Guys I realize that this specific forum is always the most active and has the highest profile, but please keep your posts on topic. This forum is general Cobalt discussion. I see lots of stuff thats not even close to on topic. So when you post please make sure it's in the right section. This specific forum is getting cluttered with off topic posts.

So when your going to start a thread scroll down the page and make sure you have the right forum. Otherwise it will get moved and you get a point against you in my super secret moderator score card.

 

Then you wouldn't have anything to do.

 

oh I have plenty. When I am not helping Jonel with the videos, or special projects, I read pretty much every posts on the board to make sure it's not out of line. As the site grows we are bound to get some smacktards in here stirring up trouble.

I am sure it will get a lot worse once the SS SC comes out and we start beating some of the imports and then they come to the site to talk smack.

 

zinner are you the only moderator?!

 

Yeah unfortunently you are right things will only get worse. That's what I was telling Jonel last week.

From my experience its very hard to keep people on topic. Its even harder to get them to post in the right area. Its a simple concept but people are in such a hurry and just dont pay attention or they just dont care. But it makes your job harder as moderators/administrators harder. And having redirects because people cant post in the right forums really doesnt look that good.

 

I think things will only get better.

We have an active group of moderators and a great Admin. I don't think we will have any trouble keeping the site on track.

 

stay on target... STAY ON TARGET!

 

I think your misunderstanding what I'm saying.I'm not trying to be negative, and I'm not saying the moderators like yourself and Jonel cant handle it or dont have the ability. I'm just saying that as any board grows and has thousands of members the number of problems increase. Even if a problem is solved I still consider it a problem. Like if someone posts something in a wrong area and then the administraton of the board move it.Or just like a new member the joined my forum yesterday and started spamming every thread he could about how the 2.4L engine in the grand am is junk and needs to be recalled. Now of course myself and my moderators deleted all the posts within a few minutes of them being posted. But that is still a problem. I am very confident in this sites ability or I wouldnt linked this site on the frontpage of my forum or wanted my site linked here.

Some of the best boards that I am on have the most number of problems. What seperates them from the bad boards is the way the staff handle the problems and the members. We cant always stop the problems but we as administration of a forum can handle them. Hopefully this clears up what I meant.

 

I like cats

But serioulsy, I know how you feel. People sometimes just have information they want to post so bad they don't stop to think which forum it should be in.

I moderate a different board and I think half the time I spend in there is moving/mergeing threads.

 

All the boards have problems... As said before, it's how they are managed that makes a board good. The trick is to have that ballance between enforcement and being relaxed. It looks bad to constantly be on top of everything people do, but on the converse the board will go bad quick if things get out of hand...

 

Exactly

 

what i do as a moderator is basically if a topic goes off topic for more than a few posts and doesnt look like its coming back, i'll split the topic and move the split topic to the appropriate forum (like off topic).

If the babble continues on the thread i just split, i lock it cause people are obviously not interested in that subject anymore. That way, in the other thread i just made, they can continue if they like but the original thread is still intact

 

Even doing that is not good. I mean, what if after you lock it, someone comes up with an answer to the question... The only person you hurt there is the one with the problem. the best way to deal with the off topic problem (That the other mods and I on S-series.org have found) is to create an off topic thread. Let anything go in that thread, but limit everything else to relatively on-topic discussion... It's worked well so far (and we have 613 pages so far)

 

but thats what we are discussing here now is the fact that on topic threads are weaving off topic

so they are trying to keep people on topic and trying to keep the off topic in off topic

i was suggesting what i do.. worst case, if someone has an answer, its a simple pm to a moderator and they can unlock it

 

I'm going to have to agree with you that is the best approach on how to handle the matter. If someone has an answer to the thread then the person can either message the person who asked the question or start their own thread stating what the problem was and the solution. But the thread should not be allowed to continue off topic expecially if its one where people are starting to get overly defensive/argumentative.

 

A post entitled "Stay on topic" that has gone off topic.
I love it.

 

How is the thread off topic we are discussing the best way to handle posts that have gone off topic...