A thread to discuss naming threads, board policy, new thread suggestions, and anything else that has to do with board administration and maintenance. Guaranteed to include lively debate and polls. Natter discouraged, but not deleted.
Current Stompy Feet: Jon B, P.M. Marcontell, Liese S., amych, msbelle, shrift, Dana, Laura
Stompy Emerita: ita, DXMachina
I was thinking the questions would be set up like a poll where everyone has only one choice to select.
Which isn't perfect but it's something and would be easier to track than complicated answers.
As for the reason why it's rather selfish I admit. People keep talking about majority and minority opinions on things, but I can't get my head around how many peple that is and how big it is.
I have no idea how many people we have that regularly either post or lurk. I know it's more than 100 but in the past 6 (Excluding the SPN poll) 100 or less people voted and some of those peole were lurkers.
People have said that Bitches and Natter are the core experience of Buffistas but then there are others who don't go to either thread. How many people are we talking about? What if it's not as big a difference as people think?
I'd like to see some solid numbers and data. It would make things a lot clearer for me.
We've done A poll before. it doesn't look like the one being proposed now. ANd honestly. only 2 questions on tv is what that last poll was. nothing like what at least I am suggesting.
Excuse me for interrupting here, but what were the results of our last vote?
Well, the last Lightbulbs discussion didn't come to a vote, yet. We decided we wanted to talk more. Actually I thought we were taking a rest before talking more, but I was apparently mistaken.
good grief, I read press all the time, and I missed that! I've been looking for the thread for almost 2 weeks.
Askye hits it, for me. I--and others--have been proceeding on the assumption that Natter, Bitches, possibly Music and Other Media, as well as a tv thread or two is the core Buffista experience.
What if that's not the majority experience? What if only 60-70 people--very vocal people--use the board that way, and there are a couple hundred who check in every day to monitor Minearverse or Boxed Set, mostly lurk, may occasionally post in those threads, and go nowhere else on the board? They never interact outside the threads that interest them, and have no wish to. Their experience is the discussion of a couple of narrow points of focus, not a broad range of people and subject.
- If* that's the case then it suggests to me that it doesn't matter to the majority of posters not the majority of posters in Bureaucracy, but the majority of people actually using the board, that the "community" we've been so proud of and so careful of damaging isn't that important. That we are, in reality, just another tv board, so we can get on with a thread for every show and let go of the "community" aspect of the board.
I think it's premature to get worked up over that possibility. We should see what the majority says and hold the concern unless and until the results seem skewed from the prevalent opinions among the long-time community members. I feel I should point out that even the long-time community members seem to be far from consensus about what the board is and should be.
I'm fairly opposed to changing the user experience here to fit a possibly larger group of casual users (non bureaucrats and nonvoters). In fact this suggestion is making me kind of ill, but I don't want to be passive aggressive about it. Also I know this tension has been expressed uncounted times here. I find this Clay Shirky article fairly persuasive, though I'm not sure how persuasive others will: [link]
If we want to alienate the users that make this community, allowing casual users to trump is a good way to go about it.
