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Tom Coates
02:24 / 27.09.06
So I've spent a large part of my evening trying to determine some useful statistics about board usage which you might find interesting. Don't read too much into them, but they are presented here for your interest with my commentary.

Firstly, for those of you who think that the board is getting less active generally, here are the total number of posts that have been made year on year:

Total posts in 2002: 127334
Total posts in 2003: 114648
Total posts in 2004: 113863
Total posts in 2005: 123291
Total posts in 2006: 104921

It lokos pretty stable to me in terms of amounts of stuff getting generated, although the last couple of years have seen a bit of an upsurge.

In terms of posts per month, here is the last twenty months or so:


Posts per month:
2005
Jan - 8403
Feb - 7683
Mar - 8021
Apr - 12403
May - 8712
Jun - 8516
Jul - 12942
Aug - 12924
Sep - 12861
Oct - 11721
Nov - 10377
Dec - 8728

2006
Jan - 12233
Feb - 11948
Mar - 14292
Apr - 11187
May - 13489
Jun - 11731
Jul - 11824
Aug - 9406
Sep (so far) - 8809

Other than the last couple of months which have seemed a bit slow, basically everything has looked pretty solid, stable and reliable. Not particularly explosive, but then we're looking for a stable relatively homeostatic community that is manageable rather than explosive growth.

New topics per month also seem to be relatively stable, with perhaps a bit of a dip in the last couple of months:

New topics per month:
2005
Jan - 277
Feb - 230
Mar - 257
Apr - 339
May - 242
Jun - 286
Jul - 342
Aug - 320
Sep - 325
Oct - 288
Nov - 259
Dec - 240

2006
Jan - 321
Feb - 283
Mar - 368
Apr - 271
May - 305
Jun - 238
Jul - 271
Aug - 206
Sep (so far) - 168

I'm not particularly worried about that last month or so. Seems like it could be a bit of a blip, or the consequence of good weather and playing outside.

Active users per month is pretty interesting:

Active users by month:
2005
Jan - 387
Feb - 385
Mar - 380
Apr - 442
May - 385
Jun - 400
Jul - 443
Aug - 425
Sep - 440
Oct - 443
Nov - 442
Dec - 419

2006
Jan - 407
Feb - 444
Mar - 470
Apr - 461
May - 447
Jun - 471
Jul - 441
Aug - 422
Sep (so far) - 376

Active users means people who have made a post over each month. The actual identities of the users may vary quite a lot for all we know, but the numbers posting seem consistent and - while perhaps a little lower than I'd like - still a healthy number for discussions to thrive.

The most interesting stats for me are posts by forum. I only did this for this last month, and it goes like this:

Conversation 3226
Policy 834
Head Shop 193
Laboratory 127
Switchboard 466
Temple 965
Art, Fashion & Design 92
Books, Criticism & Writing 337
Comic Books 601
Film, TV & Theatre 1241
Games & Gameplay 242
Radio & Music 558
Creation 259
Gathering 265

The most active boards are the Conversation by a mile, then Film, TV & Theatre, then Temple, then Policy, then Comics and Radio & Music. Some traditionally strong areas of the board seem to be less engaged than they might be with the Head Shop and the Switchboard particularly surprising me. I'm pretty interested in the Comics forum being fairly low as well.

Places I think we could probably do with putting more effort into include Head Shop, Laboratory, Art and Design. I'm interested in how we can get some of the activity in the Conversation distributed more effectively through the rest of the board and why that isn't happening already. I'm a little concerned that the Temple is becoming a bit of a separatist parallel entity - thriving in its own right but not really part of the larger community. Or maybe that's the right model - maybe we should be looking towards driving the others as consistently interesting destinations for people interested in those specific subjects?
 
 
grant
03:29 / 27.09.06
I actually kind of think part of the reason why Barbelith may be difficult to engage with is that there are so many new posts at once -- I wonder if there might be a correlation between the periods with the greatest number of new posts generated and the periods when Barbelith seems the least, I dunno, functional/friendly/"well". Or not. I'm not exactly sure how to measure that. (Periods of activity in one of several "Is Barbelith Dying?" threads?)

