Hi all. Moderators - feel free to move this post to the feedback centre if you think that is more appropriate.
Right then guys, after hardly posting for a few weeks due to an unreliable connection, I come back and notice there's some debate on the effect The Harbor has on the MI forums.
I'd like it if we could all have a friendly chat with no user/moderator arguments, and come up with some constructive ideas on how to improve things, make The Harbor a better place, and get more involvment in the on-topic MI forums.
My own initial input to get the ball rolling is that I'd like to see:-
1) More imagination in posts
2) The feel-good factor to return, people to be friendly to each other at all times, and encourage the less imaginative or popular poster to develop their skills rather than simply ignoring or picking fault with their posts
3) Fewer unamaginitve posts, ie film/music/game recommendations or reviews
4) No "Hi - I'm back" posts unless the person in question has been away for months and months, and/or has an interesting tale to tell - maybe the title of the post could be something more interesting in these circumstances
Obviously you may feel different - but lets get some ideas out in the open....
Free whiskey, more women, and gratuitous nudity.
It's hard to keep the sarcasm down in this thread, but I'm going to try.
Personally, I think we need more new, inventive people. I like to think of myself as an example...
When the scummbar went down, I saw the link to "Our Forums." I gave it a look, and saw that it was good. Now, posting on these forums is a regular thing for me. I know that one of my personal friends saw the link too, and became a member.
The problem MAY BE that people have trouble finding their way here....or it's not likely that they would, without searching for "Monkey Island Forums." I have many friends that I have introduced to Monkey Island, and they loved it with a passion. If such people could hop on these forums and give it a go, they could input their thoughts 'n such to the harbor.
I think I'll give them a call now.....try to bring them into the world we love.
hmmmm.. that is a good idea roy.. and to directly come on topic here.. i fully support your points 1, 2, 3 .. and 4 :)
a drink or two, fun, fights, games and free discussion about real or forum life.. that is what the harbor should be like.. as i see it the harbor in some way had/should have the character of the scumm bar..
i mean monkey island basically is a FUNNY, HUMOROUS GAME with some dark and spooky elements and it seemed to me the harbor was founded on that basic ideas of the game..
;)
I've gotta wonder what peoples opinions on things like this are:
Originally posted by pHILBRUSH (in some other thread)
I am the most P***ED OFF PERSON IN THE wORld!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Tekken 4 is the crapieist flucked up game in the fcucklin' WORLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! from now on I need to play it in a room with loads of smashable things so that i can put the controller in a vase and SMASH IT!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!
Is this what The Harbor should contain? Does this sort of activity promote new readers? Well, new readers of a type anyone would want to talk to? Just curious.
Hi Jake,
With the most possible respect, could we avoid pointing fingers and naming names? It's this sort of thing that aggravates people, and turns posts into slanging matches.
Deleting the post altogether and sending a private message and/or email to pHILBRUSH, letting him know that we love having him as a member, would would rather he steered away from such outbursts of emotion with his * key;)
....anyway, I'm with Groovy regards the free Whiskey and women!!!!!:)
I see what you mean, Jake. The way this was said was terrible, but the topic could have had potential for a wonderful conversation. You really cant do anything about that, except PM him.
bring back the good members that left ages ago that were witty, intelligent and took a joke well.
Good examples being Kid, Grannen, Brief, Natty, NFGB etc...
I could go on and on, but...........
We could use an Administrator watchng over us again, too keep members AND moderators. Metallus and Zero left us. ;___;.
We're lonely for powerful people. XD
this is like deja vu all over again. I tried doing something similar, several times, with the RSN forums, and guess what. the only thing different was that people would post something to the effect that they knew they were doing something i didn't like right after they did said thing.
closing threads causes more of a **** storm than does any good, and trying to enforce your philosophy of what a forum should be is ultimately futile.
Originally posted by Kjшlen
We could use an Administrator watchng over us again, too keep members AND moderators. Metallus and Zero left us. ;___;.
We're lonely for powerful people. XD
ooh yeah, bring back meat-allus. and dinghy (mt. blanc) if he's still around.
If you suffer your people to be ill-educated, and their manners corrupted from infancy, and then punish them for those crimes to which their first education disposed them, what else is to be concluded, sire, but that you first make thieves and then punish them?
The mods educated the harbor from the very start to be spammy, it always was spammy, but the *mods* never did anything about it, until it was too late. Maybe if they did their job from the start then none of this would have happened...
Of course, like I said somewhere else, I liked it better when it was just the old escapemi.com forums which wasn't part of this lucas forums thing.
Originally posted by Ikhnaton
closing threads causes more of a **** storm than does any good, and trying to enforce your philosophy of what a forum should be is ultimately futile.
Nobody is trying to enforce a philosophy, just try and introduce some catalysts for good natured chat......
