Concerns

[FoxDemonSoavi]

IF anyone has any sort of concern this is the thread for it. I will start off with some of rye's concerns.

Rye brought up the following concerns and I think others may have had the same issues.
<Rye> I just hate leechers who PM me on a different site asking me how to use the tiles I posted on spongen
<Rye> I am also worried for anyone who posts any stories--since people will do anything to get good stories =_= but that's just paranoia

I want the site to be safe from such things if we can do it without it becoming a major issue. First off set the creation forum to only people on the site.
Second off people could join just for stuff and we might need a way ot discourage that more than we are already planning.

[Ronove]

Yeah, the main problem with the private is that people will sign up, get what they want and leave and never come back. That's really hard to prevent.

[Cup o' Wisps]

Well that'll happen anyway. Look at the other forum, there were private sections and there are several inactive members, a chunk of that doing the same.

But it does give false readings when you want to gauge your stock membership.

[Erk]

I'm concerned that 60.25 still hasn't put on any lip chap. I'm concerned about the state of his lips.

But yeah. Leeching is, I'm afraid, somewhat inevitable. So is plot theft: the sad fact of life is that if you don't want anybody to steal your work you have to keep it to yourself and never release it until after you die. Then at least nobody will steal it until you're too dead to care :P

Forcing registration will only slow down leechers, and doesn't accomplish too much. I would rather prospective users were allowed to look around and see what they can be a part of, and even lurk without creating an account if they want.

I really can't think of any way to stop people from downloading and using content they want to steal.

[FoxDemonSoavi]

I can. something a tad different that may work. a friends list of sorts + the ability to make a thread you post reged users only view. it changes things a tad but not drastically.

[Erk]

Actually yeah, developing a system where users could designate a thread "white list only", ie. only specified users can view it, would be neat.

[Cocoa]

Ideally it would work, however we can see something happening where certain users may not be allowed access since they give harsh critique. Harsh but true and effective that is. I know, myself, that I won't mind to point out every flaw I notice and treat the item what it's worth as well as telling how to improve it. There may be users that are more fragile about their works they would not recieve this critique on a whitelist system.

[FoxDemonSoavi]

but with users already able to delete and ban people from their threads, it doesn't change much. it jsut gives people optional protection against leechers if they fear them a lot.

[Lunarea]

I like the system. I'm sure we all know the risks of putting things up on the internet. This would at least allow a small measure of control, and that's comforting :)

[Cup o' Wisps]

I'm concerned that Erk is a little too concerned about the state of my lips.

White listing is fine. I mean, how many times are we going to PM someone, because we want to show them some sprite for CnC, and if someone else ends up with it we get a little pissy right? This'll be a fine way to keep it at least somewhat private. Sure, it's not going to actually guarantee stoppage, but it's a step forward.

So what if Reives blocks me from seeing Quintessence one day (:mad: YOU BETTER NOT :mad:), I could be banned regardless. So if it's "members only" or only specific groups or what not, it's really just making it easy for Reives. If he wants only 4 people to see it, as of my writing this we have 62 members, he won't have to ban 58. He could just allow 4.
That is, unless I've got how to do things wrong.

Fine idea. It has my full support, for whatever that's worth.

[JakeyZombie]

I think a feature like this would allow people putting out original work to have a sense of security when it comes to these forums, because Rye does bring up a good point. (I'm more leaning towards the writing.:x) It would suck if you put your story up for critique and then you see someone making a game with your story replicated for their use. This goes for anything somebody throws out there though, so if a white list is what it takes to keep thing from being stolen, and all that garbage, then maybe it should be implemented.

I for one, am all for it.:D

[Alisa_Tana]

I am definitely in favor of white-listing, especially in conjunction with child-threads. So that one can create a main parent-thread for a project, then white-list some of the specific child-threads. A way of controlling media leak, and even a way of giving groups working on a single project a "private" forum to discuss their project outside of PMs and Chats (which can be annoying if not everyone concerned is available).


