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The nuclear option
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- Two options really
By Charles Chamberlain on Jul 13, 2008 10:44 AM
Either the Watercooler continues forever or we treat off-topic comments like all other successful blogs in the world do and delete them completely. Which would you prefer?
I would rather keep the community we have here together and allow for open discussions on an open thread. But if no one who comes to the Watercooler is willing to respect the concept of this open thread community then.. perhaps you are right and we should no longer "persist in this nonsense" and just delete stuff instead. Is that what you want to see?
Odd, really to see the tactics of a HQ who has had George Lakoff blog here. The difference is between authoritarianism and consensus building. What you're saying Charles, is that the howitzers haven't worked, and now you're promising the nuclear option. Reminds me of the parents you hear in public places threatening their children thusly: You want something to cry about? I'll give you something to cry about.
We've had guest bloggers, and have been asked to keep their threads on topic, and run a parallel open thread alongside the book thread, and exactly *that* happened. The difference between that and this is: the open thread was on the front page, and in no way different than the book discussion thread. What you are offering us is so called "separate but equal" -- and if you know your history, you know how well that worked *in practice.*
You are being deeply dishonest with yourself if you have convinced yourself that the watercloset is anything but a place to flush bloggers who won't obey you. THAT is what we are feeling: a profound insult that goes way beyond name calling. A deep disrespect for who we are, have been, what we have done, and what we do.
No person of color was ever fooled by being told that their separate water fountain was "just as good" as the white water fountain. That the ride in the back of the bus got you where you wanted to go just as did the ride in the front.
I don't know how to ask you to rethink what you have accomplished -- perhaps the request is bigger than the soul you possess? But I do ask.
And thank you for listening.
p.s. ~~ in my personal view, a DFA leader from Florida or N.J. asking you not to front page their local news and projects makes sense ~~ this is, or was, a national blog. That would not seem to mean, to me, that they wished for a change in the national blog. . . . I do know that Chris Chapman came to this blog, often, blogging about what we in West Virginia were doing. He was roundly insulted by a former blogger, protested, left, and has never returned. That former blogger continued, unabated for a good long while afterwards. HQ took zero steps then for the good of the blog. I personally like to hear of what the local chapters are doing. But if that means no comments not pertaining to that post may be made, that's simply nuts. Run parallel threads. But get rid of the watercloset in the third basement down. Please open your eyes before this blog is totally destroyed.
Thanks for posting this. I was just talking to my sweetie about how various other blogs handle the open thread/open commenting issue. So I was surprised to see this sort of truth by blatant assertion coming from management:
treat off-topic comments like all other successful blogs in the world do and delete them completely
Because, as I was saying, it's my experience that some blogs--especially ones where users can't submit their own diaries--are pretty relaxed about off topic comments in main threads. Others typically have at least one open thread a day, and on the main, front page among all the other "real" posts. I am not personally aware of any major "successful" blogs that have a sysem like this.
That's a good point that other blogs (who moderate their comments and don't allow off-topic posting) also have regular open threads on the front page.
That is definitely something we can do here. There is no reason why we couldn't promote the Watercooler threads to the front page regularly. When Tim (our one man tech department) comes back from his vacation next week, I will ask him to make that possible.
Positive suggestions like this make it possible for us to figure out a solution that works better for everyone. Thank you.
self-serving cherry picking on your part, but maybe BFA has really come to accept the Bushellian notion of a one *decider* rule.
"I am the decider."
Poets don’t invent poems
The poem is somewhere behind
It’s been there for a long time
The poet merely discovers it
~ Jan Skácel ~
The following is a quote from Thankful, which many here would agree with, and many would have you digest:
it's certainly understandable that we don't appreciate some of the front page posts that are old news we've already posted about and discussed in our free form style of blogging.
don't forget...
we'd like to work with you to find some solutions. :-)
btw, new post on the other thread.
Why didn't Tim the one man IT finish the work he promised before vacation, ie, archives?
We're all 'roots and in this together. Part of that to me is eliminating the old 'us' and 'them' thinking and replacing it with hey, we have a problem, how can we work together and solve it?
It's certainly understandable that posters don't appreciate the barrage of off topic comments. On the other hand, many of the front-paged threads are mighty hard to stay on topic for any length of time. Like Rich says, adding a sentence or two to genericize and/or stimulate conversation about the general topic would go a long way. Also on the other hand, it's certainly understandable that we don't appreciate some of the front page posts that are old news we've already posted about and discussed in our free form style of blogging. About those posts that get front paged from a comment moved to the wc... IMO, that's not necessarily a bad thing... an objective observation of that is that a comment is seen as off topic on one thread but worthy of a front page post... the poster may have a different perspective. Perhaps add a hat tip to the original poster would be nice.
