Match Threads - what is it you want?

[Spurslove]

Just don’t have a match thread.
Have a pre match and a post match thread, but shut it down for the 90 minutes

Ladies & gentlemen, I think we have a winner! ?‍

 

[davidmatzdorf]

Sorry to say it but just Yankspur leaving has made a difference.

Did he jump or was he pushed?

I had only noticed him by his absence - I didn't see what led him to depart.

 

[arunspurs]

I rarely view or post in match thread. Its pretty much useless as most are just post in a watch along. You cant go back & read them - context is different post game.

Lock the match thread at kick off. And unlock at Post-Game, thats IMO best way to make use of it.

 

[Bulletspur]

I agree with both @Trotter and @arunspurs as those were my thoughts

 

[Johnny J]

It wouldn't be the whole solution (no single measure would), but my feedback would be to remove the rating system from match threads (and, to be honest, the site).

I don't have objective proof, but my anecdotal experience of posting on many other forums (gaming, current affairs, science and philosophy boards and so on) is this:

When you have ratings, people often engage with the rating, rather than the post. Understandably so: ratings are a quick way of reacting emotivey, or a way to (badly) instantly evaluate a post without actually engaging with the post itself.

It's rare to see a post with a lot of agrees AND disagrees; most of the time it's a rating snowball one way or the other.

This is a bit odd: sure, lots of people might find a post funny, so they naturally get a lot of funny ratings.

But if you're having a discussion about subjective things, you'd expect more of a mix.

On discussion boards I frequent that don't have ratings, my perception is that posters tend to engage more with the discussion. The arguments (in the reasoning sense), the issues, the opinions. There's no instant gratification of ratings and so people tend not to post useless driveby crap, which improves the quality baseline of the discussion.

And when you combine that elevated baseline for discussion with good modding - which we already have on SC, of course, it engenders what I call a better "discussion culture", and in time becomes mostly self-policing, with mods picking up the outliers.

Sorry for the long post. I've done a lot of work changing the "content culture" at various businesses I've worked in. And I think viewing this issue as a cultural one could be profitable and lead to the change almost everyone here wants to see - again, apart from outliers.

Being a football fan is intrinsically emotional. But people are also very passionate about politics, religion, philosophy and all sorts of other things. And if it's possible to have a good discussion culture about those things, it must surely be possible in a football match thread, or player thread etc.

None of the above is a criticism of the way things are done at present. Just my thoughts on how ratings might not be helping.

 

[ajspurs]

No I have to admit I like the match thread at times. Commenting with others throughout can help me ease nerves and such when watching sometimes and I like knowing what others are thinking through certain periods of a match.

I use it light-heartedly and maybe miss some of the negativity as a result but from my own experience I've never had a bad occurrence when commenting throughout the game. The worst for me is actually pre-match when the teams are announced and the slating of some of the players begins before a ball is even kicked.

Maybe just have a pre and post thread that is of course only open before and after the match as well as a during thread for those who may still want to engage with others whilst the match is on? Or for the match thread to act as a pre/during one and then have a post match thread. That way those who don't like it don't have to use it and then after a game don't have to read through pages of what they may consider rubbish.

 

[Bluto Blutarsky]

For me, when I am in the game thread, its how I imagine it would be while watching the game at a pub. Its as much a social experience as it is a legitimate critique of the game/players. Its a real-time (mostly) reaction, good and bad.

I could do without the extreme negative posts about players (or other posters) - but for the most part, it just sort of follows the flow of the game.

People are people. They react to things like line-ups, or missed passes, or good passes/tackles etc. When Spurs play well, the thread reads well. When Spurs play poorly, it shows up in the thread.

I do like to see how other people are reading the game - I don't always agree, but that is life.


(Also, I really do enjoy the thread when the game is not on TV, and people are commenting based on various dodgy "rivers" - and you can tell which "rivers" are a couple of minutes behind...its fun to guess if a comment relates to something that just happened, or 5 minutes ago, or maybe my legal "river" is behind and it relates to something about to happen...)

It would be sad to lose the experience. Everything moves so quickly in the thread, its easy to leave posts behind if they really bother you. (And, as a side note, nothing that is said in the thread impacts the game, good or bad!)

 

[Romulus]

keep the match threads open for goodness sake.

the majority of people enjoy coming here and experiencing the game together as it happens. lets not get soft bellied, moaning will always happen before, during or after a game depending on how things are going. closing a match thread won't stop that.

 

[JCRD]

what I find strange is that when I’m watching a match, the comments in the match thread rarely correlate with what I’m seeing on the pitch.

It’s massively sensationalised, exaggerated, hyperbolic and overly emotive.

like, if I don’t post “arrgghh! FFS ROYAL!! You’re fucking shit!!” at every loose pass

It doesn’t mean I’m not a proper fan

I think some overvalue their opinions and think we want to read them ad nauseam.

Yeah im guilty of that and particularly Emerson - but he is so shit at crossing and passing. Like royally shit man. So so bad.

I think people take the match threads way too seriously. Why not see it for what it is - a place where spurs fans are watching the game and they can communicate their happiness, frustrations, joy, angst, shitbrickitness. celebrations and their excitement etc.

I mean this isnt work, we arent in a work place where things have to be so sanitised.

My view, to cater to all is to have the serious thread and a more erm anything goes kinda thread. Not sure how much space that takes on things like the database etc but that is a solution. You can have you rules and more considered type posts in the serious one and the mess in the anything goes.

 

[McFlash]

It's doing fine as is and has been a lot less angry of late, probably for a few reasons.

As for people saying to bin off the match thread, bloody hell, it's easy enough to just not go in there if you're that bothered by it.

