The Constructive Ideas Thread
 

This is to replace the clusterf*ck of the other thread.

Rules.

1. Only post or comment on ideas, not people
2. Any posts criticising a person or people will be deleted
3. Repeat offenders will be given infractions & bans
4. Be Nice, and if you can't do that bite your tongue and go somewhere else because we're not interested.

Can I just throw in my "member of the week" idea and confirm nobody is interested, as there was no response in the other thread, not that it surprises me, due to all the you-know going on...

You should explain it again. I stopped going to that thread.

What happens if you're member of the week?

I dunno to be honest. I thought maybe a thread where the member of the week would be mentioned. Didn't really think it through as it seemed to get no real support. The idea being that people would visit and see, hey that guy, or girl, is member of the week. How do I get that? And you get it by being voted --- either by PMs from members who have to support their vote; you can't just vote for your friends unless there's a valid reason, or by a team of maybe mods and members who would decide --- the person who contributed the most to the forum that week.

Maybe you created a thread everyone loved, or helped someone out of a personal situation, or just fostered a better attitude throughout the forum. Maybe you started or restarted a great journal, or posted a great review. Or maybe you calmed down some drama. I guess it would be up to the members/committee to decide, but I just thought it might help to promote better behaviour here if there was a small reward system, nothing big or even tangible, just a stupid mention (you could maybe add it to your sig proudly) and a ham. Okay, maybe not a ham.

I feel like that's likely to cause other drama. We already have the member awards thread, and I feel like that's great because it's annual. No need to pick someone every week, you know? I personally think we should stick with more ideas that are involved with the musical aspect of MB, so that we can get more activity over there, rather than the lounge which is already active.

What I'm really saying is...
I'll only do it if there's a ham.

I will reiterate some of my previous comments here, and make some new statements in light of everything that's occured, and contrary to some posts I have previously made in support of the mod team -

Firstly, I suggest the immediate removal of the politics forum. Its been a lightning rod for too long and encourages more argument than discussion, not to mention its seperation into its own thing compounds the problem by ensuring that only those people looking to not just discuss, but debate, politics, will enter and contribute. Removing it will lessen the focus of the lounge on silly threads and irreverent discussion by tempering it with serious topics, and will also promote greater participation in those political threads by those members of the site less politically minded but who may still hold opinions on a topic or set of topics.

Secondly, I suggest that there be a review of the spam thread - I feel that spam threads and spam forums contribute to an extant problem by legitimising the act and portraying to current and future members that we will tolerate it within a closed environment - it's a mixed message, spam should either be OK or not OK, and to seperate off a "legitimate spam zone" doesn't help the forum atmosphere.

Thirdly, I second Trollheart's "member of the week" idea - not only would a more-than-once-yearly recognition of our best members go a long way to improving atmosphere, but consider the other potential improvements it would bring:

1 - Mods would have to determine our best members monthly, and in so doing would be forced to non-aggressively discuss with each other what qualities they find most endearing and positive about given members, leading to greater mod-team-harmony. (This is pie in the sky, but whatevs, I can hope)
2 - Having an easy reference of many individual winners of the Member of The Month, would make it more apparent on a forum-wide scale, exactly which members are to be emulated, and would mean that there'd be less confusion as to exactly what sort of contribution a positive member needs to make.
3 - The ego boost given by recieving an accolade, might well be counterbalanced by the tacit admission that said accolade was achieved by not posting like a complete ****.

Thirdly, and this is the big one: I rescind my assertion from the previous thread, that the moderation here is not at fault.

I instead propose that the moderation style of this forum is too lax and/or too fragmented to be able to effectively deal with problems. The previous thread is a textbook example of exactly why the threads about Boo Boo and Dirty getting banned both turned into similar ****storms, and plenty of others besides.

Allowing drama to sit and fester in a thread for over a week, then closing it with no action taken against anyone involved, to me seems to be almost denying that there is a problem or that it can be addressed directly. It makes the mod team seem like they spend their time doing one of two things:

1 - Fearing community backlash to such a degree they refuse to undertake decisions that would create it.
2 - Being so unable to agree on a course of action, that they cannot come to a shared conclusion and actually take that action.

I'm sure none of the mod team would agree this is the case, but from a members perspective, to simply end a discussion without addressing why it went so, so sour, nor making any ruling against or for any party in any way, seems to be a simple cop-out.

