What Other Sci-Fi Boards Do You Visit ?

[Neroon]

For what it's worth, and to limit the confusion and targets, I am the one who moved the thread. And for the reason PsychoPere cited. (you're compensation will arrive soon, in the form of a red-headed telepath with a great pair of eyes).

As to the actual topic of discussion, I honestly don't visit any other sci-fi board. Mostly, that's because I dont' want to spend even more time online than I already do. Secondarily, this board is pretty diverse and informative. If it lacks information I am seeking, there is nearly always someone who knows where else to look.

 

[Hermiod]

^Thank you for your comments.

The point is, I would like somewhere where there's a good amount of positive discussions. I kind of get the feeling that too many people on here are watching the shows they watch they're being blackmailed or something and not because they want to. As you say, why should you talk about a show that stinks ? If I think a show is that bad I don't discuss it. I've gone over this before but that's why you won't see me posting much in the Doctor Who forum. Having seen a thread in there with a title along the lines of "Hermiod thinks Doctor Who is Rubbish" (I can't remember exactly what the title was, but believe me it did happen - it's true, I do think it's rubbish but apparently some people can't handle that), I can't see why I would want to post in there either.

I think we can rule TWoP out, as I've said I don't find them at all positive or friendly and I think Temis can back me up on that.

As I've said elsewhere, I'm in the process of forgetting about scripted TV for good. As shows end, I'm not replacing them. It'd be nice to just have a quiet, calm place where fans can actually talk about the important things - i.e. the story they're seeing on the screen and not things that don't matter like ratings, what the cast looks like etc. That place is not this place.

 

[Hermiod]

For what it's worth, and to limit the confusion and targets, I am the one who moved the thread. And for the reason PsychoPere cited.

Fair enough. Thank you for correcting my suspicions.

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

Most boards I've visited cover more or less the same topics we have here. I don't know that you'll find one that will exclude things like ratings, the look of the cast, etc. Not unless the moderators actively police those sorts of topics, but then you have a place that's just as heavy-handed as TWoP, but just in a different way.

I suggest starting a LiveJournal group or something along those lines. You can set the tone of it from the beginning, saying what will and won't be discussed.

Good luck!

 

[Hermiod]

I may as well start my own forum if I need to go off and recruit members for myself, I was looking for somewhere already established.

Oh well, looks like you're stuck with me for now. The topic is still open, it's still interesting to know what other places people go to.

 

[doubleohfive]

I may as well start my own forum if I need to go off and recruit members for myself, I was looking for somewhere already established.

So leave. Good luck to you!

Oh well, looks like you're stuck with me for now.

What are you, TrekBBS' bitchy ex-wife or something? MAKE UP YOUR MIND!

The topic is still open, it's still interesting to know what other places people go to.

That is debateable.

 

[Hermiod]

^I already said there's nowhere else to go, why is that so hard to understand ?

Given that others have answered the question I guess it must have been interesting enough to them or they would not have replied.

 

[cardinal biggles]

No, it's not that there's no other message boards, it's that you didn't like any of them. People suggested lots of places, and you near instantaneously shot them all down. I guess in some backhanded way we should be proud of TrekBBS' status as the lesser of all evils, the most tolerable messageboard on the Web.

If you really have 337 gigs of disk space and 6.7 terabytes of bandwidth, be man enough to use it. Go start your own board and show you can do it better instead of being a whinger and "settling" for the day-old mac and cheese that this place obviously represents. If not, then quit your kvetching, because it's not winning friends, nor is it influencing people (at least not in a positive way).

I was having a fun conversation with Temis and a few posts later it's back to a free-for-all and there's no reason for it. Why can't things just be left alone ?

That's the Internets for you. If you want a conversation with Temis that won't get rudely interrupted, I suggest some sort of Instant Messenger. This is an open forum, not a private chatroom.

I'm looking for alternatives to TrekBBS. With a couple of exceptions the Star Trek part of this board is okay, the DS9 mods run a tight ship (or station) especially, since it's gradually narrowed down to people who actually like Star Trek (except for Star Trek XI) but the Gen Sci-Fi part of the board isn't to my taste any more.

I think I'll stay clear of any Ghostbusters fans for now. I've had my fill of them for one lifetime.

Right now I do have to wonder if whoever moved this would have done so so silently if somebody else started the thread. Given who two of Gen Sci-Fi's mods are, I doubt it.

Snide digs at the staff following your recent QSF/MA fiasco will get you nowhere.


Disclaimer: I don't moderate this forum, so what I said as an private, individual member of the TrekBBS should not be regarded as either representative of what the board's senior management thinks, nor is it a "moderator action" to be complained about in the Moderator Actions forum.

