Legitimate complaints about the General forum

[Katganistan]

Post them if you've got them.

[Buffett and Colbert]

I'd like to touch on what a lot of people have been saying.

For starters, I recognise that much of the complaints about NS are cyclical. "Oh no, too many social threads in NSG!" "Oh no, not enough social threads in NSG!" It seems like we can't be pleased. However, I think the latter is a legit concern.

Dyakovo's yearly "sexist NSGer" thread has been a thing for Generalites to relax and chat with each other for a bit, now. Moving it to F7 just shuts down the dialogue between Generalites because it's pretty obvious that many are not about to venture into F7. I recognise that that thread in particular was getting "off-topic" and spammy (and I claim partial responsibility for that), but I think more leniency should be given for those types of threads.

Who knows, it might even lessen the burden Mods have, seeing as such a move might make us more chillaxed, and less likely to... er.. do this, really.

Thanks, Kat.

[Geniasis]

I truly don't understand why so many Generalites hate F7. I post on both F7 and General, and don't really hate either section, but quite a few people seem to hate F7 for some reason.

Give your reasons here.

I hate it because it's made General a worse place. It feels like anything remotely light-hearted gets shunted off to F7. This may not in fact be true, but the perception is there. So now General becomes a place that's less light-hearted than it was on Jolt. Which leads us to get angrier more, which is why all we do these days is snap and bitch at each other.

So, like an abusive alcoholic father, I come home angry and take my rage out on F7, which ruined General simply by being born through no fault of its own.

But snark aside, the real discussion got going a few pages later.

F7 may be filled with ridiculous bullshit, but so is General. The difference is that NSG is full of serious bullshit, while F7 aint.

And that's sort of my problem. Everything light-hearted goes somewhere else, everything serious goes here. And we essentially have a crowd that stays here rather than wade through F7.

I don't see how this does anything but cause the climate of NSG to become anything other than more irritable as it has since Jolt days.

When you guys talk about wanting NSG to be more "social," what exactly do you mean by that?

There used to be some more playful threads...whatcha look like?, whatcha listening to?, whatcha sound like?, "sexiest NSGer", things like that. We also had DCD's fun news threads, where he would find every odd news story and there would be a playful thread about it. Not the flood of puns we have today (which grow thin pretty quickly), but legit discussions based around something kinda fun and light hearted. Straughn and I used to do anecdote threads, which I'm fairly certain would be relegated to F7 today, as well as Peech's "Choose Wisely" thread, which was just...fantastic.


*sigh*

I miss Peech.

Sarkhaan has the right of it, I'd say. The general gist as it were.

I think too, that I might ultimately say the problem isn't that F7 exists, but that there's too stark a division between what's considered F7 and what's considered NSG. Perhaps a little more gray would help a lot.

Perhaps we should merge both. That way all threads would fit in that new forum thus allowing for a lot of gray.

Perhaps we should merge both. That way all threads would fit in that new forum thus allowing for a lot of gray.

At the same time, I think that's going too much in the other direction. None of us in NSG would probably like Mama Nana's Bistro cluttering up our pages (sorry Nana you're just an example!) but F7 types wouldn't want all of our Abortion threads cluttering up theirs.

But if we somehow made the divsion less binary... like if the suspicion that someone might smile wasn't enough to get something sent off to SiberiaF7. Hyperbole, but do you get my point? I think there's room for both.

I would agree with that assessment myself. Last year, the "Sexiest NSer" thread was allowed to stay in General, this year it was not. Things like that thread need to stay in General. I think one can tell the difference between lighthearted and spammy, and there should be less of a strict use of F7 as it concerns moving those kinds of threads.

There used to be some more playful threads...whatcha look like?, whatcha listening to?, whatcha sound like?, "sexiest NSGer", things like that. We also had DCD's fun news threads, where he would find every odd news story and there would be a playful thread about it. Not the flood of puns we have today (which grow thin pretty quickly), but legit discussions based around something kinda fun and light hearted. Straughn and I used to do anecdote threads, which I'm fairly certain would be relegated to F7 today, as well as Peech's "Choose Wisely" thread, which was just...fantastic.

I suppose the only difference between those threads and today's F7 threads is that the old NSG shared a community between the "social" and "serious" topics, while the new NSG doesn't. One group of players is social, one is serious.