I also suspect the dip in new topics MIGHT be a result of acculturation to the board's librarian culture -- I've noticed an increase in old topics being bumped lately, as more people appear to be using the search function and making new contributions to old threads. This goes... here, you know? If the shiny new yahoo search were ever fully integrated into the board layout, I think there'd be another drop in new topic creation.


That Temple performance really is surprising. I mean, it reflects my own interest levels over time to a large degree, but still -- twice as big as Switchboard? The "ghetto" is larger than the city, practically. Although I do think there's been concentrated attention on the Temple since the first time I remember seeing it referred to in those terms, and the last two or three months have seen the arrival of a few very interesting Templey posters.

Oh, Laboratory -- how I fret for you. Interesting how the lowest two fora are Art & Science.
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
05:40 / 27.09.06
Presuming we don't have any trolls for a few months it'll be interesting to look at the figures again in January and February and see if there really was a drop once we got rid of 33 or whether it just feels like it.
 
 
pointless & uncalled for
08:17 / 27.09.06
The most active boards are the Conversation by a mile, then Film, TV & Theatre, then Temple, then Policy, then Comics and Radio & Music. Some traditionally strong areas of the board seem to be less engaged than they might be with the Head Shop and the Switchboard particularly surprising me. I'm pretty interested in the Comics forum being fairly low as well.

I think that the levels in the comics forum will be more or less a direct result of the admissions process. I think that the target demographic of people principally interested in a comics discussion are disinclined towards jumping through hoops to discuss on a board that can appear rather elitist. That, by the way, is a rehash of something that has been said to me on another board.

As for the Headshop, Laboratory and Switchboard, there is this sense that I pick up on in the board that these fora have a standard of debate that is inaccessible to the lay person and in the case of the Headshop a bit hostile when it encounters dissent and questioning from grubby degreeless sods. Of course I might be perceiving this because I don't want to be alone. Nevertheless, when the phrase "I don't post in the Headshop because......." is uttered by other posters, the reasons ring true for me.

Maybe we are falling foul of setting the bar at the height it is at. Whether we would ever want to lower it is a wholly different matter for discussion though.

I'm tempted to disregard the stats for the Temple in relation to the rest of the board because of the rather special character of the discussion that takes place there. I have occasionally strayed in there by mistake and the thread summaries seem written in a different language. I'd be more at home posting on a forum about psychological analysis, a sugbject that I also know nothing about.

One of the more interesting statistics would be an overview of posting patterns. However, it is difficult to represent this in a short and meaningful manner. Even in long form it would be complicated to get a handle on.
 
 
Quantum
10:44 / 27.09.06
Film & TV? Weird, Big Brother perhaps? I had no idea.
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
10:46 / 27.09.06
I'm wondering whether the difference between the Head Shop and the Switchboard is one that's still useful. It seems to me that most of the current discussions in the Head Shop are about politics, albeit maybe not as current as 'Today in Westminster'. Considering so few people post in the former, what would people think about mixing the two together?
 
 
Janean Patience
11:25 / 27.09.06
I think that the levels in the comics forum will be more or less a direct result of the admissions process. I think that the target demographic of people principally interested in a comics discussion are disinclined towards jumping through hoops to discuss on a board that can appear rather elitist. That, by the way, is a rehash of something that has been said to me on another board.

I'd disagree... there are plenty of comics fora out there which don't require a lengthy entry process, but the higher quality of discussion on Barbelith is going to attract people primarily interested in banging on about comics. Me, for one. Because of the unique superhero/mainstream split, you're not just going to get a more rarified argument about comics on here, you're also going to discuss different comics. Jeffrey Brown, Charles Burns, Brendan McCarthy, Paul Pope etc don't light many fires on Newsarama, just as mentioning Rob Liefield on here won't cause much excitement. Different worlds. I discovered Barbelith because every time I searched Google for alternative comics stuff, it seemed to pop up.

That said, the comics forum isn't what it (seemingly) used to be. Civil War and 52 are doing well. More alternative stuff doesn't attract as much interest. To get all statisticky for a moment:

Astonishing X-Men year two has 172 posts
100 Bullets has 28 posts

Newuniversal has 80 posts
Street Angel has 17 posts

Identity Crisis has 373 posts
Charles Burns' Black Hole has 39 posts

Neither binding or damning I'm sure you'll agree, but it provides a snapshot of the current situation on the comics forum. Broadly speaking, and this is all generalisations, superheroes and particularly Marvel and DC attract a lot more traffic. Witty, intelligent traffic, with dirty jokes about Captain America, that's undeniably enjoyable to read. Still, any issue of Whedon's X-Men got approximately as much interest as the complete collection of Black Hole.

