An Annual State of the Site Speech?

[crazyyaya 4]

As Simtrop reaches it;s fifth year of showcasing, I began to think about the 'State of the Site". I thought it would be neat if the Top Moderators and founders of the Site like Dirk gave an annual speech on the welfare of Simtrop, possibilities for the future, reflecting on the past. Really just giving a general sum up of the Simcity Community. Just an idea, any thoughts?

[topcliff 1]

Sounds like an interesting idea. An address on certain aspects of the site and other stuff would be good. Let the people see what's really going on around here. No, I'm not saying there's conspiracies around here. I mean, with Cities Unlimited and Societies coming out soon, it would be cool. Let's see what the Admins think of this first though.

[Glenni 1,447]

Lol, kinda like the new years speach the queen of the UK gives, or the Norwegian king at each new year.

Sounds cool.

[Micah 16]

Interesting. However, seeing how this site isn't a democracy or monarchy... well, I'll let you put the puzzle pieces together...

[crazyyaya 4]

Originally posted by: Micah Interesting. However, seeing how this site isn't a democracy or monarchy... well, I'll let you put the puzzle pieces together... quote>

 

True, still, I think it would be neat to see a founder like Dirk's opinion on the years events and prospects for the future, especially, as others have pointed out, the release of City's Unlimited and SSC.

I'd really like to hear what other Mod's think of this idea. By the way, thanks for commenting Micah.

[Jasoncw 11,949]

I personally think it's a good idea, and I do it in the BAT - Open Discussion.  I think it would be good if Dirk wrote such a speech.

[purpledaddy 6]

Wow, is this your way of saying that Dirk and the staff need to be more visible??

[Mikeaut1 261]

Originally posted by: purpledaddy Wow, is this your way of saying that Dirk and the staff need to be more visible?? quote>

What, we aren't visible enough? I like this idea as well. It would be cool to see some up-to-date information regarding the site and what we should expect in terms of change within the short term future.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

A presidential address summing up the year's main events and proposals for the future like a government state of the nation or throne speech given by the dirktator would be nice.  I am reluctant to put any more burden on those broad shoulders, though.

[zane900 1]

Judging by what I've observed on SimTropolis, I'm not sure this would be up the Dirktatorship's alley. My observations may not be accurate, however.

[crazyyaya 4]

Maybe I'll email him about the idea, I know he's got alot of his plate, if he rejects it, fine with me. It's worth taking a shot of asking though.

[Duke87 1,070]

I dunno. Such a "speech" would be a slippery slope, because if even one unpopular thing is said, it could potentially turn into huge argument/debate/fight, and if that happened the outcome wouldn't be pretty. You know those Burmese protesting monks getting killed by the government's attempts  to suppress them? Think something like that, only with average members instead of monks and massive bannings as opposed to massive killings. So in a way it's better that the administration remain silent unless it becomes necessary for them to speak, lest they end up giving people fodder to start fights with (even though that would obviously be unintentional). And even if no fights start, it can still create resentment and dislike in the community, and that's not a good thing either.

Let's face it, people are opinionated creatures, and whenever someone in a position of power says something, they potentially make enemies by doing so. Sure, you have the policy of "if you don't like it, no one's making you stay", but wouldn't it be better for the community as a whole if fewer people were driven away because of this? Think about it. Statements by leaders often get blown out of proportion, and it's not all that uncommon for them to state an intent and then not carry though on it for some reason or other. George Bush made a lot of enemies when he proposed an amendment banning gay marriage (I'm one of them!), which he then never did anything towards actually accomplishing. Had he kept his mouth shut about it, he might be a bit better liked. I'd hate to see dirk or someone else here make a similar mistake.

...of course, I could be wrong here. The fact that it's the internet and not the real world might significantly affect the situation for the better. Or it could affect it for the worse. Hard to say.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

But what if it was a locked topic, duke?

[JanYpe 17]

Originally posted by: N_O_Body But what if it was a locked topic, duke?quote>

 

People would open their own seperate threads, find their favorite molehills from the speech and start terraforming?

[Sam 163]

Originally posted by: Duke87 I dunno. Such a "speech" would be a slippery slope, because if even one unpopular thing is said, it could potentially turn into huge argument/debate/fight, and if that happened the outcome wouldn't be pretty...

...So in a way it's better that the administration remain silent unless it becomes necessary for them to speak, lest they end up giving people fodder to start fights with (even though that would obviously be unintentional). And even if no fights start, it can still create resentment and dislike in the community, and that's not a good thing either.

