zex20913
Level: Smitemaster

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I am not calling for the heads of any moderator. This is the first on-topic meta-moderation thread that I know of, so the community has never voiced what they thought, officially, before.

Certainly, mistakes have been made, as admitted, and otherwise. As I said, I don't recall exactly where I saw that remod, but I recall seeing the post afterwards, explaining the remod. And yes, it made me angry, but I'm glad it was public, and not Georged. (George Bush, President of the U.S., likes to keep secrets.)

But mistakes are how we improve ourselves. I reiterate my call for moderators to be less restrictive in their +1s, more restrictive on how high they go, and not to change any mod simply for moral outrage. I suppose I'll add "no vindictive modding" as well. I think that's the equivalent of police brutality.

As for the maliciousness that occurred with coppro, I fully believe in the right of whoever it was who did it, to do it. However, I also believe that it was wrong, immature, and nowhere near funny. Mod points for regular forumers should be unregulated. But the community should discourage both random and malicious downmods, as we do.

Also, with almost 4,000 members, we've grown quite a bit. We've also shown that we can be responsible, helping shape architects who ignored unwritten standards (back in the past--we have written ones now) into one of the most consistent. We've shown that we are accepting of most newcomers. We've also shown that we can get irate if people don't live up to our expectations (as with Anson, but that relationship has improved, AFAIK.) I think we're a group of good people, and good people are attracted to that. We just need to be a little less willing to yell and point fingers.

Oh, and we've also shown that it's very hard to stay on topic, whether serious or in fun.

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silver
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zex20913 wrote:
As for the maliciousness that occurred with coppro, I fully believe in the right of whoever it was who did it, to do it. However, I also believe that it was wrong, immature, and nowhere near funny. Mod points for regular forumers should be unregulated. But the community should discourage both random and malicious downmods, as we do.

this is where I disagree with you, as I tried to outline in my post - I think a "hands off" attitude to how people use their mods, coupled with giving mod points for reasons having nothing to do with merit, is what changed mod points from being a system which shows people how to act in our community into a system of "random points"

you say the "the community should discourage both random and malicious downmods", but when we do so, the admins step in and say "they're just points, get over them" and "we won't do anything" and such, and try to make us feel bad for trying to discourage random and malicious downmods ("this is only interesting to six people" "it's just a dip in the graph" "they are not worth being worried about"). so not only will the admins do anything, they will try to get the rest of us not to do anything, either.

again: all this would be fine if they were relabeled "random points" and moved to a less prominent position ... as it is, they are a false reflection of our community.


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[Last edited by silver at 06-04-2007 03:03 PM]

NiroZ
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zex20913 wrote:
We've shown that we are accepting of most newcomers.

Heh, the forum has given some the the new people a pretty rough time. Especially when it comes to the feature request, where it can become quite insulting.

Anyway, from what I can see, I'd say that modpoints alone are not the problem with this forum. As MeckMeck said, the forum is changing, but from what I can see, the Admins haven't really changed much at all, especially in stance. I mean, heck, they didn't really do anything to rein in the Mitchthro situation (except for requesting it stop, which obviously wasn't working), and the downmod campaign should have been dealt with ages ago, before it started spawning copycats. Leaving people to sort it out themselves seems to be just giving people enough rope to hang themselves.

I'm not crying for blood here, but a little bit more control to keep discussions on track, as well as nice and friendly would be very welcome.

eytanz
Level: Smitemaster

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NiroZ wrote:

zex20913 wrote:
We've shown that we are accepting of most newcomers.

Heh, the forum has given some the the new people a pretty rough time. Especially when it comes to the feature request, where it can become quite insulting.

Not nearly so much now as in the early days of the forum - feature requests have always been a dangerous place to post. But as a general rule - though there have been exceptions - I think the forum accepts newcomers eagerly, in the sense that people don't give other people a hard time because they are newcomers. However, the forum isn't very welcoming of certain types of posts - such as hint requests off the hint forum without good reason, or poorly worded feature requests, or anything written in incomprehensible English. These posts tend to be normally associated with newcomers, mostly because the people who post them don't stick around for too long.

