Remove the prohibition of "Prone to Argument" threads.

[Jrathje]

I take issue with the rule prohibiting "huge prone to argument" threads.

Discussions and "arguments" in debates are healthy. People want to talk about certain issues, especially issues where viewpoints can differ dramatically between individuals.

This is the water cooler, where we talk about "anything altitude players want to talk about", only not really, because the topics that actually matter and have real significance are off limits.

Why are we limited to only talking about Jersey Shore, who's going to win the super bowl, what cool new video games are coming out and other mindless, inane bull crap? Why is intellectual discussion prohibited? I propose that the prohibition be removed and that intellectual discussion of controversial, "argument prone" topics be allowed, as long as the discourse stays mostly respectful and adult.

Edit: No, these forums are not a democracy, but I added a poll anyway.

Someone will probably say "The altitude forums are not the place for those types of discussions". What other place is there? Altitude has a community of members that know and have friendships of varying degrees with each other. Yes, there are other forums specifically for discussing prohibited topics but I don't want to talk about this stuff with strangers.

[CCN]

my favourite part is when threads get locked in
"The Water Cooler: Anything Altitude players want to talk about."

[Beagle]

not that i care because i don't post here, but it would be prudent to take a look at what you have to lose from allowing people to argue as they please, particularly in only one part of the forum.

[Ajuk999]

You'd have to think of all the other rules that could be broken by allowing those types of threads.

[MajorPayne257]

Originally Posted by Jrathje

Someone will probably say "The altitude forums are not the place for those types of discussions". What other place is there? Altitude has a community of members that know and have friendships of varying degrees with each other. Yes, there are other forums specifically for discussing prohibited topics but I don't want to talk about this stuff with strangers.

This is definitely the strongest selling point for me. Yeah I'm sure there's thousands of forums discussing 9/11 conspiracy theories, or whatever topic we could come up with, but I enjoy debating with my fellow Alty friends over people I don't know.

[banana]

Its why I don't bother with these forums much anymore. If the thread is even slightly contentious, all it takes is one out of the mods to dislike it and lock it citing that rule, even though nobody on the forum wanted that. If people feel a thread is out of line they have the report button.

[Ribilla]

I'd support this, you could even put an 'asbestos cage' next to the 'water cooler'.

IMO this all boils down to whether the admins want to put up with the sheer amount of BS that will flow like a river out of those discussions.

[Ingbo]

+1 10chars

rib the admin dont even have to read the threads if they dont want to, they dont answer to anyone about whats written on this webpage lol.

[JDR]

well they do have to monitor every single thread that gets posted for stuff like child porn and terrorism plots, or else yes, the site will get shut down. there are some things you can't put on the internet.

[Ingbo]

Originally Posted by JDR

well they do have to monitor every single thread that gets posted for stuff like child porn and terrorism plots, or else yes, the site will get shut down. there are some things you can't put on the internet.

NOTED - smartass

[Mt.Vesuvius]

Originally Posted by JDR

well they do have to monitor every single thread that gets posted for stuff like child porn and terrorism plots, or else yes, the site will get shut down. there are some things you can't put on the internet.

Hmmm I was not aware that anyone on the forums had an argument about child pr0n..

[Evan20000]

As long as people don't take things too personally and can avoid ad hominem attacks, I don't see any reason this restriction shouldn't be lifted.

Oh wait, this is the internet..... never mind....

[Tekn0]

There is no "discussion" that can possibly go on, it's just one side trying to assert its "facts" over another and almost ALWAYS will go down to personal insults.

From a forum admin's perspective - this should definitely stay banned.

Basically, you want to discuss 9/11 conspiracy theories which is well fine. Tomorrow someone will want to discuss Religion, and the day after World War 2. And we all know where that will go.

[Duck Duck Pwn]

A new subforum for flami-i mean debating?

But honestly I really don't care if threads degenerate into flame wars. I enjoy watching the trainwreck and enjoy the debates that may occur out of them.

[Boko]

Well known fact: half the people who voted do not know what rescinded means

[mikesol]

So another point of view that you're all missing it that these threads usually contain a ton of posts that are either flat out breaking other rules or are on the borderline. Rather than have us have to sift through tons of pages of crap and then give out massive amounts of infractions for people being dicks - we try to lock it beforehand.