For example the mods getting their heads together and agreeing NOT to insult people on the forums would be a start and would cut down on flame wars, bad feeling, walkouts etc.....
Encouraging imaginative posting, but not banning poorly thought out or repetive posts would be a good thing.....
....everyone, mods, admins and users going out of their way to welcome new users and make them feel special......
From my side of things it's mainly the public insults from mods that gets my goat. This may not be a paid job, and we may not be customers, but I still stick by what I said, that we should be treated like 'customers', and hence should receive good customer service. The customer is always right - and thats why the MI forums are dying......trust me, get the mod/user relationship right and things will look rosier.......
Who would actually be against the death of the harbor? I mean think about it, the only moderating you actually don't like is the stuff we do in the harbor, and the harbor is the main reason loads of people stay away from here. So kill it, its only purpose was for mi fans to not talk about mi, you can do that in just about any other forum in LF. So how about it. Or are you all too scared about losing your precious post counts?
We could of course bring it back anew, and start enforcing the law from the start. Ideas.
I think that would be a bit like throwing out the baby with the bath water.
I think the Harbor can be made to work in it's current state as long as all the rules that are to be enforced from this point on are made explicitly clear to everyone. People are bound to be a bit bewildered and upset when you announce that "Welcome-Back" and "Farewell"-type threads are against the rules when they were never a problem in the past and only after you've closed a bunch of them out of the blue.
Make a sticky thread with all the regulations that folks are expected to obey.
Make sure there's not even a hint of an apperarance of favoritism towards some users and/or "singling-out" certain other users for specific abuse.
Perhaps that was never the intention in the case of Ray and Natty,.. but that's sure as hell the way it came across to a lot of people. It had every appearance of "We have decided that these are the type of folks we don't like here, and we are going to do everything in our power to offend them to the point where they go away."
Sorry guys,.. but all these people posting here now are your user base. You should be working with them to get the Harbor to a point you can live with using the folks who are right here, right now,.. and not be trying to set things up to work with a group of theoretical users who just might come and be the community of your dreams if the Harbor was only different.
I think that means the mods need to appear to be a little more open, less cynical, sarcastic and jaded, and a little more willing to go the extra mile to work with the folks who are already here and who have chosen to make this place thier home on the Web.
Replace the mods except for Neil. He's the only person with any brains.
I thought you said you were done posting here, Natty.
The forums would be a worse place without Natty, I'm glad she's still around!!:)
Originally posted by Natty
Replace the mods except for Neil. He's the only person with any brains.
Meaning you'd want me moderating the entire mi discussion forums? No, doesn't work like that. as it is, it's only me and gabez and even now hardly any moderating is happening (the closing of that i'm back thread was the first piece closed thread in the harbor in months, elsewhere, the closings were more justified). Also, gabez hasn't actually done anything wrong apart from grow to hate you all (and probably even me, I don't really know)
And I would like to say that another mod would be handy (someone you could be confident would make a difference, not like that phoney other guy, kneel or something :p ) but it would be hard to find, it would have to be an mi regular who is sensible, we got a lot of sensible people here, and a lot of regulars, but...
So really, we're here at a stand still with everyone hating each other. Is this the best forum or what?
Heh, I don't hate you all. Really. I love you all. I'm just so sick of all these bad vibes. :~
I'm getting that feeling as well, it's not so much fear, but i'm just downed when I come here now, I know there's going to be royal bashings around the place directed at me and me friends (remi and benny, yep, I consider them pretty decent people, even if you guys don't). But we all know why there's a bad vibe so i'm not going to go into it.
Originally posted by edlib
Make a sticky thread with all the regulations that folks are expected to obey.
Edlib, you are the most reasonable and sensible member here. :D You should be made a moderator in the Harbor immediately.
IKE! WHat are you doing here? You agree with us, YOU be our powerful person, we'd love you. =D
@Neil - No closing the Harbor, too many first LucasForums memories here. It's like erasing your childhood. Not good.
@Natty - YOU! STAY! :D *Huggles*
@Everyone else - Lets pretend nothings wrong and go back to being a happy forum.
If people just tried to understand the mods instead of flipping out and being immature about it, it would sure make it a better place.
Leaving or saying stupid things like "You power tripping a-holes!" doesn't help, infact it's a step backwards. Leaving insightful, calm posts like "I don't agree with this because...." is a better idea.
since this isn't *my* board, there really isn't much i can do unless the owners give me permission.
As RSNers will attest, i'm not real big on crap topics, but as they also can attest, i haven't locked a thread in ages, nor do i complain about the lack of substance in the threads. i never have to deal with flaming and other negative stuff like that. the posters on RSN are having a lot of fun, even if it seems asinine at times. I've come to the realization that that is what is most important. They are at least doing it within the sub-forum that allows for any and all topics.
i've found that in administering a message board, less is more. it pays to take a "wind it up and let it go" approach to moderating.
