GateWorld's Vision Statement .Suggestions welcome

[Pandora's_Box]

Well, it looks like the mods really mean for Change to happen this time. I think they will enforce the rules better. If a poster is completely negative at all times, then he/she shall be terminated.

Or, you know, whatever the mods want to do with them. Heh.

EDIT: Sweet, passed 15000th post without knowing. Yay!

I vote for a Prometheus-inspired style of punishment.

[PG15]

Shot through the middle by an Ori death-beam? Do the mods have those?

Wait...OH...oh...ohhhhh, riiiight. Right.

[jelgate]

I vote for a Prometheus-inspired style of punishment.

So who gets to be the bird?

[tagger]

So who gets to be the bird?

Who gets to give the proverbial bird?

[tagger]

Naturally, I vote me.


I vote myself as the penultimate bird giver.

Why the frick not ?!?

Let me be the bird wielder, I will use it appropriately. =)

[Laura Dove]

So the "swallow constant praise" bit, yes. You'll have to accept other people's positive opinions and not be offended by the fact that they praise what you dislike. The "shut up" bit? No. You don't have to shut up. You can disagree with those opinions praising those aspects you dislike - as long as you do so respectfully.

Yes you'll have to shut up, that was precisely my point, and Madeleine confirmed it:

Quite honestly: yes. If they can stomach McKay in the show that they watch, they can stomach people talking about mcKay.

"All people are equal. Some are just more than others." What about accepting the opinion of those who DON'T enjoy your favourite character? Why should those be silenced? And by the way, what about those who praise a particular character or episode doing so respectfully? Is respect only necessary for those who don't like a particular thing?

I think in this instance you may have misunderstood what Mads meant here - I may be wrong but my understanding of Mads' response here is related to what I discussed above - that to a certain extent you have to learn to deal with the fact that people are going to like - and will post about how much they like - a character that you dislike.

I was specifically talking about not being allowed to express one's dislike of something. "Quite honestly: yes" seems hard to misinterpret.

By the way, expressing your displeasure with a particular point is a means to evacuate the tension it causes. If you are not allowed to, but on the contrary are forced to listen to the opposing opinion without being able to defend your own without being pointed fingers at, this particular point you dislike will grow and grow in importance until it spoils your enjoyment of the show or the forum. Or you can retreat back to your comfort thread where at least you'll be allowed to express yourself, but wasn't the need for those precisely what drove the mods to come up with the Vision Statement in the first place?

[GateGipsy]

"Morality cannot be legalized."

I'm not sure a forum "attitude" or forum "cultural outlook" (positive or negative), can be changed with rules, or externally enforced limitations. The change has to occur internally, with each poster.

Also, I think the negative feel in GW is no different than the bloggers/ armchair critics I read everywhere on the internet. It seems like most everyone likes to poke holes in shows, talk about their dislikes more than their likes? This seems to be the Age of Armchair Criticism (I include myself in that group, of course ).

I think negativity is prevalent everywhere, not just GW, so how do you change that?

Hopefully that is something we'll sort out here.

Additionally, the disinhibition that occurs with the relative anonymity of the internet seems to encourage posters to be more aggressive than they are in RL?

Now that is something that can only be addressed by a closer adherence to the rules about respect.

I am all for a more positive feel to GW. I prefer the positive threads, and tend to hang out there. I don't give a rip if that makes me a "Pollyanna". I have enough stress and negative stuff every day. Negative posts just add to my already stressful life, so I avoid them.

Personally, whether I like a show or not, I know each episode takes a ton of hard work, effort, and creative energy to pull off. Hard work is not a free pass through all criticisms. Nonetheless, I feel like I need to at least acknowledge the work that went into a show or episode. In the end, if I dislike a show, I stop watching whether I post anything or not.

Currently, I feel free to state my dislikes in certain episodes, plot holes, etc... and it does not sound like that will change.

no that will not change.

[Reefgirl]

From what I can tell, the negativity on this board is reflective of a significant portion of the Stargate fandom being upset and unhappy with changes that have happened on what may have been one of their favorite shows. This has been building up and building up over the past few seasons and has come to a head with the cancellation of the show and the realization that there will be no new episodes (aside from the movie) and a possible happy resolution to their issues.
I don't see how enforcing the positivity program will change the fact that people feel hurt and saddened by what has happened to Atlantis, either that it has gone in the wrong direction or that it has been cancelled prematurely.
You may have hope for the new series, as perhaps more people who watch it will be happy campers, but eliminating anti-threads for shows that have already generated so much angst amongst the fans will just be putting a bandaid on a wound, it still hurts and has not yet scabbed over.

At last!!! Someone has actually put their finger on the entire problem, well done that woman.

[PG15]

Darren talked about that in the opening post:

Also, we recognize that Atlantis is coming to an end in just a few weeks. We want to respect the grieving process at losing the show, and give people a place to mourn, and even to yell and scream a bit.

