Close the Aldershot forum

a) It’s offtopic (by design)
b) Having the effect of decreasing the signal to noise ratio of the forums in general.

Alternatively, remove the Aldershot posts from https://www.riscosopen.org/forum/posts

This place is degenerating into another csa.misc, being about as useful.

Can you not just skip over those posts?
You know, like I do with stuff that isn’t I don’t find to be of interest…

The point is there is no point in having the Aldershot thread and moving conversations there because those of us who view the site via recent posts have to wade through it all anyway.

What a good idea. Get rid of all that crap.

Can you not just skip over those posts?

Not easily, if you’re reading via Recent Posts. I quite often read the forum on a phone whilst on the bus, and last night I gave up because I couldn’t find the interesting, RISC OS related, stuff.

Also, this site is a “public face” of RISC OS these days. Religion and politics are usually divisive, and I’m not sure that having them discussed so visibly (see above) actually helps make the platform look welcoming to potential new users. The regular discussions about Trump and Brexit also fall into this category, along with other stuff.

Finally, some of the posts from the past couple of days look to be bordering on the kind of thing that could cause ROOL some legal bother if reported. I’m not sure that policing the posts to ensure that they don’t step over the current line is a good use of anyone’s already limited time¹, and I’m also not sure that dealing with any fallout would be a good use of ROOL’s limited income.

So, as I posted yesterday: could I suggest that the ROOL Forums are not the place for this full stop?

¹ I know that Dave H deals with spam, but does anyone ensure that posts are “legally” OK?

I’m not particularly interested in visiting Aldershot myself but wouldn’t want to see the town and its free-speaking citizens destroyed.

Anyway, having somewhere for threads to drift to is useful and losing that ability might introduce new problems for policing the relevance of content on other forums.

It sounds like Aldershot’s presence in Recent Posts is the real problem. Is there any scope for excluding Aldershot content from Recent Posts? How much work would that be?

I don’t if this a real problem but why not remove the Aldershot and Test from the ‘Recent Post’ . Then indeed only relevant RISCOS items popup instead of the non-relevant items.

So, as I posted yesterday: could I suggest that the ROOL Forums are not the place for this full stop?

I absolutely agree with Steve’s sentiments.

I suppose the argument in favour of having the Aldershot forum is that it serves the same purpose as the Playpen on The Icon Bar: some people just can’t help themselves and will happily post whatever pops into their head into any discussion, so you need a place to contain it. But there are already places for it: the Playpen for forum addicts and csa.misc for everyone else.

does anyone ensure that posts are “legally” OK?

If I had grounds to believe anything I saw here to be a legal problem, I’d do something about it. Do you see anything so far that might be on the wrong side of the law? I don’t. Nothing anywhere near a problem AFAICS.

Nothing anywhere near a problem AFAICS.

That’s my impression too. Blasphemy isn’t a crime in the UK, and I don’t think anyone’s even come near that. Much less incitement to violence or incitement to racial hatred (which are, of course, and rightly so).

Not to mention, you would invite a boatload of legal problems if you started actively moderating posts (as opposed to removing those reported or those clearly intended to be offensive) because performing active moderation implies that you accept (and accept responsibility for) those posts that are permitted. When anybody can sign up and submit a message, that’s not a smart move. The current style of moderation is better, don’t get involved unless there is reason to do something… Thankfully said reason around here is pretty much always spam.

My personal opinion is that the forum should stay; I’ve seen on other forums that if you don’t have a place for random stuff then it’ll inevitably clutter up other threads.

I do agree with having an option to hide Aldershot (and Tests) posts from the Recent Posts feature; that way you can completely ignore this forum if you’re not interested in it.

Don’t forget the RSS feed.

Maybe then I’d be more inclined to keep up, more often.

Personally, I vote for closing the Aldershot Forum. Its only valid reason for existence is the theory that off-topic chatter would be concentrated there and would reduce it in other topics of the forum. However, looking at the trend to off-topic chatter in so many threads shows me that this did not work out. The signal-to-noise-ratio got a lot worse in recent years.

Since there are millions of forums for all kind of non-RISC OS topics, Aldershot is clearly non-essential for the ROOL site, RISC OS, the RISC OS community. Just close it.

Since there are millions of forums for all kind of non-RISC OS topics, Aldershot is clearly non-essential for the ROOL site, RISC OS, the RISC OS community. Just close it.

But, but… All these Steves and Steffens, these Ricks and Chris’es, they’ve become acquaintances to me. Not that I ever met them, or even know how they look like, but they’re all part of a community that I feel at home with. I love to read what they think about whatever subject, not only RISC OS related.
I, for one, would really miss the Aldershot.

But, but… All these Steves and Steffens, these Ricks and Chris’es, they’ve become acquaintances to me. Not that I ever met them, or even know how they look like, but they’re all part of a community that I feel at home with. I love to read what they think about whatever subject, not only RISC OS related.
I, for one, would really miss the Aldershot.

