(Site is a graveyard - How can boards save itself?) Any update?

Flinty997

I don't see the purpose of these threads. What changes.

uptherebels

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122434011#Comment_122434011

I guess my post went over your head

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122427727#Comment_122427727

As I said, I wanted to respond to this in a little bit more detail than just acknowledging your post. Although this is being said to you, it is for 'Boards' or whoever it is are the key influencers within the organisation.

As I said in my OP here, my concern on the original thread was that I saw a lot of 'things are fine, let's just keep the same was what we are doing' and your post here confirms that that is the case.

Moderation absolutely is influential… for a long time it has trended to be dictatorial and personality focused rather than facilitating the ethos of the platform 'Now you're talking'

But it is not just moderation, I feel there is opportunity for Boards to promote or sustain conversation in a way that I have rarely see them do. The focus of internal conversations, in as much as we can see them, seems to be 'How do we stop people complaining about mods.' And that's it!

The original thread title referred only to activity on the site, the conversation did go in to moderation and it is important, but there is way more to it than just that.

The key players in Boards have seemed intent for a couple of years now of prioritizing non-conflict threads, that's it, no matter the angle you're looking at a particular discussion from, the priority is peace and quiet and if that means there's only 4 people in the conversation rather than 20, than so be it. It is in itself self-defeating. I've seen close to zero attempts at promoting conversation in my time here with the 'Ask me Anything' threads being the sole thing that has me saying 'close to zero' rather than zero.

Even the fact that the final post on the original thread stated 'We'll post updates here' and yet a few of us have had to go digging for updates months later just leaves me feeling negative about the chances of the site to be what it could be. Some people have alluded to changing engagement styles and demographics, which is the case in the broader sense, but there's always going to be people who enjoy the longer format style of interacting on line, this could be a place for them if it figured out how to focus on attracting them rather than alienating those that do drop in or spend time here.

Quantum Erasure

Another thing that might promote conversation is not closing 'IMHO' threads in CA / IMHO on the basis that they're not 'current affairs'

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122436040#Comment_122436040

I guess mine went over yours.

I think we've all been there when certain posters get away with blue murder for extended periods, or certain sides of a discussion. While other people have the mods on them like a ton of bricks, for very little, zero tolerance in fact.

While I have every empathy for the mods and I hear what Bag o Chips, is saying. I don't see changes, and I stay away from the threads and forums where perhaps I might. I avoid certain mods and their forums also. Life's too short. The site is so buggy it's unusable at times.

I think "Tell me how" OP about revisiting the main complaints and asking what progress is a valid question.

uptherebels

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437173#Comment_122437173

I'm not sure which part of my post was difficult for you. Because it has clearly gone over your head, or else you are just ignoring the parts you don't want to hear.

As I already pointed, alot of the moderator "bias" is in fact just moderation.

Too many posters believe their "opinion" should be listened to without question and if it's not they play the victim.

If people respond to them, they are being ganged up on. Play the victim

If sanctions aren't 50/50 it's mod bias. Play the victim

Even in the instance I provided where the moderators bent over backwards so as not to moderate them, they were still the victim of moderator bias. To them it's not their posting style, not their inability to debate on facts, etc etc. the only way they are sanctioned is because the mods are out to get/silence them.

They want boards to be like twitter or Reddit, where they can have a bubble and when it doesn't work out like that, guess what? Play the victim

LambshankRedemption

Can anyone explain to me why the quote button only worls 50% of the time?

You click quote, it scrolls down to the "Leave a comment" field but no quote. So you have to scroll back up, find the post you wanted to quote, click quote again, and it works.

It's very annoying.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437288#Comment_122437288

Theres a litany of basic functionality broken.

Shoog

I would say the interaction between the site software and Android spell correction mangles nearly 100% of all of my posts often needing multiple edits to correct the mistakes. Its very frustrating.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437265#Comment_122437265

There's a certain irony in complaining about not being listened to while complaining about people complaining about their opinion not being listened to.

If you believe there is no issue with moderation I'll agree to disagree. There are also a litany of technical issues.

Flinty997

Have to say it's laying on it bit rich putting the blame of the forums being quiet on modern youth or society etc, when even the oldest members of the site are complaining about basic functionality not working. Thats before you get into more subjective topics.

Though I will agree there's a certain mob mentality to reddit, that I dislike. A certain tabloid approach to discussion these days.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437419#Comment_122437419

Same here I can often need many attempts to post something. Eventually I just give up.

The Nal

Not being able to copy and paste different parts of posts was the big change that saw a lot of people leave/stop posting. Huge fall off after that change.

bartkingcole

Maybe send a weekly email to registered uses on hot topic threads. This is something that Mumsnet does and it does attract traffic. I don’t know of the sign up conditions permits this!!!

LambshankRedemption

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437474#Comment_122437474

Im going to echo this. Multi quoting being absent is a major missing feature, Quote working 50% of the time Ive already mentioned. I really miss the roll eye emoticon. You don't realise how much you use something until its gone. I dont know if its related to the upgrade, but Ive noticed an increase in the wrong topic ending up in the wrong forum.

I a member of multiple other fora spanning a wide range of subjects, and they have not seen a mass exodus as a result of modern youth or society. It was the month or so of teething issues, followed by month on month of basic functionality missing that caused people to stop coming here.

