From reading this thread, my conclusions on the “ignore” feature are:
Pros:[list=A]
[li]Makes posters happy to be able to avoid reading posts by someone whose contributions they want to ignore for whatever reason.[/li][li]Possible decrease of the amount of board drama because when posterA is mad at posterB posterA can ignore posterB instead of dragging posterB to the pit.[/li][/list]
cons:[ol]
[li]More work for the SDMB server? (this is an educated guess)[/li][li]Increase in number of threads where posterA says “posterB, why didn’t you answer my post on page 1? You’re ignoring me, aren’t you? I just know it!” Spike in bar chart next to the category “number of posters feeling unloved.”[/li][li]Increased number of pit threads caused by reason 2.[/li][li]IMHO thread “who’s on your ignore list?” causing a general melée.[/li][/ol]
We’re discussing it amongst the staff right now. But my personal mood is changing from cautiously optimistic to dubious.
I appreciate your concerns, Arnold. The only thing I can add to your list is that any change in server load appears to be not measurable, according to what I understand from being on the vBulletin Community site. Any increased CPU time in checking names (which are done anyways) is balanced out by less time spent transferring data for ignored posts. But there are many factors, so it is hard to tell. I can say on my low-bandwidth low-server-powered site, where all effects are magnified, I see no difference in server load with it on or off.
That is the only factual thing I can contribute which is relevant to your post. I do have an emotional contribution.
I most humbly beg of you to evaluate the issue over at least a month, unless things really explode out of control. I don’t think there is a significant sample size of opinions or behaviors in this thread here, and I feel that comments of people that they would feel “unloved” knowing that people might be ignoring them are not quite warranted.
You know I have been a big critic of the Pit, and of things getting out of control. I do think that the Ignore function can yield a net positive gain to the Board in that people will compose fewer flames back, and fewer Pit posts will be started by people who are goaded continuously by others.
I do think, IMHO, that the behaviors of bragging or boasting that certain specific others are on an ignore list need to be strongly discouraged. This may become a problem; I certainly hope not. I would also say that a person who starts a “Who’s on your ignore list” should be BANNED immediately, with no second chances, as should anyone who posts a list of names to it.
Nonetheless, I once again humbly, and respectfully, beg that you give this issue some time to be truly evaluated fairly for a month or so. Once the “new-Board smell” is gone, you find that it is indeed more trouble than benefit. If so, then that is your decision to make, and we as continuing Members must all support it, without griping about at it after you make it.
Anthracite - the decision hasn’t been made yet. I realize that there may be benefits to the ignore feature. However, it seems to me that the ignore future can also easily be accomplished by scrolling past the person’s post, and a person possessing enough self-control to use the ignore feature and not “peek” could presumably also use the “old-fashioned” method of skipping past the post. After all, if I’m ignoring UserX, I can still see UserY saying “UserX just called me an (expletive deleted) for no reason! What a (more expletives).” or “UserX, your argument is tripe and your thought processes are sub-par.” Then my natural sense of indignation will induce me, in a chivalrous spirit, to go start a pit thread and/or support the thoughts of UserY.
I know you say that people should be mature enough not to brag about who’s on their ignore list, yet even you yourself say
People with less restraint than you may drop even less subtle hints, and I don’t like the idea of having to remind people “If someone’s on your ignore list, can’t you just keep it to yourself?”
We could wait for a while to see how well the feature works. But the longer we wait, the more people will get used to the feature, and the bigger the outcry when we get rid of it. Sure, there might not be a big blow-up because of it, but if there is we (the staff) are going to be stuck with the job of cleaning it up.
In addition, another thought that occured to me; it will make moderating harder, in that sometimes we will have to guess “did X just see Y’s post or not?” e.g. “Can I close this as ‘asked and answered’ before it turns into a fight, or is X going to start a Pit thread saying ‘where do you get off saying the question was answered’?” and that’s just one example.
In conclusion: You are presenting some good arguments. The decision is not a done deal yet.
I think you have made a truly excellent point here. The tone of what was said smacked of exactly what was being warned against.
I have always had my own internal “Ignore” feature, so when I saw that the board had one, I welcomed it as a nice convenience to spare me any accidental reading of what I really would rather not.
But further reflection has led me to the conclusion that this could get really sticky and ugly really, really fast, for all the reasons outlined in this thread.
I vote kill it, and we all go back to dealing with people who annoy us as privately & quietly as possible, avoiding the mess that such a formalized system is bound to create.
Since people are likely to continue to chime in - should this even be discussed anymore, Arnold? I mean, do you want any more polite debate on it, or has enough been aired that it best just left up to the Staff at this point? If people are going to keep wandering in and putting forth their points, I’d like to politely make a counter-point to them, unless you all have had enough discussion on this for now.
