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Can we please have a 'Alternatives to the iPhone' forum?

VulchR

VulchR

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Jun 8, 2009
3,580
14,629
Scotland
I like MR but it seems these days that many posts in the iPhone forum are about mobile phones from other companies than Apple. Some of these posts do not even attempt to be relevant to discussion of the iPhone (e.g., such as comparisons). I get that many of us who surf MR are interested in general technology, but it seems some of these posts are by marketers and/or trolls. I am not saying that these posts should be blocked or banned, but it would be nice not to have to pick through the posts to find one genuinely about the iPhone or at least relevant to it....

Why not simply create a forum that would accommodate these posts? :)
 
VulchR said:
but it would be nice not to have to pick through the posts to find one genuinely about the iPhone or at least relevant to it....
Click to expand...

Almost any post I've seen about a different phone has the name of the phone in the subject or something like "this blows the iPhone out of the water."

How much simpler does it get than that?
 
DeaconGraves said:
...
How much simpler does it get than that?
Click to expand...

Having a separate forum would be simpler. ;)

Besides it might reduce some of the bickering. People likely to track such a forum are more likely to be open-minded about non-iPhone alternatives. Those of us who simply want to learn more about the iPhone would be spared what we consider to be spam.

Do you not agree that the constant arguing about the merits of the iPhone versus others is getting stale? If so, do you have a better idea to reduce the venom that is being exchanged currently in the forum?
 
I see little reason to have a non iphone forum here. After all this is an apple fan site and while many of us have a non iPhone it makes little sense to have a forum dedicated to non iPhones on a site that is apple centric.
 
VulchR said:
Do you not agree that the constant arguing about the merits of the iPhone versus others is getting stale? If so, do you have a better idea to reduce the venom that is being exchanged currently in the forum?
Click to expand...

Yes. My idea is that if you see a topic that doesn't interest you, you ignore it.

It's not like anyone is tricking you by posting a thread that says "Why I Love my iPhone" and then going into a 4 page manifesto about the Evo. This is an Apple forum. And when discussing things Apple-related, you're going to have to compare Apple products to non-Apple products.
 
miles01110 said:
Because nobody would use it. This has been brought up before.
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No miles, YOU think no one would use it. You posted your exact same statement when I asked for an alternate OS thread.

The amount of trolling on Macrumors anymore is ridiculous and it would be great if we could lump the alternate OS discussions into one sub forum. Sorry you assume no one would use it but they would. Not to mention mods can always move the thread.
 
AlphaDogg said:
This is MacRumors forums, not Alternatives to MacRumors forums...
Click to expand...

Agreed - which is why I'm not personally interested in testimonials of 1-post newbies about how wonderful their non-iOS device is. Sure I can skip the topics, but it sets a combatitive tone for the forum and it means I have to page through material unnecessarily when I access MR from my iPhone.

And, frankly, there is a commercial incentive for Apple's competitors to spam this site; I am certain that they do (new MR members who have posted exactly once to share a web link advertising a competing product); and I find that both insulting and annoying.

Actually I'd love to put this issue to a poll in the iPhone forum, but it seems off-topic...

The only other solution I can see is a system whereby posts are voted out of the forum by an 'off-topic' button, but this will always hurt MR users whose interests are in the minority.
 
AlphaDogg said:
This is MacRumors forums, not Alternatives to MacRumors forums...
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Then why are we talking about bloody phones? :D

It's been a long time since this site was focused on the Mac, the success of the iPod, iPhone and iPad has made sure of that. AppleRumors would now be a more apt name for the site. :)
 
Are you suggestion segregation as a way of isolating the non-iPhone trolls? A separate but equal forum?
 
eawmp1 said:
Are you suggestion segregation as a way of isolating the non-iPhone trolls? A separate but equal forum?
Click to expand...

I prefer think of it not so much as segregation but more efficient way of organizing information. ;)
 
VulchR said:
One of us - I am not sure whom - needs an overhaul of their sarcasm detector.
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;)

"Star Trek: Voyager" Living Witness (1998)

Vaskan Ambassador Daleth: [after Janeway has ordered to shoot the Kyrian cities with biogenic weapons] Captain, don't you think that's excessive?
Captain Kathryn Janeway: You picked a bad time to have second thoughts, Ambassador.
Vaskan Ambassador Daleth: I want them defeated, but... but this is genocide!
Captain Kathryn Janeway: Defeat, genocide - why quibble with semantics?
 
Just ignore the threads. Don't read them or bump them if someone already posted relevant information to debunk the thread.
 
chrono1081 said:
No miles, YOU think no one would use it. You posted your exact same statement when I asked for an alternate OS thread.
Click to expand...
iPhone alternatives have existed before the iPhone. There's a reason there is no "Alternatives to iPhone" thread; because it is pointless. If there was a compelling reason to have such a forum, there would be one.
The amount of trolling on Macrumors anymore is ridiculous and it would be great if we could lump the alternate OS discussions into one sub forum. Sorry you assume no one would use it but they would.
Click to expand...
I don't see how "amount of trolling" has anything to do with the suggestion. Unless you are championing the idea that a forum for "iPhone Alternatives" would reduce the amount of trolling, which is hardly a defensible position.
Not to mention mods can always move the thread.
Click to expand...
Or they can leave things how they are; in one forum. Less work for the mods; same result.
 
miles01110 said:
iPhone alternatives have existed before the iPhone. There's a reason there is no "Alternatives to iPhone" thread; because it is pointless. If there was a compelling reason to have such a forum, there would be one.
Click to expand...

