New Forum Proposal: "Questions We're Still Thinking About"

I’ve noticed that the first page of General Questions (GQ) often contains a mere 4 hours of posts. This is unfortunate, as questions deserving further investigation are sometimes buried.

New Forum Proposal

“Questions We’re Still Thinking About” (QWSTA) would consist of threads moved by moderators from other forums.

I would suggest that the mods add perhaps 9 or so threads to QWSTA daily, so that threads from the past ten days or so would be visible on the first two pages.[sup]1[/sup] Ordinary members may not initiate new threads in QWSTA (directly, that is).[sup]2[/sup]

Ninety percent or more of the threads would originate from GQ, as that forum is the most crowded and closely identified with the board’s core mission. Occasionally, threads from Cafe Society and the like may appear, if they may benefit from exposure to a broader audience.

Proposed Forum Descriptions:

Questions chosen by the moderators for in-depth discussion

Questions deserving additional attention, selected by the moderators

That’s the proposal. Further discussion will occur in my next post.

[sup]1[/sup] Each SDMB page displays about 50 threads.
[sup]2[/sup] If vBulletin does not contain this blocking feature, then I retract my proposal.

Objection number 1: The proposal may be infeasible, as vBulletin may not permit the option of blocking new threads but allowing new posts in certain forums.

Does anybody have a vBulletin manual?

Objection number 2: It will require an additional moderator to handle the extra work.

Point taken.

Objection number 3: There will be much whining about never having started a thread that got moved to QWSTA. There will also be “nominations” to move a thread to QWSTA, adding to bandwidth. Begging. Pleading. Gnashing of teeth. Oh the humanity!

Ah well.

Objection number 4: Too confusing.

How so?  There will be a "moved" label in the original forum.

Objection number 5: Cecil has referred to “Questions We’re Still Thinking About” in an ironic fashion. Subtext: these are moronic questions.

Submissions for improved forum labels and descriptions are welcome.  Personally, I like QWSTA (pron:  Kwes-tuh (Kwis-tuh?)), despite its somewhat misleading provenance.

Objection number 6 It’s not fair! It’s elitist! It’s censorship! Why should the mods get to decide which questions are more important?

It is unfair, as is life.  But the mods are not deciding which questions are more important.  They are arbitrarily setting aside certain questions for greater potential exposure.  Ultimately, I'm asking the whiners to lump it.

Furthermore

Under certain circumstances, there is no reason why threads couldn't be moved back to their original forum.  For example, the question may be answered definitively or all angles may have been addressed.  Alternatively, if the same set of people may have been discussing the issue for the past 2 weeks or so, there is no reason why they couldn't continue in the original forum. 

IMHO, the inclusion of QWSTA would assist in the fight against ignorance.

**The criteria for inclusion** needs to be hammered out.  Top priority should go clearly stated unexplored questions, preferably those with a little whimsy.  Extra points for adequate elaboration.

Should questions posed by posters with a history of helpful moderating and good behavior be given extra consideration?  Maybe.  Alas, there's the whine factor to consider.  OTOH, small positive incentives can be beneficial.

Coverage of a diverse set of topics might also be appropriate.

The ultimate criteria, however, should be whatever the moderator feels like.

FYI, you can very easily do this in vBulletin for each Forum.

I like the idea.

I wouldn’t limit it to General Questions, though. Great Debates don’t drop off the first page quite as quickly as GQs, but there are probably a few that would benefit from more time on page one.

It’d be a way to promote the kind of threads that make this place so great.

I’m may be too optimistic, but don’t think this would add too much to the mods’ workload. I think that nominating a thread would be OK, but whiners should be shunted to the pit and then ignored.

Threadspotting[sup]2[/sup].

How about the BBQPIT2 (Electric Flamearoo).

Man, that had to be the most turgid OP I’ve ever read (not to mention a highly defensive follow up).

Eris: Or Buttonholing ?

"Threads chosen by our esteemed moderators for in-depth discussion. "

Anthracite: Thanks!

After reading heresiarch’s post, something else occurred to me. It might get confusing if QWSTA has originating forums with different rules. In the worst case, people would follow a pit thread into QWSTA, and forget to check their manners at the door. A moment’s confusion could then lead to flames in an adjoining GQ thread.

For simplicity, I would recommend that GQ rules apply in QWSTA. That would mean that its threads could not originate in the pit and probably (alas) could not originate in GD.

Deep Background: A moment’s data

I thought I would relate the time-length of page 1 from various forums.

Comments on Cecil’s Columns: 10 days. Utterly appropriate. Nay, too short.

Comments on Staff Reports: 6-10 days (Today is 4/22. The oldest post is from 4/16. My browser is set to “last 10 days”. Go figure.)

General Questions: 2 hours, 4 minutes. Page 2 has 5 hours, 22 minutes. Houston, we have a problem.

Great Debates: 8 hours, 35 minutes. Ok, but the remainder of today’s (and yesterday’s) posts are on page 2.

Cafe Society: 3 hours, 50 minutes. Dang.

IMHO: 7 hours, 12 minutes.

MPSIMS: 3 hours, 47 minutes. Dang again.

Overall:

It appears that the SDMB is taking on the qualities of a chat-room, as opposed to a (very serious) forum for fighting ignorance. My proposal seeks to address this matter. Comments welcome. (How’s that for turgidity?)