Originally posted by lil bitchiness
Ok, so there is a differance between an 'off-topic'' random talking threads and totall garbage useless threads...i mean what the hell is the point of making a thread ''Burp'' for example...🤨 and the whole first post is '' *burp* '' that has no point, thats just taking the piss.
Actually, I do not agree. There should be no question of threads in the OTF ever having to have a 'point'. That is against the principle of it. Garbage useless threads belong here.
The only reason the OTF might now have a purpose other than that it was built for is because users of the forums have made it that way. If people want to use the OTF as a social area, then so be it- but if they then complain when it turns bad, I have little sympathy- that's what you get for using somewhere as uncontrolled as the OTF as a social area! As I say, there was never, ever any guarantee of quality. Plenty of people apparently enjoy the OTF. If you do not, then as ever, do not use it. I think the idea that the OTF is somehow infecting the rest of the board is an overstated one. The fact is simply that the board is changing due to many factors, mainly size, and I think the OTF has become a convenient thing to blame by those who resent the change.
As for the diverse communities- actually, it is policy to support that, which is why social threads in, for example, the LOTR area have been allowed. The board has grown to a size now where that seems to be the way to go.
Any attempt to regulate the OTF beyond the boundaries of common sense- e.g. offensive/illegal posts, threads that belong elsewhere, 400 duplicates of the same thing etc.- simply undermines the whole point of the OTF. One simply has to ask- if it is regulated in a meaningful way, what is it FOR? It just becomes a pointless rival to the GDF.
If we are going to have an OTF- and it is far too popular to not have- the only logical way to run it is pretty much the way it already is.