Yeah, some folk get carried away and some folk chat shit but it's football and no fan site should be without a match thread.
It's easy enough to avoid, or scroll past but there's absolutely no reason to suggest sacking it. It's part of the fun.

 

[Ickle73]

I'm waiting for us to move with the times. Set-up the match thread as a Teams meeting. It would be hilarious, 300 peeps shouting at whoever misplaced a pass last.

We would ascend to a higher plane of kneejerkishness

 

[kthwlsn]

I'm in the "if you're not interested in a thread, don't click on it" camp. This is also why I hate the "lock the thread" posts in player threads. And the "don't do it to to yourself" brigade. If I want to do it to myself I will. I'll do it to myself all night long if I want to.

But back on topic, I have one person on ignore which helps the match threads for me. And if/when they reach the point that I don't want to read all the negativity and toxicity, I leave.

 

[Jgplk1]

It wouldn't be the whole solution (no single measure would), but my feedback would be to remove the rating system from match threads (and, to be honest, the site).

I don't have objective proof, but my anecdotal experience of posting on many other forums (gaming, current affairs, science and philosophy boards and so on) is this:

When you have ratings, people often engage with the rating, rather than the post. Understandably so: ratings are a quick way of reacting emotivey, or a way to (badly) instantly evaluate a post without actually engaging with the post itself.

It's rare to see a post with a lot of agrees AND disagrees; most of the time it's a rating snowball one way or the other.

This is a bit odd: sure, lots of people might find a post funny, so they naturally get a lot of funny ratings.

But if you're having a discussion about subjective things, you'd expect more of a mix.

On discussion boards I frequent that don't have ratings, my perception is that posters tend to engage more with the discussion. The arguments (in the reasoning sense), the issues, the opinions. There's no instant gratification of ratings and so people tend not to post useless driveby crap, which improves the quality baseline of the discussion.

And when you combine that elevated baseline for discussion with good modding - which we already have on SC, of course, it engenders what I call a better "discussion culture", and in time becomes mostly self-policing, with mods picking up the outliers.

Sorry for the long post. I've done a lot of work changing the "content culture" at various businesses I've worked in. And I think viewing this issue as a cultural one could be profitable and lead to the change almost everyone here wants to see - again, apart from outliers.

Being a football fan is intrinsically emotional. But people are also very passionate about politics, religion, philosophy and all sorts of other things. And if it's possible to have a good discussion culture about those things, it must surely be possible in a football match thread, or player thread etc.

None of the above is a criticism of the way things are done at present. Just my thoughts on how ratings might not be helping.

I think the ratings are great. Some people don't have time to write replies to every post and the ratings are a quick and easy way to show if you agree, disagree etc.

Also, if you've been off the site for a few days and come into a thread that's had 30 pages added to it, the ratings are an excellent way to help skim through all the posts. They save me a LOT of time, as I'll often skip posts with no ratings, or look out specifically for the informative rating.

I definitely think the match threads should be kept open. I don't post in them, but for fans who can't get to the game or watch on TV, it's a much better way to see what's happening than the BBC live text thing. Also if the match threads closed during the games, people would still moan, it would just spill over into other threads. At least now, if you don't want to read all the complaining etc. you can just avoid the one thread.

@spurs mental's idea of a few posters commentating on the game is a good idea, but would need people to commit to it.

 

[DFF]

Sorry to say it but just Yankspur leaving has made a difference.

I don't venture in there that much but it seems to be a better atmosphere now. Could be the better results but hopefully not.

You leaving will make infinitely more difference to the entire site, you spamming ****. ?

 

[Spurslove]

Sorry to say it but just Yankspur leaving has made a difference.

I don't venture in there that much but it seems to be a better atmosphere now. Could be the better results but hopefully not.

I'm intrigued about the poster who has apparently left the forum. I don't go into match threads purely because I'm too busy watching and concentrating on the matches to post anything, but from the tone of your post, it sounds like he or she had a negative effect on match threads for you?

 

[spurs mental]

he or she had a negative effect on match threads for you?

Every thread.

 

[dontcallme]

I'm intrigued about the poster who has apparently left the forum. I don't go into match threads purely because I'm too busy watching and concentrating on the matches to post anything, but from the tone of your post, it sounds like he or she had a negative effect on match threads for you?

I don’t mean it in a nasty way at all. He was very over the top and incredibly negative.

For me, posters like him set a bad tone in the match thread.

 

[FITZ]

On ratings - there’s too many. Simplify.

Copy what most of what Social media does. Even bbc just has thumbs up and thumbs down.

 

[mightyspur]

I don’t mean it in a nasty way at all. He was very over the top and incredibly negative.

For me, posters like him set a bad tone in the match thread.

Hank was comedy gold! I miss him

If im conte, im throwing him in an octogon with Dier to work on his aggression. He’s so timid.

Eat shit craig pawson. They are getting away with everything you dick

The post just cost me $1k. Everything is pain

Just liquidate this club. Fuck you ENIC.

 

[mr ashley]

Personally I think the match threads have improved to a maximum point.
since the issue was addressed it feels like less people make indulgent, over emotional and negative comments (I include myself in that). And that’s made a massive difference to the threads. I can’t see the point of locking them as the serve a purpose and tbh I don’t think they’ll get much better than this either. People are regulating themselves and those who can’t stand out like a sore thumb (making themselves look silly). But that’s not limited to a match thread

Regarding ratings, again no reason to get rid. They are useful to gauge reaction to your opinion, and whilst some still can’t understand why someone disagrees with their opinion (and want to call people out for it) again that’s a minority.