Should the poll subforum return

[Spinach]

So to boil this down, "that's how it always was, and that's how it always should be."

That's not my argument at all. If I held that kind of mindset, I'd have been against new banners. What I'm saying is that the poll forum had a use, and just because people were shitposting in it during periods of inactivity doesn't warrant deleting the entire thing. It warrants better moderation.

If a board's activity rate is what determines whether it's worth keeping or not then the two Doujin Projects subforums need to be deleted too. Events & Gatherings can go as well.

A forum I would compare to the poll subforum is the Anime/Manga/Merchandise/Doujin subforum in the TM section. Whenever new content is coming in things get posted, but otherwise activity in that subforum is relatively low (during the F/Z anime these subforums were booming, same with CP). Thing is, Anime/Manga/Merchandise/Doujin has less idiocy potential than the poll subforum, so it didn't have the problem polls did where during periods of inactivity it's just a shitfest.

Now that there is another poll subforum in the 7th the

A forum that is only "active" 25% of the time and just sitting there or filled with silly crap the other 75% of the time isn't something that's getting good traffic.

point is pretty much moot.

That's their choice. Let's put it this way: If they mostly lurk fanfics, and you claim they wouldn't go to GD, why would they go to Polls?

People who lurk tend to look at the forums and the topics, just not post in them.

For some reason people who lurked AND posted in fanfics, but didn't go to GD, came to polls and cast their vote. Not everyone who voted posted, but hey, that's the point of polls. You get your opinion out there without having to say anything. Most polls were about your favorite [x], which was something that people in the fanfic forum and GD had an opinion of and wanted to weigh in on. Aside from some select users, a good portion of the fanfic forum users don't go to GD.

This cures that part, but it doesn't get around the fact that most of the time the Polls forum sits there and sucks on dust till the next thing that makes it wake up for a blip before going back to sleep

Not much different from the TM Anime/Games/Merchandise/Doujin forum in that regard. Though admittedly Anime/Games/Merchandise/Doujin's activity booms are usually longer lasting.

To be honest, it's why I'd thought about removing even the Forum Votes forum as well - hardly ever used.

Best toss those Doujin Projects/Events & Gatherings then too, eh?

[Bittersweet]

I think getting rid of the poll forum is just yet another bad decision around here.

[Milbunk]

Hmm I can see why they did it though, perhaps a warning would have been nice or something to that degree, but as of late it was being used for a lot of spam and similar polls, I'd say that just using GD or the Fanfics areas are good ways to increase traffic there. (I've noticed getting new threads in GD has been rather scarce lately.)

So in short Maybe a warning would be nice or perhaps even a vote of some sort but I don't think it's that big a deal.

[BlackField]

The polls subforum had some advantages and disadvantages. It was nice to be able to bring some thread back from the dead without being heckled because no one goes there and you're just explaining your vote for something. At the same time, it was like the least TMy of the subforums that was in the TM section. If it was reactivated it would be ghost city and most of the topics work well in GD.

The only problem I have is the way it was done. Admins seem to want to be like businessmen making the hard choices rather than be leaders of a small community of nerds.

[Cruor]

Hmm I can see why they did it though, perhaps a warning would have been nice or something to that degree, but as of late it was being used for a lot of spam and similar polls, I'd say that just using GD or the Fanfics areas are good ways to increase traffic there. (I've noticed getting new threads in GD has been rather scarce lately.)

So in short Maybe a warning would be nice or perhaps even a vote of some sort but I don't think it's that big a deal.

New threads have been getting scarce because its being generally looked down upon if you give a question its own thread in the current board meta. It used to be the little questions getting answered in Questions with any discussion that can actually have a nice discussion being given its own thread. Even before Badass, things like protagonist fights (SHIKI VS SHIROU, SHIKI VS RYOUGI etc) were given their own threads which allowed people to discuss it to death without getting sidetracked by a new versus (which is something some people have been abusing to get out of arguments/questions/versus they don't want to participate in.

Honestly, its currently just a phase that new threads aren't made.

Polls were kicked to Events and Gatherings because they used to plague old GD with tons of FAVORITE XXXXX and other polls before it became the popular thing to post them there until the mods began enforcing it by closing polls put in GD.

[Optimus]

No it shouldn't.

[Kotonoha]

DP really should not be the spokesperson for the admins. 2rude.

[Blue]

But its like... rude-dere? Rudere? Its adorable =D

[Seika]

I'm unmoved about the forum itself. I like (as do most people, I think) the properly-defined serious/7th split, and I can handle GD becoming the place for the serious side.

But that the action was taken with no warning, no consultation, no attempt at something more less drastic worries me. It's been an occasional phenomenon that the mods or admins do something like this in haste when there was absolutely no reason for not asking everyone. And then it turns out that the users really disagree or (about as bad), we agree but think the implementation was really cack-handed. I do not see that just slowing yourselves down and working with the people on your forum costs you anything, and it disappoints me that the phenomenon does keep cropping up. Yes, you have the power to do these things. Yes, it could be - either in all aspects or at least one - a good idea which people will agree with. But don't get carried away with that and always assume it's the right thing or that you should plough ahead because you can plough ahead.

[Neir]

mike where are you we need you

[Dark Pulse]

That's not my argument at all. If I held that kind of mindset, I'd have been against new banners. What I'm saying is that the poll forum had a use, and just because people were shitposting in it during periods of inactivity doesn't warrant deleting the entire thing. It warrants better moderation.

