Thinning the herd.

[sarnold]

SKINNYFAN!!! YOU DO NOT TALK TO WOMAN THAT WAY!!!

I have a respect for Tafkas. I have a respect for hesscl34 and a Daseal. But I never respect you Skinnyfan. i never respect a gay and you was so lucky that the redskinrat come save you earlier and you also RedskinRat. You break my heart as well.

[RedskinRat]

Originally Posted by sarnold

SKINNYFAN!!! YOU DO NOT TALK TO WOMAN THAT WAY!!!

I have a respect for Tafkas. I have a respect for hesscl34 and a Daseal. But I never respect you Skinnyfan. i never respect a gay and you was so lucky that the redskinrat come save you earlier and you also RedskinRat. You break my heart as well.

[RobH4413]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

Ok, Daseal's post really bothered me as well as the responses. Believe me, this is something the entire mod staff as been concerned about for some time. It's very hard to strike that balance between keeping the discussions here civil and informative while also bringing in new blood to the forums.

This isn't meant as a slam to newbies, some are great and become valued members of the board. Others come on and just post, post and post away with no regard to what's already being discussed. To me that's just poor forum etiquette. But hey, you can't educate everyone who comes through the door. I think we're all guilty of jumping on newbies at times, and that's not good either.

I've searched high and low for some solutions and I have FINALLY found something. I installed a modification today that won't allow new members to create new threads until they have 10 replies to existing threads. I'm hoping this will help with spammers as well as easing newbies into the board. I can adjust that number as we see fit.

Let's see how this goes. I also encourage everyone, including myself, to be more aware of newbies and try to help them out when possible.

Thanks guys

Awesome job... Shows once again the quality of this site.

I'm glad that somethings been done, and it will be interesting to see how it effects the board.

Really the problem is kind of a catch 22. People want liberal, unadulterated, open forum for discussion, yet at the same time don't want annoying "newbie's" coming in and ruining their fun.

People, you can't have your cake and eat it too. The good has to come with the bad. The mod's are clearly trying to find the most successful middle ground while preserving the essence of the "open forum" that the site has been so successful because of. I'm glad to see that they've taken the constructive criticism and applied it to the site. I'll be here as long as I'm a redskins fan.

[MTK]

ironic that in a thread of this nature we have a dope like sarnold posting this nonsense

[firstdown]

How about blocking a new member from starting new threads until they have a 100 or so post under their belt. When I first joined I read most things and did not even post for a week or two. Then I satrted to post and had a good feel for the site and what it was about. It was several months before I started a tread which I thought would add to the contents of this site. We have new members coming with just a few post starting several threads a day and the only post count they have is on defending why they started the thread. Making them wait for their post count to get to a certain number will drive away the ones that just come here and start stupid threads.

[jamf]

Originally Posted by The Zimmermans

This site is still many times better than the others, less volume, more quality, with a touch of uniqueness. I'd like to stick around for a while.....if I'm allowed. I'll keep my volume of posts down since I'm new, it's just so tempting at work to respond when I'm bored as sin, sitting in my cubicle.

It's not the quantity its the quality of the post that matters.
If you have something to add, Please feel free to voice your opinion.

Unfortunately the forum attitude reflects the team and they both suck right night. Lately i've waited till Tuesday to post my thought and by that time there are already 1020932903904 Brunell is a doodie head threads.

It's just a matter of ignoring certain type threads.
Usually I only read the first page of a thread, If its going down hill, I will ignore it.

Only participate in threads started by respected members( AMD, Matty, BSB and many others). They will keep the thread clean from the gargabe we've seen lately.

People use the forum to vent. We've all done it. Stay away on sunday nights, thats when the bullshit is deep.

and most importantly, Stick around, One of these days we are going to have a porn section on the site! I'll even get you a Kick-A-Puppy picture section. (if those pictures of Matty really exist, I'm taking over!)

and don't forget your sense of humor

[wilsowilso]

Originally Posted by firstdown

How about blocking a new member from starting new threads until they have a 100 or so post under their belt. When I first joined I read most things and did not even post for a week or two. Then I satrted to post and had a good feel for the site and what it was about. It was several months before I started a tread which I thought would add to the contents of this site. We have new members coming with just a few post starting several threads a day and the only post count they have is on defending why they started the thread. Making them wait for their post count to get to a certain number will drive away the ones that just come here and start stupid threads.

I think 100 is maybe too much but 10 is not enough.

[ArtMonkDrillz]

Originally Posted by wilsowilso

I think 100 is maybe too much but 10 is not enough.

