Retire Free For All Forum?

As I have stated elsewhere, I am for a registration required but (largely) unmonderated "Free For All" forum. I did step in, and moderate one "FFA" topic, by closing it, but only because I thought worthy, but way off topic discussion was happening. In at least one case, per my suggestion, one of those off topics discussions has gone on to be its own topic.As per my impersonations of myself - since things had gone goofy, I thought I'd have a little fun with variations on my names (micromooseus, macromouseus, and admacromouseus). This just illustrates that any message from any unresistered name could be anyone.I point out, that one of the atvantages of being registered, is that you can go back and edit your messages. Unregistered members can not. If the unregistered could, then anyone could edit any unregistered member message.As far as doing edits is concerned, I think it proper to edit for content only at the time of the message creation. I think that any later editing involving content best be done by adding commentary, rather than changing commentary. In general, a comment at the end of the message, explaining what editing was done, is a nice thing (i.e. "Edited to correct spelling errors", "Edited to fix typos", "Edited to fix UBB code errors").Adminnemooseus

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The consensus is that Free For All should be registration only. I'm making the change now. I'll leave this thread open for further comment.

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--EvC Forum Administrator

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For any who may have forgotten the change.Also, it is appearing to me, that the "Welcome, Visitors!" forum is kind of starting to have problems like the "Free For All" was having. The "Welcome, Visitors!" forum is becoming a dumping ground for topics, pandering to the unregistered. As I see it, this is wrong. That forum should be an area for beginnings at , not a refuge for those who refuse to register. It also should not be a forum for extended, in depth discussion/debate.I am strongly thinking of trying to suppress what I see as bad uses of the "Welcome, Visitors!" forum. That may include closing topics after they go a certain number of messages (25???), or moving the topics to other forums. To the unregistered - you can be a visitor for a while, but then it's time to either register or give up posting messages.Feedback welcome. You can put it here, or maybe even better, at the "Change in Moderation?" topic.Adminnemooseus[This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 05-07-2003]

Quoting myself:

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People, even in the "Free For All" forum, there is the concept of "The Topic". Please try to stay somewhere in general vacinity of it. The topic of this string is pretty clear cut. See the title.

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Adminnemooseus

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I personally think that most of the "Free For All" topics belong in other forums.That said, I now suggest that forum guideline rule 1 apply even at the "Free For All" forum.

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1) Please stay on topic for a thread. Open a new thread for new topics.

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I am currently clashing with the ever profound "Wise", in regards to the above cited and quoted.Adminnemooseus

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That said, I now suggest that forum guideline rule 1 apply even at the "Free For All" forum.

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1) Please stay on topic for a thread. Open a new thread for new topics.

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I have done (or at least attempted) some topic drift control in "Free For All" forum topics before. Previous to "Wise", I don't believe anyone has objected to this.All that I am proposing, is that the above quoted forum rule also apply to the "Free For All" forum, and that this be put into the description of that forum. Otherwise, with someone like "Wise" participating, there might as well not even be a designated topic.Now, I would also suggest that members stop using the "Free For All" forum for new topics, unless you have a specific reason to think the topic belongs there. I would guess that there is no reason why 90 percent of the existing "FFA" topics could not have been started in one of the other forums. "FFA" topic starters might also consider requesting that a topic be moved to one of the other forums.Likewise, I would also suggest that members stop using the "Welcome, Visitors!" forum for new topics.Adminnemooseus

Rei's message 90 is a testiment that even "Wise" can trigger an interesting conversation - too bad it is now located in very much the wrong topic. Perhaps this line of thought should be brought to its own topic (please, NOT in the "Free For All" forum).Once again, in strongly encourage all to start new "FFA" topics only if there is a substantial reason for it to be there. I think there should actually be very few topic in the "FFA".Perhaps we need to start a "Unique Perspectives" forum for the likes of Syamsu, Peter Borger, Salty, and (maybe even) "Wise".Adminnemooseus

The closed topic in question is "How did you celebrate protection from porn week". My closing message is here.I titled the message "Too much 'Free For All' ", and the content was:

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I think the use of the "Free For All" forum is getting out of hand. Most to all of the topics belong in the other forum. My choice would be to close the "FFA" to any more new topics.

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Comments? Go to "Retire Free For All Forum?".

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Also, it sure seems that the focus seems to be straying from the core area - Creation vs. Evolution.

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The above quoted was intended as commentary on the whole of the "Free For All" forum, and on the debate topics at in general. It was not aimed specificly at holmes' topic, although certainly holmes' topic was part of the situation.It seems that there was a bit of a typo(?) in there. The "Most to all of the topics belong in the other forum." would be better stated as "Most to all of the topics belong in other forums.", or something like that.

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Now please go to the thread I opened just for this whole issue and present your counterevidence.

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Closing this topic.

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Adminnemooseus

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Comments on moderation procedures? - Go to
Change in Moderation?
or
too fast closure of threads

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The internal quote was from holmes, from the previous message. Responding to that, and to the general thought that the topic had gone on long enough, I closed it down.Adminnemoosuesps: Not a well written message, but I had already been up much later than I wanted to be, and I was trying to inject input into several different topics that night."So many topics, so little time to close them all down"------------------
Comments on moderation procedures? - Go to
Change in Moderation?
or
too fast closure of threads[This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 11-17-2003]

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Here's an even better idea - how about a forum where the threads automatically close/expire after a certain predefinied time limit, to discourage meaningful conversation from accidentally occuring there and to mitigate storage problems...

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I think a message number or time limit might just cause people to babble even more, and they try to beat the deadline.There was a topic a while back, that got something like 70 new messages in 6 hours, before I closed it down. I seem to recall that a certain Frog stated that they thought the topic was doomed to get shut down soon, so they better post fast. Self-fullfilling prophecy. We better babble fast, before this topic gets closed for babbling.Adminnemooseus

Proposed: Close current FFA to new topics.Get many of the topics that would have gone to the FFA, to better homes in the main forums. As I see it, many to most of the topics that have gone into the FFA, could just as well gone to one of the main forums. But the admins/moderators are not at liberty to do such moves.Start a new forum, for the "exiled" members, and perhaps the truly bad topics (although I would also like to really cut back on the starting of the truly bad topics).Please review up-topic also.Adminnemooseus