OT (sort of) priorities

SaintJohnsEgger

I'm hoping that with the new year coming on we can get our priorities straightened out. this is a Big Green Eg forum and something is wrong when legitimate questions go unanswered or just a few post while a 4 year old Chik-fil-A post can get resurrected from the dead and start an argument all over again (19 new posts in two days). The Friday weirdness is okay but its now grown to be an all week thing. We now often have more off topic threads and arguments than legitimate BGE threads.

This site is also very clannish and intimidating to new members. I've been here for over 2 years and I still don't feel like I belong here. Think about what that does to new BGE owners. 

This has been bothering me for a while and I'e been hesitant to say anything.

That's my $0.02.

Kent8621

well said

JohnInCarolina

This should go well.  

st¡ke

This is all true. 


Take comfort in that nothing has changed in twenty years or so

Frankly, this place is genteel compared to greeneggers.net back in the frontier days. And I was late to that party myself

Bonus: No one here has threatened to shoot anyone. And there are no dustups re sexual dalliances among significant others at Eggfests. 

This place is a conveyor belt. New people getting on all the time, folks dropping off, and people along for the ride thinking it's their conveyor belt. 

I think it's more similar than different compared to its overall history 

Phaqallyall

Complaining about the lack of legit BGE threads by starting an off-topic thread sure is a weird way to make your point. 

SaintJohnsEgger

Phaqallyall said:

Complaining about the lack of legit BGE threads by starting an off-topic thread sure is a weird way to make your point. 

I agree. But it isn't fully BGE related as I wasn't discussing cooking issues or techniques etc. So I decided to give it the OT (sort of) monicker.

I knew that would appease some and alienate others. Some people are here to just argue and you can't appease them no matter how hard you try.

GrillSgt

I have always found the group to be very helpful with any egging question I had. If you aren't interested in a topic, don't open it. A lot of these guys know each other from BGE events, most of these are open to the public so if you're feeling left out just jump right in. You may meet guys that you become life long friends with or you may come home laughing about all the douche bags you met. Either way you won't find a better source for your egging queries. Honestly it sounds like you're looking for something that isn't offered here.

GrillSgt

Here’s a pic of my Off Topic page. It’s easy to just not open a thread that doesn’t hold any interest for you, or at least I find it easy.


for you. 

bgebrent

You belong here.  Just pick and choose what you want to be a part of.  Some of the lackluster responsiveness to some posts merely reflects the redundancy of the question that could be well answered using the search function.  No ill will for sure.  Glad you're  here.

Photo Egg

GrillSgt said:

Here’s a pic of my Off Topic page. It’s easy to just not open a thread that doesn’t hold any interest for you, or at least I find it easy.


for you. 

You are right, It's anyones choice to view or not to view the OT posts.
My complaint would be how many times a legitimate BBQ post is hijacked for no reason. Same happens to many great OT posts. Many, not BGE related, are still excellent information on other products or cooking styles. They get spun in another direction and drug down the drain.
Many will say this is a public forum and you HAVE to expect things like this to happen. This is not a public forum. You have to sign up in order to post, but it's a BGE Corporate forum. Granted, very poorly moderated.
It's great to have some forum leniency and not be policed for every word but it really gets pushed well beyond a reasonable level on a regular basis.  

GrillSgt

I don't think many great threads get sidetracked. The ones that do are usually ones that have pretty much been played out or a thread that has been hashed, rehashed, sliced and diced many times. 

For example, there are @ 30 threads on the Egghead Forum front page and the only 2 that seem to have gone sideways are the Chik Fil A and How to cook a woodpecker threads. Both of those were only serving their destiny.

Photo Egg

GrillSgt said:

I don't think many great threads get sidetracked. The ones that do are usually ones that have pretty much been played out or a thread that has been hashed, rehashed, sliced and diced many times. 

Should not matter if you think it has been played out. Many others still read it looking for information and should not have to weed through the BS on a legitimate post. There are many OT posts, by the title, that I expect to be sideways. I have no issues with these going every direction.

