Dale asked what could be done even about fluff even if he wanted to. So I did a bit of thinking and I thought of the view posts since last visit botton. Is there any logistical way to create a few last posts with exception button? Like type in certain names and have the forums show new posts except for those people?
I think this would really increase my enjoyment of these forums. But then again it is extremely rude and counterproductive. I mean what’s the point of community if you ignore or delete one half the contributions?
In every medium under the sun–and in particular an unedited medium like this one–the reader bears the primary responsibility for choosing those items which they want to read and skipping those they don’t.
Grow up and exercise this responsibility. Read the stuff you like and skip the rest. It won’t kill you to do so; everybody else does.
Murphy, as far as I know there’s no job openings in the moderator department. Relax and enjoy the parts of the board you like and ignore the rest. s’easy!
You and s1mOn are correct but getting to the parts of the board that I like is increasingly difficult and time consuming. I’m not trying to be a moderator.
No, Murph, it really isn’t. If I can skip the political, the depressing, and all the threads I don’t understand, I’m sure you can, too.
Perhaps you are approaching it from the wrong end.
Here, I’ll share my technique. Just pull up the list of forums, click on the one you wish to begin with, and read the title. Interesting? Click on it and read. Not interesting? Skip it.
Then, next time you come by, you’ll see that threads with new material, and new threads, will be marked with a yellow gadget at the left. Simply click on those, drag to the end, and read. Scan over the new titles to see if there is anything interesting. If not, skip 'em.
Murphy, there are fewer political threads than any other on this board. If you were to take a tally of the political threads as opposed to all others for say – the last year – I’m sure the political threads would be way outnumbered. But even in the face of these overwhelming odds I’m able to find the political threads very easily. Not only that, but I’m able to avoid threads that don’t interest me. After navigating my way to the threads I’m interested in, I still have so much time left over I can even contribute or start my own. All the while I’m practicing my concertina and flute, learning new tunes, doing gigs, managing the band, reading newspapers, watching TV with the misses, completing my graphic art contracts, going to the bank, shopping for and cooking dinner, going to sessions, goofing off, sleeping, and whatever else fills my day and night. If I can do it – so can you.
I think you may be asking for something that runs counter to the culture of the board. (E.g., remember the “Rummmble” thread?)
This is the POSTSTRUCTURAL pub/whistleboard, etc. If you go over to Chiff&Fipple and take a look at the writing, there’s this goofy, stream of consciousness style, and that carries through the board.
If the fluff annoys you, that’s unfortunate, but there are quite a few people, including me, who are often entertained by it and actually come here looking for some comic relief or just to connect to some goofy, well intentioned people over nothing in particular. In other words, the fluff serves a purpose.
I’m reminded of an incident I observed on a Chicago subway train years ago. A couple of teenage girls were in one seat talking about very fluffy stuff. I can’t remember quite what, but along the lines of “I can’t wait to get home and into a hot bath. Then, I think I’ll paint my toenails and read magazines … .” And then maybe a conversation about which color to pick and did she see what so and so had done with her hair, etc.
There were two twentysomething guys in the seat right in front of the girls, and one of the guys was obviously drunk. He began to rant, mimicking what the girls were saying in a sarcastic tone and then announcing, “It’s so goddamn INEFFICIENT!!!”
Well, maybe so if you’re trying to convey data or negotiate business. However, that wasn’t the purpose of the girls’ conversation. It was just to connect with each other and talk about SOMETHING. The important thing was the connection, and not the content. And it wasn’t inefficient at all, from their point of view. But from the guy’s point of view, it was annoying as hell.
If you want that kind of feature, you might want to consider looking into Usenet.
On Usenet, the servers don’t provide any fancy shmancy organization: they provide raw articles (posts) by the millions, posted from all over the world, and your local software displays and organizes it however you like.
This way you can subscribe to a group, and instruct your local software to filter out individual people or threads or subjects containing the word “cheese,” if you don’t want to read about cheese. You get arbitrarily powerful filtering with a decent Usenet reader.
Also, since Usenet has such a huge volume of traffic, far exceeding the piddly traffic on these web forums, Usenet readers are designed to handle that kind of volume. You spend a lot less time reading a lot more posts because the software is designed for quick paging through everything.
Also, the things you say on Usenet are archived forever, and part of the historical record. There are some bad things about that, but the good news is that you can dig up a post you made in 1995, and you don’t need to rely on whether some web site somewhere is still up. I post recipes to Usenet, and dig them up later by searching in Google groups (who has made the archive searchable.)
Well, technically speaking, it would be very easy to modify the board so that in your personnal user options, you got an “ignore” list and don’t see threads started by the people listed in there. It wouldnt hurt the people not caring about all this, and would help people who do. Stop trying to tell Murphy that he’s wrong, and maybe just try to see how we can accomodate people who wants what he does?
Hmmm, I don’t think this software has an “ignore user” function. I’ve looked all through the administrator functions on another phpBB board I . . . administrate . . . and didn’t see anything like that.