Anyway, from what I can see, I'd say that modpoints alone are not the problem with this forum. As MeckMeck said, the forum is changing, but from what I can see, the Admins haven't really changed much at all, especially in stance. I mean, heck, they didn't really do anything to rein in the Mitchthro situation (except for requesting it stop, which obviously wasn't working),

That was an unfortunate case in many ways, but lets just say that there were certain circumstances in that case that were not (and will not be) made public and complicated things. I'll say that it was about as well handled as it was possible at the time.

and the downmod campaign should have been dealt with ages ago, before it started spawning copycats. Leaving people to sort it out themselves seems to be just giving people enough rope to hang themselves.

That I think is more important criticism, as it *is* representative of an issue at large - but note that it is tied back to the issue of mod points. Basically, the forum admins, especially Schik, strongly believe in the "people should be free to use their mod points as they see fit" philosophy that silver is arguing against above. The question isn't whether this is causing problems - it certainly is - the question is what is a good alternative - either another approach that the admins would agree to support, or how to tailor the mod system to work better under this approach.

One thing, which I think I already stated above, is to stop handing out mod points to anything but good posts. If people really need to contribute to get their mod points, then even if someone misuses the ones they collected, at least they had to do a lot of good to get to that position. It might also be worthwhile to tweak the costs of modding. And maybe add some sort of time limit so that posts cannot be modded after a certain time period.

These are all technical solutions to what is basically a sociological issue, true, but they will nudge people in the right direction without actively policing how people spend their mod points. I'm hoping that at this point, that will be sufficient.

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[Last edited by eytanz at 06-04-2007 03:16 PM]

zonhin
Level: Delver

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I still think the forums aren't in very bad shape. I have yet to see any flaming, just the occasional clashing of opinions, which is, of course, bound to happen as a community grows. The more people there are, the more opinions there are, and the more disagreements spring up. It's part of the natural growth of a community. Don't like it? Leave. Go to some undiscovered forum in a remote area of the internet and watch it go through the exact same changes. This is being blown way out of proportion. Stop it. It won't help.

____________________________
I looked at the world through apple eyes
And cut myself a slice of sunshine pie
I danced with the peanut butterflies
Till time went and told me to say hello but wave goodbye

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[Last edited by zonhin at 06-04-2007 10:48 PM]

Kwakstur
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zonhin wrote:
I still think the forums aren't in very bad shape. I have yet to see any flaming, just the occasional clashing of opinions, which is, of course, bound to happen as a community grows. The more people there are, the more opinions there are, and the more disagreements spring up. It's part of the natural growth of a community. Don't like it? Leave. Go to some undiscovered forum in a remote area of the internet and watch it go through the exact same changes. This is being blown way out of proportion. Stop it. It won't help.

I agree. The thing about a community is that it's nice when it's small, but it doesn't stay small. It's nice to know everyone and where they stand, but soon enough, the population grows, the place gets more cramped, and some extremists are born. Arguments are unavoidable. Soon, people don't have any clue about who else is in thier community. Idiots arise, and have no clue as to what to do.

So Mike tells some people about the DROD. Those people tell others. Soon, DROD is this lost gem that more and more people are finding out about. You can't prevent that. And, in fact, you encourage it when you put games like SubTerra and Wonderquest on here. Not a lot of people knew about SubTerra beforehand (or even now), but it's the game that brought me here, and I'm sure it brought others. And if any of those newcomers don't lurk first, they'll think that it's okay to make thier first and only post be an illegible copy of one already on Hints and Solutions.

There is no longer this small community where we all know eachother and feel safe. It all becomes an unintended simulation of industrialization. Soon, you get some dynamics added in: blowup smilie extremist Maurog, 9 year old, mod-down resenting Anson, and long-post-typing, autistic Kwakstur. It would all be fine if the community was small, but, alas, that isn't the case.

We try to fix this with post-count-based ranks. All it does it give us random posts. We try mod points. All it does is get newcomers, and even veterans, angry. And look at how chaotic GameFAQs is without any system at all (unless you count karma, which is simply the number of days registered).
No system will prevent downgradding of posts. Name one forum you have ever seen that hasn't experienced this problem over time. They all gain members, they all turn chaotic.
But, whether or not you agree, the mod points help when not abused. And even if abused, they still help slow down degrading if people don't take random mod-downs seriously (although albeit that destroys the purpose of having mod-points). But all mod points do is help. Not prevent.

