BR Forum Feedback

disha · Post by **disha** » 02 Oct 2013 11:37

matrimc wrote:
disha wrote:If it has entered BRF lexicon - give me the credit!!!
Not an original from me. I took it off of a quote (is it Bertrand Russell or GBS) "in a democracy, people deserve the government they get". Didn't know you were the originator

The quote of "Yatha raja tatha praja" has been an hallmark of Indic literature on kings and governance. So Indic culture gets the first rights to that quote and any alliteration there of.

I did reverse the above to suit the trends going on since 2008/2009.

Did not know that I am in the hallowed sphere of Bertrand Russell! Why if it is spoken in English it came first?

disha · Post by **disha** » 02 Oct 2013 11:39

shiv wrote:
ramana wrote:Folks, Sorry to sound dictatorial but I do not want admins or admin policy discussed. It has evolved over a period. People are free to go where they want to.
Thanks for the feedback.
ramana
Admin policy having evolved over a period means admin policy cannot be changed easily. I am not talking of admin policy but admin tenure and the ability to let go of control and allow young blood to take over. Admins can change no? They can continue policy but bring in a less fossilized mindset. You are doing a Suresh Kalmadi to BRF. There is a such a thing as Admin propriety. Isn't it odd that the admin policy that has evolved since 1997 has no rules about change of admins? No one should be a permanent fixture.

Shiv, first of all congratulations that you are alive and kicking.

Second, picking on Ramanaji is plain wrong. You should be equanimous and pick on other forum moderators too.

negi · Post by **negi** » 02 Oct 2013 11:47

Rahul_M

I do not have any feedback as such for personally I was fine with the things back when I had joined and nothing has changed for me now too; most of my posts on this thread are just a tongue in cheek type.

disha · Post by **disha** » 02 Oct 2013 11:50

To a post on what changed after Aug 2012 to see a drop in traffic to BR(or BRF?).,

Two things - Twitter/SM and Narendra Modi.

I myself have spent very less time in Space/Satellite (my fav) and more in the GDF forum. One thing that is important, however deep we bury our memories., politics will not go away and is infact necessary. So why the very need of "burqa" forums?

Mahendra · Post by **Mahendra** » 02 Oct 2013 12:33

negi wrote:Rahul_M

I do not have any feedback as such for personally I was fine with the things back when I had joined and nothing has changed for me now too; most of my posts on this thread are just a tongue in cheek type.

Abey tu moderator banne ke application daal raha hain kya?

pehle langot pehen

Negi for Moderator please

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 02 Oct 2013 13:25

Rahul M wrote:shiv ji, you know there was an effort to get SRR rolling again under the stewardship of n^3 ji. you and I both contributed articles to that.
seeing that you are not encumbered with any admin responsibilities now AFAIK, why don't you take up charge of resurrecting that ?

Rahul it is not as simple as that. The real problem faced by enqyoob and me were lack of article contributions. This is a situation that stems from BRF's restrictive policies and I will state why and how BRF has changed to illustrate why there are no articles now

1. BRF restricts membership by having an outdated and unreasonable "no free email" registration policy
2. For this restricted and self anointed "elite" members group, the best and most active forums are hidden away where casual visitors and lurkers are unable to see the discussions
3. Admin policy cracks down on new threads with missionary fervor

These polices restrict membership and innovative posting. If members are not present in sufficient numbers and not encouraged to post innovative stuff the duty falls upon admins to lead the way. In the past this is exactly what happened. The admin caste consisted of people who themselves filled up BRM and indeed BRF, with articles. A casual search through BRM archives throws up names of admins who held the flag aloft - and that included me, Sunil Sainis, ramana, sachin, Calvin, Sridhar, Rupak, LNS, JEM, kgoan. Their verbal diarrhoea encouraged others like Airavat, vsunder and Hari Sud to do their bit.