Having a water cooler in principle is a good idear ~ the name isn't offensive in the least as conversations around the water cooler can be anything On the other hand, IMO, it took on an offensive feel to many when it appeared our conversations were flushed after 24 hours. Thank you for letting us know the archives will become available, that helps :-)
I echo the wish to have parallel Open Threads and would also like to see them switch out less frequently, maybe every 6 hours or so. That would be less disconcerting than the 3 hour snippets and allow for a new thread often enough for dial-up peeps. It would also be a statement that Open Threads are valid along with the others.
Change is difficult, major change more so ~ difficult to implement and difficult to accept. Yes, we were informed a Water Cooler was coming, but my perspective is that HQ, in their frustration to satisfy posters, made a mistake and flipped into an authoritarian mode when they could have said, 'hey, we respect your form of communication but would like to have front page posts stay on topic in respect to those writing them. New folks coming here expect other formats and we're going to have parallel open threads for those who prefer the original bfa format.' On the other hand, many of us reacted in anger when we could have said, 'hey we get it and parallel open threads would be great.'
I can just imagine how hard Tim and Danny are working and believe we all value that. I also believe their intentions were good and they never meant to insult us.
As for the 'personal attacks'. Take heart Tim and Danny, you can't please 'em all all the time. Best to take nothing personally: read, filter so as to hear what the point being made is, and most of all, continue doing the best you can with a small staff. (and believe me, you are not the first in the position to be criticized, it comes with the territory.)
And hey, we have some problems with how this new system is going and we'd like to work with you to find some solutions. :-)
Thanks anni, but not really, I've posted about my displeasure at this new system. At the same time, I'm trying to see this from other's perspectives and take into account what it's like to have 50 things to do and time for only 22, all while keeping everyone happy when that's just one more impossible task. Sometimes solving one problem creates another and that's what's happened here - I'm willing to cut some slack and work to restore the blog.
I never deluded myself that we were invoking Shakespeare here, but there are often some very insightful and and intellingent posts and comments here. I no longer visit here as often as I would like because of the new restrictive blog format. Yes some of the irritants are gone, but I feel like I am being babysat and controlled.
I don't like to come here to complain, particularly since I don't come here very often. But it just isn't 'home' anymore. The problem with that is that without the blog, DFA doesn't seem like home anymore. There are many many options.
DFA started it all. As far as I am concerned there would be no Kos, no Americablog, no Eschcaton, Talking Points, or even Huffpo were it not for DFA. But the contraints are killing us. Let's not be afraid of a few inappropriate remarks or off-color comments. We are grown-ups.
Let this be a 'No Stifle Zone.'
- The on topic threads in no way preclude our original no stifle zone.
By Thankful2Thankful4Dean on Jul 13, 2008 6:37 PM EDTAbsolutely! This is where it all began. And there has been evolution of this space from its inception. As our demographics change, I see no problem evolving to the on topic and parallel open thread format. While we have a long history here others don't, and to attract new bloggers and build a bigger community, change needs to happen. We can adapt, we're da best!
As far as I know, Dailykos is the most popular political blog. I've been a member there since 2004. I am not aware of any comments being removed, other than the obnoxious being hidden. In my time there, I think I've used the troll rating twice.
There are many comments on formatting or humor or even scatalogical references that have nothing to do with the topic below which they appear. Some posters routinely go into great detail about their state of mind, location or social situation to explain, or not, why they are proposing a topic.
I get the sense that some of the DFA staff, including Charles, really don't know what they are talking about. I'd appreciate a list of what he even considers to be "successful" blogs. In my experience, what you want to avoid is commercial spam and obnoxious, insulting commentary, regardless of whether or not it's on topic. The internet is a public forum and public decorum ought to be maintained.
If some people don't want their post on the front, they should indicate that by linking just to their group and HQ should not promote those. There's a simple way to indicate that post are appropriate for the main blog--join the BFA group and select it as a link.
If HQ staff wants more to do, prepare a number of protocol posts to inform the membership how to negotiate the web site. And get the software to be consistent. Every time I send out an invitation to me group to visit the site, I get back email telling me they can't cope.
- I thought kos sells Ad space. All those Ads are the main reason I don't got there.
