To all members of the Escapist: Please help us improve this site

[Lullabye]

Thanks for the spoiler box. I already knew though but some of the wierder ones.....
anywho, that thing about people going into a thread just to complain gave me an idea. What if the person who made the thread had the power to ban people from the thread as well. Or maybe we could incorporate a system of some sort that won't let you go into a thread because you don't have the requirmnts. Like a dead baby badge is needed to qualify for a contrversal joke thread, and you can't get it till you show your neutral or accepting or not whiney.
EDIT: okay maybe a dead baby badge isn't such a good idea but you get my drift.

 

[Zersy]

Less platform fanboyism. Every person has an opinion on what THEY want to play games on. Respect it.

this pretty much solved it

Thank you. Good to see someone sees it my way.

No Probs afterall i'm a True Gamer !

 

[Liverandbacon]

The problem that I see is a general decline in thread quality. Now 90% of threads seem to be repeats of ones only one day old, have incomprehensible grammar and spelling, or are simply trollish. These threads aren't helped by the people saying "Correct your grammar", "Report and move on", and "Get off our forums you troll!". People also don't seem to get put on probation for this sort of behaviour as much as they used to.

People need to actually report and move on instead of loudly announcing to the world: "Hey guys! I reported and moved on and you should too!" No, you didn't. You just exacerbated the problem. Both old and new members alike do these things, so seniority is pretty much moot. Perhaps there needs to be a massive wave of probations in order to discourage these behaviours, so that people will learn. Bans will not solve the problem, and will just anger people, but temporary suspensions or probation are the online equivalent of a friendly warning.

Another problem I've seen recently is the proliferation of "Watchmen" threads. Luckily that has been mostly stopped by the creation of an official thread. I think perhaps we'll need to preemptively create an official Half Life 2 Episode 3 thread when it's released, or the forums might as well be renamed "The Half Life Episode 3 Discussion Escapist forums."

 

[Galletea]

snip

I don't think that there is that marked a difference in the forum quality. It is merely that you have seen the threads before. When I joined there were a lot of threads with the first few posts telling people to use the search button.

 

[Liverandbacon]

snip

I don't think that there is that marked a difference in the forum quality. It is merely that you have seen the threads before. When I joined there were a lot of threads with the first few posts telling people to use the search button.

I'm not talking about since I've joined, I'm talking about since I started watching these forums. I tend to lurk in forums for close to a year before registering.

 

[GenHellspawn]

Because this is a forum. A forum is a place where people state opinions and have debates, not sling petty insults at just because they don't agree.

I haven't been seeing a lot of the former lately, but I'm sure there's a real debate going on somewhere that I haven't seen yet. At least, I hope so.

 

[Iceman23]

The Escapist, ladies and gentlemen, is a place, and like any place it has problems. Some are there when the place first comes into creation, others develop as said place grows.

We have always had "repeat threads", and the people who cry foul about there existence, even in the "Good Old Days," when we were like a true community with one another, when we could easily find each other and start up a good conversation about damn near anything. If you don't believe me that we've had repeat threads in the old days just take a look at this one <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.52626?page=1> here . Within the first ten posts of that thread, someone stated that that type of thread had been done already, exactly like people are doing now.

These types of threads remained few and far between because, frankly, we were a small enough community that we all knew what had been done already, and what we would all say in regards to it. However, like any forum, we eventually began to grow larger, and newer people who did not know about the threads that we had already created and discussed came, and began to start these topics again. We however, knew that these topics had been done, and so we informed these newcomers of this, and, for the most part, went on our marry way back to the newer topics that had been created by "us."

As time went on however, The Escapist continued to grow, and an even larger number of rehashed threads began to surface, blocking out all of the newer threads about topics that had not been discussed before. This made finding all of the people we had come to know, our community, more difficult as they avoided these repeat threads because they had, obviously, discussed this topic before, and did not wish to do it again, and so the members of our community began to become harder to find, and we began to loose our ability to bring a good discussion together like we had before.

