Alright. I have noticed recently that these boards have been suffering from an obscene amount of spam and one on one conversation based posting. The entire vibe and feel of the boards have, in my opinion, reached a kind of low. The debate threads are more stagnant than ever. The lounge is a waste of time. The entertainment threads suffer any kind of in-depth or worthwhile posts. It just seems like the community boards are really beginning to suck.

The problem is, how would we solve this problem?
Do we need to punish those spammers? If so, will traffic decrease to a useless degree?
Maybe we can try to attract some older parties?
The debate thread could become exclusive. But, then it might actually become entirely stagnant.
The idea for an art subforum seems to be a push in the right direction.
Or maybe I should just find a more suitable community board?

What do you guys think?

Hahaha or you're always quoting people ..

THEN something happens.

i would explore my options, nothing wrong with posting on more than one forum. here's my theory.

you see, cB's high point was when designers like roxanne and trish got thousands of page views per day, and advertised createBlog on their wildly popular xanga pages. there has been a mass exodus since. i myself left for a few months and when i returned, all of the contributing members left and we are left with 12 and 13 year old spammers.

what do we do? our biggest draw is of course the layouts and scripts we provide. we used to be the number one site for xanga layouts. i think we have been dethroned now in the age of myspace. we need to go back to our 'deisgn site' roots, and attract more visitors through offering better myspace skins and scripts.



sure, cB rules have gotten strict, but lets not confuse cause and effect. cB did not cause people to leave because of the strict rules; spammers and dumb posts caused cB to get stricter rules. now strict members? that is another story.

i think that the gap between member groups is getting too big. we got those who go off topic in every single post, those who type proper with a condescending tone, and 'dumb members'. there's a small middle class. just like in economics, the middle class sustains the board, and we have none.


at least that ensures conversation. it's true though, the whole board is filled with stupid threads or threads that last 6 versions. this happens because of lack of creative heads and because all the good members left. so i think we need to go back to our 'design site' roots and attract members that frequent our site because of the myspace skin and scripts section.

Amen.

It's strange how relationships work here on CB. There are some people who make really close almost clique-ish friendships and people who are more alienated. People either get way too personal or not enough. Either way, it's self-serving. Community has lost its "community" aspect. People just want to say what THEY want to say and leave, regardless of whether or not it's actually relevant to the topic.

You're confusing "lots of posts" with "conversation". Conversation is an interactive experience that naturally grows and evolves over time. Many threads are with lots of posts is simply a long queue of posts with no interactive element—which is the crucial part for building a community.

Freal tho. I admit, i HAVE been spamming but i usually end the spam with a reply to a topic. ( Although I kind of splurged in spam on a few topics ) but cB has been the funnest these past few days because I don't care about an impression on here anymore. Im tired of holding my tongue and opinions cos someone might think wrongly of me. This is the internet.

^ Forreal. I just think you guys take this too seriously.

you're right. anonymous shoutouts, official confessions, i win, i lost, etc. are one sided threads in which people just post their post and leave. no conversation, no interaction, nothing. our biggest issues are that there are fewer good threads (some of this can be attributed to the loss of some members - namely brandon saunders), and fewer good members. also, cB is falling off in terms of being the #1 site for myspace layouts and scripts as previously stated. so we gotta make better threads - threads where everyone can talk and build off one another, and design better layouts. cool.


this got nothing to do with being opinionated or holding your toungue. you can be opinionated without spamming. all spam does is alienate members, espeically newbies. you can have the same conversations on AIM or anywhere else. holding your toungue does not mean not spamming. come on now..

Steven, I actually agree with pretty much everything you said.

On that note, I really loathe myspace. Let's not debate that; I just do.

I especially like your point about the growing division, though. On another board, people have sublety mentioned that they avoid certain forums because they;re overly cliquey, and generally unwelcoming. Obviously we're not going to get along perfectly all the time, but I think in general, we need to work on being civil to one another, rather than making more threads about homw much we hate each other. Thry're fun, sure, but they aren't constructive, and that's what we need: something to reuninte the community, somehow. If this mean letting go of old grudges, our biting our tounges instead of correcting someone's grammar, or improving one's own grammar for the sake of not pissing everyone else off, we should. One way or another, spam (or retaliation or aversion to the spam) needs to stop being our way of life here.


