Thoughts of Leaving animemusicvideos.org

[FirestormXIII]

For the past couple of months, I've noticed that people have been getting so unbelievably rude. People are unwilling to help new ones out and around the site. Blantly rude comments about videos has been one of the many "popular trends" around the site. And worst of all, the people here have been discouraging many to come and visit this site again.

Amended to more properly reflect reality:

For the past couple of years, I've noticed that people have been <s>getting</s> so unbelievably rude. People are unwilling to help new ones out and around the site. Blantly rude comments about videos have, for some time, been one of the many "popular trends" around the site. And worst of all, the people here have been discouraging many to come and visit this site again.


Honestly, that facet of the org is no different from when I first joined. The only thing that has changed is that the percentage of sarcastic commentors have increased slightly, and the level of people helping others has become less noticable.
Really, it's perception.
The people who are unwilling to help are usually more outspoken, and more noticable, than those who actually are helping.

Combined with the fact that new people still post in the wrong forum for a lot of things, oftentimes because they don't take the time to find the right forum (And there's no excuse for that, not when everything is prominently labled and forum descriptions are given), and it becomes easier to have people say "Omg, STFU n00b" on a frequent basis.

Are the people making comments in the right? On some levels, yes. Technically, no.
If anyone remembers the rule Phade made about posts in the wrong forum, it implicitly said that members should point the post to the right forum AND answer the question if it's within their ability to do so.

If you have nothing to say that either points the question in the right direction respectfully, or answers the question and redirects future comments...then don't post. But people seem to have either forgotten that, or just disregard it entirely. I've been guilty of it myself.

On the flip side, questions posted in the right forum with at least half-decent grammar and spelling usually get answered quite nicely and without much hassle.

One thing you seem to leave out is the prevalence of new people who want their questions answered right that second, and if they're not, they get testy. As well as new people who makes posts that are almost completely indecipherable because of bad spelling and such (people whose first language is not english excluded). And let's not forget newbies that ask a question, get it answered in a reasonable and respectful manner, and still behave rudely towards whoever answered it. With people like this running around, (who are in the majority of new posters) responding sarcastically and being rude suddenly seem like more attractive options than actually helping.


If you decide to leave the org, what exactly does that improve? If the number of people who don't help are on the rise, then people who actually do help running away is only going to shift the scales that much more. If you're hoping to leave the org, and then come back later to find that everyone is suddenly respectful to one another, then let me be your wake up call: It's not going to happen that way. And if it somehow does, it won't be because you had any hand in it. If you care about animemusicvideos.org, then the idea that you're leaving it to fall apart should bug you at least a little.

There have been enough people who've left because they didn't like the way the org was 'becoming'. What they didn't seem to realize was that being helpful is a solution, running away isn't. And if you stop becoming part of the solution...well, I'm sure you know the rest.

[Veldrin]

We all think of leaving here (besides people whith no life....CoughPropyroCough) I for one have thought of it many times. I say go for it if its what you want. We all will leave some day.

[RedFusionX]

I might leave the whole idea of making AMVs, but I won't leave the forum, it is a good way for me to kill time when I am bored

As for people being rude, thats them and if you take it seriously, you have a problem, these people don't know you and they probably won't, I mean come on, most people don't even know if I am a boy or girl, and I leave it to them to decide. Don't take things said here personally, it's your own fault if you do.

[SarahtheBoring]

If it's fun for you, stay. If it's not fun, leave. It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks either way.

That's always been my guideline for online forums, and it's served me pretty well so far.

[Castor Troy]

I'm sorry but..

When you join a-m-v.org..

You're here

Forever.

[moonslayer]

We all will leave some day.

Correction, I'm here till the day I die.
I have left and probably will leave again, maybe even for good. Until then I'll try and enjoy my time here.

[Flint the Dwarf]

If it's fun for you, stay. If it's not fun, leave. It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks either way.

That's always been my guideline for online forums, and it's served me pretty well so far.

Very much agreed. It's the only way to decide these things. Frankly, I've put a lot of thought into leaving... but only because it occupies more time than I have available to me.

Anyway, do what feels right. If you're only brought down or depressed or just generally disgusted by what you see here... you should probably leave, for your own good.

[SarahtheBoring]

yep. Besides, if you get bored or feel like chatting about AMVs, you can always drop back in. Nobody's going to notice unless you make a big deal out of leaving.

[Arigatomina]

I agree with a lot of what people are saying here, so that's nice. ^_^

But I *do* think the org has gotten better since I first joined. I haven't seen any noob-flame threads in months - and even the insults now tend to be dumb comments about intelligence instead of random bolded rants and useless namecalling. Things have gotten worse lately, but it's still more sarcasm than outright hate and bandwagon style flaming. Most of the threads die before it gets really hateful.

I think you started this to hopefully pull a guilt trip on some of the worst offenders. ^_^ I tried that once. And I didn't post again for a month. One or two people did tone down their flames, but most of it eased up on its own. I had nothing to do with it. The sad fact is, they're right - you can't change people until the public opinion changes.

Right now people think being frustrated and tired of the same questions means it's okay to snap at a new member. As long as people think that, it'll continue.

A better solution would be to leave the questions for those who *aren't* frustrated and liable to be rude. If you're tired of answering the same dumb questions, don't answer them. Someone else will. If not, the person asking will eventually try to find the answer himself - and it it *has* been answered before, then he'll find what he's looking for.

As far as I can see, there's no excuse for snapping at new members. If you don't want to answer their questions (because you're sick and tired of answering them), then *don't* answer the questions. It's simple. Don't do it. Let people with more patience do it. Being rude to a new member (no matter what the cause) just leads that person to adopting the same behavior - it becomes the trend. Half the people I welcomed months back are now as bad as the older (years older) members. Why? Because that's what they see being 'normal' here. That's the example frustrated people have set for them.

Fungie...are you frustrated? ^_^

That sounds odd, but you're one of the patient ones. I've never seen you snap or be rude to new people because you're sick and tired of helping. You can't make a difference by talking to people who are just doing what's 'normal' - not when they think they have a right to behave that way. The only thing you can do is try to set a good example, and hopefully a few new members will adopt your behavior instead. It won't change much, but if you like the place, give it a shot. If you're 'sick and tired' of the place, go underground. But it won't accomplish anything at all. If you can help even one person, at least you did that - it's better than walking away.

[Iamshadowkiller]

We all think of leaving here (besides people whith no life....CoughPropyroCough) I for one have thought of it many times. I say go for it if its what you want. We all will leave some day.

say it ain't so veldrin, say it ain't so

/end