Ziggy Stardust
Absolutely Sane
It's not like we never have multiple threads on a subject on the fist page. How many Ask A Certain Flavour of Christian threads are we sporting at the moment? And lets not forget the double homophobia whammy recently.
Red Diamond Threads
- Thread starter Birdjaguar
- Start date
MobBoss
Off-Topic Overlord
If no one is being called names, no flaming/trolling, no poster being made the topic, and no specific TOS rules being broken......
Then whats the problem?
I see where it was brought up that the overall goal was to bring OT to the level of the Roman forum where the senate came to debate........
Do you really think those Romans didnt 'bicker'?
I get the impression that someone is putting the old romans upon a pedastal they probably dont deserve. They were human, just like us, and just like us assuredly argued much the same way we do. Probably worse. As I recall, wasnt Julius Ceasar murdered at a meeting of the Senate? How would that be infracted?
QFT, emphatically. Yes, the quasi-trolling occasionally annoys the crap out of me. Frankly, even knowing that RD threads exist where the heavily-moderated debating societies can have their elbow room makes it better, even if I hardly ever venture there. If the stupider of the stupid crap finally makes me stop contributing in a thread, I can go to (or create) the similar-topic'ed RD version for mostly-guaranteed-to-be-civilized non-stupid discussion. And I'd suspect that the RD option will end up balancing OT pretty well - the stupid-crap usual suspects will find that the threads they suck down into the mud will become echo chambers as everyone drifts to the RDs instead, and perhaps they'll scale back a bit as a result, or they'll exceed even the (new) greater latitude given to non-RD threads and get whacked with a mod stick and the thread will get closed.
Sorry, but this just isn't true, and Ziggy said it but I'd weight in too. Maybe RD gives the OP more say in how actual infractions are dealt, gaining some influence on that with the mods, but in every other way, OPs have had massive and often unjustified control of petty things for years. There are hundreds if not thousands of counterexamples all across the entire forums, not just OT where it's also true but including the civ boards. The number of times posts have been dismissed, removed, or split off merely because the OP decides they don't want to discuss a particular valid strategy are staggering.
If anything, it would be great if there was moderator consensus to remove excessive OP control as it exists except for the new RD threads (but you don't have the equivalent of RD on the rest of the forums) but it's certainly never been the standard.
LucyDuke
staring at the clock
Woah. There's an enormous difference between allowing and encouraging. You don't like that flavor, go to the RD thread. Encourage that. Obviously some posters like the bickering. Sometimes I do. It's not rule-breaking, it's not a freaking... pink cubic zirconia. It's just a regular thread. Ding the actual rule-breakers and let the rest be.
We have two threads on a single topic all the time. Seriously, watch for it, it's not even uncommon. And dammit Ziggy! Why must you post everything I'm going to post before I post it?! Like all the time, man!
Actual discussion does take place in those bickerfests. It's not high-brow, it's down in the dirt and it doesn't go out of its way to be polite but there's discussion. Until you lock it.
Ziggy Stardust
Absolutely Sane
Well it wouldn't make much sense posting what you're going to post after you posted it now would it?
There's some instances when a thread absolutely is the OP's, and should be. The "Ask a..." threads, for example, or some of the hypothetical question threads. In other forums, there are other examples- some of the questions in tech support sub-forums and every AAR in Other Games or story in one of the S&T subforums, are pretty much the OP's thread. Not that they should have excessive control over their thread, or anything like that, but it's certainly theirs.
Now, Random Rants, or Political Issue X, or "What is your favorite breakfast cereal?"-type threads aren't really the OP's at all, and shouldn't be treated as such.
I've always thought a lot fewer threads should be controlled by overzealous OPs than there are anyway, don't get me wrong. It's the perception that RD is somehow changing this which is way off, it's not changing anything regarding what an OP can do to their thread except the slight effect on infractions.
Or at least, RD really shouldn't be changing what an OP can do with their threads, that echoes a lot of everyone's worries that this is really going to end up with the mods and not OPs (let alone all the other posters) deciding on where some discussions go.
