Site Topics - Part II

[CDFS]



Its my fault. I tried to redirect in my other post.
Since Vox left the discussion its gone in a different direction. Sounds like the whole topic is a wrap.

idfnl,

You're right. It is (partly) your fault. If I was so actively inclined I could find enough posts to show that you are a part of what is wrong on the forum as well. My take on you: Sanctimony and crassness are your weapons; perservering misunderstanding your defense. The sanctimony makes the rest unpalatable to me.

I've been trying to keep my mouth shut about this because I tend to get a bit emotional when the subject of the downfall of this forum comes up. I pre-date everyone in this thread so far save Fok, J, Matt, Manton, and RJ. Don't let the join date fool you, this isn't my first iteration, and not by banning either. I've been here through my own personal death, destruction, resurrection, homelessness, poverty, disease, despair, shame, and just about every other ****** thing that can happen to someone. One of the constants throughout all that has been this forum. Most of you don't know that, or anything about me mostly because I keep my business to myself and have seen what sharing too much publicly here gets you, but this place has been the only place I hang out on the internet for quite some time. I've met some amazing people through this site, and been able to experience things that I never imagined I'd see, all through the help and kindness of the people I've met through here. Its really been incredible for me. Having said that, this place is a pale shadow of what it once was, and it really makes me sad, and quite angry. It started long before the commodization of the forum through Huddler and the infinite ad attack. Long before the entire front page of MC was clogged up with 9 out of 10 threads belonging to someone selling something and the forum's main goal became quantity and not quality. Long before every inbred jackoff with internet access seemingly found this place, signed up, and started posting up whatever ************* outfit he was wearing while simultaneously becoming a nuisance to every other good poster on the board. The rot's been seeping in for some time now and its almost at the point where everything needs to be replaced because no one was paying attention and now its too far gone to be repaired.
Short of blowing up this place and starting from scratch (which becomes a more interesting idea to me as each day passes on here), its got to start from the top down. Since J abdicated his duties, Fok's turned into The Man, and Matt left, the ship been lacking someone who can step in and quiet down the inmates. The lack of moderation on here has really been pathetic. Its more than someone just reading reported posts, flagging spam, and banning people. Someone's got to step in and tell people to shut the **** up. With consequences. The fact that you've empowered people to do it and did not even explain to them what in the hell they could do should be evidence enough that maybe, just maybe, you've ****ed up and dropped the ball. And while picking the most respected members of the forum might sound like a good idea in theory, picking the starting squad from Pleasantville isn't really going to leave anyone quaking in their boots. Manton's the only one who I suspect will have the requisite chutzpah to be able to tamp things down BEFORE posts start needing to be deleted. Once you've hit that point you've already lost whatever momentum you were building in the thread and then you're just going to have all the jackoffs here wondering about why all their posts were deleted and "no one ever told me there was an issue". If anyone needs a reference, just take a look at the WAYWRN thread and see how things have been left to fester. That's actually what prompted me to post - these ****ing lemmings are in there talking about this newb's teeth and just taking a piss out of the kid for no other reason than he posted a picture of himself smiling. Its a ****ing disgrace. And I don't want to hear any **** from you mods about "well, we didn't know" or "no one told us". People have been bitching about this **** for weeks. And not just MC. SW&D, CE, DT they've all got posters who are doing nothing but ******** up the forum and making things miserable for everyone else. All the braying and gnashing of teeth over the "things that are good/bad" threads could have been killed several times over if someone with some authority would have just said "next person who posts about their bowel movement, or a ******* snack cake, is getting 2 weeks timeout." Did that happen? Obviously not. How someone like Arthur PE ended up at 700+ posts before someone decided to step up to the plate and knock him out of the park is a complete ******* mystery. Also, this special flower idea is ridiculous. This forum needs WAY less special flower treatment and WAY more of people being told to just stand up, step away from the keyboard, and shut the **** up. And leave DT alone. You people who don't like it need to just take your **** and get out of there. Frankly, its one of the only redeeming areas on the forum left. The reason its gotten so ****** lately is because the good posters don't want to have to deal with the jackoff's who currently make up 60-70% of the posters in there. Again, lack of moderation. CE's the same way. But CE's ALWAYS been that way. The problem now is that the degenerates are being allowed to bleed into other parts of the forum, most prominently, DT. You really don't see too much of this **** in Fine Living and Social Life. I suspect its because those forums are just generally boring by themselves and these people see no benefit in stirring up the **** in there.