Agreed. I'd lean closer to about 25 myself; maybe up to 50.

[724Skinsfan]

Is this mainly about starting garbage threads or posting garbage in general? I'm probably a contributor to the latter. I haven't taken anything seriously since I got held up in an attempted robbery and the dude's gun misfired. Ever since, I try to keep it light.

I hope Daseal reconsiders. I bet he will. He is one of about 20 whose posts I'm inclined to take special interest in due to the intelligence and unique perspective.

Daseal, if you're reading this, come on back. Where you go, others may follow and that'll suck.

[firstdown]

Originally Posted by wilsowilso

I think 100 is maybe too much but 10 is not enough.

No I think 100 will get someone in to the flow of the site and will give them knowledge to what others want to talk about and not just starting a tread to do so. If they are true fans (I'm not saying a new poster is not) and really like this site 100 post would only take a week or two.

[JoeRedskin]

Matty,

I like the reply posting requirement. Thank you. I do expect, however, we will get a few thread spammers who will just run up a quick post count with meaningless replies (one word replies, etc.) so I think you will end up needing to set the initial post count pretty high (50-100).

Another thought, and in conjunction with the "new thread" requirements, how about placing a post-per day limit on new members? This would both cut down on spamming to reach the "new thread" requirements and provide newbies with a chance to make limited posts while seeing how things operate around here.

As many of the vets (and mods) know, losing Daseal as an active participant decreases that which was the essence this board. Seeing the decline in several other posters whose contributions I have always appreciated has, in my opinion, hurt the board and, I believe, Daseal and Cpayne have clearly stated the reason why this has occurred.

I do appreciate the mods concern with being an inviting and open forum that encourages discussion by not placing limits on membership. As with Cpayne and Daseal, however, I have missed the "knowledgeable fan" discussion that previously marked this board.

Let me just ask this - what is the Warpath's goal? To have increased membership or to have knowledgable and informative discussions? If the former, change nothing. If the latter, then it may time to place limits on posters. Doing so will weed out the kidwell's, etc. (who simply have to go somewhere else to vent their Extreme opinions) while, hopefully, encouraging those who are looking for some more meaningful discussions to stick around.

If I sound like a veteran snob, so be it. I understand that, in limiting newbies and low-posting regulars/lurkers, the biggest concern is that you limit and cut off discussion. Currently, however, the multiple thread garbage and excessive dross seems to me to be doing the same thing with Daseal's announcement being the most obvious evidence of it.

This post ended up being MUCH longer than I anticipated. I hope it will be taken in the spirit it was meant (See below).

Two final points:
I hope Daseal changes his mind b/c, as many have said, I greatly appreciate his contrarian nature when it comes to the Skins.

In one of your posts you indicated that the mods had already been discussing this issue. I would simply like to thank you for the efforts you, the mods, HAVE made in keeping threads clean, merging where appropriate and locking when appropriate. Given the "in season" issues, I recognize the vigilance used, the careful balancing that you have performed, and the incredible amount of work already being put into the board. And, for all the above critique, this is still the only forum site I visit for discussion. Thank you for your excellent work and commitment.

[MTK]

I appreciate the feedback but 50 or 100 is way too much. I've been a member on other boards that required a certain amount of posts and 10 seems to be pretty standard. If someone had to hang around for 50 or 100 posts alot of people would quickly look for another forum. We'll see how this goes and we can always make changes.

Spammers aren't going to hang around, they look for a quick in and out. Most aren't interested in hanging around for even 10 posts, and there is already a requirement in place as to how long a reply must be, so quick one word answers won't always cut it.

As far as limiting posts per day there isn't a way we can do that currently, unless I can find a modification for that.

Obviously we're never going to find a perfect solution, but I think these new member restrictions are going to help.

[MTK]

As for the knowledgeable tag line, I appreciate that you guys liked that. I can bring that back, I just felt like changing it up a little. It wasn't meant to reflect that the site is moving in a different direction or anything, but perhaps it was important to help set the tone.

[onlydarksets]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

As for the knowledgeable tag line, I appreciate that you guys liked that. I can bring that back, I just felt like changing it up a little. It wasn't meant to reflect that the site is moving in a different direction or anything, but perhaps it was important to help set the tone.

It's back! I like it!

[onlydarksets]

I'm already in favor of what JoeRedskin posted (I forget who posted it first). Some kind of a limit on the number of posts per day would be great.

An alternative for creating the new thread could be that you have to have 10 posts and be a member for a week, or something like that. It would prevent people from dumping a bunch of posts in the Parking Lot just to be able to create a new thread.