Anf those of you who are talking about this being fun: it's great once in a while, but you're driving the rest of us away. James and I got past that phase, now it's your turn.

I think part of what leads to division in the "community" is the focus cB places on superlatives. How many threads are about the "member/staff member of the month", or who's posts you like the most, or who's posts you like the least, or who creates the most drama, or who you like the most, and so forth? I say, who cares? Do we need to devote entire threads to the most notable members of the community? Is that the sort of thing we really want to focus on? Or do we want to focus on actual content and conversation?

I've definately noticed this problem while browsing the lounge. Usually, I'd view a topic about something, and then suddenly having the whole topic discussion swallowed by random conversation.

Michael: Theoretically, maybe. Yearbook superlatives actually used to be fun, though.

I think the thread about whose posts you love/hate are pretty stupid, because if you're in that mindset,you're automatically going to write off whatever a particular person says as being stupid, or that someone else's input is predeterminitely superior. Not the threads themselves- I don't blame them- they just got me thinking. Every sisngle post a person makes is going to be different. Sometimes I'm going to sound like a condecending bitch, other times I'll just make a joke, give a thoughtful reply,say something absurd, etc etc. Between that and he cliquish member divisino, everything's becoming too black and white, and it doesn;t seem that we can reach a happy medium that way: one group overshadows the other, and then some just get lost in the shuffle.

I do feel like a bit of a dumbass promoting this bonding crap, but seriously, this is just miserable. I know it's just the internet (I hate it when people say that, by the way), but there's no harm in making something better when you have the chance.

So you're saying we should hold back our thoughts and opinions and bite our tongue for the sake of pissing somebody else off ?

But otherwise I also do agree. We probably shouldn't have thread likes anonymouse shoutouts and who's posts we love/hate to read, because they dont get us to interact much, and we should have more threads where we delve deeper into our minds to connect. But to me, this is just an online forum. I really don't take it too seriously, while others take it way to seriously.

Um, no.

But following rules might be good.

Again, slightly hypocritical, but I can recognize not only that but also when I've gone too far. Knowing limits is very helpful.

Not pissing someone else off != holding back one's thoughts. I think everyone should feel free to express his thoughts and feelings; Nicki is just suggesting it be done in a respectful manner. In other words, it's alright to tell someone that you disagree with his point of view and find it to be misguided; it's not alright just to call someone a bitch.

Of course, sometimes the mere act of disagreeing with someone does piss him off, but such a person just needs to deal with the fact that sometimes, people will disagree with him.

I have followed rules my entire time at cB. Only these past 3/4 days I have gone a a little overboard with the spammage and cB errupts into topics like this. I used to look at yours and James posts and be like "Omg ... why aren't mods stopping them ? Why havent they been suspended or anything for having ongoing conversation in lots of threads ? Why isn't she following the no spams rule, isnt she a mod ? " But now that im doing that im just like lighten UP. Maybe it's cos its the first time i've ever gotten off topic in threads but damn. cB like ... reacts crazy and says we are flooding boards with nonsense and we should all together eliminate certain things and focus back to only skins and layouts and womp womp.

I know my limit, but once in a while nobody can help but go over the line. I know right now people are talking about Me Lorena Elba and Evan but it's not like we've done this aaall the time. If it causes too many problems then maybe mods should PM us and ask us to stop instead of creating full out topics.




In my entire time at cB I have never gotten rude or called anyone out of their name. I think that is going overboard and I haven't done that.

^It's a good thing I never accused you of doing otherwise, then. I'm speaking generally. Don't take it so personally. Same with Michael. We don't mean you, so there's no need to be that defensive.


But let's put it this way:

I'm not on particularly good terms with Jason or Steven. We all know this, whatever, doesn't matter anymore.

However, Jason responds to everything I say with excess curse words and name calling.

Steven is capable of intelligent speech and will still act respectfully.

Thus, I have no respecy for Jason whatsoever, no matter how many times he tries to tell me he's not actually an idiot, whereas I know Steven isn't an idiot, and although we don't usually agree, we respect each other enough that we are capable of doing so.

