Suggestion: Prohibit leaked episode discussion in the Season Discussion forum

[skylights 127]

As everypony knows by now, episode 3 of the new season was leaked earlier this week. Now I'm sure I'll get a lot of hate for this but my suggestion is that in the future, threads for new episodes ahead of their premiere should not be allowed in the Season 4 Discussion forum (or whatever season is current in when a leak happens).

 

My reasoning is that many of us don't want to watch an episode ahead of its official premiere, and it's kinda discouraging to see a long thread already in existence when it finally does show. The Season Discussion sections are sort of unofficial official place to discuss new episodes, and by allowing a thread for a leaked episode in these sections, it draws attention to the leaks and I think this sends a negative message to the users. As one of the most important forums in Ponydom, I think this moderation is necessary to ensure that MLP Forums maintains an image of propriety with regard to Hasbro and The Hub and all others concerned.

 

And to clarify, my suggestion is only to apply this rule to the Season x Discussion Forums, not to other parts of the boards.

 

That's all. Hate away everypony

[NavelColt 22,881]

Give suggestions for alternatives, bro :3 The best suggestions give alternatives, not just point out what you believe doesn't work well. When an episode is leaked, like it or not, there are shittons of people who couldn't care less about spoilers, and will watch it ahead of time. Allowing artificial Show Discussion threads for the leak and then merging them with the thread after it's made will end up splicing the posts and make the thread look rather thrown-together and disorganized, and not allowing any discussion of leaks whatsoever is bias towards people who care to avoid spoilers, rather counter-productive seeing as the goal is try and please both sides.

 

I'm all for, most of the staff is all for tackling concerns about the spoiler issue, but there's got to be a better way; can't just change something we don't know how best to improve.

[skylights 127]

@@~Chaotic Discord~, My thought is that a pure episode discussion thread shouldn't exist anywhere until the premiere. While I don't see a problem with people bringing up events from leaked episodes in other threads (with appropriate spoiler warnings), I think "Season 4 Episode X Supercoolnewleakedepisode Thread" should not exist until an appropriate time.

 

I mentioned the Season Discussion sections specifically because those are the places such threads would naturally be created.

[NavelColt 22,881]

@@~Chaotic Discord~, My thought is that a pure episode discussion thread shouldn't exist anywhere until the premiere. While I don't see a problem with people bringing up events from leaked episodes in other threads (with appropriate spoiler warnings), I think "Season 4 Episode X Supercoolnewleakedepisode Thread" should not exist until an appropriate time.

 

I mentioned the Season Discussion sections specifically because those are the places such threads would naturally be created.

 

Like I said, I'm personally not for outright stopping the episode threads from being made early when leaks occur, because if the episode is out and available, it's out and available, regardless if the release date is honored or not. But hey, I'm just one staff guy I'll see what some of the others can put in here, for us.

[Harmonic Revelations 8,835]

If we're going to go ahead and prohibit discussion of leaked episodes in the Season discussion subsection, some kind of alternative should be provided. Personally, if we were going to do something like that, I'd say that we should have a subsection specifically meant for leaked episodes in order to make it feasible for users who do want to see the content to do so and those who don't want to see it to avoid it.

 

I'd like to see what some other staff members and users have to say about it first before jumping to conclusions, though.

[duidamasterXD 9,627]

 

 

If we're going to go ahead and prohibit discussion of leaked episodes in the Season discussion subsection, some kind of alternative should be provided. Personally, if we were going to do something like that, I'd say that we should have a subsection specifically meant for leaked episodes in order to make it feasible for users who do want to see the content to do so and those who don't want to see it to avoid it.

 

I don't know if this happens often enough to justify an entirely new section, though. My best alternative would be to make two episode topics, one (clearly labeled) thread when the leak is confirmed and another that would remain locked until the episode actually airs. This would allow the people who seek out the episode to discuss to their heart's content, and those who want to wait and experience the episode together in unison with a broader group of people to do that as well. The threads could be merged into one after a number of days to avoid clutter and later redundancy.

 

That's the closest compromise I can think of. As a forum based on encouraging discussion, it seems pointless and arbitrary to forbid excited people who have just seen an episode from talking about it with each other at all for several days. However, this isn't to say that you don't have a point skylights, and that plenty of people prefer to experience the episode together, without having to wade through spoilery review posts along the way. Having two separate topics for a limited amount of time seems like an acceptable middle ground, to me at least.