So I suppose what I'm trying to convey here is that we have grown, both in terms of size, and by extension, farther apart, thus killing what we used to be. So to remedy this, I ask that all of us from the "Good Old Days" add one another to our friends lists, keep in contact with one another, and when we create new threads, inform one another of their existence so we can get everyone in on it.

That, is at least what I believe we can do to remedy our current predicament.

 

[Inverse Skies]

So I suppose what I'm trying to convey here is that we have grown, both in terms of size, and by extension, farther apart, thus killing what we used to be. So to remedy this, I ask that all of us from the "Good Old Days" add one another to our friends lists, keep in contact with one another, and when we create new threads, inform one another of their existence so we can get everyone in on it.

That, is at least what I believe we can do to remedy our current predicament.

I like that idea, it'll help stop some of the newer threads which haven't been done before becoming buried under the sea of slightly rehashed or repeated ones. Please keep the good ideas coming, I'm thinking of submitting them soon.

 

[Trivun]

I'm sorry, but I just assume people who have ZP avatars, or worship Yahtzee, are new here.

That does not make sense, something you have against Yahtzee Mr. Juge A Book By Its Cover?

Nevermind him.

That's prejudice and bigotry.
Whatever argument he may pull from there is moot and void.
Just carry on and ignore him.

SpartanBanana is the prime example of what's wrong with some of the old posters here. Jesus Christ, this looks like the situation in 4chan.

"The cancer that's killing /b/" ? Ever heard of it? That's what I'm seeing right now.
A site, getting popular and the old people screaming at the new people for "ruining" the site. When they in fact didn't ruin it at all.

The old pretentious elitist twats are not part of the solution, but part of the problem.

People who had/have ZP avatars:

Trivun.
Eggo.
Fire_Daemon.

And those people completely and utterly rock.

Too bad Eggo got banned...for reasons unbeknownst to me.

It really was only a matter of time though.

As for me right now, I'm off to bed. Goodnight folks.

Sorry to drag this up, but I was just searching through old forum threads and found this by accident. Anyway, I just wanted to mention, I'm pretty surprised that I was included on that small list? I never really thought of myself as being well known on the Escapist, so I was just slightly surprised to be referenced somewhere. Anyway, I agree with your point about Eggo, but he was banned for a proper reason I think. Trolling or something, I think he was in a forum argument with someone and got in trouble for that.

For the sake, however, of contributing to this discussion, I think that the main reason the Escapist is one of the best gaming forums on the internet is because we have so many mature and smart people posting. Unlike /b/, people make an effort to follow the forum guidelines and rules and not post crap. Obviously this doesn't account for everyone, although a lot of it is common sense, but the mods do a fine job (above and beyond what they should reasonably be expected to do) in weeding out the bad from the good and keeping the integrity and reputation of the site and it's members intact. I have to say I do sometimes disagree with the mod's decisions, like in some cases where I feel they've been too lenient with offenders, but at the same time I'm not complaining and they definitely do a great job on the site. However, I suppose more needs to be done to some extent by the creators of the site's forums to prevent people from making repeat threads by mistake (I suppose a few weeks is acceptable, though).

 

[Mr.Pandah]

I'm sorry, but I just assume people who have ZP avatars, or worship Yahtzee, are new here.

That does not make sense, something you have against Yahtzee Mr. Juge A Book By Its Cover?

Nevermind him.

That's prejudice and bigotry.
Whatever argument he may pull from there is moot and void.
Just carry on and ignore him.

SpartanBanana is the prime example of what's wrong with some of the old posters here. Jesus Christ, this looks like the situation in 4chan.

"The cancer that's killing /b/" ? Ever heard of it? That's what I'm seeing right now.
A site, getting popular and the old people screaming at the new people for "ruining" the site. When they in fact didn't ruin it at all.

The old pretentious elitist twats are not part of the solution, but part of the problem.

People who had/have ZP avatars:

Trivun.
Eggo.
Fire_Daemon.

And those people completely and utterly rock.

Too bad Eggo got banned...for reasons unbeknownst to me.

It really was only a matter of time though.