Which is more our fault than anything else, honestly. Forum 7 was basically created as a sandbox which we could make of what we wished, without moderation and with regular purges (much like NSG circa 2003). Look what it's become.

I suppose the only difference between those threads and today's F7 threads is that the old NSG shared a community between the "social" and "serious" topics, while the new NSG doesn't. One group of players is social, one is serious.

I think this is a big part of it. Back in the old days we were able to share some sort of casual rapport between posters, even those with whom we'd normally rip jugulars out. It helped us separate person from ideology.

I suppose the only difference between those threads and today's F7 threads is that the old NSG shared a community between the "social" and "serious" topics, while the new NSG doesn't. One group of players is social, one is serious.

Which is more our fault than anything else, honestly. Forum 7 was basically created as a sandbox which we could make of what we wished, without moderation and with regular purges (much like NSG circa 2003). Look what it's become.

The issue is this: many of us didn't want the sandbox. We wanted the moderation, we still wanted structured conversation...we just didn't want it to be all serious. F7 took what we had, spun it off, and ripped off the chains...somewhat needlessly. Things were fine with the light hearted threads and no word games, and I'm not entirely sure who decided or why they decided that things needed to be changed.

I could see F7 sticking around for the pure spam (Jolt had a spam forum, iirc). I'd just like to see threads that have actual social value remain in NSG.

I would agree with that assessment myself. Last year, the "Sexiest NSer" thread was allowed to stay in General, this year it was not. Things like that thread need to stay in General. I think one can tell the difference between lighthearted and spammy, and there should be less of a strict use of F7 as it concerns moving those kinds of threads.

And sometime before that it would have been moved to F7 without a doubt. I remember that in the beginning of F7 the rules were more strict(the dutch topic was also in F7 for a while). So it went from very strict to less strict to a bit more strict again.

But I disagree on the idea that the difference between lighthearted and spammy is easy to distinguish. A lighthearted thread can easily become a spamfest or at least more spammy after a while. Do you move it then from NSG to F7? Do you move it at the start just to be sure? Do you lock it when it gets too spammy for NSG? Do you let it slide in the danger that threads that start out spammy will appear instead of just threads that evolved to become spammy?

I know that's a lot to slog through

[Sarkhaan]

I stand by the same thing I have been saying since the move to these forums. The social aspect is still somewhat absent. Of course we will never have another DCD, but we lack the fun light news stories he provided. That isn't the fault of the admin.

We are also lacking things like Sexiest NSer, which was allowed to stay in General last year, but not this year. We lack threads like "whatcha look like" and all those which allowed for some directed and moderated conversation. We lack threads like "Choose Wisely", which achieved much the same.

F7 takes the social aspect too far for my taste. I don't want unmoderated spam. I do, however, want to be social with other users.


Oh, and Kat: Thanks.

[Sailsia]

I honestly think there should be special threads for NSG with the mod's pre-approval so that way there can be a few social threads, but not a bajillion of them. Like, someone posts a request in Moderation to do the sexiest NS'er thread, and if it's accepted, then it may be in NSG. or even more so, maybe it can just be an unwritten NS thing to allow the Sexiest NS'er thread to be in NSG? What B&C said, some leniency would be nice every now and then.

[The Blaatschapen]

For starters, I recognise that much of the complaints about NS are cyclical.

And here I quote myself from that other thread:

I could see F7 sticking around for the pure spam (Jolt had a spam forum, iirc). I'd just like to see threads that have actual social value remain in NSG.

I remember this call being made before sometime ago (1 year ago? 0.5 year ago?). Back then it was a hot topic with much discussion and also as one of the solutions some new mods and a bit more leeway regarding social topics in NSG. Are we reinventing the wheel again? Were the actions taken back then not enough? Or have they been reverted somehow?

And indeed another possible question to add is: Are Generalites just always in a persistent state of unhappiness regarding "their" forum? (ie. there are no solutions for this perceived problem because Generalites just like to complain a lot )

[Sailsia]

maybe each forum should be autonomous and come up with their own rules? It sounds like something that would please almost everybody in my opinion.

[Wiztopia]

This has to do with the forums in general but especially relates to NSG: stop locking threads and calling them necroposting. A post made 1-3 weeks after the last post is not necoposting. That is still bumping.

[Auremena]

If I ever attempt to say my opinion on something they just say "shaddup ya stupid commie whore, you don't work"
At least most do.