Reasons why. Ongoing comics attract more attention and speculation than complete graphic novels. Identity Crisis, while by most accounts a heap of crap, was an ongoing mystery about characters many posters knew and cared about. There are more jokes to make about Captain Boomerang's paternity case. You don't even have to read the comic; it's perfectly possible to be outraged about Dr-Light-the-rapist (SPOILER? What, now?) without even flicking through it in the shop. Civil War's plot twists can be decried without purchase, because it's all there on the internet. The overwhelming majority of comics readers know who Tony Stark is, even who Black Goliath is, already, even if they wouldn't touch a superhero comic these days.

Black Hole's there, complete, so there's less opportunity to speculate. (I know it was serialised, but the particular thread I'm pointing to is about the collection.) A thread becomes a shared experience of reading automatically when a story's serialised; half the fun's checking in and seeing what everyone else thought. With a complete work we're all offering reviews. There's no speculation and there's less excitement. "I liked Black Hole, even though it was sick and disturbing," doesn't have as much online milage as "Yeah, like Deathstroke could take out the Flash. Chinrubs."

There are a few things I've bought recently that I've not brought up in Comics. Jeffrey Brown's I Am Going To Be Small, and in particular the strip Wild West Jesus Dies, possibly the best comic ever. Ty Templeton's Bigg Time, a lot of fun. Eddie Campbell's Fate of the Artist. The forum is, or appears to be, geared more to what's out this week than graphic-novel backlists. There's a feeling that if you're not discussing it when it's first out that you've missed the boat. That's the way the comics market has been for so long that it's natural. The reality of the bookstore market means that comics now are very different; you could just be getting into Promethea or Grendel or Blankets right now. The forum doesn't, IMHO, reflect this. Hence the bias towards superheroes and serialised comics, and away from those who, like myself, wait for the trade. It's a similar problem to the books forum.

The only way to change this is, of course, for posters to bring up any comic anytime and see who bites. Or to start a specific graphic-novel-backlist thread to bring up old stuff you've just read.

Anyway, this is my longest post ever and it's in Policy. I must be fixin' to die. Please, leave my family something recognisable to bury.
 
 
Disco is My Class War
12:03 / 27.09.06
I worry a lot about the Head Shop. In response to ignominious's point, I really wish that 'degreeless sods' would post more to the Head Shop. This discussion about elitism has been had over and over. I'm not sure that the problem is an 'elite bunch of wankers', though. If people are making up their minds to avoid the Head Shop rather than reclaim it for their own purposes, why not try the latter?

On the other hand, Head Shop threads often take longer to develop, if only because people go away and think about threads before posting, or because many of the active threads are old ones that have been revived.

I love the fact that we have a huge archive, and I appreciate people's growing efforts to act as librarians and point out previous relevant threads. But this can sometimes militate against new threads being started. Countless times I've gone to start a thread, done a search, realised the conversation has been had already, and not posted it. It's like the question has been answered before I even start. Sometimes I think the old crashes were useful: they allowed us to wipe the slate clean, or forget, to an extent, and start afresh.

Me, I reckon Head Shop and Switchboard are still quite distinct, and that the distinction is useful. Switchboard seems to attract discussion of current affairs, helped along by posting of news items. Which is perhaps why it moves faster and attracts so much more, uh 'passion'.
 
 
Olulabelle
12:24 / 27.09.06
If people are making up their minds to avoid the Head Shop rather than reclaim it for their own purposes, why not try the latter?

Because there is a standard in the Headshop which has dictated that unless you use words like hegemony in everyday conversation you will very shortly become unstuck. But as you say, we've discussed this many times before.

Regarding combining Switchboard and Headshop, whilst there are many parts of Switchboard that Headshop could accomodate, there are a lesser number of Headshop threads which would sit comfortably within the Switchboard remit. I think it would be very difficult to find a happy description for an all-in-one forum. Having said that it might overcome some of the issues surrounding lack of contributors which Headshop currently has.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
12:28 / 27.09.06
Because there is a standard in the Headshop which has dictated that unless you use words like hegemony in everyday conversation you will very shortly become unstuck.

