Idea and Response to "FTR Well-Being" Thread

[Setzy]

A forum not involved with poker whatsoever that I used to highly frequent (and still stop by every now and then) has something called "UnMod", a completely unmoderated forum where anybody who wanted to could go in and make jokes about anything, off-topic about anything, DO ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING without any ramifications whatsoever. I like it, because you know exactly what you're getting into when you enter the forum. In addition, UnMod is inaccessible except to registered members, and you could have its posts not show up on the main list of "recent posts", so nobody accidentally wanders in..

Or just put a NSFW tag by Community. But I don't think the "Community" as a whole is NSFW...you see what I'm getting at?

As always, keep up the great work.

~Setz

[Xianti]

I had considered this in the past....

[ttanaka]

hmm... very interesting idea... personally, I like it. But I look out for the rest of the members here, so we'll see what they say.

[swiggidy]

I don't like it.

People could do whatever they wanted on IRC and FTR decided to distance itself from IRC for that exact reason. Why would you go back and then decide to harbor such an environment?

[bigspenda73]

FTR needs to stop supporting the ridiculous posts of some of it's veteran members. The gay bashing/racist/dead baby posts littering the commune are at the very least ridiculous. By not removing these posts and taking action against the members FTR is agreeing with these posts. Free speech is a right in the sense it is not violated. I cannot believe you would actually think of adding another forum just to allow these types of posts/thoughts/words. You have a bunch of young kids here sitting behid a keyboard typing things they would never dare say in public. I would hope your range of humor goes beyond such sensitive subjects as race and sexual preference. I would emplore the mods not only to disallow such a forum being opened but to also start disciplining some of the offensive posts we see here on a regular basis. It reflects entirely too poorly on a poker site full of insightful and (what I'm hoping) intelligent people.

[jyms]

I would agree with bigspenda, except, they are behind a keyboard, they will keep posting, and incase you haven't been watching, banning doesn't work most of the time. If you had this hidden forum, alot of good poker playing regulars would still be here commenting and participating(doggz, bailey and others come to mind). I think it's a good idea to have a forum that you can just move things into and let it be. let them have their forum, there are some great poker players here that want to vent, tell tastless jokes, or post a link that's funny (to them) let them vent, and move on. Puting a disclaimer on the forum is enough. Like it or lump it. If you don't like it stay out of the forum. I for 1 will stay out, but I'd like to see it.

Give me back my commune. But don't censor the content of the forum, just move it.

[a500lbgorilla]

ill mod the new forum.

[swiggidy]

ill mod the new forum.

lol

[jyms]

You can Un-mod the forum but still have a janitor to remove the garbage. Rilla would be fine, he can't be offended. He can remove the spam, settle arguments and move threads from the commune to his other forum when necassary. you have nothing to loose with this option. If it doesn't work and you close the forum, you only lose the garbage not recommended in other forums anyway. I think the novelty would wear off once everybody got a few posts in and there is no real shocked responses. It would end up just a NSFW type forum anyway with the odd peice of shit and some porn. DO IT. See if it works.

Hey what happened to the ttanaka post just above this one that said bad Idea????

[biondino]

Would this new forum make the community a classier, less bigoted, less Beavis-and-Butthead place? And if so, what would it become instead?

I dunno, I don't read the lame fratboy threads but they seem pretty contained, and no-one gets too uptight by and large. I'm not sure how making a forum where they're practically encouraged to be even bigger morons is a step forward.

[Warpe]

Let's encourage even more juvenile behaviour. Not.

[Rondavu]

It will spill over. People will post porn. Racists will have a field day. In short, an un-mod forum will be difficult to moderate, because you'll actually still have to moderate it.

I think things are pretty well in control right now. We get the occassional troll, but nothing unreasonable. Why open a can of worms.

[jyms]

personally I don't care either way. like i said, i won't be in there. I've really been avoiding the commune as well, except the odd standout conversation that intrigues me. I need to stay in the poker forums, I have little time these days and if it ain't porn or poker, I move on.

[Pelion]

I hate this idea. People already have a place they can post trash. Its called "the 99.999999999999999% of the internet that isnt FTR". We dont try to keep the community clean because we have to. We try to keep it clean because we dont want mindless/offensive rubbish on FTR. Giving people a forum where they are encouraged to post that stuff is going to slightly confuse the message dont you think?

[euphoricism]

My problem is I figure about 1/3rd of FTR reads the community. Therefore 2/3rds of FTR does not. And yet, this silent majority has no place to not be subjected to fratboy humor, and I suspect they overwhelmingly want a place where they can.

When you ask people, "Why dont you read the commune forum" the answer is inevitably, "I'm not amused by the fratboy humor and so I don't take part". This is sad, and it excludes a LARGE portion of our members.

I think it deserves a shot, and I've said so for a long time. We're losing our community feel.

[euphoricism]

Also, please note that the Well-Being thread was meant as satire against me for submitting the same ideas. The fratboys think we're lame for not wanting to hear their drivel.