[Laos Refugees]

If I ever attempt to say my opinion on something they just say "shaddup ya stupid commie whore, you don't work"
At least most do.

I highly doubt that.

[Katganistan]

This has to do with the forums in general but especially relates to NSG: stop locking threads and calling them necroposting. A post made 1-3 weeks after the last post is not necoposting. That is still bumping.

viewtopic.php?p=2190735#p2190735

Gravedigging: Posting a reply on a long disused thread; bumping threads that aren't used anymore. Adding legitimate new material is permitted, and the acceptable age varies from forum to forum. Adding a book report in Arts & Fiction is acceptable after months of inactivity, but bumping a week-old topic in General may not be.

[Auremena]

If I ever attempt to say my opinion on something they just say "shaddup ya stupid commie whore, you don't work"
At least most do.

I highly doubt that.

It was on something about economy and the reseccion, and I said it could be avoided if my ideology was implemented, I explained it, and they were just like "no, communist is always wrong. Get out of here and go back to your shitty F7"
And that was before I started posting on F7.

[Nadkor]

From the locked thread...

More like "if there were topics in NSG that weren't all Serious Business News Politics Discussion Show 24/7, there might be more of a sense of an actual NSG 'community' here, keeping us from alienating new posters and causing old posters like myself to strongly consider quitting", really.

Alright, I'm gonna comment seriously on this now.

There's a thread like this every six months or so. Part of it is nostalgia; the people you recognise stop posting, you fall out of the loop with in-jokes, don't feel so connected etc. But certainly, since towards the end period of the Jolt era I feel like standards have dropped dramatically.

We've lost a lot of good posters. That's going to have an effect, and quality accumulated over years isn't going to be compensated for quickly. But it's more than that. I think it's a lot down to Forum 7. Not to say for a moment that it's a bad place or should be got rid of. But it's very much a separate community with relatively little overlap with NSG. In the past, we had social threads where we'd discuss non-political or non-'hard' news items. Now they pretty much get carted over to F7 without much question. So there's not much opportunity for generalites to hang out and get to know each other.

I remember in the past I was reasonably friendly with some posters on the right. It's because in the social threads we could talk about non-political things. You don't so much flame and troll people you feel that you know on some level. Along with the disappearance of the old 'core', this has created a situation where I feel the social element has gone, and it's effectively a dry debating club between people largely - like most of the population - incapable of quality debate. I fully admit I've got dragged into the mess of nothing but childish partisan bickering and that I've been part of the problem.

In reality, it's only habit that keeps me here, since the elements I used to enjoy are gone or severely diluted. A community takes a long time to build up, and I think if we want to re-establish it a lot of conscious work will have to come from all sides.

(^this seemed to be particularly agreed with)

Let me put it this way. Take any successful forum on a given topic. That topic forms its core, but for a community to form (a prerequisite for civilised discussion) the members need to occasionally step back from petty arguments around the topic area of choice - here, largely politics - and talk about other things. So yes, mostly. The problem is that this mostly has increasingly become an 'entirely', feeding back into the general quality of discussion across all topics.

Totally valid. I didn't intend my post to seem in any way an attack on F7, so sorry if it came across like that or has helped trigger any F7 bashing. But I don't think it's a lack of willing as such on the behalf of the Generalites. There's a difficult-to-pinpont distinction in content and form between the types of forum games and RP threads that form much of F7 and the type of social thread there used to be back in ye olden days of NSG. I don't think the mostly debate-oriented crowd here are particularly interested in the bread-and-butter threads of F7. But there's an almost an element of a 'WTF, who got my humour in my NSG?' attitude which I reckon is pretty corrosive. What I mean to suggest is that perhaps we have gone too far the other way on NSG. Where precisely the line might be moved to, though, I'm not so sure. My ability to speak only in general terms rather than specific proposals can be considered as yet another reason why I'm best placed on this side of the mod boundary

Having been a part of a number of communities over the years -- NSG, II, Gameplay -- I know that more or less every community is in accordance on one point. NS is dying. It's hard to think of any group that is currently thriving or at its peak... maybe 10000 Islands, based on the number of active nations, but that's a few hundred players out of thousands. When discontent springs in such a great number of communities, particularly forum- and game-based ones (as opposed to region-based ones), one must stop to consider the existence of a potential common thread, or several.

