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Jack, Seth> The issue isn't just banning, nor is it just about getting new blood in. Those two things, though, are a direct result of the core problem - a total lack of technical control.
The idea, for a whole back there, was for Barbelith to be a place where a new form of online community could be developed through constant reinvention of the structure of the board - societal as well as technical, yes, but there comes a point where you can't do an enormous amount to the former without having the ability to shape the latter.
And where we are now is almost the exact oppostie of that. Barbelith has become the least adaptable board I've ever seen, and quite possibly one of the least adaptable on the entire internet. You decide to go for an off-the-shelf solution for your message board, you're going to be able to get any one of a number of plug-ins to make it do what the people on the board want it to. You go for a custom-developed piece of software, as we have here, and you're going to leave yourself in the hands of the person who developed that software.
Which is why there's a part of me leaning towards Tann's option 3, possibly even above option 2.
Changing the surroundings keeps the company fresh, keeps people interested and invested. Leaving everything as-is makes everybody, eventually, grow very tired of having to consistently deal with the exact same problems again, and again, and again. I keep asking myself why I want to bother with somehwere that has no effective troll management system in place, a moderation system that has the potential to fall apart at the seams at the drop of a hat - if a number of moderators in any one forum are away for any amount of time together, nothing will be voted on, and we *do* currently have moderator lists that are in sore need of updating - and a crippled signing-on systemn that can only put people off from joining. Amongst other things.
And the answer is that I'm still emotionally attached to the place, both because of my personal history here and also sections of the current userbase. But it's getting to the point now where I honestly don't think I can read many more posts about how some new dickhead is disrupting Temple, or see a membership system that was originally put in place to weed out trolls clearly failing to do so, without that pushing me over the edge and giving up.
Or even smaller things, like having to edit yet another post because somebody didn't bother making a link into a link, or tried to use UBB code, or posted spoilers without even trying to warn anybody, or couldn't be arsed to add an abstract to a topic, or... you get the picture.
Anyway. That's me for this topic for now. I want to wait and see if paleface and Tom can work anything out, or if somebody else can throw their hat into the ring and offer the kind of technical expertise that we need. But trying to keep a board functioning without a single person available to fix bugs or try out new solutions to old problems is absolutely bonkers. |
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