This quote from WH40K is perfectly suited for the current state Teamliquid.net has found itself in. I don't really know how or when exactly did it happen but I'm seriously disappointed with TL right now... I've always viewed this site as having quality content and high standards. A peaceful oasis among the sandstorms ravaging the internet. Unfortunately, soon after the opening of SC2 forum section it all begun to change. I don't know if it was caused by the sudden influx of new users or because the mods have lowered a bar a bit, but things started going downhill from then on. There are still a lot of quality threads, especially in the Broodwar and Tourneys sections of TL.net, where people keep up the good work and make excellent use of the new features being added to the site. The General, Starcraft 2 and Blogs sections of the forum have deteriorated greatly though...
Whenever I come to visit TL.net this days and I'm browsing through the forums, it seems that all I see is Pokemon, Apop and porn, an uncanny combination of things I never wanted to see around here. The seemingly omnipresent NSFW tag is being abused all around the place. Where once it was used to hide an occasional titty flash, now it has actual pornography hidden behind it. I'm not a person to bash porn, I just think there are better places to look for it than this site. The same goes for Pokemon and all sorts of Asian pop (this one being offensive only when it starts spreading to other threads than the ones dedicated for it).
What has happened? Who is responsible for this? How (if at all) will Teamliquid recover from it? This are just a few questions that are on my mind right now. Personally I decided to pick up the slack and no longer give in to the deterioration of this great site. I have a solemn resolve to up the quality of my posts and refrain from posting inappropriate content.
Teamliquid.net needs you! Help improve the quality of the site to restore it to its former glory!
I'm agree with the NSFW -.- Porno is ok but it has nothing in common with the spirit and the purpouse of this site...
However is natural that SC2 is full "of shit". This is a new game and as a new game there is enthusiasm for all the new features..You only need to wait some months and all will return as one month ago
On March 16 2010 20:31 LuDwig- wrote: I'm agree with the NSFW -.- Porno is ok but it has nothing in common with the spirit and the purpouse of this site...
However is natural that SC2 is full "of shit". This is a new game and as a new game there is enthusiasm for all the new features..You only need to wait some months and all will return as one month ago
It's not one month ago... It's been going on for some time now (I believe it started when SC2 was announced).
And spoiler tags were not added with primary purpose being hiding porn...
On March 16 2010 20:40 JohnColtrane wrote: i for one think that drhelvetica's blogs have been a great addition to the site
+1 haha
Honestly I dont really see this as a problem, its not like a go to a starcraft discussion thread and someone starts posting vods of kpop singers having sex
One thing that would be nice though if there was a rule that people who post porn always have to write NSWF-porn or something, since NSFW can mean quite a few things and you dont necessarily expect something like that.
But I still dont really get it, I never stumble upon porn or stuff like that in any sort of serious thread.
I place my trust in the godly ban powers our admins wield As long as these things are kept to their respective threads (random pics that make you laugh, K-pop discussion, etc.) I don't see the problem. The SCII forum has been bad but as we've seen the admins are banning people left and right for less than quality posting, so I think that not only are things going to get better from here on out but once the community has been exposed to SCII for a longer period of time people will stop posting whatever rubbish they come up with out of pure excitement. Also, there are a lot of new users, but I think this is a good thing.
I've really only noticed this trend in the SC2 forums. Even then, the mods stay on top of closing the awful threads/banning the really bad posters pretty well. The general forum seems the same as ever to me, same with blogs, broodwar, and tourneys
I certainly agree with you. I can't say I'm surprised by the blog section though because, I never really expected high quality threads there anyway.
General used to be like the RSS feed with latest news. It was awesome browsing it. Now it's more... general as in "everything" and less "news" and cool stuff.
I knew right from the start that the SC2 forum was going to be the biggest shithole ever when we go into beta or retail. Newbs flooding in, kids with beta access and <10 posts discussing balance (more like crying about balance rofl...) and generally the lowest posting standards ever. I don't mean that FrozenArbiter is doing a bad job by this, but either he's too lantient there or there's too much for him to keep up. The saying "options are like assholes, and noone wants to hear yours" fits in perfectly.
IMO we need another purge or get Mani to come back. Alternatively give Rekrul the banstick back.
Blog and General have always been quite bad. I mean there are some really good threads but most of the stuff is like random news, anime, terrible music and movies ( Thanks Daigomi for posting good stuff btw ) , pseudo religion stuff, undergrad Eco students arguing about why libertarians speak the truth, and once in a while a ridiculous China thread will appear.
But the worst is the Sc2 forum. Thanks god the mods have started the purge.
However when i look at my own blogs i feel somewhat guilty too :<
biggest problem is that so many people just post for the sake of posting without contributing anything.
shit like "cool (whatever) bro" also is getting really annoying. maybe admin should close registration for a couple of weeks, weed out the trash and then go from there. atm the site is much too crowded.
another problem might be that most of the people who loved Broodwar are aged in their early or even late twenties now whereas the bulk of the new users who come here because of Starcraft2 are probably much younger. now I know that there are great contributors on this site that are very young (Frozenarbiter for example was very young when he first came here and I think konadora is also still pretty young) but still age might have something to do with how posting has changed around here.
Yeah, I admit that I haven't been doing the greatest job with my posts recently and even though I would argue I specifically am not part of the problem, I think that I'm not doing enough to spread positive vibes and discussion into the site.
Hopefully all the veterans put a little bit more thought into things before they hit the post button. I know for myself personally I can get a little to "one linery" which encourages new users to do the same...
On March 16 2010 21:18 Vasoline73 wrote: Yeah, I admit that I haven't been doing the greatest job with my posts recently and even though I would argue I specifically am not part of the problem, I think that I'm not doing enough to spread positive vibes and discussion into the site.
Hopefully all the veterans put a little bit more thought into things before they hit the post button. I know for myself personally I can get a little to "one linery" which encourages new users to do the same...
I think there are still enough positive vibes, the quality posters haven't gone away (yet). it's just being drowned out by the sheer amount of shit that's being posted.
They don't post porn, pokemon, and _pop in the SC2 sections...
so I'm guessing that you've been reading the forums more due to SC2, and seeing these subjects more often.
They get posted because they're popular, and they're popular because the demographics continually shifts. Unless you control the userbase, it's going to happen.
