Hi guys, I am a refugee from both Reddit and Tildes. I have tried to read up on what is in the future for mainchan and what it is about. I hung around 4chan way back when and I get and appreciate the culture. I ultimately ended up frequenting niche subreddits, because there were still places where long-form ,"serious" and level-headed discussions were being fostered. I have an account on Tildes as well, a recent mod actions made that site untenable as well, although I like the site conceptually.
So now I am here. I like the culture and humour, but my question is whether mainchan can ever be a place to have more serious in-depth discussion? The reason I ask is that having been a mod myself and having plenty of meta discussions, on how we discuss I don't believe it can be had without deliberate design or perhaps a very strong culture.
For example what was very typical on reddit is that the threads that got traction, got exposure. At some point it hits the broad audience of reddit and there is big influx in low effort comments, or people who perhaps doesn't understand the culture, context or have no interest in engaging with it.
Another issue was how there was lack of social context I feel. For example people ended up talking past each other, because the thread had no clear direction. Did OP want a debate? Did OP want a exploratory discussion? Did OP even know what he wants? The result being that people talked past each other, and the people that call for elaboration(or context) and these more "boring" answers did not get upvoted.
More can be said here(ask for elaboration), but it has been talked about on places like /r/theoryofreddit and other places. Both for reddit, tildes and I am sure other sites, this is a central question. How do you promote those quality posts or comments?
So my question is do Mainchan community want the site to be a place for more serious discussion? Has Cicero himself have any thoughts or plans here, and if so what are those?
Want to leave a comment?
>So my question is do Mainchan community want the site to be a place for more serious discussion? Has Cicero himself have any thoughts or plans here, and if so what are those?
Mainchan is whatever you want it to be. I don't think it's my place to decide what kind of content should be on here. If you want to make a subchan(s) that's more geared towards serious discussion, with specific rules that you want to enforce in order to mould that kind of environment, more power to you.
I probably should have written a longer post, but it's an age old discussion I can't be bothered rehashing so often. I would just ask, now that I have your ear. If mainchan ever hits critical mass, please consider designing the site such as to give sub-chan owners a lot of flexibility. I am not necessarily talking about moderation, but the design and how the discourse has to happen. Having been a mod, there was so many no-brainers that we could not do, because the site itself would not allow it. Creating your own moderators bots isn't the easiest thing to do either.
>If mainchan ever hits critical mass, please consider designing the site such as to give sub-chan owners a lot of flexibility
Could you give some examples of this?
I've stated many times that I plan on being pretty hands-off with the moderation style of mods teams, as long as it doesn't interfere with how the website functions. So for example if you decide your /s/dota2 subchan into a sub dedicated to making fun of dota and talking about how much League of Legends is better, then I might have to step it. But that's about it. And if users aren't happy with the moderation style of your mod team then they can just go make their own subchans.
Again it's not really about moderation style, as in enforcing civility or rules or whatever. It's more about not discouraging quality posters and undermining good discussion. For example, there is no reason somebody (god save his soul) should have to wade through pages and pages of low effort comments or bait like you could see on anonymous message boards. People often writes long comments, but then is still not interested in having a discussion, stealing even more time from people. All of this has to evaluated by those who engage in good faith. Young guys have a lot of time on their hands, but for those who doesn't, having to search for that one person takes too much time. The baseline noise that is low effort comments, memes etc etc, is more akin to entropy, for sites like reddit that tries to be a lot of different things: Entertainment. Activism. News aggregate, etc etc. I'll copy paste the primer points from meta discussions on discussions:
- It takes effort to both type out a long-form text and then also to evaluate it. Therefore low-effort responses gets relatively more evaluated and voted on.
- Because of the time factor and the point above, the quickest(which necessarily tends to be the low effort ones) comments necessarily get more exposure and more evaluation, acting as a snowball effect.
- There is a lack of (social?)context online. You don't start a vigorous debate with someone waiting in a queue to the bank. Therefore having something that clarifies what kind of discussion somebody want is useful, so as not to speak past each other. Note that there is no apparent reason that this only be helped by the users(!)
- Fourthly, this is self-reinforcing. Why spend an hour typing something out, when you know somebody else give a three word answer get more exposure?
I know you asked specific suggestions here, but that isn't all that too relevant for what I am trying to bring up. I am more interested in your thoughts and perspective. I am asking in order to decide whether I want to migrate here. Perhaps it is possible to avoid the issues with rigorous and conventional active moderation, but after critical mass I doubt it's possible based on what my experiences from reddit and anonymous message boards. I am sure I am not the only one that doesn't want to stay in a place that will ultimately end up like reddit.
So if your answer was, correct me if I am wrong, that you have settled on how the website will function(or design) for the next few years. Then you have answered my question and it's all good in the hood.
Well, this place still has a way to go before long form comments are buried by shorter ones. In the time it takes to build up that userbase a few of us here could shape the culture toward bigger discussions.
(the irony of me writing a couple sentences in reply to your post is not lost on me)
Edit: also, seeing as this is now the fourth most upvoted post of all time here, I do think there is demand, even if some aren't vocal about it.
I'm sure it's just pity votes. Yes I totally agree. It is a scaling problem if anything and there is no need to act today if ever. It is probably safe to say that most people here are prosumers and see their effort here partially as an investment. So people stay not just for how things are, but for what the site can become. Therefore it is a good idea for people designs sites like these to expand upon their vision or perspective. Everything so far I like(even monetization). Ultimately the end results is what matters, not the specific solutions. By that I mean if the top dawg doesn't consider x to be a problem, then x won't ever be solved(in whatever way). If x is a problem, then I at least know there will be attempts at solving x at some point in the future.
Not a bad idea!
>saidit
I don't really see the point of reddit alternatives that don't try to at least add upon reddit. Like mainchan has like 10+ features that reddit doesn't. How could you expect your alternative to go anywhere by being reddit with less features lol
I think reddit has that feature too? At least I thought I saw it described in one of the protest posts. Maybe that was part of turning the sub nsfw.
I don't see any problem in that.
The site can be both, a place for trolling and serious discussions.
If you want serious discussions about pounding my tight twink fart hole then you can find that at /s/shitpostdungeon
>tight
Ha, Angus everyone knows your shart shaft is all loose and flappy.
Like an old beat up golf bag
Very cool very cool
tl;dr? I'm not reading all that
Well it all started the day I banged your mom, but I'll cut it short. In the end I managed to weasel my way out of paying child support and that's why you can't read today.
it's not botting if I'm manually asking Bing right?
I'm happy to have more serious discussions here as well as the less serious.
MyMan.png
Why is everyone trying to change his site
I'm not. If you look at the discussions on reddit about finding alternatives, people are looking for sites and what they are going to be in the future. If things haven't been laid out by the creators already, then there isn't much else you can do than ask about their vision and/or plans.