I think there needs to be a review of how moderation works on MB. When it was booboo, I took the mods corner. When it was Dirty, I took the mods corner. Every time since, I've taken the view that the mods do a very tough job very well. When it came to this, I took the mods corner again, because I believed we had a fair, effective mod team that would and could do what needed to be done to keep things, if not reasonable, at least under control enough that positive feeling could shine through an argument - look at the booboo and dirty threads if you don't believe me. ****storms as much as they were, there was good humour in those discussions and people seemed to enjoy being here a lot more than was shown in the previous thread.

The previous happenings though, didn't seem to me to be a lack of moderation born of restraint and a dedication to doing the right thing only when necessary. All I saw in the previous thread was that 40+ pages of argument happened, and that the only 2 attempts to moderate it in any way were to split it off into its own thread, which failed spectacularly, and to close the thread entirely, which less "worked" so much as just threw that discussion directly into the shoutbox and forces people to now try and address it indirectly in this thread.

I don't necessarily have fantastic suggestions on how to improve the mod team right now. All I can say for certain is that whatever system you guys operate under now seems to simply be hamstringing you and preventing any sort of decisive or worthwhile action being taken, in favour of simply allowing disruptive members to run riot based on them not being disruptive "Enough".

TL;DR - 40 pages of unmoderated, vicious argument doesn't happen under the watch of 7/8 different moderators including the threadstarter and many members of the discussion itself, unless something is very, very wrong with the way moderation is being handled.

In fact, I make the suggestion - Can any of the mods suggest to us exactly why they feel they personally, and as a group, did not have the power, authority, consensus or justification, whichever may be the case, to have moderated that thread in a more timely, effective, or simply direct, manner? Is it dischord within the team, the lack of a defined approach all mods should be taking, differences in opinion, a need to clarify what is and is not rulebreaking, a difference of opinion regarding grey areas, or something else?

I feel like while we as members can obviously do a lot ourselves to improve the forum, the previous thread has made it very clear that we need something better than what happened in the previous thread, for when things and people inevitably do go awry, and if that is to happen, the mod team needs to either restructure itself, or crowdsource a solution to the same question. Whichever it is I don't mind, but fixing it from your side, where you have all the info about mod team structure, seems the intuitive way of doing it, unless the mod team see's fit to share exactly how it works with either us, the community, else a select number of members making up that community who the mod team may select in order to hear their input or to invite them into a private discussion.

There is no official moderator policy when it comes to handling matters. It's a very fluid, very relaxed, very inconsistent thing that depends on who is doing the moderating more than it depends on what is being penalized, who is being penalized, or what group consensus is. Whether or not this is effective is I think a matter for the community to decide upon. Those who see it working positively remain moderators and continue to function under this system, and those who don't have departed.

I do think that this is constructive criticism, whether or not those to whom it applies agree or are interested in hearing it, so I would hate for this to be taken the wrong way and to be used to detract from yet another thread addressing problems deeply rooted in this forum's structure.

I generally agree with GB that moderation is not working as well as it should on the site and that is is too lenient.

Some suggestions in regards to moderation :

• Create a mod guide with specific examples that, besides usual business, gives clear cut answers how to deal with "grey areas". [Ex. Member X has borderline trolled for weeks. Suggested solution : 2 weeks temp ban. Should member resume bad behaviour after returning, suggested solution : Perm ban.] The goal is to have faster and more consistent and efficient moderation. It should also make it easier to mod, particularly for those new in the job.

• In the future, be less comprimising with moderation. Don't negotiate moderation with members. Don't share your insecurities regarding modship. Act with decisiveness and confidence.

• Edit members posts so that they adhere to the rules, f.ex by removing insults. Leave notice in red stating why the post was edited and perhaps a reminder that people should behave. This shows the community that moderation is taking place and it is an excellent way of demonstrating where the lines are drawn.

edit :

I agree with this.

I don't think we can really state 100% that the current moderators "See that working positively" - Every mod and ex-mod I've spoken to about this has told me the same thing regards moderation consensus - There isn't much of it to speak of when it comes to the longer term problems or larger issues. Whether that's shared by the mods I haven't spoken to is a mystery.

