Comments on: Mightier Than the Sword http://www.kaz.therumblepack.com/2008/01/14/mightier-than-the-sword/ Games, Cars and Life Sun, 08 Nov 2009 00:45:23 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 By: Jard http://www.kaz.therumblepack.com/2008/01/14/mightier-than-the-sword/comment-page-1/#comment-103 Jard Mon, 10 Mar 2008 14:22:43 +0000 http://www.kaz.therumblepack.com/2008/01/14/mightier-than-the-sword/#comment-103 I've generally concluded that the message board in it's native form is unusable by humankind if you hope to have any kind of intelligent and useful discourse. In particular the official Blizzard forums are a cesspool of trolling and baseless idiocy. However, another forum I frequent, elitistjerks.com, is heavily moderated, going so far as to give people infractions for poor grammar, use of "lol" etc. or just generally being a troll or making useless posts. It goes a long way to keeping their amazingly long threads useful all the way to the end. In many commenting systems, there are similar measures in place to enable the community to moderate itself, such as youtube comments being hidden when they get enough thumbs down. I could envision a system going even farther than this, allowing the community to associate several scores associated with common forum pitfalls such as "Spam +3 Troll +7 Flame +25" so that people could create thresholds beyond which posts and sometimes their respective threads would be shown in a subdued manner. I’ve generally concluded that the message board in it’s native form is unusable by humankind if you hope to have any kind of intelligent and useful discourse. In particular the official Blizzard forums are a cesspool of trolling and baseless idiocy. However, another forum I frequent, elitistjerks.com, is heavily moderated, going so far as to give people infractions for poor grammar, use of “lol” etc. or just generally being a troll or making useless posts. It goes a long way to keeping their amazingly long threads useful all the way to the end.

In many commenting systems, there are similar measures in place to enable the community to moderate itself, such as youtube comments being hidden when they get enough thumbs down. I could envision a system going even farther than this, allowing the community to associate several scores associated with common forum pitfalls such as “Spam +3 Troll +7 Flame +25″ so that people could create thresholds beyond which posts and sometimes their respective threads would be shown in a subdued manner.

]]> By: McFadden http://www.kaz.therumblepack.com/2008/01/14/mightier-than-the-sword/comment-page-1/#comment-54 McFadden Thu, 17 Jan 2008 20:55:38 +0000 http://www.kaz.therumblepack.com/2008/01/14/mightier-than-the-sword/#comment-54 I think that the perception that message boards spin into dismal arguments over nothing, but real life doesn't is possibly a mistake. I assume that there are plenty of people walking around in everyday life that would get into similar arguments with me, or anyone, about virtually nothing. The difference being, in reality, I can tell immediately that the person standing in front of me is either crazy, looking for a fight, or just not worth it. Also, I don't really walk around spouting off my opinion on everything, and those I do talk to are typically friends, if not at least acquaintances. These people tend to be similar and/or reasonable when conversing. I think in part due to the fact that you can walk away from someone and not talk to them again. Contrastingly, a message board is designed to go and share your opinions and such. Also, on the internet, where you can't see someone, can't hear the tone or inflection of their voice, etc. it's harder to write someone off as being a little too far out in left field. (Think of the commercials where the sweaty, nervous guy sits down next to someone on the bus and proceeds to try to run one an email type scam on them. It just doesn't work in person.) Also, I'm sure that there are people who troll on boards to instigate. It's fun for them, and there is no threat of physical violence so there are no real ramifications. You can always make more accounts. I think that the perception that message boards spin into dismal arguments over nothing, but real life doesn’t is possibly a mistake.

I assume that there are plenty of people walking around in everyday life that would get into similar arguments with me, or anyone, about virtually nothing. The difference being, in reality, I can tell immediately that the person standing in front of me is either crazy, looking for a fight, or just not worth it. Also, I don’t really walk around spouting off my opinion on everything, and those I do talk to are typically friends, if not at least acquaintances. These people tend to be similar and/or reasonable when conversing. I think in part due to the fact that you can walk away from someone and not talk to them again.

Contrastingly, a message board is designed to go and share your opinions and such. Also, on the internet, where you can’t see someone, can’t hear the tone or inflection of their voice, etc. it’s harder to write someone off as being a little too far out in left field. (Think of the commercials where the sweaty, nervous guy sits down next to someone on the bus and proceeds to try to run one an email type scam on them. It just doesn’t work in person.)

Also, I’m sure that there are people who troll on boards to instigate. It’s fun for them, and there is no threat of physical violence so there are no real ramifications. You can always make more accounts.

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