Yeah I agree with you about Jason. In his posts he seems to take everything to the butt and starts calling people bitches and assholes and all these other obscenities. I didn't mean to seem to take it personally, cos I didn't. But when you said that for the sake of others we should bite our tongue, i got the impression you were saying we should not express our full opinion. I'm sorry i mistook your sentence/phrase or general meaning.

Okay, this is gonna sound rude, and I'm honestly not trying to single anyone out. That's my disclaimer.

It's not about us trying to silence anyone with a bunch of rules or anything like that. Fact is, it's annoying. It's annoying having to scroll down past posts that I can't even attempt to relate to, and by the time I get to the bottom of the thread I realize that there's not a point in even trying to come up with a response.

I agree that the spam has gotten out of hand. I agree that cB on the whole is much too cliquey. It's rare for me to agree to something like this, because I tend to prefer taking a more laid-back approach, and the last thing I want to do is keep someone from speaking his or her mind. I think we can still have fun on the boards even if we have to restrain ourselves just a little bit in order to follow the rules.

Ah, when I said that particular bit, I just meant that no matter how fun it is, the spam has to stop at some point, because the rest of us will go mad otherwise. That was all, and I speak from experience. I know I've had awful spam bursts, but that was far from my entire participation on the boards.

We can all be candid without being malicious. We can speak our minds freely while still following the rules. The idea that this is a dichotomy between spamming and biting our tongues is absurd. Eitherway, I don't think anyone wants you to not speak your mind. But, if what we all have been seeing on the boards is the contents of everyone's mind, we don't have a prayer.

Sorry to be cynical, but it is beginning to seem hopeless. We need more meaningful, more honest, and more friendly threads and posts. The lounge is expected to be laid back, but that doesn't mean we should vandalize it.

I think we have capable and well-intentioned posters. But, I think we need a lot more. Although there have been a great number of useful and worthy suggestions relating to the boards, I think our biggest issue is our members. Very few members seem interested in actually creating a strong and meaningful community here. "Drive-by-posting" isn't the worst thing that could happen, but when nearly all the board consists of it, everything becomes characterized by monotony.

And I agree with you about the spam getting out of hand, because I have been partly resposible for that. But then again, it's only been around 2/3 days that spam has gone overboard ( with me at least ) and cB reacts like this.


I understand that and agree.

[enters conversation]

This is actually why I don't spend a lot of my time on cb anymore. The spamming and arguements...it gets irritating. Very irritating. I know it does.


But honestly, there isn't anything we can do about it because the people who do spam, honestly don't care. If they get suspended, they make another account, adidng more spam for revenge. It's a vicious cycle.

Also, this place isn't very newbie friendly. Just...it isn't.

This sound ridiculous, but separate the Lounge into two different forums. One for the "Anonymous Shoutouts" and others like it, and then one for the topics with serious discussion. Yeah, it's a bad idea, but really there's nothing else you can do.

Ah, I know you guys haven't been doing it for very long, it's mainly timing in this case. It's been going on for a while with other people, in more ways than just conversing back and forth between threads.. It's just that you happened to be doing it when this thread was made. I'd rather not point fingers anyway, I'd just like for there to be a general understanding with everyone that if we want cB to stay active, the spam needs to stop.

@Shauna - I've seen other forums (one other forum, but I won't say the name) that have one forum for General Discussion and another for Extended Discussion. It seems to work pretty well, but as a general rule the people who visit one forum don't mix well with the people who visit the other forum. It's already like that here to some extent. I don't think it's a bad idea, though, and it probably wouldn't hurt to send some of the threads in the Lounge to the Sandbox. =\

yo, not to put anybody on blast or nothing but i have rarely if at all seen L!ckitySplit make any non spam posts. lol

spam is delicious.

the problem is, there aren't enough people to eat it, so it starts stinking.

seriously, without all the idiots on the boards, i would not enjoy it.

but you do have to have people to make snarky remarks in thier general direction.

seriously. spam is delicious.

expecially in debate. i mean, what fun is it when everone agrees? it's better when you have a worthy adversary, but that will almost always end in a stalemate. No, what's fun is when you're up against idiot spammers who stick around to make fools of themselves. Then you can beat them, and feel good about it.

there is , of course, a line between being snarky to spammers and just a plain ass. but hey, all the more fun.