But right now admins only restrict membership and threads and keep a secret "members only" forum. Admins and members like you, Sridhar and rohitvats have separate blogs outside of BRF. You guys should be posting your blog articles on BRF. Unless people contribute articles no editor can do much. No scratch that. If I am put in charge of articles I will write all the articles myself and you will have "shiv's blog" courtesy BRF. But this forum must not be about one man's viewpoint or any narrow set of views. For that we need: (IMO)

1. More people - let people get any login name with any email id
2. More freedom to post with less admin jihadism. The world is not going to end because of a few flamewars or inane posts. Even inane posts are regulated on BR - "Go to benis" is the order and even the name p.e.n.i.s. was edited to benis. Talk about control freaks in an admin policy that has evolved with a one track control mindset.
3. A separate and new "Original articles" forum where people are invited to post any original article or book review or commentary on political events under the sun, subject to the condition that they may get bouquets and brickbats. No more IB4TLs
4. Open up the burqa forum and let lurkers see the width and breadth of topics under discussion. BRF started with a military forum only. That BRF is long gone. How about "going all the way" now?

negi · Post by **negi** » 02 Oct 2013 14:27

Mahendra wrote:
negi wrote:Rahul_M

I do not have any feedback as such for personally I was fine with the things back when I had joined and nothing has changed for me now too; most of my posts on this thread are just a tongue in cheek type.

Abey tu moderator banne ke application daal raha hain kya?

pehle langot pehen

Negi for Moderator please

Abe sale tu yahin hai

. Me and Mod ?

Pagal hai kya ?

negi · Post by **negi** » 02 Oct 2013 14:32

shiv wrote: Rahul it is not as simple as that. The real problem faced by enqyoob and me were lack of article contributions.

There is a very simple solution to this i.e. writing at least one SRR/BRM paper a year should be made compulsory for everyone in the Moderator/Admin panel.

Manish_Sharma · Post by **Manish_Sharma** » 02 Oct 2013 14:42

shiv wrote: I am not talking of admin policy but admin tenure and the ability to let go of control and allow young blood to take over. Admins can change no? They can continue policy but bring in a less fossilized mindset. You are doing a Suresh Kalmadi to BRF. There is a such a thing as Admin propriety. Isn't it odd that the admin policy that has evolved since 1997 has no rules about change of admins? No one should be a permanent fixture.

This the same poisonous attitude for which poster like Arun_S had to go. The root of it is personal hatred. How can you handle posters-military experts from all over the world? When you can't digest individuals like Arun_S & Ramana.

No all this policy-sholicy change is just an excuse, hidden in the lairs of these advices is the core agenda, personal crusade of Shiv who wants to oust Ramana ji like he ousted Arun_S.

Now having left the boring-fossilized-BRF and visiting DFI - GFE forums and finding them pathetic he wants to come back, but with an excuse as a sudharak of BRF.

But the agenda is same:
"I'm Shiv the superheavyweight of BRF and still have the power to oust Ramana like I did several others like Arun_S."

plus

Instead of coming back to BRF normally was not digestable to ego, so all these sudhaars as a cover.

negi · Post by **negi** » 02 Oct 2013 14:45

It's gonna be fun; thoko taali.

Manish_Sharma · Post by **Manish_Sharma** » 02 Oct 2013 14:57

http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... 4#p1451404

shiv wrote:Well BRF took many years to degenerate to its current state of constant whinery and off topic arguments. But it has finally got there.

The mil forum was a refuge for some - but well all good things have to come to an end.

Congratulations one and all.

The man who left and thought BRF has degenerated due to "constant whinery and off topic arguments", comes back and says open it to all, let people start threads on their own? No agenda is something else; personal vengeance.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 02 Oct 2013 15:55

My unasked for three cents

+1 to Negi as mod
+1 to restarting BRM or updating main site
+1 to GDF remaining as is. It's much required to prevent the malicious types from trying to prevent folks from speaking their mind

Free email...mods choice as it will increase admin workload for sure.

member_20292 · Post by **member_20292** » 02 Oct 2013 16:24

yups, negi will make a good natured mod....

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 02 Oct 2013 16:54

shiv wrote:
Rahul M wrote:shiv ji, you know there was an effort to get SRR rolling again under the stewardship of n^3 ji. you and I both contributed articles to that.
seeing that you are not encumbered with any admin responsibilities now AFAIK, why don't you take up charge of resurrecting that ?

