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Post by jasonward on Oct 5, 2015 11:43:00 GMT
Having spoken to Ian at some length, the reasons given really are the only ones. He and Joe spent too much time moderating arguments, spam attack being almost constant and concern that - like last year - certain posters would become troublesome when the new series came back on air. That's fair enough, but those concerns didn't just appear from nowhere in the minutes before Season 9 aired, BF could and should have warned us, prepared us, and they didn't.
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Post by whiskeybrewer on Oct 5, 2015 12:00:34 GMT
Having spoken to Ian at some length, the reasons given really are the only ones. He and Joe spent too much time moderating arguments, spam attack being almost constant and concern that - like last year - certain posters would become troublesome when the new series came back on air. That's fair enough, but those concerns didn't just appear from nowhere in the minutes before Season 9 aired, BF could and should have warned us, prepared us, and they didn't. This ^^
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Post by david on Oct 5, 2015 12:09:13 GMT
Having spoken to Ian at some length, the reasons given really are the only ones. He and Joe spent too much time moderating arguments, spam attack being almost constant and concern that - like last year - certain posters would become troublesome when the new series came back on air. That's fair enough, but those concerns didn't just appear from nowhere in the minutes before Season 9 aired, BF could and should have warned us, prepared us, and they didn't. No, they didn't, you're 100% right. I was told the decision to close it with no notice was so that Big Finish Day didn't get overshadowed and social media swamped. Again - only the messenger
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Post by jasonward on Oct 5, 2015 12:12:29 GMT
Then their decision was not only wrong headed it was crass.
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Post by david on Oct 5, 2015 12:16:14 GMT
It could hardly have been handled worse, frankly. I know for me I was on a real high after Magician's Apprentice and felt sucker-punched by the closure. Even moreso when the forum was locked with no access to read-only or to PM people.
I understand the issues, I accept the issues...but I still think some of the most loyal - to a fault - BF fans going really didn't get any consideration in the end because Facebook and Twitter have more "reach".
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Post by jasonward on Oct 5, 2015 12:39:56 GMT
Indeed, if BF's intention had been how do we alienate and offend our most committed fans in one action, then doing what they did would have fit the bill perfectly.
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Post by typeforty on Oct 5, 2015 14:08:10 GMT
While I did feel..."suckerpunched" I don't think they handled it badly... just.. sudden. I would have preferred them to explore the idea of getting volunteer moderators tho help.. I know there would be a line to sign up. I was looking really forward to restarting the "Flash" thread with S02 starting tomorrow.... instead.. I'll be doing it HERE!
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Post by kfbate on Oct 5, 2015 14:22:14 GMT
Unfortunately I think the decision reached reflects the fact that BF are essentially not that big of a company, and to employ resource whether it be within or external is at a cost, whether that be in money or in time of those that do the policing of the forum. Also when all said and done a public forum is just that, and, as others have said, you have to be prepared to take the good with the bad. You also are in a world where you have to be prepared that things like DDNS, SPAM and multitude of other nasty's will do the rounds. The simple fact is I sort of now get why they have done it, the only thing I don't get, is the manner in which they have done it, and also the fact, I now feel we don't really have that line into them. When I started to get into the BF stuff, I had many questions answered by forum members, I also had PM's sent to me from Ian and other members of staff to sort out orders, and the like. I fear that this corporate response has created a sort of stand off. At least that is what I get from all of this. In the perfect world Ian or the like might join here, as this does start to feel like home, but alas I suppose the truth is that they (BF) cannot be seen to favour one over the other, and ultimately the like of Twitter/FB are less exclusive to the rest of the web and their prospective audience. However hind insight is a wonderful thing is it not ;-).
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Post by barnabaslives on Oct 5, 2015 17:24:51 GMT
Very glad to see this forum!! Hadn't been in the DW forums that long at BF but I'd gotten incredibly used to reading some new posts over morning coffee or on breaks, and even celebrating new purchases - and I'm sure others miss the BF forum much more than I do already. I still don't know what to think of Big Finish's decision - I understand it, but still not entirely sure it's completely for the best. On the one hand, with 1500 likes instantly this morning for the War Doctor, I can't argue with the idea that something like Facebook might really be a more convenient and dramatic way for BF for people to express support and BF to assess it...
On the other hand, the invited "discussion" on Facebook over the month's Listeners pick still hadn't materialized last I looked, perhaps because I don't think you really "discuss" things on Facebook? I'd love to have been the first to post personally that that audio indeed has to be the Halloweeniest thing Big Finish has ever done, but I just don't do social media. I shouldn't.
