So, if you haven't heard of the term "forum sliding" before, it refers to making posts, whether factual or not, that are not related to the content that is discussed in the board. In most cases in other places on the net, it does have intent, and that intent is to push a narrative that's either completely false or against the grain of the purpose of discussion. I think in honesty, for what I have been witnessing happening here on GAW, that's not exactly the whole story, so what I am describing is not out of criticism, but of concern.
To those who are innocent of this, they may not realize they are doing it. There has been a LOT of this happening for a while now. Whether it's karma farming (the act of gaining popularity and reputation on a board, with really no substantial value) pure self promotion (which is actually a rule here that's not being followed sometimes, with some being either actual feds, employees or promoters of an external website), or it's because this is the only or one of the few boards that posters frequent, it serves as a deterrent, a distraction, and it really weakens the overall motive of this board; to gain better understanding about the references that Q made, and to help all anons, no matter their level of knowledge, to congregate, share ideas, dig deeper, and sometimes have a little fun, which I'm not against at all. It also creates unnecessary tension (as I am guilty of), and we should focus on getting as many anons awakened as possible, and not losing them to such antics.
I know I can't call myself a mod, but to veterans and newcomers alike, it's cluttering up the board, and some very good posts get drowned out or get basically no visibility, unless you diligently filter by "rising" or "new". The mods can only do so much, so I think we should really focus on tuning out the noise and post those types of content on their designated boards within the .win community. I've made the comment many times about switching to a vBulletin style board, which would make this issue much easier to manage, and I would be willing to help, but I know that will take quite a bit of effort.
But in the meantime, and I'm saying this humbly; please consider what you post. Check the catalog to avoid duplicates, use the correct flairs when available, research the source of your posts to make sure it's verifiable and relevant, and if you see a post that's high quality and deserves to be stickied, let the mods know! But most of all, let's try not to post things that are reposts we see on social media sites that don't relate much to Q or GAW, or do not have a reliable source. I would say that's where the filtering would have the biggest impact.
Thank you all for being here, and for all the deep research and discussion that is had here. Many forums like these have fell away, and it all started by sliding posts, sinister mods, or outright trolling and shadow banning. Just want to keep the spirit alive here and tweak things just a bit so that we can all get good, reliable info. We are doing damn good for what opposition we face, I just hope that we stay together and don't lose the momentum.
Sincerely,
An oldfag from the early 2000s
Since, like you say, the good posts are often hidden in new or rising...
I think the onus is actually on the UPDOOTERS, more than the posters.
For example, the link to the alternative history fandom site talking about the 'big boy' bomb being dropped on China...
Anyone is capable of posting some dumb shit that looks legit, or doesn't conform to everybody's idea of what is relevant on this board.
I think a bigger problem is when a god-awful post like that manages to reach 'Hot'...
and I think there are two main culprits:
enthusiastic dooters who just don't read carefully, and
people who intentionally abuse the 'hide liked' feature, and updoot whatever they don't want to see anymore.
special shame to that latter category.
if someone posts garbage and it never leaves 'new'... does it even really matter? i mean sure, it does. but the vast amount of visitors here just check 'hot'. so it is super extra incredibly embarrassing when such garbage makes it to the front page of the board.
CHECK YOUR DOOTS, FRENS
I'm still shaking my head at the 'we nuked China' posts/comments.
And intersting point about people mindlessly upvoting just to hide a post. Does this really happen that often?
Yep, it's coordinated. If we got a registry of all accounts on here, I can almost guarantee you'll find that there are way more lurker/influence accounts than one would expect. All they do is use the voting system to exploit content and to up/down rank comments. It's the same thing that happens on Reddit, which is why A vBulletin style board is much more preferred, because only comments are ranked rather than posts in most cases. A good example; have the slightest opinion that is concerned about "Bitcoin"... not all crypto, just BTC, and watch the fire rise rapidly against you.
I also suspect some of the fake posts receiving lots of upvotes is a coordinated thing. Its way more than normal. Right now there is yet another highly upvoted bullshit post in "hot" (the Kamala calling for t-shirt kid to be banned post...completely fake).
We are in an information war. Disinfo is an old trick used to poison the well and drive curios normies away. With the elections coming you would be an idiot not to realize GAW would come under attack at such an important time.
But that was really about the "hide liked" feature (which I would never dream of using and had forgotten about).
I like to think there arent that many anons just upvoting bullshit in order to hide the post on their screen?
That also ties in with forum sliding....i.e. people doing it to hide the 5 posts of the same meme that the same usual suspects have copy/pasted from twitter.
Precisely, I know we are all aware of this, but the vigilance of noticing these things is what is key. If anything, I'm the most concerned about newcomers that genuinely are looking for a good source of info, like family and people who you personally want to see the board.