So this is going to be a gradual change.

[perkin127]

I personally think that the anti threads are a bit much, and i think closing them after a certain amount of time is a good idea, giving people a chance to vent but not continually. Otherwise people will just continue to moan on and on, and focus on the negative rather than the positive. Dwelling is never a good idea.

[Laura Dove]

"Yes, you hate Keller, that is fine, no problem, I respect that, but do you have to attack the actress and the writers"?

It goes both ways, doesn't it? When you have something like this:
Naysayer: "I hate Keller, she's whinny, childish, and plain unbelievable as a CMO!"
Yaysayer: "You're just pissed off because they killed Beckett."
Who exactly is disregarding the other person's opinion? Do you really believe such reply will convince the naysayer that Keller is an awesome, or even simply a bearable character?

(I have seen the exact same thing about SGU, by the way. THIS is the kind of behaviour that makes me retreat into the Wraith Defenders Club.)

[GateGipsy]

It goes both ways, doesn't it? When you have something like this:
Naysayer: "I hate Keller, she's whinny, childish, and plain unbelievable as a CMO!"
Yaysayer: "You're just pissed off because they killed Beckett."
Who exactly is disregarding the other person's opinion? Do you really believe such reply will convince the naysayer that Keller is an awesome, or even simply a bearable character?

(I have seen the exact same thing about SGU, by the way. THIS is the kind of behaviour that makes me retreat into the Wraith Defenders Club.)

By changing the 'culture' around here, that's exactly the sort of behaviour that we hope to change. It isn't constructive criticism is it? So that's the sort of lines of discussion we hope to steer people away from. Less of that (it won't go away entirely but we can reduce it to a level where it doesn't make an impact on the way the forum is used) would mean you wouldn't need to go hide in a 'protected' thread.

That is the sort of forum we want to work towards, and it is with your help and the help of other posters that we want to achieve this.

Make sure that you don't post in a way that would annoy or upset you if someone posted like that towards you. And when someone does post like that towards you - ignore them. Report the post (we're ready for the increase - it will decrease over time as people understand how things work). Carry on as if what they do or say doesn't impact the forum and you'll find that in fact, it doesn't.

That's just my two cents anyway. Feel free to disagree or agree

[Kor]

Sounds like a good idea to me. Sounds like it is more of a common sense sort of thing. It sounds like it may improve the forum, especially since doing it gradually as mentioned sounds like a good idea instead of a poof it's all changed as of x date and time sort of thing.

[GoSpikey]

I'm also a fan of getting rid of the redding system, if it needs to be said still.

Nothing good every comes off it. If you have to 'respect' people's opinion, you shouldn't be able to red them for it.

When someone's a total pain, dissing things, isn't it better to be able to report them for it, so the mods can say to that person to calm down, than going into a cycle of redding?

[JenniferJF]

And from what I gather, if there are no more Anti threads then it stands to reason that there will be no more Pro threads either and that every thread, character ones included, will be general discussion threads where all viewpoints (positive and negative) will be welcome.

As one who posts mainly on a protected pro-thread, I hope they don't do away with the protected ship (or character) threads. And it sounds like there are no immediate plans to touch that folder, anyway. To use Darren's metaphor, those threads are sorta like the comfortable corner bar where you can gather with friends and discuss things of common interest. To those of you who may never have really spent time on them, at least on the one I hang out on we tend to discuss more than just the single ship, but actually discuss much of the rest of the show from the basic shared assumption that said ship is a real character motivator. I'd hate to lose the 'family' or the place I've grown so fond of. If I wanted a place to discuss whether the ship should or does exist, I'm sure I could find one. However, as that's not what I'm interested in doing in discussing the show from the perspective of my particular favorite ship, I hope they don't force us into only that sort of thread. Similarly, I'm not interested in reading tons of posts about other ships I'm not interested in, and so like the fact there are other specific places for people to go who are interested in discussing the show from those perspectives, too.

That said, I also don't think they should do away with anti threads. Cause really, if you don't want people complaining about things, don't go there. And I'm sure folks who do go there feel the same way about having a place to complain that I do about having a place to celebrate. I do, however, find there are people (lets call them trolls) who tend to hang out on the 'wrong thread' and who seem to never have anything positive to say and whose whole purpose on GW seems to be to rain on other people's parades. I hope that is one of the types of behavior this new policy is meant to correct, because repeatedly stating versions of "Well, it might be that way if the writers weren't horrible" isn't terribly useful, as many in this thread have pointed out.

Or, going back to Darren's metaphor one more time, I hope we all get to keep our favorite corner pubs. And it would be great if we no longer had to keep one eye on the door in case someone comes in with no purpose other than tipping over our tables and spilling our drinks. (too far? )