"Soft" Merger
« on: June 17, 2016, 07:21:32 PM »
A bit ago we discussed the option of a soft merger where we would play nice with each other for a bit and see how that goes before going forward with something more permanent and dangerous.

I'd love to hear a bit about what you guys would hope to get out of it and we can move on from there if there is indeed interest on your side still.

Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #1 on: June 18, 2016, 04:55:21 AM »
A bit ago we discussed the option of a soft merger where we would play nice with each other for a bit and see how that goes before going forward with something more permanent and dangerous.

I'd love to hear a bit about what you guys would hope to get out of it and we can move on from there if there is indeed interest on your side still.

Speaking as somewhat of an outsider: this forum has 2 advantages over the other one.

1. Better moderation.
2. Faster.

As long as those two things are maintained, I suspect most people would be happy. Regarding the moderation issue: almost every thread at the other site seems to turn into a poo slinging contest, with even the "moderators" egging it on, and often starting it.

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #2 on: June 18, 2016, 05:41:25 PM »
My only concern is that if we combine the forums there will be way too many people asking me questions. I kind of like a small forum environment, because the conversations can get a little more in depth.

As a wish list for a combined forum I would want my own "Ask Tom Bishop" section on the main site or on the forums (or maybe "Ask a Believer" or "Ask the Zetetic Council"), where people may submit questions and I can publish answers without feeling like I would need to be on the forums 24/7 catering to dozens of threads filled with dozens of people asking endless questions.
« Last Edit: June 21, 2016, 04:24:52 PM by Tom Bishop »

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Offline juner

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #3 on: June 22, 2016, 02:31:14 PM »

Speaking as somewhat of an outsider: this forum has 2 advantages over the other one.

1. Better moderation.
2. Faster.

As long as those two things are maintained, I suspect most people would be happy. Regarding the moderation issue: almost every thread at the other site seems to turn into a poo slinging contest, with even the "moderators" egging it on, and often starting it.

These two things were the crux of the initial merger discussions in the beginning. At this point, I don't think that many people care what happens anymore. It simply has been too long with no progress or follow-up.

Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #4 on: June 23, 2016, 02:08:43 PM »
A bit ago we discussed the option of a soft merger where we would play nice with each other for a bit and see how that goes before going forward with something more permanent and dangerous.

I'd love to hear a bit about what you guys would hope to get out of it and we can move on from there if there is indeed interest on your side still.

Speaking as somewhat of an outsider: this forum has 2 advantages over the other one.

1. Better moderation.
2. Faster.

As long as those two things are maintained, I suspect most people would be happy. Regarding the moderation issue: almost every thread at the other site seems to turn into a poo slinging contest, with even the "moderators" egging it on, and often starting it.
I do worry the "faster" bit is due largely to having significantly less traffic and less data. Our site happens to run as fast when we are a similar load - the solution on my side may just be upping our hosting plan again. Between the two teams we can get over that minor hurdle though.

Moderation - spot on.

My only concern is that if we combine the forums there will be way too many people asking me questions. I kind of like a small forum environment, because the conversations can get a little more in depth.

As a wish list I would want my own Ask Tom Bishop section on the main site or on the forums (or maybe "Ask a Believer" or "Ask the Zetetic Council"), where people may submit questions and I can publish answers without feeling like I would need to be on the forums 24/7 catering to dozens of threads filled with dozens of people asking endless questions.
A valid concern.

An Ask Tom Bishop section on the new site is a great idea and would take almost no work on my part. I'll try to add it this week.


I do believe there is a bit of confusion here. I am talking about not merging the forums at first and simply having you guys act as a chapter of the main society, maintaining your autonomy. The large majority of folks on our site really don't see any benefit to the merger at all. This includes our entire userbase, as far as I can tell. Really its just me, Wilmore and Pongo that are for this. This will give them a chance to see what benefit there is.

The idea here in part would be to take advantage of some friendly cooperation across things like social media outreach and links to each others sites while at the same time allowing both sides to get accustomed to each other again and hopefully working through old hard feelings. Also, we'd have some time to discuss as a whole issues like branding, who hosts what, what role each of us will have in general and so on.

However, I'm really happy to see that the negative opinions of the merger were mostly due to a minority that have since left the forums (or have yet to voice in?) Perhaps this will change the feelings on the other site as well.

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #5 on: June 24, 2016, 03:11:41 PM »
I'm not particularly interested in contributing to any Ask Me feature on the main site, or contributing to any Flat Earth articles, or collaborating with anyone on the .org unless the forums can be combined. A benefit to joining the societies is that you get Tom Bishop.

