[ Poll ] Smoking

We've noticed over the past couple weeks that many of new threads have been popping up with Polls attached. Obviously the poll feature is a built in function of PHPBB, but we feel it's a bit overused. Usually the contents of the poll are not conducive to conversation (ie: What's Your Favorite Park In The 300 Mile Radius Of Fort Knox?) or a X vs Y scenario (Which Is Better El Toro or The Carousel At Knoebel's?). This is doubly bad when the only contents of the message is basically restating the thread title.

Basically, let's try to be a little bit more restrained with the use of the poll feature. If it's an interesting question with the promise of discussion and debate, go right ahead. If it's just a way to create a filler topic that clogs up the boards and knocks high content threads like Photo TR's down, don't do it. Threads we feel violate this will be locked accordingly.

Remember guys, summer is here! Let's fill up the forums with awesome Photo TR's and discussion of all the crazy new coasters that just came out. I'm sure our members would love to read that way more than [ Poll ] Dog Fart Coaster vs. Tatsu.

Sincerely And With Love To All,

The TPR ASSistants

You tricked me. I thought this thread was about Smoking in Parcs or something. Hah! I should learn to leat the little yellow text beneath topic titles.

Do you have something against the Dog Fart Coaster? Did Tatsu send you to do this?

Actually I agree, polls are lame because I'd rather hear the thought behind the vote and its far too easy to just vote and move on...

Wes, you are so punny. hehehehehe

Since I'm sure no one wants to be accused of posting a meaningless poll by shepp, everyone should be sure to read this thread!

Since I'm sure no one wants to be accused of posting a meaningless poll by shepp, everyone should be sure to read this thread!

Just won't let it go, will ya?

I love how cute you get when you're angry...all pouty and self-righteous...

Eh, I'm more in the vain of mindless fun is fun

I don't have a big issue with totally piontless thread or polls, why is the community here other than entertainment

but do what you want, or maybe post a poll seeing what others think you should do

Maybe we should have yes or no polls for whether or not certain polls should be closed.

As long as the polls have a smoking section...

Maybe we should have yes or no polls for whether or not certain polls should be closed.

I believe brilliance has just shone down upon the boards

^I don't know about that. I mean, shouldn't we vote on that?

But how will I find out which RCT game is really the best???

^ A cock fight.

^ Allright but no contact. I don't want to get pregnant...

...oh you meant...nevermind.

DFC > Tatsu

I'm responosible for this board.

Mark "Whats Your Favorite Park in Cedar Point?" Z.

One important question. Is the Dog Fart Coaster in anyone's top ten? I have yet to ride it, unless we are counting friends visiting a local Taco Bell before entering a park...hmmm

If so, then I now put BGE's A/C in my top 5 DFC.

This has been happening quite a bit again recently, so I figured I'd bump this for everyone to read.

^ Agreed. Personally I find most "What is your favorite/least favorite...." polls completely pointless and worthless.

Unless you are going to post a poll where you know that everyone who votes has a better than average chance of having participated in *ALL* of the selectable options, the data is really completely worthless.

For example, if you had a poll "Which Dragon do you like better, Fire or Ice?" Most people who have ridden Dragons would have ridden both so therefore that's a worthy poll. But "What is the best B&M Invert" is totally pointless because how many here have been on them all?

If you're going to post a poll, it should be focused on a question that the majority of people can answer and the end result is valid.

"How old are you?" for example is a good poll. Obviously EVERYONE can respond and the information is valid.

"What is your favorite Cedar Fair Park?" - totally pointless. Since statistically most people have been to Cedar Point, that would win. But that doesn't mean that Cedar Point is the best park!

Now if the question was "What Cedar Fair park have you visited the most?" that would be valid.

Anyway, that's kind of my rant on polls. Hope that at least helps.

--Robb

Awww, but I loved the dog fart coaster, it had it all over Tatsu.

Maybe there should be a new forum, "post your meaningless, pointless, or done a thousand times before topic here" and any crap topics in other forum's get transferred there, we in Australia would call it a "sin bin". As punishment for repeat offenders, they get access to the sin bin forum only, for a period of time. I think it's possible in phbb, have sin bin posts not count in a member's post count.

If it's just a way to create a filler topic that clogs up the boards and knocks high content threads like Photo TR's down, don't do it.

