# [+] Plus Threads



## Mistwell (May 4, 2018)

I've seen this come up several times, but the most recent one (today) was more explicit than I had seen before around here. 

A user started a thread and put a [+] mark in front of the thread title.

A user then replied to challenge one of the premises of the thread.

The person who started the thread then replied "You need to read up on the concept of "plus" threads if you think I want an echo chamber, or if you don't see the very valid reasons why the site supports such threads. If you want to keep discussing this that's fine, but I will need to ask you to start a new thread to do it."

A second user said they doubted the premise of the thread was possible, and was told again "This is a plus thread. If you want to argue against the premise of the thread, start a new one."

When questioned on that, the poster then said, "Questioning the point of the thread is exactly what you don't get to do in a plus thread."

Can a user now declare a thread they start to be designated a "plus" thread and therefore police their thread for anyone who questions a premise of the topic?

Are we now supposed to always start a new thread if we question the premise of a designated "plus" thread?

It's possible I missed that new rule. I asked elsewhere and someone mentioned [MENTION=1]Morrus[/MENTION] had discussed the possibility of such a thing but it had never been enacted as a rule as far as they knew.  

So, is this a thing now?


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## Umbran (May 4, 2018)

I asked Morrus about it.  It isn't a new rule, as such.

It seems a handy enough convention, but EN World won't be enforcing "plus" threads with moderation - which means that moderation will not fall on your head for questioning the premise, if you aren't a big jerk about it.  

However, you should probably take it as a polite request from the OP to please not question the premise.   You are being given the signal that the OP really doesn't want to have that discussion - why, as a decent EN Worlder, would you want to effectively barge in and do it anyway?   Given nigh infinite virtual space to talk, it seems a small enough favor to ask.


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## Mistwell (May 4, 2018)

Umbran said:


> You are being given the signal that the OP really doesn't want to have that discussion - why, as a decent EN Worlder, would you want to effectively barge in and do it anyway?   Given nigh infinite virtual space to talk, it seems a small enough favor to ask.




Because it's a discussion board, and it's not a blog that is just about what the guy who starts the topic wants to hear about that topic? You raise a topic and people are going to have an interchange of ideas about it...even if that interchange goes in a direction the original poster didn't want it to go. Because that's how two-way (and many-way) conversations actually happen. People who start a conversation don't "own" that conversation. 

Regardless, thanks for the clarification. I certainly won't go out of my way to question the premise of a topic that's a plus thread, but if it naturally comes up in conversation and I am being polite about it I won't necessarily actively avoid it either.


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## CapnZapp (May 4, 2018)

Here's the Meta post Morrus wrote on the subject, [MENTION=2525]Mistwell[/MENTION]:


Morrus said:


> It's something I've considered before in different forms - answer threads, for example, where someone asks a question and the responses should be (attempts at) factual answers. I think Straight Dope handles that well - one of its forums, there's a rule where the initial post must be a question seeking a factual answer (rather than a debate) and responses must be factual answers. I think that's going too far for us, but a category of threads like that might not be a bad idea. I'm tempted to give it a try.
> 
> So the [+] notation means support/factual - i.e. stay on topic, address what the poster asks.




Here's a plus thread Morrus started, with his own definition: 


Morrus said:


> Following on the FR and Greyhawk threads
> 
> The [+] tag is something I'm trying. It means positive stuff in the spirit of the thread title. If you *don't* love Dragonlance, this thread is not the place to inform us. You are welcome to start your own threads!
> 
> So, why do you love Dragonlance?




To me, "stay on topic" plus "positive stuff in the spirit of the thread title" (direct Morrus quotes) was clear enough. It would have allowed a poster to, say, start a thread on My Little Pony the RPG. Discussing things, i don't know: how would it look like? what system to use? who'd buy it? And so on.  

And specifically this (my personal opinion): posters only posting to tell the OP what a bad idea that would be, why it would never happen, etc getting sanctioned by moderation. A very useful feature of any discussion board, if you ask me. Especially one where this type of shitpost is all too common; where users are (I'm afraid) accustomed to being able to outright question or deride the premise/spirit of the thread and getting away with it - in my case successfully bringing several threads to a crashing halt (and in at least one case getting the thread closed). Enabling the plus thread tag would have been a very welcome signal that this kind of behavior isn't acceptable. Or rather, that it constitutes an attempt at derailing the topic: this is not about censorship; it's about manners. Start a new thread if you absolutely must: if you started the previous example thread the idea is that you would have to accept (free speech and all) someone starting a "why a My Little Pony RPG is a bad idea and should never get made" thread, for instance. The big win is: it would mean its posts didn't appear in the first thread, which would remain all positive and constructive. 