Hoping it goes back is like older generations complaining teenage culture being sexualized at younger ages, wishing rap died in the 90s, and countries complaining about immigrants.
I don't think TL is bad, I just think it is diluted. There are 5x as many people visiting as when the OP was active. TL was simply not built for 30k visitors a day, let alone the 60k we get now.
I do think that the SC2 forum was terrible because new posters were making crappy threads as if this were the battle net forums. However, now that the behaviour is being weeded out, I think the SC2 forum is very decent.
Blogs... meh, blogs suck. Too many are created every day. The NSFW stuff I am not in favour of either and I think that will stop soon. General is the same as always, just with a few more on going threads and less of a current events focus. That trend is 3 yeas old though.
With new users and little regulation, you'll always boil down to the lowest common denominator.
Thankfully, the new SC2 forum guidelines keep shit in line. The difficult part is regulating a huge site like TL in order to keep the quality of posts at maximum.
But yes...as manifesto has already said, it is a dilution. I personally would like to contribute some articles or write something of worth someday when I have the time. Perhaps there should be some monthly article contest, similar to contests SC:L has done, to spur community participation.
To be honest I think there are tons of good posts every day. But, other than the hardcore people who read everything, they can be very hard to find. Even the news gets a cursory glance by many people. Also, with so many nooks and crannies in the site, people generally gravitate toward the same areas each visit, creating different environments on different parts of the board.
That's a part of what I meant. There still IS a lot of quality content around, but it becomes gradually harder to find as we're being drowned in a lot of poor topics or topics that are being side-tracked 10 times during first 3 pages and devolve into another flame war.
I believe TL.net is fine. It has regulated shit like SC / SC2 forums. (They should be regulated to keep things on-topic.) And blogs for random stuff, that range from a day in the park to asian softcore porn.
To me, it's fine.
The other sections like General still have quite interesting new stories and other stuff that can be fun to learn, which it's usually regulated better then blogs, so imo it works too.
You really have a point here, i too hate the tone of pop and porno shit that's present on the site. The asian pop was so omnipresent that if i opened a PL stream it was more likely to catch some of that instead of sc, not mentioning the tone of threads and blogs.
Altough the Random pics that make you laugh, even if NSFW and decreased in quality as time passed, was a great thread. I for one love funny fails and stuff like that, but i dont have the time and the taste to go to failblog 4chan and other sites like that, to search trough pages of boring stuff to find a good one. There different people who lurk at different sites posted their favorites making it a really intresting and hillarious collection. Many sc-related pictures borned there as well, i think it is a mistake to have it closed :S
I think the blog section used to be better than it is now, I feel like it was used for actual blogs and right now it`s more of a "I just made a shitty thread so I think I`ll just post it in blogs". General section doesn`t appeal to me personally either recently, but I think it`s more of an opinion since it`s just more of a shift towards different than towards bad.
When I think about I make a lot of one-line posts myself which would contribute more if they were not posted at all. Teamliquid is by far the best internet forum I have ever stumbled upon so it`s definitely the time to change posting habits.
TL should probably go back at least to its former state, at least to a certain degree after the SC2 fuss is gone.
Poll: What is the the worst kind of threads ? (Vote): PvZ Imba (Vote): Eco libertarians threads (Vote): Hey look this random video ! (Vote): China is full of evil commies blablabla (Vote): TvP is rigged i quit bw (Vote): Why i'm a Christian (Vote): Roach / Immortal / whatever IMBA FIX PLZ !
OMG I hate these threads so much. Sometimes I don't see them right away too, but they are all by sub 50 post people, and they get responses so fast. Maybe it doesn't seem like it, but it REALLY feels shitty as a mod to close a thread that has two pages of replies already. Like... I just wasted everyone's time. But those threads are a goddamn cancer.
On March 16 2010 21:57 barth wrote: I think the blog section used to be better than it is now, I feel like it was used for actual blogs and right now it`s more of a "I just made a shitty thread so I think I`ll just post it in blogs". General section doesn`t appeal to me personally either recently, but I think it`s more of an opinion since it`s just more of a shift towards different than towards bad.
When I think about I make a lot of one-line posts myself which would contribute more if they were not posted at all. Teamliquid is by far the best internet forum I have ever stumbled upon so it`s definitely the time to change posting habits.
TL should probably go back at least to its former state, at least to a certain degree after the SC2 fuss is gone.
I don't think this is ever going to happen in the future. As Teamliquid grows, the number of people coming in on a daily basis will continue to increase. It's inevitable that posting quality and overall forum quality deteriorates as overall members increase. It's just how it is. When things are nice and limited, everyone contributes and pitches in a little here and there. But when more people flock in, everyone feels the need to try to stick out a little here and there.
I equate it to my Livestream chats over the months that I've streamed. At the beginning when I only peaked at around 300 viewers per night, I used to really enjoy sitting down and chatting with the sparse few that would talk in my chatroom. We'd talk about almost anything, from the games itself to whatever else was happening at the time. And it'd be nicely paced where everything was still nice and orderly. However, I nowadays get about 750 people per night watching my streams, upwards of 1500 when popular gamers/teams are playing. It's absolutely impossible with the influx of people to have an organized chat and share your opinions when people are just spamming random nonsense. When one person starts doing it, others feel like its appropriate to start doing so as well, and thus chaos erupts.
It'll be hard for TL to go back to what it was before unless things change. Moderation'll have to kick in, and commoners like you and me are gonna have to contribute and set an example for newcomers as to how things should be done around here with better blogs, better threads, better posts. Till then, it's just gonna be a chaotic influx of SC2 idiots who feel like they know everything there is to know about the game.
I think that the significance NSFW/Apop/Pokemon hold to the deterioration of the blogs section pales in comparison to the influx of random "what I think about SC2" threads that seem to pop up every five minutes in the blogs section because they don't belong anywhere else and everyone is just dying to read your thoughts and feelings about SC2, along with the thoughts and feelings of ten billion other people.