Note: I agree debates can be useful - whether or not we'd actually see any useful debate on these forums is debatable though

Typical internet debates usually degrade to hitler, personal attacks, strawman arguments, etc.

[Boko]

This topic is prone to argument

Better lock it

[Kuja900]

I been wondering about that rule for a long time. A forum is a place to have discussions and arguments/settling of disagreements should be part of that as it is on most other forums. There is no reason that Altitude forums cant handle some (civil) debate.

[Evan20000]

Originally Posted by mikesol

So another point of view that you're all missing it that these threads usually contain a ton of posts that are either flat out breaking other rules or are on the borderline. Rather than have us have to sift through tons of pages of crap and then give out massive amounts of infractions for people being dicks - we try to lock it beforehand.

Note: I agree debates can be useful - whether or not we'd actually see any useful debate on these forums is debatable though

Typical internet debates usually degrade to hitler, personal attacks, strawman arguments, etc.

Perhaps we give it a trial period? If the community proves to be unable to handle a civil debate, then feel free to bring the rule back.

If nothing else, this would be an interesting social experiment.

[mikesol]

Originally Posted by Evan20000

Perhaps we give it a trial period? If the community proves to be unable to handle a civil debate, then feel free to bring the rule back.

If nothing else, this would be an interesting social experiment.

I mean this isn't my choice to make lol. I was just throwing out some rationale. Lam and Karl would have to decide that

[Boko]

Look at how all the trolls agree, lol

[Knipchip]

I was shocked said topic was closed in the water cooler, it was not at all heading to the wrong direction.

Originally Posted by Tekn0

There is no "discussion" that can possibly go on, it's just one side trying to assert its "facts" over another and almost ALWAYS will go down to personal insults.

People like that cannot discuss, neither they nor their parents have ever taken the time to learn this. They may actually learn a lot here in the water cooler.

Originally Posted by Evan20000

Perhaps we give it a trial period? If the community proves to be unable to handle a civil debate, then feel free to bring the rule back.

If nothing else, this would be an interesting social experiment.

Vouch.

[Boko]

Guys it's the water cooler..

I dunno what you guys talk about @ the watercooler inrl?

[sunshineduck]

the amount of "work" the mods have to put in in order to properly enforce a rule shouldn't be taken into account when designing said rule imo. shouldn't lock/delete a thread just because it might degrade into a slapfight.

[Tekn0]

Originally Posted by Knipchip

People like that cannot discuss, neither they nor their parents have ever taken the time to learn this. They may actually learn a lot here in the water cooler.

It is probably posts like this that mods want to avoid.

[malkin]

I didn't like that the Conspiracy thread was closed due to the "prone to arguement" reason. Almost any thread in The Water Cooler is "prone to arguement." We could have had a good discussion and learned a few things instead.

[Ingbo]

i would like to furthermore completely disagree with whoever said that discussing things like this is disrespecting all the ppl who died that day.
If anything putting a lid on it is disrespecting the ppl who died that day. Anyways since discussions like these arent allowed or whatever i just wanted to get that out there and am not intending to defend this opinion but felt i had to say it.

[Boko]

Originally Posted by Jrathje

what cool new video games are coming out and other mindless, inane bull crap?

?? y u do this

[Karl]

The Altitude Forums were set up first and foremost for Technical Support and Suggestions.

Later it became apparent that people needed an easy place to organize Altitude Pro leagues, so we added a forum for that because it's pertinent to Altitude.

So on and so forth every forum we added was pertinent to the playing of Altitude.

The water cooler was eventually added because people naturally want to discuss other topics such as "Is Kuja a girl". All topics that don't belong in the Altitude forums but people were posting about anyways so we made a water cooler thread.

The reason we strictly disallow any controversial topics is because we are a business and we will be blamed for any and all content on our website. Even if our forum software had an age verification system and we could restrict 18+ to a particular forum I wouldn't do it because it's just bad business. If people are offended on our forums they will associate it with Nimbly Games and will avoid our products in the future.

I realize there is offensive content from users in the game but we don't have the technology or man power to prevent it. We do what we can.

[Evan20000]

Reasonable enough I guess. Thanks Karl for making an official statement. ^^

[Boko]

The real question is:

Is Kuja a girl?

If so, I'll pewpew that explodet with my loopy tracker missile!

