Update on Administration & Community Changes
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@Applied-Mediocrity said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Is this still about megatopics?
Better. This is megatopic.
Edit: damn you Hanzo!
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@Applied-Mediocrity said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Is this still about megatopics? If you gaze long into a megatopic, the megatopic also gazes back into you. Be careful then that in your discussion about megatopics this doesn't become a megatopic itself.
for hitting the 150 post per topic limit, topic needs to be closed :jeff_trollface:
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@Gąska said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Better. This is megatopic.
What? That was only the 151st post!
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@PleegWat sure, it starts as 151st post, but then you keep posting more and more, and one day you wake up and all you see is tens of thousands of unread replies.
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@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Topics already have buttons for "go to the start" and "go to the end".
But "go to end" isn't really helpful when the last 10 posts don't make any sense without the prior posts as context, which is usually the case in old topics. So we're back to square 1: Accessibility sucks in the megathreads, no matter what post we jump to by default
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@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
So we're back to square 1: Accessibility sucks in the megathreads, no matter what post we jump to by default
Which is why I'm not suggesting any other default than the one for every unvisited topic.
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Just to offer a different view: Usually, when I see a megatopic or other huge topic in my unread list, my first thought is "is this thread really still going?". Then I click on it, realize there are way too many new posts (which I'd all have to read to even figure out what the topic even is right now), close it again and never catch up.
There are a few long threads that I actually participate in, but those are the ones that actually stay on topic. Plus the status thread, where I just ignore what happened in the meantime.
I suspect that I'm missing a lot of interesting stuff because of this, for example in the WTF bites thread, but I'm not willing to dig through an almanac of pointless discussions to find them.
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@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
I suspect that I'm missing a lot of interesting stuff because of this, for example in the WTF bites thread, but I'm not willing to dig through an almanac of pointless discussions to find them.
That particular thread generally[1] has 3-10 posts on any particular conversation starter. So the context needed is pretty minimal and you can jump in wherever.
[1] Unless a couple of people get in a back and forth of line-by-line fiskings of each other's posts. Those are obnoxious anywhere.
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@Benjamin-Hall
My main point is that separate threads have the advantage of actually providing useful information for selecting potentially interesting content. In megathreads, the interesting bits are hidden inside a huge wall of text, with no indication of where you might find them. So I usually just give up instead of participating.
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@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@Benjamin-Hall
My main point is that separate threads have the advantage of actually providing useful information for selecting potentially interesting content. In megathreads, the interesting bits are hidden inside a huge wall of text, with no indication of where you might find them. So I usually just give up instead of participating.I guess I read fast enough that the overhead of switching between tons of small topics is way bigger than that of just reading a bit more in one infiniscroll topic. So YMMV.
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@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Topics already have buttons for "go to the start" and "go to the end".
But "go to end" isn't really helpful when the last 10 posts don't make any sense without the prior posts as context, which is usually the case in old topics. So we're back to square 1: Accessibility sucks in the megathreads, no matter what post we jump to by default
You just need to make your browser 3px wider.
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If you don't care so much for megathreads...be the change you want to see. Start making new topics. Who knows, maybe it will catch on?
Most of this is the classic blunder of
starting a land war in Asiatrying to solve a cultural "problem" with a technical fix.
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@boomzilla said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Topics already have buttons for "go to the start" and "go to the end".
But "go to end" isn't really helpful when the last 10 posts don't make any sense without the prior posts as context, which is usually the case in old topics. So we're back to square 1: Accessibility sucks in the megathreads, no matter what post we jump to by default
You just need to make your browser 3px wider.
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@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@boomzilla said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Topics already have buttons for "go to the start" and "go to the end".
But "go to end" isn't really helpful when the last 10 posts don't make any sense without the prior posts as context, which is usually the case in old topics. So we're back to square 1: Accessibility sucks in the megathreads, no matter what post we jump to by default
You just need to make your browser 3px wider.
<insert Blakeyrant
hereas new topic>Sheesh. It's like no one's paying attention here, people!
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@boomzilla said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@boomzilla said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Topics already have buttons for "go to the start" and "go to the end".