I just don’t want to make waves, that’s why I’m asking.
Me too, however, I can that the benefits outweigh the potential problems that might last a month or two. Ignore is good, damn good. But like Biggirl, I am too damn nosey to put anyone on ignore.
So for what it’s worth, I say stick with it, ride it out and see what happens. I think it actually might be a valuable tool.
So some feelings get hurt, some people gotta whine…it also might help in the amount of Pit and Piss traffic that happens on this board. People’s feelings get hurt every day in here and in real life. If someone wants to put me on ignore, by all freakin means go for it…less stress for us both or us all.
I just found a possible new benefit of the Ignore list: lower blood pressure. I recently added someone to the list who shall remain nameless, and upon passing a few of their usual-coronary-inducing posts this morning, I remained calm.
Well, I like it. Yes, I have the self-discipline to not read certain members posts - if I notice that a post is by someone I want to ignore. But I don’t read the threads like that. I generally read down the thread without really looking at the posters’ names. It’s almost random chance whether I look at a name or not. So this function allows me to skip posts completely for posters I know I don’t want to read, rather than getting halfway through and getting annoyed. And I can use it to remind me that I don’t want to read a certain poster’s ramblings. It sometimes takes a long history of stupidity for me to remember that this particular poster is not someone I want to read.
IMO, this should not only stop some pit threads, but also some troll behavior as well. After all, since trolls feed on attention, the best way to starve them is to put them on your ignore list.
I can see the problem in GQ if a poster that you are ignoring comes up with the answer. OTOH, if you dislike someone enough to put them on your ignore list, would you accept their answer anyway?
Note: all references to posters being ignored either via the ignore function or by my simply not reading their posts should be considered hypothetical and are not intended to represent real posters. IANAL, YMMV, not valid in all areas…
Perhaps I am a much more caring and sensative individual, or more of a callous bastard, than I give myself credit for, but I have personally not found anyone worth ignoring yet here.
I guess it is time to stop thinking of myself as a newbie (but I still feel that the board is fresh and interesting as I did when I first signed on), but in the year or so that I’ve been here I’ve only had a problem with one person, and it certainly wasn’t to the effect that I wanted to ignore them.
I don’t have a say for or against it: if you want to ignore someone, and it doesn’t drown the server, than I think it is a fine idea. But my personal bet is that those who use the ignore feature with a heavy (or medium) hand better remove their email from public view.
“Why won’t you respond to my posts, you bitch/ bastard/ androgynous dirtbag?!”
I dunno. Since I’m not a moderator or Admin the trolls amuse me.
This may not be an issue: given what seem to be more…stringent…enforcement of the “No BS hijacks of the Wildest Bill in GQ” policy (which I completely support, btw), if I ask a question in GQ and a hypothetical person on my ignore list answers, what I’ll see that the ignored hypothetical person responded and “This person is on your Ignore List. To view this post click [here]” It’s not like the person is invisible or that you don’t know they said something, it’s just a layer between you and their post, and boy is it nice.
In any event, I suspect I’d click on anyone’s post, ignored or not, in GQ, Cecil’s Columns, ATMB or Staff Reports. I’d be lots less likely to click on a hypothetical ignored post in MPSIMS, IMHO or CS. GD? Depends on the topic. The Pit? Projected entertainment value will determine clickage.
And a reason it’s so nice to me is that I’m very close to a page-at-a-glance reader (though that’s overstating it). I see the whole page in usually two chunks, and frankly, there are people who’s comments I’d rather not read that I do end up reading just because of the way I read. The Ignore List gives me the choice without harming the other person in any way.
And I agree with Anth that Ignore lists should be kept private on pain of Mod action: she made a very convincing case.
And erislover: it’s not necessarily that an ignored person is “worth” ignoring, or a troll as such: some other possible reasons to ignore a poster could include
[ul]
[li]Perhaps they have valueable things to say, but the way they say it drives you nuts. [/li][li]Perhaps they’re a One-Note Wonder and everything they say reverts to their one note (Remember Fatherjohn? “SUVs ARE SATAN’S OWN CAR!!”). [/li][li]Perhaps it could just be someone you have a personality clash with: not their fault or yours, just someone you don’t get along with.[/li][/ul]
After due consideration, I have to agree with Arnold. I’m dubious about the effect the “ignore” function will have on the dynamics of the SDMB.
Apart from the threat to the continuity of discussion, I think I disagree with the “ignore” function on a philosophical basis. The SDMB already has a well-enforced set of rules that keep people from being jerks. If someone gets too far out of line, they get put on the entire board’s “ignore” list by getting banned.
The ignore list takes that to a whole new level. People can avoid exposure to another poster because they don’t like the poster’s point of view or method of expressing themselves. In effect, the “ignore” feature allows you to create your own private board, populated only by like-minded posters.
