We've got a major problem...

misspoptart · 08-07-2013, 04:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Janszoon

Yes to all of this. I completely agree. Like I mentioned earlier in this thread I think it would be great if we all made a commitment to avoiding hot button lounge threads in favor of contributing to the music discussion.

I can commit to that. Since I first arrived, I've had the sense that if I didn't respond to lounge posts or participate in the popular threads I wouldn't fit in or might not get noticed. Somehow, though, it's important to remember that this is a music forum, where neither your post in the member pic thread nor your time spent on tinychat or whatever the f should really matter. Maybe that's what everyone means by cliqueyness. I'm not sure, I've tried to stay out of it so far. But yeah.

Lisnaholic · 08-07-2013, 06:26 PM

Lots of very sensible stuff being said in this thread; Trollheart about ignoring posts; GB about the conduct of debates are both spot on imo.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pedestrian

.... I return from work. I unlace my shoes. I look at my computer, and think to myself. Do I want to log on to MB? No, **** it, I don't need that. I refuse to go online just to be made angry. And then I pick up a novel and put my emotions and energy into that instead.

^ This post made me the saddest of all

, although I think duga and some other members may be using rose-coloured specs to look at the MB past. I´ve occasionally dipped into some old threads, and the standard of discussion or response wasn´t noticably better than that of today as far as I could see. So I think AwwSugar makes a good point:-

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arya Stark

...
A couple of years ago there were STILL lounge posts. There were STILL posts about banned members and deleted posts and all that bull****. but you know what? it was taken with a grain of salt! People laughed **** off and moved on....

I have no problem with the lounge; to quote Jerry Garcia,"Believe it if you need it, if you don´t just pass it on..."

Quote:

Originally Posted by misspoptart

... Since I first arrived, I've had the sense that if I didn't respond to lounge posts or participate in the popular threads I wouldn't fit in or might not get noticed....

^ I think Miss P makes a very pertinent remark about newbie mentality here. After all, what most newcomers want is a little recognition, and the lounge seems the best place to get that.

I´m sure I´m not the only one to notice the irony that this community-center thread is much hotter than the music forum threads that it intends to promote. We all like to rub shoulders in the same thread occasionally, and that doesn´t often happen in the music forums. You can post in those and be completely ignored, and I´m sure that affects newbie moral more than the ranting and drama they sometimes witness.

So, in a rather rambling post, I´m suggesting:-
i) the lounge and its policing are being done well enough as is.
ii) MB could encourage more action in the music threads. One possibility could be to re-start the weekly genre threads that Pedestrian, I think, was the last to operate. Remember those ? They were good at generating the frisson of a crowd scene in a music forum. (A variation could also be to nominate a particular forum for attention each week.)
iii) understandably, old-timers (and I don´t exclude myself from this behaviour) sometimes leapfrog newbies´ posts and just reply to their friends posts back up there in the thread somewhere... Perhaps we should be more aware of how demoralizing this may seem to a newbie.