1) Moderation. I bring this up first because nearly all of the communities that regularly interact with the moderators have reported issues with it (roleplayers, generalites, gameplayers etc) and indeed blamed some of their woes on the mods. It's easy to dismiss this as refusing to take personal responsibility and blaming higher authority for everything, but there are areas in which moderation could be improved. Communities less touched by moderation (such as F7 and the various regions) seem to have a more positive opinion of it. Perhaps less moderation in general is needed; perhaps moderation needs to change its priorities in certain areas -- priorities that often seem to be "avoiding work."

2) Players. This is the other thing every community has in common. Players leaving. Players going inactive. Players growing old and bitter, like me. Players grown old and bitter creating a more hostile environment around each other, alienating new players. Put simply, we don't seem to be sufficiently invested in our own communities to improve them, so small wonder things are getting worse. (See: that group of II posters that, rather than improving II, decided to suicide by mod. Moderators should know which ones I mean.)

3) Make some of the old names available, perchance? It's been nearly two years since that was made possible, and I can't imagine it's that difficult to do. Quite a lot of people who might be interested in joining NS don't do so because all the names they can think of are already taken. (I can't remember the passwords of any of the nations I used back in... 2004 or whatever. Nor do I care to. I doubt anyone is going to come back after 6-7 years to look for their old nation, and if they do they can always create a new one.)

4) A general sense of "let other people do it", e.g. "Someone really needs to revitalise this forum." Who are we talking about? It's rarely the speaker, as a rule. "New players need to be more active" or "Veterans need to take more initiative" or "Mods need to change the rules" or "Admins need to fix this feature." Ironically, I'm probably the most guilty of that at the moment.

Those in charge have come to ignore complaints in large part because everyone is complaining... because they ignore complaints... because too many people complained.

It's somewhat recursive at this point and no, nothing's going to change. Unless we make an effort..... I. Unless I make an effort. (damn you, SCI, do something!)

Since the move here, there has been a thread like this about every 3 months, and each time there has been a consensus that there has been a general and noticeable decline in quality on NSG.

Each time the problem has been identified as a lack of a more relaxed, social, element to NSG, such as there was previously. Each time F7 has been identified as a potential cause of this. Each time those in charge have done fuck all about it, and each time a number of established posters have left in disillusionment as a result.

[Sailsia]

I highly doubt that.

It was on something about economy and the reseccion, and I said it could be avoided if my ideology was implemented, I explained it, and they were just like "no, communist is always wrong. Get out of here and go back to your shitty F7"
And that was before I started posting on F7.

Well, did you have the anime flag then? Anime flags are kind of known to be one of the signs of F7. Of course, they may also have been neo-cons. I know the type. The "LEFTIST-STATIST-WELFARIST! GET OUTTA HERE!" people. They aren't fun.

[Wiztopia]

This has to do with the forums in general but especially relates to NSG: stop locking threads and calling them necroposting. A post made 1-3 weeks after the last post is not necoposting. That is still bumping.

viewtopic.php?p=2190735#p2190735

Gravedigging: Posting a reply on a long disused thread; bumping threads that aren't used anymore. Adding legitimate new material is permitted, and the acceptable age varies from forum to forum. Adding a book report in Arts & Fiction is acceptable after months of inactivity, but bumping a week-old topic in General may not be.

Then whoever wrote the rules was wrong. You all lock the threads even if discussion starts again. I remember one thread that had a good discussion going but getting locked just because the original person who bumped it got called for necroposting.

[Geniasis]

Just on the first point, we did alienate new posters to a noticeable extent before the split, so I don't think this would fix it.

I agree with the overall gist of the post though.

[Nadkor]

Fair play to Kat for not only modifying the rules of Moderation, but also for starting this thread.

[Auremena]

Since the move here, there has been a thread like this about every 3 months, and each time there has been a consensus that there has been a general and noticeable decline in quality on NSG.
Each time the problem has been identified as a lack of a more relaxed, social, element to NSG, such as there was previously. Each time F7 has been identified as a potential cause of this. Each time those in charge have done fuck all about it, and each time a number of established posters have left in disillusionment as a result.