(It was just... a little strange to think that someone catering so perfectly to my antiquated taste in television couldn't picture me as someone too way out of date for social media entirely... I'm not quite as much the total technophobe as My Hero Barnabas, lol, but when first I met The Doctor, phones had rotary dials and Steve Jobs hadn't even been invented yet... Me, adjust? Never!!) :-)
I thought awhile about trying to explain to BF that I can't just go and find some other Who forum because it's taken me an investment of time to get to know people and their likes and their background with DW that I probably won't be able to repeat elsewhere. There are people from the BF forum whose tastes or opinions I've learned over the course time by reading many, many posts that I can trust to be similar to mine, and their input has been hugely helpful and influential in many purchases by now - as were the kind and insightful personal recommendations that I got when just starting out with the DW ranges and was wondering what people thought I'd like to hear who knew about my tastes already. These are both the sort of wonderful thing I don't see getting from BF's Facebook page.
A community like that is a fantastic thing for someone to keep going, and maybe it's the best of both worlds if the old forum community can reassemble itself without BF having to be in charge of it? (I guess I always did find a bit odd to have a producer moderating a forum in the first place, and BF is only getting busier, it looks like).
Maybe you can achieve an unofficial place for BF themselves too - even if they're hanging up their mod hats I'm sure they must be almost as addicted to announcing their wonderful products as I am to purchasing their products ;-) - and I'm delighted to see that BF Dark Shadows celebrity Rob Morris has already posted here, bless his heart. More familiar around here every minute... thanks VERY much, and very best of luck with this!
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Post by Ela on Oct 7, 2015 1:02:49 GMT
BTW, on the subject of writers/producers etc posting here, be aware with the guest function, you can easily claim to be anyone at all, so be wary of posts from "guests" claiming to be someone known. That's a function that should probably be turned off, if that option is available. Otherwise we will be spammed like crazy.
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Post by Ron Jeremy on Oct 7, 2015 2:08:48 GMT
BTW, on the subject of writers/producers etc posting here, be aware with the guest function, you can easily claim to be anyone at all, so be wary of posts from "guests" claiming to be someone known. Yes, I guess that's something we'll all have to look out for.
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Post by kimalysong on Oct 7, 2015 11:17:19 GMT
BTW, on the subject of writers/producers etc posting here, be aware with the guest function, you can easily claim to be anyone at all, so be wary of posts from "guests" claiming to be someone known. That's a function that should probably be turned off, if that option is available. Otherwise we will be spammed like crazy. Whoever is the moderator is not very active here.
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Post by jasonward on Oct 7, 2015 11:57:49 GMT
That's a function that should probably be turned off, if that option is available. Otherwise we will be spammed like crazy. Whoever is the moderator is not very active here. Or prefers to lurk and remain anonymous, it's quite possible their reasons for such are quite benign, but it does worry me.
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Post by mrperson on Oct 7, 2015 13:48:00 GMT
The only portion of the reasoning behind shutting it down that I have an issue with was the reference to negativity about things like the decision to go with Missy, to bring Missy back, etc. We all have different tastes and we will by definition like different things. Chances are we'll also have reasons for liking or disliking things. I doubt that there are many people who woke up one morning and arbitrarily decided that they were going to start hating Missy or Moffatt. And because of that, I completely agree with this: I completely agree. I don't mean to offend, but can the idea that "we don't want to hear negative opinions" be a cultural thing? Here in the US we are used to being bombarded with all kinds of opinions. I never thought anything that was said was over the top.(Except for the one or two exceptions like Dalekbuster or paulmorris777) The idea of a forum is for discussion, and boy would they be boring if everyone liked the same things. I don't have a problem with people not liking what I like, unless they get insulting. If the folks at BF can't handle some friendly, heated disagreement, then maybe they did the right thing and shouldn't be hosting a forum. But it also causes me to lose some respect for those folks. It probably also helps that I participate in a politics debate forum, which makes the rudest exchange on the old BF forum look like polite tea time banter in a Jane Austen novel... That said, if the forums were causing Joe and Ian to work for free, especially on weekends, I cannot fault them for shutting down the forums. It would have simply been nicer to have more warning and explanation than "we're done here. Peace. /drops mic"
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Post by jasonward on Oct 7, 2015 19:07:37 GMT
It's not a cultural thing, at least not in terms of UK vs US culture, negative opinions are voiced often and loudly here in the UK, and of those with the most negative opinions they are only too happy to voice are the little 'c' conservative British.
