Just like various iOS update threads getting filled with all kinds of "courage", "headphone jack", or "watchbands" type of posts that are essentially just meme-like digs that aren't even related to iOS or anything that the articles/threads are about.
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This site should be called MacHaters.com
- Thread starter Rogifan
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Because you think you may have joined a site - sort of akin to a cult - where you will meet others who are equally passionate about the product.
But the the nature of the wider computing world, - and the product have changed, and Apple is no longer a company that needs to define itself by the radical and innovative design of its tech and computing arm.
Some of the 'haters' - emotionally - strike me as being in a place where they feel enraged that they are no longer able to feel 'special' or part of an esoteric cult.
It may come as a shock to some of them to learn that Apple is a company, not a cult.
Yep, stuff like that is exactly what I'm talking about.
Never thought about it that way, but you're on to something. Apple definitely isn't a niche company anymore- though the essence is the same, it's largely a mass-market company now that tries to appeal to a large percentage of the population as opposed to a smaller, more specific market. Something's gotta give, and unfortunately for Apple's traditionally hardcore following... it's them.
Agree with most posts. I don't think Apple products are perfect, I have been very vocal about the mac price hike within my friends and I've been apple since I could afford products on my own.
But every thread gets steered towards Apple hate. The drone campus thread is littered with Apple hate and no discussion about the actual topic.
Aren't mods suppose to regulate conversation and keep it on topic?
But every thread gets steered towards Apple hate. The drone campus thread is littered with Apple hate and no discussion about the actual topic.
Aren't mods suppose to regulate conversation and keep it on topic?
Are you really asking mods to censor threads because you can't use the ignore list?
Pretty sure all kinds of off topic discussions get stopped and at times removed fairly regularly. Nothing surprising or new about it. Ignoring things isn't really the way to deal with them as it doesn't actually deal with them.
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No. I am asking them to keep threads on topic to foster a good discussion about the actual topic rather than having threads littered with off topic comments.
I'm not disagreeing with you here but for clarity, MR largely depends upon the member report system. Under normal circumstances, the posting volume is such that Moderation is a difficult task. Introducing new products or a new OS increases the difficulty.
https://macrumors.zendesk.com/hc/en...re-the-goals-of-the-forums-and-of-moderation-
(And, there's MR' [IMO, laudable] philosophy of allowing a free exchange of ideas by erring on the side of allowing it, within reason.)
For me the challenge is differentiating the whiners and disingenuous posters from people who genuinely have concerns about things. I have been as devoted to Apple as anyone could be, but I am increasingly frustrated by things I see.
The MacBook Pro keynote was just one in a series of things that is causing me to lose faith in the leadership of Apple. When I hear Tim Cook say how there is awesome stuff in the pipeline and what we get is a OLED strip and a thinner laptop that can't take 32GB of ram because it would use too much battery. I feel like I'm being lied to.
And starting off the keynote saying how much they love the Mac and then showing us what they did, feels completely like someone trying to sell me a bridge in Brookline. So, while I agree that many new posters here just complain incessantly, there are some us who have been here a long time that are truly disappointed at what is happening.
I have a fist full of cash to spend on new computer equipment and as of now, it is going unspent because the company I love is not what it used to me.
The MacBook Pro keynote was just one in a series of things that is causing me to lose faith in the leadership of Apple. When I hear Tim Cook say how there is awesome stuff in the pipeline and what we get is a OLED strip and a thinner laptop that can't take 32GB of ram because it would use too much battery. I feel like I'm being lied to.
And starting off the keynote saying how much they love the Mac and then showing us what they did, feels completely like someone trying to sell me a bridge in Brookline. So, while I agree that many new posters here just complain incessantly, there are some us who have been here a long time that are truly disappointed at what is happening.
I have a fist full of cash to spend on new computer equipment and as of now, it is going unspent because the company I love is not what it used to me.
I agree. I was so exasperated with the hate today that I wrote a post saying that all these standard "Apple is doomed" posts, that don't say anything else should be deleted by default. My post ended up getting deleted, but the entire first page of the thread with "Tim should resign", "Apple has lost its was" etc are still there.
I think the moderators should really have a think about their policies. I'm feeling more attracted to Arstechnica.com by the day...
Well you should be, arstechnica is great, and so are a bunch of other tech sites out there. I think all sites have their community quirks, if you ever read the posts on wccftech you'll see how ridiculous some sites can get. But I think the difference is most of them dont have as much emotional attachment to the topics as macrumors does, or when they do such as a team A vs team B crowd, they flame each other in a generally hilarious and (viciously) entertaining way.
I totally agree with C DM that a lot of poeple are posting irrelevant doomed messages on irrelevant threads (not so much the main page news threads, I think they are open slather, but threads started by regular users asking for helpful information or advice). The worst thing that happens is potentially good discussions get thrown off track, but thats the internet for you. Sure moderators could keep those threads in check, but the main news articles I'd rather just see what people are posting, get a sense of the general mood of people on macrumors, and see the various opinions positive and negative.
Now onto my little rant. I would love to keep using OSX and buying Apple products for years to come, I like the ecosystem, and more than anything the 3rd party developers make it the best platform out there. But a lot of Apple decisions as of late have left me looking at linux alternatives, such is life, and occasionally I'll express my displeasure regarding recent Apple decisions in the relevant articles.
