Bill Tabor
EF5
Well thought out Mike. I think I agree.
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Bill Tabor
EF5
Someone mentioned the new members and having a filter on them because a lot are spammers. SO, I decided to click the newest member link to see what I found. Check it out a spammer:
http://stormtrack.org/forum/profile.php?mo...wprofile&u=3253
http://stormtrack.org/forum/profile.php?mo...wprofile&u=3253
Robert Dewey
EF5
They can't post to the board, Tim V. has to approve the account first. I doubt that one will pass, for some reason :lol:
Rob_Davis
Exactly. I click on every new member that shows up, and sure enough, the greatest number of them are spammers. Interestingly, most seem so similar that it looks like they are all the same idiot. You'd think he would have figured out it was futile months ago.
And I always get a kick out of the ones who aren't spammers but didn't read that they had to use their real name to sign up. Some of their "handles" are pretty funny.
And I always get a kick out of the ones who aren't spammers but didn't read that they had to use their real name to sign up. Some of their "handles" are pretty funny.
Robert Dewey
EF5
Also... Most of those aren't actually individual spammers - they are bots setup to crawl through PHP forums and enter certain values/information. If it was setup so they could automatically post, you would see every forum bombarded with "Buy this!" and whatever...
Jason_Politte
EF2
Sure, this applies to new applicants, but what happens with what's occurring presently. Much of what led to the Core being created in the first place still exists, as Mike U. so eloquently stated. While most in this thread have responded responsibly, this thread being started as it was and continuing on as it has is a prime example of that, IMO.
Jason
Robert Dewey
EF5
I guess just suspend the users who are violating rules? Seems like a viable option to me....
Mike Umscheid
EF4
It's certainly a dynamic issue in internet human psychology/communication! Cater to all. That's my vote, and it can easily be done by creating a Usergroup within the forum. This *does not* segregate the community at all. In fact, it provides a better means of communication. A two-fold membership... the basic member, and an "experienced chaser" member (or whatever PC name it should be called).
Where did the FAQ board go? This is *Fantastic* venue for the basic member to post question who may be new to the hobby or is meteoroligcally related. This allows communication between the hard-core chasers and the younger, less experienced, newer audience. The current WeatherLab is too broad of a board. Open this up for general chasing/weather discussion like the former W&C, even for basic membership. But, create a 2nd board similar to this for "advanced chasing discussions" for the experienced/hard-core/seasoned chasers to "talk shop", advanced theory discussions, new chase tactics, etc etc.
This is how I envision the future of StormTrack Forum... a fully interactive community where newbies are welcome to post question and can talk in a more "open" board, yet at the same time, the hard-cores/seasoned people can seek refuge in a more intimate posting environment.
Also, open up Chaser Reports in a board of its own and make it available for all to enjoy and read, even guests. [edit: but posting priveledges only for the "experienced" membership level, sorry for any confusion]
Again, these are my 2c for whatever they are worth. I'd hate to see a group of veteran/seasoned chasers who've been at it for 8+ years become more and more disassociated with Stormtrack, which is what I strongly fear is taking place.
Mike U
Jason_Politte
EF2
But that's just it - there's not necessarily any rules violations ongoing. Personally, I think the only way to really get around it would be to restructure the forum with a clean slate, and apply the new application rules to all members instead of having everyone grandfathered in as was done. However, I doubt this will happen.
Jason
Mike Umscheid
EF4
This is where the Usergroups idea comes in. Yeah, it was done before with TA, but do this with more boards and make it more interactive so the more experienced/seasoned guys feel a little more at home and have a forum to go to with less riff-raff, if you will.
Mike U
Rob_Davis
I agree that the current W&C forum is already shaping up to be a little too broad. And I agree that it would be helpful to the forum as a whole to have a more limited area for hardcore/advanced discussion. I guess where we might disagree is whether or not it should be hidden from the rest of the community.
I never disagreed with the concept of the old secret forum. I only disagreed with it being secret.
Jason_Politte
EF2
I do believe you have some good thoughts and ideas here, Mike, but I believe we were also told that a multi-tier system would not be put into place with the restructure of ST.