[Jokuc 8,174]

I'm all for, most of the staff is all for tackling concerns about the spoiler issue, but there's got to be a better way; can't just change something we don't know how best to improve.

 

This is probably not possible because of IPB limitations and lack of time to create such a feature, but I'm thinking of a similar feature to what they have on sites such as FimFiction and Derpibooru; create a couple of "base" tags which you have to pick one of when creating a thread. For example, one of the tags in that list could be "spoilers". Then the users have the option to filter out tags they do not want to see, where "spoilers" would be hidden by default. This way we could deal with all the people raging over the threads about clopping and such too.

Edited December 5, 2013 by Jokuc

[SCS 7,537]

I agree entirely with Chaotic Discord's post. As it is impossible to please everyone, it is preferable to seek as best a balance as possible when choosing our actions based on the wants and needs of both the users and the staff.

 

I feel that threads for leaked episodes should be allowed, as long as appropriate spoiler warnings are put into place. That way, those who were not bothered by spoilers and wanted to discuss the episode would be allowed to, and those who were bothered by spoilers would be able to avoid the threads in which they were present.

 

I, also, dislike spoilers and would not want to watch an episode until its official release date, but I feel that it would be the most fair toward the community as a whole to allow the existence of threads for leaked episodes.

Edited December 2, 2013 by SCS

[NavelColt 22,881]

http://youtu.be/CGFIumhNiM0?t=1m40s

 

This is probably not possible because of IPB limitations and lack of time to create such a feature, but I'm thinking of a similar feature to what they have on sites such as FimFiction and Derpibooru; create a couple of "base" tags which you have to pick one of when creating a thread. For example, one of the tags in that list could be "spoilers". Then the users have the option to filter out tags they do not want to see, where "spoilers" would be hidden by default. This way we could deal with all the people raging over the threads about clopping and such too.

 

Having a deep-rooted tagging based system to do things like that and more, is something Feld0's brainstormed of doing if MLPF ever gets its' own software, but yeah, with IPB nothing like that's really possible.

[Jokuc 8,174]

Having a deep-rooted tagging based system to do things like that and more, is something Feld0's brainstormed of doing if MLPF ever gets its' own software, but yeah, with IPB nothing like that's really possible.

Yeah I kinda knew the answer already but I had to ask st least you know

[valete 195]

 

Having a deep-rooted tagging based system to do things like that and more, is something Feld0's brainstormed of doing if MLPF ever gets its' own software, but yeah, with IPB nothing like that's really possible.

 

Since we can't really have those tags because of the reasons you've mentioned, then would it be possible if the staff just added a little something to the titles of threads with spoilers?

 

For example, a thread named "S04:E09 - (Insert Title Here)" could become "[spoilerS] S04:E09 - (Insert Title Here)" instead. 

 

It's just an edit to the title, so that could be easier. The title of the thread can be edited later on when the episode is officially released.

 

I'm pretty sure that people who end up clicking on these would be pretty aware of what they were getting into.  

[NavelColt 22,881]

Since we can't really have those tags because of the reasons you've mentioned, then would it be possible if the staff just added a little something to the titles of threads with spoilers?

 

For example, a thread named "S04:E09 - (Insert Title Here)" could become "[spoilerS] S04:E09 - (Insert Title Here)" instead. 

 

It's just an edit to the title, so that could be easier. The title of the thread can be edited later on when the episode is officially released.

 

I'm pretty sure that people who end up clicking on these would be pretty aware of what they were getting into.  

 

Unless people pay no attention to episode numbers, I would assume most threads are obviously spoilers based on the titles, already But yeah, that'd be possible.

[Justin ZW 396]

 

 

but yeah, with IPB nothing like that's really possible.

Well, I wouldn't say it's impossible, CD. In fact, anything is possible. It's more of incredibly time consuming and tedious. And as I'm certain everyone knows, time is in short supply, as well as the manpower to do such things.

 

OP does bring up a point that spoilers can ruin the experience, but I think it's better if you just avoid any threads that could possibly spoil stuff for you. That's what I do. In fact, when a new episode comes out, I watch it before I ever go on MLPF

[NavelColt 22,881]

Well, I wouldn't say it's impossible, CD. In fact, anything is possible. It's more of incredibly time consuming and tedious. And as I'm certain everyone knows, time is in short supply, as well as the manpower to do such things.

 

Which is the only reason I call it nearly impossible, in the first place, anyway :3 IPB is retarded in more ways than one, so even the simplest ideas are tedious as hell to implement. No one ever has the time, let alone do we ever usually have the people capable to put in such time.