State Of The Site, Late 2013
![keyboard_bash[1]](https://mgoblog.com/sites/mgoblog.com/files/images/State-Of-The-Site-2013_136F1/keyboard_bash1.gif "keyboard_bash[1]")
This is obviously meta.
I may or may not do something like this again, but UMHoops does 'em and they seem like a good idea. Since I've mentioned my general dissatisfaction with the way things have been going around here in a couple of different formats, I figure a fuller explanation is due to everyone who doesn't listen to the podcast or care about Twitter, and Twitter was about six sentences anyway.
I've gotten a lot of emails and tweets in support and while I appreciate them a great deal, I feel like it's not really all that bad and perhaps I haven't expressed any of this clearly enough. So here's an attempt.
THE BAD THING
![one-flew-over-the-cuckoos-nest-11[1]](https://mgoblog.com/sites/mgoblog.com/files/images/State-Of-The-Site-2013_136F1/one-flew-over-the-cuckoos-nest-111.jpg "one-flew-over-the-cuckoos-nest-11[1]")
We moved servers just before the season, and for some reason this imploded the Drupal module we were using that did the voting/comment-graying. Don't get me started on that unless you want the animated gif above to be my fate.
The new server is a champ, and was direly needed. We only blew up during the Hand commitment aftermath, and I guarantee you that the blog would have been crushed four or five other times during the year if we had not moved. At times this has been a mixed blessing—it probably would have been nice to be down after Penn State—but having your internet site on the internet is a goal.
The cost was steep, as without the obvious disapproval provided by your comment shrinking into a gray box, dumb comments multiplied and fights about those comments multiplied since there was not an obvious indicator that other people had already dismissed it. I felt this would happen but had very little time to do anything about it since this event happened smack-dab in the middle of me pounding out the 50k-word season preview.
Flaming went up, signal got obscured, and things veritably roiled.
THE BLOWUP
We brought Brandon on board to be a recruiting reporter and he posted an interview with a 2016 kid; he gave us a picture in which he looked pretty young. I thought nothing of it because I follow hockey closely and there kids who don't have to shave commit all the time. (A kid born in 1998(!) just committed. The OHL speeds up their timelines.) Michigan just took a 2016 commit in football, and has a half-dozen offers out. But this resulted in a comment thread in which a lot of people made jokes about the kid not having to shave; others put on their Serious Issue faces and wondered if this was ethical. Then the prospect posted a screenshot of people making fun of him on twitter. SMH, man.
By this point we'd had a lot of crap on the board and this was a seeing-red moment. I posted a thread about how this was unacceptable, etc., whereupon there was a huge comment thread in which concern trolling featured heavily. The ethics of talking to high school kids about where they might go to college was frequent topic.
This was and is ridiculous. We're not about to Rosenberg these kids, both because we're not [REDACTED] 5'2" [REDACTED] goobers who'll do someone dirty to get ahead in the world and that going Rosenberg on someone would completely crush us with our readers, deservedly.
We're going to ask them softball questions and publish them after correcting any spelling mistakes, and you, the reader, are going to post comments like "Good luck wherever you go!" because that's the social contract we have here. That's how this works. You are going to assume that high school kids are going to read anything they can about themselves online, and we're going to throw Charmin at them in slow motion. This is not hard-hitting journalism here.
Anyway. The primary concern troll was a guy who'd been around since the very beginning of the site, chitownblue. He quit in a huff once, then came back as chitownblue2, and almost never appeared except to chide someone about something. At some point virtually everyone who writes for the site complained to me about him. The rest of the people who had posted things that broke the social contract in that thread quickly apologized; he dug in to fight the battle of the Somme. Another complaint about him happened in the midst of that thread, during which my dander was up and finger already hovering over the button. So I banned him, and various compatriots. And I've had an itchy trigger finger since.
They'd been around forever. I regret nothing, except that I waited so long. I hated that guy.
