Rapidly Declining Quality on Storm Track

[nickgrillo]

I'll never understand the bouncing back-and-forth of this board... There was a major brawl back last summer about having people write essays / prove chase expierence in order to join. Now the board allows "anyone" to join? I'm not gonna disagree and bring that whole stupid subject back up again, but it's just interesting how this "transformation" took place and why it did... ?

(the thing is with the "anyone could subscribe to ST" is that it meant anyone could read the magazine. Now anyone can write and "contribute" [if you wanna call it that] on ST, regardless if they chase, or ever even plan to chase or not).

It'd be nice if a moderator would shine some light on my question I posted a bit ago. Could I take a wild guess the decision to let anyone in is because that is what will increase hits and drive up the rates on the banner ads to help certain persons to sell more of their products? What other reason would there be?

There still wasn't any explanation given on why the essay / chaser only rules were removed. The thing is that many of the new members don't seem to understand or care about maintaining a high-quality board, or a board that's rich in meteorological and chase-related posts -- that make sense.

 

[Andrew Herron]

Nick,

What's to stop someone from lying on their essay? I had to fill one out but it wasn't like anyone, at least to my knowledge, did anything to confirm my qualifications.

I think we should get our undies out of a bunch and relax. Granted, the BS posts need to be addressed, but like it's been said, that's why there is a way to report posts to the mods. Until, say, February or early March, if there is still a problem, then it should be addressed.

Rob,
Is there a reason your initial comments weren't sent to a mod instead of making a thread out of it? (I'm not being malicious, just curious)

 

[MatthewCarman]

Nick no offence but I once saw you and another guy (I will keep him nameless but he once posted you were a great guy, I find irony in that) making fun of someone for having bad spelling. If you remember I chimed in and said it was wrong and that this sort of thing should not be allowed. The mods removed the posts. (This was like spring time) I see you post alot of low quility posts so I dont see why your beating your gums.

Again no offence was ment towards you I just feel you dont like me much because I am new and yes I did fill out the form and paragraph before I joined. I filled it out 3 times. Please dont hold a grudge against me for past problems. I have let them be in the past and hope you could to.

 

[nickgrillo]

Are you saying that someone made fun of me for having bad spelling? I didn't understand the post... If you did, it was a post back in the summer, and it was made in jest because of a few words I used that were "rare" to say the least, and I happened to use "their" in the wrong context, IIRC.

I'm not talking about a few grammatical errors here, I'm talking about nonsensical posts and posters.

Matthew, I have a number of low-quality posts? ROFL... I'll refrain from saying anything to avoid it being considered that evil "ad-hominem" attack.

 

[MatthewCarman]

The only posting I was was three from you and Darin Brunin making fun of a guy for his spelling. He then defended himself with a reply and that is when I posted saying this kind of Immature posting should not be allowed here and explained that we need to act our age and I said please dont take offence to this. I was very nice in my reply to you and everyone else there and I took nobody's side. The mods removed the posts. I never saw anyone making fun of you and probibly because the mods removed it. If someone did then what did you do besides turn around and make fun of him?

I just dont see why your beating your gums when you post some low quality stuff yourself. Check the recent Bar and Grill thread I started. I feel you were doing that to get back at me for things I said in the past. Why I asked you not to hold a grudge.

I already said I have yet to chase and hate repeating myself. Again please dont take this personally or offence but your taking this a little to far.

 

[Jeff Snyder]

Discussion is okay, but let's not let this degrade to bickering.

Nick, the membership policy was changed late this past summer to allow for open membership (by removing the essay requirement and not requiring moderator approval). I will yield to Tim for an explanation of reason for this policy change (if he chooses to do so).

While we encourage users to use the PM system to address concerns about other members, any member that receives a threatening or abusive PM is certainly welcome to contact a moderator. I'm not saying there is evidence of such, but any abusive or hostile language directed at another member is not acceptable. While this is the obvious case for comments made on the forum, it also holds for the PM system if the particular member wants to take it to a moderator.

 

[Darin Brunin]

The only posting I was was three from you and Darin Brunin making fun of a guy for his spelling.

Before you go pointing fingers you should get your story straight.

 

[nickgrillo]

If you are so unhappy all the time with who posts, how they post, what they post and if they chase, perhaps you should start up your own bannerless, adless, chaser only, high quality, snowless, half-grammatically correct, gold standard chaser forum. Seriously. Passing a chaser essay isn't the highway to greatness...obviously. And btw the site/stormtrack wasn't for chasers only; perhaps if you don't believe that you should ask Tim Marshall or David Hoadley.

But then that'd go against my evil plan, which is soley to "make fun of people just to boost my own self up", am I right?

 

[Tony Lyza]

This thread is really grating.

I don't post here a whole lot, and it's because of posts exactly like the posts in this thread. I do chase (This was my group's first season, and we had little success.), and I do know what's going on when we're chasing (We don't just drive a car to a storm and not know the structure of the storm and what's happening.). However, I am far from all-knowing when it comes to forecasting severe weather, and I do not know as much as many of you all do. I am continuing to study the weather (I received Tim's Red Book for my birthday a couple days ago, and I'm going to get the Storm Chasing Handbook and the Weather Forecasting Handbook for Christmas.) with hopes of going to OU in a couple years. I do not post a lot in forecast or NOW threads because of what's being displayed here; a highly elitist angle that many members here share. There's been many a time where I have started to post something but stopped for fear that a certain poster or two would demeaningly correct me because I make mistakes. That's right, I'm human and I make mistakes. Stop the presses!

