Can we discuss the catch all threads?

PitMaster

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Look, I really enjoy this board. It is a great Alabama site, and unique in many ways. However, I have mixed feelings about the catch-all threads, and I'm curious as to how others feel.

For example, the NFL draft thread. If you're not involved in those type things from the beginning, it is hard to jump in in the middle and catch up. when I see something like 40 pages and 780 posts, I tend to bypass the whole thing. What this means is that I will not really participate in any NFL discussion here for this year's draft, nor will I really get any news or read the debate.

Understand trying to keep too many threads on the same topic from cluttering the board, but I'm thinking maybe there can be a happy medium. I think the use of the kitchen three it may inhibit and deter people from reading and participating, and I'm curious as to what others might think
 

Padreruf

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Look, I really enjoy this board. It is a great Alabama site, and unique in many ways. However, I have mixed feelings about the catch-all threads, and I'm curious as to how others feel.

For example, the NFL draft thread. If you're not involved in those type things from the beginning, it is hard to jump in in the middle and catch up. when I see something like 40 pages and 780 posts, I tend to bypass the whole thing. What this means is that I will not really participate in any NFL discussion here for this year's draft, nor will I really get any news or read the debate.

Understand trying to keep too many threads on the same topic from cluttering the board, but I'm thinking maybe there can be a happy medium. I think the use of the kitchen three it may inhibit and deter people from reading and participating, and I'm curious as to what others might think
I just look at it as walking into a coffee shop conversation...they don't repeat everything for me. I just read a few posts from the last page or two and jump right in. No one will/should? crucify you for that.
 

PitMaster

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Fictional example

Let's say someone met Phil Savage or Jonathan Allen in the airport here the last day or so, had an interesting conversation.

If that person posted about it, it would most likely be lumped into the NFL draft catch all thread. As such I would never see it

Kinda reminds me of the last scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark where they're taking The Arc, a Priceless treasure and it's getting buried with a whole bunch of other stuff in a huge Warehouse
 

pluckngrit

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I agree 100%. It's the main reason I dont visit the site as much as I used to.

It's so tired and just plain LAZY.
 

Redwood Forrest

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I think it needs to be like the Game Thread where each quarter is its own thread. The Auburn thread needs to start over every time the topic changes long term. There may be twenty pages of a QB controversy and then the hot topic with all the replies is the assistant coach who did "so and so" and now the first forty pages are history. The Ole Miss Sanction thread needs a restart too.

Also, I started to post something about Lane Kiffin and FAU that I found interesting but I didn't know whether to add it to the Catch all Kiffin thread or start a new one. So I just did neither. How do we know when the catch all dies a natural death?
 
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PitMaster

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And I understand the concept, for example, you don't want the entire front page to be taken up by various threads on the NFL draft.

I'm just wondering if there cannot be a happy medium between the megathread and having clutter
 

TrueCrimson7

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Sep 21, 2014
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I am a fan of catch-all threads because it keeps us from being like so many other sites where there are 30-40 completely unorganized threads (inevitably with teaser titles) all talking about one aspect of the game/draft/player.

I do understand your point, however. Perhaps a single thread for each draft day would have kept it from being so overwhelming.

And if I had a question as to whether something belongs in the catch-all thread, I would just start a new thread with a specific topic title. It will be moved if it needed to be in the catch-all.
 

PitMaster

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Another example, since its early Sunday and I'm bored right now.

I think it would be interesting to hear what other members think about the draft of joe mixon so high, and also maybe the culture of Cincinnati especially since AJ is there. There probably is some discussion on this in the mega Thread about the draft, but I tend to not want to sift thru all the pages to find it

Also, I think discussions like that, in a megathread, tend to be limited due to the nature of other things being discussed around it
 

Bazza

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I'm at the low end of the totem pole here but will pitch in my 2 cents, FWIW....

I think it's OK to start a thread other than the main thread (like the draft thread for example) as long as it is a subject that deserves it's own thread.

This requires some thought and consideration - is this subject something that deserves it's own thread? Will it bring VALUE to the form community?

If so, then have at it...the mods are here to help, if needed.

Otherwise, reading through a huge thread is not all that bad - especially in the off-season!
 

B1GTide

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I think that this board strikes a good balance between catch-all threads and topics of the day. I get that the guy who is not on the board every day can easily miss 20+ pages in a thread that interests them. Happens to me all the time on a runners board that I frequent but do not visit daily. When that happens I generally do the board the courtesy of at least skimming the 20+ pages that I missed before chiming in, but it isn't required. If you are a regular contributor, no one minds if you jump back to an issue already hashed out.