After that, its the bad pint of Guinness vicious cycle. 4 men go into a pub, order a Guinness each, it arrives but its bad. Maybe it was a dodgy barrel, or the pipes werent cleaned properly, either way, after one, they leave. A few more people, come in order a pint, but leave after the one. A keg holds 88 pints and usually in a busy pub, at least one keg would be used in a night, but because people keep having one and then changing to something else or leaving, it goes 2 days, or 3. The place gets a name for selling dodgy pints. That barrel is replaced, the pipes get cleaned, but the damage is done. People don't go there any more, which now means a barrel lasts for more than a week by which time its gone stale and really not nice at all.

I used to frequent the Information Security forum, just like the pub, the last post was from a week a go. So people come on here, but its a ghost town. Some forums, the last post is from months ago. They assume the site is desserted and leave.

nachouser

The reality is the site has one employee and a bunch of volunteers. I would imagine it's run on a shoe string budget at this point, so expecting anything other than what we currently get to experience is probably not realistic. A few bug fixes, but that's about it. At the end of the day, the owner could wake up with a hangover one morning (I've no idea if they drink!) and say to themselves "Meh, I'm done." and the site would be over.

The moderation complaints will always happen because some people think they are always right and their opinion should be allowed, unfettered and if that's not the case then it's clearly because of moderator bias.

IMHO, boards is full of useful information, fun threads and frustrating ones in equal measure, but it's completely down to people who volunteer their free time that the thing exists. Like it or lump it. I've had about 14 mod warnings in a little over a year, so I'm as bad as anyone else:-)

The bug fix thread is still ongoing for anyone not aware of it.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058199223/just-bugs-missing-functionality-reports-no-griping

Leg End Reject

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437552#Comment_122437552

I'm not sure being more like Mumsnet will help Boards tbh. 🤣

ETA - Bringing back the most thanked feature might help, but it's not possible on Vanilla. Mark used to do a round up every month too when Niamh was also here, now it's Mike on his own, and he's part-time, but he's busy raising tickets with Vanilla.

Jim_Hodge

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437700#Comment_122437700

This thread is now just repeating the previous ones. The same people with the same moderation complaints. 90% or more of posters never have any interaction with Mods. There are dozens of forums, with copious threads, ticking along merrily with good discussions, queries & advice, information and craic. 46 threads have multiple posts in the last 30 minutes. It's hardly stagnant. People shouldn't judge the entire site on just the forums they generally use.

It's not perfect but it's still an excellent free resource.

Witcher

The duplication of threads in CA is becoming ridiculous, especially US politics related.

On the front page of CA at this moment we have:

• Kamala Harris v Donald Trump
• Donald Trump Megathread
• Assassination attempt on Donal Trump
• ????? Vs Trump
• And a Joe Biden thread

I mean...at this rate what is the Politics forum for? There is one US Presidential election thread in Politics at present which is what should be in CA and have the multi thread, topic variety in Politics.

It just smacks of the lack of attention being paid across the site generally. One time those threads would have been merged, closed or moved. Now it just seems to be do as ya like on CA.

I've seen lads start a thread on a topic and an existing, active thread on the same topic could be right at the top of the thread list. You'd have gotten a card for that laziness 2-3 years ago.

It also leads to problem posters jumping from thread to thread to avoid threadbans and ultimately making a mess of possibly 5 threads with their shítposting.

Leg End Reject

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122438029#Comment_122438029

Actually, an American subforum wouldn't be a bad idea at this stage.

It was suggested before, and I disagreed with it at the time, but CA is full of these now.

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122438029#Comment_122438029

These two in particular are identical in scope

• Kamala Harris v Donald Trump
• ????? Vs Trump

The others in theory have different topic but unless thats moderated it just becomes a sprawling free for all... and threadbanned posters moving onto the other one and carrying on as before.

Witcher

There should be one US Politics/Presidential Election megathread in CA to concentrate discussion and then should any poster act the bollocks they're gone for good from the discussion, not just off to the next thread down.

One ban for the mods not five. Threadbans in general need to be looked at imo, they don't achieve what they set out to, problem posters will just move to the next thread, regardless of topic and start shitposting.

If someone is crossing the line in the forum, put them off the forum in its entirety t'fúck, nevermind half arsed thread bans.

nachouser

At this point, CA is probably a necessary evil. It keeps traffic going so that other forums exist to answer genuine questions, like how to fix a derailleur on a bike or where to find a decent barber in Sligo on a Monday morning before a wedding. Look, it is what it is.

tohaltuwi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437499#Comment_122437499

it doesn’t work well with iOS either. Plenty of incompatibilities.

tohaltuwi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122438029#Comment_122438029

2 or 3 years earlier it was easier to locate threads on a given subject. I know this doesn’t apply to the US presidential scenario here, but I find before starting a new thread I tend to google the term+Boards.ie to check if there is a pre-existing thread that is very similar.

Musicrules

Boards.ie is kind of a sad looking site. Also, lots of the posters on it seem quite sad. That or angry. It's not a very healthy place. But maybe that's just the threads I'm reading.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122437700#Comment_122437700

I appreciate the volunteer nature of it. But there are small forums with stock forum software with none of these functional problems. They needed to shrink the boards appropriately to the resources available to it. But they insisted on migrating all all the old obsolete data and customisations. But that ship sailed long ago. I no longer think any of it will be fixed.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122438495#Comment_122438495

At one point they expanded the sub forums for some unknown reason, which caused many to become ghost towns. Compounded by the search being broken pretty much since they migrated.

nachouser

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122438588#Comment_122438588

Chuck your CV at boards.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122438617#Comment_122438617

Needs someone younger and far less grumpy.