 

[PsychoPere]

Disclaimer: I don't moderate this forum, so what I said as an private, individual member of the TrekBBS should not be regarded as either representative of what the board's senior management thinks, nor is it a "moderator action" to be complained about in the Moderator Actions forum.

Or the Questions, Suggestions, & Feedback forum, for that matter.

 

[Galactus]

I don't think it's the comic books as much as the movies that are coming out regarding comic books. I mean in the last several years, it's like every movie that is even in the scifi genre has been comic book based, and the discussions have lead to something like "They finally got the Joker right and Jack Nicholson's Joker is an abomination to all things the comic tried to produce" or something like that. I only state the whole Joker thing as an example, but it seems like a movie has to be related to a comic to the letter and anything less would really suck. I guess not reading the comics, I find the differences in the two interpretations satisfying, in that one may be more accurate than the other, but both are still really good interpretations from the minds of two very good directors. Also, I hope in the future, we get some scifi movies that take us back to the days of Total Recall or the Abyss. I think we're getting that with XFiles 2 (Which I wish got more buzz), Mummy 3, and Terminator Salvation, but they are too few and far between.

Couple of points. First point, why bother making a movie based on a book or comic book using the title and characters, if you are not going to actually follow the material? You might as well just create your own movie and your own characters and never reference anything else. The reason they do it is because it has a built in audience and most of time built in marketing.

The next point is why do you think a super-hero movie is any less sci fi than any other sci fi movie. I don't even understand why they separate them these days.

 

[Hermiod]

No, it's not that there's no other message boards, it's that you didn't like any of them. People suggested lots of places, and you near instantaneously shot them all down. I guess in some backhanded way we should be proud of TrekBBS' status as the lesser of all evils, the most tolerable messageboard on the Web.

Largely because I'd already considered them. The topic is still valid, other people have suggested boards about all sorts of Sci-Fi related topics. Aside from anything else it gives insight in to their interests.

If you really have 337 gigs of disk space and 6.7 terabytes of bandwidth, be man enough to use it. Go start your own board and show you can do it better instead of being a whinger and "settling" for the day-old mac and cheese that this place obviously represents. If not, then quit your kvetching, because it's not winning friends, nor is it influencing people (at least not in a positive way).

I bought a hosting package a couple of years ago. The space and transfer has grown quite astonishingly since but it's sitting around unused. I don't pretend that running a high volume board is easy which is why I preceded it with "if I could be arsed". I appreciate that British speech is not easily understandable to Americans all the time so I will clarify - that means I do not wish to make the effort.

That's the Internets for you. If you want a conversation with Temis that won't get rudely interrupted, I suggest some sort of Instant Messenger. This is an open forum, not a private chatroom.

I never said it was.

Snide digs at the staff following your recent QSF/MA fiasco will get you nowhere.

It was a snide dig at me that started it, remember ? If members of the board's staff are also able to post as regular posters then they should take the rough with the smooth just as I am expected to.

 

[PlainSimpleJoel]

As others have stated it was moved here ... just like other threads about other boards have been moved here over the last few years.

 

[Hermiod]

^Neroon already cleared that up, thanks.

 

[cardinal biggles]

If you really have 337 gigs of disk space and 6.7 terabytes of bandwidth, be man enough to use it. Go start your own board and show you can do it better instead of being a whinger and "settling" for the day-old mac and cheese that this place obviously represents. If not, then quit your kvetching, because it's not winning friends, nor is it influencing people (at least not in a positive way).

I bought a hosting package a couple of years ago. The space and transfer has grown quite astonishingly since but it's sitting around unused. I don't pretend that running a high volume board is easy which is why I preceded it with "if I could be arsed". I appreciate that British speech is not easily understandable to Americans all the time so I will clarify - that means I do not wish to make the effort.

I know what the phrase "if I could be arsed" means. And here we have yet another sly dig... the dumb American who can't understand all your witty Britishisms.

Since you apparently can't be arsed to go do it on your own, I would suggest that you start contributing to the board in such a manner that it nudges whichever forum you think is lacking in a better direction. But since you seem to view your continued presence here as us being "stuck with you," I'm guessing you can't be arsed to do that either.

Snide digs at the staff following your recent QSF/MA fiasco will get you nowhere.

It was a snide dig at me that started it, remember ? If members of the board's staff are also able to post as regular posters then they should take the rough with the smooth just as I am expected to.

Where did I say we couldn't take it? I was simply pointing out that your thinly veiled passive-aggressive insults will curry no favor.

 

[Hermiod]

I know what the phrase "if I could be arsed" means. And here we have yet another sly dig... the dumb American who can't understand all your witty Britishisms.

