Let's bring CD back to the way it used to be

[Nathan Rossi]

Originally Posted by Mastonevich

Fear is a powerful motivator.

True, I don't post here often due to myself always being concerned about what I post. I spend way too much time making sure my posts are acceptable. Reading them several times over, even when it's something as simple as "Looks great! Can't wait to see your robot at competition." But, this isn't exclusive to CD, it's a quirk in my personality.

I don't want to be wrong, but I know I will be from time to time, it's part of life. In fact, you're more likely to remember something if you are corrected (in a respectful manner).

Plus, if I'm unsure about something, I know someone else on CD will reply in a moments notice, that's the power of the internet. But with great power comes great responsibility.
I'm sorry, I couldn't resist.

Looking back at my posts, I can see one thread that I added a bit of fuel to the flame, I apologize for that.

[Tristan Lall]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Get rid of the BS political handwringing - Who the hell CARES if a company uses the patent system to make a profit? Take their money, say thank you, and then be inspired to go fix the patent system. Want more women in FIRST? Don't harass me about how my friends aren't diverse enough, help me recruit more women to STEM.

Frankly, the discussions of the political, societal and cultural implications of ideas—whether or not they have anything to do with robotics—were historically some of the most interesting conversations on the forums.

The increasing ease with which anyone can access our posts leads us to self-censor our opinions out of fear of the consequences. As a result, here (and elsewhere on the Internet), people now tend to be more cautious and less willing to postulate something unconventional or advocate for something unpopular. While one can argue that the risks of heated discussion or iconoclastic behaviour outweigh the benefits of discussions among people with common interests but diverse viewpoints, I worry that we're overcompensating for the perceived harms and will soon find ourselves in an online echo chamber, with nothing consequential to talk about.

Today's students participating on ChiefDelphi are missing out on the kind of high-quality conversations—and outright debates—that used to be commonplace. In those cases, it wasn't so much that the outcome of the debate was especially important, it's that by having the debate in a quasi-public place, everyone learned something about the issue at hand—and for some people, that was probably their introduction to the issue.

Originally Posted by Taylor

It's also important to understand that CD is a public and searchable forum. My wife was looking up information about Jane Cosmetics, and one of the top Google responses was the CD thread.
She glanced through it, and commented to me, "That's a poor way to treat a sponsor."

Speaking of an echo chamber, do we want a ChiefDelphi where people can't have that discussion for fear of offending a sponsor?

It's one thing to cause deliberate offence with malicious intent. It's quite another to recognize that a foreseeable consequence of constructive criticism is that people might recognize that mistakes were indeed made—and to criticize anyway, because that same criticism could plausibly lead to useful improvements. Certainly we have a moral duty to be judicious, but I don't think that moral duty compels us to be silent when we have nothing nice to say.

(Also, the magnitude of the problem may be overstated: Google is probably biasing your search results by personalizing them based on your inferred interests.)

[Dustin Shadbolt]

what this site is meant to accomplish: a welcoming community, where the members all support one another, and are understanding of the views of others.

This. I think this sums up what CD is designed to be.

[Taylor]

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

(Also, the magnitude of the problem may be overstated: Google is probably biasing your search results by personalizing them based on your inferred interests.)

I agree with everything you said. I'm all for healthy academic discourse. That's what CD "ought to be" - no question.
The reason I quoted the above is my wife was on her work computer when that happened. A coworker commented on her lipgloss, so she was looking for more info on the company. My wife ... she's not a chiefdelphi kind of girl.

[BrendanB]

Originally Posted by Taylor

I agree with everything you said. I'm all for healthy academic discourse. That's what CD "ought to be" - no question.
The reason I quoted the above is my wife was on her work computer when that happened. A coworker commented on her lipgloss, so she was looking for more info on the company. My wife ... she's not a chiefdelphi kind of girl.

I'm very curious as to what she searched as I can't get ChiefDelphi in any of the first 4 pages of Google results (after 4 I haven't looked as you start hitting no mans land). Once you search "Jane cosmetics first robotics" or "Lynn Tilton first robotics" does CD start showing up in the searches but its not the headline.

This isn't here or there at this point. Everyone should use caution when posting online but on flip side I don't think we should shy away from having certain conversations such as the one regarding Jane Cosmetics at the Championship as there was some good conversation that came from it.

I agree with the OP, ChiefDelphi has become a very hostile place these days and you can see the technical discussions have moved away because this place is full of trolls who think they know everything and tear apart anyone with a differing view. Most of the time its not by students its by adults which is pathetic. Stop tearing young students down and instead build them up correctly.

