When does a topic conversation become a discussion and progress to debate, disagreement or argument,
Keith
Member, Super User Posts: 2,450 ✭✭✭
The public forum began on 20/9/2012 so has now been going for about 7 weeks. In that time about 650 topics have been started and 800 people have joined.
By and large the forum has been an informative, constructive and inclusive place welcoming everyone's views in a polite and open manner.
Nevertheless on several occasions the question of forum etiquette and behaviour has surfaced.
Sometimes a conversation on a thread may evolve into a discussion that, depending on how some people perceive the tone, some may describe as a debate. As I've said before there are the community terms of use which make reference to the forum being fun, friendly and inviting and that respect is the name of the game as this is not a debating society.
By and large the forum has been an informative, constructive and inclusive place welcoming everyone's views in a polite and open manner.
Nevertheless on several occasions the question of forum etiquette and behaviour has surfaced.
Sometimes a conversation on a thread may evolve into a discussion that, depending on how some people perceive the tone, some may describe as a debate. As I've said before there are the community terms of use which make reference to the forum being fun, friendly and inviting and that respect is the name of the game as this is not a debating society.
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Perhaps I should close by saying that clearly this topic/post is prompted by some comments in the last few days but this post is not specifically considered to be directed at any particular person or comment. Personally I value everyone's input and viewpoint and whilst these need not all be aligned they all generally add something to my understanding of the topics, the issues that people face and the many positive aspects of the YouView system too
Others at times seem to be trolling and seeking a reaction or refuse to accept what information there is and endlessly demand it's restated in a form that suits them.
I don't see anything wrong with people thrashing things out between them provided exchanges don't become profane & abusive. Everyone here is an adult, they should be treated like one and IMO part of that is hearing things they may not like, sometimes expressed in a form they may not like.
If that becomes a 'debate' then I don't think there's anything wrong with that.
I may well just have a thicker skin than some others, people have sweetly expressed displeasure at an account name that apparently takes a swipe at me and it seems the mods have deleted posts from that account.
Personally it's all water off a duck's back to me, I've never reported anyone here to the mods (or on any of the few other forums I'm a member of) and I can't see that changing.
While no-one wants an unpleasant forum, I can't see this place working if everyone is limited to 'one turn' in a discussion and no-one has errors or misunderstandings explained to them.
I think this is ultimately for the mods to decide, comment on and take whatever action they think is needed if anyone over steps the mark.
Were I to get an email in my in box telling me 'Sorry, that over stepped the mark' I'd just take it on the chin and let it inform me next time. I think that's how forums should work.
YMMV.
PS: It's also worth pointing out that some of those who complain most about other posters are quite keen themselves on dishing out pretty robust language and views.
But if, for example, people are going to refer to the YouView staff as "ignorant" I'm not sure they really have the moral high-ground to complain about other people's perceived "rudeness".
I guess the golden rule is, be willing for people to treat you as you treat them and others.
(I see you posted again while I was already composing my answer.)
Perhaps if YV had a greater presence on these forums then many of these heated discussions could have been avoided by the introduction of hard facts where required.
Forums by their pseudo-anonymous nature often tend to lose the pleasantries that people would have in an actual conversation. There is no tone or inflection in the written word so quite often people take things in a manner in which they are not intended.
Normally on a forum you have moderators telling people to cool it when things get a bit out of hand. There doesn't seem to be any of that here. This website software doesn't really help matters by being bloody awful to use. Perhaps a discussion forum other than this would be a better place to discuss things.
Would there be any interest in an independent site with a proper forum?
I've been a forum owner, manager and moderator at varying times and it can be a thankless task.
It's very hard to get the balance of moderation right - some people want a proverbial hand to hold and someone to tell others off, while more robust/experienced/mature posters will resent anything that smacks of heavy handed moderation.
>> There is no tone or inflection in the written word so quite often people take things in a manner in which they are not intended.
I've made this very point before.
Perhaps a forum with a PM or ignore function would lead to less heated discussion, but experience suggests not!
I think a seperate forum would take something away from this forum and the new one. Information would be split between the 2.
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Agreed. This forum has indeed been a good place to find help and information. And long may that continue, too.
And posters *can* actually disagree with one another using informed civility, rather than abuse (and I believe thats actually called a debate).