You keep saying that but how do you know until you try? The OP talked about an iPhone alternative thread but I'm talking about an entire Alternate OS thread, that way when users come to Mac Rumors they can read Mac and iOS news without having to wade through thread after thread of Android and Windows garbage. It would all be collected into one thread.

You keep knocking down everyones suggestions about this even though there are just as many people who think it would be a good idea.
 
Perhaps we should put a poll in the iPhone forum....

Also, another suggestions would be an 'Alternatives to Iphone/iOS' sticky in the iPhone forum....

In any case the spamming and marketing of Android continues in the iPhone forum... with some threads not being labeled as Android-related.
 
Usually when a new forum is being considered, the number of threads in an existing forum that would be moved helps influence the decision, so I went through the the last 5 pages of forums here to see what threads could be moved into some type of non-Apple forum. Here's what I found (in no particular order):

  1. iPhone has massive Mountain called Galaxy S2 to climb. A true live demo. Devastating
  2. Droid Charge 4G LTE
  3. SGS2 vs iPhone4
  4. iPhone 4 vs. Samsung Infuse 4G
  5. Looking for the BEST smartphone (which is not an iPhone, right?)
  6. Unlocked Samsung Galaxy S2
  7. Smartphone battle is heating up
  8. Samsung GS2 On Top Of The World - WOW!
  9. Will Android sync with Macs?
  10. Smartphone without data?
  11. Making the switch from iPhone to Android to iPhone...
  12. Android + iOS
With 60 threads per page * 5 pages = 300 threads, that's only 4%, maybe 5% if I missed a few. Not very many really.
 
VulchR said:
...do you have a better idea to reduce the venom that is being exchanged currently in the forum?
Click to expand...

Yes. If you see bickering or posts that violate the rules, report them. We delete bickering that gets off-topic or breaks rules, and the more often we do this, the clearer the signal we send to members that discussions have to remain on-topic and civil.

With the amount of new posts made every day, there's no way for us to see all problems. That's why post reports are so important.
 
kainjow said:
....
With 60 threads per page * 5 pages = 300 threads, that's only 4%, maybe 5% if I missed a few. Not very many really.
Click to expand...

With respect, the % of threads is perhaps not the whole issue, but the % of readers of the iPhone forum who would rather not have to sort through Android threads in the main iPhone forum.

I get that we can decide not to read threads, but (1) on the mobile site paging through threads can take time (it's that inadequate small iPhone screen compared to the big bad SG2) and (2) as your list shows, not all threads are labeled clearly as containing non-iOS information.

With respect to moderation, that also has a drawback. Either the moderator has to decide that a given non-iOS thread is spam and remove it – causing dissatisfaction to about a third of the forum readers if the poll results are representative – leave it where it is and annoy the other two-thirds. A simple compromise is to create a sticky or a subsections specifically for comparing the iPhone and iOS to other devices.

Finally, with respect to the 'Trolls will be trolls. We can't stop them.' argument, wouldn't it help moderators if the decision was not so much whether a person was trolling, but whether a thread belongs in a specific sticky/forum subsection?

I repeat once again that I am not suggesting censorship - just a little organization of information so that everybody can find the threads they want and avoid the ones they don't.
 
kainjow said:
Usually when a new forum is being considered, the number of threads in an existing forum that would be moved helps influence the decision, so I went through the the last 5 pages of forums here to see what threads could be moved into some type of non-Apple forum. Here's what I found (in no particular order):

  1. iPhone has massive Mountain called Galaxy S2 to climb. A true live demo. Devastating
  2. Droid Charge 4G LTE
  3. SGS2 vs iPhone4
  4. iPhone 4 vs. Samsung Infuse 4G
  5. Looking for the BEST smartphone (which is not an iPhone, right?)
  6. Unlocked Samsung Galaxy S2
  7. Smartphone battle is heating up
  8. Samsung GS2 On Top Of The World - WOW!
  9. Will Android sync with Macs?
  10. Smartphone without data?
  11. Making the switch from iPhone to Android to iPhone...
  12. Android + iOS
With 60 threads per page * 5 pages = 300 threads, that's only 4%, maybe 5% if I missed a few. Not very many really.
Click to expand...

It might not be very many, but it would be a useful subforum. There are many forums on this site that don't get very much use, with your logic we should get rid of them. (Apple Collectors, Distributed Computing, Post contest, Console Games)

Also: I bet that given a new subforum for iPhone competitors that there would be more threads about iPhone alternatives.
 
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