• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

Good Posting Practices

Can any forum or thread be removed from a posters view?

I haven't investigated the details, but the new board has some settings that look like users can be granted permissions for specific forums/sub-forums. The default is for them to see everything 'public'.

We'd have to look into it and experiment with some test accounts, but it might now be an option.

I would say, however, that unless it's the single thing that's making you enjoy the board less, the CHAT section does serve a helpful purpose.

I, for one, like getting to know the membership and seeing snippets of their lives and interests beyond Forteana.
 
I haven't investigated the details, but the new board has some settings that look like users can be granted permissions for specific forums/sub-forums. The default is for them to see everything 'public'.

We'd have to look into it and experiment with some test accounts, but it might now be an option.

I would say, however, that unless it's the single thing that's making you enjoy the board less, the CHAT section does serve a helpful purpose.

I, for one, like getting to know the membership and seeing snippets of their lives and interests beyond Forteana.
'Chat' is the main reason I visit at all, I'm fine with that.
 
Can any forum or thread be removed from a posters view?

Short Answer(s):

Any forum (including sub-forums): Yes, but it's labor-intensive.
Individual threads: No - not on a user-by-user basis.
Both cases: No - not via any discretionary user controls or preferences.

Here's why ...

Every forum / sub-forum listed in the forums overview is a structural component of the forum site. These components are attributed certain specifications, including which user groups (yet another structural component) can access which of the forum / sub-forum components.

The primary means for mapping user groups onto forum components is manipulating permissions.

The component and permissions specifications are in effect implemented as global rule-sets governing forum functionalities and user groups' affordances. None of these rule-sets are applicable at as fine a granularity as individual users.

Having said that ...

There is an admin-level feature affording the ability to specify special component-level permission sets for an individual user. This feature is intended for fine-tuning permissions for those of us with mod or admin powers.

In theory, this feature could be used to set permissions so as to disallow a particular user from being able to view a particular forum.

In practice, this would entail our having to handle who-the-f**k-knows-how-many user requests to create who-the-f**k-knows how many different such permissions configurations and subsequently revise (on request) these settings who-the-f**k-knows how often.
 
Is it me, or... does anyone else not really understand the need for ignoring posts or hiding threads / sections?

If I'm not interested in something I simply don't read it. Same for posts - I've never felt the need to ignore a poster... I find that if I disagree with someone on one thread, I may well agree with them on another. There's no one on here that I dislike enough to want to 'ignore' altogether. Plus I think it would make reading threads rather confusing (and I get confused enough already).

So if someone doesn't want to see, for example, the 'chat' section... simply don't go there? Rather than have the mods spend their valuable time trying to tweak things to suit?

Everyone's different I know, but... that's just the way I see it. For instance, I'm not interested in Esoterica. Ergo, I've never (to my knowledge!) ventured into that part of the forum. But I don't see the need to make it especially hidden for me... what would be the point?

And as for the chat thread... I like it and would definitely not like it if it went (like @escargot, I would likely go with it). Yes, this is a forum about Forteana stuff, but... we all need a break from that from time to time and being able to loosely chat about (almost) anything and everything is nice, I think. Especially for those of us who don't "do" twitter/facebreak/mybook/etc. Chat is supportive, friendly, relaxing... part of what makes this forum what it is.

In my opinion. :)
 
In practice, this would entail our having to handle who-the-f**k-knows-how-many user requests to create who-the-f**k-knows how many different such permissions configurations and subsequently revise (on request) these settings who-the-f**k-knows how often.
I was hoping it might be more a 'see box, tick box' kind of deal, no matter. :hoff:
 
I think we're experiencing the same narcissistic obsession with personal opinion that other media are noticing and that it's not the fault of the structure of the board.
That right there. That's the problem. I might put it a bit differently: Some people desperately need to grow up.
 
What if, you have actually undertaken a search, say.... 'indian tiger' and that search does not identify a related news story?

If it's a news story, just check NEW POSTS.