If you are not prepared to think about things, you'll come unstuck. If you become confused and aggressive when what you have previously always thought of as your unassailable argument is taken apart, you'll come unstuck. If you want an audience rather than a discussion, you'll come unstuck, and finally, if you don't want to read the thread, I will come round to your house, eat yr food and personally unstick you. Not using hegemony in everyday conversation? Not so much. Not caring what hegemony means when it is a relevant concept to the issue you want to talk about? Well, yes. That might lead to unsticking.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
12:37 / 27.09.06
There's a definite distinction between Switchboard and Headshop, as far as I can tell. Disco's right- Switchboard is current affairs. Head Shop is more sociological/theoretical analysis of same, on the occasions when it gets political.

The traffic in Switchboard is also, for obvious reasons, largely dictated by what's happening in the world. Five years ago, when I joined, Switchboard was the busiest forum, as far as I remember (I joined for the Morrison stuff, but stayed for the Switchboard, basically). The WTC had just gone down, "we" were piling into Afghanistan, and the "War On Terror" had just begun. Yeah, shitloads has happened since then, but in terms of "immediate news", and responses to that, the end of 2001 takes a fair bit of beating. If (dreaming) one year the Switchboard had just a handful of threads, I'd see that as saying something good about the world, rather than something bad about the forum.

(That said, I'm scared of Head Shop, but I'm currently experimenting with dipping my toes into the waters of the Temple... if that doesn't go horribly wrong, my next Barberesolution will be to contribute to HS).

We also can't really expect the numbers to match across fora- we've had before the discussion about why, say, Books is slower than Music is slower than Comics or FTVT, because of the ways in which we consume these entertainments.

G&G seems, while not exactly exploding with vitality, to be trundling along healthily, which is nice, I reckon, having argued for its inclusion! It's also had some really great commentary of the type you rarely see in published gaming media (largely thanks to E Randy), but I think it's found its feet. In terms of statistics, we're doing the whole Venn Diagram thing of having "people on Barbelith / peeople who play games / people who like talking about games"... but that overlap seems to be big enough.
 
 
Lurid Archive
12:40 / 27.09.06

Because there is a standard in the Headshop which has dictated that unless you use words like hegemony in everyday conversation you will very shortly become unstuck. But as you say, we've discussed this many times before. - lula

I don't think thats quite fair, though it is clear that it is the impression of many and is a problem which we should deal with. Whether we like it or not, the Headshop is seen as elitist by many, and I suspect that the upshot of this may be to confer some kind of posting privilege on those of us with uni education under our belts. (That this is about preception rather than anything else seems sort of clear to me, since I don't have any relevant education in the studies that would be relevant for the HS, but don't have problems posting. That said, observing this doesn't help very much.)

References to the quality of the discussion, the level of debate and so on are probably unhelpful in this regard, are they probably do more to discourage curious but nervous individuals than they do to scare off committed thread-rotters. But thats just a guess. I'm very keen on getting people without a formal uni education posting more in the HS (and elsewhere). I'd like to hear ideas, or even just some, hopefully constructive, criticism so we can work out if this whole elitism thing really is a problem we need to sort out.

As for the lab...it has lots of problems, but being inaccessible to the layman isn't one of them, imo.
 
 
pointless & uncalled for
12:45 / 27.09.06
This discussion about elitism has been had over and over.

Yet if it arises regularly, as really it does, then is it truly over?

I'm not sure that the problem is an 'elite bunch of wankers', though.

Absolutely not, masturbation rates are at an all time low. But rejoinders aside, it's about dealing with the board's elite on a subject matter. That which they are passionate about, frontline directly affected by, and very well versed in, including information sources and current politics and theory thereof. Nothing in which I specialise is a Headshop topic, being white, male, straight, psychologically stable etc and not working or studying any related field. I may take an interest in gender issues and so on but frankly I cannot communicate on the same level. Anything that I might offer feels like an unwelcome brainspill that leaves a nasty stain.

If people are making up their minds to avoid the Head Shop rather than reclaim it for their own purposes, why not try the latter?

