Celestia Forums

It meanwhile seems that this forum is running so much out of sensible Celestia-related threads that we need a Quizmaster to entertain the users :

http://www.celestiaproject.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=9598

What a pity. Apparently, most of the more interesting members have been running away, recently.

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During the last 4 years of being an active member of this community, I have always felt it would serve a good purpose if I try and bring up interesting topics, or report about some ongoing progress at the developer front in regular intervals.
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But really...looking at the LOW LEVEL of what I read recently in this forum, I have given up! Clearly the threads in a way mirror the minds, interests and perspective of their writers...I know from quite a few PM exchanges that others feel similarly.

Sadly,
Bye Fridger

Crikey Fridge...you're one reason why I keep lurking around! Don't go matey. I will keep a stealy eye on 'CelestialMatters' however.

Good luck with all your future projects...I mean that.

The level of contribution in any forum is strictly a result of what actually gets posted. If nobody takes the initiative to discus "interesting" topics, then none will be discussed.

If there's a topic that you think is interesting, then you should post about it. Only you can make a difference. (Here I'm using "you" in the general sense, not meaning Fridger specifically.)

Fridger,

Obviously, you don't have to read or reply to the nonsense or fictional things that people put here. Many are young, and just starting off, many are scientifically immature and learn (albeit slowly) from reading the more professional posts. It would be a shame to see you totally remove yourself from this venue, as your interpretation of things can be useful. Having the ability to follow along in your work towards a better Celestia is important to many of us as well. I hope Celestial *EDIT* Matters Visions is what I think/hope it is, so your resourcefulness is still available.

t00fri wrote:It meanwhile seems that this forum is running so much out of sensible Celestia-related threads that we need a Quizmaster to entertain the users :

It's a dirty job, but someone has to do it.

well, IMO, nothing strange here, this is a symptom of the bad rythm in the dev, many people were so bored during so looonng that we can see this as a logical result... In all case, this don't seems to be a problem for Chris, so I suppose all is fine, no?

Well, I at least use the astronomy forum to post interesting questions and articles...

But Selden's right - if you want to be interested in things on a forum then you just have to post them yourself. I noticed that quiz thing myself - I wondered why it wasn't in Purgatory to be honest, since it's not like anyone doesn't know astronomy here, but I just ignored it - and you should ignore threads that don't interest you too. There really is no point in getting frustrated at these things (and as Buggs points out, most of the "problem users" are probably young anyway and don't know much better).

But certainly there's a bunch of us who do use the Physics and Astronomy board for what it was intended - to post interesting articles, papers, and to ask serious questions about astronomical and astrophysical matters. I thought you found that mathematical problem I posted there interesting anyway, certainly enough to do a worksheet just for that (for which I'm grateful). Either way, it's easy to just focus on the wheat and ignore the chaff.

Telepath wrote:

t00fri wrote:It meanwhile seems that this forum is running so much out of sensible Celestia-related threads that we need a Quizmaster to entertain the users :

It's a dirty job, but someone has to do it.

Well, no, that's the problem - someone DOESN'T have to do it at all. This forum isn't a frivolous playground and shouldn't be used as such (and as I said, do you honestly think that people here really need to be 'challenged' by simple riddles and elementary questions here?)

Personally I think it'd be nice if the Physica/Astronomy board had its own dedicated moderator who can shunt off the irrelevant chaff into Purgatory.

Malenfant wrote:Well, I at least use the astronomy forum to post interesting questions and articles...

Hey Consty,

indeed you are high up among the few idealists left who constantly try to focus people on interesting news and questions! I really appreciate this. I might have left this forum already without your interesting contributions.


Bye Fridger

selden wrote:The level of contribution in any forum is strictly a result of what actually gets posted. If nobody takes the initiative to discus "interesting" topics, then none will be discussed.

If there's a topic that you think is interesting, then you should post about it. Only you can make a difference. (Here I'm using "you" in the general sense, not meaning Fridger specifically.)

Selden,

sorry, but that answer is WAY TOO simplistic for a guy like me who has witnessed the ups and downs of this forum since its beginning! You know very well that with ~4000 posts and /several hundred thousand/ of readers of my posts I have contributed my share.