THE ISSUE
A friend sent me this post from 4chan's founder in response to similar issues he'd had, in which he cites another post from Steve Pavlina about why he shut his popular forums down. Pavlina talks a lot about entitlement of longtime users and standards that he felt weren't being met, both of which I kind of feel. But moot's thing is the thing:
Something that’s always surprised me is how often people seem to forget how large the overall 4chan community is outside of their own respective interaction with it. Some simply don’t care, but I think others plain don’t realize they’re just one of millions of people who post and browse 4chan on a monthly basis. …
My view is that it simply isn’t possible nor prudent to attempt to please everyone, and so I don’t. This can be misinterpreted as not caring, but it’s far from it—it’s just a reflection of my belief that the needs of the community outweigh the needs of individuals. Which is an ideal I think most would agree with, but when emotions run wild and tensions run high, we often lose sight of it.
The general rule of thumb is that 10% of your readers will read the comments/forums and 1% will leave most of them. I believe our numbers are quite a bit higher than that, but even so that the the primary thing that happens in the comments is lurkers reading them. From the perspective of the commenters these people do not exist. From my perspective, they're the majority of the readerbase.
Most of these people seem to like the site. They visit it. That majority has not been reflected in the comments. Of late when people recognize me I wince a bit, because I'm not sure how this interaction is going to go. I'm kind of waiting for someone to unload on me. This never happens.
As the season's gone along this disconnect has become apparent. And I'm finding the complaints harder to deal with because with the demise of voting so many of them have become personal attacks hardly sheathed in anything resembling logic. Brandon just took a lot of crap for posting that usually when recruits are open with him that means they're excited about Michigan and Malik McDowell was tight-lipped, which may not bode well. This exploded into controversy for some reason: that reason is there are a bunch of people who just complain about everything about the site.
IT'S NOT YOU, IT'S ME
Why these people can't let go and do something else, I don't know. They're locked in a prison of their own devising, being miserable about the state of the blog while they make it worse by constantly complaining about it.
I am going to help both these folks and myself escape from purgatory by hitting the eject button on them. Like this guy who has 41,000 points, most of which seem to be accumulated complaining about the site. And this guy. Great news for everyone: they're banned. Now they are free to explore the rest of the internet, perhaps to find something they don't hate.
This represents a policy change. In short, that is: if the people who write for this site hate you we will ban you. That is the upshot of the twitter burst and the podcast thing. This is not really a change for most people since we did that for anyone with a few points who came in guns blazing. This mostly applies to folks like guy I just banned who'd accumulated the third-most points on the site. I hated that guy! For three years! And out of some idea about respecting the community I let him fart all over it.
To respect the community, we should ban jerks, even if they've been around so long that it seems that there must be some redeeming value in having them around.
If you don't like the way the comments are laid out, or you think there should be more jumps, or fewer jumps, or have a substantive disagreement with what I think, or even have argument-free opinions I roll my eyes at every six months or so, fine. I have to get to know you to loathe you. All you people are good. In fact, here are protips to not get banned under this new regime:
- Don't have an avatar. You're less likely to get noticed.
- Don't be a jerk to people who write for the site. Much more difficult that #1, but still doable if you try.
- Don't constantly complain about the people I hire. If you want to send me an email, fine. Publicly crapping on the other guys who write for us is filed under jerk.
- Don't get mad at me for having a particular emotional state. This happened constantly throughout the season, as if the internet tough guys who were taking the bullets the season threw at them could somehow improve my mood by berating me.
I can understand how the last few years have put people in a place where they find me irritating after once enjoying the site, but all the comments in the world aren't going to be able to change what is primarily a sports blog about what it feels like to be a Michigan fan. If you feel differently, okay! I accept that you feel differently. If you want me to feel like you, that is an argument you are welcome to have anywhere else.
It's been a trying year for everyone, and I'm about to go figure out how to get the damned voting back on comments, so hopefully things will recede from this, their irritating zenith. Thank you to everyone who did not expect me to be an emotional clone of themselves this year, which is like 99% of you. I enjoy you.
-Brian
December 7th, 2013 at 1:01 AM ^
I say hooray. I'm one of Brian's 10% who read but don't post until very, very recently when the hope of improving the signal/noise ratio drove me to finally register. I'd bought MGoShirts out of a feeling of obligation long before I registered for the forums, since I'd honestly felt for many years that as a relatively casual Michigan fan I'd not had anything to add to the conversation.
