Seperate Club Forums

Dont be at yourself

It's not about wanting an insular community for just fans of one club. It's about organising the existing discussions in a way so that they're immediately accessible to all.

As it stands, it is all but impossible to discuss multiple issues in a superthread. One topic will take hold, the noisy posters will pile in, and all other discussions will be drowned out by the torrent of posts. Threads, by their very definition, are designed to handle a single thread of discussion. Shoehorning all of the dozens of discussion points into one of these threads is utterly, utterly ridiculous.

I don't post in the Chelsea, Arsenal, United superthreads. I barely post in the Liverpool one - only on the rare occasions its not swamped by some tiresome topic. If there were separate sub-fora, I'd post a hell of a lot more.

ShiverinEskimo

NekkidBibleMan wrote: »

only on the rare occasions its not swamped by some tiresome topic. If there were separate sub-fora, I'd post a hell of a lot more.

So the majority of people want to talk about topic A, but you want to talk about topic B. So topic A and everyone who wants to discuss it should be swept aside into another forum so you can have the SF to yourself and your less tiresome topics?

pickarooney

monkey9 wrote: »

Why is this?? Surely, the Spurs forum should be scrapped as it's completely unfair that this is the only club forum in existence while other club ones are banned.

It's not the only club forum in existence

Dont be at yourself

ShiverinEskimo wrote: »

So the majority of people want to talk about topic A, but you want to talk about topic B. So topic A and everyone who wants to discuss it should be swept aside into another forum so you can have the SF to yourself and your less tiresome topics?

You've completely missed my point. I don't want everyone swept aside, and I don't want the Soccer Forum to myself.

I want one thread per topic, as it's easier for everyone to discuss what they want to discuss, not just the loud ones who invariably take over every thread with their cyclical arguments on the same dozen topics.

To me, sub-fora for each club would be the easiest way or categorising these one-topic-per-thread threads. Sub-fora based on leagues or competitions would be an alternative. But the key idea would be the same: one forum thread per thread of discussion. Simples.

ShiverinEskimo

NekkidBibleMan wrote: »

You've completely missed my point. I don't want everyone swept aside, and I don't want the Soccer Forum to myself.

I want one thread per topic, as it's easier for everyone to discuss what they want to discuss, not just the loud ones who invariably take over every thread with their cyclical arguments on the same dozen topics.

To me, sub-fora for each club would be the easiest way or categorising these one-topic-per-thread threads. Sub-fora based on leagues or competitions would be an alternative. But the key idea would be the same: one forum thread per thread of discussion. Simples.

Each of those fora would inevitably only be frequented by fans of that team. What little bipartisanship there is between rival clubs on the SF will be lost.

The advantage of the current system is that non-fans can jump onto the superthreads and catch up on that clubs news and join in the discussion without having to check 5 or 6 threads to do so.

tbh

seems to me that the main reason for seperating out the forums would be to keep the assholes who think it's funny to call, say, rafa a "fat spanish waiter" away from the assholes who take can't ignore the fact that an asshole called rafa a "fat spanish waiter".

Seems a shame that some people can't discuss football in a mature air of mutual respect. But if they can't, just fcuk em out. Don't start changing the rules to cater for them, that'll get us all fcuked.

Time Magazine

tbh wrote: »

seems to me that the main reason for seperating out the forums would be to keep the assholes who think it's funny to call, say, rafa a "fat spanish waiter" away from the assholes who take can't ignore the fact that an asshole called rafa a "fat spanish waiter".

Seems a shame that some people can't discuss football in a mature air of mutual respect. But if they can't, just fcuk em out. Don't start changing the rules to cater for them, that'll get us all fcuked.

Nah, the main reason is to make it much cleaner to discuss the Fat Spanish Wanker. Have separate threads on his stupid facial hair, his tapping-up of the competition's players, his foolish tactics, his tendency to come across as slightly mentally detached, his obscene wages, his new stupid facial hair, and so on.

By that I really mean it's hard to have several distinct discussions going on in one thread.

Also, there is (afaik) no forum on this site that is for regulars only. Trolling in any forum is a bannable offence, but Liverpool fans should not be unwelcome in the Everton forum etc.

tbh

Time Magazine wrote: »

Nah, the main reason is to make it much cleaner to discuss the Fat Spanish Wanker. Have separate threads on his stupid facial hair, his tapping-up of the competition's players, his foolish tactics, his tendency to come across as slightly mentally detached, his obscene wages, his new stupid facial hair, and so on.

wouldn't be a forum that I'd have any interest in, tbh. could be a selling point.

Dont be at yourself

ShiverinEskimo wrote: »

Each of those fora would inevitably only be frequented by fans of that team. What little bipartisanship there is between rival clubs on the SF will be lost.