Rahul it is not as simple as that. The real problem faced by enqyoob and me were lack of article contributions.
............

have to disagree there because n^3ji's efforts had after all led to a decent collection of articles for SRR. a number of first timers (me included) had contributed as well. enough to have a pretty good new issue.
even now I can think of members not of the old guard who can contribute really well. who were not around at the time.

This is a situation that stems from BRF's restrictive policies and I will state why and how BRF has changed to illustrate why there are no articles now

I dont deny that there is some truth to your points. I have myself raised some of them earlier. and discussion on policies would continue.

but to make restarting SRR incumbent to change of BR policies serves no one. BR, even in its current form is good enough to churn out at least 2 issues of SRR/BRM per year. with you at the helm may be even 3-4 issues a year.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 02 Oct 2013 16:55

@Marten, you were speaking of SSC. even there the SSC version of GDF is under burkha.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 02 Oct 2013 17:28

negi, if admins focus on writing, how will they show the danda to your postals!?

imho, first of all what is the drive for change? there could be many levels of controls .. like i said about automation to article writer level special roles., who get more privilege, send emails, pm and what not, but can't ban or moderate. i would say, make life simpler for both users, writers and thinkers.

social networking is not about banning, but about making sure it is propagated by discipline.. we don't need to know what that is..

i also see that many thinkers (article writers) are moderated by comments and thread discussion points.. the ideas generated by discussions is summarized well by articles.. it is not that article writers, have got data everything.. and does not require discussion lines. if that is so, then why dhaagas at all?

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 02 Oct 2013 18:39

Are we putting the cart before the horse?

Shouldn't we be discussing "What is the vision for BRF in say 5-10 years" first, before the details of moderation policy and forum rules etc? Should it be a think tank of military/strategic issues or social issues as well or should it be a forum to play a nationalist mock-parliament by aligning contemporary political and governance issues in view of a well-defined Indian-interests vision etc.,

by the way +1 to negi/mehdi/rb/lalmohan/theo/saik/shauryat/swamyg/devesh for moderator.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 02 Oct 2013 18:47

SaiK wrote:negi, if admins focus on writing, how will they show the danda to your postals!?

Admins (IMHO) should be chosen on the basis of contribution to the site or forum. Not merely on basis of user likes/dislikes. If you want the site to thrive and be taken seriously, contributors have to step up. Almost 90% of the IAF/IA site is obsolete in terms of equipment specs etc. Plus there is little about local programs etc.
On the plus side, history/unit record sections are ticking along well and BR admins/contributors do a yeoman job during aero-india etc putting lots of stuff up.

Raja Bose · Post by **Raja Bose** » 02 Oct 2013 19:20

negi wrote:
shiv wrote: Rahul it is not as simple as that. The real problem faced by enqyoob and me were lack of article contributions.
There is a very simple solution to this i.e. writing at least one SRR/BRM paper a year should be made compulsory for everyone in the Moderator/Admin panel.

Chal beta phir to tu admin ban ja...daaru ka nasha aise hi utar jayega!

---

I propose Anujan for admin/mod...nowadays he dresses well and shaves regularly unlike certain others whose names are being bandied about.

---

KJo, pitega tu.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 02 Oct 2013 19:24

Rahul M wrote:
but to make restarting SRR incumbent to change of BR policies serves no one. BR, even in its current form is good enough to churn out at least 2 issues of SRR/BRM per year. with you at the helm may be even 3-4 issues a year.

Restarting SRR can be left to a later unspecified date. I am merely suggesting two new forums be visible to lurkers and non members
1. Make GDF visible
2. Start a "Original articles/commentaries" forum and leave it open to voluntary contributors and do not crack down ruthlessly. For example let someone write a "Why Modi must be PM article" and let someone write "Why I like Rahul Gandhi". Let one forumite say how Kudankulam is being sabotaged and let another say how the local parishioners are suffering. Let freedom to think and speak bloom.

