MS Update [MSU] Mod Squad Update for 1/4/06

The simple answer is moderation of what topics are allowed where.

I disagree - that will stop the wrong thread in the wrong place, however it won't promote the positive interaction that we want to achieve. Hence the FG will address this problem.

 

The FG will have to brainstorm hard to come up with a viable solution then.

 

For what it's worth, and I may be alone in this, I think I've posted a grand total of once in the Senate, maybe twice. And it's not because I don't have an interest in serious subjects; Force knows I do. I just find it a very intimidating forum. Most of the threads in there that would be of interest to me are on the long side, and often many of the posts are very long to boot. I find it hard to jump into those threads, and I think the one or two that I've posted in were still in very low page numbers, or else I wouldn't have bothered at all.

I'm not saying that there's a problem with the Senate, but, for me at least, the atmosphere in there is rather forbidding. That may be contributing to the rise of these threads in the JCC. There, for whatever reason (and maybe it's just me) I feel more comfortable jumping into even the longer threads, because the atmosphere is different.

*shrug* Just my two credits.

 

Try starting in the Senate social thread for a bit.

I'll admit, the Senate can be intimidating at times, but then so can the JCC. Consider the sheer volume of threads in the JCC. That could easily intimidate some users, because of the fast pace and the difficulty in keeping up.

Believe it or not, Senate regulars will not eat you, nor any babies, for breakfast. (Babies make a better midafternoon snack, and most users would be a full dinner. Liberals go better whith a white wine, while conservatives are best with a red. ) A lot of the older, longer threads, may have gone over the same ground a few times, but many of them also discourage the attitude of "I already refuted that. Go read the thread!" Instead, as one thread says:

"Read through the thread, and you'll see that I already responded" is no longer a valid response. You said it, you know what you said, and you know when you said it, so it's on you to back yourself up. If anybody calls you on one of your points, you can go back and find it, then copy and paste it into the current discussion.

The biggest difference between the Senate and the JCC isn't the length of the threads, but the approach to them. If you say something in the Senate, we expect you to be able to back it up.

For example, in a recent JCC thread on the Patriot Act, you can find comments like:

The Patriot Act is ambiguous enough that Bush can do pretty much whatever he wants under it, as long as he can claim that it's weeding out terrorism and WMD, which according to him are in the arsenal of anyone who would oppose him

In the Senate, you are likely to have people respond asking you to actually back that up. What parts of the Patriot Act are ambiguous? Point out specific clauses, etc. In the JCC, while that sort of question is sometimes asked, it's not usually expected that people actually respond to it.

As long as you are willing to explain your reasoning and back it up when asked to, you usually won't have too many problems in the Senate. If you just want to post something like "Bush is dumb" or "Bush is the greatest", without explaining why and backing it up, then you are more likely to have problems.

Kimball Kinnison

EDIT: As for the length of threads, looking at the first page of the Senate (50 threads per page), I count only 2 threads that are more than 1000 posts, and a total of 5 threads over 500 posts. In the JCC, I count 19 threads over 1000 and 20 over 500.

 

Absolutely, as I said before, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink.

Just because a thread is locked, doesn't mean that users will follow this thread. Believe me, I've even moved threads from ROTS to PT and went to check. They pretty much died because the ROTS user didn't follow and the PT users were doing their own thing. That's not to say that this happened every time, but on a thread by thread basis, most people will just move on unless it's a topic that's near and dear to their heart.

That's the demographic you have to reach. Those people that are interested in the conversation being more in-depth, and don't want the frivolous "O RLY?" posts, and are open to diving into a new community. Unfortunately, I don't see this mass exodus of serious posters grabbing their things and moving to Senate. Here's to hoping, but if it doesn't happen, it's not fair to blame JCC moderation for the fact that JCC regulars only want their serious discussion when they want it, and on their own terms, so to speak. Hopefully, opening up some cross-forum type communication and community building will be the solution, I'm optimistic it will. One thing is for sure, arguing over who is to blame for the Senate's decline in users will not fix the problem.

Spelling...

 

Agreed. I too find the Senate a little forboding when I open a thread and see a lot of replies (don't get me wrong they are great replies) to be very lengthy.