			
				Umbran said:
			
		

> *As for the site "supporting" it - Morrus has told me that EN World moderation is not going to actively enforce this convention.*



Thank you for finally providing an official reply. I could never understand why this wasn't formally included in site rules (hard to sanction a user for breaking unwritten rules, after all). Now at least we know why. 

In a cautiously optimistic spirit, I note with gratitude the attention of moderation in this case (direct link removed). Thank you for that.

Regards
Zapp


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## Umbran (May 4, 2018)

Mistwell said:


> You raise a topic and people are going to have an interchange of ideas about it...even if that interchange goes in a direction the original poster didn't want it to go.




Discussion can take many forms. Most American-educatd people typically only use one form - the adversarial method, in which two sides take opposing opinions and debate to win in an effort to either win or to explore a topic.  But that is *ONLY ONE* of the several valid and useful ways to explore a topic.  The Socratic method, for example, uses a question-and-answer format in which the particpants do not have to be staking out particular positions they are attempting to support.   And there are others.  This one is, if I understand it properly, applying a, "Yes, and..." approach.  You are allowed to add to and expand upon what has been given so far, but not directly negate, remove, or contradict what has already been offered.  

You ever see a good improv comedy troup in action?  Their work goes in directions no one actor intended.  THey aren't blogging or single-author scripting.  They go wierd places nobody predicted, and do it without ever directy and intentionally negating what a previous actor said.  They (and, say musicians) can riff off each other without having to say, "No, that's wrong."


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## Mistwell (May 4, 2018)

I understand where you're going with this (you're lecturing an attorney about the Socratic method, which is particularly presumptuous). So, it's not that I am having trouble understanding what you're saying.

It's that I disagree. His approach routinely is leading to more adversity, not less. Because he's going around the thread and lecturing people on how their replies don't meet his criteria for appropriate replies as if he owns that thread. Which is causing more people to want to disagree with him, which causes him to lecture them more, which spirals more into further drift off topic. It's a bad approach.

Indeed, even in improv, if someone messes up the rule, you don't point it out and stop the imrpov, you roll with it as best you can to keep things going. Because that's the goal of the improv...not the rule. That's not what's going on in that thread - the rule is causing it to grind to a halt because it's being pointed out constantly as if the rule is more important than the topic.

If he want's a "Yes, and" approach, then there are such superior ways to present than then a "plus" thread that such alternative methods should be his goal. 

For example, this is an audience of gamers...so present it as a game!  Say, "Here is a premise, and each person gets to build on this premise". That likely would have worked.  Instead he took an audience of gamers and started to focus on rules...which also works, if what you want to talk about is this kind of thread we're in right now rather than the topic he wanted to talk about.


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## Umbran (May 7, 2018)

Mistwell said:


> It's that I disagree. His approach routinely is leading to more adversity, not less.




Your disagreement is noted.  If he wants to take it into consideration, he may do so.  For now, there is not so much adversity as to be a big deal, in terms of moderation.

As most experiments, it will be monitored.  It'll take off, fall flat, or blow up, as experiments do.  That's okay.


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## lowkey13 (May 7, 2018)

*Deleted by user*


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## Umbran (May 7, 2018)

lowkey13 said:


> b. Fan threads. "I love FR. Don't you?"




Note that the most recent thread in which this was used was exactly this.  "I would like books with these characteristics, wouldn't you?"  It was all about personal preferences.  

It is left as a question to the reader whether occaisionally having a thread where "No, what you want is badwrongfun!" is discouraged is such a bad thing.




> For the most part, we should be able to rely on the overall forum rules for civility and the fact that we are all good & honorable gamers in order to keep conversations going.




For the most part, we can.  But not always - which is why moderation is sometimes necessary.

It seems to me, reading through this, that the issue is not actually whether we have a thread that discourages certain posting patterns.  The friction apears to arise with folks being reminded of that fact.  In essence, some folks don't like to be told what they should or should not do, unless the person telling them is holding a banhammer.

Which is not exactly an indication of great community feeling.


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## lowkey13 (May 7, 2018)

*Deleted by user*


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## Umbran (May 8, 2018)

lowkey13 said:


> I would characterize it differently




That's your prerogative. 