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Flat posts attract further posters in this category!
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Such trends and initial fluctuations may well be counteracted by responsible people with visions and good ideas. Like moderators, for example!

"Law and order" is by far not the only aim for a florishing forum...

Bye Fridger

t00fri wrote:

Malenfant wrote:Well, I at least use the astronomy forum to post interesting questions and articles...

Hey Consty,

indeed you are high up among the few idealists left who constantly try to focus people on interesting news and questions! I really appreciate this. I might have left this forum already without your interesting contributions.

Thanks (who'd have thought we'd be complimenting eachother a couple of years ago, eh? ). Well, I'm certainly not going to stop contributing in that way, and I"m sure other "idealists" won't either.

One of the major points of the Physics/Astronomy board I think is for people like you and me and Dollan and Eburacum and Buggs and all those others who know a lot about astronomy and astrophysics to be available for people to ask questions and to ask eachother questions to expand their knowledge too. Even if a lot of it is hypothetical, it's still useful because a lot of the time we can actually forge a bit of new ground in the understanding of those subjects and we can certainly learn a lot (I know I've certainly learned a lot from talking to people and asking questions on that board). Even you can learn something there .

Of course some people are going to just blunder about and make frivolous and irrelevant posts and so on. This is just part of the internet experience unfortunately. But nobody is forcing anyone to respond to those posts, and if they're ignored then those people will eventually get the message.

t00fri wrote:sorry, but that answer is WAY TOO simplistic for a guy like me who has witnessed the ups and downs of this forum since its beginning! You know very well that with ~4000 posts and /several hundred thousand/ of readers of my posts I have contributed my share.

I'm sure that most of us appreciate that, but you also have to realise that this isn't really anything to do with the issue. Your ability to continue to contribute interesting posts has nothing really to do with how many less serious posts that others contribute here, and their posts should have no impact on your contribution at all.

Selden's answer may be 'simplistic' but it's 100% correct and true. I've seen the same thing said on many other forums - forums only remain interesting so long as people post interesting things. If the people who do that leave the forums when people post frivolous or irrelevant things then that's certainly not going to help improve the situation now, is it?

buggs_moran wrote:Fridger,

Obviously, you don't have to read or reply to the nonsense or fictional things that people put here. Many are young, and just starting off, many are scientifically immature and learn (albeit slowly) from reading the more professional posts. It would be a shame to see you totally remove yourself from this venue, as your interpretation of things can be useful. Having the ability to follow along in your work towards a better Celestia is important to many of us as well. I hope Celestial Visions is what I think/hope it is, so your resourcefulness is still available.

No, I am not leaving, YET

I just did not find a better heading for this thread, so I chose the last line of my post:

Sadly,
Bye Fridger

Malenfant wrote:

t00fri wrote:sorry, but that answer is WAY TOO simplistic for a guy like me who has witnessed the ups and downs of this forum since its beginning! You know very well that with ~4000 posts and /several hundred thousand/ of readers of my posts I have contributed my share.

I'm sure that most of us appreciate that, but you also have to realise that this isn't really anything to do with the issue. Your ability to continue to contribute interesting posts has nothing really to do with how many less serious posts that others contribute here, and their posts should have no impact on your contribution at all.

Selden's answer may be 'simplistic' but it's 100% correct and true. I've seen the same thing said on many other forums - forums only remain interesting so long as people post interesting things. If the people who do that leave the forums when people post frivolous or irrelevant things then that's certainly not going to help improve the situation now, is it?

We always had ups and downs. Sure. I have always tried to ignore the "flat" stuff.

But if ON AVERAGE we are moving BELOW a critical threshold then it's time for an alert! That what happens NOW.

Bye Fridger

Sorry to interupt your thread Fridger.

I know nothing about astrofysics att all, but I'm one of those silent user that log into this forums about 15-20 times a day to read any posts made by the above named persons and a few more. I find the posts made by you guys very interesting since you guys really know what you talk about.

I think Celestia is an awesome piece of software, and I think its a shame that the forum is not moderated better so that people like Fridger with real knowlegd is thinking about leaving this ship.

I for one really enjoy reading your posts.

