My feeling on the matter, to put it a little harshly, is that we shouldn't start a thread (or multiple threads) just because some people are slightly inconvenienced. We're back to the board not being all things to all people.

Wow. Dana, I'm so glad you said what you did. I completely agree.

Furthermore, I feel fairly strongly that the ME/Jossverse/Minearverse is essentially still our charter. The other stuff, we all talk about and that's fine, but I think there will be a significant shift by focused threads for other shows. A shift I won't be pleased to see.

Oh, and I lurve the whitefont, especially the masterful non-spoily but tantalizing versions.

Furthermore, I feel fairly strongly that the ME/Jossverse/Minearverse is essentially still our charter. The other stuff, we all talk about and that's fine, but I think there will be a significant shift by focused threads for other shows. A shift I won't be pleased to see.

Mmmmmm, yeah, but, we weren't happy to see Buffy, Angel, Firefly, Wonderfalls, and (soon) Tru Calling get cancelled. That's what happens.

Liese agrees with me! Whoo!

To continue with the theme of harshness, I still haven't really seen any convincing arguments. I've seen a series of "it bothers me to read whitefont", "it bothers me to miss the beginning of the discussion", "it bothers me to try and re-start the discussion later", etc.

We have threadsuck. We have bookmarks. We have a shortcut for spoiler font. We're a demanding bunch. I don't understand how a TV thread, or individual TV threads are really going to solve any of these problems. There will still be whitefont. There will still be people on tape or TiVo or West Coast delay. There will still be natter in those threads when someone else would still rather be talking about the episode.

Mmmmmm, yeah, but, we weren't happy to see Buffy, Angel, Firefly, Wonderfalls, and (soon) Tru Calling get cancelled. That's what happens.

I don't understand your point.

I don't understand your point.

That those things that got us started are gone. While I think we need to keep threads going for them, because there will always be discussion, it's a type of obsolescence to be unwilling to move on from that. Either that, or freakishness a la old school Trekkies.

Oh yeah! I'm obsolete and a freak. Thanks, Gandalfe!!

Also, agreeing with Dana.

And, can I ask how tabling a discussion works? You table the discussion and then? What? When you're ready to restart it, you do for another four days etc?

I think that when you make a motion to table a discussion, the motion should include the period of time for which it will be tabled.

Meep! Honestly, I don't want this to turn into the navel-gazing tell me about procedures discussion, but I was confused.

Based on the feedback I've gotten, I am tabling the proposal for one week. When/if I bring it back, it will be about starting specific threads for specific shows.

It looks like one week was specified to allow time for polls.

It looks like one week was specified to allow time for polls.

Thanks, Aurelia. And yeah, I'd like to design a poll by the end of the day tomorrow-ish (basically, I just need to know how to write it up and send it to a Stompy to get coded, since it looks like we know what will be on it), leave it up through Tuesday, see the results, and then come up with a proposal we can bring to a vote next Friday or so.

To continue with the theme of harshness, I still haven't really seen any convincing arguments.

And to go with my own harshness, I haven't seen any convincing arguments against starting new threads to reflect new TV interests. And while whitefont and not being able to find discussions may seem like low barriers to you, they're high enough barriers to keep many people out of conversations they would like to have.

I've seen a few people say that they don't feel we should start new threads until discussion about the topics overwhelms Natter; the problem with that is, almost by definition, nothing is going to overwhelm Natter. It's just not in the nature of the beast. It's theoretically possible, I suppose, but vanishingly unlikely. On the other hand, if you're coming at this from the POV that doesn't read Natter constantly, trying to find and pursue a specific conversation *is* overwhelming.