[Nate Laverdure]

The weeks immediately following the competition season is a dark time for ChiefDelphi. A simple search for "negativity" reveals the trend:

April 2002: Negativity on and about CD
Late March 2005: Stop the Madness
May 2006: Refrain from the negatives
October* 2009: Whatever Happened to the Old Chief Delphi?
Late March 2011: Is there usually this much frustration?
Late March 2012: Sippin' on the haterade
May 2014: Let's bring CD back to the way it used to be

*an outlier here, but extremely relevant.

[Conor Ryan]

Originally Posted by Nate Laverdure

The weeks immediately following the competition season is a dark time for ChiefDelphi. A simple search for "negativity" reveals the trend:

April 2002: Negativity on and about CD
Late March 2005: Stop the Madness
May 2006: Refrain from the negatives
October* 2009: Whatever Happened to the Old Chief Delphi?
Late March 2011: Is there usually this much frustration?
Late March 2012: Sippin' on the haterade
May 2014: Let's bring CD back to the way it used to be

*an outlier here, but extremely relevant.

The old saying in finance goes... "go away in May, come back in September to play". I've always thought that it could apply to CD too.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sell_in_May

As for the general quality control post on this forum, I would like to see some more of the tribal knowledge in FRC institutionalized somewhere like a Wiki that could be easier to send a rookie team in need to. There are soo many best practices here that really just stop on some thread from 2006, it would be great to see that go somewhere that would do it justice. Maybe a wiki isn't the best place because the community needs to emphasize and validate information, but I'll let the community figure that out.

I'm just looking for a way to add some corporate jargon to this place.

[Hallry]

Originally Posted by Conor Ryan

As for the general quality control post on this forum, I would like to see some more of the tribal knowledge in FRC institutionalized somewhere like a Wiki that could be easier to send a rookie team in need to. There are soo many best practices here that really just stop on some thread from 2006, it would be great to see that go somewhere that would do it justice. Maybe a wiki isn't the best place because the community needs to emphasize and validate information, but I'll let the community figure that out

A while ago, there was a FIRST wiki, albeit rarely used by most.

EDIT: Oh, right, tons of spam...

[coalhot]

Originally Posted by Hallry

A while ago, there was a FIRST wiki, albeit rarely used by most.

EDIT: Oh, right, tons of spam...

Also, no use. I remember setting up a whole page for my team, I think it was viewed more by me then anyone else. Sad...

[nuclearnerd]

I'm new to CD so I don't want to speak with too much certainty, but I wonder if the occasional nastiness isn't a reflection of the (pretty old by internet standards) vBulletin template. Other online communities have been trying to grapple with similar problems (maintaining civil discussion, highlighting useful information) and they have come up with various forum features that help somewhat. These include:

1) "Likes" (Slashdot, Reddit, Metafilter, StackExchange, Facebook, Twitter and almost everyone else) - this gives posters a chance to show support or agreement without having to fill the thread with "mee too"s. It also gives readers another way to filter or sort replies.

2) "Flags" (Metafilter, Slashdot) - gives posters a chance to notify moderators of particularly good or bad posts without having to fill thread with "pile-on" criticisms

3) "Real Name Policy" (Facebook, Google+) - a bit more controversial (I'm not actually in favour of this one, even though I follow it myself). It eliminates sock puppet accounts, and gives posters a bit of pause before posting to know that their comments will be attached to their names.

4) Help forums (AskMetafilter, StackExchange) - specific places where anyone (not just CD regulars) are encouraged to find help, and regulars are encouraged (through various gamification tricks) to provide high-signal/noise responses.

There are other techniques as well (heavy / pre-moderation, signup costs, contributor rankings / best post trophies...). Not all of them will be useful here, but some of them might. A facelift wouldn't hurt either - the CD interface is pretty intimidating for someone who isn't already inclined to post online. I don't have the skills to contribute the changes myself unfortunately, but I'm sure there are some talented web designers in FRC who might be up to the challenge.

[Andrew Schreiber]

I'm gonna just respond to these, there's some interesting ideas on them.



1) "Likes" (Slashdot, Reddit, Metafilter, StackExchange, Facebook, Twitter and almost everyone else) - this gives posters a chance to show support or agreement without having to fill the thread with "mee too"s. It also gives readers another way to filter or sort replies.

I've personally, never been much of a fan of "likes" I feel it leads to people writing things that are likable rather than useful discussion.


