And frankly, there are more members who consider themselves "experienced and knowledgeable" than are either experienced or knowledgeable. They can benefit from being challenged or even annoyed by fresh voices. (Remember when so many of the very young new members took the name "expert" as part of their username?)
While the statement is true, many of those currently challenging them have no idea how things actually work, and they have been bluntly told so on multiple occasions. And usually those putting "expert" in their name are usually far from it in my experience.
So we are each faced with the question: is the Forum about MY interests or is it a community I wish to support and sustain?
My argument is towards supporting a community, not myself. If it was just me holding these opinions I'd have just left already. There's been quite a bit of evidence now that there are many who largely support what I'm arguing.
There's a big difference between someone posting about the goats at a zoo they visit often and someone posting facebook links to goat births/deaths at a zoo they've never visited and likely never will. I get it, I love the goats at my local zoo as I assume many others on here do. If someone posts news about the goats they love from their zoo, that's great and I don't have any problem with that. It's a bit different though to be posting facebook links to goat births and deaths at random, obscure zoo that you don't have an invested interest in. Part of me wishes that people would save the reporting of news to those who visit the facility and know it best.
I agree with this, especially if it's a zoo that's visited on a regular basis. I will say though that a great many zoos are not routinely visited, and so it's a bit complex to say "no news unless you visit the zoo."
I'm willing to bet a decent amount of "lurkers" would also be more inclined to post if the site was more encouraging to and more dependent on local zoo-goers to report news, rather than have members half way across the country who have never visited dominating the news threads.
I suspect you may be right.
It seems like you are fascinated with goats, is there something you're not telling us?
I know a fair few people on here who like goats - but they also don't think they belong on a zoo forum.
Jokes aside, I have an invested interest in every facility I post and there are members (who aren't private) that I could name who post news from across the world at different facilities. I guess what separates me is how often I post the news in threads that "not many people care about".
That's a lot of facilities to have a vested interest in. Especially given how obscure some are. You are correct in how a lot of what gets on people's nerve is how much you post, though a fair chunk of it is also what you post.
I believe that one can simply mark any member as "Ignore" and be free of selected "clutterers"
You can, and I know a couple people who tried it. They said it lasted only a short time as due to the sheer volume of posting by certain members it was dreadfully annoying to be scrolling through so many blank posts. It cuts out
a lot of content so I'm told.
I rather think I have made my point. A seemingly small number of members disagree and feel that more rules and even censoring will improve their experience. That's disappointing.
I'll leave you to it then
I don't feel you have. More and more members keep stepping in to voice opinions contrary to yours - you also keep moving goal posts. You also seem to be arguing for high-quality content while simultaneously arguing for the worst possible way to achieve it.