Sure, that is the general nature of a discussion board. What I have an issue with is that the moderator population seemingly doesn´t do anything to control trolling and promoting content-driven discussions here, but more so focuses on silencing those with critical views on the development of this board from one of the highest quality Apple communities, to a community that is driven by flaming, trolling, joking and cynicism.
Seriously every front page story these days is full of negative comments. The negative overwhelmingly outweighs the positive. Every product sucks, every experience is horrible. Tim Cook needs to go. Everyone else on the executive team needs to go. And every story has someone complaining about lack of Mac updates. This is no longer an Apple rumor site it's an Apple hate site.
I've stopped reading comments and commenting (other than to come here and express my frustration with commenters). There is room for constructive criticism but as you said, every post is so full of negativity that it's not worth being involved in the community any more. I still visit MR for the updates (for now) but refuse to deal with comments until there is a major overhaul of the commenting system.
I've been coming to MR for over a decade (I lurked and had a different user name before) but comments are so bad now (they've been on a downward trend since 2012) that they remind me of whining kids (I love kids but incessant whining is hard to stomach).
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It's much worse than Facebook because there's no way to down vote and hide comments on MR. Further, with Facebook your identity is known so whining is less than it otherwise would be. MR used to be a place where there was good discussion (pre 2012 but fairly often since then), now it is definitely not.
I would rather have it called www.machaters.com than www.macsheep.com
Sheep are all on the same page, no different point of view.
"Haters", so called, bring different views which can lead to discussion, compromise and progress.
Sheep are all on the same page, no different point of view.
"Haters", so called, bring different views which can lead to discussion, compromise and progress.
This forum saw the same exact complaining when they switched from 30 pin to lightning.
After Christmas when everyones stockings are filled with adapters, dongles and cables the hate will move to some other device; ipad pro?
It's entertaining at least.
a good examples of the haters is the couple of threads showing users the different dongles. The haters can't complain that there isn't a solution. Yeah they will complain about the price but on the next breathe flash their iphone 7 (P) pay $5+ for their "Starbucks".
That about sums up my experience with MacRumors moderation - they'll come after you for the tiniest infraction of an obscure rule, whilst skipping over pages of irrelevant vitriol.
The best example: I quoted a few "Tim should quit" style post and replied with an eye-rolling gif. It got quite a few thumbs up from other members. Of course my post is removed as "frivolous" whilst the irrelevant posts I quoted remained.
The system favours the people who are ruining the forum - you can't report them because the mods don't consider them to be breaking a rule. You can't respond to them because your post will be removed. In the end only the aggressive loons remain.
Why not bring in a downvote system? It doesn't even have to be publicly visible. Just have the ability to downvote and members with a high number of them can be automatically suspended.
It seems the moderator team is unable or unwilling to deal with the degradation of the fabric of the forums that has occurred in recent years.
Did you report those posts? Or reply with something more than emoji (or meme, or something else similar)?
If people report the posts it seems like it would be similar to a downvote as it would urge for action to be taken and the post likely removed if it's not in line with forum rules.
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Personally I come here to see news and information about Apple not other brands. I think showing other brands is just not what I want. It just muddies the waters.
Well, many of them impact Apple in one way or another, so it seems to make sense to keep tabs on it all too.
I don't believe it is anything intentional on the part of the moderators, but I do think we are in a bit of a transition phase with some of these new, dumb phrases and memes you mentioned. I think what mods don't view as frivolous today, they may at a later time. For example, the "Safari snappy" posts routinely get deleted from threads if you report it... no questions asked. That was not always the case. I think what could happen if enough of these posts get reported and over time the moderators see that "can't innovate my ass" is annoying a large number of forum members and not contributing to the discussion, the mods will come to an agreement that "can't innovate my ass" or "courage" are frivolous posts and they will be removed when reported. I have reported quite a few of these dumb meme posts to the mods with a note explaining why I thought the post was frivolous. Some of the posts were removed, and others were not depending I think on context.
I can't speak for the mods, but my thought is if enough forum members consistently report "can't innovate my ass" posts, for example, it will come to be viewed the same as "Safari snappy" posts and result in a quick removal after being reported.
The other issue is what C DM alluded to. There are just a handful of volunteer moderators, so they don't even see a large volume of the posts here, so you need to report these issues or a mod will likely never know.
I often report posts. Not all get removed. The rules appear not to explicitly prohibit futile posts like "time to fire Timmy", or unnecessarily rude and condescending posts, because they don't appear to come under the frivolous, irrelevant, or repeated rules.
You make a good point about reporting being similar to downvoting. But the beauty of the anonymous downvoting would be that it would be automatic, and far more efficient at tracking poor behaviour across multiple threads and extended periods.
(Edited for typo: irreverent -> irrelevant.)
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I think the problem with downvoting is that it can similarly be abused by many. It's kind of a fine line, and hard to say which one is truly better--there are upsides and downsides.
For now I think more people reporting often enough likely ends up promoting the right thing to happen, but that does require more purposeful action on the part of the users to actually report and say something in the report.