[Knipchip]

Originally Posted by Tekn0

It is probably posts like this that mods want to avoid.

Likely. Although it's no more than an inoffensive claim. Those who strike based on that are wrong in the end. There are numerous sentences in a discussion which take along the same impact. Doesn't matter though now that Karl clarified things

[Tekn0]

Originally Posted by Knipchip

Likely. Although it's no more than an inoffensive claim. Those who strike based on that are wrong in the end. There are numerous sentences in a discussion which take along the same impact. Doesn't matter though now that Karl clarified things

Inoffensive claim to you, not so inoffensive to others. That's the whole problem. If people are not capable of grasping this they are in the wrong end.

[classicallad]

Originally Posted by Evan20000

Reasonable enough I guess. Thanks Karl for making an official statement. ^^

Its not like they havent said it a gazillion times before anyway, and besides, it's all in the forum rules ^^

[Jrathje]

Originally Posted by classicallad

Its not like they havent said it a gazillion times before anyway, and besides, it's all in the forum rules ^^

Did you even READ the original post? This whole thread was a proposal to CHANGE the forum rules............

[Knipchip]

Originally Posted by Tekn0

Inoffensive claim to you, not so inoffensive to others. That's the whole problem.

Sure but take a look at an example which invokes (most likely) at least 1 member of the alti community. If someone (for some reason) posts a picture of someone with a small eh.. willy and someone else claims just this, then is that also a post mods want to avoid as this claim is inoffensive to one group, not so inoffensive to the other? Sure this claim serves a different purpose but it comes down to the same.

Originally Posted by Tekn0

If people are not capable of grasping this they are in the wrong end.

Inoffensive claim to you, not so inoffensive to others. That's the whole problem.


Not offending/feeling offended here, merely wondering.

[Ingbo]

Originally Posted by Jrathje

Did you even READ the original post? This whole thread was a proposal to CHANGE the forum rules............

jrathje ur just too funny

[Tekn0]

Originally Posted by Knipchip

Sure but take a look at an example which invokes (most likely) at least 1 member of the alti community. If someone (for some reason) posts a picture of someone with a small eh.. willy and someone else claims just this, then is that also a post mods want to avoid as this claim is inoffensive to one group, not so inoffensive to the other? Sure this claim serves a different purpose but it comes down to the same.

I didn't even bother to read this. thanks.

Inoffensive claim to you, not so inoffensive to others. That's the whole problem.
Not offending/feeling offended here, merely wondering.

No the whole point is you're failing to grasp that what is offensive/inoffensive isn't as clear cut as black and white, especially given the average age of this community seems to be like 10.

[tgleaf]

As Mikesol tried to point out, it's not the arguments that we have to moderate, but more so the reaction in threads with argumentative posts.

Take this handy flowchart as an example:
1. OP: I believe X.
2. B: I disagree with X.
3. C: I agree with X and I like ham.
4. B: C, You're stupid.
5. D: Ham is delicious!
6. E: I believe X but I don't always agree with everything about X.
7. B: E, you're stupid.
8. F: Stupid is as stupid does (image embedded).
9. G: This is lame.
10: H: I disagree with X and I think it could be fixed by Y.
11: F: X is a lame reason to do that. And you're all stupid.

And on and on. About 1/3 of the people are actually following the debate and giving somewhat useful feedback either agreeing or disagreeing. 1/3 of the people are just insulting each other for no good reason. 1/3 of the people are spamming.

Again, with usually two full-time moderators available, we don't have time to read through every word of every post. If -- as in the example above -- it looks like a thread is heading downhill, we'll close it. The 1/3 who were having a reasonable discussion will be pissed off and frankly they have a right to be pissed off, but it doesn't mean the thread shouldn't have been closed. The community as a whole has to respect the forums or they don't work.

And yeah, we do try to warn/ban those 2/3 of the people who aren't playing nicely but sometimes we also need to close a "hot" thread in order to give us a chance to clean things up and issue bans.

[Smushface]

I miss our old trolls. Now all we have are Ajuk and Beagle's butt buddies. At least Ferret and Snowsickle could say something besides "you mad bro?"

Karl, you're right. My apologies.

edit: Oh I should clarify. Ajuk isn't a troll. Just a small, cheap lollipop. Same end result though.