The problem with implementing any sort of policy that will allow moderators to agree on the treatment of a situation is that no set policy can be agreed upon in the first place.

Maybe, but we (Mods, members, both) either fix that, or **** continues to go to hell every time there's any problem less clearcut than a spambot, and that thought concerns me.

I'm honestly not sure there's much that can be done about it. If the recent arguments are anything to go on, I'd say there's very little we can agree on at large. I'm sure that this will blow over, return to normal, repeat, blow over, etc. as every major dramatic event has in the past. I think we can only ride it out.

Gotta try.

I don't think of it as an impossibility. The simplest way to do it, I think, would be for somone to write a thread of examples and how to deal with them and then publish it in a thread to the other mods in the mods forum. Mods can then discuss these examples, f.ex. one at a time. When a consensus is reached, those examples are ordained .. or what you call it. ;)

I got a couple of suggestion that ive seen work in other forums and maybe they can work here ^^

1, Profile customization

Basically pimping out your profile and maybe notifying Vms
this would be for ppl here to Vm each other more often and approach each other personally more

2. Community events

i know they have community events here but more events specifically more diverse events will draw some ppl here, like a poetry contest or a song contest where the community votes and picks out the winner

3, Better layout / Blogs

personally i think the layout of this forum is too basic to quote murderface it lacks.. Sass lol

also i don't understand why blog are disabled and instead we have member journals that have to be Mod approved

through blogs we could get to know how a person is like not just how much he knows about music
i think in blogs you can share more personal thoughts without affecting the community or threads here

Francis, suggestions 1 & 3 have been repeatedly ignored/denied by the administrators of the website. Anything that requires a change in layout or forum features and can't be created in the thread-template is a non-option for us on this present forum.

As for number 2, we used to have many of these, and they worked well for a while. If you have an idea, by all means go for it! They're a fun way to bring people together, they just don't repeat well.

The problem with your first and last suggestions, are they require technical changes to the forum, or the enabling of vbulletin options that are only available to the admin. It's pretty much impossible to get those things done, which is precisely why the forum looks as dated as it does - Tore campaigned ceaselessly for technical improvements to the site while he was a mod, and ultimately came away with nothing. Its common knowledge at this point that even if the whole mod team makes the request, they're far more likely to get no answer at all, than they are to even get a simple "no".

Your second suggestion makes perfect sense, and a few members have expressed similar sentiments, but I think we should be careful not to start a hundred clubs at once - I don't think we have the membership, nor does our membership have the time, to devote to that many different clubs and meber-led initiatives.

i also think this community strictly encourages a certain behavior, like to be a music know-it-all

and while that is good in a way because these ppl can educate ppl that know less it also means the key members basically run this place and sometimes its hard to be at the same lvl as them and if you are not you basically get ignored by them..

i mean seriously, we can't be all as charming as Trollheart..
Not everybody that comes here is a professional music critic it feels like music hipsters that only socialise with other music hipsters and if you don't know as much you get excluded

How can i say this,
it seems this place is run by certain key members and they are the same key members as always cause not many ppl make the cut and that's why i think not many newcomers stay here cause they don't feel acknowledged here.. it feels not everybody is welcomed here just certain ppl..

Thankfully this place has the lounge where you don't need to be a music pros to socialise here

I don't want ppl to think im an assh*le or anything, i like MB and i like how smart ppl are here.. i do, personally i have alot of respect for some ppl here cause they know their sh*t :)
i suggested a friendlier tone to this forum to counteract that, so its not all about who knows more about music and proves it but also about socialising and getting to know ppl

I'm pretty sure Urban's first post said not to go criticizing members.

Just in case, I wasn't criticising Trollheart quite the contrary i really like his post ^_^

Mainly i was trying to express what the MB vibe feels like to me i used Trollheart as an exmpl of what it takes to be a popular member here..

In fact, i think Trollheart is a good exmpl of a balanced member here
Though he knows alot about music and he is very charming he also acknowledges ppl and has a sense of humility imo

Damn, this is why i don't like saying sh*t here ppl always misunderstand and make an issue about it

plz look at the context of what i said i was never attacking him why would i? he's been nothing but nice to me like i said i was expressing my personal opinion of what i feel the vibe of this place is..