On March 16 2010 22:06 Roffles wrote: I equate it to my Livestream chats over the months that I've streamed. At the beginning when I only peaked at around 300 viewers per night, I used to really enjoy sitting down and chatting with the sparse few that would talk in my chatroom. We'd talk about almost anything, from the games itself to whatever else was happening at the time. And it'd be nicely paced where everything was still nice and orderly. However, I nowadays get about 750 people per night watching my streams, upwards of 1500 when popular gamers/teams are playing. It's absolutely impossible with the influx of people to have an organized chat and share your opinions when people are just spamming random nonsense. When one person starts doing it, others feel like its appropriate to start doing so as well, and thus chaos erupts.
Livestream chats are fucking AWFUL, it is like real time youtube comments. I don't know how you manage it tbh. Your analogy is a good one though.
Altough the Random pics that make you laugh, even if NSFW and decreased in quality as time passed, was a great thread. I for one love funny fails and stuff like that, but i dont have the time and the taste to go to failblog 4chan and other sites like that, to search trough pages of boring stuff to find a good one. There different people who lurk at different sites posted their favorites making it a really intresting and hillarious collection. Many sc-related pictures borned there as well, i think it is a mistake to have it closed :S
For every funny sc pic born in that thread, you had to wade through 8 nigger jokes, 12 titties, and a gaping asshole. It wasn't worth it.
On March 16 2010 22:14 Saracen wrote: I think that the significance NSFW/Apop/Pokemon hold to the deterioration of the blogs section pales in comparison to the influx of random "what I think about SC2" threads that seem to pop up every five minutes in the blogs section because they don't belong anywhere else and everyone is just dying to read your thoughts and feelings about SC2, along with the thoughts and feelings of ten billion other people.
I used NSFW/Apop/Pokemon as an example. There's quite a lot of things that contribute to the deterioration of site quality but I wanted to keep my OP short and simple instead of making it a 5000 word essay no one would bother to read. As you can see, other symptoms are being listed in the replies to my OP and thus fill the gaps and make it whole.
By the way, I seriously enjoy reading the comments in this thread. It's like moving back in time
I can only agree with mani and the others saying TL has gotten too big and thus the good posts are diluted in a sea of spam. When I started to come here it was almost like everyone knows everyone. Now I can see posters I've never noticed before with a higher postcount than me. Earlier TL was like a big room where people would stand in different corners and you could walk around and atleast notice everyone. Now you have alot of different rooms and people in LR threads, sc2 and blogs dont mix with people in broodwar and strategy.
For new users - The bar to participate is very low, requiring only a registration. Maybe it could be adjusted so that you can't post a topic with your first 20 posts, and a cap at 5 posts a day for your first week. People might search more and post less, leading to an increase in post quality and decrease in spam. Also, you can't bump old topics with your first 100 posts.
Maybe a forum for random posts is in order as well. A place where people are free to spam and post as much as they want with sparse moderation - though forum rules still apply. This could lead to Blogs being a place for more quality posts and General a place for discussions about current events. Over at gamefaqs.com there is a forum called "Random Insanity". It's very active with several new topics a minute, by far the most active forum over there. The quality is low and posts are rarely longer then a sentence, but it still manages to create a sense of unity and it can be quite fun to browse through. And sometimes there are even more serious topics. It's the chat Roffles was talking about - only in forum-form. Maybe users can vent in a place like that and the rest of the forums can stay clean. Images are disabled and links appear only in text form requiring users to copy-paste them into the address bar. This way it stays safer and doesn't turn into another 4chan.
On March 16 2010 21:26 Manifesto7 wrote:The NSFW stuff I am not in favour of either and I think that will stop soon.
That would make me happy. I took a year break from TL, somewhat due to the fact that this was starting to get out of control (also because I knew I had to stop watching proleague live and I had to quit cold turkey). It has gotten pretty bad over the past month or two in particular. It doesn't bother me as much as it used to, but I've accidentally clicked the wrong thread and then gone "What on earth is this?" before realizing what has happened. Not particularly cool.
On March 16 2010 22:14 Saracen wrote: I think that the significance NSFW/Apop/Pokemon hold to the deterioration of the blogs section pales in comparison to the influx of random "what I think about SC2" threads that seem to pop up every five minutes in the blogs section because they don't belong anywhere else and everyone is just dying to read your thoughts and feelings about SC2, along with the thoughts and feelings of ten billion other people.
I used NSFW/Apop/Pokemon as an example. There's quite a lot of things that contribute to the deterioration of site quality...
I've gotta say that I feel the worst effect so far is just poor-quality posts. Nothing even extreme like image macros or whatever. Just people posting whatever sits on the edges of their brain. Posts with no thought or effort, no conviction or passion. These posts are fucking everywhere, and they tend to ruin the good threads that are made - they just become 50 pages of "lol i agree".
I don't think it's the mods' faults really. I mean there's only so much you can do without indiscriminately banning every person in a thread (please, Chill, I'm begging you!).
Yeah, the image macros are definitely getting out of control too. You never used to see them, now they seem somewhat common, even though the mods are clamping down on them.
On March 16 2010 22:54 zer0das wrote: Yeah, the image macros are definitely getting out of control too. You never used to see them, now they seem somewhat common, even though the mods are clamping down on them.
I love image macros, and they aren't that common...mods ban people who use them on sight and if you visit the automated banlist thread you'll see that there aren't that frequent bans against people who uses them.
On March 16 2010 22:36 Emon_ wrote: For new users - The bar to participate is very low, requiring only a registration. Maybe it could be adjusted so that you can't post a topic with your first 20 posts, and a cap at 5 posts a day for your first week. People might search more and post less, leading to an increase in post quality and decrease in spam. Also, you can't bump old topics with your first 100 posts.
Maybe a forum for random posts is in order as well. A place where people are free to spam and post as much as they want with sparse moderation - though forum rules still apply. This could lead to Blogs being a place for more quality posts and General a place for discussions about current events. Over at gamefaqs.com there is a forum called "Random Insanity". It's very active with several new topics a minute, by far the most active forum over there. The quality is low and posts are rarely longer then a sentence, but it still manages to create a sense of unity and it can be quite fun to browse through. And sometimes there are even more serious topics. It's the chat Roffles was talking about - only in forum-form. Maybe users can vent in a place like that and the rest of the forums can stay clean. Images are disabled and links appear only in text form requiring users to copy-paste them into the address bar. This way it stays safer and doesn't turn into another 4chan.