It's unfortunate that the level of discourse here has gotten to the point where I feel like the stupid crap I have to say is potentially a relative improvement over the median comment. I'd much prefer going back to the "Welp, they're better at this than I am, I'll just read it and nod along" MGoBlog that drew me in years ago.
December 7th, 2013 at 1:20 AM ^
Can you hear me?? What is that, you can, and it is too loud? Okay sorry, I was just making sure the ban hammer didn't screw me. That might be the wrong tool pun, I'm not sure as I am not very handy Bro. Back to lurking until voting comes back.
@B-rye, for what it is worth I thought we could self regulate. I advocated that it made more sense to stay sans voting as it was lazy to just click rather than post why you disagreed. That was short sighted and I was wrong. It gave the turds a sturdy platform and sucked others down to their level of [insert emotion you felt during twitter rant]. I enjoy you too bro and glad to see our mini civilization evolving.
December 7th, 2013 at 1:39 AM ^
I feel Brian has lost site with what we the readers/posters bring. I am sure that he has met former players and accessed areas of Michigan many of us can only dream because of this web site. I also can freely say without the visitors this site isn't a success and he never sees the opportunities to have access to the football team he has had because of the site.
December 7th, 2013 at 7:28 AM ^
Good on ya Brian. Behind you 100%. Keep the faith.
December 7th, 2013 at 7:39 AM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 8:56 AM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 9:11 AM ^
All that and no mention of Nefarious Eduardo? I am disappoint.
December 7th, 2013 at 9:14 AM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 9:39 AM ^
Although I do not love the term, I am definitely one of the lurkers. I visit the site two to three times a day and, quite frankly, its often the highlight of my day. I know, I know that's more a comment on my life than the site, perhaps, but its true.
Brian: you and the whole MGoBlog staff do a great job. Please keep it up. You have high quality content and editorial about an issue that so many of us are emotionally invested in. Thanks again!
December 7th, 2013 at 10:11 AM ^
that is all...
December 7th, 2013 at 11:03 AM ^
I agree eliminating disagreeable trolls that are likely not M fans anyway is a good thing however.....fairly applied subjective censorship requires that you walk a very fine line. I believe sometimes that opposition/critisicism is good to hear even though its given in a combative or belligerent fashion. It makes you express your opinion better and maybe even changes your opinion sometimes. Anyway, I applaud your efforts to iimprove the site!
December 7th, 2013 at 11:08 AM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 11:17 AM ^
my various avatars too, but having said that, I really don't have one avatar that I stick with, because they are generally things I loved that happened during the past season. I don't want to bring attention to myself as much as I love mitigating the negative feedback we get after losses. I try to stay positive and know that it is just a game after all. I simply cannot call for a coaches job because I don't agree with his playcalling, hair style or lack thereof or whatever todays beef is with him. I know he has a family, a home, a loving wife typically, and these things are much more important than a football game. Besides if someone was to write about my weeks at work every week and anal-lize it the way some of these posters do I would have been fired long ago.
As for what else Brian is saying I do believe that we need pos.and neg. voting and athough I agree its not a perfect science that can't be undermined I think its the easiest quik fix to the problem of TROLLING. There has definetly been an explosion of these so called UM fans who are thinly veiled and are simply jelous of this site and all things Michigan. I also think that we are smart enough to see through these tricks that they will try to get around neg votes, and why a person is getting negged and why they have positive votes. So Bravo Brian in keeping the best UM site on the web and all of sports blogs, I love coming here and love this site and because of my humble opinionated opinion, I can't stop writing in. Thank you again, I remain confident this is and will always be the best damn sports blog on the web ... GO BLUE !!! and GO MgoBlog.
December 7th, 2013 at 11:18 AM ^
Though not a true old timer, I am in complete support, Brian. There were several days I would read one or two posts and shake my head and go somewhere else to spend my time. It was out of control.