But "go to end" isn't really helpful when the last 10 posts don't make any sense without the prior posts as context, which is usually the case in old topics. So we're back to square 1: Accessibility sucks in the megathreads, no matter what post we jump to by default
You just need to make your browser 3px wider.
<insert Blakeyrant
hereas new topic>Sheesh. It's like no one's paying attention here, people!
Now you've slipped up and confused your alts. @dfdub was supposed to argue for new threads and @boomzilla was supposed to argue against them.
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@dfdub I'm just here for the
slutsjokes.
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@Benjamin-Hall said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Way less overhead. If each topic has 2-5 posts, then I'd spend lots of time bouncing back to the main unread/recent screen. Probably more than I would actually reading things.
I think slack has some feature that lists all new conversations in all forums and PMs in a single page that you just scroll down. , but it's interesting.
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@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
jokes
Shush! There are Germans around!
Will you be zo kind and report yourzelf to the local zaltmine? Zank you!
Did I do that "Z" thing right? I think I nailed it!
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@MrL said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Although I admit I don't know what exactly you're talking about, so I may be completely wrong here.
That's never stopped any of us...
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@Applied-Mediocrity said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Is this still about megatopics? If you gaze long into a megatopic, the megatopic also gazes back into you. Be careful then that in your discussion about megatopics this doesn't become a megatopic itself.
They said they've seen megatopics in other forums. But is there any other forum with a megatopic about megatopics? Is it a metamegatopic or a megametatopic?
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@sockpuppet7 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@Applied-Mediocrity said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Is this still about megatopics? If you gaze long into a megatopic, the megatopic also gazes back into you. Be careful then that in your discussion about megatopics this doesn't become a megatopic itself.
They said they've seen megatopics in other forums. But is there any other forum with a megatopic about megatopics? Is it a metamegatopic or a megametatopic?
Well, I can state that this is a topical question best labelled as a metamegametatopic!
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@Rhywden not yet but give it a few days.
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@sockpuppet7 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
megametatopic
Sounds like a newly discovered dinosaur.
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@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@sockpuppet7 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
megametatopic
Sounds like a newly discovered dinosaur.
Or a pokemon.
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@pie_flavor That concerns me too. This feels like the only place (aside from setting up my own blog) where I can say "damn, H1B/SJW software really F'in sucks and here's why" without facing a court martial, my worldly possessions auctioned off, and having a scarlet R branded on my forehead. Social media has really turned into a scary place where you either agree with Officially Sanctioned Grievances , keep your mouth shut, OR ELSE. There's no room for criticism, and as a result no impetus for improvement, because some people can't separate it from their identity politics and everybody else is cowed into going along.
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@Zenith said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
having a scarlet R branded on my forehead
Are you sure it hasn't happened already? Sometimes from what you say it seems you might be on some at least state-wide shitlist
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@remi said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
creating a thread is so expensive that we don't do it often. We tend to prefer finding a thread that already talks about a similar topic and reuse it
Agree with your post, except this. Creating a thread is not at all expensive; in fact, it's free. Creating a new thread is often much less effort that finding ( search) the existing thread, especially if it hasn't been posted to recently. But we as a community tend to prefer keeping related discussions together; the previous discussion, even if it's old, provides context for the new comment.
In fact, I'd say creating a new thread sometimes causes problems. Specifically, when there are Garage and regular, Lounge and regular, or all three, versions of a thread. It can be difficult to keep track of which one you are in and keep your comments appropriate for the category. If we eventually add some distinguishing feature, like the Lounge background, to the Garage category, that will help with that. But appropriateness aside, having multiple threads on the same topic makes it more difficult to find a previous comment to want to refer to.
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@Applied-Mediocrity No, I check every couple of weeks though. I think smart people secrete some sort of pheromone.
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@Benjamin-Hall said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@sockpuppet7 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
megametatopic
Sounds like a newly discovered dinosaur.
Or a pokemon.
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@Benjamin-Hall said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@sockpuppet7 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
megametatopic
Sounds like a newly discovered dinosaur.
Or a pokemon.
A digimon seems more likely.
