Plans for the future of Gamingforce

So will the split off CH and My Stuff just have Basil, waferballs, ^_^ and Bucky (And apparently Pang) moderating it or will we all be moderators there too? I only ask because the chances of me ever logging on to a board made up entirely of My Stuff and CH are pretty slim.

Also, I agree that this might well completely nerf our membership intake as people by and large only join for those two bits any more and just happen to find an awesome community in the process. Is there not some way you can move the attachment hosting to .com and leave the actual discussion bits here?

Jam it back in, in the dark.

As and when we split off CH, can we change the banner to something Kristallnacht themed?

How ya doing, buddy?

In light of Basil's comments about how an unhidden My Stuff and Concert Hall would be shut down almost immediately, I second the motion to just delete both and pretend nothing ever happened.

Also, as a matter of interest, if it wasn't VGM that got us a warning letter, what was it? Was it when LeHah reported us to the RIAA for that Superman box set?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Calm down Blah, I think Acer is just concerned that from the way you tell it, it looks as though the Gamingforce forums are reliant on SD and VGMDB to remain in existance. This is a worrying situation because in the past when we were reliant on someone else (bobo) we were let down and damn near lost the whole place, and in fact would have done, but for your own and Miles' intervention.

I can't speak for Acer but I think is main issue is that if we're relying on them, we have little in the way of a safety net if they decide they don't want us anymore. I don't think he's saying that we pay so we deserve respect, he's saying he'd rather pay so we weren't reliant on anyone else. I imagine he's also bothered that we have to sacrifice part of our boards (Albeit parts we won't miss) to make room for VGMdb or SD. It makes us feel like the expendable ones out of the three.

The hostility I imagine comes from some slight frustration that other projects are seemingly a higher priority for the admin team than this place, and again, the echoes of bobo. Nobody would ever question yours or Miles' dedication to this place but you've got to realise that people get nervous here when an admin comes out with an announcement of this magnitude almost out of the blue and especially for those of us tasked with looking after the place, without mentioning it in the Hut first.

Nobody really gives a flying fuck what happens to CH or My Stuff, as you said yourself, the community has outgrown them and I doubt many of us would even have noticed if you'd just deleted them. If I'm reading the mood in the thread right, people are concerned that we're in danger of losing the Gamingforce forums because of the dubious legal standpoint of sections of the board or the huge database attached to an online catalogue of computer game music (Or whatever VGMdb is, can't say I've ever visited).

Getting all defensive and snarky because people are worried is only going to exacerbate the situation. All people want is reassurance that these boards aren't going anywhere, telling people if the don't like your tone of voice you're going to turn your attention elsewhere is hardly a sensible way to give that. If you need more money in order for us to guarantee our survival then by all means tell us.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Of course you aren't and I wasn't suggesting that you were. It's just that the rather sudden nature of the announcement caught us off guard and as other people have already mentioned in this thread, Miles is less hands-on than he used to be.

All I'm saying is that I can see how people might draw parallels in their minds to the end of the bobo era and his increased absences and prioritising of other projects.

Nobody wants to lose the boards and whilst we have no problem ditching CH or My Stuff to do so, we don't want to feel like next time VGMdb needs more space for whatever it is they do, we'll have to cut out Community Commons.

And I'm not suggesting that we will, I'm suggesting that while we're relying on two other websites to exist, that shadow hangs over us, no matter how unlikely it actually is.

And you know, it might have been nice if you'd mentioned this in the Hut before Board Support.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Originally Posted by Bigblah

Also, I've already addressed the issue of priorities. I have stated before that I'm preoccupied with VGMdb, that's exactly why I pushed for CHz to take over my role. He's been doing great so far, don't you think?

It wasn't a complaint, it was an observation. CHz does indeed do a great job, I was simply saying that we don't want to be kept too out of the loop on these things if you're busy with VGMdb because Miles isn't here to tell us and I can't see Naka or Squirrel making an announcement in the Hut somehow.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Originally Posted by Secret Squirrel

someone needs to start this conversation in CH.