2) "Flags" (Metafilter, Slashdot) - gives posters a chance to notify moderators of particularly good or bad posts without having to fill thread with "pile-on" criticisms

Moderators already do way too much work for too little pay (ie, $0). Plus, define a bad post? I'm certain that my definition is vastly different than most folks. The rep system kinda serves as a way of passing a message to the actual user. (I use a lot of green and gray rep to give feedback).


3) "Real Name Policy" (Facebook, Google+) - a bit more controversial (I'm not actually in favour of this one, even though I follow it myself). It eliminates sock puppet accounts, and gives posters a bit of pause before posting to know that their comments will be attached to their names.

I've used my real name on here for many years. It doesn't really give me pause at this point. I know that you find this account if you search my name in Google. But, while I'm a bit of a jerk a lot of the time on here it's nothing compared to how some of my coworkers are. But I do like the idea of a person being a known person Accounts like LF are different imho. Having been on the prediction side of the coin, doing it from NOT your real name is a good thing. This community SAYS it's respectful but the horrific comments/lies I've gotten sent my way say quite the opposite.

However, that logic really only applies to adults.

4) Help forums (AskMetafilter, StackExchange) - specific places where anyone (not just CD regulars) are encouraged to find help, and regulars are encouraged (through various gamification tricks) to provide high-signal/noise responses.

I'd be ok seeing a StackOverflow style Q&A board, it solves some of the problems with forums. It does introduce some new ones.




How do we get to a less cyclically negative community? Well, I got a few wonderfully enlightening text messages today... at the time I didn't find them quite as wonderful but with a few hours to think on it I learned something. I'm sharing some of the thoughts since I have a hunch I'm not the only one who does it.

- Snippish responses to misunderstandings. I do this a lot, a lot of other folks do too. Maybe we should take a lesson from what we always yell at the GDC for and not rush our calls. I've been writing most of my posts 2/3 times before posting them... unfortunately I'm a REALLY fast typist. Coupled that with the fact that I get frustrated with what I perceive as stupidity and stay that way for a long time; I guess I need to physically write them out. I'd be willing to bet this would prevent a lot of misunderstandings.

- Negative tone. I, and many folks (esp this year) have a really negative tone. Or at least that's what folks tell me. I rarely see it as I focus mostly on content rather than tone. I'm open to suggestions on avoiding this one. It's a writing style/personality style. I've noticed, at least in my field, it tends to be quite common to be very negative when looking at things. Suggestions on being optimistic are very welcome.

- Frustration at arguments based solely on feeling. I'm a firm believe in facts. It's why I'm in STEM. My mind is wired to believe there is an OPTIMAL answer. Because of this I find myself being frustrated by folks who think that an opinion based on nothing more than "well I feel that..." is worth as much as a researched opinion. Big wakeup call to folks like me: We're wrong. I hate writing that, I hate admitting that. But as this friend pointed out (as much as I didn't want them to), feelings are just as valid about a lot of topics. That being said, folks who base opinions on feelings should recognize that if facts come to light disproving your feeling? Responding with "You're wrong because I feel this" without incorporating the new facts into your belief is just rude.


Those are the big three I pulled out of that conversation. I figured I'd share in case someone else similar finds any use out of them.

[Brandon Holley]

Thanks for the kind words Ryan.

I 'officially' joined ChiefDelphi back on kickoff in 2004 after a couple of years of stalking. Like Tom pointed out, CD helped me grow up, learn to make concise well-articulated arguments and was a source for endless information on all things FIRST (and more).

I had a chance to interact with guys like Andy Baker and Joe Johnson on a daily basis, and have them critique my designs, strategies and choices. Of course there were spirited debates and arguments, that will come with ANY group that is passionate about something.

What I think we're really missing these days is hearty technical discussion, with original ideas and complimentary content. Looking at designs posted up for critique in the past several years, much of the feedback is regurgitated from older/similar posts. Creative ideas are often first critiqued with something like, "Interesting, but you should just do 6WD kitbot instead...". While this is extremely useful advice in certain situations- I miss the CD that celebrated cool ideas with a nice discussion about them- not endless rants and questions as to why you would ever do such a thing.

I was very fortunate to have some amazing mentors both here on CD and in person along my path. I still have these mentors as I've gotten older and picked up new ones along the way. I would like to think the next generation of FIRSTers can be exposed to the same experience I had here on CD. It's not a simple problem to fix, as cultural issues are often deep-seeded and have massive inertia.

All we can do is lead by example and hope the rest follow suit. Something I have tried to do as a mentor, and I know many others have as well.

