Anybody Getting the Bigger Picture Yet?

Well here we go. I mentioned this in earlier threads, and in an effort to inform, I'll mention this article...

Caveat: I know I said I would not post any more "worldly" threads, but this is major stuff, and what's the point of the Coffeehouse if you can't discuss what is going on around you? If this thread gets struck down, then I give up...

Escalation in the Middle East

After the capture of more Israeli soldiers (and the loss of a few of them)...they are calling up reservists and...

Jerusalem Post wrote:

A very high ranking military officer said that if the soldiers were not returned in good condition, Israel would turn Lebanon back 20 years by striking its vital infrastructure.

Can we please just focus on technology topics?

Posting these non technical, political/world affairs topics only brings out the trolls and endless/pointless arguments/debates.
 
I want the coffeehouse to be about technical topics of interest.

There are plenty of other web forums out there to talk about such matters.

Zeo wrote:

Can we please just focus on technology topics?

Posting these non technical, political/world affairs topics only brings out the trolls and endless/pointless arguments/debates.
 
I want the coffeehouse to be about technical topics of interest.

There are plenty of other web forums out there to talk about such matters.

You've lost a long time poster then, because I give up now. I've been around since the beginning of this site, and while I agree that sometimes such topics do bring out trolls, that was never my intent. Larsenal, W3bbo, ScanIAm, JCSampson (or whatever his name was) and others seem to be able to handle these topics quite well. Since Charles was banning trolls anyway, I thought we could safely debate things. I guess not.

That said, I do not think discussing this was "pointless", and frankly I'm more or less surprised you would say that.

Zeo wrote:

Can we please just focus on technology topics?

Posting these non technical, political/world affairs topics only brings out the trolls and endless/pointless arguments/debates.
 
I want the coffeehouse to be about technical topics of interest.

There are plenty of other web forums out there to talk about such matters.

Why ? It's the coffee house, not tech off. You don't like it don't read it. Coming from a MS guy that’s kind of crummy you say that, or believe it.

Programmers (most) are free thinkers, that’s where ideas come from. Otherwise your just another bot on the assembly line waiting for lunch hour to come along. We should be able to talk about anything here we wish. Without criticism, nor personnel opinions on topics we choose. I agree when it gets out of line to stop the rolling train, but hey yours was only the second post.

I don't even read the TechOff... 

I hope the Coffee House doesn't close down - I don't know how I'd spend my day...  Oh yeah, doing work.

And yes, some major shi£ is going down in the world, and I love to hear other people discuss it.  I think most of us are intelligent enough to listen to people's opinions without feeling insulted.  You can call me or my beliefs wrong and I wouldn't care - it's your opinion.

But, if the Coffee House shuts down, there's nothing on C9 to keep me here.

Charles wrote:



We are not going to close the Coffeehouse.

Please keep these discussions civil or threads will be deleted, Niners banned. That's just the way it is now. It's fine to talk about world events here. However, religious discussions must happen elsewhere. Period.

C

I mean this in a polite way.

Charles; I agree to some extent, but most of the world events involve religious artifacts. Especially today’s events.

I think that “most” 9ers are quite grown up enough not to get carried away. Your posts lately have been like (smarten up, or your going to get a spanking type stuff). It’s definitely changed here over the last couple of months. Ramped discussion has not been that bad from what I’ve seen has it?

Anyway, you’re the one with the finger on the red button, guess it’s censorship in the works or get out.

billh wrote:



Zeo wrote: Can we please just focus on technology topics? Posting these non technical, political/world affairs topics only brings out the trolls and endless/pointless arguments/debates.   I want the coffeehouse to be about technical topics of interest. There are plenty of other web forums out there to talk about such matters.

You've lost a long time poster then, because I give up now. I've been around since the beginning of this site, and while I agree that sometimes such topics do bring out trolls, that was never my intent. Larsenal, W3bbo, ScanIAm, JCSampson (or whatever his name was) and others seem to be able to handle these topics quite well. Since Charles was banning trolls anyway, I thought we could safely debate things. I guess not.

That said, I do not think discussing this was "pointless", and frankly I'm more or less surprised you would say that.

Bill I wasn't saying that this topic or the discussion around it (at this moment) is pointless. But posting these kinds of topics is just asking for trouble at the moment.

After the recent problems of Coding4Jesus and all of the other trolls, I believe we all need to be more responsible for our posting and avoid certain topics for the time being.

Let's see if civility can return to the coffeehouse and then let's jump back to talking about every topic under the sun.

I just don't want there to be any topics that bait the trolls into attacking the great community that is here on Channe9. I also don't like the idea of having niners start to argue, and get viscous with each other over conflicting views on politics/religion, - I'd hate to see a niner leave because they became ostracized by other niners.

 

Let’s just play it safe for the time being and avoid certain topics here in the coffeehouse, if we still feel the need to talk about them, I’ll be more than happy to start a private forum for us to talk about them.  

Charles wrote:

We are not going to close the Coffeehouse.

Please keep these discussions civil or threads will be deleted, Niners banned. That's just the way it is now. It's fine to talk about world events here. However, religious discussions must happen elsewhere. Period.