Jason
Mike Umscheid
EF4
Okay, this is fair enough. Make it available for all users to see, but only the 2nd tier user level be able to post. This still solves the "less noise" problem, which is my largest beef within the whole community. Content, Content, Content. This is key. Quality content is a must.... and is what I seek to see more than "a refuge hidden place" in all honesty. The only way about this is restricted posting priveledges in select boards based on whatever Usergroup you are in.
Mike U
Melissa Moon
EF5
Look, I don't think that anyone should be discriminated from joining Stormtrack. Even the enthusiast. For one, it's hypocritical; we were all mere weather enthusiasts at one point. If a nice php message board like this had been around when I was 17 years old (only 4 years ago!) and I had known about it, I would have wanted to join it and get involved in a heartbeat. I think that if an enthusiast or a new chaser is willing and able to come onto this board and make insightful posts to contribute to the discussions on the forum, then why put a stop to that? How can you even tell who will make an excellent contributing member to the stormtrack community by a membership application alone? There are a handful of really intelligent people out there who may not have any formal chasing experience due to money or life situations, but could offer a headload of insight and knowledge to the forum for others to benefit from. I mean, with this prescreening process, it's almost like you have to build somewhat of a name for yourself in order to be let in, which in my opinion is treading along the fine line of being elitist.
I don't agree with a special forum for only more *experienced* people to post or whatever. In my mind, "mindless"posts (ie ones that are made with no original thought like..."oh I agree with so and so" with no reason behind them) are the only things we can be objective about (because it's easy to see when there is no original thought in a post) but beyond that, the quality of a post is really a subjective thing. What one finds useful, another might think as junk and vice versa. By all means, if someone is using their brain to come up with the post and not just paraphrasing someone else, then I don't see a problem with it at all because it may inspire someone else's mind in some way.
And no, I don't think people who come onto Stormtrack to either never post anything or violate the TOS should be allowed to keep their membership because it is doing nothing positive for the forum. So, if I were the head honcho of Stormtrack and I was put in charge of making these changes, here is what I would do:
I actually model this a bit off of the Australian policy for drivers' licenses.
First, I would not discriminate against anyone who wanted to join (except of course spammers). HOWEVER, the first month or two of each new members' membership would be a provisional one. In that period of time, that person must make a certain number of insightful contributions (say maybe 2 or 3) to a weather/chasing-related topic (in other words, the person must either start a thread or post some sort of reply that shows that the person put original thought and effort into his/her posts). If this critera is not met by the time provisional membership is up, then the person's membership will be cancelled and not upgraded to being a regular member.
Also, with provisional memberships, there would be a no-strike policy on TOS violations; if a person under a provisional membership starts a flame or something to that effect, then his/her membership would be revoked on the spot.
Once a person is upgraded to a regular member, I think a two-strike policy on TOS violations is fair. The first violation would be a downgradement to provisional membership for a set period of time (almost like being on probation again), and of course if the person struck again while under provisional membership, then he/she would be out. If he/she serves out this "probation" successfully, then he/she will earn his/her two strikes back if that makes any sense.
Also regular members who become completely idle on the board and noticeably stop contributing the to the forum for an extended period of time I think should also be downgraded to provisional members where it is compulsory to actively contribute to the forum to sustain membership.
Anyway, that's sort of my rough plan for what I would do.
I think the whole provisional/regular member thing would solve a lot of problems and be a good way of giving everyone who wants to be a part of Stormtrack a fair chance to do so. It will weed out those who join and don't bother posting anything insightful about weather (or don't post anything at all), along with those who come onto the board and create problems. BUT it will keep those who are wanting to be an active, useful member of the community (which is what we want from new members, right?).
I also think that it will help police older members who may start better. If you're a regular on here, and your membership is placed on probation for doing something out of line, it will get your attention more and you'll be much much more careful about what you say/do in the future. Things will then be more pleasant for everyone.
Anyway, I welcome your comments/critiques regarding my idea.