I just read through the entire thread. These are some great ideas Emon. I would love it if the mods were to introduce some new things to stop the deterioration of the quality of posts. hint hint..
Anyways, I think I agree that much of the reason for the decline in threads is the influx of starcraft 2 users. In the long run, they will learn that TL is not like other internet forums, that it is a haven from stupid spam and useless discussion. That the search function is not dangerous. I agree that the quality of posts is decreasing due to the relative age of starcraft 2 users, but some of them are also transferring from warcraft, and their forums were never this great. After a few months they should come to appreciate TL for what it is. Also, the reason for the decline is not that we have more people, it's that we have more young people or people from inferior forums.
And the random pics thread is pretty much dead to me...it's run its course, every page is reposts and unfunny shit, and "wow lol" instead of pictures. There is one quality poster every five pages.
The morning hours(EST) right now still feels quiet, probably because all the starcraft 2 users aren't as diehard as to go on now.
I love austerity >.> and blue and grey and horses perfectly fit in that
You just gave me an awesome idea for a little project. Stay tuned for the results.
Edit: And to the post above me: Yeah WC3 forums were kinda crappy place. That's why (note: I'm a WC3 player/fan, not an SC guy) I always hung up around here and never even bothered to register at any of the WC3 or (gods forbid) battle.net forums. Surprisingly, there are quite a few very good WC3 gamers hiding around here and the few threads about WC3 in general or strategy in it, that you can find on TL.net, are pretty damn awesome.
i've said this before and imho it's crystal clear: the one big bonus of tl.net has always been that it was a relatively small and exclusive community (compared to wc3, cs, wow ~similar communities) with users who value a game that is over 10 years old and a progaming scene that's not even available in our culture. i suspect that these traits and the manageable size have led to the forums being exceptionally mature. even when tasteless went to korea and his broadcasts were regularly announced in 4chan threads the quality of the site didn't drop that much (though i've started reading 4chan memes more and more often since then and posting culture on the whole has gotten worse with stupid "memeish" one liners). it could still be controlled. but now we have starcraft II with teamliquid being one of the last (and first) established starcraft sites, with content and a team that has been perfected over many years and a perfect starting point to grow bigger and expand, to connect the professional coverages (i call them that) we had for sc:bw and for a relatively small audience with the huge masses that come with a new and flashy and trendy game that starcraft II is. I once formulated my doubts what would become of tl.net and its "exclusive status" when it clashes with the huge masses of new and (young) scII fans. Whether TL could withstand the change that those masses bring and still be true to itself. I also see a difference in mentality. Most of teamliquid's users have cherished a 12-year-old game while being laughed at by many "why would you play such an old game with shitty graphics and outdated controls?" but have still been content with their game and the community because they knew what the game was worth - despite graphics and missing mbs / rally on minerals "lol wc3 has this - why play sc?". For many new users SCII is just the logical follow up of wc3 or a game they wouldn't have touched after ~2003 (sc1), they don't share the fascination that tl.net stood for in its love for bw progaming, they just see that this is the major site for sc2 atm and an alternative to the blizz forums to create their "ROACH / HYDRA / MY MOM IMBA HALP" threads.
i strongly hope that the forum vets can cope with the huge influx of new users who change the forum structure in tone, style, maturity, etc. and are able to moderate accordingly so that the tl.net we know and love won't die or become only a mere shade of its former self. if that should happen i would even have prefered tl not jumping the sc2 bandwagon at all and staying exclusively with sc1. this site is such a gem because most of the users have the "sense of star" what a great and timeless game sc1 was / is - a trait I can't expect from people who are wow / wc3 players and now frequent this site as well. it would be a real pity if tl.net would deteriorate because the (respectable) mods / admins cannot keep up with the change that happens from now on and consequently aren't able to preserve the community's identity.
I love the starting quote in this thread. I have always thought that Warhammer 40k games/books had some of the best/badass quotes. Some of my favorites:
Pain is an illusion of the senses, despair is an illusion of the mind. In failure are the seeds of Heresy sown. Perseverance and silence are the highest virtues.
These are so pro when said in the marine like gruff voice of a 40k character =D
It's all caused by SC2, yes. With SC2 looming and the beta going, TL's getting an influx of users of a generally lower age group than previously seen. I joined TL with the influx around the GOM Invitational 2007, and wether or not TL saw an equal drop in quality by that influx, I don't know, but I'll assume if it did occur, it was nowhere near what's happening today. Age is the difference here, obviously.
With GOM Invitational, the new wave of joinees were mostly older SC-enthusiasts or previous gamers who'd experienced the game during its (back then) 8-year long life. The new influx of members though, are a part of the pokemon / 4chan generation that are attracted to TL not through their aging love for a game, but instead for their newfound love of a new game.
My point being, with original SCBW and the GOM influx, TL attracted older veterans primarily, while with SC2, TL is getting the prepubescent pond scum of the internet of today.
Just add a 20-year old limit on making new accounts and it'll all fix itself in no time.
On March 16 2010 21:16 iG.Zeep wrote: "give Rekrul the banstick back."
plz
This. Even though I don't frequently read the SC2 section because I cba to play the beta anymore, I agree with the OP, but I think the problem will be solved by the diligent TL mods eventually. Also, I couldn't agree more with what Roffles said about the livestreams. At the start it was a fun place to discuss the game with some other people while watching the games, but after a while whenever chat was on I wanted to gauge my eyes out. -___-
Interesting question you guys raise. Is a forum's quality of users really in the hands of anybody?
The forum seems amazing to me , as someone who is surrounded by people who can't even begin understand the appeal of something like bw on a competitive level, coming to a place where everyone is into it, is so refreshing because I at least know they share a similar view in some way. With Sc2 this may quickly deteriorate because it will no longer be such an unusual interest.
There seems to be a built in filter though, in that if you haven't worked your way up by helping others on the forum you don't really deserve the prized opinions of the known TLers. Obviously though theres no way for the ideals to be apparent to new users if it isn't clearly defined. It sounds like in the old days things peopel were able to infer these things though.
