Site is a graveyard - How can boards save itself? [Threadbanned users in 1st post]

I’ve been on this site with two different accounts (and about 5 different names) since about 2003, when Dangerhere.com was blown away.

In that time I’ve had 1 temp forum ban for being naughty, and it was deserved and was delivered by a mod who I have a huge amount of respect for. I had one thread ban where I pm’d the mod immediately after and when he explained why I was thread banned, I saw it from his point of view. However in the same pm sequence he said “look, you’ve engaged with me reasonably, you’ve accepted where you were our opinions differ but have been fair and engaging so threadban lifted”

In old vbulletin I had one red flag rescinded, again where I engaged with the mod.

I probably had one or two yellows over the years too

I was recently warned for a comment. I didn’t bother engaging with that mod. Not because the warning was fair but because that mod in particular is one of the worst I’ve seen here over the years.

Speaking of Vanilla, what's the recent upgrade that changed sharing or editing of links all about?

And quoting of posts seems to not work about half the time.

What a crappy interface. Any chance we can revert to the previous version?

What do anecdotes add to discussion in these type of threads?

An example Newposter123 joins and their first post is about how they saw people from country xyz dump their pushchair at the bus stop but they have also know a friend or family member working in social protection and they have been told they have a warehouse of them so the person from country xyz can collect a new one later that afternoon.

There is nothing factual or verified and it's an extreme example but it's clearly posted to stir up hate against people from country xyz.

I think what threads like CA need is more fact checking. The amount of link dumps posted from random Twitter\X users and dubious sites is a plague on the site.

Also I understand this is not practical from a moderation point of view to fact check what is posted so I do not really have a solution but I think it's one reason why some posters avoid posting in threads like CA now.

Ok, so what's the difference between the example you gave and another poster saying that they live close to an accommodation centre for people from country xyz and that they are all very friendly lovely individuals?? That's anecdotal too.

In practice both are equally likely to be true or untrue, but whilst the latter will be passed over without a glance, your example may well draw a warning or threadban.

You might as well shut down these threads as have this sort of censorship threat hanging the Sword of Damocles over posters.

"A mod cannot act on any post that doesn’t break the rules."

LOL, that gave me a good laugh!! That is exactly the complaint of many here - moderator actions for posts that don't break site rules, charters or specific thread advice. That are done on a whim, that are very subjective. Surely you've seen this in your time here?

feic - look at all the letters after your name - can you name them all? 😀

what the hell…..

that Long John Silver post. Wow. Just wow.

LOL indeed. The complaint of “many” here, and in the “Dispute Resolution” forum, is that they’ve been unfairly targeted, and totally innocent, when they’ve clearly broken site rules.

You’d swear butter wouldn’t melt in the mouths of the lads in that forum, always blaming the mods for their inability to not be a dick. Claiming they just have the “wrong” opinions and the mods don’t like it. Really low quality users, who’s dreadful record on the site usually comes up in the conversation.

Now, it should be pointed out, that there is nothing in the rules against having these “wrong” opinions. In fact, many users share them but, unlike the whiney lads in the DP forum, they can express them without breaking any of the, actual, site rules.