Because as an extraction of the above, one thousand savages with spears are not really any match for an Apache gunship and my earlier experiences with engaging with the Headshop have left me feeling that the technological advances come faster than my ability to learn them. The energy to return ratio isn't conduicive. I for one will be sticking to my specialist subjects of sustainable development, civil governance and road traffic theory. Alas not high interest topics in these parts.
 
 
Lurid Archive
12:49 / 27.09.06
If you are not prepared to think about things, you'll come unstuck. - Haus

As I say above, I really do wonder if this is the best way to respond here. For someone used to an academic environment, I imagine that what you are saying is just a clear way of expressing the posting requirements, much as one might outline a dress code. But to someone not used to that mode of interaction, I worry that it might read more as an accusation and a criticism. After all, as a response to the suggestion that the HS is elitist (and from a respected poster) it doesn't express a real openness to examining that. You could even read it as a bit defensive. I think I understand why you are staking out the territory like this, but I worry that it works on the wrong people and in the wrong way.
 
 
pointless & uncalled for
12:53 / 27.09.06
seconded
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
13:15 / 27.09.06
Well, there's a mod request in the pipe, because I hit send too early, but I think you're off on a number of counts, Lurid. For starters, I haven't been near an academic environment for many, many years now, and what I studied when I did study had nothing much to do with most of the topics that have been discussed. Unless you have been running tests with which I am unfamiliar, I don't think we know who in the Head Shop has received or is in university education, or what their fields of study are or were. Further, I would venture that many people whose contribution to the Head Shop was, not wishing to put too fine a point on it, a bit shit were the recipients of at the very least education to the level of a bachelor's degree. And this:

Nothing in which I specialise is a Headshop topic, being white, male, straight, psychologically stable etc and not working or studying any related field.

Is a perfectly good reason not to claim personal experience or authority, but not a good reason not to participate, or indeed a reason to impose stereotypical readings on those who do.

However. If people do not wish to talk about subjects in which they are not knowledgeable, or wish to be treated as knowledgeable in areas about which they know not very much, they may be better off avoiding the Head Shop. If a thread is discussing Marx in a way that requires a knowledge of Marx, then turning up without one and telling everyone about how shit Marxism is is likely to lead to criticism of more or less intensity. If people do not want to talk about things in which they are not specialised, and they are not specialised in any subject that is within the remit of the Head Shop, then again they are probably better off not going there. If people do know something about a subject but are unable to cope with other people holding differing views (jbsays, for example), then they are, again, better off avoiding the place. I'd rather have low churn than high churn made up largely of flame wars.
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
13:22 / 27.09.06
Well, there we go then, problem solved. We'll let the Head Shop die on it's arse so that Haus can maintain it's ideological purity.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
13:26 / 27.09.06
Did you even bother reading what I wrote before pressing the big red button on the misreadingatron and feeding the strip of paper it produced into the insultingcontentfreepostalyser that time, Flowers? If not, I suggest you read it. If so, I suggest you read it again, then come back when you have something useful to say.
 
 
pointless & uncalled for
13:31 / 27.09.06
Is a perfectly good reason not to claim personal experience or authority, but not a good reason not to participate, or indeed a reason to impose stereotypical readings on those who do.

Not a reason not to participate per se but an attempt to qualify my reasoning as pursued in the following sentences.

I'm not imposing stereotypical readings on anyone who does really. I know well enough that numerous Headshop participants are none of the above except where I did mention the term study. Admittedly studied is a cruel stereotype but in interaction this is how I find fellow participants as they debate rather conversantly. Is there a high occurence of savantism?
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
13:37 / 27.09.06
Um... I didn't quite get that HS was actually dying on its arse from those statistics. It has slower traffic than various other fora.

Did I miss a meeting?

Speaking as someone who, yes, finds HS intimidating, I wouldn't want it to change. I'd rather raise my own game to a level where I felt I could contribute than bring it down so I could play.
 
 
Lurid Archive
13:49 / 27.09.06
I entirely agree that specialist academic knowledge isn't really the issue - I say so in reference to myself above. It is the *perception* that the HS is an elitist forum for academics that is the problem, or at least could be a problem (I may well be wrong here).

