Forums not used as much anymore

[ehfeinberg]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

People are scared to death of posting on CD because they'll get torn apart for making unpopular opinions. I've heard this quite alot in the past few years.

Quoted for truth... Just look at the 2013 lessons learned negative. It was painful just to read. One group goes against CD opinion and BAM all the regular members start backing each other up creating this wall of exclusion.

I have also found that CD has turned into this college student hang out spot. If you look at the members who actively post who are students, its like 5%. Doesn't make a very inclusive atmosphere. Tis a shame.

If you really want to make CD a thriving community, then you have to actively work to make it feel inclusive to new and younger members.

[Anupam Goli]

Originally Posted by ehfeinberg

I have also found that CD has turned into this college student hang out spot. If you look at the members who actively post who are students, its like 5%. Doesn't make a very inclusive atmosphere. Tis a shame.

I actually think there's a higher professional mentor:student ratio than a college mentor:student ratio. Also, I'm willing to say there are a large number of students who come here to ask a single question or two, and then don't bother signing on, because for many CD is a tool for students to ask questions to professional engineers and seasoned FIRST veterans.

[KrazyCarl92]

I know that many of the students on our team use chiefdelphi as a resource to look at, but are hesitant to post in the forums. I often hear many of them talking about things they saw on CD or asking questions about stuff other teams were doing that they see on CD. Most of them either do not have an account or just very rarely post.

In some cases, searching CD to figure out whatever it is that you want is sufficient. It's simply possible that a certain level of technical information is already available through this forums that further technical discussion would be extraneous. I know there are plenty of times when I've had a question and thought about posting it only to find that someone else was wondering the same thing a few years back and already had the question answered.

[Madison]

CD opinion is the collective wisdom of nearly fifteen years of uninterrupted discussion on many topics. Think about that for a bit -- fifteen years. There's something to be said for the conclusions that have been drawn by this community and the topics that come up over and over again have been hashed out pretty thoroughly. It's rare for someone to offer a new wrinkle in these debates and our reluctance to entertain them again and again shows this.

How would the scientific community react to someone that wanted to argue against the existence of gravity, but provided no new, compelling evidence to support their theory?

I have a few thoughts about why there's less technical discussion happening today than in the past, but they're not fully baked. I think, generally, that there are fewer authoritative voices in the discussion today and that people posing questions do not adequately communicate respect for the authorities they're soliciting help from. That is to say that it seems like people are asking for answers before having done any research on their own; or that they ask a question and receive an answer, but never reply to acknowledge the help they've received. That makes people answering questions work harder and they receive less in return. That's lose-lose for everyone.

I don't know how you fix problems like these. They seem institutional; like there's been a great shift in the attitude of students in the last ten years or so.

[cmrnpizzo14]

There are less website posts now, but let's not forget what 1114 and 254 did earlier this year with their facebook and twitter campaigns to release a robot reveal picture and video respectively. I think if you included that in the data it might change things a little bit...

[dcarr]

Originally Posted by Madison

I don't know how you fix problems like these. They seem institutional; like there's been a great shift in the attitude of students in the last ten years or so.

Different thoughts on why there might be fewer questions from students on CD now then there were in the past.

The makeup of the Internet has changed in the past 10 years. 10 years ago there was no Skype, Google+, or Facebook. Chief Delphi (and the little-used official FIRST forums) were perhaps one of the only places that members of the FIRST community could network online.

Now, on a daily basis, there is a ton of FIRST interaction and discussion on Facebook on dozens of pages and groups. Teams can help one another via Skype or Google+. Teams have better websites than ever with more resources. There is a higher number of experienced mentors in general, and events like "kit bot build days" are more common, helping bring new teams up to speed with greater success than before.

I don't think it's a change in the attitude of students, more a change in how this interaction occurs.

I know students on our team are never hesitant to post on Chief Delphi when they have a question, but often the problem gets solved another way first.

[PVCpirate]

Originally Posted by Madison

CD opinion is the collective wisdom of nearly fifteen years of uninterrupted discussion on many topics. Think about that for a bit -- fifteen years. There's something to be said for the conclusions that have been drawn by this community and the topics that come up over and over again have been hashed out pretty thoroughly. It's rare for someone to offer a new wrinkle in these debates and our reluctance to entertain them again and again shows this.

How would the scientific community react to someone that wanted to argue against the existence of gravity, but provided no new, compelling evidence to support their theory?

I'm not trying to pick apart your post or your opinion, just providing a counterpoint.

Many of the issues that the controversial threads are about are unlike gravity because they are very much grey areas, like mentor/student built, team organization, etc. People who are new to the program, of which there are THOUSANDS each year, are not familiar with the nuances of these issues, much like a freshman physics major is not familiar with the nuances of quantum physics. Both of these things are very complicated matters. If a student had a new or different angle on the topic, should the entire physics department run into the room and each repeat the same explanation of why the student is wrong? By the same token, if someone has an unpopular(but thoughtful and respectful) view on this forum, does it need to spawn a 200 reply, mostly redundant thread? If you ask me, the student and the poster have one thing in common: they both get discouraged and find something else to do.