We've had the Tiger twice and Snowden twice (or arguably three times).
 
Please ...

Do not post links to 3rd party services holding materials that you own / store / control at that 3rd party's site and which require anyone following your link to subscribe or log onto that 3rd party service just to access your materials.

Posting a link to your personal (e.g., cloud) storage is analogous to the old problem of people posting links to files stored on their local hard drives, in the sense of opening up potential security and reliable accessibility issues.

If you want to openly share materials you hold (e.g., images), you can post them here on the forum.

If you wish to offer only limited access to your materials, advise readers to contact you for access to or forwarding of the material.

Posting links to 3rd party services involving materials the 3rd party service itself "owns" is fine.

The point is that you should not expose readers to accepting obligations (to a 3rd party) just to access materials you "own" (control; etc. ... ) yourself and could post here on the forum.
 
I was sure I'd posted this request before, but I cannot for the life of me locate it.

Anyway, please would members post only direct links to articles, not links that load via Google News frames. You'll recognise the ones we don't want from the enormously long URLs they generate.

You can either search for a specific chunk of text to turn up the article page proper, or 'locate' the true URL that is buried in the bloated one and extract it.

We have had another today--the URL was three or four lines long.

Name withheld to protect the guilty.
 
I was sure I'd posted this request before, but I cannot for the life of me locate it.

Anyway, please would members post only direct links to articles, not links that load via Google News frames. You'll recognise the ones we don't want from the enormously long URLs they generate.

You can either search for a specific chunk of text to turn up the article page proper, or 'locate' the true URL that is buried in the bloated one and extract it.

We have had another today--the URL was three or four lines long.

Name withheld to protect the guilty.
Can I point out that if people use a URL shortener (such as Tinyurl), they may hide a URL that may lead to a dodgy or unsafe site. So... it's much safer for us if people put in a full (original) URL.
 
Web best practice is to hyperlink like this.

Yes and no.

Some users are very wary of 'clicking blind'. And while hovering of copying will reveal the URL (depends on browser, I think), that's introducing a further step.
 
Yes and no.

Some users are very wary of 'clicking blind'. And while hovering of copying will reveal the URL (depends on browser, I think), that's introducing a further step.

It depends on your audience - screen readers will read out every character of a URL, but will read the alt text of a hypertext link. If you want a highly accessible site, full URLs are a big no-no.
 
There is no guarantee any quoted URL or derivative form of a URL will always reliably work unless you quote the full URL of the source page to which you're directing readers' attention (i.e., the entire URL string in your browser's address box at the time you see the given webpage).

This has been the case ever since Web servers obtained the server-side capability to dynamically assemble pages (being served) using Flash or other data management tools.

If the full URL from a successful access is not given, any shortened form may not necessarily lead to the material originally presented. Now that dynamic server-side content management is becoming more ubiquitous there are even servers that can't process a truncated / "core" URL at all anymore.

Mytho is correct in pointing out that 3rd party URL compressors such as TinyURL can be easily rigged for spoofing or misdirection mischief.

Hiding a long URL behind a short text label (e.g., "Here"; "This site") accomplishes nothing if the label - and / or the surrounding text - don't give a clue WTF is being linked.

If you're too damned lazy or inarticulate to give your readers here on the forum any clue to WTF you're linking to, you're fooling yourself if you think everyone else is going to assume it's safe to click on the link.

In any case, some browsers won't or can't secondarily display the full URL hidden behind the cursory label.

Innumerable posts (and even entire threads) have been flushed into extinction because insufficient original URL data survived to permit searching for archived / alternative versions and / or overly cursory allusions to badly-linked external materials rendered them undecipherable.
 
Good web copy looks like this:

"The BBC News website contains the latest UK updates on the story."

"If you want to see the latest click here." leads to trust issues.

"Go here for the latest https://www.bbc.co.uk/news " is bad for those who use accessibility software.

However this is not a website per se. It's a message board. So it really depends if your priority is making the copy work for as many users as possible, or you want the links to be included in searches.