Heh, see that's why none of the regulars give a fuck about ditching them. They're so fucking insular, we could move the entire subforum to a new url and but for their bookmarks not working, none of the regulars there would even notice. We're a place that prides itself on it's sense of community and they simply aren't a part of it.

FELIPE NO

The thing is Seanne, I can be as rude as I like about the CHetards here in Board Support, safe in the knowledge that no more than two of them will ever read it and those two are probably already convinced I'm a boorish barbarian who listens all kinds of devil music and doubtless doesn't even own a harpsichord.

Yes, I'm being uncomplimentary about them but I hope you're not suggesting that Concert Hall types would be more outgoing if the rest of us didn't swear quite so much. My Stuff is not in the same league of unpopularity by any means. Most of us here will have had some interaction with My Stuff and the regulars there are not an insular community of their own, they interact with the rest of us perfectly normally and although some don't venture out often, they don't get all upset when someone gently pokes fun at them. Also, all the stuff in there is hosted off-site, all My Stuff is is a glorified links board and as such, the drain on the server is minimal. The only threat to the rest of us from My Stuff is the potential for a law suit fucking us all over next time LeHah makes some moves to maintain the exclusivity of some album he paid far too much for.

Think of it like this; Gamingforce is a small town and one side of town is a traveller camp (My Stuff). They're a bit unruly and make a bit of mess and don't pay to use the land but then they also aren't a drain on the town's resources particularly and they sell good drugs which occasionally, people from in town like to buy. On the other side of town is a gated community (CH), inhabited entirely be paedophiles who spend all day passing kiddie-porn around amongst themselves. They use the streetlighting and police paid for out of the council tax budget but they're all on long-term benefits so don't pay any council tax themselves. They have their own private security teams who enforce their own interpretation of the laws of the town and they never leave their compound.

For a long time, the town has existed as is. People bought drugs from the pikeys and sometimes, the naughtier kids would climb over the wall into the gated community for a game of footy on their nice park, until they were chased off by the security teams. Now though, the two neighbouring towns in the district are expanding and need a bit more space. On top of that, a disgruntled dealer from in the town has called the feds and sold out the pikeys.

The townsfolk are concerned that the expansion plans of the other towns might mean their own town amenities will suffer and as such, they look to the biggest drain, the gated community full of people who don't contribute to the town as a whole. As an added bonus, the removal of a large nonce-ring will mean less hassle from the feds if they ever show up. At the same time, a decision is made that maybe we ought to move on the travellers too because although we don't really mind them and they don't have much of an impact on the tax bill, it's not like we have that much to do with them and they are breaking the law after all.

Given the choice of higher taxes or getting rid of all the undesireables, the paedos and the pikeys, it's understandable that most towsfolk would choose to lose the outsiders en masse, no?

What I'm getting at is that Concert Hall is seen by a lot of people here as a non-contributing group who go out of their way to remain distant from the rest of us. Whilst at the same time there's a lot of My Stuff-ers who we have no interaction with, they don't go out of their way to remain aloof, they operate on the same rule set as the rest of us and they don't use up a huge amount of server space to conduct their illegal activity. If the server was based in Finland or wherever Pirate Bay are to avoid getting in trouble for posting links to illegal stuff, My Stuff wouldn't even have come up in these discussions. What we're primarily worried about is Concert Hall but the simple fact is, most of the regulars there, people who probably visit this place as much as I do, won't even be aware fo the problem, let alone the suggested moves to fix it, unless a very explicit message is posted in their little forum telling them.

Gamingforce is a community and through their specialised interests, general lack of a sense of humour and fear of social interaction outside of choir practice, the CHetards simply aren't a part of that community and as such, not many people who are a part of the community would be too sad to see them go. The rare breed of CH poster who does occasionally post elsewhere will continue to do so after a split, especially if we have inter-forum links clearly labelled and available.

For most of us, it's a win-win situation. The only real issues raised in this thread are that some people are worried that Gamingforce isn't self-supporting and are concerned that we're playing second fiddle to SD and VGMdb, which has pretty much been shown to be untrue because deep down, Miles still loves us more than them.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Originally Posted by Secret Squirrel

Also, come on Shin. You need to boil your thoughts down to something more concise and readable, especially for us Americans.