If a board's activity rate is what determines whether it's worth keeping or not then the two Doujin Projects subforums need to be deleted too. Events & Gatherings can go as well.

A forum I would compare to the poll subforum is the Anime/Manga/Merchandise/Doujin subforum in the TM section. Whenever new content is coming in things get posted, but otherwise activity in that subforum is relatively low (during the F/Z anime these subforums were booming, same with CP). Thing is, Anime/Manga/Merchandise/Doujin has less idiocy potential than the poll subforum, so it didn't have the problem polls did where during periods of inactivity it's just a shitfest.

They problably could go, you're right. The thing is, as you also pointed out, they also have less potential for idiocy.
The problem here wasn't that they sat and got no new posts. If that's all it was, it would've kept sucking dust as it had been. The problem here was twofold:

1. That the new polls were stupid, irrelevant, and far outweighed the legitimate content of the forum.
2. That lately, trying to enforce rules has met literal, actual resistance.

You can argue better moderation, but "better moderation" lately has just been getting backlash from people. We tell food to knock off the shitposting; he kept right on doing it and got permed. People tried to fake a banwave, and even when I banned their ability to use the word "Banned" as a custom title they began to find ways around it, forcing me to add in a change that a user could not duplicate before people finally stopped. Koto kept resetting her profile when I kept editing it to remove her "Banned" usertitle (she and Kyte kept finding ways to put it back in), so I locked her out from editing it, and then we get a massive blog entry from her, and to this day she still hasn't admitted she was being an idiot - instead, it's us, the staff, who have to look like idiots, while she gets to go off scot-free. It's like we can't just tell people "knock it off," instead we just get told "It's your problem, I'll stop when you find a way to stop it" and get given the finger.

Lately, it's like people are trying to resist us trying to be "more vigilant." Let's put it this way. If we began locking those shitpolls, are you honestly going to try to convince me that within two days, there wouldn't have been six or more new polls up asking "Are the mods oppressing us?"

I don't doubt it for a second.

That, along with the fact that there was really (in our view) no reason to keep a completely arbitrarily, segregated polls forum, meant that we felt it was better to just let them be posted in the most natural places (i.e; GD or whatever) and to add a silly polls forum to the 7th. To be dead honest, while people will complain now because it's fresh, you can't deny that we had to do something about the situation. Do you really think people will be complaining about it in three to six months?

We did what we thought was best; let's see how it works before we begin calling it a failure, shall we?

Now that there is another poll subforum in the 7th the (activity) point is pretty much moot.

Wasn't just activity. See above.

For some reason people who lurked AND posted in fanfics, but didn't go to GD, came to polls and cast their vote. Not everyone who voted posted, but hey, that's the point of polls. You get your opinion out there without having to say anything. Most polls were about your favorite [x], which was something that people in the fanfic forum and GD had an opinion of and wanted to weigh in on. Aside from some select users, a good portion of the fanfic forum users don't go to GD.

That's their problem then - fanfics forums are supposed to be for fanfics, so if you want discussions/polls on characters and the like, then you go to GD. Why have them in polls which barely had more than a dozen or so people visiting it at any given time when GD generally 20+ on it at any given time at virtually all hours of the day? GD gets more traffic than Polls ever has, by far - the only times I ever really remember seeing Polls consistently break 15+ people are when we were doing stuff on banners. The polls will wind up more visible in GD and eventually people will be around who will be used to these things being in GD, which will mean more people will simply get in the habit of going to GD, which is overall better for everyone.

If you're trying to convince me, you're doing a pretty poor job of it.

Not much different from the TM Anime/Games/Merchandise/Doujin forum in that regard. Though admittedly Anime/Games/Merchandise/Doujin's activity booms are usually longer lasting.

And again, lack of use isn't the sole criteria. Or else nuking Announcements/Forum Votes would've been more than a thought that I discarded eventually.

Best toss those Doujin Projects/Events & Gatherings then too, eh?

See above.

[Mcjon01]

No, sorry. Give me a better reason to keep the Poll Forum. A forum that is only "active" 25% of the time and just sitting there or filled with silly crap the other 75% of the time isn't something that's getting good traffic. Ditto for "Announcements," which has had a whopping 15 topics in 2+ years (and no surprise, three of them are Mike related). Forum Votes has even less - a mere seven, five of them related to the banner stuff.

...

To be honest, it's why I'd thought about removing even the Forum Votes forum as well - hardly ever used.

I seriously thought that only forum staff were supposed to make topics in these subforums.

[terraablaze]

Wait what, we were supposed to be using that?

[Kelnish]

Making threads in forum votes about avatar changes is going to be the Next Big Thing!

[I3uster]

"People piss me off with retarded shit and so I deleted their forum?"

[kay4today]

"People piss me off with retarded shit and so I deleted their forum?"

You say that like it's a bad thing!

[Erlkonig]

"People piss me off with retarded shit and so I deleted their forum!?"

Fixed, now we just need to get a publisher, artist, and editor.

[Kotonoha]

We did what we thought was best; let's see how it works before we begin calling it a failure, shall we?

But... you messed up at doing the thing you were trying to do. It was a literal failure.

[Petrikow]

Fight da power

[KENTA]

Don't often agree with Koto on stuff like this, but she's right. This entire move has been a disaster on just about every front.