-Brando

[magnets]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

How do we get to a less cyclically negative community? Well, I got a few wonderfully enlightening text messages today... at the time I didn't find them quite as wonderful but with a few hours to think on it I learned something. I'm sharing some of the thoughts since I have a hunch I'm not the only one who does it.

- Snippish responses to misunderstandings. I do this a lot, a lot of other folks do too. Maybe we should take a lesson from what we always yell at the GDC for and not rush our calls. I've been writing most of my posts 2/3 times before posting them... unfortunately I'm a REALLY fast typist. Coupled that with the fact that I get frustrated with what I perceive as stupidity and stay that way for a long time; I guess I need to physically write them out. I'd be willing to bet this would prevent a lot of misunderstandings.

- Negative tone. I, and many folks (esp this year) have a really negative tone. Or at least that's what folks tell me. I rarely see it as I focus mostly on content rather than tone. I'm open to suggestions on avoiding this one. It's a writing style/personality style. I've noticed, at least in my field, it tends to be quite common to be very negative when looking at things. Suggestions on being optimistic are very welcome.

- Frustration at arguments based solely on feeling. I'm a firm believe in facts. It's why I'm in STEM. My mind is wired to believe there is an OPTIMAL answer. Because of this I find myself being frustrated by folks who think that an opinion based on nothing more than "well I feel that..." is worth as much as a researched opinion. Big wakeup call to folks like me: We're wrong. I hate writing that, I hate admitting that. But as this friend pointed out (as much as I didn't want them to), feelings are just as valid about a lot of topics. That being said, folks who base opinions on feelings should recognize that if facts come to light disproving your feeling? Responding with "You're wrong because I feel this" without incorporating the new facts into your belief is just rude.


Those are the big three I pulled out of that conversation. I figured I'd share in case someone else similar finds any use out of them.

This is a great post, and might just be the best one I've read, ever. If you look at the "negative" conversations that have been going on, 90% of the posts are by the set of people people who have full/almost full rep bars, and are active, well-known users. If everybody makes a good effort to be constructive, we could really make CD a wonderful place. After reading this, I looked through my posts from this year, and realized that I'm guilty of doing most of the bad stuff. I've convinced myself that I'm not going to post anything that doesn't help someone or contribute to a conversation. If I think something isn't good, I'll try to stay more positive, and help find a possible solution. For all the complaining over little things I did this year, I accomplished absolutely nothing.

[stuart2054]

As a mentor with only five years in FRC and on CD my opinion is of limited value. I offer this. I find CD a good resource and generally positive in nature. I can figure out negative threads usually by the title but I some times read them and post if I have input for or against.

I think discussion is generally positive on CD. Discussion in a civil manner should never be discouraged but I would agree that some posts are not civil. Welcome to our world and the realities of it.

There has always been negatives to freedom of speech but we should not run from the principal of it in this forum. We should strive to be CIVIL in our discussions and PERHAPS censor uncivil posts but who is the JUDGE of that. I like this forum and try to be constructive in my posts and I believe for the most part others do as well.

I think questioning this forum and what is posted is healthy and the question should be asked from time to time but a third party just deleting posts or the like does not seem to me the way to go unless FIRST is drawing the wrong sort of people more than I have witnessed.

[JaneYoung]

This is a thought based on a few years of participating in Chief Delphi and in FIRST.

When members refer to the mentoring leadership skills that Andy Baker and Joe Johnson shared and continue to share with us - they are addressing skills that are hidden in plain view. One example would be the value of listening. Another would be paying attention. Another would be, and I think this is very important, they don't forget about the membership of the Chief Delphi community. It is a wonderful community comprised of members of all ages, diverse cultures, interests, and experiences. Andy and Joe never forget that. Neither does Brandon.

When new members participate, they are learning. When new members of a FIRST team join and participate, they are really learning. We can all remember the struggle of learning about this amazing program, and.. whoa... there is a forum, created by a team, for people to gather and be a community. Wow, how cool that?!?! There are those who always keep the community, and the unique opportunities that it presents, at the forefront of their thoughts when posting. There are those who begin to slip into taking it all for granted and who stopped listening and keeping the community members in mind when they are posting.

And that's why threads like these are healthy.

It's been quite a year and it has been reflected here within this community. That said, many wonderful things have happened and opportunities have occurred. Don't lose sight of those when you bring your gifts and talents to boards here in CD. It's not that hard to do.
---
A final thought - Andrew, you have a really good friend. You are lucky that he/she cares enough to be that honest with you. Everyone should have a friend like that.

Jane