I will stick to my interest which are none of the above subjects. (I prefer Lalu for PM and power from cowdung). Let any variation of IB4TL be replaced by ****** rather than the current choice of BRF word censorship. Stop turning people away from BRF with insane restrictions.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 02 Oct 2013 19:27

there is already Rahul M's patented BR wiki for that.
http://bharatrakshak.wikia.com/wiki/Bharat-rakshak_Wiki

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 02 Oct 2013 19:32

Rahul M wrote:there is already Rahul M's patented BR wiki for that.
http://bharatrakshak.wikia.com/wiki/Bharat-rakshak_Wiki

What has your patented Wikia which is unheard of and virtually unknown got to do with BRF? Why should anyone contribute to this if he cannot even join the forum? There are a thousand sites where people can post what they want, and they do. The question is what is anyone doing to take a degenerating, decrepit BRF with waning interest and membership forward.

The forum is old and it behaves like many elderly people, slow, resistant to change and fixed in its views.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 02 Oct 2013 19:35

well then all we need to do is make it heard by more people and problem is solved, no ?

change for the sake of change is like the cultural revolution, achieves nothing and disrupts many good things.

edit : on this I would like to quote what Gen S RoyC once said to me

"in India you can't have revolution, only evolution". wise words IMHO.

negi · Post by **negi** » 02 Oct 2013 19:38

Kya mazaak hai , hum se to ye na ho paega .

Austin, ArmenT, Indranil Roy , Vivek Ahuja, Rohitvats, Karan M, Sum aur Nachiket jaison ko lo yaar they post with a high SNR. Hum to apne aap ko hi ban kar denge kisi din.

Mahdi sorry yaar tera naam nahin liya if you and me become mod then there won't be any fun left here.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 02 Oct 2013 19:45

Karan M, honestly not a bad idea if we can get people with dual role or multiple abilities.

BTW, these are my QoS in my thoughts:
- Profiles
- Capabilities/abilities
- Interests
- Supervision
- Peer Ranking instead of post counts
- ..perhaps a duma setup!?

BTW, I thought the burkha forum was established mainly for contributors and thinkers to discuss about articles before going public.

--

mahadevbhu wrote:yups, negi will make a good natured mod....

Are you saying the current mods are not good natured?

KJo · Post by **KJo** » 02 Oct 2013 20:49

We need a nukkad forum where people can open threads willy nilly as they like. Now they can do it in 1 thread and things get mixed up. This should be for the chai biskoot, non serious talk. The other sections should be serious and moderated more strictly. We are now mixing serious and non serious threads in the same location.

I agree that free emails need to be allowed now.

But I think the mods are doing a great job too. ramana, archan (thanks for the warnings man

) etc and others have been very good. But there can be new mods as well. I was Administrator in an Afghan Muslim

site for 5 years and that isn't a job for the faint hearted. Imagine having to deal with people calling you kafir every day and wondering why a "foreigner" was running the show. But I made some great life long friends.

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 02 Oct 2013 21:08

The GDF was created because because of the clamor for a forum replicating what used to exist at one time, much before a large number of present posters joined - the History and Current Affairs Forum, a.k.a HICAF. HICAF was a hybrid of today's GDF+TEF threads, and emotion level was similar in nature to what's inside GDF now. This was until the mid 2000s.

It became an administrative and moderation overload due to all the discussions on politics and religion, as well as sniping between members, to such an extent that BRF moderators of that era decided to delete the whole thing. Much rona dhona ensued. I think some got banned during the protests of that time. Of course, the problem did not go away. Many of these discussions leeched onto the existing set of forums. Subsequently, to again clean things up, GDF was set up, and later was put behind login-only.

Like many other forum issues, this has a current solution that evolved over many years. It's by no means perfect. Arguments can - and just have - been made against it. What's not discussed is the presumption of being able to do so with all else being unchanged. From prior history, that's not going to happen. Having an open GDF, or no GDF at all, had its own share of issues.

For all its warts, GDF in its present form has proven itself as good, if not a better solution, than what existed before. Definitely a better one than not having any HICAF or GDF, which led to flamewars in strat/mil forum and people being banned. That's why politics and religion discussions are restricted there and given more latitude within a closed GDF.