The same goes for Celestial Matters, I check that site several times a day too in hope of some new stuff. Since quality and accuracy should be a priority, and I've seen the screenshots from Fridgers textures among others, and they're among the best I've seen.

Thanks for the word, Anders

Malenfant wrote:....
I'm sure that most of us appreciate that, but you also have to realise that this isn't really anything to do with the issue. Your ability to continue to contribute interesting posts has nothing really to do with how many less serious posts that others contribute here, and their posts should have no impact on your contribution at all.
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Sure it has. Authors need motivation to write through their readers! Actors need people watching them act! etc.

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If, after reading the majority of the daily posts, I simply realize that a thread of mine about determining e.g. binary orbit parameters or rendering planetary nebulae would at best interest you and one or two others, well, then I just spend my little spare time otherwise!
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Such articles take a lot of time, you know.

See you at CelestialMatters...

Bye Fridger

We can talk horurs/days on this topic, IMO there is nothing to do...
If we (the community) are not able to attract intersting people it's clear nothing will change or things will go worst...
Advertising about Celestia in high sphere of education/research, having a dynamic dev and of course some intersting topics on the forum will change the situation... a global politic that don't exist unfortunatly... (I suppose we are all conscious of that)

I agree with what you're saying here... I remember the days of the long-running debates about atmosphere colours, scientific worldbuilding topics and the like.

I still regard this community as the best place I know to get a good set of replies to astronomy and "scientific worldbuilding" questions... occasionally we get some good "old-style" physics&astronomy threads (the one about temperatures in binary systems was one of the best in ages IMHO), but it definitely isn't the place it once was.

As others have said, I guess the long delay to 1.4.0 took its toll on the community

t00fri wrote: I have given up!

I hope not... Your name attached to a post nowadays makes it one of the few that makes it worth reading.
(Not to forget *a few* others, of course. But they haven??t quite given up..)

I hope this turns around. Maybe it will: we are getting new users that (sometimes) aren??t bots, and some old-timers are waking up, it seems...

ElChristou wrote:Advertising about Celestia in high sphere of education/research, having a dynamic dev and of course some intersting topics on the forum will change the situation

Indeed. Higher visibility is crucial to attract people that can contribute. So, spread the word...

t00fri wrote:If, after reading the majority of the daily posts, I simply realize that a thread of mine about determining e.g. binary orbit parameters or rendering planetary nebulae would at best interest you and one or two others, well, then I just spend my little spare time otherwise

Remember that often we read without participating! Some threads go way beyond my competence level on the topic discussed, so i can??t contribute. But i read them anyway, sometimes to get oriented on what??s going on, sometimes learning something new. You can??t always measure this by the number of replies you get...

- rthorvald

t00fri wrote:Sure it has. Authors need motivation to write through their readers! Actors need people watching them act! etc.

I used to think along those lines, but I realised eventually that the only reason you should post or contribute anything to a project is because YOU want to. Don't do it for anyone else, do it because YOU think it's interesting and enjoyable to do. Because at the end of the day if you're not excited or interested in what you are doing, then you're only going to start feeling bitter about things and thinking you're only doing it out of obligation to others.

I post my questions or write my responses to questions because I want to find answers to them and because I'm interested enough in the topic to want to educate the original person who asked the question, not because I'm playing to an audience.

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If, after reading the majority of the daily posts, I simply realize that a thread of mine about determining e.g. binary orbit parameters or rendering planetary nebulae would at best interest you and one or two others, well, then I just spend my little spare time otherwise!
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Again, I think that's the wrong motivation. I think that people should answer questions and post new articles because they're actually interested in them, not because they have some 'readership quota' that they feel they have to fill.

At the end of the day we have to be honest here - the sort of questions and topics that YOU personally are going to be directly interested in and find most stimulating are going to be few and far between here, because most people simply don't have the level of knowledge about the subject that you have.

I'm not really sure what the solution could be - certainly we can try to improve the standard of posts on the Physics/Astronomy board (and maybe elsewhere too) with some dedicated moderating, but you're always going to be one of a handful of people who know a heck of a lot about those subject. If it's code development and catalogue assembly that you're more interested in then the Development board needs to be more tightly focussed and you also should be encouraged to post threads about the topics that you're interested in developing further there too.