 

[idfnl]



idfnl,
You're right. It is (partly) your fault. If I was so actively inclined I could find enough posts to show that you are a part of what is wrong on the forum as well. My take on you: Sanctimony and crassness are your weapons; perservering misunderstanding your defense. The sanctimony makes the rest unpalatable to me.

And admitted as such in multiple posts. You're search would be successful, I've been guilty of abuse. Post a list of them if it suits you. Just because I have been part of the problem doesn't preclude me from talking openly about it.

It comes as no surprise someone might try to turn it on me, its a symptom of unclean hands in the matter as well as a certain sense of entitlement by others who feel they are higher on the pecking order and should put one in his place.

So you snap judgement seem to have me summed me up very nicely. Although it seems rather contrived, as if you read it somewhere and have been looking for an appropriate place to post it. Generally, sanctimony would rely on hypocrisy. Having openly admitted my own fault in the matter I have trouble understanding your use of the term.

 

[CDFS]

^That would take me posting examples, which I'm unwilling to do here and/or now. PM me after the summer and I'll see what I can whip up for you. By the way, in this thread; you made it about you. Before that the subject was the decline of MC, C.Q. the forum and the way it could be improved be it by moderation or by setting entrance hurdles.

PS
Thank you for the backhanded compliment on my description. I thought about that one a bit longer, mainly due to the language barrier.

 

[idfnl]



^That would take me posting examples, which I'm unwilling to do here and/or now. PM me after the summer and I'll see what I can whip up for you. By the way, in this thread; you made it about you. Before that the subject was the decline of MC, C.Q. the forum and the way it could be improved be it by moderation or by setting entrance hurdles.
PS
Thank you for the backhanded compliment on my description. I thought about that one a bit longer, mainly due to the language barrier.

I wont be PMing you about that but ya, thanks for the offer.

Although I agree, I did start to own the discussion a bit, it was not intentional. I was trying to share my thoughts on improving the forum. I got swept up with personal experience BS.

Funny thing is, nobody says that about Vox when he posted 30 times about his topic of interest. Again, its the pecking order. Why didn't you try to put Vox in his place? I understand, the cover story is 'you made it about you' and you'll argue that Vox's intent was different, but roles reversed you wouldn't have challenged him either. I'm an easy target. Also, you quoted the very statement in which I admitted derailing and said we should wrap it up. I was prepared to let it rest, but you decided to revive it, not me.

I was actually aiming for a subtle jab. I didn't intend to backhand compliment you. Language barrier again.

 

[NORE]



I don't think I've ever interacted with you over the years. I have no personal beef or history. But you know what? Shut up. The above type of post is what hurts this forum. Non-quality post. Just shut-up about your history of banishment. Nobody cares. That's the kind of **** that hurts this forum. It's inane. It's not witty. It adds nothing. I've probably read hundreds of posts from you about your history here. Just stop or put it into dumb threads, but stop clogging the threads I want to read with references to your past.

I can respect your opinion and that of those whom agree with you. I am being me and I do this for a reason. Talking of times past is at the heart of the original discussion. If you don't like it, you can either skip over my posts, put me on ignore or whatever. I don't think my taking jabs at j or Fok hurts the forum. I'd like to think they tolerate it/me because I do contribute in other areas of the fora. Not sure I can say the same for you without first performing a search.

 

[RJE]

Expectations aren't realistic. After visiting SF for half an hour almost daily for the last five to ten years, just how much more stimulating conversation on the same topics can people expect? People really need to develop wider interests. I really think there's a fantastic group of people here (well, outside my incredibly long ignore list).

The boredom of some posters becomes destructive. While Vox can be a fantastic poster - clearly the best poster on SF - when he gets bored he begins thread-jacking. There's a core of acolytes wanting to remain identified with him who come out to play at these times, and threads are killed off. Once it starts, it's just not worth anyone else posting relevant material.

The Monty business... There's nothing a mod should have done. It became a pile-on, but Monty's expectations weren't the best either. I really liked Monty's shots and hope we see more of them. If he continued his sartorial journey, I suspect he has some great material for a few threads.