You just did the exact same thing Worf412 did, you took my uncertainty about the differences between British and American culture as some sort of anti-American attack. We may speak the same language (sort of) but differences have evolved between us. I sometimes don't know what American colloquialisms mean and sometimes Americans don't know what the British ones I use mean.

Is it not better to make sure we're both on common ground rather than assume that we are ?

Since you apparently can't be arsed to go do it on your own, I would suggest that you start contributing to the board in such a manner that it nudges whichever forum you think is lacking in a better direction. But since you seem to view your continued presence here as us being "stuck with you," I'm guessing you can't be arsed to do that either.

You guess wrong. I said I wanted more discussion of comics, for instance, so I have started lots of comics related threads. These threads have usually died within hours. If I can't generate discussion of Secret Invasion, arguably the most important Marvel Comics event ever, then what else can I do ?

I've participated in four different threads on the Stargate forum today without mentioning ratings, 'shipping or what the cast looks like once.

There is only so much that I as an individual poster with only the access that brings can do to influence the direction of this board.

Where did I say we couldn't take it? I was simply pointing out that your thinly veiled passive-aggressive insults will curry no favor.

I'm not interested in currying favour with moderators. The ones who treat me with respect (like Neroon or SPOCKED or RJ) will get it in return. The ones who don't will not. The same applies to anyone, moderator, admin or just a poster and I expect the same will be applied to me by others.

I do not believe I have ever directed a deliberate insult at anyone on this board. I may criticise the behaviour of others, as they do me, but that is not the same thing.

That may very well be another British/American difference - when we choose to insult people we make sure they know they have been insulted. I have not chosen to insult anyone.

If, on the other hand, someone feels insulted by something I've said they could just tell me so and I'll most likely apologise and clarify my remarks.

 

[cardinal biggles]

You guess wrong. I said I wanted more discussion of comics, for instance, so I have started lots of comics related threads. These threads have usually died within hours. If I can't generate discussion of Secret Invasion, arguably the most important Marvel Comics event ever, then what else can I do ?

I've participated in four different threads on the Stargate forum today without mentioning ratings, 'shipping or what the cast looks like once.

There is only so much that I as an individual poster with only the access that brings can do to influence the direction of this board.

I don't know what else to tell you to do, then. Threads die because nobody else is interested in the topic. You can't force people to discuss things they aren't interested in. And even if we had a devoted Comics subforum, it would probably still be dominated by the current and upcoming comic book movies, and their related titles.

So it sounds like you're totally fucked. The comic threads you want to see die quickly, you don't like any of the other forums out there for various reasons, and you can't be arsed to start your own forum. I don't know what advice to give you.

 

[Hermiod]

I don't know what else to tell you to do, then. Threads die because nobody else is interested in the topic. You can't force people to discuss things they aren't interested in. And even if we had a devoted Comics subforum, it would probably still be dominated by the current and upcoming comic book movies, and their related titles.

So it sounds like you're totally fucked. The comic threads you want to see die quickly, you don't like any of the other forums out there for various reasons, and you can't be arsed to start your own forum. I don't know what advice to give you.

Well thank you for trying.

 

[Lord Garth]

Just this board, I've been a regular for nine years, even though I've been around much less this year than during the first eight.

It's the only board that managed to stick for me because the others were either too narrow in their focus, undermoderated, or overmoderated. Not that this board doesn't have issues, for most of its history it took itself too seriously and I was part of that problem but, at the end of the day, I'm here for the topics.

 

[tomalak301]

I don't think it's the comic books as much as the movies that are coming out regarding comic books. I mean in the last several years, it's like every movie that is even in the scifi genre has been comic book based, and the discussions have lead to something like "They finally got the Joker right and Jack Nicholson's Joker is an abomination to all things the comic tried to produce" or something like that. I only state the whole Joker thing as an example, but it seems like a movie has to be related to a comic to the letter and anything less would really suck. I guess not reading the comics, I find the differences in the two interpretations satisfying, in that one may be more accurate than the other, but both are still really good interpretations from the minds of two very good directors. Also, I hope in the future, we get some scifi movies that take us back to the days of Total Recall or the Abyss. I think we're getting that with XFiles 2 (Which I wish got more buzz), Mummy 3, and Terminator Salvation, but they are too few and far between.

Couple of points. First point, why bother making a movie based on a book or comic book using the title and characters, if you are not going to actually follow the material? You might as well just create your own movie and your own characters and never reference anything else. The reason they do it is because it has a built in audience and most of time built in marketing.

