Here is my two pennies worth. Please excuse me if the long winded post sounds like it cost more but I have very firm views on the matter and have brought it up online and off it many times over the last 4-5 years.
Here are some of my opinions which colour my views.
1. CC is the best part of this site and I wouldn’t be on this site if it weren’t for CC to start with. I will be surprised if that is not true for many others.
2. It is impossible to avoid discussions (which is what we should ideally be having here) turning into arguments which then degenerate into verbal wars.
3. Statistics are an integral part of cricket discussion and debate. To try to curb the use of stats is childish. The problem does not lie with the use of stats, it is with the attitude of some posters which turn discussions to arguments to verbal fisticuffs.
4. To create a sub forum sounds like a good idea to start with as do all quick fixes but unfortunately, like most quick fixes, it does not tackle the real issue. Comparing players great or mediocre, present or past is one of the oldest topics of discussion amongst cricketers and cricket lovers. To send it to a sub-forum in the hope that those posts and arguments we are irritated with will be away from our ‘pristine’ CC is to deny those of us who want to talk and discuss these issues too. And if we were to go to the sub-forum designated then how have we solved the problem.
5. Someone has mentioned my name for posting more often since it brings down the ‘temperature’ as it were. Thanks for the compliment but honestly I do it because it is about myself. I love to ‘talk’ to guys here and if the debate is moving in a direction that makes me feel “this is not the place where I want to spend my time” I try to do my bit to ‘clean it up’ if I can. I do it for myself trust me. It allows me to say something worthwhile PLUS, I hope, it puts some sense into some of the guys. Maybe my age helps but I am not so sure thats the main reason. I think there are many senior members of CW who could do the same. At a Pinch I could name (to use their onsite names) Fredfertang, JBMac, BoyBrumby and ArchieMac. There are others who fall in the same category.
6. I will now let you into a ‘subversive act’ that i once tried to initiate.
I was once so disgusted with the atmosphere that had developed on CC that I wrote an e-mail to Sean suggesting we form a private forum of select CW members where we could have a decent, informed discussion amongst knowledgeable and objective cricket lovers. Nothing came of it but the idea gives a clue to what we ned here. A more active role by those who are not the ones creating the problem we are discussing here. One SJS posting more often is not a complete solution. There are many others who could post more often, time permitting of course.
7. I think our moderates do a very good and most importantly thankless job. In fact some of them have ‘transformed’ themselves since they came on the staff :-). Having said that we tend to be too lax with some habitual trouble creators. We dont have to wait for some one to indulge in blatant abuse or racism to ban them. There are some trouble makers who do not cross the barriers of parliamentary language and yet are responsible for a lot of problems here. The moderators (and the owners) need to be smarter rather than sticklers for some ‘guidelines’ before taking action. Trust me if someone appears to be a person you feel is becoming irksome he surely is. If he does it again and again you need not hesitate. A spot in the ‘cooler’ does most of them some good. Those who are incorrigible can be eventually banned for good.
8. I do not like the idea of closing good threads because some idiots are ruining the place. Thats a perfect example of throwing the baby out with the water. Lets be strong enough to take the tougher decisions. My sincere apologies James for sounding off here but being Chief Executive is also about being able to take unpopular decisions at times.
We need to be able to differentiate between newcomer trouble makers and older ones. The standards of debate on many cricket forums on the net is obnoxious. It is possible that we may get new members who are not used to our higher standards (and the standards we are here discussing). They need to be told with the politeness due to newcomers, repeatedly if required to allow them to get used to our culture. The bigger problem is the older trouble makers. We need to be tougher with them for their own sake PLUS for the bad example they set for the new comers. How can we tell new-comers we dont allow nonsense here when some of our senior most (in longevity) are themselves indisciplined and not checked as strongly as they should be.
Thats all I can think of at the moment
