'll get locked soon and thus it's a veritable free for all. Whether that would have happened anyway if the threadcrapping hadn't taken place? We might never know, but it has happened in the past, so there might be a correlation.Besides, some political/religious threads can and have been going fine and I'd much rather use the built in system for stopping those who can't abide by the rules or use a more discussion-friendly method of self-policing (telling anyone skirting the rules and accepted behaviour to calm down and rethink their posts).
Threadcrapping doesn't contribute anything positive to a volatile situation as far as I can see.
Most other places where these kind of discussions take place are heavily skewed in one or the other direction, so you're basically "discussing" issues with people who agree with you and how enlightening and thought provoking is that?Like Pathfinder and 4e here? ;-)
Well, I was thinking more about political and religious discussion and you very well know that you blue bastard (see, I acknowledged that you're also blue)! :-p
Besides, truly antagonistic posts towards the other system is also verboten here, as are direct personal attacks because of any other reason (religion, politics, race, sexual orientation etc.). Doesn't mean that you can't have a meaningful discussion about different viewpoints in many areas.|
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So, my takeaway from this thread is that threadcrapping/intentional derailment is a permitted and respected form of behaviour on these forums.
Haven't been here for a while but when I did frequent these boards more regularly, I understood that threadcrapping/intentional derailment ofthreads starting to become (or already having become) a trainwreck/flamefest in a funny way was indeed a permitted and respected form of behaviour on these forums.
Now this may (or may not)have gotten outta control over time, but to be honest I actually prefer this kind of member-driven self control over a more heavy moderation approach. The alternative being to moderate and/or even ban those people causing those trainwrecks. Which isn't (or didn't use to be) the same group of people critizised for their behavior in this thread but more importantly would probably mean banning discussion of some topics guys like GentleGiant seem interested in.
I agree that in the best of all possible worlds,the turning of flamefests into smurffests, Aberzombie's sock puppets, KaeYoss' tomfooleries and Sebastian's snarky remarks wouldn't be necessary (though I think they're funny as hell most of the time). But them being reactions to the real problem makes me think that you all probably blame the wrong persons.
But as I said before, this may have changed over time especially as the explosion of these boards through Paizo's success also increased the number of actual jerks and I know from my own experience that you can grow rather thin-skinned over time. So it would probably be a good advice to all people involved to relax just a bit, to try not to be offended by everything some other forum member says and to once in a while remember that this here is about having a good time, not about winning the internet.
I see what you mean. I did try to respond seriously at the start of this thread.
You've beeeen baaaad.
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....Aberzombie's sock puppets....
I've been wanting to correct this mistake in terminology since I first noticed it. Just so we're clear:
A sockpuppet is an online identity used for purposes of deception within an online community. In its earliest usage, a sockpuppet was a false identity through which a member of an Internet community speaks with or about himself or herself, pretending to be a different person,[1] like a ventriloquist manipulating a hand puppet.
In current usage, the perception of the term has been extended beyond second identities of people who already post in a forum or blog to include other uses of misleading online identities. For example, a New York Times article claims that "sockpuppeting" is defined as "the act of creating a fake online identity to praise, defend or create the illusion of support for one's self, allies or company."
What I create are aliases! And pretty damn awesome ones if I do say so myself. Each one is like a tiny work of art. But everyone knows that each one is me. I take a great deal of pride in handcrafting each one to a specific purpose (OK, maybe not each one. Some are just silly). Feel free to peruse some of them and marvel at my own sense of wonderous brilliance. Hell, someone once started a thread about them.
I'm particulary proud of Hungry Jack, Clinically Depressed Poodle, Angus McDuff, Potato Slaad, Frank the Mime, Bulmahnaut #5, and (the best) Secretly Replaced With.
Thank you. We now return you to your regularly scheduled B@$#! Fest.