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Penny Arcade - Comic - Vox Something Or Other

DogDog Registered User, Administrator, Vanilla Staff admin
edited October 2015 in The Penny Arcade Hub

imagePenny Arcade - Comic - Vox Something Or Other

Videogaming-related online strip by Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins. Includes news and commentary.

Read the full story here


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Posts

  • RedMattisRedMattis Registered User regular
    If you're posting industry, political or whatever commentary and then remove or heavily moderate the comment section it basically sends the message that you just want to preach to the choir. Everyone else can GTFO.

  • RMS OceanicRMS Oceanic Registered User regular
    RedMattis wrote: »
    If you're posting industry, political or whatever commentary and then remove or heavily moderate the comment section it basically sends the message that you just want to preach to the choir. Everyone else can GTFO.

    Remove, maybe, but I'm not sure about moderating. A firm hand to cut out GIFT can do wonders for actually discussing the issue.

    Comment sections aren't inherently good or bad, they're a tool that can be (mis)used.

  • OrphaneOrphane rivers of red that run to seaRegistered User regular
    RedMattis wrote: »
    If you're posting industry, political or whatever commentary and then remove or heavily moderate the comment section it basically sends the message that you just want to preach to the choir. Everyone else can GTFO.

    Remove, maybe, but I'm not sure about moderating. A firm hand to cut out GIFT can do wonders for actually discussing the issue.

    Comment sections aren't inherently good or bad, they're a tool that can be (mis)used.

    i've seen comments sections on fire off the shoulder of Youtube

  • m0r1artym0r1arty Registered User new member
    With how LGML is going soon they won't need writers either. Just lots of clicks to fool advertisers into thinking that it is people, and not bots, who go there.

  • LittlestarsLittlestars Registered User regular
    I am part of a formerly vocal, but now disenfranchised, block of fans for a franchise that shall go unnamed. Over the past ten years, their various forms of community have undergone rapid change in the guise of an evolution necessary to keep up with the newer, hip crowds on the net. I believe that the series of complete forum purgings and mass deletions on par with a night at the Clinton server room were to hide that a lion's share of the content and members of the community were generally displeased with the direction the franchise was going; criticism that, in retrospect, might be along the lines of PAs recent strip Epiphanito.

    To go from having forums and comments to not is a very bold measure and in itself a statement: "We don't care about what you have to say." It's very uncouth.

  • JauntyJaunty Registered User regular
    m0r1arty wrote: »
    With how LGML is going soon they won't need writers either. Just lots of clicks to fool advertisers into thinking that it is people, and not bots, who go there.

    I cannot for the life of me uncover what LGML is an acronym for

    qcklw92m98s0.png
  • KalTorakKalTorak One way or another, they all end up in the Undercity.Registered User regular
    Jaunty wrote: »
    m0r1arty wrote: »
    With how LGML is going soon they won't need writers either. Just lots of clicks to fool advertisers into thinking that it is people, and not bots, who go there.

    I cannot for the life of me uncover what LGML is an acronym for

    Let Go My (L)Eggo!

  • cooljammer00cooljammer00 Hey Small Christmas-Man!Registered User regular
    edited October 2015
    This was a very peculiar attempt at trolling. They posted comic about a website with no comment sections on a website with no comments section.

    Yes, we have this forum/comic thread, but the forum credo is literally "Gabe and Tycho do not read the forums".

    edit: I was just informed there is a comments section that just pulls from this thread. I have been coming here for over a decade and didn't know it existed, which kinda goes to show how effective comments sections are.

    cooljammer00 on
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  • cB557cB557 voOOP Registered User regular
    This is some top tier badpinion having from spencer and tycho

  • darleysamdarleysam On my way to UKRegistered User regular
    Already seeing some upset about this, followed by a list of every previous, unforgotten ill. So I might end up ignoring twitter for the day.

    forumsig.png
  • TFXRavenTFXRaven Galactic Emperor Phoenix, AZRegistered User regular
    Vox becomes increasingly vile with each passing month. A growing group of nerf-herders are controlling the publications and tagging in huge ads and brag about their traffic this month. What a bunch of rubbish.

  • Eat it You Nasty Pig.Eat it You Nasty Pig. tell homeland security 'we are the bomb'Registered User regular
    is there any major news or whatever site where the staff writers do take feedback via comments? Even on PA where the 'comments' are filtered through vanilla and thus moderation, 'GABE AND TYCHO DON'T READ THE FORUMS' seems to need to be included in every recitation of the rules

    NREqxl5.jpg
    it was the smallest on the list but
    Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
  • Eat it You Nasty Pig.Eat it You Nasty Pig. tell homeland security 'we are the bomb'Registered User regular
    alt joke post: perhaps G&T will now be reading the forums?