[Pelion]

My problem is I figure about 1/3rd of FTR reads the community. Therefore 2/3rds of FTR does not. And yet, this silent majority has no place to not be subjected to fratboy humor, and I suspect they overwhelmingly want a place where they can.

When you ask people, "Why dont you read the commune forum" the answer is inevitably, "I'm not amused by the fratboy humor and so I don't take part". This is sad, and it excludes a LARGE portion of our members.

I think it deserves a shot, and I've said so for a long time. We're losing our community feel.

If thats the case then the 2 most sensible options are

a) Clean up the community we already have.
b) Make a new community forum that 2/3 of FTR will feel they can chat in.

Neither of these options require us to leave the old community unmodded. I vote for a) btw.

[euphoricism]

They dont want the community cleaned up. Xianti has made the point that 20 year old college students are FTR's target audience, and believes thats what 20 year old college students do. I'm not entirely sure I can disagree.

Yeah I mean theres no reason to stop modding the first one, but I'm not sure what you'd be modding. The overthetop racist and gay bashing posts? Yeah thats fine mod them.

I'm not sure I understand if youre making a distinction between something like a "mature" community and an "immature" one.

[ttanaka]

Hey what happened to the ttanaka post just above this one that said bad Idea????

I posted, then deleted it, and then started a new post, and then thought I'd wait and see what discussion points come up...

There is a forum strategy to have an unmodded forum or spam forum, so bullshit goes in there and stays out of the real content forums. A seminar I went to actually suggested to have one forum for this purpose.

But I think this could be a can of worms and would probably end up causing more problems. It appears that the majority is voicing this is a bad idea.

[Pelion]

Yeah I mean theres no reason to stop modding the first one, but I'm not sure what you'd be modding. The overthetop racist and gay bashing posts? Yeah thats fine mod them.

Youd be modding it pretty much how it is now .
[/quote]

If other members want an area for a "mature" community forum thats fine. My only point is that we shouldnt let the original community become completely unmodded as the original post suggests.

One question though. If the community is aimed at FTRs "target audience", why is it that 2/3 of FTRers cant stand it there?

Im not making a dig at the commune there btw. I personally enjoy reading the it. Theres alot of crap there but theres also quite alot thats funny/entertaining.

I definatly think an unmodded forum (or a less modded forum) would have a much higher crap : content ratio and would likely just become a flamewarzone. Thats not what I want to see.

[euphoricism]

I think its because FTR's target audience isn't accurate as it pertains to its actual membership base. I just think the 20somethinyearolds are louder. I'm just shocked by the number of our very active members who NEVER post in the commune. What makes them not want to take part?

Yeah I guess I can see your point about completely unmodded forums descending into chaos. It would indeed need to be lightly modded.

[Setzy]

Here is the only "law" of UnMod as posted by the head admin of the other website I am referring to.
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Topic: A note about the (limited) moderation of "Un"Mod

Site Admin

I've received numerous complaints about spamming, racism, etc. from UnMod regulars. Whilst this specific forum is designed to be very open-ended and have minimal moderation - as the name implies - there's enough semi-legitimate usage going on, and some forms of abuse are so unnecessary and resource-intensive, that the following guidelines should be kept in mind for all forums, including UnMod:

- No flooding, where flooding is defined as posting nonsense or random topics and/or replies one after the other.

- No trolling, including racism/hate speech, where the intention is clearly to offend and nothing but.

- No thread-breaking or other activities clearly intended to disrupt a topic or exploit PHPBB so as to render topics illegible.

- No posts encouraging illegal activity. Even though you yourself are solely responsible for your words, anything that would damage the reputation of OCR is fair game for deletion.

These are very generic guidelines for a reason - essentially, we have neither the time nor the inclination to patrol UnMod 24/7 looking for the above behavior. However, if we see enough of it or if we hear about it from others, your account will instantly be banned and all topics and replies made under that account will be permanently removed.

If this seems harsh, just remember that no matter how bored and/or clever you think you are when you do the above shit, your actions are not unique in any way, they prove nothing other than your lack of creativity and time management skills, and they only really result in wasting our time having to moderate you when we could be dedicating that time to running/improving this site.

Thanks,
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Other than that, it's free reign.

[Setzy]

If other members want an area for a "mature" community forum thats fine. My only point is that we shouldnt let the original community become completely unmodded as the original post suggests.

My original post was either way.
A.) Make this new, unmoderated forum.
or
B.) Put NSFW tag by all Commune posts.

At the end of my post I actually stated the opposite, that I didn't think the Community is NSFW.

Basically UnMod becomes its own corner..like ttanaka said, its a place where the rest of the folks at FTR don't have to see or put up with some bullshit. The reason I really support the idea is because the unmoderated forum lets you blow off your steam, go say or post whatever meaningless junk you want, then you can move over to whatever sections you frequent and put in some real, valuable input.

[biondino]

The fascist in me says that I don't want to be part of a club that courts the people who'd use this proposed cesspit, but then it really does take all sorts. Ultimately, I don't think it's necessary, and the mods, in their infinite patience, should continue their excellent work at making the whole of FTR a nice place to be almost all the time.