Originally posted by Jaguar:
Yes, we are. We already proved it to the HFStival forum.
No, madam, with all due respect, we are not. For all of the shortcomings HFStival.com had, it had a sense of community – that people were there because of a common interest or hobby, and that community was protected. For all the mistakes myself or Brian may have made in running that forum, NEVER did we allow miscreants to come onto the board and destroy that sense of community. Never did we hold out the abstract idealism that people whose sole purpose for being on the board was to argue with others, put others down, and ruffle feather had some inalienable right to life, liberty, and posting on messageboard.
And so, despite all the things we may have done wrong over the years, the one thing I'll hang my hat on was when we were faced with our Dupek's or our Brian Wallace's we banned them. We did not allow one person to annoy everyone else and run off many decent members of our community. It didn't matter who they were, or how funny they might have been, we banned them. And because of that, that sense of community was allowed to thrive. Its noteworthy that many of those people – who didn't know each other at all outside of the messageboard – gathered together en masse probably 20 times during the existance of that board and continue to do so now.
So, for all the things 930.com does right, and all the good decisions the moderators on here make, it couldn't be more obvious to me that their greatest misgiving is that when there's a threat to this community, they're simply asleep at the wheel. We have had numerous regular members of this board leave this board, or take hiatuses, because of the stated reason of how gosh-darned obnoxious certain unredeeming posters are. The longer the Brian Wallace's and Dupek's are allowed to run free and clear and destroy the community, the less claim we have to trumpet ourself as a thriving community.
So, no, from where I sit this community is in no way better then that community. We/you/I may like the common interest this community is based around more then that one. Heck, I'm sure 98% of us think the HFStival was stupid, but don't play up how enlightened this community's decisions are. On HFStival.com, when we were faced with hatemongering, racism, people intentionally pushing other people's buttons, people using the board for streetteaming or commercial purposes, or people trying to tear down our sense of community or friendship, we acted to excise it. When we face that here, we give the person 55 chances to change. Who are supposed to be the adults again?