    NREqxl5.jpg
    it was the smallest on the list but
    Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
  • TubeTube Registered User admin
    This was a very peculiar attempt at trolling. They posted comic about a website with no comment sections on a website with no comments section.

    Yes, we have this forum/comic thread, but the forum credo is literally "Gabe and Tycho do not read the forums".

    edit: I was just informed there is a comments section that just pulls from this thread. I have been coming here for over a decade and didn't know it existed, which kinda goes to show how effective comments sections are.

    Vastly more people are aware of the comments but not the forums than know about the forums but not the comments. There's also no "just pulling from the thread", it's the other way around. You are posting in the Penny Arcade comments right now. You're just using a different interface. So as for how effective they are, well, you're using them aren't you?

  • cooljammer00cooljammer00 Hey Small Christmas-Man!Registered User regular
    alt joke post: perhaps G&T will now be reading the forums?

    Well they show up every once in a blue moon, so they are "reading" the forums. They just purposely don't want anybody to know about it....which defeats the purpose and undercuts their own message. They don't want it to be easy to contact them, I guess? God forbid people pester them.

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  • TubeTube Registered User admin
    is there any major news or whatever site where the staff writers do take feedback via comments? Even on PA where the 'comments' are filtered through vanilla and thus moderation, 'GABE AND TYCHO DON'T READ THE FORUMS' seems to need to be included in every recitation of the rules

    Much as it would be to my benefit to pretend it were so, Vanilla isn't the only comments system that allows moderation. Essentially all of them do. If comments are unmoderated (they shouldn't be), it's because of a lack of will or staffing resources.

    The "GABE AND TYCHO DON'T READ THE FORUMS" isn't really related to criticism or comments. It's there because we don't want to spend half of every day sifting through the Great Idea For A Comic that people have.

  • ElijahBaileyElijahBailey Wordsmith. VirginiaRegistered User regular
    edited October 2015
    Not that I disagree with Tycho at all on this point but this comic makes this quote from him particularly funny:

    "Robert asked me once how I’d feel about comments after my newspost; I laughed at him for ten minutes, without breathing."

    ElijahBailey on
    "Building the future and keeping the past alive are one in the same thing."
  • Eat it You Nasty Pig.Eat it You Nasty Pig. tell homeland security 'we are the bomb'Registered User regular
    Tube wrote: »
    is there any major news or whatever site where the staff writers do take feedback via comments? Even on PA where the 'comments' are filtered through vanilla and thus moderation, 'GABE AND TYCHO DON'T READ THE FORUMS' seems to need to be included in every recitation of the rules

    Much as it would be to my benefit to pretend it were so, Vanilla isn't the only comments system that allows moderation. Essentially all of them do. If comments are unmoderated (they shouldn't be), it's because of a lack of will or staffing resources.

    The "GABE AND TYCHO DON'T READ THE FORUMS" isn't really related to criticism or comments. It's there because we don't want to spend half of every day sifting through the Great Idea For A Comic that people have.

    well right I mean, obviously none of the actual software involved is totally bereft of mod tools. I'm just saying in the case of PA, it runs through the moderation process they already have in place, as opposed to what happens on other sites/comments.

    NREqxl5.jpg
    it was the smallest on the list but
    Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
  • Grey PaladinGrey Paladin Registered User regular
    If you're popular and write about... Anything truly controversial, such as politics or religion, there is basically no chance for your comment section to not be a total shit show. You can pay a bunch of moderators to get PTSD for your sake and restore a semblance of civility but not everyone can afford to do so. If you somehow find the time to do it yourself all of the abuse is likely to take a toll on your mental health. I don't - I can't - blame anyone for killing off their comment section.

    "All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes to make it possible." - T.E. Lawrence
  • TubeTube Registered User admin
    Any comment section should be moderatable, it's just a matter of how much effort you're willing to put into it. Past a certain point it's not a good use of resources.

  • LucascraftLucascraft Registered User regular
    So I guess I'm missing some context here. What is Vox? Is it a site, or a service or what? And what is Motherboard? Is that a company that recently did something regarding the removal of a comments section?

  • orthancstoneorthancstone TexasRegistered User regular
    edited October 2015
    The old school newspaper is making a comeback!

    (Ok, probably not)

    orthancstone on
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  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    If a site isn't going to moderate their comments section I don't really see a problem with removing it altogether. I'm not familiar with Vox so I dunno if they did that or not or were able to do it well.

  • AnarCHrisAnarCHris Trash Lord New York CityRegistered User regular
    The comments section is usually the actual Christian devil, so eliminating them is something I can get behind. This strip seems a little "Oh man yells at clouds" -esque.

