Hi,
I fail to see how rep points and the infractions stifles free and open discussion. There are plenty of different areas in the forums to cater for all types of discussions, and if you look at the infractions and rules, they do not stifle anything, except the obvious rules of behaviour we expect in normal everyday life - such as, no slander, no racism, etc.
The reason the rep system is in the state it is in is because people were not using it soley for its intended purpose as a marker to show someone has provided helpful information. The biggest flaw in the rep system was the inability, either deliberately or through stupidity/ignorance, of people giving rep to things that were not rep-worthy. This reflects more on the users than the system itself.
As such, these forums, like any growing community, need rules and they need to be policed or anarchy will ensure. And, sadly, like the current trend in modern society, no one takes responsibility or accountability for themselves. If they did then we would not need rules. If everyone was sensible there would be no need for speed limits on roads, or labels such as "warning- causes drowsiness" on bottles of sleeping pills, etc. People, for some reason, surrender their responsibility to others, rather than owning it themselves. They make it someone elses responsibility to govern their behaviour. The result of this is rules to govern people. The irony is the very same people spit the dummy 'cos they feel they are being strictly ruled and governed!
Perhaps we should throw away all the rep and infractions, and just let it become a big free-for-all mosh-pit? We have just one massive forum where jokes, sales/purchases, technical issues and car rides and conversions are all mixed into the one area?
If I was a normal forum member, I'd probably not give a rat's about rep and infractions. I'd log in, post or read what I have to and I'm done. However, as an admin/mod we don't have that luxury, and we get a lot of messages sent to us that there has been a shit fight in this thread, or that thread is in the wrong section, and another thread is a duplicate, and someone's whoring the place with shit, etc. Now we can do one of three things...
1 - Do nothing. Let it go pear shaped. Let the users search through crap for what they want. Who cares!
2 - Spend all our waking moments moving and cleaning up threads, but don't give any warnings or penalties... just keep fixing the fuck-ups that people do.
3 - Same as point 2, but make sure the culprits incurr some penalty for their lack of consideration and respect for the rules and, more so, for the greater forum users.
Anyone can shoot holes into any system we put up. But, at least we are trying different solutions. If you have a workable solution then let's hear it, 'cos we are getting a tad tired of people pointing out issues with what we are doing (or proposing) without the forethought of offering a workable solution themselves.
seeyuzz
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