Photo Assignment War... and Peace

All,

I would be the first to admit that I am not a photographer. I point a little box at something I want to capture for posterity, I press a button, and I sometimes end up with a digital image which can, with sufficient help from NSA supercomputers, be identified as a child, building, or animal of some sort.

At the same time, I love seeing the work of good photographers (and, compared to me, anyone who has ever posted a picture on these forums is a "good photographer"). I have very much enjoyed seeing the submissions to the assignments as well as the photographs posted in the other threads here, themed or not. This has been one of my favorite places to lurk... until recently.

I would very much like to see an end to the disputes over the assignment threads. I say this both personally and 'professionally'. Personally, I am bothered that there has been such friction over what seems to me to be a non-issue - the forums are essentially infinite in size and so I can't for the life of me understand bickering over one small space - the assignments. As far as I can tell, those who like the assignments as-is can stick with them (and there seem to be a lot of members with that opinion) and those who don't can feel free to start their own threads. There is plenty of room for all.

Professionally, as it were, I have the sinking suspicion that, as a mod newbie, I will be tasked with resolving the disputes in some moderator-like fashion, mainly because no one likes to have to do that and so it'll end up being my task. I certainly do not want to have to start entering a cycle of Private Messages and posts and cajoling and whatever. I've seen too much bad happen in similar situations over the years.

Maybe I'm just reading way too much into posts I've seen here lately, but I fear that this could grow out of hand, that things will get said and feelings will get hurt. No one wants that.

Am I missing something - is there a reason why there should be all this hassle over assignments and all of that? I'm not dismissing feelings from either side, and I've read through a lot of threads and posts before writing this. I don't want to add fuel to the fire by taking sides, because I can see things from many different points of view.

It would be very nice if we would just allow all groups to 'sponsor' whatever threads they like and decide how they want threads they've started to be 'run'. No need for bickering - if you like something, participate. If not, participate in or create a new thread. MR has room for all, and I'd like to see people back spending time showing how much better they are than me at photography than getting upset over whose photographs go where.

They're all nice images. There's room to display all of them. Can we all just get along? I've had pleasant exchanges with nearly everyone involved, I'd like to think we're on good terms, and I hate to see friends bicker.

Thanks for reading and for any comments.

jsw

Thanks! All the mod title does is give more perceived weight to my comments, but I would have posted nearly the same thing were I still a plain ole demi.

I hate to see people fight here, especially what seem to be turf wars when real estate, as it were, is free and I like all of the people involved.

Chip NoVaMac said:

Some have won, some have lost.

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I don't see it as that way; I think there's room for everyone.

Chip NoVaMac said:

Is this only for threads in the DPF, or is this a new direction for MR? I am not trying at all to start an argument, not at all. I am just concerned that we are seeming to set up "rules" for posts here in the DPF, and different "rules" that apply to other forums here on MR.

If there are going to be different "rules" for each sub-forum, then we need a sticky to spell that out IMO. For as far as I know, there are only a select few forums that have their own "rules". The foremost being the Political Forum.

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I apologize if it sounded like I was proposing a change in the rules - I wasn't. The general rule of thumb is that threads should stay on topic. Obviously, off-topic posts occur frequently, and often they are allowed as long as others don't protest much (we can't read every post in every forum to ensure that all posts match the thread topic, and many threads predispose themselves - often with full and complete consent from all those involved - to veering wildly off topic). However, in this case, there was a clear difference of opinion as to what posts were/are "appropriate" in given threads (and by "appropriate" I mean from the point of view of the original poster and/or a majority of thread participants, not appropriate from an MR rules point of view). Instead of things devolving into bickering over who was or was not right, I was simply suggesting that those who want a given thread content to be different should open a new thread. They're free.

I personally have no opinion whatsoever as to which photos should be present in a given thread. None of them were inappropriate from the point of view of MR rules. As far as I know - and I don't think any other mods are around to ask - no non-mod was allowed to delete posts from any threads. There are/were no mini-mods (well, excluding edesignuk a while ago). No MR member has absolute possession/control over the content of a thread. The idea is to do that which promotes the most enjoyment among the most members, and in this case I believe that there was just way too much ado about nothing.

Again, I must stress that I have no opinion whatsoever as to what should or should not belong in a thread. I haven't touched any of the dig phot threads or posts. I don't think anyone was clearly right or wrong. I do think, though, that when there is a clear difference of opinion as to what a thread should contain, the easiest and often best thing to do is to create a separate thread for those who disagree with the way a given thread is going. It is a lot less stressful than bickering. There's plenty of MR to go around.