Personally speaking, I refuse to register on the Digital Spy forums, because of all the troll/ fanbois/ 'my platforms better than yours' abuse that stops coherent conversation of any particular users platform board.
And I for one hope this forum never becomes that. Because this is a good place to be, for finding help, info and problem solving. And long may it stay that way.
>> Personally speaking, I refuse to register on the Digital Spy forums, because of all the troll/ fanbois/ 'my platforms better than yours' abuse that stops coherent conversation of any particular users platform board.
Lord yes! Thread titles such as "pauperview' abound on DS.
If so, take a step back and rephrase it.
A similar consideration can be applied to third-party postings, and might have prevented the monstering of Tara Brown, for instance.
I hope in the few posts I've made, that at all times that I have been civil - even when in disagreement - because that is how I am in 'real face 2 face' life . Like Martin & Visionman have (sort of) said that is the essence of debate. Furthermore and again sort of quoting Martin here, If I ever were to received a moderators 'warning' I too would take it on the chin and use it to improve in future forum use. I actually use that saying in 'real' life - sad but yes i do :-)
Also I would ask you to consider this; I, for example am new to 'full' forum use & only got involved by virtue of being lucky enough to be an original trialist. Having no previous experience of posting to forums I have been please by help and advice given but also a little surprised at some of the feedback witnessed. A minor theme of my few posts have been to remind all (including myself) to be friendly at all times. Perhaps others are new as well?
It's great to disagree, it just how we do it.
At present, not convinced by the idea of a separate forum. I would rather keep what we have and have more moderater input ?
People posting should be asking themselves: 'An I wasting other people's time? and 'Am I being clear in what I say?"
In the example you cite, a lot of people thought they were clicking through to a statement about a product they're excited over, only to discover that it was a very poorly and misleadingly titled thread.
The respect you're calling for has to flow two ways.
I also find it impossible to "value everyone's input" as you seem to be able to do (albeit, a laudable aim that, given my critical thinking, is beyond my abilities). I would prefer to say that I respect everyone's right to have a point of view, even if it runs counter to my own, but I neither respect, nor wish to read comments from people who just seem to want to rubbish other people's views, and attack them on a personal level. As Roy Brown says so wisely below, ask yourself: 'Am I playing the man, not playing the ball?' And if you ARE playing the ball, then try to word it in language which is aimed at engaging, rather than enraging.
Of course, most posters do this, but, as time has gone by, some of you have taken to snide remarks to one another which are not helpful to the rest of us, and in some forums, would constitute you being warned for your conduct and then removed from participating.
As I'm most likely one of the oldest on here at 68, can I ask you all that from now on, we all conduct ourselves in a grown up manner and refrain from personal remarks about each other?
Its not about how you feel about another poster is it? We're all supposed to be here trying to both help YouView make an excellent product that beats the opposition and meets everyone's needs, and also help any newbies and users having problems.
Let's all get on with each other please, and concentrate on the important things!
Thanks TG
All I will add as has been mentioned on this forum before, but one phrase I stick by, is "Think before you speak", so when on forums, I rephrase it to "Think before you type."
Also I think people forget that written communication is harder as it looses a lot of how we communicate in real life face to face, when we are not able to see the other person, so it can be taken out of context, so I simply try to remember that.
I look forward to a hopefully helping, if I can, as many new users of the YouView platform, as being ex-trialists, we should be in a position to offer our guidance and expertise!
And lastly, if anyone has been upset or worse offended, by anything that I have written, I would hope they are able to tell me, so I can apologise to them and learn from it, as we are never too old to learn and hopefully become better human beings.
I know there is a person who mentions Martin in his ID. I would like to say categorically that it is not me. I am on a fixed IP address so anybody who doesn't believe me can ask the mods to check IPO addresses.
I've also never had a post deleted apart from a couple I did myself.
Maybe I have come across as a bit scathing, especially to Martin, If so I apologise and will not do so again.
I know some people don't get my sense of humour but at 65 years old I am not going to change that now.
>> I know there is a person who mentions Martin in his ID. I would like to say categorically that it is not me.
I've never met you but from what I've seen of you on here I wouldn't imagine you were the type to hide behind an account name like that. Not that the account name bothers me, if you're big enough to dish it (and I do) then you should be big enough to take it.