Or at least, RD really shouldn't be changing what an OP can do with their threads, that echoes a lot of everyone's worries that this is really going to end up with the mods and not OPs (let alone all the other posters) deciding on where some discussions go.
Cynovolans
Not in my dimension.
I've noticed some polls with Red Diamonds also have joke options. I think that goes against the purpose of the Red Diamond.
LucyDuke
staring at the clock
Joke options serve as "none of the above". "None of the above" is appropriate in the most sterile environments, Red Diamond isn't meant to be perfectly sterile, I don't see the need to sterilize a joke option for a Red Diamond thread.
Mods might take note of what impression folks are getting of the Red Diamond business. Please correct me if Red Diamond threads are meant to be absolutely devoid of humor.
Mods might take note of what impression folks are getting of the Red Diamond business. Please correct me if Red Diamond threads are meant to be absolutely devoid of humor.
No, joke options are fine. I 'spose if a poll was entirely joke options (presumably to go with a spammy OP), then it wouldn't be acceptable, but humour is certainly allowed! You just have to provide some content alongside that humour, which is what the other poll options are for.
I'll get to some other points later.
I'll get to some other points later.
Perhaps the moderators need to keep this image in mind before they infract, because much of what is infracted isn't that much different than what the Senators of Rome of yore would have let fly.
Does this mean we can also conduct business in OT, metaphorically bury people alive, and drop metaphorical feces on them? Most of the "debate" went on in the curia; the forum was more like a combination of the American National Mall and, well, the other kind of mall.
sophie
Break My Heart
The radioactive monkeys agree.
Rashiminos
Fool Prophet
Most of the quotes provided were not even off-base, much less infractable.
You know I think the image of the forum being used in the analogy is the mythicised one, rather than something completely historically accurate. 
To get back to this point, yes, we have multiple threads on a given general topic (e.g. homosexuality, religion, US politics), but we don't have duplicate threads on specific news items. No duplicate thread for California adding some bits of gay history into their curriculum. No duplicate thread on 50% of Texan students being suspended. If you were to start one, it would be closed. That's how it's always been. You can start a thread on the same general topic, but the majority of threads are specific rather than general (and if a rather general thread exists already, then starting another thread on the same topic will probably result in a lock as well; if you were to post a thread asking whether or not homosexuality was wrong, it would be locked if one was already active). Yes, you can have a thread about the Californian curriculum and a thread about religious views on homosexuality at the same time, for example, even though they are both about the general topic of 'homosexuality'. But you can't have a second thread on either of those more specific topics. That is how the rules currently stand. So allowing for both an RD thread and a non-RD thread on the Californian curriculum, to continue the example, would be a change from this rule. I'm not ruling out the possibility of such a change here (I don't think we're really ruling out any reasonable possibilities at the moment), just saying that it would be one, because currently duplicate threads are not allowed. I think you're talking about more general topics than what make up most threads.
So if we were to allow two threads on the same news item; one RD and one non-RD, how would that pan out in terms of activity? History seems to suggest that people are generally attracted to a fire. Troll threads often get very high activity. Does this mean that the worse of the two threads will be preferred, because it gives people more of an opportunity to troll, or to observe trolls, or to watch others squirm? What happens when a moderator action is posted in the RD thread to improve the quality? Wouldn't it just be easier for the poster in question to take it to the non-RD thread, rather than actually being bothered to think about what they're posting? Doesn't this create an echo chamber? And wouldn't this drag with them those that they are arguing against (because there is someone WRONG in the other thread)? Is that an accurate representation of what people prefer? I'd be tempted to follow a conversation to the non-RD thread if it meant there was someone to actually argue against, but in reality I'd most likely prefer to be arguing against them in a situation in which they had to abide by the RD standard. But because I would've jumped ship to the non-RD thread, it gets my activity instead, and the RD thread dies. I think a lot of the time unless you've got two sides who are willing to engage in a civil and productive discussion it's a race to the bottom in terms of posting quality. If one side of the argument doesn't want to play ball and discuss an issue, then they'll move the conversation to being of a lower quality. RD threads largely work on the basis of 'if you want to discuss this issue, please abide by these standards/conventions', but if on any given topic you can instead go and not abide by those standards/conventions, can they actually be upheld?
