I wish TMF would.......

My main contention here is that it is perfectly possible to have respectful and civil political discussions. Even on the internet. But to do so requires a lot of work by the board sponsors. - theland


Not really, TMF set themselves to expend a lot of energy because of the FA button. With a good set of tools, the posters themselves can shield themselves from content or posters that they found offensive.

The FA button was just too attractive to certain personality types who self appointed themselves as board nannies whose mission was to ā€œprotectā€ others from content they felt others should not see.

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Just because I find a specific utterance of a person offensive, doesnā€™t mean that I think everything they ever say should be ignored. For this reason I find the ignore button not useful.

And the back and forth vitriol pushes other Fools into not posting out of fear of being attacked themselves. - Fuskie


Can someone be so weak and timid so as to be afraid to post because they might receive criticism or even ridicule from anonymous posters on a message board? There may be a few, a tiny tiny minority and I feel sorry for them and their disorder.

See something that offends you, hit next. Have a poster that insults you, hit Ignore poster. Withdraw and curl up into the fetal position??? Sheesh.

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Fuskie
Who thinks Fools who simply want to shout at each other have plenty of other places to goā€¦

But the focus in this thread is clearly NOT Fools who simply want to shout at each other. They constituted a minimal subgroup of the Fool COMMUNITY. Forcing them to go elsewhere is all well and good. But accomplishing that by dismantling the entire meaningful, productive, thoughtful, non-investment-related Fool discussion groups?

The Fool is a pale and greatly limited shadow of its former vibrant self.

=sheila

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Fuskie
Politics on the boards does not improve the Fool; it makes community impossibleā€¦

Who is talking ā€œpoliticsā€ here?! Health and Nutrition? Pandemic? Womenā€™s Health? Low-carb living? Gardening? Cooking? etc etc etc etc etc etc etcā€¦

ā€œPoliticsā€ is being used as the scapegoat to justify tossing an entire meaningful community off the cliff because the current Fools in power donā€™t want to bother. If that really were the problem being resolved, then the few boards that were the source of all the unpleasant noise would simply have been eliminated.

=sheila

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Just because I find a specific utterance of a person offensive, doesnā€™t mean that I think everything they ever say should be ignored. For this reason I find the ignore button not useful. - tamhas</I.

--------------

That is a reasonable choice you make. But it is your decision and thus you may be exposed to content you detest at which point you quickly hit next. Better than TMF burning down the house.

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Sheila, I was not using politics as an excuse for the closure of all the non-financial boards. That did not have anything to do with politics but with TMF making the decision that going forward with the new platform that is coming (3 premium services are now operating in the new TMF Community), only investing and financial-related discussion boards would be maintained.

I was not in the room when this decision was made, and my own discussion boards that I had launched over the last 20+ years were closed down, so I understand how Fools feel about that side of the Community. All I can say is that there are other places I have found to continue discussing my non-financial and investing interests. It was nice having those forums here, but I was able to adapt and move on.

The issue of politics in the TMF Community is a separate issue.

Fuskie
Who notes that unfortunately in the case of politics, a few loud voices can drown out a chorus of others, and more people appreciate being heard than being run overā€¦


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Sheila, I was not using politics as an excuse for the closure of all the non-financial boards. That did not have anything to do with politics but with TMF making the decision that going forward with the new platform that is coming (3 premium services are now operating in the new TMF Community), only investing and financial-related discussion boards would be maintained.

Fuskie, I donā€™t know if youā€™ve directly addressed this point yet - are there upgrades or a new platform planned for the non-premium side of TMF? IOW, are any changes coming to these boards, which weā€™re now talking on?

Albaby

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Albaby,

Not Fuskie but I can answer thatā€¦yes, there is a plan in place for a new platform for the non-premium side. In fact, we just did a test migration last weekend on the free side and are working through the things that didnā€™t migrate properly.

I wonā€™t speculate on a timeline, itā€™s summer and things just seem to take longer in the summer since folks are on vacation and such, but itā€™s coming.

Jen Roberts
Boards Manager

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Fuskie
Politics on the boards does not improve the Fool; it makes community impossibleā€¦

Who is talking ā€œpoliticsā€ here?! Health and Nutrition? Pandemic? Womenā€™s Health? Low-carb living? Gardening? Cooking? etc etc etc etc etc etc etcā€¦

I could argue that Health, Pandemic, ā€¦ are politically-related, or can be so.

I used to know an economist who taught at The University of Chicago, but instead of teaching in the famous economics department, he taught in the law department because he felt the two fields were so closely related that they had to be taught together. Apparently, the University must have agreed, or they would have put him in the economics department. He was a good enough economist to get the Nobel economics prize.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Coase

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"less interesting to folks who have interests beyond investing.

But, TMF is in the business of providing a resource for investing, not in the business of providing resources for diverse unspecified interests. "


TMF has decided to limit their views - much as they decided that policing their site was onerous.
I feel less interest in reading the boards - I may be less driven to an investing only site than
folks who are 5 to 10 years away from retirement. I have retired.

I enjoy reading investment discussions - but I find more enjoyment from varied topics and varied
views.

Howie52
Following the herd is not always a good investment plan.

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I enjoy reading investment discussions - but I find more enjoyment from varied topics and varied
views.

ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”ā€”

same hereā€¦

TMFā€™s motto was
ā€œThe Motley Fool: To educate, amuse, enrichā€

The motto used to appear under the old version of the Jesterā€™s hat. It looks like theyā€™ve done away
with their motto as well. I donā€™t see it anywhere, probably because TMF is no longer in the amusing business.

As the saying goes, ā€˜time is moneyā€™ and the Fool no longer has the time for amusing.

TMF has forgotten back in 2002 they felled on hard times. TMF asked the Fool Community
to pay to play to help keep them afloat. Many of us stepped up to the plate and helped TMF
till they were able ā€˜to fend for themselvesā€™. We were glad to contribute thinking
we were a part of the Fool community.

Well, so much for all thatā€¦Shrug.

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Well, so much for all thatā€¦Shrug.

I hear ya Mom.

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TMFā€™s motto was
ā€œThe Motley Fool: To educate, amuse, enrichā€

The motto used to appear under the old version of the Jesterā€™s hat. It looks like theyā€™ve done away
with their motto as well. I donā€™t see it anywhere, probably because TMF is no longer in the amusing business.

As the saying goes, ā€˜time is moneyā€™ and the Fool no longer has the time for amusing.

TMF has forgotten back in 2002 they fellā€¦ on hard times. TMF asked the Fool Community
to pay to play to help keep them afloat. Many of us stepped up to the plate and helped TMF
till they were able ā€˜to fend for themselvesā€™. We were glad to contribute thinking
we were a part of the Fool community.

Well, so much for all thatā€¦Shrug.

Sigh, not Shrug

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Improve the Fool?

Delete the pinhead that keeps posting on ā€˜closed boardsā€™.

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"Improve the Fool?

Delete the pinhead that keeps posting on ā€˜closed boardsā€™. "


?

Howie52
Somehow or other the concept of a tree falling in a forest with no one
around really should not be a problem of great concern for anyone.

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Somehow or other the concept of a tree falling in a forest with no one
around really should not be a problem of great concern for anyone.

It is exactly the problem that the boards have experienced recently, and it a reflection of some current national problems as well. Let me give a much too long-winded explanation.

[TL;DR version] Apparently, some folks donā€™t think that rules should apply to them.

When the large board purge happened a couple of months ago, there was a bit of wide-spread tomfoolery around posting to closed boards. Iā€™ll admit to participating in that, even to the extent of one of my post-closure posts remaining to this day. Iā€™ll defend it as both perfectly on topic for the board, and as poking a bit of fun at TMF with the truth, much in the vein of the court jester as espoused very early on in TMF history.

But that time has passed. TMF closed a couple of the open loopholes in their programming, and very clearly said that the closure of boards needs to be respected. It sounds like someone has been circumventing the board closure again. I havenā€™t seen any in the last couple of days, but I did notice one post a week or two ago. It sounds like it is happening again.

If someone is using backdoors to post to closed boards today, they are saying nothing more than they believe they are above the rules. If this is a one-off transgression, I would privately chastise the poster and let them remain. If they have made such posts repeatedly and have continued to post to closed boards after being told not to, they should be banned. To do any less is to insult all posters who do respect the rules and who donā€™t post to closed boards in spite of knowing how to circumvent the closure.

Long time board users have suffered enough insults from TMF in the closure of many popular boards. Adding another insult in allowing a disruptive poster to remain is going beyond the pale.

ā€“Peter

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Well,I read of the back door playtimes, but my solution was then, to remove all the closed boards off my Favorites, even though a couple i had years of py own posts left behind, tidbits of history, Iā€™d hoed then as now that maybe someone might gain a little help, but time marches on, and theyā€™re gone as far as Iā€™m concernedā€¦

Kept the keepers, added a couple maybe, but my interests have never been investing, retired, made choices way back, am OK with where we areā€¦

Still interested in a nice collection of posters, missing quite a few, but so be itā€¦ Not my boards/company, just a good find, a long time agoā€¦ Was better than the Yahoo Zoo, Raging Bullā€¦ There maybe were others, but no others became a community like MF didā€¦

Still a few babblers hanging about, but a click to begoneā€¦ Many are a lot more serious in some areas, so sometimes tidbits of interestā€¦

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Long time board users have suffered enough insults from TMF in the closure of many popular boards.

Not the closure alone, but in the dismissively inconsiderate way in which it was done. There was no explanation, there was no sense of regret for what would be lost, no sense of understanding for the sense of loss that many would experience. No timelineā€”not even a very rough oneā€”was provided, and the door shut with no warning. The question had actually been posed here on Improveā€¦ in April, and someone from TMF had said that she didnā€™t know the date, but that it was moving slowly and she anticipated that it wouldnā€™t be happening until some point during the summer months. And then BOOM!ā€”it happened in less than a week, as I recall. What a shoddy and uncaring way to have handled it. And that speaks loudly about the current ethos of TMF.

=sheila

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Not the closure alone, but in the dismissively inconsiderate way in which it was done

What a shoddy and uncaring way to have handled it. And that speaks loudly about the current ethos of TMF.

=sheila


Hmmmā€¦Iā€™d think twice handing over money for any of their how to invest Boards now that we know how they operate.

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