Future of the Forum

[Michel H]

Perhaps you could tell him what he should prefer for breakfast?
...

Not what he (Randi) should have for breakfast, but I'm considering a possibility that I write to him myself (politely of course). Although, in view of the way I have been treated here in my telepathy threads (in spite of some good posts), I really don't think I should be the prime person defending Randi's forum, this would be a little bit like trying to defend my worst enemies, it would not be logical. Also, I would appreciate some support, some real support for this forum as it exists now (disregarding here some technical issues), this may require, in my opinion some dialogue and discussion with the bosses, rather than magnificent texts that the bosses (perhaps) don't read.

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

OK. Now I understand why your posts sound like recipes for sabotage. Thanks.

 

[Kopji]

I've always wanted to go to Sweden!

 

[davefoc]

I just read through quite a bit of this thread. As usual everybody around here seems to know about this kind of stuff before I do and everybody has more inside knowledge about what goes on around here than I do.

A few comments:

Some kind of focused forum about issues JREF thinks are important.
That sort of exists now in the comment sections to the articles on the main site. That might be about all that JREF is interested in and all they JREF would ever be interested in.

Bringing back banned people
I have favored unbanning some people for quite a while and selective unbanning seems like a good idea to me in the new forum. I kind of like the idea of charging people for the unbanning, but there are bannings that should be absolute, IMO, and I wouldn't favor charging people banned in this forum to get into the new forum.

Paid premium membership to get rid of ads
That seem exactly right to me. I didn't see why members didn't need to look at ads anyway.

Darat, Icerat and everybody else that seems to be making this happen
Awesome and thank you.

Value of the forum to skepticism education
I agree that JREF seems to significantly underestimate that. The 9/11 threads were amazing. I suspect that in no other place on the internet were 9/11 conspiracy theories dealt with in such an informed and educational way. This is true for quite a few other subjects as well. The JREF point of view might have been that this kind of thing was buried in the gunge of all the other discussions on issues they didn't want their organization associated with but their failure to acknowledge the educational aspects of the forum suggests that they didn't understand that aspect of it.

Major long term problem for a forum not affiliated with JREF
New blood. There was a synergistic relationship between the forum and JREF. JREF provided a public entity that could attract new participants and the long term forum participants provided various benefits to JREF. Although, the claim was that forum participants tended to exaggerate the benefits of the forum to JREF. Regardless, without a public persona as a face for the new forum I am concerned about its long term viability. Maybe we could get Kim Kardashian?

Randi
I was always disappointed to see how little Randi cared about the forum. I think he made about 12 posts total. I enjoyed his posts but at times I thought he was treated rudely for no apparent reason and he might have come away with the notion that the forum was dominated by jerks. Regardless, I am a life long fan of Randi and part of the reason I liked this forum was Randi's association with it. I have a sense of loss because of that with regard to this change, but it sounds inevitable and I am at least appreciative of Randi's willingness to continue to support it during a transition phase.

 

[Ampulla of Vater]

Bringing back banned people
I have favored unbanning some people for quite a while and selective unbanning seems like a good idea to me in the new forum. I kind of like the idea of charging people for the unbanning, but there are bannings that should be absolute, IMO, and I wouldn't favor charging people banned in this forum to get into the new forum.

The problem I see with charging people to become unbanned is that they then have a sense of entitlement with regard to future bannings. I think I would if I paid to be unbanned. How long does a payment for an unbanning last? Are you guaranteed an amount of time you are ban free? If someone pays to be unbanned and comes back at snark5 level, do we give him back his money and keep him banned? Anyway, you get the idea of the potential issues.

Paid premium membership to get rid of ads
That seem exactly right to me. I didn't see why members didn't need to look at ads anyway.

I do like this idea, although would pop-up blockers negate the purpose?

Darat, Icerat and everybody else that seems to be making this happen
Awesome and thank you.

The ratpack!

 

[Rat]

I do like this idea, although would pop-up blockers negate the purpose?

I run adblock+ and noscript, and have come across some sites that require you to turn them off before they'll show you any content. I turn them off on some sites anyway, if I want to support the site and the ads aren't too obnoxious.

 

[xterra]

I run adblock+ and noscript, and have come across some sites that require you to turn them off before they'll show you any content. I turn them off on some sites anyway, if I want to support the site and the ads aren't too obnoxious.

Yes, so do I for sentence one.

Only very infrequently for sentence two.

YMMV also.

 

[davefoc]

The problem I see with charging people to become unbanned is that they then have a sense of entitlement with regard to future bannings. I think I would if I paid to be unbanned. How long does a payment for an unbanning last? Are you guaranteed an amount of time you are ban free? If someone pays to be unbanned and comes back at snark5 level, do we give him back his money and keep him banned? Anyway, you get the idea of the potential issues.
...

I had similar thoughts and perhaps those problems make it so that in practice it wouldn't be a good idea. I do see some ways that it might work though. First, absolute bannings need to exist so that getting out of a banning for a serious breech needs to not be allowed. In particular serious breeches that occur close in time to when the individual joins the forum.

Putting a price on the cost of a less serious banning seemed to be a bit humorous to me. I could see the person's friends contributing to the cost and certainly the cost of additional unbannings would need to be increased substantially with each infraction.

As it is, the rules to be followed in the new forum will be a bit of a contentious issue for awhile. The finality of Darat's decisions and the necessity for them was always rooted in running the forum in a way compliant with what JREF wanted. When that goes, and we begin to move more towards self governance what happens? Both the spin off forums from this one that I'm aware of moved much more into a licentious direction. Will that happen here? It's mostly not what I'm looking for, although I'll be the first to admit to admit to hypocrisy on that kind of thing. If I had any sway, I'd loosen the rules a bit on civility, but not to any great extent.

