Some of you might find this useful - ignoring boards.

great no we can ignore the cancer and feed it...

Honestly its pretty telling that on other forums i can upload daily, get in the area of 3-8 comments on average and non of them is junk! And here, i try to get back in every few months and either i get spam as a comment that i have to delete or nothing, meanwhile the off topic cancer is nurishedtothe maximum, and yes now i am doing it as well.

If I look at the off topic section or if i shown that of topic section to people who are interested in gas discharges and some lighting phenomena but are not strictly lighting enthusiast. The feedback is the same:

What a depressed deplorable bunch are you. At least half of you seem mentally ill or unstable, incompetent or dumb and unwilling or lazy... It seems as wonder that there are some functioning humans in there... 

So for me the best: stay out an laugh about it

Oh, an earache? I had full blown ankle surgery yesterday! A tendon tumor that had gotten into the bone! A little earache is nothing and this post is pretty much clicking!
I too have ear problems but I don't go posting about all my complex medical issues on a public forum!

Soo a few days ago(last friday actually) I has an earache looked at. I am a cochlear implant recipient and my ear had been earaching on and off for a week! SOO that was a PROBLEM!  Anywho, the doctor sent me to the ER because they had an ear-nose-throat doc on call.... i was sent home in like 4 hours after I had arrived whith a prescription for amoxicillin. that is all.

a shame my carefully worded post disappeared because i got plenty of positive feedback by pm for it…

@Danny

On this board you may discuss non-lighting related subjects, such as your other hobbies and interests, or anything else you would like to share with the community.  As always, discussions must remain respectful.  Please refrain from obscene, sexually explicit, or controversial religious or political matters.

Nothing I have seen in this section has violated these rules for a while, do you mind defining what you mean by "abused"? If these rules were to be changed, making this section only for "other topics of interest" and not for "anything else you would like to share", I can see how that has the potential to make this section less controversial, but of course that is subjective and we can't know for sure.

@Alex

great no we can ignore the cancer and feed it...

Honestly its pretty telling that on other forums i can upload daily, get in the area of 3-8 comments on average and non of them is junk! And here, i try to get back in every few months and either i get spam as a comment that i have to delete or nothing, meanwhile the off topic cancer is nurishedtothe maximum, and yes now i am doing it as well.
...(not gonna paste the rest of the comment in cause it was a little rough)

May I ask what other forums you are talking about? Do you mean lighting forums? Because if so I would definitely love to see it to compare. And yeah unfortunately there are always a few nuisance junk comments here from some users, but in my opinion it really doesn't cause that much of a hassle, and that is one of the risks that I knowingly accept being part of a forum.

I don't think that being able to ignore the off-topic sections could possibly make the situation worse, I mean I think it just benefits people that don't want to get involved with it. I personally would say it's a net improvement, even though I won't be using it.

Edit: I thought you might have deleted the comment yourself so I didn't comment on the rest of it, but that was not the case so I will do so here.
Like I said with RCM442, let's not insult people. No need to call people depressed, deplorable, mentally ill, unstable, incompetent, dumb, unwilling, or lazy. You as well are a relatively helpful and mature member on LG, and I was not expecting that from you. No offense of course but next time you try and prove a point let's try to do it in a more respectful manner. Obviously I have no control over what you say but I would like to think that you want LG to be a safe place for people.

@RCM442
I don't want to offend you at all of course, but discouraging posts about medical issues directly after talking about your own medical issues is probably not the strongest thing to do here, assuming you are trying to be a role model for the behavior of other members here.

Also, belittling the problems of others (no matter how insignificant you may think their experience was) can be considered unprofessional, I am sure you are aware you are in a position of responsibility here. If you saw someone else doing what you are doing right now, would you be tempted to step in as a moderator? No matter how valid an insult may be, the purpose is always to make someone feel worse, which is always unnecessary even if you think the other person deserves it.

@Multisubject you said yourself that some topics should be deleted that would mean to me that somewhere along the line you are border lining on the same page.

The topics I refer to are topics that just do not need to be posted. If you cannot work out which ones they are then you are missing the point seen as every other member here “including an admin” has backed me up. You’re the only one in disagreement so far whilst Patrick remains very much on the fence

This is a discussion topic not a social media page to post your life stories. We don’t need to know or care about personal things.  Do it in PM. Some stuff that gets posted here just does not need to be shared with everyone here. And some of it is just attention seeking. Post it on your own personal Facebook timeline if you want people to know. Not a public site.

This is all I’ll say on the matter. I’ll not be replying further. My opinion is clear, and I respect yours.

Oh, an earache? I had full blown ankle surgery yesterday! A tendon tumor that had gotten into the bone! A little earache is nothing and this post is pretty much clicking!
I too have ear problems but I don't go posting about all my complex medical issues on a public forum!

Ooo.. I hope you get better after your surgery.  It is no picnic when there is complication from my right hip surgery that I had last December.  I'm still recovering from that to this date.

As a newer member, I feel that the off-topic section should be mainly hobby related things (mainly electronics, etc) with the occasional incident or funny thing here and there.


But the strange thing is, other lighting discussion places with off topic are more active. For example lighting discord servers have plenty of off topic channels, yet have a constant flow of lighting related pictures. So according to statistics, off topic shouldn't be an issue.


I still agree that comments on photos have gone down a lot, comparing oct 2023 (when I joined) and now.