However I definitely think it was a cultural thing in terms of BF. As an organisation it appeared clear to me that BF never understood forums, how they worked and how to make them work, they repeatedly failed to respond to calls for community moderators and such made a rod for their own back.
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Post by brax on Oct 7, 2015 20:19:01 GMT
Post removed by Moderator as it contributes nothing to the discussion and contains potentially inflammatory remarks.
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Post by TinDogPodcast on Oct 8, 2015 20:58:24 GMT
Right. Blame will achieve NOTHING.
This is our.... yours and mine... place.
Lets show the world how good doctor who fans are.
Lets play nicely
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Post by agentten on Oct 8, 2015 22:44:32 GMT
No doubt BF are experiencing growing pains. The NuWho material represents a big change for them. I don't know how much the forums sold product generally speaking, but I know for me I often went off of positive recommendations I saw in the forums when I was deciding to buy new ranges. I also came to Big Finish a little bit after the first 50 went out of print and I had no idea they were out of print when I was browsing the site, I just thought their stock was low and would be replenished. If it hadn't been for the forums I wouldn't have known to hurry and snatch up the ones I needed before the second hand market price got too bonkers.
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Post by Digi on Oct 9, 2015 12:21:31 GMT
Speaking as someone who has moderated forums both corporate and public for 14 years, the assertion that it was 'just too much work' is, frankly, a load of crap. Forum software is easy to use by design -- you can ban a user and delete every post they've ever made in less than two minutes. You can ban entire IP ranges, so multiple-user attacks originating from the same place can be blocked en masse. A curse filter can block any word you choose to define as a bad word. By and large, the BF forum community is (was) some of the best behaved out there. Users are civil to one another, discuss and dissect just as you'd expect on a forum of that nature, and very very rarely have spats. Spats, I add, which were still more civil than you see on many other forums out there. As an added bonus: the financial cost is negligible too. Last time I checked, the yearly license fee for the vBulletin software is around $150.
In short, the excuse that it was too much for them to manage is a complete load.
I find the whole thing very puzzling. Big Finish is a fairly small business, and they know it. They've said as much on many occasions. And it's in a small business's best interest to cultivate its core, which is exactly what the BF forum was. So why betray their most loyal? It seems like they've gone and shot themselves in the foot for no good reason.
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Post by Audio Watchdog on Oct 9, 2015 16:23:09 GMT
Speaking as someone who has moderated forums both corporate and public for 14 years, the assertion that it was 'just too much work' is, frankly, a load of crap. Forum software is easy to use by design -- you can ban a user and delete every post they've ever made in less than two minutes. You can ban entire IP ranges, so multiple-user attacks originating from the same place can be blocked en masse. A curse filter can block any word you choose to define as a bad word. By and large, the BF forum community is (was) some of the best behaved out there. Users are civil to one another, discuss and dissect just as you'd expect on a forum of that nature, and very very rarely have spats. Spats, I add, which were still more civil than you see on many other forums out there. As an added bonus: the financial cost is negligible too. Last time I checked, the yearly license fee for the vBulletin software is around $150. In short, the excuse that it was too much for them to manage is a complete load. I find the whole thing very puzzling. Big Finish is a fairly small business, and they know it. They've said as much on many occasions. And it's in a small business's best interest to cultivate its core, which is exactly what the BF forum was. So why betray their most loyal? It seems like they've gone and shot themselves in the foot for no good reason. Agreed. Is it possible that those kinds of filters would not work with the web site as it currently exists? It's a thing that can't support wish list functions, the use of gift cards or purchasing discs to send to third parties as gifts....would it be that big a surprise that anti-spam and enhanced moderation tools would not work either? I really think they got taken for a ride by whatever parties were responsible for their last web site redesign. Just throwing that out there. Anyway, I see no reason to take the reasons Ian listing to David, Jason & myself as anything other than the truth. Like most of us here I question the timing of it and the method in which it was carried out. And as others have mentioned, and it certainly something I banged on about a lot on the forum, there is a trend of the higher ups at Big Finish, and this includes the late and still much loved Paul Spragg, to not think things through or to be caught completely off guard when people revolt. We saw it with the subscription bonus, the booklet debacle, the discounted subscriptions flap. Anyway, that place of gathering is gone. It sucks but there you have it. We have this now. Let's make it work and let's make it better than what we had before.
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