Most movies are based on books and they do try to follow the material. But they can also take some liberties to make it more entertaining for the movie going audience. One of my biggest problems with the Lord of the Rings movies (Yes I know, I'm probably the only one here who found them incredibly overrated) was that they followed too closely to the book and they were boring. Also, my problem isn't movies that follow the book. My problem is more of an oversatuation of this kind of scifi film (Addressing your second point). Why can't there be any other scifi ideas anymore that are the likes of Alien or Total Recall or Terminator. I mean we're in a time when it seems like the entire Marvel or DC catalog has to be used before we even dream of getting a non-comic book scifi movie anytime soon. Super Hero films are fantasy/scifi, but they are oversaturating the market making me miss the "scifi" film and making me disinterested in what is coming out like Incredible Hulk or Watchmen.

 

[Timewalker]

Television Without Pity seems to be full of angry women who are jealous of every female character they see. I think I've only seen Juliette from Lost and Sydney Bristow ever get cut any slack.

I'm a member of TWOP, female, and I will agree with you as far as your saying the place is "full of angry women." But there are men there too, and like the women, some are angry and some are not. I tried posting in the Terminator: The Sarah Connors Chronicles forum and found it to be ultimately not very interesting. It seems to me that a lot of the people there are not much into the nuts & bolts of good science fiction.

My regular TWOP activities occur in the General Hospital and One Life to Live forums (yes, soaps). I don't actually visit the forum that often; it's sufficient to keep up with the posts via daily digests. If I see something I want to reply to, I'll drop by the forum and post. But I do agree that there is a lot of trivial complaining going on. It boggles the mind why some people get so upset over which shade of light brown an actress' hair happens to be. I don't even notice those things; all a soap (or any TV show) has to do for me is entertain me and make me think.

I'd love somewhere where I could talk about Stargate and Star Trek without it being purely about ratings, "needing a break", what the actors look like and fan made deck plans.

What's wrong with talking about fan-made items? It's part of being a fan for some people. If you don't want to talk about it, just skip that thread.

I'm a TrekBBS loyalist, by default rather than loyalty.

I tried TWOP but the mods are little tin hitlers. When I saw someone being warned for spoiler-coding info from a next-week's-preview (just to be polite to others), simply because TWOP doesn't regard previews as spoilers, I knew the inmates were running the asylum. They also warn people for incorrect capitalization and punctuation.

Not all the mods there are like that. I get the impression that each forum is like a mini-kingdom, which the moderator runs according to his/her interpretation of the general board rules, which may or may not be the same level of strictness. The soap mods tend to focus mostly on appropriate use of spoiler tags and keeping the conversation soap-focused. I wouldn't run the place the same way if it were my board (I admin and mod several), but then I'm not on staff there.

If you really have 337 gigs of disk space and 6.7 terabytes of bandwidth, be man enough to use it. Go start your own board and show you can do it better instead of being a whinger and "settling" for the day-old mac and cheese that this place obviously represents. If not, then quit your kvetching, because it's not winning friends, nor is it influencing people (at least not in a positive way).

I bought a hosting package a couple of years ago. The space and transfer has grown quite astonishingly since but it's sitting around unused. I don't pretend that running a high volume board is easy which is why I preceded it with "if I could be arsed". I appreciate that British speech is not easily understandable to Americans all the time so I will clarify - that means I do not wish to make the effort.

Well, since you have all that space and bandwidth and can't be bothered doing anything with it, can I have it? I would have no difficulty whatsoever figuring out what to do with it.

Or you could donate it to a worthy cause. There must be some charitable organization in your locale that would appreciate having 'Net space and bandwidth to reach out and help people.

I don't know what else to tell you to do, then. Threads die because nobody else is interested in the topic. You can't force people to discuss things they aren't interested in. And even if we had a devoted Comics subforum, it would probably still be dominated by the current and upcoming comic book movies, and their related titles.

So it sounds like you're totally fucked. The comic threads you want to see die quickly, you don't like any of the other forums out there for various reasons, and you can't be arsed to start your own forum. I don't know what advice to give you.

Well thank you for trying.

Hermiod, you sound like you really want to talk about specific comics, etc. but few other people want to join you. Since forums depend on interaction to be successful and you don't seem to get much on your favorite topics -- why not use some of your space/bandwidth and do a blog? There are lots of hosting services, both free and paid, and you could talk about whatever you want. Depending on how you configure the reply/subscription settings, you could have your comics discussions without worrying about stuff you don't like cluttering it up.


Oh, and to answer the OP: I belong to several Dune forums and a couple of Doctor Who forums. I got a reminder email from a Highlander forum asking me to come back and post. This is the only (mostly) Star Trek one I've come to really enjoy, though.