Perhaps that's a rather pessimistic view of what would happen. How do you think two simultaneously running threads on the same news item would pan out if one were RD and one non-RD?
To get back to this point, yes, we have multiple threads on a given general topic (e.g. homosexuality, religion, US politics), but we don't have duplicate threads on specific news items. No duplicate thread for California adding some bits of gay history into their curriculum. No duplicate thread on 50% of Texan students being suspended. If you were to start one, it would be closed. That's how it's always been. You can start a thread on the same general topic, but the majority of threads are specific rather than general (and if a rather general thread exists already, then starting another thread on the same topic will probably result in a lock as well; if you were to post a thread asking whether or not homosexuality was wrong, it would be locked if one was already active). Yes, you can have a thread about the Californian curriculum and a thread about religious views on homosexuality at the same time, for example, even though they are both about the general topic of 'homosexuality'. But you can't have a second thread on either of those more specific topics. That is how the rules currently stand. So allowing for both an RD thread and a non-RD thread on the Californian curriculum, to continue the example, would be a change from this rule. I'm not ruling out the possibility of such a change here (I don't think we're really ruling out any reasonable possibilities at the moment), just saying that it would be one, because currently duplicate threads are not allowed. I think you're talking about more general topics than what make up most threads.
So if we were to allow two threads on the same news item; one RD and one non-RD, how would that pan out in terms of activity? History seems to suggest that people are generally attracted to a fire. Troll threads often get very high activity. Does this mean that the worse of the two threads will be preferred, because it gives people more of an opportunity to troll, or to observe trolls, or to watch others squirm? What happens when a moderator action is posted in the RD thread to improve the quality? Wouldn't it just be easier for the poster in question to take it to the non-RD thread, rather than actually being bothered to think about what they're posting? Doesn't this create an echo chamber? And wouldn't this drag with them those that they are arguing against (because there is someone WRONG in the other thread)? Is that an accurate representation of what people prefer? I'd be tempted to follow a conversation to the non-RD thread if it meant there was someone to actually argue against, but in reality I'd most likely prefer to be arguing against them in a situation in which they had to abide by the RD standard. But because I would've jumped ship to the non-RD thread, it gets my activity instead, and the RD thread dies. I think a lot of the time unless you've got two sides who are willing to engage in a civil and productive discussion it's a race to the bottom in terms of posting quality. If one side of the argument doesn't want to play ball and discuss an issue, then they'll move the conversation to being of a lower quality. RD threads largely work on the basis of 'if you want to discuss this issue, please abide by these standards/conventions', but if on any given topic you can instead go and not abide by those standards/conventions, can they actually be upheld?
Perhaps that's a rather pessimistic view of what would happen. How do you think two simultaneously running threads on the same news item would pan out if one were RD and one non-RD?
Mise
isle of lucy
It means that we get to choose whether we want to post in the trolly thread or to post in the RD thread. Some people will want less moderation and more pithy one liners and therefore choose the former; others will want more serious debate and less petty bickering and will choose the latter. People who don't want to read the trolls will have a troll-free thread to read and post in instead. People who like to argue in the JR/MobBoss style can do so without annoying those who want to be high-brow scholars or whatever. It's win-win: Everyone is happy.
Apart from you.
Apart from you.
So if I'm arguing with someone in an RD thread, and they get told to lift their game, but instead take the easy way out and vacate to the non-RD thread, with me following to continue the argument, does that mean that I deep down or subconsciously want a more trollish thread rather than an RD thread? Some level of serious debate relies on having someone to debate against. And if the complaint is (and has been) that those that you are arguing against aren't allowing for serious discussion because they're posting absurd strawmen (or something else that wouldn't be acceptable in an RD thread), then offering an option in which it is still allowable for those strawmen to be posted doesn't solve the problem. It's allowing an opt-in to moderation for trolls, and dragging the whole conversation to the venue that they choose (because someone is WRONG and that means people will argue it, whether they would actually prefer something of a higher quality or not).
