Suggestions

[Garamonde]

Spoiler

Oh I wasn't 100% crazy about changing the name, I'm just voicing the concerns of a few other people who felt that the name didn't fit with the other casual titles like "Help me!" and "Welcome/Goodbye!"

I'd rather have a serious discussion forum so I'll just touch on those things instead, and do the really annoying "pick your post apart" thing

If you only want serious posts in a thread, people will know to put something like [SERIOUS] in the thread name.

Whoa, seriously? I can't believe I didn't know that!
Where in the GD forum rules did it state that?

Serious discussions should be possible within the General Discussion board. There's no need for a board dedicated to people asking things that will just end up causing arguments and fights in yet another board.

They theoretically possibly might be able to be done (technically!) within the General Discussion board given the forum's structure and more sensible forum culture. Unfortunately, with the new relaxed rules in GD as well as GD historically being more of a casual area to talk about hobbies, it's difficult to talk about actual world issues while maintaining an intelligent perspective. It's happened sometimes, with Koopaul's new Male Gaze thread and Sengir's Real Life post regarding transgenderism in the modern world.

Creating an actual subforum

• automatically sets a serious tone for the posters and posts
  
• this reassures posters that their topics won't particular be shitposted in (and we all hate shitposting, right? that's why there's no lounge)
  

A Serious Discussion subforum,

• allows for intelligent discussion, not arguments and fights (if you're getting mad over an actual debate that's pretty stupid, sorry).
  
• and all this serious discussion actually creates a stronger bond between the community
  
• it also ensures that the community is a little more knowledgeable on world issues (we can probably tell you that Israel and Palestine don't like each other, but no one here could tell you why. And probably 1 in 4 of us don't even know or care about it - and that's an issue)
  
• Users will be able to empathize better with one another on personal issues as well, (THIS is actually a big one - particularly on LGBT issues in 2014) and really allow some posters to shine
  
• Discourages groupthink within the community
  

With a subforum though, you could assign a moderator specifically to ensure that things don't get out of hand, and if they do, exercise a zero-tolerance policy. Currently if we did that in GD, you'd end up having additional responsibilities as administrators (and moderators, too) to ensure serious topics go smoothly.

I actually think that would not be a bad idea

I mean I really don't think everything should be all crammed up in one forum

you'd have like the "New Unfunny Buttcheeks Images Thread" right above the "That mass-murder that happened in X place" thread or something which obviously would not be appropriate at all

can we at least consider it?

[Key0808]

Is there any option to make the width of the page smaller? In big posts the lines warp all across the 1080 pixel gloriousness that is the width of full HD monitors and I find it quite uncomfortable to read.

[Vipershark]

They theoretically possibly might be able to be done (technically!) within the General Discussion board given the forum's structure and more sensible forum culture. Unfortunately, with the new relaxed rules in GD as well as GD historically being more of a casual area to talk about hobbies, it's difficult to talk about actual world issues while maintaining an intelligent perspective. It's happened sometimes, with Koopaul's new Male Gaze thread and Sengir's Real Life post regarding transgenderism in the modern world.

Creating an actual subforum

• automatically sets a serious tone for the posters and posts
  
• this reassures posters that their topics won't particular be shitposted in (and we all hate shitposting, right? that's why there's no lounge)
  

A Serious Discussion subforum,

• allows for intelligent discussion, not arguments and fights (if you're getting mad over an actual debate that's pretty stupid, sorry).
  
• and all this serious discussion actually creates a stronger bond between the community
  
• it also ensures that the community is a little more knowledgeable on world issues (we can probably tell you that Israel and Palestine don't like each other, but no one here could tell you why. And probably 1 in 4 of us don't even know or care about it - and that's an issue)
  
• Users will be able to empathize better with one another on personal issues as well, (THIS is actually a big one - particularly on LGBT issues in 2014) and really allow some posters to shine
  
• Discourages groupthink within the community
  

With a subforum though, you could assign a moderator specifically to ensure that things don't get out of hand, and if they do, exercise a zero-tolerance policy. Currently if we did that in GD, you'd end up having additional responsibilities as administrators (and moderators, too) to ensure serious topics go smoothly.

I kind of feel like I'm stepping out of line by replying to this, but since I'm an administrator now I figure I should put in my two cents and leave the final decision to Dazz and/or Petie.

That being said, I'm pretty strongly against a "Serious Discussion" forum.

Those sorts of posts can go elsewhere as already talked about (the number of topics that realistically would be in there is pretty low so there's no need for a dedicated subforum) and General Discussion or Real Life are already good enough candidates for them. If it's a current event or news story (Israel vs. Palestine or a mass shooting or something as Jetters said) then it can go in GD, while discussion on *isms and such can go in RL since they're much more personal topics.
Considering that they're completely different topics which are relegated to their own threads, I don't see the issue of having both the funny images topic and a serious discussion thread next to each other. That's the point of General Discussion; there's not just one particular thing that goes there. Those topics won't be overlapping anyway so it won't be an issue.
As far as your concerns of shitposting go, the report button is still under every post as it has always been. If someone shitposts, report them and they'll be dealt with accordingly.

