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

Good Posting Practices

If we didn't bicker then we would all be sat in front of the tv.
Then maybe sit in front of the damn TV, then.

Yithian is entirely right. Our traditional line of peacekeeping has always been between those that fervently believe, and those that fervently do not believe in weird things. We are getting sick and tired of having to wade into what are, in effect, bar-room banter fests that nine times out of ten feature the same people making the same oh-so-clever remarks with a tinge of deniability (know how many times I've been told "Oh well that's up to them if they take it like that." ?)

We're fed up with it, Grow up. Nobody forces you on here, we don't charge you money, some of us have devoted thousands of hours of our own time to keep this place running as it does, fought for it, put up with troll wars, flame fests, schisms, personal abuse and tons of other crap to keep this place alive. If you don't like it, fucking tough.
 
There's plenty Fortean to talk about that has no need to be linked in with whatever reactionary cause you care to mention - they fill the magazine with it every month. It's more that problem with social media where everyone thinks it's their personal broadcast medium and intolerance arises more from being aware others want to have their say who might drown you out. I'd hate to see this place go the same way as Twitter, it's a pretty tolerant place when individuals are concerned, less so when perceived groups are brought into it.

Edit: I see Stu has replied in more robust terms.
 
Heck, I look stupid more or less 24 hours a day, but if something baffles you, it doesn't hurt to ask questions, and if it's a baffling subject anyway (as is often the case, comes with the territory) then maybe we'll make a little progress.
Asking questions is a way to learn, no one should put anyone down for wanting to learn. Forteana is a broad field and most of us do not devote our entire lives to it so there will be gaps in knowledge, nothing wrong with asking for help to fill those gaps.
 
I also think that it is /fine/ to chew over the same ground again. Nobody forces anyone to take part of the next iteration.

Things change, we change, new people arrive....

I like it when someone says - "here's a link to intersting and relevant stiff we said in a different thread".

I do not like it when someone says "not this again! if you used the search function (it's very easy, you really should try it) you'll find that we have already dealt with this a couple of decades ago."

Frides
 
As someone who's been here a long time (longer than it states on my profile) I think that the resurrecting of old threads, and the replying to ancient posts, can only be of the utmost benefit to the health of the board. And likes added to very old posts can nudge the likee to look back at something and maybe reinvest in the discussion.

More of it, I say - lots more.

(Some time back - when I thought we were going a bit stagnant - I did actually try and work out if we could makes some sort of game out of resurrecting old threads: like, an individual gets nominated, and a thread and a page number get picked at random, and the nominated poster has to bump a thread chosen from that page with some new content/comment. There's always something new to say - but beyond that rough outline, I couldn't work out how it might work).
 
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Got to say I never liked the 'right wing soapbox' aspect of the site, and it did very nearly put me off when I rejoined. Happy to stick to the Forteana and not hear anyone's fascinating opinions about immigrants or feminists.

Not able to disclose details, but I've been accused of being both a 'rabid Tory' and a 'social justice moron' while trying to walk the line here.

Not recently, admittedly.

 
For those who haven't seen it, this post contains some important guidance for future posts.

https://forums.forteana.org/index.p...the-warning-ban-log.23687/page-2#post-1875975

Relevant text of said post reads:

There have also been a number of explict warnings posted by the moderators saying that we will not see the board dragged away from Forteana and into 'Culture Wars'. Once again, we do not say your political musings are wrong (or right), but simply that we will not be debating them here.

Immigration, the perils of Islam, the evils of the E.U., SJWs Vs Antifa, the IRA, the SNP, 'black crime', Boris, BLM, Trump, A.O.C, Pelosi, Corbyn and a whole host of YouTube political 'personalities': if there isn't a clear Fortean angle to discuss, we don't want it here. Where there is a Fortean angle (usually Conspiracy), please give us a decent source, not opportunistic crap.
 
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This is a question, not a complaint....but...why is it OK to have a thread which is borderline mocking Jehovah's Witnesses? If not mocking it's at the very least negative.
It's a good question. Religion, like Politics, tends to be very divisive - the only reason we keep it open as a field is that there is so much of Fortean interest in there. I suppose the Witnesses, for Brits at any rate, are the closest and most familiar example of a sect by dint of their prosetylisation (sp?) and most people know someone who has been either a Witness themselves or have some connection with it, and as a result they represent a great example of how cults operate. Again, it's fine to mock the operation itself, and the utterly illogical beliefs (ditto all faiths), but having a go at adherents or those sympathetic isn't really cricket. I'll have a look at the thread later.
 