Ideally the text would be clear enough for the search to work on that alone, whether the URL is visible or not.
 
Good web copy looks like this:

"The BBC News website contains the latest UK updates on the story."

"If you want to see the latest click here." leads to trust issues.

"Go here for the latest https://www.bbc.co.uk/news " is bad for those who use accessibility software.

However this is not a website per se. It's a message board. So it really depends if your priority is making the copy work for as many users as possible, or you want the links to be included in searches.

Ideally the text would be clear enough for the search to work on that alone, whether the URL is visible or not.

I had never considered the factor of URL text featuring in SEARCH results.

I/We are content to continue with the inconsistency of members following their own practices, but there's no harm in the debate over which is best.
 
There is no guarantee any quoted URL or derivative form of a URL will always reliably work unless you quote the full URL of the source page to which you're directing readers' attention (i.e., the entire URL string in your browser's address box at the time you see the given webpage).

This has been the case ever since Web servers obtained the server-side capability to dynamically assemble pages (being served) using Flash or other data management tools.

If the full URL from a successful access is not given, any shortened form may not necessarily lead to the material originally presented. Now that dynamic server-side content management is becoming more ubiquitous there are even servers that can't process a truncated / "core" URL at all anymore.

Mytho is correct in pointing out that 3rd party URL compressors such as TinyURL can be easily rigged for spoofing or misdirection mischief.

Hiding a long URL behind a short text label (e.g., "Here"; "This site") accomplishes nothing if the label - and / or the surrounding text - don't give a clue WTF is being linked.

If you're too damned lazy or inarticulate to give your readers here on the forum any clue to WTF you're linking to, you're fooling yourself if you think everyone else is going to assume it's safe to click on the link.

In any case, some browsers won't or can't secondarily display the full URL hidden behind the cursory label.

Innumerable posts (and even entire threads) have been flushed into extinction because insufficient original URL data survived to permit searching for archived / alternative versions and / or overly cursory allusions to badly-linked external materials rendered them undecipherable.

Easy, Enola, there's a box of doughnuts in MOD HQ.

You're right about survivability, though. We're clearly here for the long haul and tricks and practices can and have change over the years (we'll soon be saying 'decades'). Our best bet for ensuring links remain intact and stable (as long as the content remains hosted online) is by quoting full URLs.

I know--and many of you should--that Enola has spent many hours resurrecting apparently lost material from earlier incarnations of this board, so his advice on this specific matter is likely more informed that ours.
 
Web best practice is to hyperlink like this.

Of course, we all agree that that form looks the neatest. My Chrome and Safari browsers display the URL on hovering over the hyperlink, but I am sure that browsers I have previously used did not.
 
I found [\URL='https : //youtu.be/ dQw4w9WgXcQ']this[\/URL] video on the subject highly informative.
So by following Carlos' suggestion for best practice, you have a more easily-read text, while the full URL is retained, and can be seen if necessary by toggling "BB code off" in your posting settings. (I've had to insert some spaces and backslashes to show the actual URL code, rather than it be interpreted by the board as, well, a URL...)

@James_H, :yellowc:.
 
So by following Carlos' suggestion for best practice, you have a more easily-read text, while the full URL is retained, and can be seen if necessary by toggling "BB code off" in your posting settings. (I've had to insert some spaces and backslashes to show the actual URL code, rather than it be interpreted by the board as, well, a URL...)

@James_H, :yellowc:.

Indeed. And if you are using a screen reader or other accessibility tool (which will switch BB code off by default) then you won't be turned-off the site by having to listen to reams of slashes and colons.

Interestingly, I've just run a site search for the YT ID in the URL quoted above - and the site found it both when 'naked' and hyperlinked.

1573479844067.png
 
Hmm, maybe you're right, Ringo. But the Daily-Maily-fication of the board continues apace - this thread is a prime example, but it's far from the only one - and I know for a fact that long-standing posters are disengaging as a result. I maintain that something is going awry with the spread of opinions expressed if I can take at face value what was meant to be parodic.