I don't agree with a special forum for only more *experienced* people to post or whatever. In my mind, "mindless"posts (ie ones that are made with no original thought like..."oh I agree with so and so" with no reason behind them) are the only things we can be objective about (because it's easy to see when there is no original thought in a post) but beyond that, the quality of a post is really a subjective thing. What one finds useful, another might think as junk and vice versa. By all means, if someone is using their brain to come up with the post and not just paraphrasing someone else, then I don't see a problem with it at all because it may inspire someone else's mind in some way.
And no, I don't think people who come onto Stormtrack to either never post anything or violate the TOS should be allowed to keep their membership because it is doing nothing positive for the forum. So, if I were the head honcho of Stormtrack and I was put in charge of making these changes, here is what I would do:
I actually model this a bit off of the Australian policy for drivers' licenses.
First, I would not discriminate against anyone who wanted to join (except of course spammers). HOWEVER, the first month or two of each new members' membership would be a provisional one. In that period of time, that person must make a certain number of insightful contributions (say maybe 2 or 3) to a weather/chasing-related topic (in other words, the person must either start a thread or post some sort of reply that shows that the person put original thought and effort into his/her posts). If this critera is not met by the time provisional membership is up, then the person's membership will be cancelled and not upgraded to being a regular member.
Also, with provisional memberships, there would be a no-strike policy on TOS violations; if a person under a provisional membership starts a flame or something to that effect, then his/her membership would be revoked on the spot.
Once a person is upgraded to a regular member, I think a two-strike policy on TOS violations is fair. The first violation would be a downgradement to provisional membership for a set period of time (almost like being on probation again), and of course if the person struck again while under provisional membership, then he/she would be out. If he/she serves out this "probation" successfully, then he/she will earn his/her two strikes back if that makes any sense.
Also regular members who become completely idle on the board and noticeably stop contributing the to the forum for an extended period of time I think should also be downgraded to provisional members where it is compulsory to actively contribute to the forum to sustain membership.
Anyway, that's sort of my rough plan for what I would do.
I think the whole provisional/regular member thing would solve a lot of problems and be a good way of giving everyone who wants to be a part of Stormtrack a fair chance to do so. It will weed out those who join and don't bother posting anything insightful about weather (or don't post anything at all), along with those who come onto the board and create problems. BUT it will keep those who are wanting to be an active, useful member of the community (which is what we want from new members, right?).
I also think that it will help police older members who may start better. If you're a regular on here, and your membership is placed on probation for doing something out of line, it will get your attention more and you'll be much much more careful about what you say/do in the future. Things will then be more pleasant for everyone.
Anyway, I welcome your comments/critiques regarding my idea.
Jeff Snyder
EF5
Melissa,
If the phpBB version of ST was around when I was 13-15yrs old, I would have loved to join as well. However, I probably wouldn't have been a valuable contributor to the ST community, mainly because I just didn't know too much. Would I, a non-chaser, have expected membership to a storm chasing community? Certainly not! What would I have done (read: what did I do instead)? I searched for answers to all my questions. There are a bunch of excellent resources on the internet (see other thread) from which non-chasers can learn a LOT from. You don't necessarily need to post a very basic question when you can go to Google and find an answer from a credible resource (NWS, universities, etc) in less time than it would take to formulate a good question. It wasn't the easiest of things -- to go searching for answers to my questions -- but I did it (and so did most others pre-phpBB version of Stormtrack). I do think we should bring back the FAQ as a read-only feature of ST, since there are valuable questions/answers in there.
Similar to what David mentioned earlier -- if I were interested in a hobby, yet didn't participate in the hobby, would I EXPECT membership to discussion forum about that hobby? Heck no. It would be nice, but I probably wouldn't have much to contribute at first... Perhaps after learning about the hobby, and practicing the hobby for a bit, I'll have the knowledge to contribute -- THEN I'll be able to contribute positively.
Stormtrack can be a very valuable tool for beginners, don't get me wrong. Let's get the old FAQ cleaned up and perhaps work on the ST frontpage some. As it is now, anyone can still read all Stormtrack discussion (save Bar and Grill). If you don't chase but think it's cool, then please cruise Stormtrack. There are tons of good discussions here. But, if you don't chase, then I'm not sure how you can expect to be a member of a board who's motto is "serving chasers since 1977". As someone else noted, you can always contact members via their websites, etc. Read up, go on a few chases, and apply for membership!
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