Yeah, people aren't going to follow a well established thread to another location most of the time. Also, your right when you say it's useless to play the blame game at this stage. Right now we all need to be brainstorming as to what we can do to make the community threads (YJCC, AMP, SENATE, SCI-FI) all function in a cohesive way that hopefully won't disrupt any of the 4 forums. We've acnowledged there is a problem and now we need to fix it. How the forums are moderated in the future WILL play a big role in whether the 4 forums can interact and work succesfully with each other or whether some of the forums will fail. It's not the only determining factor in the survival of Senate and Amp, but you can't deny that moderating will be a big part of whether these two forums will continue to function the way they were intended at their inception.

 

While I don't believe the JCC is any form or shape a threat to the Senate, threads that really belong in the Senate should be re-directed there. Yes, the Senate is a bit intimidating, but as along you can back up what you post then you shouldn't have a big problem. I don't much there, not because I find it scary there, it's because everything I have to say has been said and far more eloquently than me. As for lengthy posts, so what? If that topic interests you it won't matter the length of the posts. You don't have to write post a monster essay, others prefer too.

 

EDIT: As for the length of threads, looking at the first page of the Senate (50 threads per page), I count only 2 threads that are more than 1000 posts, and a total of 5 threads over 500 posts. In the JCC, I count 19 threads over 1000 and 20 over 500.

How many of those YJCC posts longer then a sentence?

 

Many posts in the Senate aren't more than a paragraph or two. The long, essay style posts are not as common in the Senate as you might think.

For example, look in this capital punishment thread. Most of the posts are only a paragraph or two, with the longest I saw being about 5 short paragraphs (neglecting the post with a list of states in it). That size and type of thread is really quite common in the Senate.

A lot of those complaints about the Senate really are based on old data, or negative stereotypes that have been passing around the boards for years. The Senate really is not as long-winded as people think.

Kimball Kinnison

EDIT: Try this thread, or this thread, or this thread. Those are just a few threads picked randomly off of the front page of the Senate. The majority of the posts are only a few paragraphs long, with only about 1-3 sentences per paragraph. Sometimes large articles are posted with accompanying commentary, but even those are more of the exception.

 

The Senate really is not as long-winded as people think.

Except when Gonk posts something, in which case pack a lunch.

 

Tunick, any offical sports threads you want to create are certainly welcome in the Senate.

Just keep them to a reasonable amount per season/per sport, but other than that, there wouldn't really be any other specific restrictions.

Also-the Senate's comtemporary fiction sign up thread is active, so if anyone wants to put in for an author's slot, they are more than welcome to..

 

For what it's worth, nice update

 

This is a great development. Thanks.

 

If it works out, I'd like to see you get your sports forum yet..

It's not just up to me of course, but I'd still like to see a new comtemporary section where the Senate and Amp are freed from community, and put along side of the sports forum.

It would look something like:

THE JC ROTUNDA

Senate- serious social/political discussion
Ampitheatre- hosted media discussion
Arena- offical sports discussion

 

Well the Senate has it's participates for the FG, any word when the JCC mods will have theirs?

 

I'm sorry, how exactly is it "not appropriate for Comms"? The poliferation of private boards for individual forums here with a limited access list prevents all moderators from knowing what goes on everywhere on these boards, and thus is an issue for Comms. Back when there was just the Mod Squad and Old Folks Home forums there were issues with not everyone who held a moderator position knowing what was going on, so it's not likely to have improved with the increase in private forums. The increasing segregation of the administration into forum-only moderators rather than board-wide moderators with specific areas of interest is most definitely something that we all have a right to discuss.

Regardless of the year, regardless of the size of the forum community, even a single moderator does have the ability to determine the direction of not just a single forum, but an entire messageboard. Whether or not a person or group of people wish to do what is required to achieve that end does not in any way change the fact that they can.

I seriously expected a lot better from you Josh.

You were not part of the months long struggle that got the Senate created. You were not a "regular" of the JCC when the Senate was created. You were not a moderator at the time of the Senate's creation. To say that the Senate came about purely because those of us that moderated the JCC couldn't be bothered to do our duties is both offensive and insulting, especially to those of us mods that helped create the Senate.

