The Soapbox - an option [modified]

[Pete OHanlon]

Sorry - didn't see that. I'm loaded with pain killers at the moment so my brain's a bit fuzzy tonight.

"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith

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[Henry Minute]

Ilíon wrote:

Dewd! Someone closed the so-called Soapbox

You finally stumbled on the point of my original post. Although clearly you didn't understand it. Whoever it was that said irony is wasted on Americans, might just have had a point!

Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.”

[Henry Minute]

Oakman wrote:

Are "before" and "under" synonymous in Jolly Olde, then?

I've just got that. Just glided past me first time round. :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.”

[Nemanja Trifunovic]

Chris Maunder wrote:

I create a new forum 'After 8 Lounge' or something. Anything not PG rated goes there. I do miss bad, politically incorrect jokes.

Or just lower the PG bar of the Lounge. I like bad jokes too, and it is nice to be able to remind the VB/C# crowd they are not real programmers ;P

Chris Maunder wrote:

I reopen the Soapbox and remove votes and remove ...

Whatever. I still don't see how that forum has anything to do with the Code Project mission though.

Programming Blog utf8-cpp

[0x3c0]

Now you know how everyone else feels

[Lost User]

IMHO you should leave the Soapbox closed and be done with it once and for all. This is primarily a programming site and the Lounge should be adequate for people to chew the fat in a civil and responsible manner. If people want to vent their spleen or contribute to flame wars then there are plenty of other Internet forums where they can rant to their heart's content. The Soapbox has become a waste of disk space. Please leave it closed, because no matter what hoops people have to jump through to post there, you are going to end up with the same problem eventually - some of the replies here demonstrate exactly what you will be dealing with. If you must stick to the kid-sister rule in the Lounge (why? aren't we all grown-ups here? The odd rude joke isn't going to hurt is it?) then go for option 1, but the Soapbox in any form will end up biting you on the backside and it's just not worth the grief. You don't owe the community any kind of forum where they can post abusive messages and any form of disclaimer may protect you as the site owner, but it will still taint the good Code Project name. Other tech forums can cope with abusive content, and if it means a CP employee or nominated members have to police the Lounge for dubious content, then so be it.

[Henry Minute]

Brady Kelly wrote:

Mac. Humour. I think not.

Really! Have you seen their prices?

Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.”

[Dalek Dave]

Stop feeding it!

------------------------------------ "May I introduce Blon Fel-Fotch Pasermeer-Day Slitheen from the planet Raxacoricofallapatorious, known by her friends as Margaret" The Doctor

[Henry Minute]

Roger, Wilko and Out.

Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.”

[Shog9 0]

Rob Graham wrote:

Let Ilion have his precious victory.

My argument for keeping the SB open in times past has always been that it provides a way to quarantine misbehavior. To date, Ilion has, for the most part at least, behaved appropriately elsewhere on the site. If that remains true (for Ilion and others), then I would agree - it can stay closed. If it just means that instead of needing someone to police one forum, we need people to police hundreds of forums... then we've just dumped the cesspool onto the lawn.

[Brady Kelly]

Henry Minute wrote:

Have you seen their prices?

OK: :laugh: :laugh:

[Rob Graham]

Unfortunately, I think it's only a matter of time before the cesspool overflows here. I think it has already started to.

[Marc Clifton]

Sounds good to me. Marc

Will work for food. Interacx

[Jorgen Andersson]

The soapbox as it was until yesterday is in my opinion quite pointless. I do see the point with a forum for, less than politically correct, rants and jokes. But it needs to be and stay atleast remotely connected with computers, programming or the life of a programmers to not get out of hand. If the only way to clean up the place is to "moderate" it for a while, so be it. After a while of having their posts removed the resident trolls will have moved on to other better fitting forums or have adjusted to the climate. The lounge will of course have to be monitored for a while too, for reasons obvious already in this thread. An alternative is of course to register a new domain such as "sad_trolls.org" and move the offending messages/threads to it And for the ones that complain about getting "censored". No newspapers or tv-channels are obliged to publish everything that get sent to them. They choose what to publish, so can you. As you yourself have pointed out[^], there are better forums around for religion and politics.

[Christian Graus]

The main point of the soapbox, historically, is that a place exists to move posts that should not be in the forum that is the public face of the community. The difference between community members having posts deleted and it happening to you, is that you're not a community member. This post is the first attempt at actual discussion I've seen from you in a long time. Usually, you just flood forums with lnks and abuse people who try to discuss them with you. Deleting your posts is an appropriate way for the community to protest such behaviour.

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.

[Christian Graus]

Ilíon wrote:

except, of course, that you "community" boys will have to stop acting like school-yard bullies who know that teacher has your back.

If the community loses the ability to respond to bullies like you, then the community loses.

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.

[Christian Graus]

As a rule, I find the soapbox more interesting than the lounge. However, it seems to me that the SB, by it's nature, has become a breeding place for festering wounds such as CSS and Illion. In my book, if you close it, your only issue is how to deal with the cockroaches that moved into the house while the latrine was uncovered. If they go away, and the more reasonable aspects of the SB can exist on the lounge, or move somewhere less unfettered, then perhaps the site will be better off for it. If CSS starts posting his racist drivel all over the site, and Ilion fills every article with asinine links, then the SB would have been better kept as it was.

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.

[Dalek Dave]

Well said CG

------------------------------------ "May I introduce Blon Fel-Fotch Pasermeer-Day Slitheen from the planet Raxacoricofallapatorious, known by her friends as Margaret" The Doctor

[Lost User]

Luckily there isn't an (wh)or(e) icon :sigh:

___________________________________________ .\\axxx (That's an 'M')

[Lost User]

Assuming you believe the 'Kid Sister Friendly' lounge is necessary, then having an 'Adults Only' lounge would seem to me to be a good idea - although I suspect that would end up being used much more, as it's not only original messages that wish to break kid sistership regs More work - but what about having an option in the profile of whether you want to see 'Adult' content - and having each message reply be abe to be graded (simplest case a checkbox of 'contains adult material' ). So now it is up to the individual whether they want to see potentially offensive material. If a message is posted with incorrect labeling, it ca be changed by moderator(s) which will automatically message the poster telling them of their error in grading their message. So in a thread I might see the original (PG) post followed by some PG replies and a AO reply. If I have opted in to see AO replies, then all would work as is - if not, then I would see the equivalent of the current 'message automatically removed' - but I would at least have the option of changing my setting to allow me to read it (indeed, there cold be a link to read this one message without changing my settings) As for the soapbox. It's a difficult one - and I appreciate the legal ramifications although IANAL. I don't think removing all references to the soapbox will work - you'll end up with more rap in the lounge. Adding a 'Terms of Use' agreement on each post sounds excessive! What's to stop someone posting something libelous to the VB forums? As the number of posts in the soapbox is not huge - how about: 1. Everyone who posts in the soapbox, the first time (or any time they change) has to agree to some terms of use. 2. A small number of moderators are assign rights to delete messages (and child messages) from the soapbox where these messages my compromise CP - but ONLY under those circumstances (i.e. not just because they disagree with the poster) 3. When deleted, messages and all replies are removed, no reference to them is left, and the posters get a personal message telling them that the message has been removed due to a terms of service violation. 4. Discussions will not be entered into - if you think your message should not have been deleted, tough! (this relies on a good set of standards given to moderators). 5. All soapbox messages are deemed Adult Only (as per the ratings mentioned above). So you have to opt-in just to read any messages. My 2c - hopefully helpful.

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