What he said! I think a place for ROOL posters to socialise, should they wish to, is a good thing. Those of us who don’t get out much will certainly benefit from that. ;)

I also think that requesting a whole sub-forum be completely removed simply because your chosen technology for viewing the forum makes it hard to avoid it seems a bit harsh. There’s got to be a better solution than that.

In fact, if it frustrated me to that degree, I think I’d throw together my own proxy or browser to filter that information out. “Recent Posts” does show the Topic by each post. A couple of regular expressions might even do it. I don’t blame you guys for asking though.

Regarding the concerns about Aldershot affecting the public perception of RISC OS Open, most of those effects would be mitigated if that forum could just be made visible to registered users only. Having said that, it’s very clear that it’s an Off Topic area of the site by design and almost all other internet forums have something similar. The political debates and so on are rife everywhere on the internet. Yes they can become tiresome and in some cases can alienate people but I don’t think anyone should be especially surprised or offended to see them there.

On other forums like phpbb the view of Recent or New Posts is usually threaded so you’d have to choose which part of the site you wanted to read. If enough people feel strongly about it, I agree there probably should be a way to hide Aldershot optionally from them but I don’t think it’s fair to ditch the whole thing.

But there are already places for it: the Playpen for forum addicts and csa.misc for everyone else.

I like the implication, also, they because a person participates in these forums, that they take part in all forums.

I don’t. This, here, is the only forum I am active in. I used to frequent the NeurosTechnology forums (where I got promoted to Global Moderator ;-) ) but that has been inactive for a long time.
From time to time I pop by csa.whatever, but I find Pluto awkward and the Usenet reader in my phone is worse. Besides, arguing something non RISC OS related in csa.misc? Are you crazy? Some of the people there can’t handle bad grammar, never mind off topic stuff.

Besides, one of the useful things talking about politics or whatever here is the participants are generally sufficiently well educated as to have a reasonable counter argument, plus there are fairly few of us who take part so things come and go pretty quickly. Like that one about the religion that shall not be named lest it offends somebody somewhere quickly became about the proof or otherwise of a God, which became whether or not every assertion needs to be considered via scientific methodology or if one can discount the obviously mad, which then become the difference between that which is theoretical and that which isn’t. And now might have died out…
… Leaving this, gloriously, off topic thread in the wish lists. Which to me looks like unless somebody is proposing to create a crap filter withing RISC OS itself, probably ought to have gone to… Yeah, you guessed it… Aldershot!

PS: and I rather suspect discussing anything involving Is**m and tear-ists in the same sentence elsewhere would have instantly generated thousands of messages full of self-righteous indignation and extreme views on both sides. At least here people with functioning brains participated.

Hear, Hear! – to what Rick, Andy S & Paul have just said.

The best way to destroy a community is to stop it communicating. I have to wonder about the etymology of those to words. Hmm.

My suggestion, based on my own personal thoughts which others can choose to ignore, is to keep Aldershot and Test. Remove both from RSS. Add some basic ground rules about keeping things civil. Ie. things you could discuss around the dinner table without inciting an argument. I thought something like that was in place already, but I guess not?

The best way to destroy a community is to stop it communicating.

Irrelevance is destructive too.

The first post in this topic makes the point beautifully.

This place is degenerating into another csa.misc, being about as useful.

csa.misc has now degenerated itself into almost oblivion.

The RISC OS Open Forum is the first RISC OS site I go to when I sniff the air in the morning. I do not contribute often, but I have to confess that as I senesce I am less able to provide useful technical information. Aldershot provides a welcome displacement activity. Dulce est desipere in loco . But if it were to become a liability, too tasteless, a stain upon the RISC OS community, then it should be first to go. I have a number of hobby horses, some relevant to RISC OS, others not. When I exercise them, as often as not, the thread closes. Whether it is because I have struck the readers dumb and caused their eyes to roll upwards in pity, or because I have said the last word, I do not know. Anyway, the forum seems to be a very friendly and polite place on the whole. Long may it continue so.

The RISC OS Open Forum is the first RISC OS site I go to when I sniff the air in the morning.

The RISC OS Open Forum is the only RISC OS site I go to (except sometimes riscository).

When I exercise them, as often as not, the thread closes.

Perhaps it is your erudite nature leads the rest of us to Wikipedia for an explanation in simple words, but assures that nobody will be brave enough to reply?

It’s not bad, mind you. A while back you posted something that seemed gibberish so I looked it up. Wandered into Homer’s Odyssey. Thought to myself “this stuff sounds familiar” which led me to remember a cartoon I used to watch as a kid – Ulysses 31, which I found on YouTube a couple of months ago. Great soundtrack.

Keep on going Gavin, your many varied references are making us smarter. ;-)

Dulce est desipere in loco

Softness despises madness? Okay, it’s Google time again…
[edit: this? ^^^ uh, no, not quite (^_^) ]