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Newsboard Anarchy Trial
Posted by Magnus on 25 October 1999, 14:24 GMT
As any regular visitor to our site knows, there have recently been a lot of controversy about the comments on our newsboard. In accordance with our site policy, we have deleted comments that we have considered to be in violation of the guidelines or completely off topic. This has rewarded us with everything from "thank you"-notices to being called communists. It has also taken up a lot of valuable time from our staff members. It was clear that something had to be done about the situation. As we saw it, we had three alternatives. We have tried the first one, are right now trying the second one, and would like to avoid the third one if possible. The first one was to disable the posting permissions for the people who posted most off-topic or abusive articles (which accounts were affected is not relevant here). Naturally, this was done after multiple warnings to the persons in question. This was done a couple of weeks ago, the result of which each person can evaluate for themselves. The trial was in force around Oct 9th to Oct 19th. The second one is the one we are trying now. For this two week period, we will no longer delete off-topic posts. We will let any kind of discussion go on. We will still delete articles that are clearly out to disrupt the page layout (such as 10 pages of blank lines), or that can be considered illegal or highly inappropriate (such as pornography links or anything like that). Apart from that, anything goes. Please note that there is no change in our policy as to what we will answer in this. We will still not answer off-topic posts. If you want to get in touch with the staff, use e-mail.
This trial will run from the posting of this article for two weeks, and will close on Nov 7th. The third option, which we would like to avoid but will have to fall back to unless the situation is resolved, is to turn off the commenting on our news articles. News would continue to be posted, but the user commenting would be disabled. Discussions would be referred to the mailinglists where appropriate. While we think that this would remove value from our site, there is a limit to how much we can provide as a free service, and we have been pushing close to that limit. Once the current trial is over, on Nov 7th, a survey will be posted, in which we will ask you, our visitors, which way you think we should handle the situation. The survey will be open for one week. This survey will be purely suggestional - we will make the decision based on the result of that survey and based on what we think at that time ourselves. The survey is not decision-binding. However, we can guarantee that the result of the survey (as well as the result of the trial in whole) will have great influence on the decision. We have been accused (by certain parties, as far as we have noticed it is not a general concern, but we would still like to address it here) of not listening to the voice of our community. We feel that this has not been the case before, and certainly will not be in this case. But as usual, we ask you to send your constructive comments to our staff directly at news@ticalc.org (assuming it is about our news system). We do not constantly monitor our comment board for site suggestions. We do, however, keep all mail we receive to the appropriate mailing addresses, and we take into consideration every idea that is proposed to us. We regret that the situation has gone as far as it has. Any other suggestions on how to deal with it are very welcome - drop us a mail anytime.
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The comments below are written by ticalc.org visitors. Their views are not necessarily those of ticalc.org, and ticalc.org takes no responsibility for their content.
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What? No lines?
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Dan_the_Tuba_Man 
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[The text of this article has been removed by a news editor due to violation of the acceptable use policy.]
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26 October 1999, 01:47 GMT
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Re: Newsboard Anarchy Trial
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Etec
(Web Page)
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It's better to talk in a real time forum (chat room). Why doesn't anyone make a page or site or add to a site a chat. Cussing out flamers is fun, espically in real time.
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26 October 1999, 02:25 GMT
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This Message Board Can't Handle a Monster Chain
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Dan_the_Tuba_Man
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Comeone every body! I bet this board can't handle even a chaing that is 100 posts in length. It will never handle a moster chain! Muahahahahah!
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26 October 1999, 02:36 GMT
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Re: Newsboard Anarchy Trial
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XoBoFNi
(Web Page)
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I think this needs to be said... Magnus is a evil, caniving robot... with 8 arms and a head made out of a 83&85 combined... didn't u know?
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26 October 1999, 03:20 GMT
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Re: Newsboard Anarchy Trial
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Mike Knapp
(Web Page)
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so, what are the 7 words that are always banned?
fuck, shit, cock, cunt, bitch, fuck, fuck?
im not really fucking sure, but i think fuck is on the list, would anyone care to fucking help me figure this out? itd be fucking appreciated, thanks.
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26 October 1999, 03:54 GMT
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Re: Newsboard Anarchy Trial
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levine
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There was nothing wrong with the 'old' system, as far as the common user could tell. If this fails, go back to that.
Eliminating the message boards as a whole would be a foolish thing to do. Try instituting an 'abuse' system; users who feel one particular user (Beasty? that an(_)s guy) is making a mockery of the system can report him, along with whatever pieces of evidence are required. If the operators feel the evidence is strong enough, institute a week long ban on posting and flag the user. After that week is gone, if more abuse is reported, and backed up by the operators, permanently ban the user.
Feedback on this method? Anarchy, as has been observed in this thread, will not work. 135 replies or so at the time of this posting is _too_ _much_ for such a frivolous topic. Imagine what would happen on something like "TI Announces 85+"? It's just too much to wade through.
Levine
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26 October 1999, 03:57 GMT
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One Comment
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jamin
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One comment is all we should need. Everyone should think long and hard about what they are posting, how it is related to the news topic, how others will be effected by it, and why they are posting it. Posting a large quantity of spur of the moment messages clutters up the discussion board and offends so many people. We need to think before we type.
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26 October 1999, 04:20 GMT
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Re: Newsboard Anarchy Trial
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ericb
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Personally I think all of the comments from Bryan should be deleted since he is so very annoying. I haven't seen him post anything productive at any point in time and all he seems to do is whine about leaving Ticalc.org, correct grammar, and complain in general.
Plus he seems to have no life whatsoever choosing instead to monitor message boards 24/7. Granted, this isn't exactly relevant, but I was thinking that.
OK, I'm done. Let the rebuttals begin.
By the way I even typed this up in MS Word to spell and grammar check it for you....
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26 October 1999, 04:20 GMT
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