Padlocks and Russia....

[BurnR8]

I am not one for being shy, and I appreciate this board a great deal, so please hear me out. I have learned more here than I could have hoped for and my savings account can attest to my belief in the sponsors, and the quality of their products. All that being said, it gaul's me to no end to see a dialogue begin (positive or negative) and then be shut down because it may show a "sponsor" in a negative light. Hearsay has no place, rumor is just that, but if people want to talk about their experience....LET THEM! I was vocal for a while about ONE tuner in particular....I said my mind and now I am done....I do not buy anything from "them" and that is that....but to padlock threads....remove them, or edit them, defeats the purpose of this board.....I know I do not have to be here, but I enjoy the board and have made friends here....I would hate to leave due to censorship or capricious edits....Please let people speak their mind....That is what makes the Net a great thing.....If I wanted to read a bunch of **** ups I could read MotorTrend....Flame me if you want, but it is not like a bunch of pansies wrote our Constitution.....it took months of ******ng and yelling to get it right...Free speech is healthy and should be welcomed....sorry for the rant....

 

[Sniper]

Nicely said!

 

[Mike Brunton]

BurnR8,

You are dead right on this one. WHY WHY WHY do threads get locked without any explanation? Makes me want to stop visiting this site when I see that sort of thing...

Here is the posting guideline...

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>The following types of messages are UNACCEPTABLE:
Profane, gross, ****** (language and images). Inflammatory statements, Inappropriate posts - Examples: Inaccurate or incorrect information, Non-viper by non-members, Commercial non-viper announcements, Test posts or posting mistakes, Forgery, impersonation or invalid return e-mail. Anything retracted by poster, Personal assaults or name calling, Posts of no interest to members of the Viper community, Ads (Site includes free classifieds for members) No return E-mail (this is post dependent and at moderator discretion).
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

So what policy exactly did Marc's thread violate? Yeah, it was annoying in the beginning when he posted 10 times a week about getting burned by HMS, but it seems to me that this time he tried to post in a positive and constructive way - but his thread was still locked.

At the very least, the moderators need to post a note at the end of ANY locked thread indicating WHY the thread is being locked and WHO locked it, so that issues can be taken up with the moderator who locked the thread directly.

I've said this about 10 times now - why is nobody listening? Is it SO hard to just leave a note before you lock a thread, saying something like "I am closing this for XYZ reasons". Then we know WHY, and WHO to contact if we have a problem with it!

Can whoever is ultimately responsible for this site please comment on this? I think everyone here is willing to work with you guys to make this place an enjoyable place, but all I am asking for is that moderators post a note before they lock a thread. Can we make that a policy change? So far I've asked a bunch of times but heard no answer - if the answer is "no we will not make that the policy" then so be it, but I'd like to know either way.

My .02

 

[Kevin ACR]

This thread got me wondering whether a bias to be sensitive towards sponsoring members might exist?

Clearly the participants here are an intelligent group capable of determining what they want to read and buy into. I come here to learn all I can, good and bad. I value knowing how business has been handled with others.

Having all the data is a good thing. Tone, attitude, vindictiveness, maliciousness, hidden agendas eventually reveal themselves to the readers.

I'm with the majority here, I prefer to see it all. I'll sort out what I need to know at my discretion. Thanks.

 

[BurnR8]

don't feel sad about anything....even if you are right and it was a redundant thread....it was not the "positive" thread that was locked....it was the negative thread that was locked.....Let Electronic Darwinism take its course....if a thread *****, or is redundant, it will soon go to the bottom of the pond never to be seen again....that is pretty darn simple. I am not trying to Slam the moderators here(you guys work hard here), I just want the rules to be clear to all, and have everyone that functions within them have the right to be heard....candidly, some of the whiny threads bug me big time....so I just stop reading them.

 

[Mike Brunton]

Guys,

I have posted here about 10 times saying that I strongly feel that any moderator closing a thread should post a one-line explanation of why. That way, anyone who disagrees can take it offline with the moderator. I know there is a time issue involved - and the moderators work for free, but I still think it is appropriate to leave a note. As BurnR8 said, electronic darwinism will play it's course, and the dramatically unpopular decisions will create a lot of noise, whereas the obviously good decisions will never be questioned. It works on the Corvette forum! Quite frankly, I think if someone doesn't have time to respond to questions about why they closed something, then maybe they shouldn't be a moderator due to lack ot time - my opinion only.

