Originally Posted by
Rart
I'm just curious what you guys think of tracker invite forums, like TI, TR, whatever. I always see them advertised as a invite forum "built on community", which I feel like a load of crap. I have joined a couple of them from reading blogs and have left with a sour taste in my mouth. Here are some of my thoughts:
1. Single minded thought train, no individual opinion
All the posts I see are "good idea", "good post", "well said", "this is a good post", yadda yadda yadda. Every post is in support of another post, and there never seems to be any actual arguing or speaking out. Every one seems to be kissing each other's ass, and I never really see people really express individual, unique opinions. How do you build a community based only on everyone agreeing?
2. Quality of posts degenerate
Everyone is out for themselves. In every GA post requirement is a must, and it becomes a given in a forum like that that more posts = better reputation. It feels like everyone is in a rat race to build up posts, and I've rarely, if ever see multi sentence/paragraph posts.
3. Quality of members degenerate
The only people that join these places seem to be, well, collectors desperately on the lookout for more invites. They read the blogs and constantly pounce on any invite site to inflate the ranks with more people just purely seeking out to collect trackers as their primary ambition. They seem to be the generic member who can never quite put a sentence together, always seem to go "plz can i has this invite i want it for community thx in advance". There posts are less than useful and it seems like all that's on their mind is getting more invites.
4. Witch hunt against traders
I have seen some of the report threads against traders, and boy are they brutal, especially if a notable member starts the thread. It turns into an all out witch hunt, with almost no regard as to whether the person is actually innocent. I realize that trading is bad for a tracker, but these people take it to the next level. They hunt him down, try to find his IP's, and ask anyone who is in those trackers to report him, in an attempt to get him banned. Maybe this isn't terrible, but what if hes innocent? I saw the other day a topic made saying that the OP "was sorry" for a previous report he made, and that he was mistaken. Another prominent member came in and said that, the members there would be willing to help him in any way, and would try to get him any invite for a site he was banned from. This really exemplifies this "witch hunt aspect". Since it's a given to just believe what someone says to kiss up to them and in order to not speak out, they automatically assume the accused is guilty. And when a thread comes out saying "I'm sorry, I was wrong", it may already be too late. The damage is already done.
5. Staff
It may be wrong to judge people by the quality/spelling/punctuation of their posts, but on many of those sites it just seems like the staff is too lazy to put a basic sentence together. Half the spelling is completely wrong, and the other half of the time I have to read a post 2-3 times just to understand what he was saying. Maybe I shouldn't judge like this, but it makes me really wonder what kind of people run this place. And then I see staff/moderators with signatures such as "Looking for ftn, if you have please help me". Honestly, I feel like that reduces them down to any other member there. Just like the normal members who join the sites, they are just the same, creating/modding a forum just for the sake of "sucking up" and hopefully getting into a dream tracker. Maybe its just me, but I feel like any sort of staff should never be desperately asking for invites like that in their signature.
How do you create a "community" like that?
Thoughts?