By Susan Rowe on Jul 13, 2008 9:31 PM EDTI hope DFA HQ is not planning on selling Ad space on their site.
If you have firefox, it's possible to get an add on called Adblock. . . . I haven't seen one single ad at kos for *years*. . . .
- Thanks... I use IE the most but this new DFA website isn't always IE user friendly.
By Susan Rowe on Jul 15, 2008 2:25 PM EDTI do use firefox sometimes to post pictures and videos.
- comments in regards to the Watercooler for 07/13/08 9:00 AM thread...
By Susan Rowe on Jul 13, 2008 9:13 PM EDTCharles Chamberlain wrote on on Jul 13, 2008 11:27 AM:
The decision to implement the new Blog format was done by consensus.
====
Would that consensus have come from those DFA state leaders who are on some list serve you moderate that the DFA local group leaders don't know exists and were never invited to join?
Full disclosure is always needed in order to be able to reach a good consensus.
btw, Who on God's green earth came up with the title "watercooler"? IMHO, it's just an awful word. The word isn't even in spell check.
I wonder what Dr. Lakoff would think about the word "watercooler" being used to describe a community of caring folks. Good grief, you just don't call a group of well intentioned, hard working, intelligent folks an inanimate object and then expect a positive response.
Why didn't you just call the watercooler the blog for America and called your "new" blog the DFA Blog? That would have been the kinder, wiser and more responsible thing to do. The previous DFA website and the Link were even set up to eventually do that. Why did you think you had to re-invent the wheel? I just don't get it.
----
By puddle wrote on Jul 13, 2008 2:31 PM:
Funny thing there, Charles,
In my time on the phone, for Dean (my time, my phone), that is pretty much how some of my most effective calls worked, lol! Peeps who are paying for their phone lines are not all that interested in hearing another HQ's script. If you can turn yourself into their *virtual* neighbor, they actually DO listen to you. . . .
====
puddle, You sure did got that one correct.
That is called loving your neighbor. And that is how you to build a community [the Democratic Party] neighbor by neighbor. Community building just is not all about the business of a singular campaign for one election.
----
Charles Chamberlain wrote on Jul 13, 2008 11:59 AM:
If... ...that volunteer wanted to make calls to voters to tell them about their weekend and their thoughts on a new recipe, then the campaign would not allow that volunteer to keep making phone calls.
====
And yes Charles, we neighbors do share family recipes, food and flowers grown in our gardens and orchards, food that has been lovingly prepared in our kitchens, wine from our cellars and books and videos from our personal libraries. We also open up our homes and yards for community gatherings, hold bake sales, garage sales, car washes and open up our pocketbooks to help out when it is needed.
Neighbors even take on volunteer leadership roles and some even choose to run for political office and are elected to their local, state and the national Democratic Party. And our caring neighbors don't do all this get a pay check. They do it because they care about our community.
The local year round Democrats In Action! office in my area is totally funded and run by volunteers. We don't get a dime from the state or the national Democratic Party. But they and the candidates sure do like that it is there and they all use it when they come through the area. What is interesting is that most never leave a donation towards our efforts.
Water cooler is a derogatory term. Slackers hang out at the office water cooler.
.... Sure, it’s a neat little lexiconian phrase that people in media can use and it’s sure got a nice twang to it and all, but really, honestly, did you ever stand by the watercooler and discuss the day’s events and drink cup after cup after cup after cup of water out of those annoyingly-cheap conical paper-cups that they make you pee into at the doctor’s office?
No, I didn’t think so.
Find me someone who actually does stand around a watercooler and talk about what they saw on TV last night or how they think Bush is doing in his second term or what they did this past weekend or why they’re wearing pumps instead of heels and I’ll give you someone who (a) gets no work done, (b) goes to the bathroom every fifteen minutes, and (c) has really great looking skin due to the neverending imbibing of H20 every second of every day.
Find me someone who actually doesn’t stand around a watercooler and talk about what they saw on TV last night or how they think Bush is doing in his second term or what they did this past weekend or why they’re wearing shoes instead of boots and I’ll give you someone who (a) is excelling in their career, (b) has oily looking skin, and (c) is really going somewhere in this here corporate world of America. ....
Thank-you, puddleriver! ♥ I posted here frequently "back in the day" (the Dean Campaign and the time afterward), as many may recall. However, I haven't been by so much this past year because it does not feel like home anymore. I am not a DailyKos poster and am not saavy about getting around in complex sites. So I'm over at HEP (Howard Empowered) where we can post any ol' thing that's on our minds and in our hearts (and the folks who blog are kind souls); thus the Community that Howard Dean started and encouraged continues on.
