Your New Retro Gamer Community Team

[Tom_Baker]

Could you please unlock the "what's your jobbie thread"
Being as this is the off topic section I see no problems with it.

[jpishgar]

I can take a look. Link me?

Quite possibly it was locked due to containing Personally Identifying Information. That stuff tends to be taboo in the post-GDPR world.

[WaveRacer]

If People are talking about things you don't like.

Are you going to Ban them, and then afterwards add something to the AUP and say they were banned for breaking rules that were never there.

Just wondering.

[jpishgar]

If People are talking about things you don't like. Are you going to Ban them

No. That will not be our policy.

[Antiriad2097]

If People are talking about things you don't like. Are you going to Ban them

No. That will not be our policy.

Will not? Good to hear. When will it be changing to this new policy?

[silvergunner]

Could you please unlock the "what's your jobbie thread"
Being as this is the off topic section I see no problems with it.

no GDPR stuff in that thread I can assure you.

[Tom_Baker]

Can we unban JapJac as he is the first known AND proven SNK NEO-GEO Retail Version owner in the English-speaking World.

[RetroBob]

The forum is clear and readable and easy on the eye. The other designs are distracting.

[DPrinny]

Its now all on another site, its tiresome

That tends to be how it happens. One of the controversial GRAPES (guns, religion, abortion, politics, economics, sexuality) emerges in a forum dedicated to anything but emerges, bickering occurs, relationships fray, an exodus is triggered in the interest of preserving broader discussion and the bickering follows until the newer community melts from the intensity of the animosity, and the old one loses what constitutes its quorum. Yep. Classic. Fortunately, there are fixes.

The key to good conversation
Avoid politics, religion and sports

Spectrum style

Show me?

You would have to poke about in the styles database

[Sephiroth81]

That tends to be how it happens. One of the controversial GRAPES (guns, religion, abortion, politics, economics, sexuality) emerges in a forum dedicated to anything but emerges, bickering occurs, relationships fray, an exodus is triggered in the interest of preserving broader discussion and the bickering follows until the newer community melts from the intensity of the animosity, and the old one loses what constitutes its quorum. Yep. Classic. Fortunately, there are fixes.

Have you ever said "quorum" in real life and if so, were you harmed in the process?

[Crusty Starfish]

He's not a real person, is he?! There is no way a normal person would write like that It just makes him look like a bit of a censored.

[RetroBob]

Joe read books and paid attention at school or something, shame on him, apparently.

[Spector]

Joe read books and paid attention at school or something, shame on him, apparently.

You actually believe the hideous corporate jargon he comes out with is a sign of good English???? You don't write that way by paying attention at school. You write that way because you have been brainwashed into thinking the ultimate goal in life is to be PR assistant to Mark Zuckerberg.

[DPrinny]

He's not a real person, is he?! There is no way a normal person would write like that It just makes him look like a bit of a censored.

Everybody knows that those robots are slowly taking over our lifes, bit like Terminator, but less Skynet and more Google and Alexia

[pratty]

Hello Joe, Josh and Caitlin.

Q. What does this mean for the community policies and the way things work in the forum?
A. No revolution required, no coup necessary. No big policy changes or guidelines shifts. Not going to rock the boat, toss the baby out with the bathwater, or any other euphemism for screwing something up for the sake of change itself. Over the next quarter or two, we'll likely empanel a new group of moderators from the active folks here to keep things clean and tidy at the spam level, and look into sprucing up the place with a nifty new theme. And of course, maybe adding in some new (better!) categories for retro games discussions. Sidenote: There's a few items I'd like to know, like what *technically* qualifies as a "retro" game - how far back, and how far forward? Does a Gamecube game qualify? How about Space War from 1962? These are the questions that gnaw.

"What is retro?" has been discussed to the point the question has become a running joke. In my opinion it is quite irrelevent, and has effectively become so on the board. Simply discussing games of any age without making a distinction has actually served us quite well. For me being a retro only gamer is just as close minded as being a new games only gamer. People can talk about about whatever games they want and the topic will be bumped as a result. For example we have a Gamecube collectors thread, if anybody wants to discuss the Gamecube they need only search for it and bump it with their post.

Unban all the people who were banned for talking politics

We're not beyond extending a kind of potential amnesty, but doing so would be predicated on the intensity of the infraction. I know that politics and certain subjects can become quite heated and factional, and often lead to a dissolution of the interpersonal relationships that form the backbone of a community - particularly one dedicated to something that's not even tangentially related to the subject of contention. If you'd like, IM me a list of the individuals in question who you think would justify extension of amnesty, and I'd be happy to review the matters with folks from before.

Hard to say for sure exactly who was banned, as the bans were done with very little open explanation, and the offending posts were deleted, likely forever. The Beans and Koopa42 are two I know for sure, but many others left in protest, and more left as the forum gradually declined as a result, regarding the forum as a sinking ship.

I appreciate your desire to make improvements but cosmetic changes are probably the least of the forum's concerns. The forum has been in decline since the ban, especially the off topic section. People want to talk about current events with the same people they talk about games with, but we now have a situation were World War 3 could break out and we'd be be banned for mentioning it. Ironically, I'm sure the bans occured in the name of 'diversity' and 'inclusivity' and other such trendy SJW buzzwords, but the board has never been more quiet and few new posters stick around as a result.