IMO, boards with scattered threads tend to skim the surface of issues. People pop in, post something, maybe contribute to a few other threads, then move on. A few folks respond, but in a few hours the thread is off the front page and lost until someone creates another thread discussing the exact same thing because they didn't want to look back a few pages to see if there was a thread already out there. So you end up with multiple threads discussing the same thing, none discussing it in enough detail to matter. When you have everyone creating new threads without looking for the subject ahead of time, you never really discuss the subject. It turns a discussion forum into a chat room.

The draft is a great example. We could easily have had 100 threads created in the last 3 days about things that happened in the draft. I would much rather read through a single thread than have to muddle my way through the 100 threads, none of which expressed much more thought than the original post of each thread.
 

Redwood Forrest

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Another example, since its early Sunday and I'm bored right now.

I think it would be interesting to hear what other members think about the draft of joe mixon so high, and also maybe the culture of Cincinnati especially since AJ is there. There probably is some discussion on this in the mega Thread about the draft, but I tend to not want to sift thru all the pages to find it

Also, I think discussions like that, in a megathread, tend to be limited due to the nature of other things being discussed around it
If I have a question about something or someone in a mega thread I must read, like 40 pages to see if the question has been answered already. This is my soluiton. When we reach 21 pages, delete the first twenty. When we reach 21 pages again, delete the first 20. We actually have a 42 page thread with only one page, the other 41 being old news.
 

KrAzY3

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From my experiences, the board has actually been fairly accommodating if you have something truly unique and worthwhile. For instance, in the past there have occasionally been things I broke off from another conversation and used to start a new thread. I did a post Ole Miss game post for example, and technically that could be part of a catch-all post game thread, but what I posted was more than a sentence or two.

The issue here is, if you for instance let everything spin off into its own thread, you will have a lot of useless clutter. For instance, what do you think of Joe Mixon? Ok, one thread, what do you think of Foster? Two, Allen? 3, Chad Kelly? 4, etc... you could easily have 15 or 20 draft threads and then how many Auburn threads, quarterback threads, etc... do you really end up with? The issue there is you can then let one or two subjects completely drown out all other conversation. So, while it might be annoying to have things moved into a catch-all, I get that, I think it's also silly for a poster to think every time they have a full two sentences of thoughts to share, that they think that warrants a new thread.
 

B1GTide

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If I have a question about something or someone in a mega thread I must read, like 40 pages to see if the question has been answered already. This is my soluiton. When we reach 21 pages, delete the first twenty. When we reach 21 pages again, delete the first 20. We actually have a 42 page thread with only one page, the other 41 being old news.
It can also be helpful if the OP of a mega thread, like the one about the draft, were to edit the original post to include major updates. For instance, the thread about the NFL draft could have been edited many times to include items of interest that occur in the draft, with links if appropriate to other places in the thread or external material. A number of guys here do that with things like recruiting threads and awards threads already. Anyone who starts a thread can do this.
 

B1GTide

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So, while it might be annoying to have things moved into a catch-all, I get that, I think it's also silly for a poster to think every time they have a full two sentences of thoughts to share, that they think that warrants a new thread.
Amen!
 

TIDE-HSV

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Interesting discussion and I don't mind trying to clarify. Mostly we have megathreads because that's the way the members seem to prefer it. We seldom step in and merge or consolidate threads. The last one I can think of is the AU thread and that was because we had so many AU-related threads on the front page that it looked like an AU board. I see the long threads as having both advantages and disadvantages. There's no need for me to repeat them, since all have been already mentioned. Unique observations can always have their own threads, so long as it's not overdone, as it is on some other boards. There will always be individuals who feel their every thought is unique and deserves a separate thread. That's an ego problem.

The only time we really insist on centralized threads, other than threads like the AU thread, is the game thread. There can be only one and, on this board, must be started by staff. Side observations must be made in the game thread or wait till after the game. We don't insist that all postgame observations be made in the postgame thread, although it seems that most seem to prefer that for the immediate postgame period...
 

rgw

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My thought was always that "Catchall threads" were for containing subject matters that would flood the board during the regular season. There was no reason to have a page of variations on a theme about Lane Kiffin during bowl season.
 

lowend

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There are also other boards on here that could be better utilized, such as Pro Sports and Rivalry Room. The description for this board is to talk about Alabama Crimson Tide football, which is what I want to come here for, not NFL/Auburn/etc. The moderators do seem to be more lenient during the off season because Football is the most active forum.
 

RTR91

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Nov 23, 2007
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There are also other boards on here that could be better utilized, such as Pro Sports and Rivalry Room. The description for this board is to talk about Alabama Crimson Tide football, which is what I want to come here for, not NFL/Auburn/etc. The moderators do seem to be more lenient during the off season because Football is the most active forum.
Just curious but what threads do you believe should be on the pro sports board?


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