This is a question, not a complaint....but...why is it OK to have a thread which is borderline mocking Jehovah's Witnesses? If not mocking it's at the very least negative.

That thread originated with a story about an odd, and arguably creepy, JW visit to the OP's home.

Much of the rest of the thread addresses other such visits and / or encounters. Much of the weirdness described in these subsequent stories was supplied by the JW folks themselves rather than third party critics.
 
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Here's a tip. If you reply to a poster on a thread but decide to send it as a pm instead, the post might still come up next time you reply on that thread. Even if you've cut/pasted it to the pm. ...

... Happens on my Windows laptop too but I've developed a slightly different way to do it... if I've started to type a reply and then abandoned it (usually cos I couldn't think what I was trying to say) then after clearing all the text out (which, as you say, reappears next time you go back to the thread) I press the Preview button - this gives an 'oops something went wrong' message along the lines of there is no text, and then the text seems to have gone forever.

The forum software maintains a copy of any text you've entered (but not yet posted) on a given thread. This is a 'draft'.

In the text entry box there's a tool icon that looks like a diskette. This is the Draft tool set, and the drop-down menu offers an option to delete an existing draft. Selecting the Delete Draft option immediately removes the record of any unposted draft you'd started on that given thread.
 
The forum software maintains a copy of any text you've entered (but not yet posted) on a given thread. This is a 'draft'.

In the text entry box there's a tool icon that looks like a diskette. This is the Draft tool set, and the drop-down menu offers an option to delete an existing draft. Selecting the Delete Draft option immediately removes the record of any unposted draft you'd started on that given thread.

Ohh now that works but you have to delete your text first.
 
Can mods see draft posts?

I'm seriously tempted to refrain from answering, just to leave you hanging and maximize our air of mystery ... :evil:

But not today ...

The general answer is "No."

Draft postings represent dynamic / transient real-time data that has not been committed to the forum's underlying database.

Basic moderating powers enable us to see anything and everything that's within (i.e., already committed to ... ) the database.**

I suppose it's possible that someone with ultimate system administration powers might be able to access such transient / pending entries, but I suspect this would have to be done deep down in the technical infrastructure (perhaps at the level of the server).

** SIDE NOTE: We can, however, see anything you ordinary users have committed to the database and subsequently deleted. Your sole deletion option is equivalent to our "soft" deletion option, which merely removes the post from public view but preserves it within the database. We also have a "hard" deletion option which permanently eradicates the post from the database entirely.
 
if the rubric of the board is to promote fortean discussion, chat is outside that circle

You are correct.

But the membership wanted a CHAT forum to run alongside the Fortean forums.

We 'simply' have to ensure that the positive aspect of the informal conversation does not bring with it ill-will and disagreement.
 
You are correct.

But the membership wanted a CHAT forum to run alongside the Fortean forums.

We 'simply' have to ensure that the positive aspects of the informal conversation does not bring with them ill-will and disagreement.

If I might be so bold to suggest that when the Mods say that any future mention of a immigration etc on a thread will be deleted that they actually follow through with it? If perceptions of "a right-wing vibe" on the board are to be combated then those who continually test the waters need to be confronted.

As this is the Good Posting Practices Thread I hope my post isn't out of place.
 
As this is the Good Posting Practices Thread I hope my post isn't out of place.

It's far preferable to peppering threads with it.

In the case of the last time you requested this, one post was edited to remove the offending piece (not the whole post) and another was edited by the poster herself following a post by me.

We're broadly following up on what was announced, we're just not making a public fuss of doing so.
 
given the locked pay attention post, and i dont think im particularly aware of the cause (thread, posters) of referred fracas, it did strike me that a lock on the chat subforum may reduce/eliminate that kind of posting ?

if the rubric of the board is to promote fortean discussion, chat is outside that circle

I make no secret of my less-than-positive attitude toward the proportionally oversized and overused Shat Chat sub-forum and its distorting influence on the forum, yet ...

It does serve a constructive role in fostering the sense of community any online forum needs to survive and remain attractive to both veteran and new users.