As for me right now, I'm off to bed. Goodnight folks.

Sorry to drag this up, but I was just searching through old forum threads and found this by accident. Anyway, I just wanted to mention, I'm pretty surprised that I was included on that small list? I never really thought of myself as being well known on the Escapist, so I was just slightly surprised to be referenced somewhere. Anyway, I agree with your point about Eggo, but he was banned for a proper reason I think. Trolling or something, I think he was in a forum argument with someone and got in trouble for that.

For the sake, however, of contributing to this discussion, I think that the main reason the Escapist is one of the best gaming forums on the internet is because we have so many mature and smart people posting. Unlike /b/, people make an effort to follow the forum guidelines and rules and not post crap. Obviously this doesn't account for everyone, although a lot of it is common sense, but the mods do a fine job (above and beyond what they should reasonably be expected to do) in weeding out the bad from the good and keeping the integrity and reputation of the site and it's members intact. I have to say I do sometimes disagree with the mod's decisions, like in some cases where I feel they've been too lenient with offenders, but at the same time I'm not complaining and they definitely do a great job on the site. However, I suppose more needs to be done to some extent by the creators of the site's forums to prevent people from making repeat threads by mistake (I suppose a few weeks is acceptable, though).

I wish I was on that list =P but I never had a ZP avatar, so I mean...if I did, I totally would've been on it.

Anyways adding onto your thoughts about the repeat threads, I thought that perhaps it could search back through some thread titles and if the same thread title comes up, it won't let you create the thread. I mean, this will only happen if the thread is exactly like another one, but it will at least stop some threads, like "OMG MOMENTS IN GAMING".

Then again, people will probably just change one letter in the title and post it anyway. Dumb idea.

 

[Raven's Nest]

anyway here's a suggestion...

When a user is signing up, have them read through the forum guidlines then make them fill out a little question sheet before they're allowed to post. Just to make sure they've read it. If they still can't be good within 50 posts or so, they won't get any sympathy from me and my report button.

That's a sensible idea as well. I knew some good ideas would eventually start coming out of this thread Later on I'll start compiling them into a letter which I can PM one of the staff with, unless of course they're reading this thread.

Ooh ooh ooh! I've got another one for you...

We could have some way of rating a thread, could be a simple 0 to 5 star rating.
This would allow people to instantly see the good threads and help avoid and take less attention from the bad or poorly written ones.

This could lead to many things, like new badges for one. I also think it would help teach the newer members how to make better threads. If the older members want to continue to take the lead by example approach, surely this would further that cause in a positive way, perhaps more so than the traditional karma ratings for individual posts.

To avoid the spamming of star ratings, enable only posters who have recieved the Trinity badge, or have 250 posts or something.

 

[Inverse Skies]

Thank you to everyone who contributed to this post.

I've PM'd Tom with a list of the better suggestions, so hopefully some good can come out of it and we can improve the nature of the community as a whole.

Again, thankyou for posting.

 

[timmytom1]

I`ve only been here a few weeks and it`s a nice place (far better than the forums i started off in)the only minor issue i`ve had was someone bemoaning my excessive use of question marks.

 

[Inverse Skies]

It's been a couple of weeks now since I PM'd Tom with the message and now it's time to give some critical feedback.

I would strongly encourage others to share their ideas of what they have seen in the previous few weeks/days on the Escapist to give a better overall community picture of what is happening.

1 There seem to have been a lot more suspensions/locking of threads being handed out than in previous times when I've been on here. If the moderators are taking a stronger stance I say fantastic and good on them.

2 The commuity is acting a lot kinder towards those who have made repeat threads and/or threads in which they have accidentally hit the enter button resulting in (no text). They're actually starting to become humourous as members of the community make little jokes about the no text post rather than blasting the creator. For this I say, well done to all of us. It is this sort of attitude which is going to help us grow as a community and foster a strong sense of community spirit.

3 The attitude towards those who use poor grammar/spelling has also lightened up so it's more taking the form of constructive critisim. Again this is another positive sign and I hope it continues.