We really are moving into uncharted territory here. Without a JREF connection will there still be activity in some of the conspiracy theory topics? Will the forum still attract true believers to come and test their mettle against the evil Randi groupies? Maybe JREF will continue to link to the forum and visa versa? If that happens maybe a lot of things stay the same. But what happens if there is no JREF connection whatsoever?

One alternative idea, is that the members could be given the opportunity to transfer en masse to a different ongoing skeptic forum. If that happens it is pretty hard to imagine that any sense of identity with this place will last more than a year or so. Does planet X exist on other forums?

 

[Olowkow]

I felt like selective unbanning was a good idea for a while, but changed my mind when I read the thread in Forum Management Feedback. Too divisive. How would the mods choose? I would like to see Marduk come back since I learned so much from his posts, but some didn't like him, and he did after all, have a lot of chances to change his ways and didn't. I'd also like to see certain troublemakers come back, since they added color, but again, who chooses?

I'm against any unbannings now.

And Randi had 56 posts total and left the forum when he made a very unfortunate mistake.

 

[davefoc]

I felt like selective unbanning was a good idea for a while, but changed my mind when I read the thread in Forum Management Feedback. Too divisive. How would the mods choose? I would like to see Marduk come back since I learned so much from his posts, but some didn't like him, and he did after all, have a lot of chances to change his ways and didn't. I'd also like to see certain troublemakers come back, since they added color, but again, who chooses?

I'm against any unbannings now.

And Randi had 56 posts total and left the forum when he made a very unfortunate mistake.

Nice to hear that Randi had more posts than I realized. I think I'll see if I find some of the later ones.

I suppose there were gray area bannings, but of the ones I was familiar with there was the wackos and the normal people and I thought the difference was pretty obvious, but if the forum leadership didn't believe it had my acuity at sorting the normal from the wackos it seems like objective rules about how short a membership would qualify an individual for a permanent ban would work. Also some offenses seem pretty obvious to require an absolute banning. I promised once before not to beat this dead horse again and I will try to not break my promise after this.

 

[lionking]

I felt like selective unbanning was a good idea for a while, but changed my mind when I read the thread in Forum Management Feedback. Too divisive. How would the mods choose? I would like to see Marduk come back since I learned so much from his posts, but some didn't like him, and he did after all, have a lot of chances to change his ways and didn't. I'd also like to see certain troublemakers come back, since they added color, but again, who chooses?

I'm against any unbannings now.
And Randi had 56 posts total and left the forum when he made a very unfortunate mistake.

My view as well. There are some banned people who I like, but this cannot be a consideration. There would be more people leave the forum if unbannings happen.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

I would say that for unbannings anyone who was banned for any rule which will be in place on the new forum (e.g. advocating suicide) should stay banned and anyone (if any exist) who was banned for a rule which may not exist at the new place (e.g. the advertising in sigs rule) should be unbanned if this applies to any banned member.

 

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

My two cents? New forum - new members.

 

[laca]

My two cents? New forum - new members.

Only if posting history goes as well. Which would be a shame. So, no.

 

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

Only if posting history goes as well. Which would be a shame. So, no.

Sorry, I was - in retrospect - very unclear. What I was saying/suggesting/asking is that if someone was banned from THIS forum, could they come back to the new forum with different details, and should they be allowed to anyway?

 

[zooterkin]

I would say that for unbannings anyone who was banned for any rule which will be in place on the new forum (e.g. advocating suicide) should stay banned and anyone (if any exist) who was banned for a rule which may not exist at the new place (e.g. the advertising in sigs rule) should be unbanned if this applies to any banned member.

Interesting that you should choose those examples. Advocating suicide is no longer an automatic banning offence (and I know of no plans to make it one when the forum has moved), yet those people banned for breaking the rule when it was still valid were not reinstated.

I'm not aware of anyone having been banned for putting an advert in their signature (outside, possibly, of straightforward spammers, who don't normally last long enough to get a sig).

 

[jhunter1163]

I think Pillory got banned for Rule 6. He's about the only one I can think of who didn't get banned for bad behavior (rules 0/2/12/smut) either in public or in PMs.

 

[Soapy Sam]

My two cents? New forum - new members.

On balance, I agree. It's possible people may have mended their ways.
Releasing the prisoners is pretty standard during revolutions.

In any case, I doubt anyone banned previously will be in a hurry to return, except for outright trolls, who will simply keep using sockpuppets anyway.

It's all fairly academic anyway. Our new Australosvensk Overlord and his team of henchpersons highly skilled moderators will decide who's in and who's out.

 

[laca]

Sorry, I was - in retrospect - very unclear.

That, or I wasn't paying enough attention to the context. Eh, well...

What I was saying/suggesting/asking is that if someone was banned from THIS forum, could they come back to the new forum with different details, and should they be allowed to anyway?

They couldn't, unless they change the rules. As for should they be allowed to, I don't really have a preference – there's good arguments pro and contra.

 

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

That, or I wasn't paying enough attention to the context. Eh, well...

To be fair, my comment wasn't really long enough to provide any context!

They couldn't, unless they change the rules. As for should they be allowed to, I don't really have a preference – there's good arguments pro and contra.

In terms of the actual mechanics - IP ban? - does that carry over to the new forum too?