[Jon Stratis]

I think a lot of good points have been made so far... but I think we've almost ignored one HUGE possible reason: there was a new control system in 2009 that no one knew how to use. It was a massive change for everyone, and there was a ton of discussion about it as we all learned what was going on. As that first year with this control system progressed, teams figured it out (through their own trial and error and through threads on here). Since then, teams have had a good idea what to do and how to do it. New teams have had nearby local teams mentoring them, telling them how the control system works. And if someone has a question, if they use the search feature they might find an answer.

As a result, technical questions on the forums would naturally be expected to decline a bit. And yes, there will always be questions in other technical areas... but rarely do we, as a community, have a brand new technical area we all have to explore and figure out at the same time.

It'll be interesting to see how things go with the new control system. I would expect to see an uptick in discussions once it comes out.

[Steven Sigley]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

I think a lot of good points have been made so far... but I think we've almost ignored one HUGE possible reason: there was a new control system in 2009 that no one knew how to use. It was a massive change for everyone, and there was a ton of discussion about it as we all learned what was going on. As that first year with this control system progressed, teams figured it out (through their own trial and error and through threads on here). Since then, teams have had a good idea what to do and how to do it. New teams have had nearby local teams mentoring them, telling them how the control system works. And if someone has a question, if they use the search feature they might find an answer.

As a result, technical questions on the forums would naturally be expected to decline a bit. And yes, there will always be questions in other technical areas... but rarely do we, as a community, have a brand new technical area we all have to explore and figure out at the same time.

It'll be interesting to see how things go with the new control system. I would expect to see an uptick in discussions once it comes out.

This guy knows what he's talking about

[Ian Curtis]

Originally Posted by Madison

I have a few thoughts about why there's less technical discussion happening today than in the past, but they're not fully baked. I think, generally, that there are fewer authoritative voices in the discussion today and that people posing questions do not adequately communicate respect for the authorities they're soliciting help from. That is to say that it seems like people are asking for answers before having done any research on their own; or that they ask a question and receive an answer, but never reply to acknowledge the help they've received. That makes people answering questions work harder and they receive less in return. That's lose-lose for everyone.

I don't know how you fix problems like these. They seem institutional; like there's been a great shift in the attitude of students in the last ten years or so.

I think this is probably reflective of a change in team composition. I would wager that the average team today has less technical talent than the average team 10 years ago, which is partially enabled by the barriers to entry being lowered. Think of how hard it was to just build a moving robot frame in 2003 vs. today. In my rookie year (2004) we did not move until week 4, and our drill motor gearboxes had a nasty tendency to fail every third match. Today there are rookies that leave their kickoffs with basically bulletproof moving robots!

I would agree with what others have pointed out, most of the posts on CD consist of hive mind or hero worship, neither of which are productive. On an individual level, I would think the most productive thing is to simply not post in threads you don't find productive.

CD's reputation for being a potentially hostile place is not new, I was aware of it when I signed up over 8 years ago.

I actually thought early on there was more technical information being shared than usual. Whether it was Ri3D, #thebucketalliance, or the small wheeled shooter thread, I think there was much more to be gained by perusing CD in Weeks 1 and 2 than has historically been the case. During the competition season there is always less technical stuff being shared as people get caught up in the rush of competition and comparing minutia of the OPR of top tier robots.

[DampRobot]

Originally Posted by Ian Curtis

I would agree with what others have pointed out, most of the posts on CD consist of hive mind or hero worship, neither of which are productive. On an individual level, I would think the most productive thing is to simply not post in threads you don't find productive.

CD's reputation for being a potentially hostile place is not new, I was aware of it when I signed up over 8 years ago.

Often, newer members (such as myself) feel compelled to add their own opinion to the topic, even when they aren't adding much of substance. Since their opinions are usually formed by reading CD, they aren't all that different from everyone else on these forums. This type of feedback loop is what generates those 200 post long bashing the n00b/praising the elite team threads, full of regurgitations of the same hive mind consensus. Not to delve too deeply into hero worshiping, but I'd like to remind the community that some of the most respected posters don't post very frequently.

I think this community has far too strong of a knee jerk reaction. I hate to bring up the whole mentor built thing... But it's kind of illustrative. There's always that one thread every year (or three months) where some new poster says that they dislike the fact that some mentors have very active roles in building the robot. The rest of the thread (all 10 pages) is flaming of the OP and worshiping of the team that the OP mentioned in their first post. If we really all agree...why do we need to spend so much time saying so?

