While its application to gaming might be reasonable (a LW gaming forum for groups formed on the main LW site seems a very good idea), I feel discomforted by this development. Internet forums have their own dynamics and if this becomes a real unofficial shadow site this might create problems. Due the different structure of moderation it messes with LW’s status as a well kept garden.
You simply can’t replicate the effects of the dynamics of karma voting and the special demographic that visit LW without the … dynamics of karma voting and the demographic that visits LW.
The discussion section already fulfils nearly all the positive functions of a forum with barley any downsides.
I can’t see the forum becoming an unofficial shadow for Less Wrong because it’s so clearly redundant for that purpose. The Discussion section is more informal than the main page, but I don’t think that site members would that be receptive to using it for, say, non rationality-related media recommendations.
Less Wrong is a community blog; it’s geared towards instruction and communication of ideas. Forums are primarily social outlets.
There is karma voting on the forum (called “exalt” and “smite”, annoyingly). I agree that the discussion section does a lot; it’s mostly intended for gaming with the other boards as places for threads that go way off topic.
Current implementation? yea. The system is under construction thou and by the time it actually grows into somehting that can have an effect of anything hopefully good systems will be in place.
Doing things in a better order could have stopped this from being a race against time thou.
While its application to gaming might be reasonable (a LW gaming forum for groups formed on the main LW site seems a very good idea), I feel discomforted by this development. Internet forums have their own dynamics and if this becomes a real unofficial shadow site this might create problems. Due the different structure of moderation it messes with LW’s status as a well kept garden.
You simply can’t replicate the effects of the dynamics of karma voting and the special demographic that visit LW without the … dynamics of karma voting and the demographic that visits LW.
The discussion section already fulfils nearly all the positive functions of a forum with barley any downsides.
I can’t see the forum becoming an unofficial shadow for Less Wrong because it’s so clearly redundant for that purpose. The Discussion section is more informal than the main page, but I don’t think that site members would that be receptive to using it for, say, non rationality-related media recommendations.
Less Wrong is a community blog; it’s geared towards instruction and communication of ideas. Forums are primarily social outlets.
Yea. This.
There is karma voting on the forum (called “exalt” and “smite”, annoyingly). I agree that the discussion section does a lot; it’s mostly intended for gaming with the other boards as places for threads that go way off topic.
I may be wrong, but I think that ‘exalt’ and ‘smite’ only tracks points for users, not individual posts.
Seconding the dedication of the forum to gaming. As mentioned elsewhere in this thread, a flood of gaming-only posts is something worth avoiding.
But I wonder if the /r/LessWrong on reddit would do. Subreddits seem nicer to me compared to the kind of shoddy proboards forum.
Current implementation? yea. The system is under construction thou and by the time it actually grows into somehting that can have an effect of anything hopefully good systems will be in place.
Doing things in a better order could have stopped this from being a race against time thou.