The target of Stu's recent announcement had more to do with prohibited / disruptive / tangential crap posted in "serious" threads than any of the stuff in Chat.

We (the staff) have been wrestling with a lot of unwelcome drama and drivel lately, of which little or none has been within Chat. Such drama and drivel doesn't hurt much in Chat, so long as it remains "in bounds" under our rules and policies.

In contrast, it pollutes, corrupts, and even wrecks threads elsewhere in which members are trying to discuss more substantive matters.

Chat represents the murky cenote into which I rarely peek, even when bulldozing big chunks of junk from other areas into it.

You're right, henry - Chat lies outside the circle of this forum's Fortean core. Locking it might stimulate thought and reflection I suppose some folks could well use. (What are the odds? ...)

However, the bulk of the issue(s) to which Stu alluded concerns unwelcome / unacceptable postings in the other areas to which locked-out Chat junkies would only migrate and aggravate the problems.

We have a big enough problem with that sort of metastasizing jibber-jabber without indirectly encouraging it..
 
I think the Chat area has a valuable function. It helps us all get to know each other which can help with understanding other points of view when discussing true Forteana. I'd be sad to see it go.

Nobody's suggesting it would or should be eliminated.
 
I think that if there wasn't a 'Chat' forum then there would be a lot more misunderstanding on the rest of the board. And people often take comments the wrong way as it is, when no offence was meant.

I've often thought certain comments could come across as rude or obnoxious, but because I 'knew' what the poster was like from their involvement in Chat I could see that they were only making light.

A Chat-less board would be a very dry and dusty place, and I imagine board activity would plummet.
 
Having a chat section is not the problem. The mods are dealing with the problem. Go mods!

It seems like everyone uses the forum a bit differently. I generally ignore the sections, or forums or sub-forums or whatever they are. Mostly I look at "New Posts" and scroll through looking for something interesting. I don't care where it's filed. On the rare occasions when I start a thread, I'll look around and try to get it put into an appropriate place. If I get it wrong, no big deal. One of the mods will move it.
 
I read and posted on the few forums that interested me for months until I found out that the same interesting and serious people who analysed ghost photos and commented on everyday strangeness also talked about cats and Gilbert and Sullivan and it was like confetti descended. The chat section is partly the glue that holds the rest together and if you disapprove of it don't read it. I don't notice that I frequent any boards that are giving the mods issues but I do support accelerated hand-slapping if this would help. 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.
 
i think the latest phase of this thread has sprung from my suggestion of a temp lock on the chat subforum in response to fire fighting the mods are doing across the site ... if chat is the head of the zombie it might quieten things down amongst the more unruly members ? not specific to deleting any thread or aimed at any user, despite above posts ...
Over the years we've tried various things with Chat. Closing it - as has been rightly pointed out - just shifts Chat stuff elsewhere. Further, as Enola said, Chat isn't where the issue lies so there's no need to close it.

If you do find Chat that off-putting but still find yourself viewing Chat threads against your will, then what we can offer, henry, is if you (or indeed anyone else) doesn't wish to see Chat we can completely remove it from your view. It'd still be there, but invisible to you.
 
If the Chat section closes I'm off.
This Forum - as a whole, not just Chat - is pretty much my only interaction with 'social media' (no Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc for me) and I'd be mortified if it went or was locked. That said, I might get more work done, so my employer might be happy.

I joined the Forum in 2005 but have upped my interaction with it over the last couple of years. I've always been interested in Fortean phenomena - UFOs, ghosts, cryptozoology, conspiracy theories etc - but most of my posts are in Chat as I don't have too many Fortean experiences on a daily basis. Not since I've been off the drugs, anyway*...

I haven't noticed a particular right-wing bent to the Forum. You can pick up some posters' politics reasonably easily (I'm pretty sure mine could be discerned without too much effort) but apart from when people overstep the mark I don't feel it's a huge issue – at least from our side, not sure if it's the same for the mods.

I'm sure there are plenty of fora out there for explicitly discussing politics but I daren't go there for the sake of my sanity! (Hopefully that's not seen as politically partisan in any way.)

* That's a joke (a poor one, admittedly!)
 
Chat we can completely remove it from your view. It'd still be there, but invisible to you
ah because i have asked a couple of times if subforums eg chat can be ignored, is this now available
 
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