Heh heh. Essentially what I'm saying is that there's a feeling amongst certain regular members of what we'd probably call the wider community here who are resentful that their forums are threatened because of the actions of a group of people who make no effort to become part of that community.

I don't believe anyone has an issue with CHetards sticking to their own discussions in their own sub-forum really. The issue is that space on teh server is apparently at a premium now and there's an increased risk of the whole place getting taken down in a legal battle. Ignoring VGMdb and SD, this is due to a massive attachment load from CH and illegal filesharing in CH and My Stuff.

The fact that CH types as a rule are so aloof and don't engage in conversation outside their forum makes it easier for the rest of us to see them as expendable.

What people are saying is that if CH was more than just a leech magnet on one hand and a bunch of hawty closet cases on the other, we'd be more inclined to think of ways to work round the problem but as it is, they're perceived as a drain on the place and removing them is the simplest solution to the problems we have.

What Zerg raised is the other issue and is the same thing Acer was worried about. What reassurance do we have that when VGMdb gets even bigger, we won't be forced to prune something else off Gamingforce, the worry being that next time it might be something we care about. Blah has pretty much allayed that fear though by assuring us that Miles is looking out for us and that you and him will listen to our concerns if we have any.

At this point we're all just standing around waving pitch-forks for the fun of it but I'd genuinely like to see some input from some CH regs in here before we cut them loose and I'm trying to coax some of them out as we speak.

Shit, that ended up all long and wordy again. Sorry Squirrel, I think I'm just naturally obtuse.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

You do have links up telling people to come and join this message board, right?

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Maybe you could add a link to us in your Off-topic discussion forum. I bet that'd increase our flow of new members, even if they were all tragic VGM nerds. I mean, if we're sharing a server it might be nice to share our members too...

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

For the record, I promised to defend any Concert Hallers who posted in here from unwarranted abuse. I never promised to defend them if they made a complete tit of themselves.

This was such a civilised discussion yesterday too.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

That's not to say we can't learn from this though.

Those of us who post all over the boards know this is a very silly place at times, as evidenced by the banner and name changes. We find that kind of thing funny and it's one of the reasons this place never gets stale or boring.

The Concert Hall types are largely unaware of goings on outside their little section of the boards and for the most part this is fine, they have no need to venture out so not getting everyone else's sense of humour is no problem.

The problems occur when they do need to venture out, either because of an April Fools prank they don't get or because something pretty serious like the entire forum being moved to a different site. Most of the CHetards are perfectly reasonable people I'm sure who are capable of delivering or understanding rational debate but sadly, the ones who choose to come out and express their views are often basically idiots with a huge victim complex; Mersenne, Gay Perverse, packrat and so on.

When they make fools of themselves, they get abused, as would any member who spouted the same sort of crap no matter where they usually posted. Because they see themselves aas intellectual martyrs or something though, they take it personally and assume that it's because we all hate them and all the other CHetards.

Although this is patently bollocks, they say it often enough for other, marginally more self-assured CH types to start believing it and this whole culture of there being no point even bothering with us because we all hate you arises.

What we really need to do is ban the idiots like Mersenne and Gay Perverse from this thread and the one in CH and try to get some opinions from the more reasonable and normal CH regulars.

I mean, we don't need to at all of course, it's Blah and Miles' server they can do what the fuck they want when they want but in the interest of doing something positive that benefits the maximum number of people, it makes sense to me to at least attempt to engage the affected parties.

At the end of the day though, if we really can't find any CH regulars who care enough about the place to engage in discussion about it's future then I guess it really doesn't matter what happens to it and you might as well just delete it Blah.

Additional Spam:
In some form of probably hopeless attempt to get this back on track, I've posted new announcements in both the main Concert Hall and the Musician's Library bit and changed the title of this thread back.

I was speaking idiomatically.

I kinda did that in my new CH announcement... kinda.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?