> ....given the thread started with:
> "What I think 5E is lacking the most at this point in time are two things:
> 
> ....




And *then* said, _"What I would LOVE to see is one or two official hardcovers that remedies this."_

So, yeah, totally about personal preference.  He's a fan of certain kinds of game elements. 



> And didn't have any "plus thread" rules. and there wasn't any support for it, and no one else really knows what + threads are.




Yes, as I've already noted and critiqued.  His approach was flawed, we all know that.



> and the issue is whether or not a person, by starting a thread, gets to control/police it or not.




That issue has already been answered.  He gets to make polite requests that folks stick by his rules.  If he becomes a jerk about it, he's apt to not like the results.  While we aren't going to hammer on people to stick by his rules, being contrarian to a jerkish level isn't allowed on this site in general, so folks strongly opposing the thread are also apt to not be happy with the results.

You are making this more complicated than it needs to be, as we see next....




> I know that I, for example, start my regular "survivor threads" that depend on the community doing the right thing- if people wanted to screw with those, it would be pretty easy to do so.




And they don't, right?  You ask folks to take those threads a certain way, and they generally do!  While he was clumsy about it, the concept here is no different - be nice to your fellow EN Worlder's when they ask for a thread to go a certain way.  Your Survivor threads are a fine example that extra moderation rules or outright software feature support should not be unnecessary.


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## CapnZapp (May 8, 2018)

I'm not sure it's appropriate for me to say anything more. Yet, I'm talked about in the third person, so I'll simply leave you with this:

Threads I start are visited by a small group of posters that uniformly have nothing constructive to say, and appear only interested in derailing the topic at hand. Being able to designate these threads as plus threads and have moderation clean out any such attempts at thread-wrecking would have been a godsend. 

I also decline to engage Mistwell in discussion other than to note he doesn't really seem interested in discussing plus threads - as far as I can see, he ignored my links and Morrus definitions. 

Instead he seems more interested in chastising my way of trying to survive a hostile discussion environment.

As you probably realize, I could have said more, but I won't. Hereby ends my participation in this thread.


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## lowkey13 (May 8, 2018)

*Deleted by user*


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## Morrus (May 8, 2018)

lowkey13 said:


> Fair enough! I often do that.
> 
> I am still unclear on whether or not "+" threads are an "official" thing (aka, supported by the forum rules), a "semi-official" thing (IOW, the OP can demarcate them as such, and it is the nice and respectful thing to pay attention to the "+"), or not a thing.




They're not really a thing (yet) as only one person uses them; they could potential organically turn into the "semi-official" (i.e. polite) option of people used them, but that wouldn't be a "rule" as such.


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## CapnZapp (May 8, 2018)

[MENTION=6799753]lowkey13[/MENTION]: no worries


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## MNblockhead (May 9, 2018)

Huh, never heard of plus threads. Learned something new. If it caught on, I could see it being a nice option. But it will take a LOT of education and moderation involvement to work. Many (most?) users are going to have trouble understanding the concept. 

Is it that hard to ignore responses that don't answer your question or attempt to start an argument you are not interested in?


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## lowkey13 (May 9, 2018)

*Deleted by user*


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## lowkey13 (May 9, 2018)

*Deleted by user*


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## Morrus (May 9, 2018)

lowkey13 said:


> So, to expand on what I just wrote....
> 
> Imagine you wanted to create a thread where people help create ... oh ... sane magic item pricing per level.
> 
> ...




There's the opposite line of thinking, though. If you start a conversation with some friends about X, and the conversation naturally drifts to Y, rebuking them and demanding they stay on topic is unusual behaviour. That's just how conversations work; people don't own them.

The idea of the + threads is that CapnZapp wants to be able to change that dynamic and say "I own this conversation, and I require that it stay on topic". Now, that's not a bad thing in general - people do that all the time on Facebook, for example - but it is a different dynamic to a traditional forum.

Like I said earlier, I'm not super opposed to the concept, but neither do I want to be moderating it. So folks (but we're only talking about one person really) are welcome to use the "+" symbol, and maybe it will catch on as a general politeness thing, but not to the level of a moderator enforced rule. It'd basically just be a kindly request of participant, rather than a demand.

The thing we'd need to watch out for is that if somebody doesn't accede to that kindly request, the OP getting angry about it. That's not really on.


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## lowkey13 (May 9, 2018)

*Deleted by user*


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