>> Maybe I have come across as a bit scathing, especially to Martin, If so I apologise and will not do so again.
From my PoV nothing to apologise for, we're both big boys with strong opinions and a passion for having our say. I have a very thick skin to go with my big mouth.
However I wouldn't want our discussions to make the forum less enjoyable or productive for others so I'll also try harder in future to ensure there's no scope for anyone to misunderstand my intention or meaning.
>> I know some people don't get my sense of humour but at 65 years old I am not going to change that now.
Despite what some think, I'm not quite as old as you but I also have a pretty singular sense of humour that probably doesn't translate well into forum posts and as I'm loathe to pepper everything I wrote with IMO and ;-) :-P and :-) it's not always going to be obvious.
And actually i think your post - and hopefully my answer - proves the point I was trying to make in my initial answer.
We're all adults, we should all be capable of hearing views we're not keen on - and to some degree, as I have, hear that you annoy people - and of reflecting without moderators constantly stepping in.
It's possible that being put on the naughty step actually makes it harder for people to talk out any views or misunderstandings as I think we've done here, and that allows resentments, annoyances and gripes to fester.
I'm sure we have this in common - we post here because we want YouView to be as good as it can be, not because we want to fall out with people.
Martin
And surely you can't be seriously suggesting that Tara was being actively disrespectful, rather than nervously making her first (and probably last :-( ) posting here, unfamiliar with the rules, but hopefully seeking advice and help?
Neither in this thread or the one you refer to did I mention 'rules' of any kind.
It's basic communication skills to take the time to word something clearly and even more of a basic English skill to know how to word a question, including the role of a question mark.
The fact that Tara was able to type 'Are there any new TV channels coming to YouView?' as the opening line shows she could have made the title a lot clearer.
I wasn't the only, or indeed first, person to comment about the misleading title in that thread so I'm not going to endlessly take flack for it.
The thing that has bugged me most is when an argument takes over a thread, often on a tangent, and the original idea/question/problem is never actually responded to.
On the whole though, there's a lot more good points than bad, and I've found it interesting enough to stick around..
I know for us PVR experts, its often hard to envisage what its like to learn how to use a PVR for the first time, I've owned one since the Humax 8000 and that's going back some years! We forget that they don't know their scarts from their HDMI's or Ethernet cables, etc, so we tend to get perhaps a little too 'sharp' in our replies. It's one of the big problems for YouView when you all think about it, they have to cover all bases, we're all here clamouring for 'bells and whistles' (as most of us have probably done in the past with every unit we have ever owned!) we want it to do this, we want it to do that etc, but in the process, we tend to forget those users for who this unit may be the very first time they have ever owed a hard drive recording device, and YouView HAVE to cater for those users as well.
As someone else mentioned previously, if we all talk to one another on here as if we were all stood in a room and were face to face, it might help. Even though we have smileys, its not always easy to convey in a typed out missive what we really mean, and that we are not being 'dismissive' or curt with another user.
(Just my twopence worth again!) Lol
And your point is so true, Technogran (love the nickname - already have a picture of you ....). Thanks for your 2 penn'orth!
Am looking forward to many more years of development.
Thank you to all posters who make this a place somewhere to go to for help, ideas exchange and a welcoming environment to hang out.
And thank you to YouView for creating a product I appreciate everyday.
I think we would all agree with comments I and others have made before that have helpfully been made again here about the differences between verbal and written communication that can lead to unintentional misinterpretation when no ill will or slight was actually intended or in the mind of the person when it was written.
I also think Dave71 makes a very good point about how a discussion/debate on a thread sometimes drifts or even jumps to something completely different and how that can make the thread more difficult to follow or of less value to others in the future. Of course there is a need for discussion on many topics which can make the number of posts quite significant and as part of that discussion it may lead in to other areas. The forum software does offer a fork option for a moderator to fork such content out to start a new topic although it is not clear to me how practical that would be and hence that it would work very well. I would hope the regular forum users can (continue to) act to tactfully point out when a topic appears to be straying and either suggest someone starts a new topic for the new discussion, or if there is already another appropriate topic suggest they move the discussion over to it which will then benefit both topics (i.e. add more useful relevant info to one topic whilst keeping it off the one it is less relevant to).
I intentionally did not want to make the main topic description or my first post too challenging/critical etc.