For now I'll leave it as is, the off topic board doesn't bother me too much.

@Danny
Don't feel pressured to respond, I just want to make my intentions clear.

When I say "some topics should be deleted", what I mean is that they should be deleted when they violate site rules. Again "topics that just do not need to be posted" is a very broad category, and I can't even begin to imagine how the mods would try to enforce that, though I do know what kind of topics you are referring to.

Members leave, and usually when they do leave they mention something horrible about the off-topic section. This is undeniably a bad thing, and like you I would love to have that not happen.

From what I am seeing, this starts by someone posting a topic that someone else deems to be uninteresting or otherwise unfit. That then prompts a user to make a comment criticising the user who started the topic. This starts a conflict between the people who defend the post and those who are against the post.

In my mind there are two ways to solve this:

1: Prohibit members from posting topics that others may or may not consider to be uninteresting/unfit (how do you enforce that?).

2: Prohibit members from making disrespectful comments on topics that they personally dislike or find boring (pretty enforceable).

In my mind, solution #2 is better. But either one will probably work, and you seem to like solution #1. And so does @RCM442. I don't think restriction is practical or desirable but that's just me.

@LightsAreBright27
I think on Discord servers people are more likely to be nicer to each other because it is more of an instant short message type of platfrom rather than a forum. More like a conversation.

Exactly, when I try and remove or lock topics that really shouldn't be here I get attacked for it! So I've just been leaving everything up!

Sorry for attention seeking behavior. I did not mean to cause problems or whatever. I was just trying to provide more info on a picture. By the way, I forgot to mention that I was actually REFERRED by an overzealous physician!    WHAT THE WOW! I deserve a...dude, where's the slapping emoji?

At this point the only reason I am still on LG is drama like this lol
My interest in lighting has turned into a broader interest for electrical engineering and electronics (but let’s face it, it was pretty much already like this, but I have learned a lot of useful information here and playing with lighting in general though)
I still like a collection of the big glowing things because I just find them cool, and I pretty much use LED and boring fluorescent exclusively.

By the way that's why I like lights too.I know this should be combined with my previous post but I'm too lazy to edit it LOL

I deserve a...dude, where's the slapping emoji?

We have it at at the gallery side

@RCM442
That is true, everything you do no matter how justified always seems to have criticism. You put in a lot of work on this platform and you deserve recognition for that in my opinion. I understand it is a lot easier to just eliminate an entire topic rather than combing through comments deleting the ones that might be bad. Ideally any unruliness would be handled on a user by user basis, but you are only one person and that would be a lot of work.

I think I have said this before, but more moderators would theoretically help. But obviously not all moderators are the same and some hold different standards and that just causes controversy. So I would say just keep doing what you're doing right now, you're doing an excellent job.

@lightsofpahrump
My interest has done the same thing, but my lighting phases seem to last a lot longer than other electrical phases of interest just due to the fact that LG exists.

Well, my personal opinion on the matter is that the off-topic section is overused. It's quite amusing how the For Sale/Trade section is a drought with one post and 10000 views, and the off-topic section is like a mini social media feed.

Have I ever really noticed it until perusing this post? No. But the trend is certainly there, and now that my eyes have been opened to the matter, I can't unsee it.

@Danny — I agree somewhat, however I think your approach is a little overzealous, if not slightly condescending. I mean, opinions are just that— opinions. And to generalize and say "rubbish that shouldn't even be posted"... it makes your point none clearer.

@Multisubject — No offense, but your tone throughout this post almost sounds condescending. I know that's likely not your intent, but why are you attempting to school people twice your age with passive-aggressive language? I feel like I'm sitting into a corporate meeting regarding policy at work hearing you reply to others making valid points. I respect you 100%, but your tone here felt somewhat abrasive, at least to me.

Though @Alex , were the insults truly necessary here? They only make the situation worse. Do remember many people on here are autistic in some way, with worse social comprehension than the average Joe on the street. Just as @RCM442 always sounds like he is shouting combatively with his '!' after every sentence, others, including myself, have their own little quirks. I, for one, am very verbose. And that can sometimes come at a cost, etc.

Generally, I have been less active due to life commitments... not because the Off Topic section has blown up out of proportion to the lighting portion of the site. I posted four images yesterday, three of which received a large amount of engagement in a short period... and I learned something new while I was at it, too.

All in all, I find the off-topic section not the CAUSE of LG's woes, but rather one of the visible SYMPTOMS of its deeper flaws. That's all.

Soo a few days ago(last friday actually) I has an earache looked at. I am a cochlear implant recipient and my ear had been earaching on and off for a week! SOO that was a PROBLEM!  Anywho, the OVERZEALOUS doctor sent me to the ER because they had an ear-nose-throat doc on call....   Now that's what I call overzealous! i was sent home in like 4 hours after I had arrived whith a prescription for amoxicillin. that is all.

An earache? AN EARACHE!? I NEARLY DIED OF BLOOD LOSS AND HAVEN’T MADE A THREAD ABOUT IT! I mean I don’t want to come across as rude but, come on man…

Now my take on off topic:

I personally think it’ a good thing! I mean some threads are a bit random like, what did you eat today but they’re still fun right? I understand this is a gallery of lights but I think it’s good to have something off topic.

Now my take on LG Drama:

I don’t want seam rude to anyone in particular but the dramatic side of LG seems to come from a few people that I could name but I won’t.