After seeing how much time the community spends on this type of thread, should we really be surprised that this is what CD is increasingly all about? Do we think that it's really necessary to create and enforce some hostile and rather superficial hive conscience, at the cost of having a forum for used for real technical discussion? Perhaps I'm being either inflammatory or cynical, but I really dislike the fact that most CD discussions are so formulaic and devoid of real discussion.

I didn't join to have people call me out on my opinions, or to annoy other people with them for that matter. I joined so that I could become respected in the community after adding to technical discussions and answering technical questions. However, I seem to spend a lot of my time putting out fires created after I disagree with what the CD community wants to believe.

Sorry for rambling, just one of my "I felt like I needed to say it" posts.

[Bongle]

Originally Posted by Madison

CD opinion is the collective wisdom of nearly fifteen years of uninterrupted discussion on many topics. Think about that for a bit -- fifteen years. There's something to be said for the conclusions that have been drawn by this community and the topics that come up over and over again have been hashed out pretty thoroughly. It's rare for someone to offer a new wrinkle in these debates and our reluctance to entertain them again and again shows this.

Part of that is almost certainly the internet-forum phenomena where a forum drifts towards one opinion or another, and becomes anchored there. Just because posts on a forum drift towards consensus on a topic doesn't mean that the forum's "opinion" on the topic is globally correct. There are conspiracy forums, misogynistic forums, and racist forums out there, whose memberships have converged on some pretty incorrect opinions over many years of discussion. If you jump onto a racist forum and try to convince them that they're wrong, you'll get shouted down too, in a manner similar to what happens on CD if someone says "I don't like that mentors built a robot". I'm not saying that CD's consensuses are as unpalatable as racism, but just pointing that simply because a consensus exists does not imply that the consensus is correct.

Since CD's posting membership is skewed heavily towards old teams, successful teams and rich teams, it is no surprise that CD's opinion on things like mentor/student ratios, spending, and competition also skews towards "let the successful/rich/old teams continue doing what they're doing". Maybe that is the correct opinion for optimal FIRST sustainability, but it's also the conclusion you'd expect a group of mentors from the most successful teams in FIRST to come to. But I know from my first couple years as a student then mentor on some poor teams, the official CD opinion can be extremely and widely unpopular among the rank and file of teams.

To avoid a debate: I must say that my own opinions have converged on the CD opinion over the years, but as someone who has been around for 10 years, I'm probably in an extremely small minority of all the mentors and teachers that have ever been involved.

[AmoryG]

Originally Posted by ehfeinberg

Quoted for truth... Just look at the 2013 lessons learned negative. It was painful just to read. One group goes against CD opinion and BAM all the regular members start backing each other up creating this wall of exclusion.

I have also found that CD has turned into this college student hang out spot. If you look at the members who actively post who are students, its like 5%. Doesn't make a very inclusive atmosphere. Tis a shame.

If you really want to make CD a thriving community, then you have to actively work to make it feel inclusive to new and younger members.

It hurts to be ganged up on, but I think people fear the negative rep button the most. I don't use the negative rep button, and I refuse to use it on new members because I feel it really discourages them from posting on this site again. It's hard to feel comfortable on this site when you think you're being judged based on your rep.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by AmoryG

It hurts to be ganged up on, but I think people fear the negative rep button the most. I don't use the negative rep button, and I refuse to use it on new members because I feel it really discourages them from posting on this site again. It's hard to feel comfortable on this site when you think you're being judged based on your rep.

I agree on this. I think the most I've ever done is either threatened to use red (once), sent a neutral rep (a couple of times), or in particularly "stubborn" cases who seemed to have filters on their inputs, thought about using red and then realized that 47 other people already used it, so I thought I'd rather not.

I'll also send a PM instead of a red rep. I've done that a time or two.


The way I look at a lot of things is: "They" have an opinion, based on some evidence/assumptions. I have a different opinion, based on different evidence/assumptions. If I'm going to change an opinion, assuming it even needs changing, then I have only one option: Present my evidence/assumptions as a counter to "their" evidence/assumptions, and let them figure out whether they agree or disagree. And, anybody who thinks my opinion needs changing is welcome to do the same to me--as long as it's not a personal attack, I'll almost certainly be OK with that. Doing that can lead to some very interesting discussion, which may actually be instructive to everyone involved.

[Tristan Lall]

Who would be open to an experiment: hide the reputation count from view in the thread.

It could still be visible on the profile page and the member list, so that the information isn't lost—just a little less emphasized. And maybe one's own reputation could appear below the welcome message in the top right—just so you're accountable for your own behaviour.

This could also be implemented as a profile option (enabled by default), so that anyone who dislikes the change can restore their preference.

Granted, responders will also see other cues like post count, rookie year and join date—but I think those represent something very different than reputation, because they inherently take years to develop.