That sure would be a good function, though. I could block people who don’t like me, so I wouldn’t have to read their complaints about me.
MurphyStout—I think you should just ask Dale privately about this. I have seen an “ignore” option in another forum setting. It did not cause hurt to anyone.
Although here you are suggesting another solution, this is really bringing up the same idea as that other thread. I hope it does not turn into another conflagration.
You brought up a very interesting music related topic yesterday—the “bubbly” flute one. That seems to me to be a much more positive and profitable approach to the problem of finding or encouraging interesting conversations. People really did respond to that question. No feelings get hurt, people learn something, there is something interesting to think about if a person wants to think about ITM or flute playing. I would encourage you to direct your efforts more in that direction and not publicly discuss how to solve the problem of how annoying some people are. It just leads to very hurt feelings and anger from what I have observed and, in fact, makes matters even worse.
I’d have to ask Rich about it. I’m sorry to say I’m not inclined to bother him with it. Everybody has to make their own decision about how to use the board and, of course, whether to. If I’ve learned nothing else, I’ve learned there is no way to make everybody happy.
Although I understand some of the feelings behind your complaints, it seems clear to me that the thing for you to do is to stay out of the pub. Check the instrument forums, post there. We’re trying to keep the OT posts out of the forums and we’ve met with a lot of success, I believe.
I’ve made suggestions to Rich, and he’s made it pretty clear he doesn’t want to get into that kind of detail, changing parameters like that. Unless I’ve just got a much more abrasive manner than Murphy Stout when I offer suggestions and it’s a personal thing Rich has towards me.
That was my impression, too. Not an unreasonable position for him to take. It’s a pretty good system as it is, and I’ve heard, though I don’t know for certain that it’s true, that Rich has an actual life.
Actually… ‘the fuss’ is everyone complaining about MurphyStout’s request for more music and less current events.
Let’s all reconsider what is going on here.
The board really is out of control.
Dale admits it and admits to not having a solution that suits everyone.
WILL SOMEONE OFFER A VIABLE SOLUTION AND NOT A COMPLAINT ?
Here’s a thought.
Consider if… this were an e-mail based message board, like LISTSERV.HEANET.IE or ITRAD… then EVERYONE would get a copy of every message posted. That would mean HUNDREDS of e-mails would be in everyone’s mail box every day.
How long do you think it would take before “WE” decide to curtail the non-musicial “I found a dried booger in my left nostril” type of posts?
Custom modifications to the software that runs the board is not an option, so blocking posts from individuals is out of the question. We need some self discipline here more than anything.
Would a ‘COMMON SENSE’ rule to exercise courtesy that as the board continues to grow and the percentage of ‘new things musicial’ keeps shrinking as our ‘personal life interactions’ seems to be talking over.
Perhaps a reminder screen when making a post “Am I making a valuable contribution to the board” make you reconsider what you say before hitting the enter key?
Has any question of serious musical nature gone unread and unanswered on these boards? Has anyone seen another person floundering for info on one of the music specific boards? Has anyone chained off the entrances to the music specific boards or dynamited any of the music specific threads so that visiotrs are forced to go through political and/or religious and/or fluff and/or humor threads against their will?
I most assuredly have not seen any of this.
This is not an email style forum, though, and so no-one is forced to go through buckets of frivolous stuff to get to the meat and potatos. If you are interested in the post, you go there. If you are not, you don’t. If you don’t care to read any of someone’s posting, you don’t. Pretty darned silple, really, and very easy to control. Your choice.
Also, you said, “Let’s all reconsider what is going on here.
The board really is out of control.
Dale admits it and admits to not having a solution that suits everyone.”
“The board”?? What Board? This board? The Chiff and Fipple Poststructural Pub board? This board set aside for posts and threads that hold interest for the widely varied population of the whole community to be used specifically for threads that were not appropriate for the music specific boards? This board that was specifically set up for religious/political/fluff/humor type posts? This board is “out of control”? I think you must have the wrong board.
And as for Dale admitting that it is out of control, I believe he said something more to the effect that it was not in need of much control.
I do agree that he said there is no solution to the problems claimed by some - at least none that would suit everyone.
Maybe I’m going senile or something, but I seem to remember that the whole point of creating the Poststructural Pub was so we could post off-topic posts to our hearts’ content without disrupting the whistle forum, the trad music forum, or any of the several other fora here that are devoted specifically to music. I don’t see that a “solution” (beyond what’s already been done by creating the pub) is necessary. This IS where you go for random conversation, current events, and yes, even “fluff.” If you (generic “you” here) want discussion targeted toward music, there are plenty of boards here at C&F to keep you happy.
Someone said on the other thread that we are a community, and that’s very true. We don’t, and never have, talked about music all the time, and this board was created to give the non-musical chat a non-disruptive place to go. Sure, it doesn’t suit everyone, but Dale offered the perfect solution himself…if it doesn’t suit, hang out on one of the other boards! It really isn’t that hard to skim this board once or twice a day to see if there’s anything you’re interested in reading or responding to.
