I disagree with the self moderated thread. Several other coins are specifically NOT open to negative discussions and become a blind group circlejerk.
While I have no fear of that happening to XMR (at least to the extent I've seen in other places) I feel leaving the main chat thread unmoderated speaks volumes about it's legitimacy.
In online forums, there are little ways to differentiate legitimate speaking from malicious. Established members recognize each other (reputation) but occasional lurkers do not have this guide. It is easy to affect the quality of discussion, and even the perception of community opinion, by cheap methods that are difficult to thwart. This is why they are so commonly used.
There is, for example, no realistic reason for any actual cryptoperson to hate let's say Monero. Yet by reading the forums, there is a perception that there is a large anti-Monero crowd there. In actuality there is not. The number of Monero users is over 10,000 and they are happy with their using. A small number of accounts is spreading their negative view.
This could be mitigated by making the posting costly, by instituting a minimum reputation threshold, by making a per-post fee, by making it needed to show that the poster actually has Moneros if he is going to talk about it, etc. These measures have not been implemented. The only way to deal with trolls is deleting their posts, which angers them, or ignoring them, which leaves the main problem - affecting the perception of the lurkers - uncured.
We in the Monero community have not yet reached the consensus on how to tackle this angle of attack. Some members have hinted that dedicated forums are coming. This is definitely a good development. The "insiders" of the coin need discussion channels where there is no interference. Yet, the importance of
Bitcoin Forum > Other > Alternate cryptocurrencies is really big and there are no plans to leave it.
There has been talk about Monero having more than its fair share of threads and activity in this forum. Now that is complete bullshit. The
Alternate cryptocurrencies main (without even the [ANN] and others) has 31,440 threads total, of which the 20 or so Monero threads that are started by Monero supporters are hardly an excessive percentage. That many of the Monero threads are in the first page, speaks about the vitality of the community. Monero is a new coin, and ranks about TOP-5 in
$ value of emission per day and
trade volume. Also it is very easy to not see Monero-related stuff - just not click those threads!
We believe this multi-pronged attack has gone a little too far now, and there might be retaliation coming.
Agree.
Both moderation and unmitigated access for fudding have their pros and cons and accepting either one of them compromises either quality or usability of the forum.
I am going dingbat crazy trying to not reply fuddsters (owing to the calls of refraining to feed them).
HERE IS MY NOOBISH ALTERNATIVE :
The ultimate aim of a fuddster is to have a psychological response from us ( panic selling from weak hands, instilling confusion, irritation, etc etc....AND eliciting a likewise response from us. This in my opinion gives them the greatest kick ). Lets respond to them psychologically:
What if we , as a community, adopt a phrase, a stinging one but which also gives space / opportunity to bring value / substantiations to their various claims; as a constant and stock reply to them all over and over again.......for a long time in the life of this thread.
We get to vent against the fudders ( We must have that satisfaction). Over a period of time the fuddsters will become dispirited (for they will realise that they have been docketed for only a single staple response), lurkers and casual observers need not verify reputations and will be able to segregate them easily; And there are more than a few fair minded people here who will prevent from abuse of this strategy , if adopted.