On March 16 2010 22:06 Roffles wrote: I equate it to my Livestream chats over the months that I've streamed. At the beginning when I only peaked at around 300 viewers per night, I used to really enjoy sitting down and chatting with the sparse few that would talk in my chatroom. We'd talk about almost anything, from the games itself to whatever else was happening at the time. And it'd be nicely paced where everything was still nice and orderly. However, I nowadays get about 750 people per night watching my streams, upwards of 1500 when popular gamers/teams are playing. It's absolutely impossible with the influx of people to have an organized chat and share your opinions when people are just spamming random nonsense. When one person starts doing it, others feel like its appropriate to start doing so as well, and thus chaos erupts.
xxx: whos playin??? xxx: Flash green, Light red xxx: buffer into gg xxx: BUFFER INTO GG ROFL xxx: lol power outage xxx: anyone else laggin? xxx: this is chinacceptable xxx: whos playin? did flash play yet?
Ugh. I started watching the streams a couple months ago, and I can only dream about having decent, mature discussion while watching a game live. Jokes and banter are fine, but the unfortunate tendency of the internet is to devolve into worthless meme slinging.
I've lurked around here for years, and what has really debased the experience for me is the utter lack of reading comprehension. Half of any thread is either composed of uselessly arguing over semantics or people blindly posting without having read any of the thread. The larger a thread gets, the more that people come in and post the same shit over and over. Does no one try anymore?
I'm not a beacon of contribution to this site by any means, but most of my posts I try to put a lot of thought into after reading the whole thread. Of course, that effort usually goes to waste because it's only to be drowned out by sheer spam and noise. I don't say that to whine about how I'm personally being ignored--I see it happen to most everyone that has written a quality post, and I know they must feel frustrated as well. It's a shame how much it discourages meaningful discussion. With regards to spam, I look at a few profiles for the account creation date, and people with many times my number of posts have only been here for two or three months.
The SC2 forum is where I've been seeing it the most, yes. It's happened several times that I open a thread from the sidebar and see that the OP is a single sentence about something idiotic and that the thread has been promptly closed (good work, mods!). Also, maybe we've been spoiled from Brood War, but the word "imba" being flung about in every new thread is really damn annoying. Not even the concept of imbalance, but the word itself and its contexts and connotations. Aside from that, I hear the same tired arguments repeated ad nauseum, regardless of their stupidity, the same one-liner memes, the same... mediocrity.
Livestream chats with a lot of people (and sometimes even with a low number of people) are cancer. Only solution is to disable the chat.
Regarding the original issue I'm going to mostly agree with Mani that there is still quality stuff, but that it's harder to find. TL and its forums certainly has a hard challenge with SC2.
On March 16 2010 22:06 Roffles wrote: I equate it to my Livestream chats over the months that I've streamed. At the beginning when I only peaked at around 300 viewers per night, I used to really enjoy sitting down and chatting with the sparse few that would talk in my chatroom. We'd talk about almost anything, from the games itself to whatever else was happening at the time. And it'd be nicely paced where everything was still nice and orderly. However, I nowadays get about 750 people per night watching my streams, upwards of 1500 when popular gamers/teams are playing. It's absolutely impossible with the influx of people to have an organized chat and share your opinions when people are just spamming random nonsense. When one person starts doing it, others feel like its appropriate to start doing so as well, and thus chaos erupts.
xxx: whos playin??? xxx: Flash green, Light red xxx: buffer into gg xxx: BUFFER INTO GG ROFL xxx: lol power outage xxx: anyone else laggin? xxx: this is chinacceptable xxx: whos playin? did flash play yet?
Ugh. I started watching the streams a couple months ago, and I can only dream about having decent, mature discussion while watching a game live. Jokes and banter are fine, but the unfortunate tendency of the internet is to devolve into worthless meme slinging.
That's just how it is. I've already given up hope for any meaningful conversation. These days I just leave it on and retreat to IRC. I used to get pissed off cause people are idiots, but as of late, I've been pretty apathetic towards everything. It's as if I'm immune to it now. Just click, choose IP Ban Forever and head back to IRC. It's never gonna change. It's just the way things are.
I was however under the impression ( checking ban thread and closed threads ) that mods were actually busy cleaning up the mess and I refrained, eventho I have the same impression as Manitou and others, to PM someone about it.
Maybe they could say, give the ops within his thread to the thread starter if he has over xxxx number of posts and has a clean history. Since we're looking for mature people and we say we have some around they could as well teach the kids one way or another. Because I don't see any other way to educate newcomers than to show them the exemple of a clean place / thread. Maybe that way they'll learn ? Less global bans and maybe give more warnings that would not allow you to post for a couple of hours. That way maybe people will think twice before posting random crap in the threads.
The TL staff are seasoned veterans who bear the scars of many a troll, which I think makes them kind of set in their ways and reluctant to change, "don't fix what technically isn't ACTUALLY really truly broken" etc etc but one change that would really help is not being able to make new threads before a certain post-count or membership length. This has already been thanks-but-no-thanks'd by said staff I believe, pointing at low-post contributors, but I almost feel like it's not worth the odd brilliant article to see the fifteen new useless topics a week. If someone has something of actual merit to contribute, surely they can let a mod know or something?
And no I may not be the site's number one contributor either, I may even be part of the problem every once in a while, but that doesn't mean stopping the new kids from making new threads the moment they join (asking why they lost to mass scouts) a bad idea.
And I may be a big fan of porn, but when I want porn I go to porn sites. No the NSFW tag doesn't help, you all know you can't NOT click it!
Pokemon.
edit: There's a week's membership's time implemented already? Can anyone tell?
On March 17 2010 01:12 Osmoses wrote: The TL staff are seasoned veterans who bear the scars of many a troll, which I think makes them kind of set in their ways and reluctant to change, "don't fix what technically isn't ACTUALLY really truly broken" etc etc but one change that would really help is not being able to make new threads before a certain post-count or membership length. This has already been thanks-but-no-thanks'd by said staff I believe, pointing at low-post contributors, but I almost feel like it's not worth the odd brilliant article to see the fifteen new useless topics a week. If someone has something of actual merit to contribute, surely they can let a mod know or something?
And no I may not be the site's number one contributor either, I may even be part of the problem every once in a while, but that doesn't mean stopping the new kids from making new threads the moment they join (asking why they lost to mass scouts) a bad idea.