I was going to message you privately, Krepostnoi, but the point, I think, could usefully be made for general consumption as it also relates to some disagreements on another recently active thread.

We do all we can to maintain a place when a very broad church can congregate and have closed off all of the major conduits for (non-Fortean) bile. We also urge (and here I urge again) members to try to be 'community minded', but, in the end, members are entitled to their viewpoints as long as they express them in ways that adhere to our rules here.

It would be impossible for we--the staff--to rigorously police the membership's opinions; simply being wrong (in whatever sense) is not a breach of the guidelines, and we rely on other members to post refutations and corrections to bad posts. If somebody lapses into abuse or outright hatred, we'll likely be addressing the matter before the majority of you even notice the post, but in normal circumstances we expect the fatuous, the idiotic and the mildly mean-spirited to be countered by the community as a whole without the staff needing to bang heads and take names.

It hasn't been too bad at all these past couple of months, but earlier in the year and for most of the two years before that, we spent too much time smoothing ruffled feathers behind the scenes. The line from Stu, which I agree with, is that although we share the concern that Krepostnoi raises (and he certainly isn't alone in having it) that a number of long-term posters do not like the tone of some of the discussions here (again, typically non-Fortean), there is only so much we can practically do (much of which has been done), and efforts to coax members back on a one-to-one basis (even those we dearly wish to retain) are labour-intensive and more than often ineffective.

A message doomed to please nobody, I fear.

(Opinions welcome by PM to me or any other mod you spot online--although two are away at the time of writing).

 
The line from Stu, which I agree with, is that although we share the concern that Krepostnoi raises (and he certainly isn't alone in having it) that a number of long-term posters do not like the tone of some of the discussions here (again, typically non-Fortean), there is only so much we can practically do (much of which has been done), and efforts to coax members back on a one-to-one basis (even those we dearly wish to retain) are labour-intensive and more than often ineffective.
Yith is understating somewhat: we have until recently spent a disproportionate amount of time brokering and counselling. In some cases, this is with justification, but in others we have (and will continue to adopt) the approach that whilst we'll listen, and in the case of genuine injustices intervene and help, if someone's just got the hump then we're not going to chase them.

We are not here to just say "Poster A is correct, so stop arguing with them." There will of course be times when that is the correct action, but by and large, as Yith said, discussions are allowed to run their course, and we only step in when they go seriously off-piste, or ad homs, flaming or trolling start. People respectfully disagreeing with you does not constitute any of the above. Get over yourself.

(Opinions welcome by PM to me or any other mod you spot online--although two are away at the time of writing).
After a lengthy sojourn I'm back. Any complaints about the mod team please address them to me.

That Magazine vid still looks very like the Belmez faces.
 
RE: the `DailyMailification` of this board.

Sorry, but I think some people just need to calm down a bit.

I would have agreed with that line if it had been said three years ago during a certain national `debate` - when it seemed to me (and some others) that a particular line was being pursued by most of the posters here - and those who disagreed were told to shut up. Some people left during that period - and I almost did.

Since that time, and perhaps because of it, the Politics threads have been removed and an apolitical approach has been enforced. I was a little dubious about this move at the time, but have since come to see it as a good idea: the fortean traffic has increased and there is a better atmosphere and sense of unity all round.

However, I do feel that any further restrictions along these lines would be excessive. It's right and natural that there should be a mainstream news secrion on here - and only to be expected that differing views will be aired on them.

I'm a namby-pamby New Statesman-loving Remaniac and some people here hold views which I regard as lamentable. But it's just a simple case of them being entitled to their opinions and to expressing them.

Liberal/left/greens have never had a monopoly on Fortean interests - far from it. Observe how the Dailly Mail and the Express (particularly the latter) regularly cover stories of fortean interest that other outlets do not, for example.