The merchandising is oppressive. It's not directly the affiliate marketing, it's the feeling that every second thread is trying to persuade me to buy something, whether from an affiliate or otherwise. I guess this is the result of a large group of people trying to buy their way into a clique. Brands just seemed less heavily pushed before - the objects were important, but they were important because you had and used well a great blue woollen or cashmere tie, not because you had a X's woollen or cashmere tie. There are even people proudly wearing ties with logos?! Would they wear a Target logo there? They just don't get that the principle is the same - it's not different just because it's a store with great merchandise. They're setting the brand as the identifying point to buy into the clique, rather than the intrinsic properties of the object.

In other matters... I recently noticed an affiliate with what looked like a sig for the brand, getting around my no-sig setting. Is this new?

 

[james_timothy]



For emptym and F. Corbera:
Paris change! mais rien dans ma mélancolie
N'a bougé! palais neufs, échafaudages, blocs,
Vieux faubourgs, tout pour moi devient allégorie
Et mes chers souvenirs sont plus lourds que des rocs.

Some make the place better by lifting us to a more elegant place...

...this place has been the only place I hang out on the internet for quite some time. I've met some amazing people through this site, and been able to experience things that I never imagined I'd see, all through the help and kindness of the people I've met through here. Its really been incredible for me. Having said that, this place is a pale shadow of what it once was, and it really makes me sad, and quite angry. It started long before the commodization of the forum through Huddler and the infinite ad attack. Long before the entire front page of MC was clogged up with 9 out of 10 threads belonging to someone selling something and the forum's main goal became quantity and not quality. ...

Some make it better by being crass, loud, and right on.

When we have both, the place is really special. When we have neither.. I go read the blogs.

 

[Baron]



Expectations aren't realistic. After visiting SF for half an hour almost daily for the last five to ten years, just how much more stimulating conversation on the same topics can people expect? People really need to develop wider interests. I really think there's a fantastic group of people here (well, outside my incredibly long ignore list).
The boredom of some posters becomes destructive. While Vox can be a fantastic poster - clearly the best poster on SF - when he gets bored he begins thread-jacking. There's a core of acolytes wanting to remain identified with him who come out to play at these times, and threads are killed off. Once it starts, it's just not worth anyone else posting relevant material.
The Monty business... There's nothing a mod should have done. It became a pile-on, but Monty's expectations weren't the best either. I really liked Monty's shots and hope we see more of them. If he continued his sartorial journey, I suspect he has some great material for a few threads.
The merchandising is oppressive. It's not directly the affiliate marketing, it's the feeling that every second thread is trying to persuade me to buy something, whether from an affiliate or otherwise. I guess this is the result of a large group of people trying to buy their way into a clique. Brands just seemed less heavily pushed before - the objects were important, but they were important because you had and used well a great blue woollen or cashmere tie, not because you had a X's woollen or cashmere tie. There are even people proudly wearing ties with logos?! Would they wear a Target logo there? They just don't get that the principle is the same - it's not different just because it's a store with great merchandise. They're setting the brand as the identifying point to buy into the clique, rather than the intrinsic properties of the object.
In other matters... I recently noticed an affiliate with what looked like a sig for the brand, getting around my no-sig setting. Is this new?

You make a lot of good points. Vox needs to take some responsibility for the tone he's set in so many threads. The problem is less his own snark (though he's gotten carried away a few times) but the acolytes, as you say. The spirit of merry thread derailment became too common and too often it wasn't very funny. I also think there's still a lot of great conversation to be had here, though I spend a lot less time there than I once did, and participate a lot less as well. If I had more free time, or started buying a lot of clothes again, that might change. I also remember the Monty thing similarly to you - I thought he was being defended by the right people and criticized by people he could have just ignored, but maybe he was relatively new at that time and not prepared for the kind of responses he got and he split. I never saw that as a moderation issue, but again, it was a long time ago and I don't remember it that well.

I don't get the problems with the marketing. I don't even notice it really, but I also use an ad blocker and only visit affiliate threads when I'm interested in buying something they sell.

 

[LaoHu]



I am saddened that this crappy discussion has caused Bill to leave, again.

