What Would a Good GW Forum Be Like?
We have been thinking about what it would take to create a forum atmosphere where members were comfortable sharing their thoughts about Ghost Whisperer. TheorizeLife0 and The Bears were thinking about this back in March when we brainstormed about ways to get more participation. We didn't have any great ideas then but we did think of a lot of little things that could help.
The first important thing The Bears see are the discussion rules. Too many of them and members are afraid to post what they think. Too few rules and anarchy develops. Our thinking is you have to play it like Calvin Ball (from the old comic strip Calvin and Hobbs) where the rules are whatever the person with the ball says they are. For example, we think any discussion of GW needs to include the possibility of bringing up religion or politics because the stories make a lot of references to them. The boundary line would relevance to show. That is, no promotion of a candidate or religious point of view -- just discussion.
Which brings up something we think is very important -- staying on topic. We got good feedback whenever we tried to bring a discussion thread back to the topic. Most members are too polite to mention an off-topic post so it is essential that the moderators stay alert for them. Similarly, we think gentle persuasion is the best way to discourage negative or hostile posts. It avoids having a lot of rules people aren't going to remember anyway and gives the flexibility to judge on a case-by-case basis.
We'd like to hear your ideas about how to make a GW forum work. What have you found you like about other forums? And what didn’t you like? Give us your comments.
The thing I liked best about HGW was the warm, friendly atmosphere. For the most part, comments were about the show, the characters or the actors (I know there were other areas, but these are the areas I paid the most attention to). It was well-organized and -- as the bears noted-- on the topic. Posters were friendly and considerate to others, and there were almost no personal attacks. There were only minimal comments like "Jim should take off his shirt more often" or "Melinda showed too much cleavage". The network board seems to be full of that sort of post, and it's tedious to sort through all that superficial stuff in the hopes of finding an interesting discussion. I am a huge fan of Ghost Whisperer, and I am really looking for an opportunity to discuss the show and things relating to it with other fans. I don't collect pictures of the stars, and am not interested in wading through lots of "Great picture, Bubba!" when somebody posts a picture. I want to be able to speculate to my heart's content about the implications of the current episode for the show as a whole, and I hope to find someone else interested in doing that, especially somebody with a different point of view, or somebody who has noticed something I missed.
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Hi Lillie Rose; A more accurate description of MYSELF,also, simply doesn't exist. You said it better than I could have. Here's to lots of that kind of discussion.
Gladys
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First, I believe that a forum - like atmosphere is a great way to go. I agree the art of gentle persuasion is important, even though all of us here (I think) are pretty good at "catching ourselves," and are thus self - regulating.
I think a discussion ought to start with a fairly open-ended question, to allow everyone a sense of unfettered expression.
Focus DOES get lost, despite best intentions; so perhaps a question about a specific aspect of the episode could be introduced, just when a drift off - topic is perceived? Let me give an example ( I'm kinda reaching here; I haven't seen any of this in our group - I know I'm using an extreme example...about Mel's clothes...don't think that one has actually come up, in Season 2, but I'm trying to show an example of a discussion drifting off - point and a way to fix it). Example:
Imagine: a discussion starts up in response to the question, "What did you all think of last night's episode?" Someone posts a comment about Mel's clothes. Someone ELSE opines that Mel's dress is too old- fashioned; a third disagrees with that and ......etc. etc. etc. This is where a question can be introduced, like, " Do you think that her clothes, in that episode, are some kind of portent - a message for us, for future episodes? Or are the writers / producers trying to evolve a certain style and have to get to "know" Melinda better themselves?" ( They went through several styles for Deanna Troy in Star Trek:TNG, before they settled on the final one). Hopefully, this gets people thinking and propels the discuission back on - point. Said question doesnt have to originate from the bears, if you prefer it doesn't. It could be introduced by another poster, all pre-arranged beforehand by email.
I hope I dont look "sneaky" or something - I just understand how easy it can be to drift off - topic; especially as new people join us.I see this a nice "gentle" way to recalibrate!
Gladys
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Gladys, your idea of gently working with problem posts by using persuasion is a good one. We think we have seen this on the forum, especially when we first started posting regularly in the fall.
A good example might be the Spoiler thread "Summary of "A Grave Matter" episode 205". The thread started to go off-topic with a post by TalonKarrde about Raven's avatar on Oct 26, 2006 7:03 am. It gets even more off-topic by turning into a discussion of ravens versus crows until Raven (a member) points this out in a post on Nov 04, 2006 7:41 pm. The thread then gets back on-topic for a few more posts.
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hey there ghost whisperer fans.
im new to all this and also to the show. i started watching about a month ago and im already hooked. cant wait to start talking about this awesome show
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Hi, GW Newbie. Thanks for checking out our blog.
We think it is an awesome show, too. So if you want to discuss the show or characters come on over to the MelindaVerse Forum at http://melindaverse.forumer.com/. Because the forum just started this season, we are only a small group of fans right now but we make up for it by talking a lot about our favorite show!
--Cheers
--TheBears
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