Is this place still better than Political Panic?

[Dennis]

[WizardfromOz]

Okay I have only been back here a little while and I never got involved in Political Panic - but something I have seen here is the condensing of threads because of derails and off topic posts. I dont mention this as a negative but a lot of interesting discussions become absorbed in thread titles that dont hint to what is going on.

First example

A thread was started about water being found on Mercury - Interesting and worth a thread, but really what is there to debate

In same thread however

A discussion broke out over the origins of life on Earth

Christian fundamentalist approach to the question of evolution.

Second example

A thread was started over favorite periods of history

We ended up with an engaging debate of Roman Republic Vs Roman Empire

And abortive discussion of medieval economic models in Western Europe and their possible Roman origins

Possibly the answer is to have the mod team bud these discussions away from the parent thread. Anyone looking in, considering do they want to join, will see a bigger and apparently more active forum, with potentially more topics that suit their tastes

[The Comrade]

funny you mention those two because i wanted to make a couple of threads based off those discussions. with school being crazy at the moment though i haven't had much time to write up voluntary essays, mostly just quick posts during breaks.

[WizardfromOz]

[uebermann]

[NAB]

[exploited]

He does bring up a good point how splitting threads would give the appearance of a forum being busier, and would encourage people to hop in without the pressure of responding to the OP.

It is not a bad idea, IMO. It should be done sparingly, when the conversation has drifted away significantly, but I think it would go along way.

[Bill_in_Bethlehem]

the community here is too small to have additional mods or it would be overkill - sometimes i go to "active topics" and it will have been over an hour since a single post was made in any thread

and thats something else that contributes to the problem

such a tight knit community of you regulars - you guys get protective of your e-reputations

hence so many threads devolve into one-on-one battles of people just looking for any way to declare a "victory" rather than an exchange of ideas

[lnrw]

The folks that have been here and posted the most have birthed the culture. If that's how it is, then that's how it is.

Not to say that it won't evolve into something other than what it is in infancy.

It's mellow and there's worse things.