For a time, he posted here as voxsartoria, I believe. I am not certain of that, however. At any rate, F. Corbera is on a self-imposed leave of absence. He is missed

 

[NORE]

And to think, all he needed to do was physically threaten [imaginary] members of teh forum and he would have been on a non-self-imposed leave of absence. Oh well.

 

[NORE]

I could swear at one time using the full page editor you could edit the titles of thread you started. Can we no longer do that?

 

[j]

Quote:
Your paraphrase is not accurate as it applies to me. I agree now and did then that there were serious problems and that we needed to do something about them, but some stuff does take care of itself, and some stuff can't be fixed from the top down. But I have been falling down on my job for a very long time. I'm sorry for that, I'm certainly not proud of it, but handling this became overwhelming. With the changeover to Huddler (which I still consider a net positive from what were realistically our options at the time) I felt that I had lost a lot of power over things relating to the direction of the forum (mostly technical things). I'm not going to give you excuses about what was going on in my life except to say that there have been a lot of things competing for my attention. The idea of wading into conversations that I'm not as inclined to participate in as when we started the forum became insurmountable in my head, so I didn't even try anymore. I kept to the back end stuff, doing the moderation queue (which is different from how we used to moderate - you don't get context) and felt exhausted enough by that to excuse myself from patronizing my own establishment. In short, I didn't just drop the ball, I stabbed it and then hid it in a bush.

Quote:
WTFITS?

I realize that we've all invested heavily on this forum... and the heated debates, the rants, the complaints, etc... shows that in some degree we do care 'bout what happens in this forum. this is a good thing, from my experience with this kind of stuff once a good percentage of members become indifferent that becomes the deathbed of any forum. but I think we all should just step back, let fok, j, the mods and the dh's sort this out privately and see what happens from there. I think all of us who cares got the message.

let's go back to our regular programming.

Business can be back to usual in the whole rest of the forum, but this is what this thread is for. I can't fix everything to everyone's satisfaction, but finally I'm getting a little more concrete information into my head about what exactly is wrong. "MC is getting to be awful" may be true but it doesn't help me much in terms of fixing things. I appreciate people bringing up whatever is bothering them, even if I can't fix it all. I would like to do what I can to fix what I can.

I've been trying to keep my mouth shut about this because I tend to get a bit emotional when the subject of the downfall of this forum comes up. I pre-date everyone in this thread so far save Fok, J, Matt, Manton, and RJ. Don't let the join date fool you, this isn't my first iteration, and not by banning either. I've been here through my own personal death, destruction, resurrection, homelessness, poverty, disease, despair, shame, and just about every other ****** thing that can happen to someone. One of the constants throughout all that has been this forum. Most of you don't know that, or anything about me mostly because I keep my business to myself and have seen what sharing too much publicly here gets you, but this place has been the only place I hang out on the internet for quite some time. I've met some amazing people through this site, and been able to experience things that I never imagined I'd see, all through the help and kindness of the people I've met through here. Its really been incredible for me. Having said that, this place is a pale shadow of what it once was, and it really makes me sad, and quite angry. It started long before the commodization of the forum through Huddler and the infinite ad attack. Long before the entire front page of MC was clogged up with 9 out of 10 threads belonging to someone selling something and the forum's main goal became quantity and not quality. Long before every inbred jackoff with internet access seemingly found this place, signed up, and started posting up whatever ************* outfit he was wearing while simultaneously becoming a nuisance to every other good poster on the board. The rot's been seeping in for some time now and its almost at the point where everything needs to be replaced because no one was paying attention and now its too far gone to be repaired.

Short of blowing up this place and starting from scratch (which becomes a more interesting idea to me as each day passes on here), its got to start from the top down. Since J abdicated his duties, Fok's turned into The Man, and Matt left, the ship been lacking someone who can step in and quiet down the inmates. The lack of moderation on here has really been pathetic. Its more than someone just reading reported posts, flagging spam, and banning people. Someone's got to step in and tell people to shut the **** up. With consequences. The fact that you've empowered people to do it and did not even explain to them what in the hell they could do should be evidence enough that maybe, just maybe, you've fucked up and dropped the ball. And while picking the most respected members of the forum might sound like a good idea in theory, picking the starting squad from Pleasantville isn't really going to leave anyone quaking in their boots. Manton's the only one who I suspect will have the requisite chutzpah to be able to tamp things down BEFORE posts start needing to be deleted. Once you've hit that point you've already lost whatever momentum you were building in the thread and then you're just going to have all the jackoffs here wondering about why all their posts were deleted and "no one ever told me there was an issue".