4 It is good to see moderators such as Wilson creating threads and becoming involved in others - it seperates the barrier between staff and member which is essential as it makes the moderators seem more like active members of the community rather than a seperate entity.

Unfortunately I'm unable to veryify if we as a community, by raising our voice and becoming actively involved in bettering the Escapist have helped to perpetrate these changes - especially those of the moderators becoming stricter because of the following reason.

This is where I lodge a complaint - I never received a reply to the PM I sent Tom.

Tom, if you ever read this, please think of this as constructive criticism only and not an attack, but not replying back even just to verify that you received the message is unprofessional. It didn't matter even if you were never going to take notice of what we suggested, it still warranted a reply. It is neglecting the very core of the Escapist - it's members and users. Please don't take offence but it is something I felt I needed to raise with the rest of the Escapist to demonstrate there must be an onus on the staff as well as the members to uphold the values of the community.

That being said, I do love your 'Chat with the Staff' segment in the Gaming Discussion. Might I add a suggestion that the idea be expanded to the off-topic discussion as well? It's great to see moderators becoming more involved - it strengthens the community as a whole.

That's the feeling I have gotten since this thread was first created and ideas compiled from it. Now it's up to the rest of the Escapist to give feedback on what they think has been happening around the place.

I leave it to you guys.

 

[NewClassic_v1legacy]

It's been a couple of weeks now since I PM'd Tom with the message and now it's time to give some critical feedback.

I would strongly encourage others to share their ideas of what they have seen in the previous few weeks/days on the Escapist to give a better overall community picture of what is happening.

1 There seem to have been a lot more suspensions/locking of threads being handed out than in previous times when I've been on here. If the moderators are taking a stronger stance I say fantastic and good on them.

2 The community is acting a lot kinder towards those who have made repeat threads and/or threads in which they have accidentally hit the enter button resulting in (no text). They're actually starting to become humorous as members of the community make little jokes about the no text post rather than blasting the creator. For this I say, well done to all of us. It is this sort of attitude which is going to help us grow as a community and foster a strong sense of community spirit.

3 The attitude towards those who use poor grammar/spelling has also lightened up so it's more taking the form of constructive criticism. Again this is another positive sign and I hope it continues.

4 It is good to see moderators such as Wilson creating threads and becoming involved in others - it separates the barrier between staff and member which is essential as it makes the moderators seem more like active members of the community rather than a separate entity.

For points 1 and 2, I'm glad you're approving of community. Though I cannot really comment on these, as this has always been how I and most I know have responded to these things in the past. Even now, I still feel as if myself and my peers have been unfairly overlooked by suggesting that it is only now that the community is sharing kindness.

Point 3 strikes me much likes points 1 and 2 do. I've always been particularly harsh on grammar and spelling errors, but primarily in the User Review section and only Off-Topic or Gaming Discussions if the post doesn't have enough coherency to be read without editing or multiple readings. Again, I'm feeling slightly put off as if our actions on the forums have been overlooked.

As for the 4th point, I feel like this is also from a bit of a limited perspective. Mods have been particularly active, even before you had ever joined, like wilson's Ask the Internet [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.81562] series, or more recently, his Escapist Audio Project [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/18.91214]. As well as that, the Staff and moderators are very often accessible on the Escapist IRC. I believe this "barrier" you speak of is primarily self-perceived.

Unfortunately I'm unable to verify if we as a community, by raising our voice and becoming actively involved in bettering the Escapist have helped to perpetrate these changes - especially those of the moderators becoming stricter because of the following reason.

This is where I lodge a complaint - I never received a reply to the PM I sent Tom.

Tom, if you ever read this, please think of this as constructive criticism only and not an attack, but not replying back even just to verify that you received the message is unprofessional. It didn't matter even if you were never going to take notice of what we suggested, it still warranted a reply. It is neglecting the very core of the Escapist - it's members and users. Please don't take offense but it is something I felt I needed to raise with the rest of the Escapist to demonstrate there must be an onus on the staff as well as the members to uphold the values of the community.