The advantage of the current system is that non-fans can jump onto the superthreads and catch up on that clubs news and join in the discussion without having to check 5 or 6 threads to do so.

I don't really subscribe to this argument. It's no more or less difficult to navigate to a sub-forum than it is to navigate to a superthread. Non-fans would just be as welcome in sub-fora as in superthreads.

To be clear, nobody is asking for fans-only forums. We're asking for the full features of VBulletin be used to better organise discussion on the soccer forum - because it's impossible to follow a the moment, and it's killing discussion.

Time Magazine

I'm not sure if the sarcasm was lost there. Sorry if that was the case.

The Villa forum I'd like to see would have a thread discussing who we could sign next summer, a discussion on MON's tactics, a thread discussing the reserves/academy, a thread talking about Freddie Bouma's return from long-term injury, etc. These discussions are hard to have in a superthread.

If people really value the inter-club discussions, the general Soccer forum will still have a "Who do you think will come 4th?" debates where everyone sticks their oar in.

Mr Magnolia

Dub13 wrote: »

We have no way to gauge what the users who left the forum want,all we can and did was ask the current users what they want and they came back with no club specific forums.

Don't know about anyone else, but I don't even read the Superthreads as they're too unwieldy. I don't bother with the forum as a result, I suppose.

tbh wrote: »

seems to me that the main reason for seperating out the forums would be to keep the assholes who think it's funny to call, say, rafa a "fat spanish waiter" away from the assholes who take can't ignore the fact that an asshole called rafa a "fat spanish waiter".

Seems a shame that some people can't discuss football in a mature air of mutual respect. But if they can't, just fcuk em out. Don't start changing the rules to cater for them, that'll get us all fcuked.

I don't think this is the reason at all. For me, it's more to do with the fact that a big club has many more topics to be discussed than be coherently presented/managed in one simple thread.

tbh

Time Magazine wrote: »

I'm not sure if the sarcasm was lost there. Sorry if that was the case.
.

my fault - I see what you're saying now.

ShiverinEskimo

NekkidBibleMan wrote: »

To be clear, nobody is asking for fans-only forums.

That's exactly what some people are asking for to be fair. And in theory is sub fora won't lead to segregation but in practice I believe it will.

Dont be at yourself

That's exactly what some people are asking for to be fair.

That's not what I've been reading, it's not what I've been saying, but I'm open to correction.

And in theory is sub fora won't lead to segregation but in practice I believe it will.

Why? All we can go on is theory, because it hasn't been tried before. Solid theory is better than a hunch. It is no more difficult - indeed, it is easier - to find relevant, interesting discussion if sub-fora were implemented, instead of having to toil through 70 or 80 posts on a superthread each morning.

Look at superthreads now. It turns into a moanfest if a rival fan comes in to make a point (about, say, Rafa's transfer record). It will be met with outright hostility from the fans of that team, because that tired and old discussion will completely smother all others until its run its course. That problem wouldn't exist on a sub-forum, because each discussion topic could have its own thread.

The barrier to entering discussions would be lowered, not raised.

CHD

Why does this come up alot? It would be a disaster. Why would people want a forum just for their club? It won't improve anything. If you want to see a forum dedicated to your team just use google, then comeback to the soccer forum where it is 10 times better.

ShiverinEskimo

NekkidBibleMan wrote: »

Why? All we can go on is theory, because it hasn't been tried before. Solid theory is better than a hunch. It is no more difficult.

Of the two examples we have; The Spurs Supporters Club and Go Ahead Eagles forum are both only frequented by fans.

So we have a little more than Theory to go on.

Look at superthreads now. It turns into a moanfest if a rival fan comes in to make a point (about, say, Rafa's transfer record). It will be met with outright hostility from the fans of that team, because that tired and old discussion will completely smother all others until its run its course. That problem wouldn't exist on a sub-forum, because each discussion topic could have its own thread.

I don't see the need for sub fora to do this - if someone wants a dedicated thread on Rafa's transfer policies then make one in the SF for open discussion. The superthreads are for club transfer news/gossip/rumours - I don't believe Rafa's overall policies are required to be discussed in the superthreads and I'm sure if you want to discuss it you are free to create a thread in the existing SF.

Dont be at yourself

ShiverinEskimo wrote: »

Of the two examples we have; The Spurs Supporters Club and Go Ahead Eagles forum are both only frequented by fans.

So we have a little more than Theory to go on.

That's not comparing like-with-like. The Spurs forum was set up as a hosted forum to organise match trips and so on. A lot of these Spurs fans also post freely in the soccer forum.

The Go Ahead Eagles forum is frequented by anybody who wants to discuss GAE, and its posters also post on the Soccer forum.

I don't see the need for sub fora to do this - if someone wants a dedicated thread on Rafa's transfer policies then make one in the SF for open discussion. The superthreads are for club transfer news/gossip/rumours - I don't believe Rafa's overall policies are required to be discussed in the superthreads and I'm sure if you want to discuss it you are free to create a thread in the existing SF.