December 7th, 2013 at 11:20 AM ^
Brian, if and when we meet, I intended to extend my hand and say thank you.
I am a smarter, more informed fan thanks to this site and the good people on it. I'm thankful to have a community of compatriots with whom to commiserate and to celebrate.
Every part of our world has rules, so impose yours at will. And please keep this going by any means necessary.
Go Blue!
December 7th, 2013 at 1:27 PM ^
This seems to be one of those things where none of us has nearly as much information as Brian. Like:
- Did way more stuff go on behind the scenes than on stage?
- Does Brian have a high or low tolerance for dissent and disagreeableness?
I confess I have fairly low standards for internet message board discourse, so things didn't seem so bad to me, relative to, say, espn.com or whatever.
As for M-Wolverine, I was always of two minds about him (I assume). He made a lot of thoughtful, well-reasoned posts, but he also was incredibly argumentative and omnipresent, so you just couldn't get away from his point of view. I don't really see that as a bannable offense (having so little of a life that you could accumulate 41,000 MGoPoints), but then see points (1) and (2) above.
Finally, and maybe this is just rose-colored hindsight, but it did seem like things were better in the "old days," in that there was less name-calling and ad hominem and more vigorous disagreement about things like whether RR should be fired or not. It's kind of odd that all of this has happened over an apparently far less controversial issue (Borges) than over the whole RR era.
I kind of feel like MGoBlog is a victim of its own success and has to some degree regressed to the espn.com, MLive mean. If the MGoPurge is one step in dragging the blog away from that mean, count me in as supportive.
December 7th, 2013 at 1:55 PM ^
Thank you Brian for all you do for the Michigan athletics community. Your blog is by far the most informative one out there. Thank you for your time and efforts to make it a place of excellence with knowledgable staff and technical capabilities that work.
As for myself I mostly read and lurk on this website but have in the past been far more vocal on other UM chat sites. Here I prefer to soak the knowledge in and keep abreast of all things pertaining to UM athletics that you provide us free of charge. You are doing a great service which is most appreciated by we minions.
That said, I have noticed in the past few months that at times the site has become almost unreadable with the riff raff arguing outrageous POV's. Thank you for introducing them to the door and I like many others look forward to the day voting is brought back which certainly helps in that regard.
Keep up the great work and don't let the haters get to you.
December 7th, 2013 at 2:04 PM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 2:07 PM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 2:12 PM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 2:14 PM ^
For the longest time, I thought I was the only one who hated chitownblue, and for precisely the reason stated: all of his comments were always of the "I'll tell you what to think and how to express it" variety. It's been much nicer without that dick, and hopefully it will be even nicer still without more dicks.
December 7th, 2013 at 2:37 PM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 3:23 PM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 4:18 PM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 6:30 PM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 9:03 PM ^
Eliminating certain assholes. There seems to be a certain element of gang banging that goes on when certain posters disagree with another's post.
I enjoy reading the entire board and don't post very often as my reading is not always timely. The debates are for the most part very enjoyable, but then all of a sudden some deuchebag rolls out of the closet with a bitchy disagreement and others jump on in the same manner.
Go for it Brian. I suspect there are a lot of folks that agree with you in every regard.
December 7th, 2013 at 9:11 PM ^
the potential return of up/downvotes. While it creates some amount of groupthink (which could probably be reduced simply by getting rid of the number of points by a user's name) it also teaches newbies the requisite manners expected on the site.
Personally, I haven't come to the site much this season because the forums have degenerated so much. Plus, I was concerned that the up/downvote thing was done (cynically) just to encourage more posts and monetize the site. My attitude remains that this is Brian's house and we are his guests; that means we play by his rules (which have been fairly generous in my opinion).
December 7th, 2013 at 9:23 PM ^
The lurkers see all, and we never forget.
December 7th, 2013 at 9:42 PM ^
December 7th, 2013 at 11:41 PM ^
Finally, some props for the lurkers! Love the site Brian, been reading for many years, keep up the good work. Okay, back to the shadows....
