This makes it sound like the Fool boards are entirely going away … which is far from the case. To be sure, it sounds like some is going away I will miss, just as there are others I won’t miss all all … but there is still going to be a lot here and in terms of investment related material, which is, after all why the Fool is here, then it should be mostly all here.
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but there is still going to be a lot here and in terms of investment related material, which is, after all why the Fool is here, then it should be mostly all here.
Aside from people who will be leaving the investment-related boards because their sense of betrayal by TMF will have destroyed their desire to participate in what’s left…
Justifying this earthquake move by the TMF powers-that-be by positing that this is “after all why the Fool is here” misses the essence of what is happening. Way back, TMF decided that just investment-related discussion boards weren’t sufficient for the life they wanted to breathe into their purpose and community. So they enabled creation of non-investment-related boards that provided a reflection of the life in which our investments exist. And over the years many of these discussion groups became vibrant as relationships took root, people were able to find practical and emotional and intellectual support, and they became ports in a storm, a stabilizing and enriching daily go-to. TMF gave life to this vibrant universe that became so centrally important to so many. So whether they intended this outcome or not, they have no right to eradicte it because it no longer suits THEIR purposes. But the people they are depriving of these friendships and support—of long-standing for many, and newly discovered for others—have no meaning for TMF. They should be determining how they can incorporate the non-investment groups into what they want TMF to be now, rather than demolishing them.
This really breaks my heart.
=sheila
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they have no right to eradicte it because it no longer suits THEIR purposes.
This statement is simply preposterous.
Denny Schlesinger
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I also think too much is being ascribed to a TMF active role … I can’t speak authoritatively, but did TMF ever do anything to promote non-investment boards than to have the Start a New Board link that has probably been there since the beginning? Oh, yeah, I suppose they created some board categories to more appropriately classify the new boards, but that is pretty nominal.
I wonder, in fact, if there will be anything in the new software to keep someone from starting say HURL2 and just continuing the tradition.
I can’t speak authoritatively, but did TMF ever do anything to promote non-investment boards than to have the Start a New Board link that has probably been there since the beginning?
Perhaps unwittingly, TMF enabled a thriving community of interactive groups that became exceptionally important to their participants. TMF members have been significant participants over these years, although—I’m realizing now—at least in the groups I participate in, they are not nearly as much of a presence as they once were, for whatever reason. Their initial lack of intent to create such a vital community does not justify taking its life now.
I wonder, in fact, if there will be anything in the new software to keep someone from starting say HURL2 and just continuing the tradition.
Only if a new board clearly carries financial relevance.
=sheila
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This statement is simply preposterous.
Not the first time we’ve strongly disagreed.
=sheila
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This statement is simply preposterous.
I concur. Seems that Sheila has forgotten whos sandbox she's playing in.
[ww.knowswhomakestherulesaroundhere.pl](http://ww.knowswhomakestherulesaroundhere.pl)
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TMF decided that just investment-related discussion boards weren’t sufficient for the life they wanted to breathe into their purpose and community. So they enabled creation of non-investment-related boards that provided a reflection of the life in which our investments exist.
You’re making a lot of assumptions here. As I recall, the reason for the creation of other boards was because the investment boards were being polluted and destroyed by political arguments and flame wars. Political Asylum was opened to try to get the politics off the financial boards and onto some other place. Somebody said “How about a Living Below Your Means board?” And the Fool made the software changes necessary to open that, and many others boards.
And lots of people did; some boards prospered, some failed, that’s life.
So whether they intended this outcome or not, they have no right to eradicte it because it no longer suits THEIR purposes
What’s also life is that it’s their playground. They can do with it what they want, whether the users like it or not. They’re Mark Zuckerberg, on a smaller and vastly less inimical scale.
They can close it down, make all the pages pink, or have the posts written in Clown font if they like. What’s not clear to me is why they bother keeping these boards alive and semi-monitored, given that I have heard they are not profitable at best, or unprofitable at worst. But I thank them.
I also support your right to protest, if that’s your thing, but to keep it in perspective, they pay the bills, they get to decide.
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Goofy:
What is the world coming to? I gave you a REC!
Denny Schlesinger
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Aside from people who will be leaving the investment-related boards because their sense of betrayal by TMF will have destroyed their desire to participate in what’s left…
Justifying this earthquake move by the TMF powers-that-be by positing that this is “after all why the Fool is here” misses the essence of what is happening… This really breaks my heart. ~ sheila727
The following was posted by bighairymike last week in response to a thread that basically argued that deleting boards was a cost saving measure. I am reposting his entire post because it is worth holding onto this explanation:
Being an IT guy myself, I can appreciate the complexities to migrate and/or reformat data to a new database. I can also assume that TMF has done a ton of programming to accommodate the data migration. But once that code has been written, it can be applied to 100, 200, even 500 boards with little incremental effort. So I think claiming massive additional effort to migrate the social boards has little to do with the real reason. My two cents. https://discussion.fool.com/and-the-work-has-already-been-done-b…
And this I believe reinforces the posts of Sheila727 and Tuni in this thread.