Wrong or right its just my opinion but i assure you im not blaming anybody in particular about it much less Trollheart

Not to mention dat hawt azz

^ I like this idea, which you also described in the previous thread:

"When things are about to turn hostile, I would like more often to see a friendly reminder to not let things escalate. On other forums, I've sometimes seen moderators edit users threads and leave notices in the bottom of the posts saying something like "Offensive remarks removed. Please refrain from name-calling and the like in the future" along with a reference or link to the rules. On that forum, when you see that colour in a post, you know it's probably put there by a mod."
Read more: http://www.musicbanter.com/announcem...#ixzz2cS3k0IWP

I feel tore's suggestion would be worth trying (again?) more consistently, since moderating posts by deleting only the offensive parts and explaining the reason in red should prevent escalation of conflicts to the level at which closing threads seems to be the only viable option.

The mods and community would need to decide which sort of remarks, pictures, or patterns of following a poster around to criticize her or him are considered offensive enough to require moderation.

I feel Urban's #1 rule for this thread..."1. Only post or comment on ideas, not people"...is a good general rule to follow and might prevent escalation of many conflicts.

For example, saying someone's idea has flaws is very different than saying the *person* is stupid. Saying you dislike a thread idea is very different than saying you think the creator is an uninspired idiot.

Similarly, I feel that calling someone on the boards a "troll" is a type of name-calling because it dismisses what the person is saying and assumes the worst about that person's intentions. Whenever I see people starting to throw around the "troll" epithet, I cringe because I can see the escalation of tension about to happen.

I recommend that mods refrain from openly calling members "trolls" (what you say in the mod cave to each other is your business) and step in when you see one member accusing another of being a troll, delete the comment from the post, and ask that the poster please refrain from name-calling in the future.

When you see someone who you feel is trolling (which I view as intentionally trying to irritate or inflame others), I recommend you keep in mind that people's irritation level with the person is not what determines whether or not that person is trolling.

* * *

As others have recommended, I encourage posters who find themselves livid after reading the opinions of particular members to use the ignore button (however it works) to prevent themselves from igniting and going ballistic.

Just a small point on the blogs: there's no real reason why you can't make a blog out of a journal. You don't have to write about music in the journals (see my Couch Potato, Mondo Bungle's Entering Infinity and of course the Batcave for examples) --- you can write about anything you want. So really your journal can be your blog. It's all just down to semantics.

Here is an idea for an event (Not sure if it has been done here already)

How bout a Music buddy thread when you match up a member with another member and exchange a music album and then when you are done listening to the album the person recommended you review it on the thread..

its sorta like 'the review the song above you' thread cause it forces you to actually hear the song (in this case album) before you completely dismiss them if you don't like it

This is a very good idea I feel.
Also, to be clear, I never took any sarcasm from Francis's comment on me, in fact I took it as a compliment. Which from his replies is how it seems it was to have been taken. I'd recommend, no offence BD, that people stop jumping to conclusions so quickly. If Francis were a less level-headed member, or one more prone to react hotly, this might have flared into serious drama when all that was posted was, in the end, a rather nice compliment in my direction.

Kind of makes you think we should all count to ten and re-read posts before replying to what we consider a negative remark...

We actually have a thread for that that's been up and down in terms of participation for years. The problem, unfortunately, is that people get lazy about reviewing the album they were given, but it's a good idea that's really fun when it's going strong. I'd love to see it get up and running again.

I feel like getting in trouble for using the word Troll is going too far. They enforce that type of rule at another forum I post at and they will ban people for using the word troll in reference to someone else.

No no no no no, I was not talking about the compliment in the first part of the post but rather the second half where he implied that "certain key members don't make members feel acknowledged" or whatever it was.

I agree. The word is used in the rules of this site, it seems pretty over the top to punish people for referring to something that's in the rules. Should we also forbid the use of words like "spam" or "advertising" as well?

@Troll

So glad you got it man :)

you're right
this could easily have turned into an argument for the sake of an argument and we would still be going at it for no reason lol

And that's part of the problem, nobody is taking the highroad
we keep looking for sh*t to prolong the arguments and sometimes this ruins threads seriously, ive seen threads here were ppl attacking each other overshadows the subject of the very thread
And me as a semi noob not knowing the ppl involved in the argument see it as childish an unnecessary

For me i don't care how smart your insults are to the person at one point you need to drop it cause its not solving anything

i understand confrontation is bound to happen sometimes but we also need to let sh*t go at one point for the sake of a peaceful community

now i say "we" cause honestly i myself im not above it but i try to remind myself that i need to be above it.