Every forum goes through this, because every community grows. I wish there was a way to prevent this, but there clearly isn't. I say to everyone, including myself, get over it. If you want, make another forum for us to go to and have another community start. Those who don't want to go to that forum, or don't know about it, will be to our benefit, as we will have a smaller community, one easier to control. That's how many forums start; people taking discussions off of Neopets.com or GameFAQs.com and making thier own websites. But all of those websites also experience this trend. And nobody ever said it was worth migrating to another forum every time the user count exceeded 1000 and history repeats.

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Syntax
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Though I'm slightly intimidated by the length of posts above generally saying not to worry about stuff, I'd just like to say:

I love this forum and always have. The game's pretty fun too...

Blondbeard
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I just want to quickly add that I don't really understand Zex's point about earning mod-points, and the right to do whatever you want with them. I don't want to get into a discussion about mod ponts, but I think the way of thinking is... odd.

I don't think you should ever earn the right to un-questioned do things that others percive as (even a tiny bit) harmful. If the moderators for whatever reason thinks that it's a good thing to reset a post I think they should do so. I hope that makes sense. I'm a bit tired now, and I am well aware that my ability to express myself in English is below avarage for this forum.

Kwakstur
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Well, your English is fine. What you said made perfect sense; I think you're putting yourself down too much with phrases like "I am well aware that my ability . . . in English is below average". I can name two people on this forum who should be saying that instead. And it's definitely better than my chemistry teacher could ever do. She still puts periods after question marks, and she's been in America for, what, 30 years?. ,

She thinks that "-ic" means "acid", despite the fact that "-ic" is a well known suffix for changing an noun into an adjective, and stuff like "acetic acid" already has the word "acid" in it, so if "-ic" meant "acid", wouldn't it be a little bit redundant?

But don't mind me. I'm just ranting like everybody else is, here.

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Mattcrampy
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I am of the opinion that it's basically impossible to come up with technical solutions to social problems. There's no way for a computer to know someone's intentions - it's up to the community to work that out.

I don't agree that these current issues are part and parcel of a growing community, as I've been involved in larger communities that have been more civil. We were certainly fine after JtRH until recently, and that's probably been the catalyst for growth more than anything.

I still stand my my initial suggestion that the moderation as it stands isn't effective, but I've been asked to clarify what I think needs to be done as opposed to asserting whom I feel the problem lies with today. Certainly I feel that we need more mods - most of the mods are volunteers, and all (except, to my knowledge, Neil) have other Caravel duties that possibly rank as a higher priority. There's a few people I think are suitable and are trustworthy, and a few others I think might work out so long as they can demonstrate their responsibility.

The other thing I'm worried about is hit-and-run moderating. I think everyone feels a little upset when some random post in the past gets modded down for no apparent reason - it's the same principle. I've heard that this has happened a couple of times in the recent past as everyone's gotten busy, and there's been some miscommunication, and so perhaps some of the mods have gotten somewhat gunshy and started second-guessing themselves. I don't have firm details here, so I'm not going to make a fuss, but I'm going to find out what I can in case there's a problem there.

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eytanz
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Mattcrampy wrote:
I am of the opinion that it's basically impossible to come up with technical solutions to social problems. There's no way for a computer to know someone's intentions - it's up to the community to work that out.

True, but we can balance the costs so that it's harder to do things that are less likely to be benign (like modding old posts).

I agree that's hardly a full solution, but it will make life easier on the mods, which will make for more effective moderation.

I still stand my my initial suggestion that the moderation as it stands isn't effective, but I've been asked to clarify what I think needs to be done as opposed to asserting whom I feel the problem lies with today. Certainly I feel that we need more mods - most of the mods are volunteers, and all (except, to my knowledge, Neil) have other Caravel duties that possibly rank as a higher priority. There's a few people I think are suitable and are trustworthy, and a few others I think might work out so long as they can demonstrate their responsibility.

I think bringing more admins on board (real ones, not just people with unlimited mod points) is a good idea, since everyone seems pretty strapped for time these days.


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NiroZ
Level: Smitemaster
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UrAvgAzn wrote:
Alright. I've actually kept all my thoughts bottle up about this, thinking in my mind from time to time, "What the hell is this guy saying?" And I want to make things clear, if things don't get better around here, we're going to lose a lot of our valued veterans.

Don't like me? Fine! Mod me down into oblivion, ban me, I don't care! Those are my thoughts, and they still stand.

If it makes you feel any better, not so long ago I came close to posting a similar message (although the context would be different), and not nearly as politely as you.