Bravo Ike. =D
Less punishment = More fun.
Aresen is a totally fun forum. Monkey Island Discussion should be fun liek that too, without the milk and mascots an a tone less insane. XD
Hear hear, K'jo! *pins an "I like Ike" campaign button on his chest, but replaces the picture of Eisenhower with Ike's av*
As I have been saying all along, the mods only have themselves to blame for the way the Harbor turned out. While I'll admit, sure the Harbor has always been spammy, that's just how the forum worked, it was spam but not rediculous spam. The mods didn't do anything, progerssivly (is that the right spelling? Oh well you know what I mean) the spam got worse and worse and worse until in the end it was out of control. Now the mods are complaining about the amount of spam in the harbor. Maybe if they did their job to begin with then there wouldn't be this problem. Maybe if they pointed out "the unnecesarry" spam to begin with people wouldn't be in such a bad mood.
While I'm the first to admit, there have been a few times I've spammed, it's been no different to what I used to do, but suddenly there was a problem with it. Maybe if the mods had pointed it out from the start, instead of allowing me and others to post spam, then suddenly decide it was spam and close it, I wouldn't have had a problem.
Besides, I thought the harbor was "off topic" And while some people might see some topics as spam, others might actually see it as something worthwhile.
In conclusion, Neil, NiKo and GB122 for mods.
Well, I don't know if any mods have been complaining about spam recently but I've certainly seen a noticeable reduction
Originally posted by Carl Shutt
I thought you said you were done posting here, Natty.
They always come back...
Originally posted by Carl Shutt
I thought you said you were done posting here, Natty.
I dropped by to say hello. Anyway it's none of your business. It's not like you're important.
@Frenchy- thank you, the first person to say that. Because frankly guys, I've tried as hard as possible to to see things from you're point of view and have tried to side with you as well as with the mods, but sometimes, you guys have to looks outside the box and realise that moderating is not all closing topics and shouting at people. It's not easy, far from it, and it's things like this that make it hard.
@Ikhnaton- You're right, this isn't your forum. We don't do things the way you do, we don't like meaningless spam in our community, and we do moderate. If we didn't, we get an excess of spam followed by nothing, people would judt leave, and then people would complain to us. So we start moderating and you complain again, there's no winning.
@Natty- I'm trying as hard as possible to side with you on this, but the level of spam in the harbor back then was fine, if we started moderating then, you wouldn't have had any fun. so now we're try as hard as possible to keep that spam at a level where it's fun, but not excessive or stupid and sometimes that hard when some people see thing differently others. If it's all down to that 'I'm Back' topic, i'm used to that, I've seen it before, but new people from the merge aren't and therefore may close it if they don't think it fits. We can't have the old Harbor when we suddenly get a whole load of people from the scumm bar and BSBC who aren't used to that sort of thing.
and then new people come along, see this spam is okay and take it further. it's hard to keep a balance without hurting someone, and yet when we hurt one person, you all leap at us. we're doing a job, you may not like it, but it has to be done. Fun levels are trying to be kept, but then spam levels are also trying to be lowered to make way for it, it's not that easy.
@eveyone else- so tell me, what are you really complaining about?
Perhaps a detailed description of what is to be defined as "Meaningless Spam" here is in order then.
We know that "Goodbye" and "Welcome Back!" threads are now on the list,.. but what else? I assume various forum games, "What ___ type are you?" quizzes, and "Post your Winamp playlists!" type threads are right out as well. But other than that it seems a bit vague at the moment to me,.. the only way anybody here knows if they've crossed the line is after the thread gets closed.
Originally posted by Natty
I dropped by to say hello. Anyway it's none of your business. It's not like you're important.
Ha ha, go on Natty girl you tell him ;)
as long as no one is getting flamed or anything like that, i see no reason to close threads in an "anything and everything" forum.
if you're going to close threads of "meaningless spam", you need to define in clear terms exactly what that is. it can't just be on the whim of each mod.
Originally posted by Ikhnaton
as long as no one is getting flamed or anything like that, i see no reason to close threads in an "anything and everything" forum.
if you're going to close threads of "meaningless spam", you need to define in clear terms exactly what that is. it can't just be on the whim of each mod.