@BD

that part was a generalisation and an assumption based of what ive seen here im not attacking anyone directly

I'd be fooking screwed then, wouldn't I? :rofl:

You know, I'm just as bloody guilty as you! I saw your comment and thought that was what you were talking about --- certain members, just the idea of criticism --- but decided to go with Francis's idea. So bad me for also jumping, and my apologies, BD.

On another note, your classical thread is jumpin'! Well done!

Here's another slightly derivative idea.
What about someone (nominate different person each week) choose a totally new and unheard album, regardless of genre, and then anyone who wishes to participate does the same and everyone gives their opinions, good bad or indifferent of the album? I know Chrysalis is doing something along those lines, but this would be an album nobody has heard. Preferably something brand new, like this year.

i like this idea as well, though i would prefer if the user wasn't nominated i would prefer if we arrange it by turn like we make a list of the ppl that want to participate and each week the next person gets the spotlight

Banning someone for one incidence of name-calling is excessive, I agree; however, I don't feel that calling some member a "troll" in public helps create a community where people will feel comfortable sharing their opinions, so I can understand why that other forum has put a stop to it.

I feel that name-calling, including labeling people as "trolls" on the boards, should not be allowed at MB. If a member decides he feels someone is a troll and starts labeling her as such, then I'd like a mod to delete his comment (he can always report his opinions to the mods in private), and remind him to refrain from name-calling (this would simply be a warning). If he did this *again*, then he would get an infraction. If he persists in using name-calling because he can't or won't control himself, then he'd get a second infraction. Third infraction would lead to a temporary 'hiatus' (temp. ban) of a week or whatever the mods usually would do after 3 infractions.

The word "trolling" is used in the rules, which say that "trolling" is not allowed, but this mention of trolling in the rules does not mean that people can or should go around accusing each other of being trolls on the boards.

I feel that accusing someone of being a troll is a type of flaming and is a much harsher indictment than saying you feel a person is trolling. If I say to someone, "You are a troll; you're worthless here on the boards, and all you do is stir up trouble," that is different than saying, "You do a lot of great things here, but sometimes I feel you are trolling people and trying to get a rise out of them."

I see at MB that people sometimes use the word "troll" to mock and devalue other members. This is the reason I feel MB members (who include mods) should not be allowed to call someone a troll on the boards when they want to disparage that person's opinions.

What mods say in private while discussing if a person is trolling is your business, but when those accusations spill out into posts about a member, I feel that just adds to the creation of a hostile environment.

Here is our community's first rule, for reference:

• While debating and discussion is fine, we will not tolerate rudeness, insulting posts, personal attacks, trolling, purposeless inflammatory posts or members deliberately provoking another member into committing any of these acts.

^ This is the one sentence that is supposed to prevent escalating hostilities on the site. It's open to a lot of different interpretations and can be context-specific and subjective. I recommend that mods and the community decide roughly what they feel constitutes "rudeness, insulting posts, personal attacks, trolling, purposeless inflammatory posts, or members deliberately provoking another member into committing any of these acts," because at present it isn't clear where the lines are.

For example, currently we don't have any rule specifically against name-calling. Usually I see mods calling people out for using name-calling.

Is calling someone a troll an example of name-calling? If not, why not?

There is no rule that we like each other here, but I interpret the intention of the first rule at MB as meaning that we should be civil with each other when we disagree. For me, that means criticize ideas but don't call people derogatory names because of their ideas.

You can always still say them in your mind even if you don't say them to the person directly. That's what I do! :p:

Maybe Loathesome Pete's New Album thread can be used as reference for that idea!!

I feel like you're really splitting hairs here. Should we also forbid people from referring to people who advertise as "advertisers"?

I think what she means is using "troll" to invalidate someone's response is different than saying they're trolling at a point in time.

Erica please tell me if I'm getting this wrong.

Calling someone "wrong" to invalidate their response is also different than saying they're wrong at a point in time. Should mods start infracting people for using the word "wrong" too? Seems pretty over the top to me.