For me it helped to step back a bit, and not just look a things that vindicated my position. Taking a more active role in fixing the problems also helped.

@ Eytanz
I'd admit that I don't know a lot of what happened in the Mitchthro situation, and considering I'm posting only with the benefit of hindsight in that regard, I can't blame too much with how the situation was originally dealt with. However, I was greatly dismayed when it was allowed to reignite.

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[Last edited by NiroZ at 06-11-2007 06:53 AM : Its context, not contest]

Oneiromancer
Level: Legendary Smitemaster

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eytanz wrote:

I still stand my my initial suggestion that the moderation as it stands isn't effective, but I've been asked to clarify what I think needs to be done as opposed to asserting whom I feel the problem lies with today. Certainly I feel that we need more mods - most of the mods are volunteers, and all (except, to my knowledge, Neil) have other Caravel duties that possibly rank as a higher priority. There's a few people I think are suitable and are trustworthy, and a few others I think might work out so long as they can demonstrate their responsibility.

I think bringing more admins on board (real ones, not just people with unlimited mod points) is a good idea, since everyone seems pretty strapped for time these days.

Yeah, as soon as I got a real job, I had a lot less time for the forums. Schik got a new job around the same time, I think, which gave him less free time during the day. And when e-mail notification stopped working, the ability of Schik and I to find problem threads also decreased.

I don't really think that we need new actual admins...moderators can move, sticky, and edit or delete threads. Well, I'm not sure if moderators (instead of admins) can edit or delete threads, but they could always move them to a private board for review if necessary. The admin powers are much more tied in to the CaravelNet workings which means that they must be guarded carefully.

It's pretty obvious that there's a difference in moderating philosophy between those who are "in power" and those who are not. I don't want to speak for Schik too much, but I know that he and I sit more on the "only step in as a last resort" side than the "monitor every single post for perfection" side. Unless there is a clear instance of something inappropriate, we generally wait and see how the community responds.

Besides giving out more mod points, which I know I usually forget to do, I don't know what else we could be doing differently. In the past all moderators had to do was move the occasional thread, edit profanity out of a post, delete double posts, remove spammers, ban the very occasional malcontent, and do various other fixes like H&S images or beta boards. Minor arguments are just a part of any community, and it is only when they become outright flaming that I would feel the need to step in. And I just haven't seen that. But again, I don't read every single thread any more, so perhaps I missed some.

I could probably say more but I'm already quite late for work and I rarely type something that I don't erase and type over. I'd probably have many negative mods if I didn't actually stop myself and think about how other people might interpret what I write, especially from a position of "power." People might be surprised how many posts I have abandoned because I couldn't think of a polite way to say something, and just settle for a snarky comment to Schik over IM.

____________________________
"He who is certain he knows the ending of things when he is only beginning them is either extremely wise or extremely foolish; no matter which is true, he is certainly an unhappy man, for he has put a knife in the heart of wonder." -- Tad Williams

Briareos
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Syntax wrote:
I love this forum and always have.

Agreed.

The game's pretty fun too...

There's a game?

____________________________
"I'm not anti-anything, I'm anti-everything, it fits better." - Sole
R.I.P. Robert Feldhoff (1962-2009)

eytanz
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 2708
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Oneiromancer wrote:
I don't really think that we need new actual admins...moderators can move, sticky, and edit or delete threads. Well, I'm not sure if moderators (instead of admins) can edit or delete threads, but they could always move them to a private board for review if necessary. The admin powers are much more tied in to the CaravelNet workings which means that they must be guarded carefully.

Ok, just to clarify, when I meant "admins" I meant what you call "moderators", as opposed to just more people like me who have unlimited modpoint but no actual superpowers.

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NiroZ
Level: Smitemaster
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Yeah, I think most of us here are referring to moderators as admins. Considering that at the moment, all moderators are admins (and IIRC, admins moderators), its easier to refer to you guys as admins, thus avoiding any confusion over people moderating (via mod points) posts and people moderating the forum (via superpowers).

NiroZ
Level: Smitemaster
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Oneiromancer wrote:
It's pretty obvious that there's a difference in moderating philosophy between those who are "in power" and those who are not. I don't want to speak for Schik too much, but I know that he and I sit more on the "only step in as a last resort" side than the "monitor every single post for perfection" side. Unless there is a clear instance of something inappropriate, we generally wait and see how the community responds.