  • GaslightGaslight Registered User regular
    I think there may be some confusion here. Motherboard is a site which is part of the Vice network which just turned off comments on their articles. Vox has never had comments, I don't think? (Given how quickly and completely they stonewall any time somebody points out they fucked up on social media I'd be surprised if they had comments.)

    The title is a reference (I am pretty sure) to the latin phrase "Vox populi, vox dei" which means something like "The voice of the people is the voice of God."

  • dfkabnzdfkabnz Registered User new member
    edited October 2015
    I used to believe in that last great bastion of unfettered debate: the comment section. But I realized there is a fundamental physical force, like gravity, that inexorably draws each instance of internet commentary into a frothing, vile cesspool.

    This is just an extension of Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory—regardless of the content of the article, if more than a critical mass of ~100 people read it, the comments will collapse into a Fuckwad Condensate that appears to any observer to consist entirely of "libtards," "fukin sheeple," "gay n****rs," and "v14gr4".

    The stupidity and genuine malice is often more disheartening than the trolling. As I've watched comment sections go away, I actually found myself applauding. I mean, big ups to nerds having a voice on teh webz, but in the absence of a strong moderation system, I think getting rid of comments makes the world a better place.

    dfkabnz on
  • Soul SanctumSoul Sanctum Registered User regular
    edited October 2015
    This seems like the perfect discussion system for Social Justice Warriors.
    Personally, I don't believe in moderation of forums or comment sections, beyond the obvious of removing illegal material/death threats/personal information/spam.

    Users should just have the ability to mute/block anyone they communicate with. Self-moderation. Beyond that moderation only exists to protect people's precious feelings and silence anyone the larger community disagrees with or doesn't like. It's childish and foolish on its face.

    Soul Sanctum on
  • ZythonZython Registered User regular
    edited October 2015
    is there any major news or whatever site where the staff writers do take feedback via comments? Even on PA where the 'comments' are filtered through vanilla and thus moderation, 'GABE AND TYCHO DON'T READ THE FORUMS' seems to need to be included in every recitation of the rules

    I would go further and suggest that nothing of value has ever occurred in any comments section ever.

    As for the comment, my experience has been that people that defend comments sections are:

    1. Extremely unfamiliar with the internet at large.
    2. The reason said comments sections suck.

    So...which camp to G&T belong to?
    Gaslight wrote: »
    I think there may be some confusion here. Motherboard is a site which is part of the Vice network which just turned off comments on their articles. Vox has never had comments, I don't think? (Given how quickly and completely they stonewall any time somebody points out they fucked up on social media I'd be surprised if they had comments.)

    The title is a reference (I am pretty sure) to the latin phrase "Vox populi, vox dei" which means something like "The voice of the people is the voice of God."

    If that's the case, then God must be a raging asshole.

    Huh...I guess that explains a lot.

    Edit:
    This seems like the perfect discussion system for Social Justice Warriors.
    Personally, I don't believe in moderation of forums or comment sections, beyond the obvious of removing illegal material/death threats/personal information/spam.

    Users should just have the ability to mute/block anyone they communicate with. Self-moderation. Beyond that moderation only exists to protect people's precious feelings and silence anyone the larger community disagrees with or doesn't like. It's childish and foolish on its face.

    Yeah, from my experience, a lot of people believe that until their feelings are the ones that are hurt. I've been infracted on MMO-Champion more times than I can count for going against their "anti-PC" slant (or being anti-PC, but not in a way they deemed appropriate), without them being the slightest bit aware of the irony.

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  • Soul SanctumSoul Sanctum Registered User regular
    edited October 2015
    is there any major news or whatever site where the staff writers do take feedback via comments? Even on PA where the 'comments' are filtered through vanilla and thus moderation, 'GABE AND TYCHO DON'T READ THE FORUMS' seems to need to be included in every recitation of the rules

    I feel like in general, comments sections aren't a good way to gather serious feedback on something.
    Comment sections should be there to give the audience an outlet to discuss the material they are viewing, debate about it, vent their feelings on it, and provide relevant information on it.
    It's there for the audience, not the proprietor.
    If a media outlet or ANY producers of media genuinely want feedback, they should provide a separate area (perhaps something as simple as a tab that switches between comment posting and feedback posting under said article/video) specifically for viewers to provide it.

    Steam is a wonderfully transparent and open platform with very little moderation, where players can discuss and review any content on the distribution system and has been well utilized by developers to gather feedback on their products.

    Soul Sanctum on
  • orthancstoneorthancstone TexasRegistered User regular
    This seems like the perfect discussion system for Social Justice Warriors.