December 8th, 2013 at 2:02 AM ^
Interesting post. Guess I had a sense this would happen, so have spent time elsewhere the last couple months. I've already gone thru this with netnews and moderated vs. unmoderated boards. Moderated boards took too much (unpaid) work, and unmoderated boards devolved to the point of an unusable signal-to-noise ratio. Netnews may still be out there, but it isn't the great thing it used to be. And there are many repetitions of the pattern on the internet. Good move to do some moderation by the banning and hopefully bringing back the voting which can help those who like to filter.
December 8th, 2013 at 2:39 AM ^
Are you meaning to tell me that you and your admins have total arbitrary and unaccountable authority on this blog? There is no commentor Bill of Rights? You can just off me at your own discretion?! Who do you think you are?! I hereby stand in opposition to this tyrannical and maniacal authority. I stand on the side of reason and of justice! I stand... alright whatever. Michigan State just won an outright national championship. The world can burn for all I care.
December 8th, 2013 at 9:05 AM ^
December 8th, 2013 at 9:16 AM ^
December 8th, 2013 at 12:18 PM ^
And silently watch
December 8th, 2013 at 3:16 PM ^
December 8th, 2013 at 3:19 PM ^
Personally my fav M blogspot. Admit I was surprised when Brian posted post Iowa, that it would soon be over. Kind of threw in the towel. Point system? Hilarious! Ego abounds at times, boordering on pretense.
Great info site---The egomaniacs --- well. If u base anything on points accrued ---sad and baffling.
"RAVE ON," MGOBLOG
Do I get 'banned' now? lmao!
December 8th, 2013 at 6:16 PM ^
December 9th, 2013 at 4:13 AM ^
I've been lurking since the haloscan days... since the 2006 Notre Dame game, to be exact. There have been many waves of turd sandwiches that rolled through these comments. Remember the WLA guys? The more cantankerous commenters we had, the worse it felt. The most accurate comments in this thread about M-Wolverine described him as "stifling" and "omnipresent." Regardless of what you may have thought he contributed, for the 9% of us silently reading the comments, his absence is going to be a major boon. Please, please don't be like him.
December 9th, 2013 at 10:55 PM ^
Enjoy this Team folks, enjoy the community and the game but take a step back and look at this as entertainment, not your life or lifestyle.
I personally enjoy the WLA community as they take a perspective on our fan base that reflects on the obsession and looks at it critically, which I feel is necessary. We are a crew who are incredibly passionate, and that manifests itself in folks who confuse that passion as being knowledge. Do we need to, as a fanbase question every recruiting detail, every call, every coaching move and mundane detail? The WLA folks were great at calling out these aspects, and I feel it is necessary. Michigan football is an institution but at the end of the day it affects my day in 0 ways. Act accordingly.
Maybe I don't agree with the ban first ask questions later mentality, but I am open to the suggestion that it is necessary. I enjoyed chitown's perspective. I liked reading it here. If it's no longer welcome, so be it.
Rad on, MGo.
December 9th, 2013 at 11:51 PM ^
Grew up in Michigan and always an avid fan of UM. Moved to St.Louis in 1995 and learned what it was like to be in a college football wasteland. Luckily,i'm a lifelong Cardinals fan, so that was a Plus...(think pre-espn coverage of the Birds in St. Joseph MI ala 1987). Somehow it took me unti 2008 to find this site...mostly a sporadic lurker until 2009, when i became "all in for MgoBlog". Hell, i even had an "all in for michigan" towel made, er...nevermind that. This site has been a long cool drink of water over these past few seasons in the hinterland of Big 12, um SEC backwater territory. Yes, i nearly cried that HE cried over that JG fella, but this site calmed down and continued to provide me sustanace. But lately. Hmmmm....lets just say standing in 18 degrees and facing a 15-20 mile an hour north wind in Iowa City a couple weeks ago was about as comfortng as the comments in this blog have been the past few months. I'm not about to switch sites or go all Mizzou, but i think we all need to imagine what it would be like without MgoBlog...welcome to my world, But hey, i'm just keepin it Real Blue in a Red St. Lou. Thanks for the lifeline Brian.
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