In addition to that, I want to say that I hope NOBODY thinks there is some kind of "conspiracy" going on here. I definitely think that someone is a bit trigger happy with the lock button, but it wasn't the moderators who post here (Tony, Jay, Joe), etc. In general, all moderators and admins are working their collective butts off to provide us with a good resource, and doing their best to keep things civil, informative, and on-topic. If we, as a group, don't like something that is going on, then we should bring it to their attention, but we should ALSO offer to do our part to alleviate the problem.

I still think any moderator closing a thread should say why they are doing it, and I will commit whatever is necessary to help make that happen... but I definitely DON'T think a bad job is being done, just that we have an opportunity to improve things and make everyone happy in the process.

 

[BurnR8]

I want to reiterate that I made this post because I REALLY LIKE THIS BOARD....if nothing else, it was meant to be constructive criticism and not a slam...The moderators do a great job, I just wanted to see things run their course within the rules of the game....Heck! I have crossed the line a few times myself and should have been censored because I broke the rules....I was just trying to say that no one should be shut down for playing it straight even if they are boring, redundant, or whiny. Come on guys!! I can feel the love!!....koom by ya ma'lord...koom by ya

 

[Mike Brunton]

Awww, can't you just feel the love in the room? Come on everyone, group hug! (not you Kid, I don't want someone grabbing my cheeks)

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In all seriousness BurnR8, I didn't mean you when I was saying how we need to respect the board, etc. There are a couple of people I know on this board who feel that there is some conspiracy thing going on, and I know they will read this thread. I know and respect the moderators of the board, and just wanted to publicly say that there is nothing fishy going on here - just someone is a bit trigger happy with locking the threads.

Vipermad,

I know you feel that this is a simple thing why one of them was locked, but NOBODY here thought "Oh, it must be because they were similar threads", so obviously it *wasn't* clear why it was locked

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. No offense, and not trying to be harsh, but that's just how I see it. As for "would a not saying the threads were similar and one is being locked make us happy"... YES. VERY HAPPY. To me, that says "if you have something to say in this thread, post it in the other one". If one of them just gets locked, I have no idea if it was the content that was offensive, or whether it has already been discussed recently, etc.. a note leaves no room for speculation or harsh feelings, or "conspiracy theories", and it lets people know they should post negative experiences in the other thread.


Now, like Kid97GTS, I too would like to know who the mysterious person is who is locking all these threads! Is it Juergen (or however its spelled) himself?

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If so, maybe he can tell us more about the '03!

 

[Tony Estes]

A problem came to my attention over a year ago about a problem the moderators were having.Everytime they deleted or closed a thread they tried to justify to the person why they closed it. This started numerous negative threads as the persons who's thread was closed or deleted tried to argue how the moderator was wrong.We had a couple of moderators quit and the rest were getting tired of spending their valuable time on senseless responses to people who just don't get it.

I instituted a policy that the moderators and administrators simply close or delete any post or thread with no explanation.
We have seen two other Viper boards go down in flames because of senseless and inane arguing. THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN ON OUR NATIONAL VCA WEBSITE.

If you would like to talk to me about it call me at 623-877-8144.

Regards,
Tony Estes

 

[Kid97GTS]

NOTE 1: I think Mike's point is very simple and entirely valid - why not just post a one line note explaing WHY threads are locked. You can even use shorthand, like "******* off sponsor - will lose money" or "smack has gone over the line" or "IEAT has become abusive." A concise note would save the time and hassle of responding to an entire thread in an attempt to justify a moderator's actions.

NOTE 2: I don't think anyone is attacking or necessarily criticizing Vipercrazy. I think he's actually been doing a better job letting threads play out without slapping on the lockdown (if in fact, he was ever the one doing the locking, see NOTE 3), and it's a given that he spends quite a bit of his free time sheparding the board to make sure it runs smoothly. Mike has just made a simple SUGGESTION of dropping a note along with the padlock. This is kind of a yes/no proposal, it doesn't really need numerous explanations stating that we, the ones backing the suggestion, should have been able to go back and look at the subject matter of all posts made to deduce the reasoning behind the lock. It's not my fault it's yours, no yours, no yours, no yours.......blah blah.

NOTE 3: Finally, WHO is the person or persons that are pulling the strings on the various locked threads when the moderators claim "it wasn't me"? Is Helmut or Hans from DC getting on the horn at 4 am German time and telling Tony to lock it down?