The point? TMF is taking an unjustified huge risk here with this move!
-=Ajax=-
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As a (former) IT guy myself, I agree that arguing that a lot of additional migration work would need to be done to migrate the non-financial boards is bogus. But what of the argument that the continued policing of those additional boards for copyright infringement and “bad actors” would indeed necessitate more work? That has some merit, but I believe that much of that work could be shifted to the posters if those boards are made to be self monitoring, where anyone can “down vote” a post - or a poster - and if enough people do that, the post is deleted, or the poster is put in a penalty box for a period of time during which they can’t post anything.
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additional migration work would need to be done to migrate the non-financial boards is bogus.
Note, in particular, the boards being dropped are supposed to still be available read-only. That either means leaving the current board software running and linking to it … a very kludgy solution … or porting all the posts to the new software, so the only distinction is whether or not they are flagged read only.
But what of the argument that the continued policing of those additional boards for copyright infringement and “bad actors” would indeed necessitate more work?
I have never seen any indication that TMF themselves policed any boards. Instead they rely on posters to flag offending posts before they are reviewed.
"As I recall, the reason for the creation of other boards was because the investment boards were being polluted and destroyed by political arguments and flame wars. Political Asylum was opened to try to get the politics off the financial boards and onto some other place. Somebody said “How about a Living Below Your Means board?” And the Fool made the software changes necessary to open that, and many others boards.
And lots of people did; some boards prospered, some failed, that’s life"
A while back there was a song written by Joni Mitchell - and first sung by Buffy Sainte-Marie -
called “The Circle Game”.
And the game works for cyclical stocks - which tend to be all/many companies if your time line is
sufficiently long. And the game works for quite a few human activities - not just those where
people forget history.
Howie52
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGHjHU_Z8d8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Z9-ofKoL-U
https://www.songfacts.com/facts/joni-mitchell/the-circle-gam…
People tend to put more than simple finance into their thoughts. Locations where thoughts
are restricted tend to have restricted longer term interest - but perhaps TMF will be careful and
cautious and remain inviting. Perhaps they will be able to avoid driving folks away and draw more
folks who are fascinated primarily by financial issues.
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Perhaps they will be able to avoid driving folks away and draw more
folks who are fascinated primarily by financial issues.
Seems to me this will be a very small/finite/mono-culture group... stagnation comes to mind.
[ww.hopethisisnotthecase.pl](http://ww.hopethisisnotthecase.pl)
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You’re making a lot of assumptions here. As I recall, the reason for the creation of other boards was because the investment boards were being polluted and destroyed by political arguments and flame wars. Political Asylum was opened to try to get the politics off the financial boards and onto some other place. Somebody said “How about a Living Below Your Means board?” And the Fool made the software changes necessary to open that, and many others boards… it’s their playground. They can do with it what they want, whether the users like it or not… they pay the bills, they get to decide.
Thanks for the clarification as to how the non-financial boards came to be. By the time I had joined TMF toward the latter part of 2000, they were already there, so I had no idea. Now I do.
I know that those who pay the bills get to decide the fate of what they’ve created, regardless of the nature of that decision. Fact of life. But this decision is not fair or compassionate. TMF used to give me the sense that people mattered to them, that they were not just a source of profit. And so suddenly and permanently eliminating all of the non-financial boards comes almost as a sense of betrayal. I know some of you think I’m grossly overreacting. Perhaps this reflects, at least in part, that what we have respectively found on these boards has been somewhat different in nature. But that’s speculation.
My reality is that I am sad. It is a true sense of loss.
=sheila
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I suspect this description of TMF purposely creating these boards may be off the mark. Why is there any explanation needed other than someone clicking on Start a New Board, picking a name, and posting a post with a statement of purpose … then telling other people about it, e.g., on the board where the politics or whatever were not welcome.
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I have never seen any indication that TMF themselves policed any boards. Instead they rely on posters to flag offending posts before they are reviewed.
Not even for copyright violations? I had thought those would have mainly been found by TMF policing, and not by the flagging actions of posters.
But if all policing is initiated by posters anyway, then the work that the TMF has had to do is even less than I thought.
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Correct … I can’t imagine any way that they could systematically read every post and assess it for copyright violation without using AI … and I don’t think the current software is there yet!
I just clicked on post #1 in each of about 10 boards.
For the boards whose 1st post is dated 1997, the first post is a board member.
For the boards whose 1sr post is dated 2000 or later, the first post is a TMFhandle, and boilerplate welcome.
The 2nd post is by the board member who seems to have started the board.
It appears that after 2000, there is a TMF gatekeeper for opening boards.
Interesting to me: Pandemic Disease was first opened in 2005.
FWIW ??
ralph
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Interesting to me: Pandemic Disease was first opened in 2005.
The second post references the 2005 Avian Influenza (H5N1) and a want to “discuss how to prepare for and survive the global pandemic.” H1N1 showed up in 2009, as well as a number of other outbreaks since. I’d say the board has been a valuable addition.
AC although the past two years I would classify it as invaluable
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