So, perception being what it is, the actual academic history of HS regulars is less important than the impression people have of that history. For instance, I have friends who find the idea of meeting and mixing socially with academics slightly intimidating, moreso if you were to suggest that they debate these academics. But these are people who would have no problem discussing topics in familiar environments. (Whatever your own specific academic history, Haus, I have a hard time imagining that an academic dinner party would be at all difficult for you.) I am suggesting that one of the benefits of education may be to prepare you for public and slightly formal debate, and that therefore certain environments may systematically, though not absolutely, discourage participation from people who don't have much formal education.

That said, I could be very wrong, and I really can't push this point myself unless people are willing to complain and engage.

Still, while I probably agree with you on your actual points, Haus, I do wonder if the tone is quite right. When Olulabelle is making a reasonably phrased complaint above, referencing jbsays a few posts down is surely over the top?
 
 
grant
13:57 / 27.09.06
Can I again raise the caution that "number of posts" isn't directly equivalent to "health of forum"?

(Did I not do that before?)

It's a good measure, but has nothing to say about quality.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
14:03 / 27.09.06
Thanks, Grant. That's exactly what I was saying when I said that I preferred low churn to high churn caused by low qulaity. I'd like to see more good posts in the Head Shop, and more members feeling able to post there, which is why I have concerns with judgements being made about people who post to the Head Shop, and what kind of person posts to the Head Shop.

Lurid: Actually Lula was making a statement rather than a complaint. My mentioning of jbsays has nothing to do with that statement, however, since jbsays does use "hegemony", and probably did whenever possible (to describe the unhealthy ascendance of SOCIALISM). He was a reference to a type of person who actually was not going to prosper in the Head Shop (somebody who gets angry and upset when their views are subjected to scrutiny), in reference primarily to TSK's post. So, it's not "over the top", I don't think, no, because I don't think there is a top relative to which Lula's statement and the citation of jbsays' behaviour as not likely to lead to a happy engagement with the Head Shop both stand.

TSK: There's a high degree of interest among people who are discussing issues, certainly. I can only speak for myself, but I don't readily identify myself as having a stake in many of the discussions, except insofar as everybody livng in society might be concerned with its process and the thinking behind it. I have not made an academic study, or any other formal study, of most of the issues under discussion. Some of them I am reliant mainly on the kindness of my fellow members of Barbelith for information about. So, if we're using study in the Latin sense of zeal or enthusiasm, I think that's true, but I don't think you can point at a particular person and necessarily say "you have studied x", in the sense of gone through a formal process of study, or at least not do so without a fair chance of being wrong.

And, ultimately, I don't think that matters. People won't post about things they aren't interested in - at least, I hope that's the case. Sometimes people post about things that they think they are interested in, but are not, and this is revealed when they are asked to clarify their statements. That's pretty much standard across the board, surely? Where I do have problems is when people say things about the Head Shop which, however well-intentioned, do not reflect reality (a) and are likely to dissuade people from posting to the Head Shop (b). That you have to be the kind of person who regularly uses words like "Hegemony" in conversation is one of those things which I don't think is borne out by the Head Shop, but might dissuade people from contributing when they are interested in doing so. Likewise that it's not worth posting if you're not gay, a woman, black, transgendered, "psychologically unstable", or working with/studying those who are. If you personally have concluded that this means that your engagement with the Head Shop will not be profitable, then that's one thing, but I don't think it should be presented as a hard and fast rule.
 
 
Disco is My Class War
14:17 / 27.09.06
ignominious, I'd actually be interested in talking about sustainable development. Why don't you start a thread?

Nothing in which I specialise is a Headshop topic, being white, male, straight, psychologically stable etc and not working or studying any related field. I may take an interest in gender issues and so on but frankly I cannot communicate on the same level. Anything that I might offer feels like an unwelcome brainspill that leaves a nasty stain.

Well, I am also white, male and psychologically stable, if not straight. I hear your pain. However, almost everyone who posts to the Head Shop feels that way sometimes, or maybe all the time. You won't know that you can't communicate on the same level unless you have a go.

Can I just point out that if someone were to write a post on elitism and how people communicate, or intellectual language, or how to communicate about complex things in a 'non-threatening' way over in the Head Shop itself, perhaps we could actually talk about real stuff while posting to the Head Shop instead of burning up energy in feeling defensive about being labelled, or resentful of, 'elites'.