Perfectly spoken.....:)
Neil, I understand where you're coming from, but I think the merged forums ended up doing more harm than good, the Harbor is a classic example of it. People have different opinions on what's considered spam or innapropriate. Besides, I personally thought it hypocritical not to close down Frenchy, NiKo and Storken's "hi I'm back look at me" type thread, but someone elses got closed down. This is the sort of behaviour I'm talking about . The mods aren't consistent. Either all welcome back/goodbye topics get closed down or none of them do. You can't close some and not the other. Basically you all need to work out some sort of agreement with the other mods, but I think it's also fair to include the forum members and let them have an input with ideas as well. Perhaps a few points that might need to be considered in this are:
**Welcome back topics. Should they be closed or not? Personally I don't care either way.
**What's considered spam? Well I know everyone has different ideas. Although I'd consider something like this (
http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=110253) to be spam. I know many people claimed the test things that I posted as spam, but people were doing them and no one complained about it being spam, so I didn't see the problem. Like I said, maybe a polls and voting forum could be considered? It's just an idea?
**The mods. Are we all happy with the mods? Well the answer is obvious and we're not. I think the mods need to lighten up somewhat. I know they have to do a job, but at the same time, the over modding can give the forum a bad name. The Harbor is supposed to be a fun place where people are supposed to feel welcome, not a place where some people get bullied around, made fun of, singled out, victimized, picked on and honestly, they're made to feel so unwelcome they don't post here anymore. That's not what a mod is supposed to do, and some of the mods are doing that (they should know who they are, if they don't they're more brain dead than I thought) If the mods can't lighten up a bit and let people have fun, then honestly I think some of them need to be replaced. Not so much the mods of the Mi Discussion board (although I know I gave that impression, I got mixed up, so I do apologize to those people) but those so called "Super Mods" who think just because they can wander from forum to forum and have the power to close anything or ban anyone (I'm under the impression they can ban as well) that they should be treated like some sort of God or something. Sorry I give and show respect to those who respect me. If I'm not getting respected then I don't show it in return. It's a 2-way street.
I know there's plenty more things that need to be considered, and obviously it's going to take sometime to sort this out, I honestly did come here to say hello, but since I've said my side on this, I should probably stick around to defend my points. Hmmmmm, oh well. Doesn't matter. I just think the longer this debate goes on, the more people could be inclined to be pushed away or made to feel unwelcome.
Roy- hehehe ;) Well it's true, Carl's just a troll anyway. I don't think I've ever seen him say something important or nice, he always seems to be slagging people off and has the whole "I am so much better than everyone else" type approach. My dog's **** has more personality than he does.
Originally posted by Natty
**Welcome back topics. Should they be closed or not? Personally I don't care either way.
STRICTLY MY PERSONAL OPINION ON THIS MATTER:
I like to think of the "Off-Topic" forums as akin to a friendly neighborhood bar, where old friends like to get together and shoot-the-**** and pass the time.
Well, I personally find it unbelivable that if you were sitting in a tavern in your home town, and someone you were once very close to and whom you haven't seen for years suddenly and unexpectedly walked in, that anyone would really have a problem with you acknowledging him or her.
Same thing if one of your group of friends then announced that they had just signed up for a 5-year stint in the Marines and was shipping out in the morning. Who would have a problem with everyone saying "goodbye" to that person?
Granted, you don't want to start a new thread every time somebody didn't post for 48 hours, or is going upstate for the long weekend,.. but for people who have been gone (or are leaving) for several months or longer deserve to be recognized.
It's only human.
I never had any problem with welcome back threads. I don't mind all leaving threads either. I just hate ones like this:
"I'm leaving the forums because of all the Nazi Mods, and stupid lamerz that didn't agree with my opinion on abortion. This place used to be cool but now it sucks.....so FU! Blah, blah, blah, yada, yada, yada."
Well, it's that kind of stuff we're trying to prevent here, eh?
I think the KEY to solving all of these problems is a sticky thread. Again, as Edlib has said, there is too much fuzziness on the matter of which topics (
http://www.beautyworlds.com/images/images/monkeys.jpg) are considered spam. Once forum members have that reference, they will know what spam is, they won't post topics that won't get closed, and no one will be angry enough to make those kinds of posts.
Cause and effect (
http://www.montrealmirror.com/ARCHIVES/1999/081299/newsphoto.jpg), my friend. ;) Let's get rid of the cause.
Rome wasn't built in an egg!
We'll have some sort of solution soon, but you'll all just have to wait.
Neil .. you spoke about that decision you (all) had come to.. not us.. and of course .. if you start to talk about a BIIIG decision you've come to .. we all wanna know what this is.. and then you tell us soon soon soon ..
:dozey:
dont try to keep the discussion (us) down with talking about things that doesnt exist (yet).. :rolleyes:
zoom..
:D:D:D
*nods*
;)
Paitience Ray... I'm willing to give Neil the benefit of the doubt here and see what they have in store.
Listen, I'm sure EVERYBODY has figured out that things around here are headed for a total meltdown if they continue the way they are. The mods don't wish that any more than the users do.
They just might have come up with the perfect solution. At least it seems they are willing to listen and work with the community towards a comprimise anyway, which was all that I ever wanted to come out of this.
Let's wait and see...