This is bad and antithetical to the function of this board which is to fight ignorance, not to ignore it. One of the best things about this board is that it does challenge you and does, on occasion, increase your blood pressure by exposing you to contrary, and occasionally obnoxious, points of view. Even if you can’t change the obnoxious poster’s mind, the exchange is viewed by hundreds of other people who do get your point. The obnxious, stupid poster is often a foil for an interesting and educational discussion.
Everyone is also assuming that the “ignore” feature will be used by “wise” posters to ignore “stupid” posters. I suspect, however, that lots of posters will use it to ignore the very posts that will do them the most good. Which posters would want to put say, Collounsbury, on an ignore list?
I vote nay. Granted, it’d be nice to say “we’re all adults here,” but we all know that’s not true (myself included). Still, it would change the tenor of this board in a way I wouldn’t care for. Anybody I’ve wanted to ignore I’ve ignored just fine so far - some little clickable button isn’t going to suddenly urge me to stop doing so if I don’t click it. And, besides - the people I actually do want to ignore, I don’t actually want to ignore 100% - they’re smart folks, I just disagree with them (sometimes vehemently). And sometimes by skimming what they say, or accidentally reading what they post, I’ve changed my mind about them. So, from a philosophical standpoint (if I may), and from a UU standpoint, for me, I won’t be using it.
eris, Truth Seeker and Esprix have already made the points that I wished to make (and most eloquently too), but since this does seem to be a poll of sorts I wished to chime in.
If you don’t want to read opposing and, yes, even inflaming viewpoints then you’re really in the wrong place. And if anyone is that bad, then they will be banned. Although there are of course members here that cause my eyes to revolve in their sockets like roulette wheels in Vegas, I wouldn’t want to place any of them on an “ignore” list. If they’re posting in a thread I care about then I want to read what they say and possibly counter it. If they’re not posting in a thread I care about then it is easy as winkum to simply bypass the post manually.
I worry about what the ability to ignore will do to the board dynamic. It’s basically sending people to Coventry - something I’m sure most of us haven’t done IRL since age 7. In real life you have to cope sometimes with people you don’t like, and social interaction is the richer for it.
But I’m trying to put words here round what really amounts to simply a feeling of ‘wrongness’. If, at the end of the day, the staff want to keep the feature in then it’ll just have to be another thing I suck up and deal with. If enough people want it, then I don’t see myself as having the right to deny them. I just think it’s a bad idea.
Yes, this is true. However, I see nothing wrong with that. Maybe there are a lot of people who, through their vapid, insane, ludicrous, or trolling posts who really don’t deserve to be listened to.
I understand what you are saying, but with all due respect - have you really seen what happens with the ‘obnoxious and stupid posters’ here? They only create thread after thread of topics and posts designed to troll for a response, which of course works, and then turns eventually into 3 or 4 Pit threads, until they are banned and then put on the ignore lists of everyone, so to speak.
Just because a person has a point of view doesn’t mean that it’s worth my time to listen to it. Two weeks ago in London a madman by an alley was screaming about how Jesus was going to come for judgement day any minute now when I walked through Covent Garden - should I have stopped to hear his point of view and debate him? Should I have listened carefully to his well-constructed arguments while urine ran down his leg? And should his non-stop braying be allowed to disturb my shopping and eating? What about the drunken frat boy at my University last month who was howling like a dog as he barfed on himself - should I have opened my mind to his Worldview?
I don’t see what happens in many threads in “Great Debates” as being any different from the madman in the alley or the frat boy in the parking lot. It almost sounds like you are asserting that I have a duty of some sort to listen to people whose opinions I have less than no respect for. I assure you, I do not.
I think from an Administration Standpoint, the points are simple - this is a Passive feature entirely. No one except the SDMB Staff knows if you have someone on an Ignore list, unless you act like a jerk and tell them. And then, you should be banned for being a jerk. Simple, and to the point.
I think the real issue at play here is that a large extent of people feel that their vanity will be hurt knowing that it is very possible that half of the Board has them on their ignore list, and that they really might not be as popular as they have built themselves up to be in their own mind. It doesn’t bother me in the least if everyone has me on their Ignore list - I already know the trash-talking about me that goes on behind my back at Dopefests and in chat, so I at least have no illusions about my “popularity”. I think it’s time a whole lot of other people were brought down to Earth as they find that suddenly no one starts responding to their innane and pointless posts.
Let them gripe and howl and wail and rant and troll - while I skim over their blocked posts, and truly participate in “fighting ignorance”. Help the people who can be helped, not the people who have come here to build an online Cult of Personality or troll for responses by being as outrageous as they possibly can be.
new feature. There - I’ve put all the whiners on my ignore list.
Hey, where’d everyone go? Looks like it’s just down to us two, Anthracite.