As it stands, GDF in its current form is the best solution that exists. An even better one would be for every poster to take their religious and political proclivities elsewhere and restrict conversation here to completely apolitical discussions. That used to be how discussions here were, at one time long ago. It was supported by a very active moderation exercise to enforce it. We are not going to go through with the open up GDF and replicate the HICAF fracas all over again.

Some suggestions, like permitting the creation of more threads, has merit. Others, like opening GDF or using web emails, don't. However for something like free thread creation to work, it requires users to be willing to subsume an act of moderation themselves, and not simply create threads on whatever comes to mind. For example, would we see threads like 'Whats the best expansion of MMS ? Maha murkh singh, Moun man singh, etc' or 'What cup size do you like best - 36B, 36C, 36D, 36F' ? Would users look at the current state of discourse and seriously feel that there's sufficient self moderation within the forum for such a policy to work ?

bhart · Post by **bhart** » 02 Oct 2013 21:15

What if free email ID's are allowed on recommendation by an existing member? Or on recommendation by a member who is registered using a work ID or paid ID?

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 02 Oct 2013 21:17

bhart wrote:What if free email ID's are allowed on recommendation by an existing member? Or on recommendation by a member who is registered using a work ID or paid ID?

that is already in place for quite a few years. plz check the pinned thread.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 02 Oct 2013 21:26

I am very happy with current moderation process and set of moderators. I also like the suggestion to add more moderators, so this community is not over loaded.

I think GDF is a very good idea. I notice a general trend to move threads from open forum to GDF for various reasons, but would like more traffic in opposite direction as and when a topic achieves critical mass.

One recommendation is to move Off-Topic thread to Open Forum. It will open the minds of skeptics.

JMHT

darshhan · Post by **darshhan** » 02 Oct 2013 21:27

Suraj wrote: Others, like opening GDF or using web emails, don't.

Suraj ji, What is the benefit of keeping GDF secret? Please explain.I am unable to understand.

kapilrdave · Post by **kapilrdave** » 02 Oct 2013 21:54

Suraj wrote:(remember, this site is hosted using someone else's money)

I would suggest to create a "monetary contribution" page (I would not call it a Donation or 'Help BRF' page) if required. I'm sure there will be many who would want to pay gurudakshina. But just don't delete anything from archive. It has been useful at least for me.

Regarding BRF being a private elites club by the way of strict moderation, well, that's what makes BRF different from others and thats what makes knowledgable people come to BRF. That is the very identity of BRF losing which will be disasterous. Those who want to post without moderation can go to rediff and such sites. The demand for loose moderation is contradictory to the laments about decreasing standard of posting.

Regarding lowering rank on internet, just open up the NM thread and watch it going upto first 10k. And I'm for opening up of entire GDF.

Regarding free emails, I think it is a valid demand but that facility should be implemented with some riders. Anyone with paid email can post wherever he wants. But free email walas should be allowed to post only in some of the less 'sacred' threads. Perhaps entire GDF should be allowed. After X (say 100) number of posts he automatically gets the right to post elsewhere. This way we make sure that the poster is genuine. It will take 100 posts for an abuser to get into more important threads. Yet there should be an "Apply for other thread" button for users less than 100 posts if they wish to post on threads other than allowed thread. In that case he has to list out his thread of interest and his vague qualification of posting there without having to reveal himself. Mods call will be final on these cases. I think this is a fair amount of exercise for a free email user who actually want to contribute to the forum. On top of that, each such user's IP should be logged so that they cannot create multiple accounts.

In any case, the quality of posting should be far higher priority than the popularity of the site. BRF aint doing that bad in terms of popularity that it has to lower its standards. As Disha said, the lower rank is due to focus on NM thread which is not public.

disha · Post by **disha** » 02 Oct 2013 22:05

Suraj wrote:PMs are disabled as a means of managing server storage space and bandwidth (remember, this site is hosted using someone else's money), as well as to prevent users tagteaming using it instead of posting on the forum. Of course, they may use other ways to communicate. ...

If H/W - S/W is restricted due to money, you can have a BRF fund raiser!