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@MrL said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
That's reassuring. I don't think I ever went after someone's personal tragedy or tried to make people feel bad in that way. Or seen something like that here ever.
I have. A couple of times a certain person known for PWI attacked my family circumstances in a way that was painful and inappropriate, and was rebuked by a moderator. And back in the day, @morbiuswilters said something that rather hurt, but he was also right that the situation I was in was (at least partly) my own fault. But that kind of attack is uncommon here.
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@boomzilla said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@sockpuppet7 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@boomzilla I'm filling a bug your screenshot doesn't respect my custom CSS
I'll get right on that.
By that, I assume you're going to kneel on it?
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@HardwareGeek said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
A couple of times a certain person known for PWI
Don't throw us all into one basket.
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@MrL said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@HardwareGeek said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
A couple of times a certain person known for PWI
Don't throw us all into one basket.
I thought PWI was the norm around here
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@MrL said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@HardwareGeek said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
A couple of times a certain person known for PWI
Don't throw us all into one basket.
#metoo
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@dfdub said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@topspin said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Suffice to say a good number of denizens consider all moderation to be excessive censorship.
Unless they can name very good reasons for that stance, I'll chose not to share that view. I guess everyone has to have extreme views about something.
This idea of "censorship" doesn't really fit here. As I've said before, this is not a platform where speakers have built an audience, and someone is blocking or penalizing what they want to say.
This is a community where members interact and self-moderate as to not hurt other members. It's okay to have fun, get riled-up, be edgy, and even be troll-y, but it's not okay when doing those things actually hurt other members. None of us here actually want that, nor do we want members who want that.
It's a small mindset change, and it doesn't take much. For example:
@MrL said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Nah, calling
someoneyour friend a retard or horrible human being for months, as long as they're playing along, is fair game
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@HardwareGeek said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@remi said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
creating a thread is so expensive that we don't do it often. We tend to prefer finding a thread that already talks about a similar topic and reuse it
Agree with your post, except this. Creating a thread is not at all expensive; in fact, it's free. Creating a new thread is often much less effort that finding ( search) the existing thread, especially if it hasn't been posted to recently.
Well as I said in another post in another thread (see, that's also one reason why we prefer mega-threads... I'm not saying it's a good reason, but it's there anyway), it depends on how hard to find that other thread is. When you're staring at it, either because you're reading it or because it's in your Unread, Recent, ..., then the cost (= effort) of creating a new thread is larger than reusing an existing one. If the thread is not easily accessible then yeah, you're right, creating is more expensive.
Which I guess shows how much of a cultural thing it is. If, as @boomzilla rightly suggested, we simply started doing more new threads (without trying to rely on some technological crutch), it's likely finding the right thread would become more and more onerous and we would more and more switch to new threads.
But we as a community tend to prefer keeping related discussions together; the previous discussion, even if it's old, provides context for the new comment.
Which applies in particular to all the "bite" threads and similar. They were explicitly intended, from the start, as mega-threads, and serve that purpose fairly well (at least some of them do).
So yeah, sometimes mega-threads are bad, sometimes they are good, but it's neither clear when it falls in either category (see @dfdub saying that the WTF bites thread is unreadable, while on the contrary I (and several others) are all for it), nor how a technical measure could actually help. All that we can agree on is that it's definitely something we do, a lot.
We can all we want the number of posts after which a topic should display such and such warning message, but in the end it seems unlikely that changing that will be easy without significantly affecting the community.
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@loopback0 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@sockpuppet7 said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
megametatopic
Sounds like a newly discovered dinosaur.
Sounds more like a kind of disease, to me.
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@apapadimoulis said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Pretty much this; something as simple as putting [Metatopic] in the title, changing the owner, and appending a sentence or two of guidance (what to post, how to read, etc.) would solve 80% of the unwelcoming feeling. The next 80% might be to put them in sub-categories to help with sorting. Maybe the next 80% would be to figure out a sort of "graduation process" so administrators know when to convert a topic, start a new one, etc.
@apapadimoulis I think that's a good idea, but the only part of this idea that I don't like is changing the owner.