Why do we have to be segregated into groups anyways? Make it a come and go. The difference, in my eyes, is just the grouping of the topics, like in the gameplay forum. NSG has the discussions, F7 has the fun. Come and go between the two, and there won't be the NSGers who think they're better than everyone else, and the F7ers who don't act mature on many occasions. I tried that a long time ago, and it didn't work because of the hardcore activists for both groups saying you can't be both. I think we should all be both, have the liberty to discuss in General, and goof off in F7 without discrimination or segregation.

It was on something about economy and the reseccion, and I said it could be avoided if my ideology was implemented, I explained it, and they were just like "no, communist is always wrong. Get out of here and go back to your shitty F7"
And that was before I started posting on F7.

Well, did you have the anime flag then? Anime flags are kind of known to be one of the signs of F7. Of course, they may also have been neo-cons. I know the type. The "LEFTIST-STATIST-WELFARIST! GET OUTTA HERE!" people. They aren't fun.

No, I had a flag that I used mostly for gameplay forums. I switched after being rejected by General several times trying to cross between the two.

[Saint Clair Island]

Just on the first point, we did alienate new posters to a noticeable extent before the split, so I don't think this would fix it.

True, and fair enough. NSG has been rather clique-ish for a while, and new posters either fit in or don't.

That's something else we should try to fix, but it's not a moderation complaint per se.

[Geniasis]

That's something else we should try to fix, but it's not a moderation complaint per se.

Agreed. It's a separate issue, but one deserving of attention.

Maybe like, an all-NS camp retreat in the mountains or something.

[Audentias Gryphus]

This has to do with the forums in general but especially relates to NSG: stop locking threads and calling them necroposting. A post made 1-3 weeks after the last post is not necoposting. That is still bumping.

It's fairly well explained here: viewtopic.php?p=3676131#p3676131
and here: viewtopic.php?p=4005474&sid=75159bca2d39002c8b9dedf095b4a2d9#p4005474
why you are wrong. It sometimes varies on a case by case basis whether to lock it, but bumps in general are okay when there hasn't been many replies. Too many bumps later, the thread is locked for OP not realizing that "lack of interest" plays a role in the replies his thread will get. But once there's already been many replies, people are just commenting on sub-topics that aren't relevant to the OP.

[Sailsia]

Well, did you have the anime flag then? Anime flags are kind of known to be one of the signs of F7. Of course, they may also have been neo-cons. I know the type. The "LEFTIST-STATIST-WELFARIST! GET OUTTA HERE!" people. They aren't fun.

No, I had a flag that I used mostly for gameplay forums. I switched after being rejected by General several times trying to cross between the two.

Awe.

That's the kind of stuff the community as a whole should just discourage on it's own, without the help of the mods.

[Nadkor]

Why do we have to be segregated into groups anyways? Make it a come and go. The difference, in my eyes, is just the grouping of the topics, like in the gameplay forum. NSG has the discussions, F7 has the fun. Come and go between the two, and there won't be the NSGers who think they're better than everyone else, and the F7ers who don't act mature on many occasions. I tried that a long time ago, and it didn't work because of the hardcore activists for both groups saying you can't be both. I think we should all be both, have the liberty to discuss in General, and goof off in F7 without discrimination or segregation.

Well, the idea is that when NSG allowed many more "fun", "social", or "community" threads, it became more of a community forum where we would disagree on politics and other issues (although there were always the hardcore arguers), rather than an argument forum, where everybody just argued with each other.

[Wiztopia]

This has to do with the forums in general but especially relates to NSG: stop locking threads and calling them necroposting. A post made 1-3 weeks after the last post is not necoposting. That is still bumping.

It's fairly well explained here: viewtopic.php?p=3676131#p3676131
and here: viewtopic.php?p=4005474&sid=75159bca2d39002c8b9dedf095b4a2d9#p4005474
why you are wrong. It sometimes varies on a case by case basis whether to lock it, but bumps in general are okay when there hasn't been many replies. Too many bumps later, the thread is locked for OP not realizing that "lack of interest" plays a role in the replies his thread will get. But once there's already been many replies, people are just commenting on sub-topics that aren't relevant to the OP.

"We lock threads whenever it's obvious that further discussion will go nowhere."

"I remember one thread that had a good discussion going but getting locked just because the original person who bumped it got called for necroposting."

That second link of yours just kicked your own ass.

[Saint Clair Island]

I also get the feeling Tag and Yoot are either immensely amused or immensely irritated by the irony.