The problem is, there is too much news/gossip/rumours/general chitchat to be capably contained in a single thread. The day's biggest topic inevitably drowns out any other topic.

Time Magazine

Bit of a hand grenade here, and I know there are differences here, but does anyone see the similarities of this situation with the great Surfing Forum debacle of 2007?

"Why would people want a forum just for their club? It won't improve anything. If you want to see a forum dedicated to your team just use google, then comeback to the soccer forum where it is 10 times better." translates to me as "It's our Soccer forum and you're not allowed change that. Tough if you want your own place to discuss things. Get lost, go somewhere else. This is our spot and we consider it sacred."

LuckyLloyd

Time Magazine wrote: »

Bit of a hand grenade here, and I know there are differences here, but does anyone see the similarities of this situation with the great Surfing Forum debacle of 2007?

"Why would people want a forum just for their club? It won't improve anything. If you want to see a forum dedicated to your team just use google, then comeback to the soccer forum where it is 10 times better." translates to me as "It's our Soccer forum and you're not allowed change that. Tough if you want your own place to discuss things. Get lost, go somewhere else. This is our spot and we consider it sacred."

On the same token, why should you or those who just want to talk about their one club in the one subforum get your way? Particularly when you can find that in plenty of other places. Those who believe in the soccer forum as it is now cannot find an equivalent out there.

Time Magazine

Surely you see the distinction, LL.

You want me to stay someplace I don't want to stay, and if I don't like it I can go piss off?

Since when is that what Boards is about?

Necronomicon

IMO we're a little stuck between a rock and a hard place - there is too much subject matter for one forum, relatively new threads end up in page 2 pretty quickly. But on the other side of that, I don't agree with any of the solutions put forward so far. A separate forum for superthreads would be pointless I think, and I agree with those that say separate club forums would escalate tribalism.

I think segregation based on leagues/competition would be a better idea. That way, you still have supporters of rival teams posting on the same forum, it wouldn't lose that sense of openness and debate. It might allow the forum to breathe a bit better.

Dub13

A question for those who support the Club specific forums,how would they be modded..?Its hard enough getting the same style/ideal's of modding the soccer forum with the current small number of mods.

I hate to think what it would be like if every club had its own set of mods,there would be no constancy at all.

Xavi6

Dub13 wrote: »

A question for those who support the Club specific forums,how would they be modded..?Its hard enough getting the same style/ideal's of modding the soccer forum with the current small number of mods.

I hate to think what it would be like if every club had its own set of mods,there would be no constancy at all.

And to add to that, no doubt that if 'non-supporter' mods were in charge there would be uproar, i.e. a Liverpool fan modding the United subforum.

On the flipside of that, if you just have Pool fans modding as Pool forum then it's just one massive circle jerk which would be even more off putting to fans of other clubs.

Either way I wouldn't be getting involved in modding them anyway.

5starpool

Time Magazine wrote: »

Surely you see the distinction, LL.

You want me to stay someplace I don't want to stay, and if I don't like it I can go piss off?

Since when is that what Boards is about?

I don't think that ius what Lloyd is saying. What he is saying (imo) is that what the boards soccer forum 'does' is pretty unique, whereas there are countless club only forums out there (irishkop being one of those). If someone really doesn't like the boards format one there are club only ones available if boards doesn't meet their needs, but if boards soccer forum split into smaller bits, while this would make you and people who wish this to happen happy, those that are unhappy with it cannot go to one of the other similar places as they don't exist.

Personally speaking, I am firmly in both camps, and agree with almost all the points that are made by all posters so far.

Dub13

One thing about all this that good anyway is a soccer feedback thread with constructive talk and no hostility.

PHB

Wow, it's 2007 again, let me see if I can dig up my posts on this from then

Dont be at yourself

Dub13 wrote: »

A question for those who support the Club specific forums,how would they be modded..?Its hard enough getting the same style/ideal's of modding the soccer forum with the current small number of mods.

I hate to think what it would be like if every club had its own set of mods,there would be no constancy at all.

I don't think that that obstacle is insurmountable. Moderators plucked from the community of each board - not necessarily fans of that board's team - and clear, concrete guidelines would go a hell of a way.

The culture clashes and cliques on the existing board are the cause of most modding headaches, so a way to compartmentalise and adapt approaches on a case-by-case basis could turn out to be an effective way of dealing with them. The less hostile and flamey communities could be allowed prosper without any draconian actions, and the communities were trolling and flaming are commonplace could be dealt with in a more, well, heavy-handed way.

Xavi6

NekkidBibleMan wrote: »

I don't think that that obstacle is insurmountable. Moderators plucked from the community of each board - not necessarily fans of that board's team - and clear, concrete guidelines would go a hell of a way.