 

as KW has said, i disagree with this. is this just your opinion? if so, that is fine. but i doubt the general JCC populace would agree with it -- i would assert that they regard the Senate as draining, difficult, something that can be fine for some, however, just not for them. they probably think that it takes too much time going through pages of threads from previous discussions.

i would say that a problem could be that there is generally less newly created forums in the Senate. this means that previous discussions on, say, atheism, appear well worn, threatening, and nothing really dynamic for a new user to add. this may be a 'problem' why there is a lesser amount of activity, because a lot of age-old serious discussions have come and gone, been discussed, et cetera. what is left is new political threads, which appeal to a certain few... basically there is just not as such serious stuff to discuss than light hearted banter. this doesn't necessarily mean we should can all seriousness in the JCC just to prop up the Senate, however. most serious threads in the Senate have already been discussed in the Senate, anyway, so i don't see this 'theft of discussion' factor to be as significant as is being made out.

if they want to discuss the same thing in more detail, with less people, to get into the 'nuts and bolts' of something. if you discuss something serious in a jcc thread, you leave for a day and your serious post is about 2 pages back. this can be off-putting. it won't happen in the Senate, though. this is why a not-as-active Senate isn't necessarily a bad thing. it actually helps the forum be what it is supposed to be.

but do you honestly think that if KW or malkie or Boogie or whoever had of closed the JCC Atheism thread within a few posts and said, "you should discuss this in this particular thread in Senate" (which just happens to have said everything you're all planning to say and hasn't been posted in since 12/3/05), that everyone, as i and others have already pointed out, would wander over and start their discussion? of course not. what's more, if the atheism thread is closed, it will drown swiftly, robbing everyone else who checks out the JCC (and who don't check the Senate) later that day, or the next, of the chance of talking about something important to them. there were 375 posts in the JCC thread -- this tells me there is enough non-poop lol users in there to talk about these things, given the opportunity, and they should be given this chance. it's important to remember that a lot of them in the jcc atheism thread are 16, 17, 18, still developing their ideas. they don't necessarily respond well to the atmosphere of the Senate. they want to discuss these things with their peers, in their 'own' forum.

further: can the Atheism thread in the Senate really be more expanded? of just regurgitated? this is a problem of message boards in general. why not close old discussions from yesteryear and re-start them if you want to revigorate discussion? different people can discuss the same old thing, yes, but they'll be doing it in a live atmosphere with others... not adding to a year old thread which no one can be bothered joining because it appears that everything has already been said (which it probably has on pages 1-15 of the thread) and merely being repeated. it is the banter between users during a discussion, be it serious or light hearted, that is the most important in these discussions.

 

people -- intelligent people -- post in the JCC for a REASON. specifically because they want to avoid this kind of pretension that can be rampant in the Senate.

absolutely.

I post in both regularly, but there are only a few threads in the senate at any given time that I feel either (a) able or (b) interested in posting. I'm not religious, so the religion threads don't appeal to me, and I'm not particularly politically active either, so that knocks out a huge proportion of the Senate. However, I really do enjoy the medicine/health threads, and ones about certain sociological issues (eg unemployment and obesity).

Meanwhile about 70% of my total posts are in the JCC - on completely random topics day-to-day. Often it's a quick joke (invariably a poor pun on a news item), or remarking on how fat/thin/stoned Lohan is today.

 

Ahem, people, focus group coming up for this...

E_S

 

Why should that prevent people from being able to discuss a topic? Not everyone is going to be in this FG so if they feel they'd like to say something on the matter in general or specifics, they should be able to. Regardless of the size of any FG there is always the strongest chance that someone else will think of something that noone involved will and thus should be able to publicly say their piece on an issue.

 

Will the focus group be viewable to those not involved?

 

Dingo; sorry, I was talking to the majority of almost-certain to potential participants wasting perfectly good FG posts in here.

E_S

 

Considering tendancies to already say the same thing more than a few times in the life of a thread, is it really such a worry?

 

There's nothing wrong with this discussion being in Comms. There can be both, I'd even assert that this could maybe be handled in Comms. The only ingredients needed are people who care enough to post their opinions and can express them well, while still being respectful. I don't think Sapient was saying that conversation on the subject had to stop in Comms because there is going to be a focus group.

 

A point I started out trying to make in post but sort of forgot. I've browsed through Senate threads and come away feeling like I have nothing left to say; everything I would say has been said. Threads tend to seem fresher in the JCC. I wouldn't necessarily say it's a fault; it's just a quality that, I think, might keep some new people from jumping in.