The .org userbase is mostly RE'ers, so I wouldn't hold it in high esteem that they don't care about merging. There is no reason why the admins of this site and the admins of the other site can't work together co-manage the site and the forums. The more hands we have, the more that can be done. I posted a suggestion that we should host Earth Not a Globe on the site. If there were more admin and technical resources to go around, that could happen.

Why do we need two societies?

Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #6 on: June 28, 2016, 04:15:50 PM »
There is a matter which must dealt with in any upcoming merger: the trolling situation in the upper forums.

For the past few years, those upper forums have been left basically on their own, with each true FE believer having to deal with an unbelievable amount of trolling which as of late has even become very organized.

It is just not worth it anymore to intervene there, to post valuable information.


Thus, each FE believer must be given the moderators powers, so that a basic two week ban (for trolling) can be implemented immediately.

This would greatly remedy the current situation, where practically the trollers have taken over the entire upper forums and do as they please.

Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #7 on: July 03, 2016, 06:08:05 AM »
For the past few years, those upper forums have been left basically on their own, with each true FE believer having to deal with an unbelievable amount of trolling which as of late has even become very organized.

I would like to point out that the trolling comes from both sides.

Quote
Thus, each FE believer must be given the moderators powers, so that a basic two week ban (for trolling) can be implemented immediately.

For a debate forum? Give one side full moderator powers? That would single handedly destroy all credibility for that forum as an unbiased place for debate. Can you imagine someone like Intikam with moderator powers?

Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #8 on: July 03, 2016, 10:06:41 AM »
The RE have taken full advantage of the fact that for the past few months the upper forums were left practically with little supervision to enforce the rules stipulated there.

A mod does not take decisions unilaterally: if there is an issue, a problem to be solved, it is brought to the admin/mods attention in the mod section, a final decision is taken there.

So far the FE forums have been totally unbiased: try and post FET on a RE forum and see what happens (or anywhere else, a scientific forum; the result will be either a ban or one's messages will be deleted).
« Last Edit: July 03, 2016, 10:08:30 AM by sandokhan »

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #9 on: July 06, 2016, 11:34:48 PM »
I propose that we combine the site and the forums and work civilly to further the society as a team.

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Offline jroa

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #10 on: July 08, 2016, 02:53:41 PM »
I thought the idea was dead.  I could be wrong, though.  I just thought that nobody on the other site who was slightly important gave a f***. 

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #11 on: July 08, 2016, 02:59:21 PM »
The proof that it is needed is that even with drastic improvements, their site experiences significant downtime every week, more or less. I have never had unscheduled downtime here.  Another win for google.com!

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Offline jroa

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #12 on: July 08, 2016, 03:04:26 PM »
What are you talking about?  I have never experienced downtime.  lol

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Offline Snupes

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #13 on: July 08, 2016, 09:05:00 PM »
Aren't the forums literally down right now?
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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #14 on: July 08, 2016, 10:23:14 PM »
Yes, they are, hence jroa being here in the first place.

Rama Set

Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #15 on: July 08, 2016, 10:34:49 PM »
They are up now. They weren't up sooner because Big Daddy Davis "didn't realize" they were down.

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Offline juner

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #16 on: July 09, 2016, 04:36:36 AM »
They weren't up sooner because Big Daddy Davis "didn't realize" they were down.

One of these days I am going to develop some sort of monitoring software that can e-mail and maybe even text alert if a critical network resource goes offline. I am going to make a killing, you guys should invest.

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Offline Roundy

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #17 on: July 09, 2016, 05:02:10 AM »
It's amazing such software doesn't already exist.
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Offline Woody

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #18 on: July 09, 2016, 06:44:59 PM »
Do not know if anyone will think my opinion matters, but will give it anyway.

This site runs better at least for me.  For me at least this site consistently loads pages faster then the other site.

I do not recall this site ever being down.  The other site is down as I post this and it seems to be down about once a week. 

IMHO The moderators on this site are more professional.

I do not know the whole story, but blocking mentioning this site on the other seems petty.  Not a fan of punishing an entire group for the actions of a few. IMHO you should be supporting each other even if you do not merge.

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Offline Pete Svarrior

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Re: "Soft" Merger
« Reply #19 on: July 12, 2016, 09:57:22 AM »
I have never had unscheduled downtime here.
It happens sometimes. Parsifal does a good job at documenting it.
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