While this is the answer I was hoping to hear, I'm going to have a tough time with parts of this. I'll try to keep the "religious" aspect out of any discussion, but at some point in all of this the world events will probably end up bringing it up anyway, and people will be forced to deal with things on their own individual basis. I can hold quite a sophisticated discussion about Scripture, but unfortunately you are probably right that it wouldn't fly very well here (although I seriously think this is where it is needed the most). It would quite easy to show how the "gift of knowledge" could apply to people who are very studious and gifted in writing programs/studying large volumes of code/books. It would also be easy to start a thread about how technology will never solve what are essentially social/moral/spiritual issues no matter how much effort you throw at it. If you seriously think Windows code is complicated, try comparing it to how passages of Scripture interlock with one another over the centuries. By the same token, I could go on and on in a discussion about creating programming languages.

Hey Billh why don't you let other niner's e-mail you?

I looked on your profile but I'm not able to send you an e-mail. Hmmm....

Sorry billh, but I've been out of touch with news for over a week while I was on my honeymoon.  It may take a few days before I feel like I'm caught up enough to discuss anything properly.

Seriously, I don't know what's more boring to read... trolling/flaming in the Coffeehouse or discussions about the trolling/flaming in the Coffehouse.

Charles wrote:



We are not going to close the Coffeehouse.

Please keep these discussions civil or threads will be deleted, Niners banned. That's just the way it is now. It's fine to talk about world events here. However, religious discussions must happen elsewhere. Period.

C

Chazz you have to accept some of the responsibly for allowing the anti-Microsoft, anti-American 9’er’s to dominate the coffeehouse.

Admit that they have kept many good people away; we should be talking about the possibilities of technology, not what's wrong with the USA and Microsoft.

jaylittle wrote:

So what happens with religious discussion and world events coincide with one another Charles?  Given that many world events are in least in part happening due to a clash of religious dogma.....

I think what Chazz means is that we dont need the 'OMG teh Jesus doesnt exist j00 idiot' attitude that's been circulating around the site for a few weeks that then leads to the retaliation by people who are *really* religous which then turns the thread into a flame war.

jaylittle wrote:

You just had to get that one in, didn't you?  Sophisticated discussion indeed.

Considering all that I have seen over the past couple of years, my perspective has changed entirely on a lot of things. And no, I didn't get sucked into some cult either. Put it to you another way, if you would have seen the abundance of evidence I've seen, you would understand where I am coming from...but the situation is hardly unique to me.

What's interesting to note, too, is that the divisions within any given faith (basically, religion) often parallels what happens in the software development world. People argue over which programming language is best, and it is interesting to study the happenings behind that and how it compares. The problem is, once you bring up such a subject, at some point people inevitably end up no longer being objective and it turns into one big quagmire of a discussion...just like putting a room full of Baptists, Catholics, Lutherans, etc. together and asking them to discuss a passage...it may start out simple enough, but given time it turns into an argument. Given all that, I still find it fun to study in terms of how people behave with certain subjects. 

Zeo wrote:

Hey Billh why don't you let other niner's e-mail you?

I looked on your profile but I'm not able to send you an e-mail. Hmmm....

I don't even remember what I signed up with for my e-mail address. It is probably invalid now anyway (hint: don't use it) because I never really checked it after a certain point. Maybe I'll put another address up later (and then watch the spamfest begin I guess).

Zeo wrote:

Bill I wasn't saying that this topic or the discussion around it (at this moment) is pointless. But posting these kinds of topics is just asking for trouble at the moment.

When is that not the case?  I suppose we could all discuss the impacts of the Spanish American war on foreign trade, but it isn't very topical.  (And, it's horribly boring).

Zeo wrote:

After the recent problems of Coding4Jesus and all of the other trolls, I believe we all need to be more responsible for our posting and avoid certain topics for the time being.

And I disagree.  Being responsible for our posting is always the case, so there is no need to avoid certain topics just because a couple of idiots decided to throw kerosene on each other while playing with matches.

Zeo wrote:

Let's see if civility can return to the coffeehouse and then let's jump back to talking about every topic under the sun.

So how long should we wait?  Do you have a timetable?  Should we preapprove all topics through you?  Or charles?  I won't make the effort and neither will the other more opinionated folks.

As I recall, Zeo, you weren't very active in those inflamable threads but that was when your calls for civility could have done some good.  Now, unfortunately, it just sounds a lot like parenting.  I'm sure that isn't the idea, but that's how it comes across.

Zeo wrote:

I just don't want there to be any topics that bait the trolls into attacking the great community that is here on Channe9. I also don't like the idea of having niners start to argue, and get viscous with each other over conflicting views on politics/religion, - I'd hate to see a niner leave because they became ostracized by other niners.

Dude, it's a public forum and most threads have explicit titles (although the subject may change).  There is no 'thread monster' who grabs you and forces you to comment under pain of death.  This isn't kindergarten when everyone's opinion was not only heard, but appreciated.  If you say something stupid in a forum post, it's there permanently, so it is unreasonable to expect that the rest of us will ignore its stupidity simply because we should all play nice.

Zeo wrote:

Let’s just play it safe for the time being and avoid certain topics here in the coffeehouse, if we still feel the need to talk about them, I’ll be more than happy to start a private forum for us to talk about them.  

That is a nice offer, and maybe it will work. 

jaylittle wrote:

It's not your perspective I was taking issue with, rather I was taking issue with the fact that you seem to believe that the audience here is akin to the unwashed masses based on the part of your statement that I bolded.  You are free to maintain your own opinion proudly and I will do nothing but respect that, but at the same time I ask that you grant others the same courtesy.  The beauty of the world at large is that everybody isn't the same, you know?

Not a problem...I understand your viewpoint...but I hardly think the audience here is "the unwashed masses". No "audience" is ever like that, and typically, much like the state of the world, in any given online community you have a very diverse set of viewpoints involved. This is a good thing.