Let's face it, people are opinionated creatures, and whenever someone in a position of power says something, they potentially make enemies by doing so. Sure, you have the policy of "if you don't like it, no one's making you stay", but wouldn't it be better for the community as a whole if fewer people were driven away because of this? Think about it. Statements by leaders often get blown out of proportion, and it's not all that uncommon for them to state an intent and then not carry though on it for some reason or other. George Bush made a lot of enemies when he proposed an amendment banning gay marriage (I'm one of them!), which he then never did anything towards actually accomplishing. Had he kept his mouth shut about it, he might be a bit better liked. I'd hate to see dirk or someone else here make a similar mistake.

...quote>

Its something that could happen to anyone on any forum, regardless of what position they hold.

I don't think the answer is to silence people, or worse, to silence some and not others. I think a better solution is for people to learn to discuss things in a mature manner and learn to deal appropriately with discussing their own opinion and others discussing their opinions.

This main purpose of this site is as a discussion forum, and for most of us that's why we enjoy it. I don't think we need to be afraid of people discussing things and because of that fear, stop them doing so. I think most people can handle it sensibly.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Originally posted by: JanYpe

Originally posted by: N_O_Body But what if it was a locked topic, duke?quote>

 

People would open their own seperate threads, find their favorite molehills from the speech and start terraforming?quote>

More power to them.  If they get out of hand we can lock or archive these easily.  Make work?

[Duke87 1,070]

Originally posted by: sam I think a better solution is for people to learn to discuss things in a mature manner and learn to deal appropriately with discussing their own opinion and others discussing their opinions. quote>

I'm pretty sure we could achieve that. It would only require sending a blizzard hell's way.

Seriously, this is the internet. Being mature? Using common sense? Those ideas are completely foreign here.

Remember, it only takes one hothead to start trouble and ruin everything. A discussion staying mature and appropriate requires that all participants keep that way. Everyone is failure critical. If only one person says one bad thing, the whole framework falls apart. A civil discussion is an unstable equilibrium. One tiny nudge away from that and it will quickly descend into chaos if something isn't quickly done to counter it. It doesn't matter that most people can handle it sensibly, not everyone can.

Originally posted by: N_O_Body

Originally posted by: JanYpe

Originally posted by: N_O_Body But what if it was a locked topic, duke?quote>

 

People would open their own seperate threads, find their favorite molehills from the speech and start terraforming?quote>

More power to them.  If they get out of hand we can lock or archive these easily.  Make work?quote>

But see, this is exactly what I'm concerned about. It doesn't look good when you have a lot of threads getting locked or archived. You can remove the thread, but you can't remove the resentment or the opinions. Locking threads and whatnot don't actually solve the problem, they're just damage control measures. Once the issue has come up, you can't just shut it up and pretend it never existed. You can forbid people from talking about it, but you can't forbid people from thinking about it. And those negative thoughts will impact things negatively in other ways. The problem is ultimately unsolvable once it's there, but it's also perfectly preventable if one avoids defecating in the vicinity of fans.

[Mikeaut1 261]

You make a real valid point, Duke87. Taking into account the community's past history, the arguments here can get pretty brutal. 

But do you really think that Dirk's speech (hypothetically if he gives one, it depends on a whole series of things, time probably being the major aspect), will breed argument and resentment in the community? We still don't even know if Dirk is giving a speech, and even if he is, we don't know what it will comprise of. And don't get me wrong, I understand you totally and you make really valid points in your posts, because the powers the staff posess can only do so much in a situation as you've described above. I just don't see an update given by Dirk regarding the site  causing some major argument as you have depicted. 

I agree with Sam's following quote:

This main purpose of this site is as a discussion forum, and for most of us that's why we enjoy it. I don't think we need to be afraid of people discussing things and because of that fear, stop them doing so. I think most people can handle it sensibly. quote>

I think as a whole, most of this community can discuss and argue maturely. With all the arguments we've seen on this site, the majority of the people invovled have self control and maturity in their posts. Hopefully if Dirk does happen to release a statement, there won't be arguments that lead to chaos on Simtropolis.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Duke, you can't win this one.  We are talking about an enitrely hypothetical situation.  You should take a page from life and "Don't borrow trouble". 

You must know by now what it takes for a thread to be locked or archived by a moderator.  It is a very difficult decision, and usually done in consultation with other staff members.  While our decisions may seem arbitrary and illogical to you, I assure you we only do things like this for the good of the community.  Flame wars, as you know, are not allowed.  Slanging other members with seriously negative semantics is also not allowed.

As a good citizen of this board you know that debates are necessary part of any set of discussions.  Debate, however, can be polite and avoid becoming unruly.  If a member can't handle that, we always try to call him to order privately before any other action is taken.  Since this is a PG13 board, there are a lot of people on here who exhibit "growing pains" from time to time.  We try to help them toward more maturity.