On the other hand, that would involve taking a risk. Which no-one seems willing to do. All you have to do to start a Head Shop thread is have a question, or a problem. You don't have to feel smart.

And Lula:

Because there is a standard in the Headshop which has dictated that unless you use words like hegemony in everyday conversation you will very shortly become unstuck.

Once upon a time I used to go look up words like 'hegemony' if I wanted to understand what was being said. I still do that if I don't understand something. The Internet has made it possible to bone up on all kinds of areas without going to uni once, all you need is wikipedia and google. Are you saying, then, that everyone should automatically understand everything that's said in the Head Shop? In the Conversation, I have no idea who John Byrne is, and if I wanted to feel included, I would ask who he was or look him up. What makes the HS so different, in this regard?
 
 
paranoidwriter waves hello
14:19 / 27.09.06
*Materialises into the Policy*

Erm....May I offer my own subjective take on the HeadShop...? Might be relevant to "quantity and quality" and (hopefully) help, a bit...?

The HeadShop is fucking ace, overall. I love it, as I love all the forums. It's why I came here, I think. Indeed, I may be wrong but I think that despite my fear, I dived head first into the deep, dark blue/purple fora and 'twas there I started my first thread and began to learn the Barbetiquette. I was scared (metaphorically speaking), but I wanted to learn and communicate philosophically with others of like minds. I wanted to play with the big kids.

The "problem" is, for me, that every discipline has it's own Lexicon, or use of teh same basic "English" language, but in slightly different ways. The idea of "convergence" is really taking off at the moment (IHMO), but it means we have to redefine terms such as "Entropy" for every discipline to share it's own connotations with such Symbols. i.e. We do not have a Barbedictionary, so being asked (e.g) every five posts or so to define terms can be, well... choose your own label, eh?

However, as academia is the all-encompassing umbrella register of the "educated", those who haven't walked that exact path don't always recognise the warning signs and walk head first into a mine-field.

This is why "manners" are vital. Patience is recommended. And forgiveness is a must. We ALL speak in tongues.

*Dematerialises out of Policy*
 
 
pointless & uncalled for
14:25 / 27.09.06
For the sake of clarity, no, I was not implying formal study.

As for the use of my own demographical description, it certainly wasn't intended to be offputting to anyone who identifies as similar but a rather poor attempt to openly examine my personal reasons for not really even looking in the Headshop without sense of deep trepidation. I feel as if I am a small child pulling at the coat-tails in that forum and that begets a sense of unworthiness if you will. It is, of course, a rather personal expression and appreciate that it is largely irrelevant unless others feel the same, and maybe not even then.

Apologies for the excess of self-examination there.
 
 
pointless & uncalled for
14:28 / 27.09.06
You won't know that you can't communicate on the same level unless you have a go.

To my shame the archives may still bear the scars of me "having a go".
 
 
Lurid Archive
14:31 / 27.09.06
I interpreted Lula's statement as implying a complaint about the exclusionary nature of the HS and your posts, Haus, as a defence of the standards upheld in the HS. Referencing jbsays as someone who couldn't cope the ground rules in the HS, albeit from a contrasted position of specialist knowledge - when lula is also implying that she is discouraged from posting - could invite a comparison. I know you are going to say that the differences are clear and that the comparison can only result from lazy reading, but I think the rhetorical effect of in effect listing the qualities of someone unsuited to the HS - lazy, uninterested, or abusive - is unfortunate.

To be honest, this isn't productive and until or unless someone wants to say more about it, I'm not sure I can go much further by myself, since I don't feel at all excluded.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
14:40 / 27.09.06
Nor do I. I'm quite happy for anyone who is lazy, uninterested or abusive to feel excluded. I wouldn't want people who do not talk about hegemony on a regular basis _outside_ Barbelith to feel excluded, however, which is precisely why I am not comfortable with having it stated as a matter of fact that anyone outside this group will come unstuck.

If you feel that naming a person who exhibited the former traits, and was thus not a useful contributor to the Head Shop, as a contrast to the hypothetical non-hegemony-discusser whom I thought was precisely not covered by the same conditions, I can only accept your feelings on this matter, humbly apologise for any offence caused, accept total responsibility for any obsfuscatory effect it may have had on the discussion so far and suggest that it be struck from the record, the better to reveal the other thousand or so words I have written in this thread.
 