That being said, I do love your 'Chat with the Staff' segment in the Gaming Discussion. Might I add a suggestion that the idea be expanded to the off-topic discussion as well? It's great to see moderators becoming more involved - it strengthens the community as a whole.

That's the feeling I have gotten since this thread was first created and ideas compiled from it. Now it's up to the rest of the Escapist to give feedback on what they think has been happening around the place.

I leave it to you guys.

I'm speaking entirely on my own assumption, but I suspect tendo has been quite busy as of late. Also, by clicking the "Sent Mail" section of the Message tab, you can see which messages you've sent. If the message's subject line is in bold, then the message has not been read. If it has been read, it will not be in bold.

As far as The Escapist at large, posts like these strike me as partially helpful, and partially hurtful. So far, you seem to have acted and pointed out a lot of your whim. This thread strikes me as a method of both explaining to the community at large what you've done, but also that you've elected yourself as the unofficial spokesperson for the community as a whole.

This is problematic because your observations seem limited to your understanding of the goings-on. (Which seems to be the purpose of this thread.) Though for the pages I've reviewed (and I freely admit to not having read the entire thread), it seems as if you only seem to be agreeing with some posts. You're using other posters to build on your points, as opposed to building on everyone's point. As a spokesperson, you cannot act on your own opinions at all.

From this point, it seems as if you've done the opposite. Your points all seem to strike primarily with your opinions on how things need to be changed. All I can suggest is that this idea lacks a bit of a professional touch. A spokesperson needs to listen entirely to the community, and should work directly with all levels instead of just going to the bottom of the chain (users) and directly to the top (head of the Red Guard).

Even if Tendo is not especially busy, it still seems a lack of courtesy to bypass the majority of the other parts of the whole. The members have been commended, but the staff and mods seem like they're being spoken at rather than spoken to.

Though that's just my opinion on this.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

The core problem of people not respecting the point of view of other people who disagree with them has still not lessened. If anything it has grown worse. Grammar Nazis have got quieter, but the usual "u retard" ranters have not.

1 There seem to have been a lot more suspensions/locking of threads being handed out than in previous times when I've been on here. If the moderators are taking a stronger stance I say fantastic and good on them.

The moderation is still as random as ever. It might be stricter, but it is doing nothing to actually address problems that occur on the boards. The Escapist needs written rules, as all forums, communities, and societies do. There are suspensions and bans for ridiculous and small things, as well as blatant trolling going on unchecked, because there is no clear definition of where the lines are people are just moving them as they see fit.

 

[Captain Blackout]

EDIT: Sorry. Deepest apologies, failure for me.

 

[traceur_]

I think we just need to be patient with each other, we're not all the same and we react differently to different things, don't post angry shit because someone uses bad grammar, jump on your couch, punch a hole in your wall whatever but we don't need to be informed that someone uses bad grammar because we can see for ourselves.

 

[Inverse Skies]

For points 1 and 2, I'm glad you're approving of community. Though I cannot really comment on these, as this has always been how I and most I know have responded to these things in the past. Even now, I still feel as if myself and my peers have been unfairly overlooked by suggesting that it is only now that the community is sharing kindness.

Point 3 strikes me much likes points 1 and 2 do. I've always been particularly harsh on grammar and spelling errors, but primarily in the User Review section and only Off-Topic or Gaming Discussions if the post doesn't have enough coherency to be read without editing or multiple readings. Again, I'm feeling slightly put off as if our actions on the forums have been overlooked.

As for the 4th point, I feel like this is also from a bit of a limited perspective. Mods have been particularly active, even before you had ever joined, like wilson's Ask the Internet [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.81562] series, or more recently, his Escapist Audio Project [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/18.91214]. As well as that, the Staff and moderators are very often accessible on the Escapist IRC. I believe this "barrier" you speak of is primarily self-perceived.

Unfortunately I'm unable to verify if we as a community, by raising our voice and becoming actively involved in bettering the Escapist have helped to perpetrate these changes - especially those of the moderators becoming stricter because of the following reason.