Perhaps, as a method of avoiding abuse (and server over-load maybe) to limit white-listing to child-threads only.

[Kettlehead]

White listing for the win. A good idea. Hopefully that would encourage lurkers to contribute as well as discouraging leechers.

[J.D. Slasha]

I really like the idea of white listing; it really sucks to have to worry about the resources you put out.

[Cup o' Wisps]

Yea, I didn't even think to combine white listing with the possible ability of children threads. That would be the GREATEST thing. There could be a project that combines child thread aspects and each one of them could be whitelisted to a specific group, while others are members only - the limitlessness! Hurry up and work this :)

Oh, and Kettlehead!
Nice sig :eek::D

[Erk]

I'd be inclined to make whitelisting a universal thing, for simplicity: each user defines a "friends list" that can get into their whitelisted topics. Or maybe they can have multiple whitelists, I dunno. Or each topic can have the option to edit its whitelist with the friends list as default.

[Elias]

I'm all for the idea of white listing.

I've had many ideas and stories I've been wishing to post for a while...even on .org, but I'm so scared my work will be seized, ripped apart for all it's worth, cut, reworded, and even...dare I say it...reused. Some people downright just take an actual script and reuse it somewhere else. No respect for literature whatsoever.

That really is my number one concern. Disrespectful people (not even going to call them 'noobs', they are real evil people) that just browse a site to see what they can get. It really bothers me.

[Erk]

another question, then: should a whitelist topic be viewable to people not on the whitelist, or should it be invisible if you can't read it? I go for the latter, myself, to avoid the feelign of elitism.

[Alisa_Tana]

Yeah, I'd say invisible. Kind of like the Silent Revolution.

[Kettlehead]

I agree. We don't want to go on about how we're elitist :D Did I say that out loud?

PS 60.25, ok, ok, I've changed my sig in your favour ;)

[Elias]

Like, would the topic be invisible? Or the list?

I'd prefer the topic to be invisible.

[Cup o' Wisps]

Invisible. This way no one get's PM'd "Hey let me in!"
People you don't want to see, won't. The whole point of whitewashing is to prevent them, so why not hide it from them?

And @Kettle,
I didn't mind the sig, it made me laugh that someone actually noticed it and called me on it :-P

[Autumn]

You might want to get some reputation sytem instead actually. I mean, while white-listing works, it does bounce off people you do not know and do have something positive to add. sure, you can do without another "nice work", but what if this person can actually help you to fix unseen errors or even to improve overall?

Then again, what reputation system? An invisible reputation system (kept secret) seems an option, but it'd leek eventually.

[Lunarea]

I don't like the idea of a reputation system mainly because it's a really vague and subjective term. Someone might think that good reputation comes from very many positive posts (without necessarily depth of content), while someone else might think it comes from very few, but informed posts. Furthermore, someone might be impressed by bluntness, while another will want more subdued language.

With it, we get into this whole sticky thing of "I can see your thread, but you banned me from commenting because you don't like me, therefore we got a conflict going on" thing that you may want to avoid if you only want certain threads to be seen by certain people.

Also, white-listing would allow for group/project team threads. If a few people wanted to do a side project, for example, it'd be easier to have a thread that only they can see than to try to organize everything in IRC and pm's.

However, there is a way to integrate the reputation system of sorts.

We could add broad user groups (and I can hear the management groaning at this, since it involves admin work - but bear with me). For example, we could have a "writers" group that would consist of everyone who considers themselves a writer and wants to read more writing or offer more input/advice. It can be open-group where the people just apply based on interest, or it can be dependent on some pre-determined criteria.

This way, the threads would be open for feedback, but not visible to guests or forum members that aren't interested in reading about it.

[Alisa_Tana]

This mod looks like white listing:
http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=122897

It doesn't hide the thread tho, but that might be easy enough to change.

[FoxDemonSoavi]

between black listing and white listing people can pretty much govern themselves.

[Alisa_Tana]

And of course access to moderate your own threads, which is currently being installed. ^__^