And I may be a big fan of porn, but when I want porn I go to porn sites. No the NSFW tag doesn't help, you all know you can't NOT click it!
Pokemon.
edit: There's a week's membership's time implemented already? Can anyone tell?
Yeah, in fact its been mentioned several times in this thread
I don't think it's all that bad, but tl most certainly had a better atmosphere/discussion going a couple of years back. I remember being lifetime banned as a 14 year old kid for something pretty minor, but the "present me" would easily prefer the state that tl was in back then.
The Blog section has always been the "trashcan" of TeamLiquid. While hidden gems can be found here and there, the only reason the Blog section (Miscellaneous/Second General would be more appropriate names) generally exists is to keep the rest of the forum tidy. This has been the case long before the recent influx of new members and you must not have read it much in the past to only notice this fact now.
General is.....general. I mean, I hate KPop and Pokémon too, but a great deal of people on TL hold interest in such topics (and this was before the influx as well). As such, it makes perfect sense it would be located in the General section.
As for the SC2 section, I do agree to an extent that it has deteriorated. It is to be expected with so many new members and not enough people to handle it all. But assuming dilligent moderation, it should eventually get better.
Make the minimum age for registration 18 years. It will at least result in more mature, insightful posting. I was a complete retard between the ages of 14-19 and can see why there's a million posts that say "lolz...+_+;;..jizzn in ma pants!"
We'd have to set it up trap style though. Like when you register an account with March 17, 1995 as your birthday, a message comes up that says "Congratulations on joining TL.net! You will gain full posting priveleges in 3 years. Please take that time to review our forum guidelines and have fun reading others' posts!"
Then we log the IP so if they remake another account right after we just blast it.
I give Mani a ton of credit for closing the NSFW thread. Its not easy to make that kind of decision. Im sure that in time TL will be fine. I still see a ton of well written stuff here all the time.
Anyone ever been to a livestream chat a few minutes early before some mediocre MST/OSL group (especially the late-night ones)? The chat there is so nice .
I agree with Emon (I think?)'s post about some sort of spam forum. Sigs gone, doesn't count for postcount, no hotlinks, etc. A lot of the time I'm reading PX or looking at the featured threads and half of them are blogs that I never saw while browsing (and I browse TL a lot), because they're buried under the masses of "[SC2]" or whatever threads that nobody cares about.
I came here from a smash bros. forum, and if the Brawl influx was any indication, eventually the new users will mostly just stay within the bounds of their chosen forum. Some of the better posters will come out and explore the rest of the site eventually but it should die down.
A post-SC2 influx of people was inevitable. Although TL won't be exactly as it was a few years ago, if you stick around I'm sure the bans will be numerous and purges pleasant and brutal. The site is fine now and it'll be better as time goes on.
I wish there was a fantasy banning league where we could make wagers on who was going to go. 10 points for a 2 day ban, 50 for a 2 week. Oh my god it'd be great if not for the inevitable flaming it'd result in.
A forum needs to teach its users how to post; it can't just impose rules and stay away.
Likewise, keeping the forum small is only a lazy and short term solution. Contributors won't have always the same quality in their posts nor will they keep posting forever.
There isn't a lot of GREAT debates here so much. That makes me a bit sad.. but I don't think that really makes TL "bad."
TL is still the best. Our bar for expectation is really high. So like Mani said, when you have a doubled user base it takes time for people to learn forum etiquette and for those that won't to get weeded out.
Have patience my WH40k friend, it will be .leveled out eventually
I just tell myself every night that a few months after SC2 is released, the flood will slowly go down, and those detrimental members will start to fade away.
On March 17 2010 04:34 Cloud wrote: A forum needs to teach its users how to post; it can't just impose rules and stay away.
Likewise, keeping the forum small is only a lazy and short term solution. Contributors won't have always the same quality in their posts nor will they keep posting forever.
The problem is that it starts to diminish true desire to contribute to a site. The biggest reason why our staff and mods are so great is because they work on their own initiative. If you start saying you *will* be a good member, and you *will* contribute, that initiative is gone, and it is a debate of quality vs quantity. Let good people stay, let bad people leave.
On March 17 2010 04:34 Cloud wrote: A forum needs to teach its users how to post; it can't just impose rules and stay away.
Likewise, keeping the forum small is only a lazy and short term solution. Contributors won't have always the same quality in their posts nor will they keep posting forever.
Rules are there for the people who do not wish/are unable to learn. And there seems to be quite a lot of those. Quality posters and most of the "mature" users don't even need to read the Commandments or any other basic set of rules like that as in most cases it comes naturally to them.
yeah I`m kinda sad about the "Random pics that make u laugh" thread . Even though the quality was gettin` low, there were still great ones. And the last one...even though it was porn, it was pretty awesomely funny errr, nvm :D
i agree that bans have increased but you also need to take into account that there are a LOT more users now than before. i guess maybe think of it as a bans per capita type of deal? lol
anyway, regarding the OP: yes staff have noticed many of the same problems you have outlined and have discussed ways to deal with it. we'll see what we come up with though lol.
On March 17 2010 04:16 Mellotron wrote: I give Mani a ton of credit for closing the NSFW thread. Its not easy to make that kind of decision. Im sure that in time TL will be fine. I still see a ton of well written stuff here all the time.
TL is a reflection. There's a huge vanity problem here and it's undeserved.
It's ironic that the people I see who have most to be proud of are the most humble, and the people who have the least are the quickest fill up with hot air. From just being on this site, people get a superiority complex, and boy, if you start giving them a few powers it's suddenly really blatant when they're looking down at you.
You can look at the general mish mash of topics and say you're disappointed, but I think the problem is deeper rooted than that. TL is full of self-fascinated dickheads that just make dumb replies and lower the overall motivation of posters to create an OP that takes an ounce of creativity. That's why we get PYF threads everywhere, and smutty picture threads. They're the only ones people are willing to put the time into replying to. That and mildly controversial threads like this one. Who the hell wants to do anything for these idiots? Not me.
On March 17 2010 04:16 Mellotron wrote: I give Mani a ton of credit for closing the NSFW thread. Its not easy to make that kind of decision. Im sure that in time TL will be fine. I still see a ton of well written stuff here all the time.
