posted
The Flameboard was a lot more fun before it was moderated. The only thing it needed a moderator for was so someone could put a lid on things when they became too heated.
Now a person who will remain un-named comes in and starts locking threads because they aren't sufficiently antisocial (well, okay, one thread). What the heck? I thought that the flameboard was precisely where you could blow off steam with the understanding that as long as you didn't get too personal or patently offensive, you would not be bothered.
I guess not. The desire to fetter the unstructured thoughts and interactions within the flameboard has been given the power to overcome it and will eventually stifle its use.
The flameboard allows us to make statements (and react to them) without fear that some dilligent thought-Nazi will decide the thread is too controversial and lock it before everyone has his say. Of course these threads take off on tangents. I thought that was part of the thrill. Apparently, you can now be shut down for insufficient offensiveness.
Of course, if that isn't part of "the plan", then go ahead and merge this section of the forums with the Officer's Lounge. It won't matter whether you loosen the standards of the OL to allow some of what goes on in the flameboard. Everyone will be second-guessing themselves as to whether they were posting something that would be judged worthless, and return to find a padlock on the thread.
--Baloo
PS: The above is not to be construed as an attack on The_Tom. I hold him in the highest respect and do not want to see any responses to this thread wherin he is personally attacked. My main gripe is that this forum will likely wither and die if it is policed too closely.
------------------ If a lawyer is disbarred and a priest is defrocked,is a florist deflowered and a cowboy deranged? www.geocities.com/Area51/Shire/8641/
posted
PPS: What yanked my chain in the first place is that I thought the flameboard was a place you could bitch, gripe, moan, or complain without regard to whether anyone agreed or disagreed with you. If there was disagreement, it could get more heated than is allowed in other forums. If everyone was in agreement, they could kvetch more expressively without fear of getting hammered by TPTB.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Gotta go with Baloo on this one. The Flameboard hasn't been moderated in a long time. I mean, we'd have to go back three or four forums to find a moderated Flameboard. Why was it unmoderated? So people could get angry, and say things that would otherwise cause a thread to get the padlock. And sometimes in other forums, the padlock is neccessary.
Everyone knows that the Flameboard is meant to allow people to let off steam on one subject or another. Just because it doesn't make one person angry, doesn't mean that someone else won't find some sort of anger or resentment about the subject. I remember some hellacious arguments that broke out in this, and previous forums, but it seems that most us have "simmered down", and aren't quite as flammatory as we used to be.
But, we still need the Flameboard because there are times when we will get mad, and say certain things that would be frowned upon in other forums. If I've got a beef about something, I want to bring it to a place where I can speak my mind, curses or no. The OL is too sedate for that.
------------------ "Angels and Ministers of Grace, defend us" -Hamlet, Act I, Scene IV
posted
There's a simple solution, just nominate one poster per thread to be the "bad guy".
Then carry on posting about innuendo, the amusing shape of vegetables, etc, and every six posts or so the nominated guy merely posts an inflammatory non-sequitor, eg. "I hate Americans" , "CocaCola is Weak", "you are all weirdo freaks with big noses", which is ignored. Thus the thread remains eminently suitable for the Flameboard.
------------------ "You're wrong, and you're a grotesquely ugly freak."
posted
I agree with Baloo. IMHO, the only reason this board is moderated is because there were too man moderators available.
------------------ Josh: I think they're getting to know each other a bit too well, if you catch my drift. Me: Oh, I agree. I think they're spending too much time together, that is of course, if you catch my drift. Asher: I think he's *ucking her, and he's cheating on his wife, and he's risking his marriage, and if his wife finds out about it she'll leave him and take their son, and his life will be ruined. If you catch my drift...
The First One
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed
Member # 35
posted
Listen: what Tom is ultimately trying to do is stop the dissemination of Lounge topics through the Flameboard. There HAVE been some frivolous (by Flameboard standards) threads of late.
Ultimately, you can do two things. Post anything that might ever offend anyone here in the Flameboard, no matter how slight the chance of causing offence is; or, post threads where you think they should be posted. If fighting breaks out, the Moderators and Supervisors step in, defusing tension and if necessary transporting the discussion that's caused all the probelsm to the Flameboard.
The former option means that eventually the Flameboard (originally just a minor Forum to let off steam in) will assimilate the whole of SolarFlare. . . and no-one wants that. The latter means that a lot of dynamic (harmless) debate goes on in other Forums and enriches them.
People are going to disagree. But if you restrict any sort of disagreement to the Flameboard, then it's ultimately censorship, of a sort.
posted
Much better Baloo.. this is what the Flameboard is for!
In all seriousness, I'm only doing what The First One mentioned above. The locking of the thread in question was not a sudden attack just because I had gained the power to do so, rather, it was a (hopefully) painless warning shot to remind everyone that as of late the Flameboard has gone quite far away from its intended purpose. If that means there'll be fewer posts here and more on the OL, then so be it. I'm not planning on locking every single OT thread on the board,including Baloo's dentistry thread. I'm gonna let them all run their course and disappear into the depths of the forum below. I can't see why people are making such a big deal about this... it's just really for future reference. All I'm trying to do is purify the place a bit. One way to make the fire burn hotter without dumping on more wood is to pull off all the green wood on it already.
*ducks back into woodwork*
Oh, and a PF is a Potato Famine.
------------------ "I haven't done any research, but I think the Defiant is 170m." -Frank Gerratana
[This message was edited by The_Tom on May 14, 1999.]
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