And some more random thoughts - FWIW

Regarding moderation/banning - how does ebay do it? There is a community based moderation. Several studies have been carried out and there is a wide literature on it - should we not look at it to start with? And BRF Admin is just another forum member with some special privs - like first among equals - so why is there an undue "fear" from that. I see post-after-post having a fear like "so jayo varna gabbar singh ayega". Are BR Admins gabbar singh?

And why the duality between "Admins" and "Paper writers"? They are dual tasks - All good paper writers need not make good admin and not all good admins are excellent "paper writers"!

Also this forum is very much male-dominated. We do not have any women representation. How are you planning to fix that?

What about catching children? High Schoolers? New College grads? Can they be steered away from facebook onto BRF where based on their age they are restricted to certain forums? Can that be even explored? Can BRF be global meeting place for Bharatiyas? The physics and maths thread were good - we had Amber G. and what did we do to her?

How many members from other real minority religions post here?

I have mentioned earlier, and state it again - BRF is what its members are. Turn off the members, you are turning off BRF. There is no pride in being an once excellent watering hole which is fast drying up.

And Shiv, you cannot shirk blame. You cannot just wake up one day and say - oh man- things have hit the fan and let us do some clean up - all gardens need care and attention. Even native gardens. Some more and some less.

disha · Post by **disha** » 02 Oct 2013 22:06

kapilrdave wrote:
Suraj wrote:(remember, this site is hosted using someone else's money)
I would suggest to create a "monetary contribution" page (I would not call it a Donation or 'Help BRF' page) if required. I'm sure there will be many who would want to pay gurudakshina. But just don't delete anything from archive. It has been useful at least for me.

+1

KJo · Post by **KJo** » 02 Oct 2013 22:12

disha wrote:
kapilrdave wrote: I would suggest to create a "monetary contribution" page (I would not call it a Donation or 'Help BRF' page) if required. I'm sure there will be many who would want to pay gurudakshina. But just don't delete anything from archive. It has been useful at least for me.
+1

I remember this issue brought up many Eids ago. I think the BrAdmans vetoed it because some members would claim diplomatic immunity just because they were paying zakat to BRF.

Also, why should the forum "do something" to bring in wimmens and minorities? This forum is open to all. They can come if they are interested. Why special proselytizing?

abhik · Post by **abhik** » 02 Oct 2013 22:13

I too agree that BRF should open itself up and allow registration via free email. The pros have already been pointed out by various posters. If there are concerns about flood of low quality posts, trolls etc, surely there are ways to control them. Some that I could think of are:-
-> Limit the rate at which newbies can post, say 100 posts in 1 month.
-> Don't give newbies the permissions to open new threads.

disha · Post by **disha** » 02 Oct 2013 22:13

As somebody suggested and extending the thought, instead of banning (lifetime banning should be thought of as a death penalty)., let the offending poster be "convicted" and sent to "jail". The jail sentence could be even based on the extent of crime. Let their conviction record show on their posts!

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 02 Oct 2013 22:15

ebay generates indirect revenue by community moderations - essentially a feedback. the market demand is created when people feel there is a trust model that can be established between a rated seller and security guaranteed buyer with protections.. normally ebay sellers face a lot uphill tasks and gets sued too.. now, they have the seller ratings, and slowly creating a more effective auctioneering environment.. we don't want to feed too much strategy for ebay anyways from here. /ot

disha · Post by **disha** » 02 Oct 2013 22:16

KJoishy wrote:
I remember this issue brought up many Eids ago. I think the BrAdmans vetoed it because some members would claim diplomatic immunity just because they were paying zakat to BRF.

Interesting. Exception becoming the rule? How many actually claimed diplomatic immunity? A simple clause - donating to BRF and then claiming diplomatic immunity will result in life-time ban will solve that

Vayutuvan · Post by **Vayutuvan** » 02 Oct 2013 22:32

disha wrote:Did not know that I am in the hallowed sphere of Bertrand Russell! Why if it is spoken in English it came first?

Sorry going too OT here. Why do think they did not take it off from the original sanskrit quote and then this mod is bringing it back home to its roots? Also, a large part of English has its roots in snamskritam.