KokoEd, I think you brought up a very good topic. I also think that many of the people here have made excellent responses and there has been alot of good thought surrounding this issue.
I was one of the people who was involved in
the thread that took place last night/morning, which I believe is what prompted the creation of this one. If you read my posts, you will see that OVER AND OVER again I tried to hammer home the message that being
constructive and respectful is the BEST and ONLY way to bring forth your problems to this community, and at the same time expect a good response which may produce a solution to the problem.
I think people occasionally lose sight of the fact that
these forums exist SOLELY to enhance the ability of FIRSTers to communicate with each other.
Why is it that we want to communicate with each other?
We communicate so that we can collectively strengthen each other, in order to collectively strengthen FIRST. This means that we help each other
solve the problems which prevent us from doing our job - namely, to inspire and reach as many people as we can to promote the goals of FIRST.
Notice that I emphasized the words "solve the problems." When people forget that this is our true aim, they also forget that ChiefDelphi is not the place to post hateful, emotionally driven libel. Communicating hateful messages has never helped anyone to right grievances. While I believe it is perfectly acceptable to be privately disappointed, it is never ok to use this as an excuse to VENT your anger in this community. Simply put, ChiefDelphi does not exist to listen to people whine about things which they can not change (such as events that have taken place in the PAST). We do, however, exist so that we can impact the future and come up with constructive solutions to REAL problems.
Also notice how I emphasized the word "real". People need to realize that it is impossible to come up with a solution to the problem if the facts surrounding it are merely speculative, or don't exist at all. Last night, a personal attack against several teams was disguised as a complaint about the lack of "good" scouting. Teams were accused of bribery and theft, and were told that they "did not deserve" to win.
There were two main problems that made this post impossible to respond to with a constructive solution. First of all, there was NO evidence that any teams participated in "bribery", "theft", or "glory-stealing". Secondly, the post was a personal gripe about a past event. It is impossible for any of us here on CD to go back in time to change the outcome of an event. This issue was inappropriate to bring up because 1) it was based on speculation, and 2) we could not have offered any means of correcting it.
So, ChiefDelphi, we have a problem. It seems that the majority of us feel that there are too many posts of the non-constructive type. Therefore, I ask you this question (which many of you offered potential solutions to in this thread):
How do we make ChiefDelphi a more constructive place?
-- Jaine