It's a good feeling when you create a thread on this forum that still gets used. The thread I'm most proud of is the Funny Stuff Thread. I would be disappointed if that was taken away.
It would also set a weird precedent going forward. If you make a successful thread, you get penalised for that success by having the thread taken away from you.
What are we hoping to achieve by changing the owner of a thread? Is there some benefit to it that I'm missing?
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@remi said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@bobjanova said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@remi said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
creating a thread is so expensive that we don't do it often
Is it technically expensive, or culturally?
Culturally. It's a running gag to complain that creating a thread is costly. I don't remember but there may also have been some quirk in that made this even more relevant. Some users (blakey...) were particularly adamant in telling people to create new threads, which by contrast and to spite them (him...) probably helped making it into a meme.
It was Jeff, he would go on moderation sprees, forking things out into new
threadstopics. He'd then berate people to create their own topic instead of replying to the current one, because "topics are free, so we should all use new ones, and you're all DOING IT WRONG!".Predictably, the community took the opposite lesson from that advice.
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@DoctorJones said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
the only part of this idea that I don't like is changing the owner.
It's a good feeling when you create a thread on this forum that still gets used. The thread I'm most proud of is the Funny Stuff Thread. I would be disappointed if that was taken away.Plus several of us use the owner's avatar to find the thread.
I know if I want Funny Stuff to look for and if I want the Trolleybus version to look for etc.
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@DoctorJones that's some good feedback, thanks!
As @loopback0 mentioned, the icon/avatar is the most prominent thing about a topic, so I mentioend it b/c it seems like a very simple solution to differentiating topics from a UX perspective;
[Megatopic]
in the title also does that as well, as I'm sure any number of other things we could try
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@DoctorJones said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@remi said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@bobjanova said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@remi said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
creating a thread is so expensive that we don't do it often
Is it technically expensive, or culturally?
Culturally. It's a running gag to complain that creating a thread is costly. I don't remember but there may also have been some quirk in that made this even more relevant. Some users (blakey...) were particularly adamant in telling people to create new threads, which by contrast and to spite them (him...) probably helped making it into a meme.
It was Jeff, he would go on moderation sprees, forking things out into new
threadstopics. He'd then berate people to create their own topic instead of replying to the current one, because "topics are free, so we should all use new ones, and you're all DOING IT WRONG!".Predictably, the community took the opposite lesson from that advice.
Didn't he, at the time, publicly advocate a moderation style of "Silently fix their mistake without telling them on the first two offences, and permaban on the third"?
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@apapadimoulis said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
@DoctorJones that's some good feedback, thanks!
As @loopback0 mentioned, the icon/avatar is the most prominent thing about a topic, so I mentioend it b/c it seems like a very simple solution to differentiating topics from a UX perspective;
[Megatopic]
in the title also does that as well, as I'm sure any number of other things we could trySome threads are also partially identified by the emoji in their titles. See for example:
- The bad jokes topic 🐴🍹👨
- Happy Pride Day! 🏳️🌈
- 🎤 Song of the day 👂
- 🙅 THE BAD IDEAS THREAD
- 😻 The Emergency Cute Things Thread
Many Garage topics are also 'marked' with 🔥.
This is of course rather brittle, but every little bit helps.
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@apapadimoulis said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
[Megatopic] in the title also does that as well, as I'm sure any number of other things we could try
Can use CSS if you want things in a different colour etc based on the topic ID too - although that might draw extra attention to it.
li[data-tid="20319"] h2.title::before { background-color: #ff00f63b; content: "Megatopic"; font-size: 10px; }
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@apapadimoulis said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
[Megatopic] in the title
I feel like [MEGAtopic] should be considered as more appropriate
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Shouldn't MEGAtopics in the garage be called MAGAtopics?
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@MrL said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
Shouldn't MEGAtopics in the garage be called MAGAtopics?
Make Administration Great Again?
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@apapadimoulis said in Update on Administration & Community Changes:
your friend
Those are some strong words IMO. But maybe it's just English language weirdness.
a retard or horrible human being for months
, as long as they're playing along, is fair gamePlay along as in "continue to act retarded" or "gladly take the name calling"? I'm confused.