The culture clashes and cliques on the existing board are the cause of most modding headaches, so a way to compartmentalise and adapt approaches on a case-by-case basis could turn out to be an effective way of dealing with them. The less hostile and flamey communities could be allowed prosper without any draconian actions, and the communities were trolling and flaming are commonplace could be dealt with in a more, well, heavy-handed way.

1. Given the tribalism that has been mentioned oh so many times, do you honestly feel a group of fans from Club A would welcome a fan of huge rival Club B as their moderator?

and

2. Why the hell would a fan of Club A want to moderate the board of bitter enemy Club B?

PHB

I posted this 2 years ago.

Why we're better for it

People will go into these forums, and live in their delusional world. United have never tapped up a player, are in no debt and Ronaldo is a United player until he dies. Arsenal have been screwed over by refs, the teams, and the Jews. Liverpool have spent 12 cent compared to the 500 billion by Utd. Chelsea are a big club

I know when I came to the soccer forum at first, I had lots of these absurd ideas about United. However interaction with other fans have totally changed my views about football [despite people probably not noticing it ]

I know I like to think that I've destroyed some of the myths surrounding Liverpool [although some people don't agree :P], and I know lots of Liverpool posters on United issues have challenged lots of the stuff about United, just recently NBM was arguing with United fans who thought the whole Ronaldo thing was being made up by the press.

To me, it's no suprise at all, that boards.ie came 5th (or was it 9th) in the league table of leagues of fantasy football. This is because as a group, we constantly challenge each other. As a result, we know so much more about football, and we belive in so few of the myths that most fans normally peddle.

I find that I know so much more about football than most of my footballing friends. I refer to Benetiz as Rafa rather than Benetiz because of how Liverpool fans do it. I know that might seem minor, but its due to the inter-action with Liverpool fans. I know so much more about Liverpool, about how they play, what each players strengths and weaknesses are, what the causes of their failures are, because of the constant interaction with Liverpool fans. I'd wager that most users of boards.ie soccer forum know much more about soccer than the average person who reads the fan-only forums.

Look, none of us like our myths to be challenged. Its not a pleasant experience more often that not. But we're all better for it.

I know people would say, you should give people a choice, let them choose between a fans-only forum and a general forum, or both. But if you give people a choice, they are instinicivel going to pick the fans-only forum. It's human nature, especially for soccer fans, we like to be part of a group, we don't like our myths challenged. Boards forces us to not live in our delusional world (although many still try, but most of the people who are like that on the soccer forum are an actual joke)

This is kinda a moral argument. I know we should have the choice, but we're better off not having the choice. The way we have it now, encourages a self-critical attitude, and it's great.

And ultimately, the choice is still there, we can have fans-only forums, there are countless ones on the net. Also I don't see why you'd want to use a boards.ie fans only subforum, when the other ones on the net are much better, have inside info, etc. etc.

We've got a good thing going here. Let's fix what's wrong with it, and keep it going, rather than abandoning it.

That's when Superthreads used to include everything, including all match day discussion. I think once that seperate was made, we saw a massive decrease in the amount of trolling that occured. I think to an extent, that has returned now.

Personally, in terms of going forward, I think the framework is there for a great discussion, if it was perhaps more heavily modded for a month or two to see it firmly established.

There would be four types of threads on the forum:

A. Super-Threads on a club which include discussion of transfers, squads, tactics, reserve team games etc. No discussion of games where an individual match thread exists.
B. Individual Match Threads.
C. Topic Specific Threads. Should Rafa go? Comparative Transfer Spend. Etc.
D. Other threads as they come.

If they were enforced, and we once again ensured that:

• All Match discussion was strictly moved to the individual match thread
• Any repeated discussion on, e.g. Should Rafa go, was taken out of the superthread and put into the Topic specific thread

I think it would work.

Dont be at yourself

Xavi6 wrote: »

1. Given the tribalism that has been mentioned oh so many times, do you honestly feel a group of fans from Club A would welcome a fan of huge rival Club B as their moderator?

and

2. Why the hell would a fan of Club A want to moderate the board of bitter enemy Club B?

You're looking at it from a different perspective. The sub-fora would not belong to fans of that club. They'd merely be a category to better organise discussion.

Just as the Liverpool superthread does not belong to Liverpool fans, and just as Liverpool fans accept Man City fans to mod their thread, so too would the case be with the sub-fora.

I'd have no problems with any of the current mods - or any of a number of rival posters - modding a hypothetical Liverpool sub-forum. At the end of the day, we all want to discuss football in a sensible way, and we should all trust each other enough to be grown-up and fair about things.

(Obviously I wouldn't want the militant fanboys like Mr.Alan or Boggles anywhere near ModCP on any forum!)