Thanks to churchwarden in particular for the comment on my post picking up on the sweeping statements. I had considered making more specific analytical statements at the outset but decided in the end to go for something rather sweeping and positive to give people something positive to work off/away from etc as appropriate.
Where I said 'they all generally add something to my understanding of the topics' and 'I value everyone's input and viewpoint' I could have expanded and been more analytic or even what some might read as critical, e.g. I could have reworded and expanded to perhaps instead include something along the lines of one of
- all posts have a value, although some more so than others
- all posts have a value, although for some it is low/zero
- all posts have a value, although for some it is negative
and hence what a given post adds to my understanding of the topic will vary, but I could also have added they add something to my impression/perception of others understanding or their opinion/point of view too and that I may not always agree with what they have written or how they have written it but do respect everyone right to an opinion (as churchwarden said).I intentionally mentioned the word debate, in its dictionary definition it can simply be to discuss, deliberate and consider something which sounds very non-confrontational and non-problematic. Equally I see that some would consider the word debate to be associated with a more formal discussion with clear opposing views which are forcefully/robustly defended/disputed.
Regardless of how one considers the definition of debate I think everyone agrees it is a discussion based on views and facts without any ill intent or personal criticism and I think various other people's posts on this topic help to make that clear
If this topic has proved useful to clear the air or stimulate a useful (short) discussion (or maybe we can even call it a (friendly, constructive and adult) debate ;-) ) then that is good. If the air did not need clearing and no such discussion was really necessary then hopefully people did not mind engaging for a while anyway, after all it can be good to get together on a topic even just to touch base
In terms of the forum system itself and problems that it may exacerbate etc, personally I do not think having a second forum would be a good idea (even if technically the features of that forum system have benefits over this one (but could equally have downsides too even if not for us then perhaps for YouView)). I think it is important to make this forum as helpful and information rich as possible for anyone who needs it.
At present it appears to me that although there are 12 YouView staff formally registered on the forum there is only actually one member of staff acting as a forum moderator/administrator, i.e. Jesse. The only other YouView person who has I believe made more than one post on the public forum is Piers and he is I believe from the technical team and just stepping in when required to give more technical specific responses.
YouView of course could focus more staff on the forum, e.g. during the trials there were a wider variety of staff responding and those other people appeared to be from the general support team etc. Whether this would be of benefit is not of course clear and does depend on what additional input might be required, the specific knowledge those people have and what information they are permitted to share.
If the desire is for more specific answers to problems and updates on the status of issues then it would need someone to either facilitate posting that information after first discussing it with the relevant team or person (outside of direct customer support) within YouView or for such technical people (in addition to Piers) to be asked to post directly where appropriate.
If the desire is to have a little more intervention, administration and moderation then YouView could task more support team members with input to the forum or they could progress their considerations of assistance from customers/the community. The Get Satisfaction system has the concept of a champerator which is a champion moderator. A champion status is something YouView bestow (or revoke) 'to acknowledge users who make a large contribution to the community and who fill an informal leadership role' and one may consider that they also need to see such people as universally respected etc. A champerator is a champion who also has customer moderator/administrator status.
A champerator could for example have more support from the community to consider changes that a staff moderator may choose not to make, e.g. they might choose to remove the answered flag from the topic on manually adding padding and/or even change it to a problem or idea rather than a question etc. A champerator does not have all the permissions of a staff moderator so could not ban someone from the forum or post official support links etc.
During the trials someone (you, I and others may remember who you are ;-) ) proposed that I should moderate the (trials) forum. That suggestion met with much support but also rightly met with questions of why a customer moderator would be of any benefit (or in fact if any moderation/administration role were required). At that time after the discussion had run for a while I posted on that topic: and also It would seem since then the number of posts by me has certainly gone up and, I would estimate, puts me somewhere in the top 5 posters on the public forum, although I'm still posting at less than half the rate of some although my word count is no doubt quite high ;-)
The position as ever though is it is up to YouView to decide how to run the forum and when and if to seek more formal assistance from me or other customers for the forum or other activities. YouView know I am happy to help them as, when and where I can but equally I do not expect that they should ask for my help nor necessarily need it, or that they would not consider others better suited to help/more appropriate depending on YouView's needs and objectives.