I think I sit right over on the other side of the spectrum, almost on the verge of paranoia. To be honest, when I first discovered this forum I was shocked at how much leniency was given to the forum members. I mean, a topic for electronic games? (How do they deal with spam?), allowing attachments? (God knows what they're attaching), a hints board that didn't have a strict set of rules and regulations, and no people flaming clueless people asked silly questions? (they must be covered with annoying questions) and contests with an 8 timer rule? (They must be overwhelmed with entrants!).

I think I was even more shocked to see that people were not abusing these things.

NiroZ
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eytanz wrote:
That I think is more important criticism, as it *is* representative of an issue at large - but note that it is tied back to the issue of mod points. Basically, the forum admins, especially Schik, strongly believe in the "people should be free to use their mod points as they see fit" philosophy that silver is arguing against above. The question isn't whether this is causing problems - it certainly is - the question is what is a good alternative - either another approach that the admins would agree to support, or how to tailor the mod system to work better under this approach.

I think one thing that the moderators of the forum should be a little more agressive with is off topic discussion. I'm not saying they should start locking threads or anything like that, but it would be nice if they would at least move posts that are off the tangent of the discussion (unless, of course, the author of the topic is involved) to a new thread. Even if they avoided the grey areas and only exercised their judgement in clear cut cases.

This would have multiple benefits; firstly, people who wished to respect the original direction of the topic would still participate in the discussion; Secondly, people wouldn't feel the need to read every thread anyone (or perhaps it's just me) because quite often a topic title will have little bearing on what the topic is actually saying; Thirdly, it would show people what exactly is offtopic, because if they're anything like I used to be, it's likely that they some of them don't even realise that they are hijacking the topic, and thus a few examples will help people to understand what is and what isn't changing the topic of discussion within reason.
(sorry for the late reply)

Tahnan
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NiroZ wrote:
I think one thing that the moderators of the forum should be a little more agressive with is off topic discussion. I'm not saying they should start locking threads or anything like that, but it would be nice if they would at least move posts that are off the tangent of the discussion (unless, of course, the author of the topic is involved) to a new thread. Even if they avoided the grey areas and only exercised their judgement in clear cut cases.

Wow, seriously? It seems to me that (a) moderators stepping in for something like that sounds quite severe; (b) allowing conversations to drift a little isn't the end of the world; (c) a discussion of whether KDD is really a 5-brain difficulty isn't 100% obviously off topic, IMHO; (d) I myself prefer to see threads drift a little as opposed to every minor point of difference put into a new thread. Generally speaking, I'd rather let people start new topics on their own, or post a suggestion that something be moved to a new topic, rather than a moderator stepping in to change it.

Beef Row
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NiroZ wrote:
I think one thing that the moderators of the forum should be a little more agressive with is off topic discussion. I'm not saying they should start locking threads or anything like that, but it would be nice if they would at least move posts that are off the tangent of the discussion (unless, of course, the author of the topic is involved) to a new thread. Even if they avoided the grey areas and only exercised their judgement in clear cut cases.

I notice that everything after your post in the 'clear cut cases' link is downmodded. Obviously someone is contemplating a topicality crusade of some sort. I seriously considered posting the following there, but decided not to derail the slightly changed but not quite so clear cut as you seem to think thread with something REALLY off-topic, so here it is, where its semi-topical.

Beef Row (almost) wrote:

NiroZ wrote:
Sounds like this discussion is worthy of a thread of its own.

Alright, I'll line up for this newest downmodding, and note that mod-crusades are getting a) very old and b) very silly.

Also, ZEEKY BOOGY DOOG!

Since 'downmodding' isn't in fact the topic a new thread has been proposed for, and neither is TDCM, I'm not sure if I'll be hit or not, but I just have to say, why even bother? Its already become clear that crusades are a really good way to make sure admins DON'T follow any approach you're promoting.

Just getting it in before the crusade is formally announced and all. Thank you, and good night.

____________________________
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NiroZ
Level: Smitemaster
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Tahnan wrote:Wow, seriously?

Perhaps I'm coming off a little more angry than I sound. I'm just frustrated because I've noticed that (as this thread proves, in my option) different people post in an on topic discussion compared to an off- topic discussion. Add to that the fact that this particular discussion has occurred many times before (I can recall at least 2 incidences).