I caved.
why did you close Manit0u's new picture thread? it had a lot of potential if properly moderated. at least also ban the idiots that messed it up and demanded that they're allowed to behave like the idiots they are?
that thread would have been the ideal place to weed out people who can't follow rules.
I feel you Chef. It can get pretty disappointing when you have some nice idea for a new thread, spend a couple hours doing research all over the internet, books or other media related to the subject, then you spend another 20+ minutes putting it all together into OP so it has some semblance of order and neatness. Only to come by later and see someone replying to the thread with 'epic, lol' or something similar, couple more people quoting this and sometimes adding 'this' or '+1' and a dozen people engaging in a flame war over something as distant to the OP as possible. Sometimes it just feels like trying to present a dissertation on Immanuel Kant's works in a classroom full of 12 year olds with just 2 or 3 people actually trying to listen and understand you to provide constructive criticism or a valuable discussion.
Go to the archives and find a random thread that's 6 years old in any of the forums you listed. I guarantee you that posting quality has not changed much since then.
I did. And posting quality did change. Go check out random threads from 2003 or 2004 and compare the amount of 'lol', 'this', '+1', 'just quote', 'insert foul language here' type of comments. Also, flame wars weren't so intense and happened less often. Another thing to note is that when someone asked for help, usually a couple of first posts were people actually trying to help and not instantly calling OP 'noob' or changing the subject completely.
On March 17 2010 04:16 Mellotron wrote: I give Mani a ton of credit for closing the NSFW thread. Its not easy to make that kind of decision. Im sure that in time TL will be fine. I still see a ton of well written stuff here all the time.
I caved.
why did you close Manit0u's new picture thread? it had a lot of potential if properly moderated. at least also ban the idiots that messed it up and demanded that they're allowed to behave like the idiots they are?
that thread would have been the ideal place to weed out people who can't follow rules.
Yeah but then you have to suffer going though the thread to find those people.
I think threads like that should be closed i don't really like the youtube thread or what music you are listening to but it's fine as it's not all "humor" resulting in 1000 dirty jokes and crapp pictures
On March 17 2010 04:34 Cloud wrote: A forum needs to teach its users how to post; it can't just impose rules and stay away.
Likewise, keeping the forum small is only a lazy and short term solution. Contributors won't have always the same quality in their posts nor will they keep posting forever.
Rules are there for the people who do not wish/are unable to learn. And there seems to be quite a lot of those. Quality posters and most of the "mature" users don't even need to read the Commandments or any other basic set of rules like that as in most cases it comes naturally to them.
You mean the internet found TL.net? Credit to the mods/admins for staying on top of it.
I really don't understand what you want Manitou, it's an inevitable byproduct of popularity, it's not like people on the internet will suddenly become "mature" individuals or frankly care. Just look at the ban list, some of those people have a decent amount of posts under them here at TL.net.
Also, honestly, this is one of the few places I would recommend that someone to just ignore the bad posts and trust that the admins/mods will take care of it. I mean if those people cared enough, then they'll come back and shape up, if not oh wells.
What I wanted was to vent off some frustration with this blog. I'm well aware that most of what's happening now is the byproduct of popularity and influx of new people, but it doesn't necessarily have to mean that TL.net has to turn into another battle.net forums or 4chan. I extend my praises to the TL.net admin/mod body as they're doing an awesome job trying to keep things under control. Despite all that, perhaps it's time for a small revolution in here? Maybe some inner workings of the site need to be changed? Future goals and plans reviewed? What actually IS teamliquid.net and what makes it so? I won't pretend I have all of the answers, because I don't. It might be worthwhile though to give it some thought.
On March 17 2010 07:44 Manit0u wrote: I did. And posting quality did change. Go check out random threads from 2003 or 2004 and compare the amount of 'lol', 'this', '+1', 'just quote', 'insert foul language here' type of comments. Also, flame wars weren't so intense and happened less often. Another thing to note is that when someone asked for help, usually a couple of first posts were people actually trying to help and not instantly calling OP 'noob' or changing the subject completely.
These are completely random threads that I tabbed through in the General forum. Maybe you're just reminiscing about good threads a long time ago, because I think the posting quality in these old threads is actually worse than it is now. Your perception may be skewed because you (hopefully) got more intelligent over the years which caused you to be less tolerant of crappy posts.
Ugh...honestly, I hate the SC2 forums and blame it for all the bullshit. The fucking tsunami of new users flooding in surfing on the excitement over the SC2 beta is getting really annoying. TL is changing really really fast...
But it should even out soon enough. I finally came in and registered during the last big hype wave, with Tasteless's GOM Star Invitational and the TSL being broadcast, and it ended up chilling out. God can only hope it does so for this one.
I see a lot of people posting in the SC2 threads that generally don't understand if you don't have something good to post, don't post it. Both in creating topics and replies.
On March 17 2010 07:33 Mooga wrote: Go to the archives and find a random thread that's 6 years old in any of the forums you listed. I guarantee you that posting quality has not changed much since then.
It's irrelevant to the spirit of the discussion whether TL was better than it is now or not. I think the OP is asking you to decide if you're satisfied with the quality of TL forums or not, and if not why you think that is and what solutions you can think of.
Ideally, anyway.
I remember this kind of topic coming up before, and my suggestion is the same as before. There needs to be a hall of shame forum, where all bad threads get moved. Not closed. Just moved. That way mods don't have to feel guilty about closing popular threads, but it sends a clear message that this kind of posting is crap ANNNND it makes all the other forums so much cleaner and full of pretty much only good OPs. Which will make reading TL a lot more enjoyable for everyone.
That doesn't fix bad posting, but it makes it more manageable. It would mean that making crappy one line posts might be more tolerated in the Hall of Shame forum, but if you fuck up good OPs on the A forums you'll have more mods on your ass because those are the threads they'll be focusing on.
It's semi-radical, but I really think it would work. The system we have right now is broken anyway, so we need to start trying new things. If my suggestion sounds like it forces mods to be really subjective, I suggest thinking about what mods currently do.
The other thing I could think of that would improve TL is just veterans and staff being better role models. Or really, everyone in general, and mod's and veterans shouldn't be above good, and POLITE posting. Not everyone is bad, but a lot of people who have been here a long time seem to think they're entitled to being a nasty person. Catty comments, ignoring social etiquette, and other just idiotic behaviour.