Nonetheless, it saddens me that those DFA staffers and interns who came along after the Campaign ended and had never blogged in the early days of THE Blog, are now in charge of it, without a proper understanding of what this blog has meant and can mean to the Dean Community. Is there some way that Tim and Charles and others involved in the decision making could regularly consult with bloggers who comprehend this meaning? The present is important but what this present was founded on needs to be honoured or the blog will wane.
Hopefully this thread itself, with puddle's wise insights and Charles' gracious response, will be followed by Tim's skillful assistance. What can be done, ongoingly, to ensure that what this blog was founded on remains central to the blog's purpose and character, going forward?
Idears?
I'll weigh in -- return the blog to its previous state and get rid of the Watercooler. If Charles, Danny, and Tim want input (ie 'front posts') they could ask. If they need anything, they could ask. But moving posts b/c they are off-topic is infantile and censorship. Maybe this whold thing came about b/c Charles, Danny and Tim felt ignored.
The 'old' blog to me was more like a firehouse. Many kinds of folks who otherwise would never have gotten together were there regularly as if on call, and the threads may not have seemed to always make sense with some comments on topic, mixed in with other conversations and poems, recipes, jokes, baseball chatter, music links, cartoons and whatever else. But to those who were there, it made sense. They were like a group of firefighters doing whatever they could to keep on keeping on and staying loose because sooner or later everyone knew that the fire bell was going to ring, and when it did, the fire fighters would be there to respond...whether it was to respond to a fund raising ''bat'', rapid response to an article, letter to the editor campaign, or an email response to CNN, or any other thing important in the moment.
The old blog worked. It was unique. It is natural to those who were there and fighting hard to miss it.
Good luck to the 'new' blog whatever it may turn out to be...
Great analogy. Right on target.
The new blog? A kos wannabee, after they've sent all the bloggers over there, lol!
Just wonderful,puddle. How did you get to the sidebar?
Thank you, Charles, for listening. What do you mean when you say that the wc threads could be promoted to the front page regularly? How about reversing that and promoting the new topic threads regularly?
What does "regularly" mean?
We need continuity if we're to be on a wc thread and changing it every 3 hours is dizzying.
I think we could have 2 front page threads; one for the stuff that's now being posted and the other wide open with no wc looming in the background.
Better yet, let's just go back to the way it was and have the sidebar receiving the stuff that's now being front paged.
Bomb bomb bomb Iran is right around the corner and there's no discussion since it's wc material - which I find very appalling. I've never been as uninformed politically as I am now, since this mess started. I didn't know about Geppy...but I knew about the Israelis coming to town and posted about it...where is it?
Of course we're upset. You've broken up our family and tied our hands so that we can't discuss anything of great import anymore...
Hoping for the best..........
DFA was intended to be a grassroots up, not the other way around. This has deteriorated into a power struggle with staff looking for something to pad a resume, and the blog floundering without real connection to hdqtrs in things that matter. There is not the needed response to the blogs input about ways to be effectively active. The topics should be about the candidates we are supporting. There is precious little info, and no wonder we've had some duds.
I don't see any resolve to this except to call in Jim Dean and establish just how and what for are we to proceed.
Why hasn't this article been front paged yet!?!
These guys aren't saints. . . .
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By Annilow on Jul 13, 2008 4:45 PM EDTWhat I want to know is 'who' is the 'consensus' who decided to change the blog? If it's Jim Dean and it's his money that's funding the blog, so be it. If it's the 'front post' writers I've seen featured here lately, why are they more important than the traditional bloggers here? The 'front post' writers almost never comment on their own or other 'front posts.' In the case of Kate, she posted her 'front post' on two other blogs and the one at KOS was rec'd a full day before it was featured here. If we wanted to discuss Kate's 'front post' we would have already done so on KOS. Some of the other articles that are 'front posted' that we're supposed to comment on are 1) old news 2) poorly written 3) just someone's opinion or 4) all of the above. Why do those folks count more than us long time bloggers? And why are we forced to discuss them? I for one enjoy the doings of the local DFA chapters, especially when they have pictures :~). It's inspiring to see what others are up to. I also have enjoyed Gary's news roundups, although their formatting is sometimes difficult to read. The articles are usually thought provoking, newsworthy or both. And I was glad for the article on Darcy Burner's thank you note. But most of the others are really quite frankly not worth commenting on. JMO.