I don't know...I'm all for content and killing off pointless polls, but I don't know if photo TRs should be held up as the height of "good content." If anything I try to navigate around them for the most part because I'm a dial-up user and they take forever to load (and some of the photos NEVER load...usually the ones I want to see most, Murphy's Law and all). That, plus I'm a big advocate of literacy...sometimes a thousand words is better than a picture after all. May I humbly suggest either separating the photo TRs into another posting venue or limiting the number of photos that can be posted before the forum software flips to the next page (perhaps 10 photos per thread page, max)? That would help tremendously in my enjoyment of such postings. YMMV.

-Jason

If it's just a way to create a filler topic that clogs up the boards and knocks high content threads like Photo TR's down, don't do it.

 

I don't know...I'm all for content and killing off pointless polls, but I don't know if photo TRs should be held up as the height of "good content." If anything I try to navigate around them for the most part because I'm a dial-up user and they take forever to load (and some of the photos NEVER load...usually the ones I want to see most, Murphy's Law and all). That, plus I'm a big advocate of literacy...sometimes a thousand words is better than a picture after all. May I humbly suggest either separating the photo TRs into another posting venue or limiting the number of photos that can be posted before the forum software flips to the next page (perhaps 10 photos per thread page, max)? That would help tremendously in my enjoyment of such postings. YMMV.

 

-Jason

I hear you Jason, the trouble is, if you look at the statistics of this site you'll find the following data:

1. Photo TR's are far more well received than text-only TR's. Not that I don't appreciate a good text TR like you do, it's just the masses want pictures.

2. The majority of users here are on some sort of broad band or wi-fi.

3. We DO limit the amount of photos per post, however it's probably more than your dial up will support. I believe the setting right now is 30 photos max, and we prefer photos to be under 150k to help people who are on dial up.

4. We DO selectively move photo TR's to the Photo TR archive once they are a few months old so that if people want to go and browse the "best" of the Photo TR's, we put them in there.

You also gotta remember the history of TPR. I founded it on Photos and Videos, so that's really the site at it's heart so I think that having it try to be something else probably isn't going to happen.

We're not really a "news" site, although we do feature the big news stories, and we're not a "database." I figure there are other sites out there that do those things better, and we'll never match them, so why not focus on our niche, which is photos and videos, and now more recently the forums.

Hope that explains things! Not that I don't appreciate your comments, I totally, but I wanted you to know my view also.

--Robb

You also gotta remember the history of TPR. I founded it on Photos and Videos, so that's really the site at it's heart so I think that having it try to be something else probably isn't going to happen.

 

We're not really a "news" site, although we do feature the big news stories, and we're not a "database." I figure there are other sites out there that do those things better, and we'll never match them, so why not focus on our niche, which is photos and videos, and now more recently the forums.

 

Hope that explains things! Not that I don't appreciate your comments, I totally, but I wanted you to know my view also.

 

--Robb

Thanks for taking the time to post that. I hope that I wasn't perceived as being unconstructive in my comments and, given that you're paying the bills around here, you can run this forum anyway you want. I guess for those of us who are "old school" coaster enthusiasts, it's best to look at TPR as being akin to a magazine...read what you find appealing and skip the rest. But then, I suppose that's a microcosm for all of life, isn't it (especially these days)?

-Jason, thinking and typing WAY too much for someone who is less than 36 hours away from hitting the road for Coaster Con

I'd rather see lots of photos of a park than read like a 4 page dissertation on how so-and-so met up with CedarPointfan19632421x$4 at Cedar Point and how long they waited for each ride and how sitting in the back row of the 4th car of the blue train of Millennium Force seemed more rattley at 4pm than their ride in the front row of the 2nd car of the red train at 11:15am, where they ate, how much it cost them, that they think they saw MeanStreakManiac4720 playing DDR over by Magnum but they weren't sure because he didn't say he was going to be there because he was supposed to be grounded, how it looked like rain and the weathermen were reporting a 40% chance of afternoon thunderstorms and blah blah blah. And I really think it would be a terrible idea to limit photos to 10 per page, this isn't Negative G for crying out loud. I'm sure lots of people don't want to click thru 12 pages of photos to see a whole trip report when it can all be summed up in 1 page. If anything, maybe the dialup users should either bravely venture into the 21st century, or use the mobile version of TPR.

Aww man and I was looking forward to the Dog Fart Coaster VS Tatsu debate too. Anyway I do agree about the pointless polls I too could care less what the best Coaster at Cedar Lake Island is.

That's true! There is always this option for dial up users:

http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/mobile/

--Robb