Why you should believe that anything dirk might say would be seriously controversial is beyond me.  If the board goes in a direction you can't live with, you can simply drop out as the ultimate defense, but I am sure I speak for everyone when I say we'd hate to lose you.

[ShortStraw 1]

Originally posted by: Duke87

Originally posted by: sam I think a better solution is for people to learn to discuss things in a mature manner and learn to deal appropriately with discussing their own opinion and others discussing their opinions. quote>

I'm pretty sure we could achieve that. It would only require sending a blizzard hell's way.

Seriously, this is the internet. Being mature? Using common sense? Those ideas are completely foreign here.

Remember, it only takes one hothead to start trouble and ruin everything. A discussion staying mature and appropriate requires that all participants keep that way.

quote>

I frequent a number of other message boards and I feel compelled to point out that the members here are remarkably well behaved.  I've seen discussion of the two most sensitive topics, politics and religion, remain amazingly well behaved and on-topic.  This is why I keep coming back here.  Well, that and the invaluable SC4 advice, heh.  Most message board sites tend to be overmoderated or undermoderated resulting in a complete lack of "free speech" or an impossible display of stupid flame wars.  The moderators here are about as "fair and balanced" as I've seen.

While I share Dukes overall opinion of the sad state of the internet on the whole, I do think this site could handle a "State of the Site" style mission statement.

[Haljackey 17,398]

Well, as it says, at the bottom of every thread on this site: "Contact the webmaster: dirktator at simtropolis dot com"

One could always contact the Driktator if they wanted to the know the status of the website or a certain issue. If a speech were to be made public, it would have its pros and cons. Every action has a consequence, weather good or bad. Generally, speeches like this help strengthen the morale of soldiers, countrymen, or followers (from a cult, faction, etc). However, on this site, we all come from various countries, with various ideologies and opinions. Although we share a common interest: Sim City, that is not enough as say a soldier who is committed to serve his country; and possibly, die for it. For such stressful duties, something to damage the morale can spread quite quickly. Speeches are a way to repair these strains on the people, letting them know the future looks bright no matter how bad the past was (the past is the past), shattering their doubt and replacing it with hope.

Is is for this reason that I do not think that an "Annual State of the Site" speech is needed. I am not against this, but I am just stressing that we do not need one. We are all not as committed to this site as others, and as Duke stated "Humans are opinionated creatures". Why die for your country if you don't sand up for what your country believes in?  We, as a community just need something more than a liking for a fictional game if such a speech would need to be made.

[Cleaner475 150]

I like the idea but it would be more suited to a smaller site in my opinion - I think there are to many different things to talk about on a big site if you get what I mean.

Richard

[Duke87 1,070]

Originally posted by: N_O_Body You must know by now what it takes for a thread to be locked or archived by a moderator.  It is a very difficult decision, and usually done in consultation with other staff members.  While our decisions may seem arbitrary and illogical to you, I assure you we only do things like this for the good of the community.  quote>

I never said it seemed illogical or arbitrary. Whenever a thread gets locked, it's usually immediately apparent why.

Why you should believe that anything dirk might say would be seriously controversial is beyond me. quote>

I'm not saying that it will happen, but I am saying that it's not impossible. You never know. I'm just trying to air on the side of caution.

If the board goes in a direction you can't live with, you can simply drop out as the ultimate defense, but I am sure I speak for everyone when I say we'd hate to lose you.quote>

I also never said I was talking about myself personally. I am near impossible to actually offend... but some people seem to offend quite easily. I'm concerned about the overall community, not myself.

----------

Besides, I say these things because nobody else is saying them and, whether you agree with them or not, it is helpful that they be said so they are not overlooked. A discussion gets very boring and loses productivity if no dissenting opinion is ever presented. If everyone just says, "yeah, that's a good idea!", none of the possible concerns will ever get considered.

I myself do not expect that a "state of the site speech" would result in such consequences, but one can't deny that the possibility is there. It is thus better that it be mentioned lest it get overlooked and mistakes be made making it more likely.

Anyway, now it's been said, and there really isn't anything more to say about it, so let's drop it.

[Palpatine001 57]

How on Earth can a small speech from the Dirktator really whip up Simtrop War (I think is 13 now )

An annual piece summing the achievements of the site and members (like the trixies) and then giving goals and his own opinion on what is happening would be a read I would sit down for.

Actually the idea would work well after the Annual Trixie Awards as the site is congraulating on achievements from the year anyhow.

Lets see what the higher ups think

[crazyyaya 4]

I'd just like to post here that I emailed Dirk awhile ago. I forgot to tell you guys. Anyways, he says he has been watching this thread and if we're lucky he might just post his thoughts here.

[Cleaner475 150]

ok - I would like to see one - it only has to be a paragraph or two every year - I think it would be nice - also give us lot something to talk about

Richard