“Sports” is already covered by the broader term “entertainment” in the forum description. I never quite understood why sports threads were not universally accepted under this heading or why there is any debate about it at all.
“You like sports?!” threadshitters should be treated the same as “You like Dukes of Hazzard?!” threadshitters.
Because of this board’s anti-sports bias, many people don’t consider sports “entertainment.” Instead, they go by the first part of the Cafe Society description which does not include sports.
Adding sports and gaming to the bolded list would probably go a long way if a Sports and Gaming forum is impossible.
As long as you consider all those threads about the poker tourneys, the werewolf games and such in there, I’m all for it.
Why are we debating this? What difference does it make? If a thread gets started in the “wrong” spot, a moderator comes along and moves it, no big deal. If it is a general question, it doesn’t matter if it has to do with sport or TV, it goes in GQ. If it manages to be a great debate (what to do about steroids in sports, perhaps), it belongs in GD. If it’s just some humble opinion you want to share, no one’s gonna kick it out of IMHO, and if they do, so what?
If you are coming into the SDMB solely to read sports and gaming threads, you are coming to the wrong place. That would be the only reason to collect them all into one forum, so that you could read them without having to sift through other things. On this Board, that’s hardly the point, IMHO. 
Because we’re Dopers. That’s what we do.
Ah, like the Second Amendment 
I don’t see how people can legitimately claim sports is not entertainment. It may not be entertaining to everyone, but still…
This board has an anti-sports bias? Then why are there so many sports-related threads? I admit that I hardly ever read any of them, since I have no interest in sports (just as I hardly ever read threads about relationships, raising children, or several other topics), but I would think that if the SDMB had an anti-sports bias then there wouldn’t be so many threads about them. Or are there a lot of “you like sports” threadshitters posting in them? (I’ve never understood that concept, BTW; if you don’t like a topic, ignore the threads about it, like I do.)
There use to be a lot of thread shitting in sports threads. It is not as bad.
We also have some newer mods that appear to be more sports friendly than the older guard. There were some discussions in the past, that led to more recent discussions about pushing Sports out of Café and taking games with it.
MPSIMS at times becomes overwhelm with threads that are games, and it was mentioned these could also go to the new forum.
That is the main reason why this discussion is being had.
It is not a dire need, but it would be nice to quickly find the latest NFL thread as an example.
I have noticed the mods have become a lot more active in moving sports threads to the Café, but in the pass, sports thread would end up in every forum.
Jim
::: Settles into armchair :::
OK, just a reminder of our history. When we decided that we needed forums (the original plan was “Comments on Cecil’s Columns” and “Other”), we thought long and hard. The usual academic classifications – economics, history, science – just didn’t seem to fit. We get too many oddball questions or topics that don’t classify easily. So, we decided to set up forums based on the type of discussion, rather than on the topic: hence, Great Debates (for unanswerable questions), General Questions (for questions with factual answer), MPSIMS (for sharing personal experiences), Pit (for flaming), etc. All based on the type of discussion, rather than the content.
However, there were so many threads about arts/entertainment, that after a couple of years, we agreed to set up a new forum for arts/entertainment, namely, Cafe Society. It is the only forum based on topic rather than on discussion format. (Aside: as such, there are often significant ambiguities about what goes there, there’s overlap. A question about the quality of sound on CDs vs vinyl could easily go in either Cafe Society or Great Debates.)
About a year ago (give or take), we had some discussion about whether sports questions should go in their own forum. We decided to incorporate sports as part of “entertainment” and so sports and cooking and similar “leisure” activites can go in Cafe Society. Again, that means there is ambiguity about proper placement: a discussion about baseball stats for a certain player could go in Cafe Society or in General Questions. A thread about my experiences at a four-star restaurant could go in Cafe Society or in MPSIMS.
From time to time, we get requests for other forums based on a specific topic: computer-related stuff, say, or math, or whatever. We tend to resist those requests, mainly because we still think our original decision (forums based on discussion type rather than on topic) was a good one. Each forum devoted to a specific topic opens up the door for ambiguity about placement.
So, at present, sports and gaming pretty much belong in Cafe Society… unless you have a particular reason for putting it elsewhere (e.g., a question about how the knight moves in chess could go in GQ.) The question is whether there is enough discussion about sports and gaming to merit a spin-off forum is what’s being discussed at present.
Where would threads about the WWE go? 
Isn’t that officially defined as “Entertainment” and not sports? Whereas Olympic/College/High School Wrestling should be in with Sports.
C K Dexter Haven: Thank you for the informative post and keeping an open mind on the idea of a new forum.
I have seen a few vBulletin sites that use sub-forums, would that be another possibility and would that make things harder or easier?
Jim
Again, I am asking a simple question: what reason do we have for attempting to segregate the sport and game threads from all other threads on here? No one has reasonably answered that question.
Should we segregate religion threads? How about computer threads (WAY more numerous, at a guess, than sports/games threads)? Where does it end?
Well, until you do that (or if you decide not to do it), could you please change the description on Cafe Society to state specifically that “Sports & Games” goes there?
While “entertainment” covers them, many people don’t seem to see it that way – obviously, from the number of threads that are started in other places and moved to CS by the mods.
Being specific would reduce confusion and the mods workload, too.
I vote for either creating a new forum, or stating that general sports questions should go in CS.
I can never find sports threads without doing a search.
(bolding added)
:rolleyes:
Well, somebody’s writing those columns!
I know, I decided to ruin Christmas this year and I asked.
It would be pretty cool to break CS into sub-forums like books, movies, TV shows, sports, games, etc.
That would help out people looking for specific topics.
Dammit, I don’t come here looking for specific topics—I come here looking for interesting and/or informative conversation!
I would hate having to check 300 different forums every day, from Nineteenth Century Russian Novels to Stories About Cats, just to see if any interesting new threads had been started.
Not 300 forums, just the ones that cluster information people seem to want.
I wouldn’t dare divide GQ into sub-forums.