 
HCE
15:43 / 27.09.06
Have folks who feel uncertain about the quality of their contributions considered other ways of participating? Has anybody found that if they ask for explanations of words or ideas that are new to them or confusing, for example, that they're insulted? One thing that works for me when I don't have a statement to make or an idea to explain is to ask a question about something that interests me. Although a statement like "I don't have much to add but am finding the conversation here useful and interesting" doesn't add content, I for one haven't yet gotten chewed out for saying that sort of thing.

I am attracted to the HS precisely because I am uninformed about most of the material there. I imagine it would be very boring to anybody who felt as though there was nothing new to talk about.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
16:55 / 27.09.06
I'd quite like to see a breakdown of how many unique users have posted to each forum. Stats aren't going to tell us much about quality, no, but that'd be a fairly good indication how wide an appeal each area has.

Bar the few high profile posters who're active across the board, Temple's existed in its own space for years.
 
 
Olulabelle
17:16 / 27.09.06
Oh deary me.

I didn't really mean to be the focus of such intense discussion in my comment, but I can understand how that has happened. I think what you are all saying is interesting, and I think I would enjoy a thread in the HS about elitism, communication and intellectual language.

I have problems with understanding some of what you have all written here, for example all the jbsay references. Is jbsay someone who posted in the headshop and made a mess of it?

Mr Disco, I feel a little bit like you are wilfully misunderstanding me, and that's the exact same feeling I often get in the HS. For example when I say: Because there is a standard in the Headshop which has dictated that unless you use words like hegemony in everyday conversation you will very shortly become unstuck. I did not think I was saying that I didn't understand the word hegemony. I thought I was exampling specialist language, which I do not use in everyday conversation. Obviously, when I come across words I do not know, then I look them up.

However, when you say, Once upon a time I used to go look up words like 'hegemony' if I wanted to understand what was being said. I still do that if I don't understand something. The Internet has made it possible to bone up on all kinds of areas without going to uni once, all you need is wikipedia and google. it suggests that you think I have said something along the lines of, "I don't understand all these big words you are using and I am too lazy to look it up in a dictionary." Which is absolutely not what I said. I don't think.

That's a good example of feeling marginalised. I tried to contribute to the debate, but my comment was misread by someone who has standing within the relevant forum and discussion we are holding, and therefore 'counts more' than I do. Does that make sense?
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
17:17 / 27.09.06
I only really stopped going into the Head Shop because I didn't have much interest in the topics under discussion. It causes problems as when 'Feminism 101' gets put in the Conversation because 'no-one goes into the Headshop'. That's the sort of thread I would like to see more of and I would like those to be put in the Head Shop where they belong.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
17:36 / 27.09.06
That's a good example of feeling marginalised. I tried to contribute to the debate, but my comment was misread by someone who has standing within the relevant forum and discussion we are holding, and therefore 'counts more' than I do. Does that make sense?

Way-ull... first up, I don't see that MD's standing in the relevant forum has an impact here, or that what he is saying therefore necessarily "counts more" - I think that may be something that you're putting on this, not him. I'm not sure that "misread" is unassailable, either. I mean, it makes sense, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's accurate. In essence, you said that the Head Shop excluded people who did not regularly use specialist vocabulary in their everyday life. MD said that there are many resources for finding out what any specialist vocabulary used in the Head Shop means. To which Fred has added that one can also ask the people using the specialised vocabulary. I think what we're all taking issue with is the idea that the Head Shop excludes people who do not regularly use specialised vocabulary, regardless of whether you, Lula, know what hegemony means. Not speaking for others, I'm afraid that statements like that turn into self-fulfilling prophesies for other people who might then decide not to try to venture into the Head Shop because they have been told that there is no point unless they are familiar with specialised vocabulary from their everyday lives.
 
 
Ticker
17:42 / 27.09.06
I'm a little concerned that the Temple is becoming a bit of a separatist parallel entity - thriving in its own right but not really part of the larger community.

I'm not sure I understand this perception....

do you mean Temple posters don't post to other forums? Because out here on the field it feels like I bump into people who post often there in other areas just as often.
In fact it feels like I spot more Temple folk out and about than I spot folks I know in other forums in the Temple. Er, that may or may not make any sense.....
 
  

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