If anyone needs a reference, just take a look at the WAYWRN thread and see how things have been left to fester. That's actually what prompted me to post - these ******* lemmings are in there talking about this newb's teeth and just taking a piss out of the kid for no other reason than he posted a picture of himself smiling. Its a ******* disgrace. And I don't want to hear any **** from you mods about "well, we didn't know" or "no one told us". People have been bitching about this **** for weeks. And not just MC. SW&D, CE, DT they've all got posters who are doing nothing but ******** up the forum and making things miserable for everyone else. All the braying and gnashing of teeth over the "things that are good/bad" threads could have been killed several times over if someone with some authority would have just said "next person who posts about their bowel movement, or a ******* snack cake, is getting 2 weeks timeout." Did that happen? Obviously not. How someone like Arthur PE ended up at 700+ posts before someone decided to step up to the plate and knock him out of the park is a complete ******* mystery.

Also, this special flower idea is ridiculous. This forum needs WAY less special flower treatment and WAY more of people being told to just stand up, step away from the keyboard, and shut the **** up. And leave DT alone. You people who don't like it need to just take your **** and get out of there. Frankly, its one of the only redeeming areas on the forum left. The reason its gotten so ****** lately is because the good posters don't want to have to deal with the jackoff's who currently make up 60-70% of the posters in there. Again, lack of moderation. CE's the same way. But CE's ALWAYS been that way. The problem now is that the degenerates are being allowed to bleed into other parts of the forum, most prominently, DT. You really don't see too much of this **** in Fine Living and Social Life. I suspect its because those forums are just generally boring by themselves and these people see no benefit in stirring up the **** in there.

I just saw the WAYWRN and did some moderating in there. I'm sorry that that was able to go on for so long and thanks for saying what you said in the thread. We are working on getting all the mods on the same page in terms of expectations.

Please keep in mind that all the mods together don't have the capacity to see everything that goes wrong, let alone address it. I sincerely appreciate your addressing the issues as you see them (and wish we had more non-mods who would do that) but please report problem posts/posters as well. The only reason I found the WAYWRN thing was a post reported by someone who was butthurt about being called out for being a dick in there. We can't be everywhere and we can't do anything if we don't hear about it.

 

[poorsod]



This is the story of Danny’s friends and of Danny's house. It is a story of how these three became one thing, so that in Tortilla Flat, if you speak of Danny's house you do not mean a structure of wood flaked with old whitewash, overgrown with an ancient untrimmed rose of Castile. No, when you speak of Danny's house you are understood to mean a unit of which the parts are men, from which came sweetness and joy, philanthropy and, in the end, a mystic sorrow. For Danny's house was not unlike the Round Table, and Danny's friends were not unlike the knights of it. And this is the story of how that group came into being, of how it flourished and grew to be an organization beautiful and wise. This story deals with the adventuring of Danny's friends, with the good they did, with their thoughts and endeavors. In the end, this story tells how the talisman was lost and how the group disintegrated.

WTFITS?

It is the summary of Steinbeck's Tortilla Flat and some critics describe it's similarity with King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tortilla_Flat

I assume Manton is using it as an analogy to the rise and fall of SF.

 

[j]

Ah, thanks. Never read much Steinbeck.

I like to think that things can rise and fall and rise again many times. I guess I should read it to find out how the talisman was lost.

 

[Douglas]

At the risk of moving the conversation beyond the scintillating discussion surrounding the fall of (stylefo)Rome (to which, btw, the clear answer is to ban everyone - from j and Fok on down to the Cabal and all the mods as well as Vox and in stitches and the inanity gang and everyone in between, and also then also change the rules so that no new members are allowed to post until they have accumulated 100 posts) -

- May I humbly suggest that the generic avatars be removed? If someone doesn't choose an avatar, they should have no avatar. I can't be the only one who skims discussions using the avatars to identify posters I want to read - but when everyone is forced to have an avatar, I have to do a double take quite frequently thanks to the generic ones.