Of course, I think what I'm suggesting is easier said than done. It's hard to say how many people are really unsatisfied with TL forums, and how many people don't see a problem. I suspect the unsatisfied are in the minority, or at least a large portion of them are ambivalent toward the idea and will wait until someone else does something about it.
Whenever I come to visit TL.net this days and I'm browsing through the forums, it seems that all I see is Pokemon, Apop and porn, an uncanny combination of things I never wanted to see around here.
no idea about Pokemon but asian pop and porn (provided NSFW and spoiler tag) were tolerated by teamliquid long before SC 2 beta came out
Interesting, I think you're right that with the copious asian girls blogs it gets pretty drab, but I wouldn't say it's going downhill. Stuff such as Daigomi's consistently awesome music blogs keep the place interesting
I have found your posts to be not only useful but an asset to the forum. Here are twoexamples that have helped me.
Hope you stick around,
Durak
Thanks for the appreciation. I've been around here for about 6 years now (perhaps even longer, I've had one other account previously but that was at the time when I didn't have internet connection at home so I only showed up sporadically to download some replays) so I believe that I'll be able to stick around some more
I have also noticed the gathering crescendo of pornography, and in that connection, I do not know whether idolatry of the flesh is more disturbing than the idolatry of ugliness (let us admit that most "photogenic" strumpets are transparently ugly people.) I think it is up to the moderators to draw a line on this issue and take certain preventive measures to reinforce that self-governing moderation which I trust is the creed of the majority.
As for your complaint that intellect is met with ingratitude, ignorance and ignominy, I do not think one should idealize the off-line world by drawing any stark contrast. Indeed, in one respect we have the advantage: here all words have an equal prayer; in cyberspace no one can drown out reason with loud interjection or artful histrionics. I do not think a nerd will find better circumstances to voice himself than in the video-gaming forum (I would recommend Parisian salons of bygone days, but there one required esprit even more than reason.) Indeed, the lack of wit is something most forum-goers need to be self-conscious about. Absurd verbal juxapositions popularized by Family Guy skits are not funny. There is such a thing as a tedious absurdism, and if I had to write a book on that very modern social phenomenon, I should like to use the humour of this website as a primary reference.
All this goes back to your original complaint: true wit, by offering an original and eccentric perspective, ought to enrich any worthy discussion. I propose frequent injunctions by a squadron of civic-minded tl.netters, a humour-police, reminding stupid people how unfunny they are. By this infallible critique one saves much time and effort. Tell a person that he is stupid, he will have a thousand repartees. Tell a person that he is dull, every defense becomes a witness for the prosecution.
As for the matter of expanding membership, I think that there is some truth in this, and I agree that the role-model element, is missing. There is no visible Optimate group in tl.net any longer. In this connection one questions whether Rekrul's Jacobinism was not preferable to Drone's extreme Scandinavian liberality. However I relate these reflections to you as questions, not as suppositions.
T_T I made contributions to TL for a year and kept my posts clean but got banned when the Automated Ban list started growing significantly. Extremely sorry TL, I still feel really bad about it.
This new wave makes me wonder if it is time to create a new 10 commandments.
On March 19 2010 06:55 MoltkeWarding wrote: Indeed, in one respect we have the advantage: here all words have an equal prayer; in cyberspace no one can drown out reason with loud interjection or artful histrionics.
Complete bullshit. And you write so verbosely for no reason whatsoever.
On March 19 2010 06:55 MoltkeWarding wrote: Indeed, in one respect we have the advantage: here all words have an equal prayer; in cyberspace no one can drown out reason with loud interjection or artful histrionics.
Complete bullshit. And you write so verbosely for no reason whatsoever.
Uh reason? He has to maintain character sir.. there IS a reason.
On March 19 2010 06:55 MoltkeWarding wrote: Indeed, in one respect we have the advantage: here all words have an equal prayer; in cyberspace no one can drown out reason with loud interjection or artful histrionics.
Complete bullshit. And you write so verbosely for no reason whatsoever.
At first I was puzzled by your complaint, then I realized that you are probably of that critical sect whose profound contemplations on structural determinants have led them to abandon the philistine pleasures of mere reading. Indeed, only a member of such a sect could wrathfully inveigh against an innocent phenomenon which dares to occur "for no reason whatsoever."
The philistine reader would call such phenoema "poetic," for him, everything which is without reason is above reason. How much happier you would be, my friend, if you abandoned your pessimistic religion, and became a free reader, like the rest of us!
I came here to rant about the degradation of the strategy forums, but after thinking about it for a while longer, the strategy forum was always home to really bad threads and posters (ie. AzureEye and his alternate accounts).
On March 19 2010 06:55 MoltkeWarding wrote: Indeed, in one respect we have the advantage: here all words have an equal prayer; in cyberspace no one can drown out reason with loud interjection or artful histrionics.
Complete bullshit. And you write so verbosely for no reason whatsoever.
At first I was puzzled by your complaint, then I realized that you are probably of that critical sect whose profound contemplations on structural determinants have led them to abandon the philistine pleasures of mere reading. Indeed, only a member of such a sect could wrathfully inveigh against an innocent phenomenon which dares to occur "for no reason whatsoever."
The philistine reader would call such phenoema "poetic," for him, everything which is without reason is above reason. How much happier you would be, my friend, if you abandoned your pessimistic religion, and became a free reader, like the rest of us!
On March 19 2010 06:55 MoltkeWarding wrote: Indeed, in one respect we have the advantage: here all words have an equal prayer; in cyberspace no one can drown out reason with loud interjection or artful histrionics.
Complete bullshit. And you write so verbosely for no reason whatsoever.
At first I was puzzled by your complaint, then I realized that you are probably of that critical sect whose profound contemplations on structural determinants have led them to abandon the philistine pleasures of mere reading. Indeed, only a member of such a sect could wrathfully inveigh against an innocent phenomenon which dares to occur "for no reason whatsoever."
The philistine reader would call such phenoema "poetic," for him, everything which is without reason is above reason. How much happier you would be, my friend, if you abandoned your pessimistic religion, and became a free reader, like the rest of us!
EPT![[image loading]](http://theshineonhealth.com/web_images/finger_pointing.gif)