Now, as for the essay, I have a biased view against it. Back when I joined Stormtrack (I registered back in January.), the essay was still a requirement. I had followed the rules in my registration, which included filling out the essay. I waited over four long weeks before asking another member here, who shall remain anonymous, about where I should go to find out whether or not I had been accepted or if I was still being considered. He told me to address my concerns to a certain moderator, and I promptly did that. The response I received was along the lines of, "Well, we didn't accept you at first, but now that you emailed, we'll let you in." I found the fact that I had been rejected without any response whatsoever from any staff here at the board to be incredibly rude. At the very least, a short response explaining why I had not been accepted should have been in order.

With regards to grammatical mistakes, they happen. We all make them; yes, that includes those of you all who think you have perfect grammar skills. When in a more informal setting, I occasionally correct posters in public, especially if we are in the middle of a dispute. However, if you all truly want this board to be held to a high quality, then you need to inform people behind the scenes that they need to correct a mistake or work on their grammar skills instead of calling them out in public, which is both embarrassing and is a waste of space in threads.

I guess that my thoughts can best be summed up by repeating what many have said; take it private. If you have an issue with someone regarding the quality of their posts, have the guts to inform them of your issues in a one-on-one message first instead of taking the easy way out and correcting them in public. If that does not solve the issue, then report their posts or take your problem to a staff member. However, if you really want to keep a high quality of posts on this board, then you all would be wise to keep this private rather than sullying the board with threads like this that reek of elitism and discourage others from participating, including those who might have something substantial to add from time to time and those trying to learn the ropes.

 

[Karen Politte]

Nick no offence but I once saw you and another guy (I will keep him nameless but he once posted you were a great guy, I find irony in that) making fun of someone for having bad spelling. If you remember I chimed in and said it was wrong and that this sort of thing should not be allowed. The mods removed the posts. (This was like spring time) I see you post alot of low quility posts so I dont see why your beating your gums.

Again no offence was ment towards you I just feel you dont like me much because I am new and yes I did fill out the form and paragraph before I joined. I filled it out 3 times. Please dont hold a grudge against me for past problems. I have let them be in the past and hope you could to.

Oh this is getting really silly.

1. Matthew - if you wish to harangue with Nick to and fro can't you do it on PM? I feel like you are bringing a lot of personal issues to the table when there really is no need for it.

2. You can stop counter-flaming Nick for posting low-quality material because, quite frankly, Nick posts here only from time to time and when he does the material is always of higher-than-average quality. I think that Nick has learned more than a lot of others have about chasing and chasers over the past couple of years and his posting quality has gone through the roof if you ask me. I have a lot of respect for him - even if I only know him through what posts he does make on a forum. Hell - all I do anymore is post polls.

3. In my opinion, Rob has the right to start a thread on here about anything that is concerning him about the quality of this forum. Are we no longer allowed to discuss the likes of this?

4. Lastly - it's offense, not "offence". There is also no such word as "alot". The word "dont" should be punctuated thusly; don't.
I'm just offering a few tips so that you may improve your posting quality. Some people just get hot-under-the-collar when it takes them twenty minutes to read two sentences in a post because there is no punctuation and bad grammar. I am one of them. Sorry.

5. Unfriendliness and exasperation are often hard to distinguish.

I think this thread has run it's inevitable - if disappointing - course.

KL

 

[Dan Robinson]

Forums of any type are going to cycle through ups and downs. As long as there is moderation to keep some sense of order, I don't see much to worry about.

While ST has avoided the worst of the worst that forums can degrade into, I would however recommend this article by Roger Edwards about WX-CHASE. Just replace 'WX-CHASE' with 'Stormtrack'.

http://www.stormeyes.org/tornado/wx-chase.htm

 

[MatthewCarman]

Yeah Karen I agree and thanks for showing me my mistakes. -Matthew.

 

[Darin Brunin]

 

[Robert Dewey]

Rob,
Is there a reason your initial comments weren't sent to a mod instead of making a thread out of it? (I'm not being malicious, just curious)

Andrew;

I wanted to make a thread out of it so that everyone could voice their thoughts on the subject. While I was correct in respects to the thread turning into a flame war, that really wasn't my intention. Instead, I had hoped that the latest influx of members would see the thread and become aware of the rules.

Again, my inention wasn't to start a flame war, so if anyone had their feelings hurt in the process, my bad. As for Nick Grillo and Andrew Pritchard - no, I didn't start this thread because of you, Richard Simmons, David Letterman, or anyone else in particular . It was just my opinion of the overall quality of posts over the past several months...

I'm with others - hopefully things will turn around by March or April, once (if?) we finally get a storm season.

 

[nickgrillo]

I'm pretty certain we were all "idiotic" non-chasers at somepoint. For the newbies out there I'm sure nothing is more inviting to the forum than seeing a signature like that. It just screams warm and fuzzy welcoming feelings.

You took the signature in the wrong way -- it wasn't meant in that context. I meant to imply individuals that have yet to chase [or never plan to] that post idiotic low-quality crap all over the forum (some users 1,000 times more than others).

If you hang out in the #stormchase channel on a frequent basis, then you'll understand what the "God Bless" meant and how it was used to reference something/someone in jest. Whatever, I'm discussing in an argument that's gonna result in nothing... I think I'll let it go.