Regardless, I'm pretty uncomfortable with creating an entire subforum specifically for hot-button topics. While I believe these sorts of discussions should happen, I don't believe that VGR is the place that they should happen in. You know that saying about how you should never talk about religion and politics and stuff in public? ...That's basically exactly what you're asking for.

As far as your point about groupthink, in my experience I've... actually seen the complete opposite thing happen. I've used quite a few forums over the years, ones both with and without these types of discussion areas, and I've seen many friendships end and needless bickering happen over these sorts of things.

One forum in particular that I go to (it's a popular videogame forum, some of you may know the one I'm talking about) basically allows a free-for-all on these sorts of threads which are commonly referred to as "minefield threads" because they result in pages upon pages of banned members. As a result, the forum (including the staff) skews heavily, heavily liberal, and whenever these sorts of threads pop up (particularly in the case of *isms), anyone that brings up any sort of viewpoint that doesn't align perfectly with the "correct" viewpoint is pretty much immediately shut out if not banned for what they say and I'm not okay with that.
That's not to say that what they said was right or that I even agree with their viewpoints, but shutting out people that disagree with the common viewpoint is... kind of the exact opposite of what should happen. It's to the point where people are actually afraid to post in those threads or avoid them altogether out of fear of being shunned or banned, and a thread of people repeating the same thing over and over and just preaching to the choir is, well, groupthink. A hivemind mentality is still a hivemind mentality, even if you agree with what it says.

Frankly, I'm not convinced that the community would even handle it well at this point. Judging by past evidence and what normally results out of these kinds of threads, I think a specific section for these kinds of things to gravitate to would just create a lot of needless tension in the air and that's not something that I want to happen. I won't endorse something that will cause members to feel uncomfortable with posting here.

Just as there is a time and a place for jokes, there is also a time and a place for serious/political discussion and I don't believe that this is the time nor is VGR the place.

[Kosheh]

...those are some pretty good points. :V

and sorry if I'm quoting you out of context here but

I kind of feel like I'm stepping out of line by replying to this, but since I'm an administrator now I figure I should put in my two cents and leave the final decision to Dazz and/or Petie.

You're an administrator. How is replying to a user's post about a desired feature stepping out of line lol?
Like if you went and called a member is an actual shitlord for 3 paragraphs - yes that'd be out of line, but providing a good, thought-out response to a good, thought-out suggestion isn't a bad thing by any means (In fact, I appreciate it as a member to get a response approximately as long as my original post because that means someone's took the time to read through that post to come up with a substantial response)

Nonetheless, if that's 2 out of 3 admins who aren't for it it's probably not gonna happen (plus i'd say that wall of text would sway petie too) wwwwwwWELP

[Vipershark]

Well, I mean
Dazz owns the site and Petie owns the server
I might be an admin but I'm still kinda outranked there ahahahah

[Omega]

I'm on my phone so I can't quote but uh
Is that a serious question?

If so, please read the stickied thread by me in GD.

I forgot about it ok

[Shade]

So, do threads need to be completely deleted when they go against the rules or whatever. Like the "impression of the above users avatar" thread? Can't it just be locked and a mod or admin post why? Just so other people don't do the create a similar thread.

And if op deleted the thread, never mind this

[Vipershark]

Nobody deleted it.
It's right here.

[Iceman404]

http://www.vg-resource.com/thread-13868.html

Move this back to the custom sprites section.

[puggsoy]

Is it possible to allow us to resize inserted attachments? Similar to the "width" and "height" attributes in the [img] tag.
Can it also somehow be made to let attachments be used in the "img" attribute for [tsrgame]/[tsricon]/etc tags?

I understand if these things aren't possible and that's fine, but it would be cool because attachments are way more convenient than hosting images elsewhere.

[Dazz]

Puggsoy, I've activated instant approval on your account. I'm surprised I hadn't done it earlier. Now you shouldn't have anything to worry about! You can just upload straight to the site now

[puggsoy]

I'm not sure you understood me correctly, I already had instant approval for submissions. I just meant for attachments in general, images for the creativity forums or whatnot. The reason I mentioned putting attachments the [tsrgame]/[tsricon] tags is if I (or someone else) wanted to use them for an example or something. For instance I would have liked to use them in this post to show how the icons would look on the site.

[Dazz]

Ah! I see. I'll have a test.

edit: So it seems the only method of doing so is to use the full image path instead of the attachment code supplied. This would be:

Code:

http://www.vg-resource.com/attachment.php?aid=####

With the #### being the attachment ID number.

I hope this helps. Besides creating a whole new set of bbcode for this reason alone, there isn't much we can do.

In terms of allowing image sizes and such on attachments, that's also some deep code we'd have to modify, and it doesn't seem worthy of researching until MyBB's updated system comes out in a few months.

[Petie]

Actually, we might be able to force image sizes with a little CSS trickery on a custom BB tag. I'll look into it.

[puggsoy]

edit: So it seems the only method of doing so is to use the full image path instead of the attachment code supplied. This would be:

Code:

http://www.vg-resource.com/attachment.php?aid=####

With the #### being the attachment ID number.

I actually tried that, but unfortunately it doesn't seem to work either.

If it's difficult to do that's fine, I was just wondering if it's something that you could. If it's necessary to do this stuff then hosting images for these things isn't a big issue, it's what I did before attachments were re-encouraged. If what Petie says works though, that would be handy.