@beef row
I take it that TDCM is supposed to be The Down Mod Campaign? (TDMC)

Beef Row
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NiroZ wrote:
@beef row
I take it that TDCM is supposed to be The Down Mod Campaign? (TDMC)

Interesting coincidence, but no... The Demented Cartoon Movie (the ZEEKY refrence)

____________________________
"Now I will repeatedly apply the happy-face rule"

Tahnan
Level: Smitemaster

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NiroZ wrote:
...this particular discussion has occurred many times before (I can recall at least 2 incidences).

If the topic's been discussed before, it seems to me that the sensible thing to do is quite simply post in the thread saying,

The topic of [insert topic here] has been discussed a number of times before, e.g. [insert links here]. Perhaps the discussion would be more on-topic in one of those threads than in this one.

and not, as I said, have a moderator have to intervene.

Mostly, though, I'm posting to add that starting new topics for going off on tangents also gets criticized. So it's not so clear that letting a topic drift is better than starting a new thread.

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[Last edited by Tahnan at 06-11-2007 09:21 AM]

NiroZ
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The forum's never been that consistent. I mean, people desperately want to shut down the 'Predict the next poster' thread, yet don't mind 'Create a cheat'. Go figure.

eytanz
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I really don't think being on-topic is something moderators have any place to intervene with, except in cases where the thread is more than just discussion - say, contests, or some of the bug threads where Mike or Schik is prevented from getting the information necessary to solve the bug.

As far as otherwise going off-topic, the right way to handle it is that if there's still something to say about the original topic, just post it and return the discussion to the topic. If a thread starts to interweave two different topics, then, someone will end up splitting it. Otherwise, that's a sign that the new topic is more important than the old one.

I personally find people who insist that a thread stays on topic without actually posting something on the topic themselves a *lot* worse than someone posting off-topic. I've done my share of off-topic postings, usually going off on a tangent after the original topic has petered out, but I've also derailed threads completely that were still alive. I don't usually intended to, and sometimes I feel bad about it, but it's not always the case that before I start posting I'm entirely sure how close I'll stick to the topic. Heck, it's not always the case I'm even sure what the topic is. I just feel it's natural, and some of the most useful and interesting discussions in the history of this forum started off as tangents off other topics. I also start new threads for tangents occasionally, but I feel that that's something that should be done in special cases, certainly not always.

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Oneiromancer
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The biggest reason we don't split threads that are off-topic is that it just isn't a simple option. There is no magic button that says "split thread". There is one for merging threads, but that almost never gets used. The problem is defining where the thread should be split, and what if later posts are on topic? So pretty much only Schik can split a thread, doing it by hand, therefore it is done very rarely.

Personally, I usually enjoy it when a thread veers slightly off-topic, to something related, because it approximates normal conversation and makes the forum feel more like a community to me. I don't want it to happen to threads on some boards, like H&S, but on the more general boards it is far from the end of the world.

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"He who is certain he knows the ending of things when he is only beginning them is either extremely wise or extremely foolish; no matter which is true, he is certainly an unhappy man, for he has put a knife in the heart of wonder." -- Tad Williams

zex20913
Level: Smitemaster

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File: on topic potato.JPG (57 KB)
Downloaded 392 times.
License: Public Domain

I second Neil on that one. In real life, "on topic" means if you begin by talking about potatoes, you will be talking about potatoes for hours, and be criticized if you stop talking about potatoes.

Off topic means you can talk about, say, ketchup on potatoes. Or ketchup and puppies. Or even something entirely different.

While normal conversation is not normally archived, tangential conversation comes very naturally. Also, there are few on-topic jokes. Like the following.


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[Last edited by zex20913 at 06-11-2007 01:41 PM]

zonhin
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I post ONE picture. ONE. And this is what happens. Damn you Tahnan (Or however you spell your name.)

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I looked at the world through apple eyes
And cut myself a slice of sunshine pie
I danced with the peanut butterflies
Till time went and told me to say hello but wave goodbye

Mattcrampy
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I have never been a fan of staying on-topic when there are more interesting things to talk about. Of course, I also moved threads when they drift into randomness. I'm not sure how people drifting offtopic hurts the forum in the first place - you might have to explain that one.

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mrimer
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Yeah, I occasionally go off on a tangents, too. Hmm...dang...I don't think the admins would do a very good job of enforcing staying on topic

That potato picture is awesome.

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Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.