This is where I lodge a complaint - I never received a reply to the PM I sent Tom.

Tom, if you ever read this, please think of this as constructive criticism only and not an attack, but not replying back even just to verify that you received the message is unprofessional. It didn't matter even if you were never going to take notice of what we suggested, it still warranted a reply. It is neglecting the very core of the Escapist - it's members and users. Please don't take offense but it is something I felt I needed to raise with the rest of the Escapist to demonstrate there must be an onus on the staff as well as the members to uphold the values of the community.

That being said, I do love your 'Chat with the Staff' segment in the Gaming Discussion. Might I add a suggestion that the idea be expanded to the off-topic discussion as well? It's great to see moderators becoming more involved - it strengthens the community as a whole.

That's the feeling I have gotten since this thread was first created and ideas compiled from it. Now it's up to the rest of the Escapist to give feedback on what they think has been happening around the place.

I leave it to you guys.

I'm speaking entirely on my own assumption, but I suspect tendo has been quite busy as of late. Also, by clicking the "Sent Mail" section of the Message tab, you can see which messages you've sent. If the message's subject line is in bold, then the message has not been read. If it has been read, it will not be in bold.

As far as The Escapist at large, posts like these strike me as partially helpful, and partially hurtful. So far, you seem to have acted and pointed out a lot of your whim. This thread strikes me as a method of both explaining to the community at large what you've done, but also that you've elected yourself as the unofficial spokesperson for the community as a whole.

This is problematic because your observations seem limited to your understanding of the goings-on. (Which seems to be the purpose of this thread.) Though for the pages I've reviewed (and I freely admit to not having read the entire thread), it seems as if you only seem to be agreeing with some posts. You're using other posters to build on your points, as opposed to building on everyone's point. As a spokesperson, you cannot act on your own opinions at all.

From this point, it seems as if you've done the opposite. Your points all seem to strike primarily with your opinions on how things need to be changed. All I can suggest is that this idea lacks a bit of a professional touch. A spokesperson needs to listen entirely to the community, and should work directly with all levels instead of just going to the bottom of the chain (users) and directly to the top (head of the Red Guard).

Even if Tendo is not especially busy, it still seems a lack of courtesy to bypass the majority of the other parts of the whole. The members have been commended, but the staff and mods seem like they're being spoken at rather than spoken to.

Though that's just my opinion on this.

That's fair enough - as I said it was meant to be constructive and not an attack.

The idea behind the community view as a whole is hard though - this is such a large community and if you looked back over the previous ideas there was many conflicting points and ideals. Yes, I did take it on myself to post what I considered the best ideas, but only because if I didn't I don't think many other members would have. Again that I'm not sure of, I'm sure many other users would also take action but that's what I felt was warranted and so that's what I did.
You can't provide a consensus view when there isn't one and not enough members commented on the ideas expressed as a whole so I had to go with what I thought was the best. I'm more than happy to add other points in or disregard some I've already submitted if it comes to that. But at the stage last time when the thread had died out that is what we were left with so that is what I posted.

The idea behind the staff is a lack of feedback causes assumptions - without a guiding hand or at least someone pointing me in the right direction I have to act on my own free will. I'm sure they understand the position I was coming from.

 

[Inverse Skies]

The core problem of people not respecting the point of view of other people who disagree with them has still not lessened. If anything it has grown worse. Grammar Nazis have got quieter, but the usual "u retard" ranters have not.

1 There seem to have been a lot more suspensions/locking of threads being handed out than in previous times when I've been on here. If the moderators are taking a stronger stance I say fantastic and good on them.

The moderation is still as random as ever. It might be stricter, but it is doing nothing to actually address problems that occur on the boards. The Escapist needs written rules, as all forums, communities, and societies do. There are suspensions and bans for ridiculous and small things, as well as blatant trolling going on unchecked, because there is no clear definition of where the lines are people are just moving them as they see fit.

You're really at that point aren't you? The whole problem could probably be partially avoided with an explanation of the ban in most cases. I guess the randomness simply comes down to what the mods are alerted to and what they aren't.