The same situation applies in the teaching world. There was a time, even quite recently, when a teacher - particularly in E.S.L - would be expected to hold liberal leftish views on most things. Not any more - if my own experience is anything to go by. A great many of my expat colleagues have political views which greatly diverge from my own. Now since I'm a bit isolated out here - I can't really be all that choosy about my pisshead buddy's drinking partners so I have had to learn to be tolerant (as, I suppose, have they).

I had learnt at quite a young age that Just Because Someone Agrees With Your Political Values it doesn't Mean You'll Get On With Them - now I am learning (at quite an old age) That A Person You Disagree With Strongly On Politics Can Be Otherwise A Decent Fellow.

Then there's the Chat section! I think the best role that this plays is as a repository of (usually mildly Fortean ) doodles which don't really fit anywhere else. What gets me down though is when you come on here to see what the latest is and you encounter a one liner in a thread called something like Not Very Interesting Things You did Five Minutes Ago, which runs:

So I went out to buy a chicken for my Aunty Magge's seventieth anniversary, When I got the chicken home I realised that it was going to need quite a lot of defrosting - but it was only when I put it in the microwave that I realised that the microwave was broken LOL!

Some of us come on here to escape that kind of banality. And as for the `Troll's Head` : what THE HELL is that all about!?!?
 
RE: the `DailyMailification` of this board.

Sorry, but I think some people just need to calm down a bit.

I would have agreed with that line if it had been said three years ago during a certain national `debate` - when it seemed to me (and some others) that a particular line was being pursued by most of the posters here - and those who disagreed were told to shut up. Some people left during that period - and I almost did.

Since that time, and perhaps because of it, the Politics threads have been removed and an apolitical approach has been enforced. I was a little dubious about this move at the time, but have since come to see it as a good idea: the fortean traffic has increased and there is a better atmosphere and sense of unity all round.

However, I do feel that any further restrictions along these lines would be excessive. It's right and natural that there should be a mainstream news secrion on here - and only to be expected that differing views will be aired on them.

I'm a namby-pamby New Statesman-loving Remaniac and some people here hold views which I regard as lamentable. But it's just a simple case of them being entitled to their opinions and to expressing them.

Liberal/left/greens have never had a monopoly on Fortean interests - far from it. Observe how the Dailly Mail and the Express (particularly the latter) regularly cover stories of fortean interest that other outlets do not, for example.

The same situation applies in the teaching world. There was a time, even quite recently, when a teacher - particularly in E.S.L - would be expected to hold liberal leftish views on most things. Not any more - if my own experience is anything to go by. A great many of my expat colleagues have political views which greatly diverge from my own. Now since I'm a bit isolated out here - I can't really be all that choosy about my pisshead buddy's drinking partners so I have had to learn to be tolerant (as, I suppose, have they).

I had learnt at quite a young age that Just Because Someone Agrees With Your Political Values it doesn't Mean You'll Get On With Them - now I am learning (at quite an old age) That A Person You Disagree With Strongly On Politics Can Be Otherwise A Decent Fellow.

Then there's the Chat section! I think the best role that this plays is as a repository of (usually mildly Fortean ) doodles which don't really fit anywhere else. What gets me down though is when you come on here to see what the latest is and you encounter a one liner in a thread called something like Not Very Interesting Things You did Five Minutes Ago, which runs:

So I went out to buy a chicken for my Aunty Magge's seventieth anniversary, When I got the chicken home I realised that it was going to need quite a lot of defrosting - but it was only when I put it in the microwave that I realised that the microwave was broken LOL!

Some of us come on here to escape that kind of banality. And as for the `Troll's Head` : what THE HELL is that all about!?!?

The Troll's Head is really a substitute for IRC.

We have said many times that we wish there was a way to enable an 'opt in /opt out' setting for CHAT and/or MAINSTREAM NEWS but there isn't. Hence the non-Fortean and the trivial must remain bedfellows.

Personally, I'm content with the respective levels of posts that CHAT / MAINSTREAM NEWS / FORTEANA have been generating since the change of hosts. It seems to be flowing in about the right measures.
 
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