    Or it replicates the last century of print media's solution for reader feedback...

    Either/or really.

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  • wprothwellwprothwell Registered User new member
    edited October 2015
    While it is true that the comment section on hot-button topic articles tends to be a wasteland, they can be useful on other types of content. For example, in the world of tech news sites, the Verge (in the same media group as Vox) turned off comments on most of their articles a few months ago, and since then I've started visiting Engadget more. As another example, Kenji Lopez-Alt over at SeriousEats.com tends to engage quite a bit with folks who leave comments on his articles.

    From my perspective, if you don't like comment sections, you're free to ignore them. But I don't get the point in shutting them off. Even if you aren't getting feedback from them, it closes down the #1 avenue for folks reading your content to discuss that content.

    wprothwell on
  • TheySlashThemTheySlashThem Registered User regular
    Social Justice Warriors

    people who actually, earnestly use this phrase are exactly the reason comments sections are the worst idea

  • TubeTube Registered User admin
    Steam's "open and transparent" review platform is widely abused.

  • AbsalonAbsalon Lands of Always WinterRegistered User regular
    Comments sections are mainly beneficial to objectively bad people who want to spread intellectual poison and society-ruining social diseases like homophobia and white resentment under the guise of libertarian wank, Open Debate and freeze peach. I hope this blows back hard against Tycho and Gabe.

  • TigrerojoTigrerojo Registered User regular
    To be honest, I don't think that erasing a comment section is worse than heavily modding it (specially when the modding prohibits the commenting over particular topics); at least in the first one, you disallow people from making both negative AND positive commentary on your material. By modding it you just twist or channel the comments to adapt to your particular view, or to look unnaturally positive.

  • aguyunoaguyuno Registered User regular
    This, yeah. This doesn't seem well thought out :/.

  • AbsalonAbsalon Lands of Always WinterRegistered User regular
    edited October 2015
    You'll be accused of censorship if you mod, and if you let it all remain the fascist teen trolls will be able to manifest and make a display of numbers because they have dog's blood and will all flood any forum with their talking points ASAP. Without removing either anonymity or free comment, the internet becomes more barbaric.

    http://www.theguardian.com/science/brain-flapping/2014/sep/12/comment-sections-toxic-moderation

    Absalon on
  • rhylithrhylith Death Rabbits HoustonRegistered User regular
    edited October 2015
    Tigrerojo wrote: »
    To be honest, I don't think that erasing a comment section is worse than heavily modding it (specially when the modding prohibits the commenting over particular topics); at least in the first one, you disallow people from making both negative AND positive commentary on your material. By modding it you just twist or channel the comments to adapt to your particular view, or to look unnaturally positive.

    You realize the entire reason this community isn't a total cesspool like other sites is because of Tube and company's very strong moderation, right? I wouldn't want to be anywhere near this place if it looked like a YouTube comments section.

    I'm pretty sad that this is the stance that Mike and Jerry have taken.

    Edit: it's also terrible because motherboard still allows comment letters which will be posted later like the old letters the editor that you'd see in papers. This means they'll be filtered through their editorial department and some comments will be discarded, but so what? It's vice's publication, and it's as much their right to decide what speech appears on their content as it is for you to submit it.

    rhylith on
  • darleysamdarleysam On my way to UKRegistered User regular
    I would at least say to wait and see if Jerry elaborates on this before assuming their position is neatly summed up by a sarcastic comic, and extrapolated out to mean "everyone should face the full, unfiltered force of an internet comments sluice".
    Like, that may well be how it turns out, but I expect there'll be a little more reason there.

    forumsig.png
  • TubeTube Registered User admin
    rhylith wrote: »
    Tigrerojo wrote: »
    To be honest, I don't think that erasing a comment section is worse than heavily modding it (specially when the modding prohibits the commenting over particular topics); at least in the first one, you disallow people from making both negative AND positive commentary on your material. By modding it you just twist or channel the comments to adapt to your particular view, or to look unnaturally positive.

    You realize the entire reason this community isn't a total cesspool like other sites is because of Tube and company's very strong moderation, right? I wouldn't want to be anywhere near this place if it looked like a YouTube comments section.

    They probably are aware of it, yes. A lot of people see that as a net negative of the forums, believing that a lasseiz-faire approach is inherently better and moderation should be minimal at best. There isn't really a debate to be had over it, because it really boils down to "this thing should be more like the type of thing I like", and the thing in question isn't interested in being that. Nor, generally, are we trying to appeal to the userbase that would prefer that.

    It's worth noting that I've never known anyone who manages communities for a living who seriously entertains the notion of lasseiz-faire moderation, even though it would obviously make our jobs a lot easier.

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