GrillSgt

My point was that it doesn’t happen enough to let it ruin your enjoyment of the forum. Currently we have one thread on the front page of the Egghead forum that is sideways, and that was already sideways when it was reposted. Unless you’re disappointed that the how to cook a woodpecker thread didn’t really go into culinary details. 

GATraveller

The "clannish" atmosphere seems to be comprised mostly of those who plan/work/attend Fests and those who don't.  A majority of the ribbing is fun among friends.  In the few years I've been around all have been welcomed and I've yet to see any legitimate question go unanswered.  I've been active on several different forums over the years and have found this one self policed, better moderated and more tame/civil than most. 
Thank you for contributing and Merry Christmas!

fishlessman

if we stopped putting the cooking and bge type threads into the great void of "what are you doing right now- what are you buying right now" and just posted our cooks and cooking buys in their own thread things would look totally different from the outside.  those two threads are sucking all the egg related topics off the page.  would be better for new members but suck for the older members

alaskanassasin

I agree with fish a bunch of good cooks are on the whateryou doing now thread 

KennyCJR

That one got too much for me to keep with.   Guess I should scroll through for new cook ideas.  

KennyCJR

I don’t feel unwelcome here.  All of my questions have been answered...even the dumb ones. 

alaskanassasin

Without the shenanigans this forum would loose a substantial amount of resources. 

Jstroke

If you really think about it, part of the problem is the depth of knowledge that is pooled here with the "Elders". Anyone on here very long soon knows the people who post consistently who can run an egg with their eyes closed. When those old timers answer a question, unless the feeling is strong from others that there are different answers, the case is closed--next topic. Even so, it's true that it would be good to add a (^^^This^^^) to further confirm and support the answer. This forum is a community. Like any community, it has a "town council" of sorts, who try hard to keep the peace, work towards improving the greater good and keep life enjoyable. We try to keep it centered around the BGE, but the reality--mostly it's a 21st century coffee shop or the benches outside the courthouse where people congregate to share their lives, check up on town gossip and stay connected to other people that share common interest. As with any small town, the old timers have the history, the arcane knowledge and usually the real answers to the questions. If someone posts a question about the correct temperature for cooking a spatched turkey, you aren't going to get very many variations. When a thread gets rolling on a question, it is probably because many members have very different opinions about how to achieve the results.
Now, if we are not responding to "show and tell", new members with their first pork butt, or their new egg or even just the cook posts in general--shame on us. The point of the forum is support. Without some admiration for their achievements, people become despondent. Everyone needs atta-boys. And not just the Elders.
To me what it is more interesting to think about are the people who can seriously cook: that sit quietly, learn from our mistakes, test our theories, try new and different ways to achieve the same or better results, post infrequently and think the rest of us are idiots. I would love to hear more from them. 

northGAcock

Many of us have met up and developed friendships....which from where I sit is not a bad thing. We get ideas, help each other outside of BGE topics, know their spouses and enjoy the banter, critisim, humor, bitching, learning, photography, wisdom / stupidity, condolences, celebrations etc. this community brings. In my opinion similar to a neighborhood centered around a cul-to-sac or community center. We all contribute and recieve different things that we need (and don’t need) at any given point we log in and enguage. Keep in mind this is the Internet, and like a community we live in, people come, go, engage and disengage over time. It’s not for everyone everyday. 

Myself, I enjoy your post, cooks and insight. I value most on here and recognize differences as we go along. Don’t take this community too seriously or for granted. there are a lot of folks willing to help given their knowledge, availiablity at a particular time....many who will jump on the phone and talk out complex responses. Take it for what it is.....I am happy you are here. 

SaintJohnsEgger

I'm not wanting to outlaw off topic threads. I'm just pointing out that they get way more emphasis than BGE questions. It is almost Christmas and we are bound to get some new people here. We should be anxious to help them instead of arguing over Chik-fil-A's stance on marriage. And we we did want to debate that it should remain civil.

Yes, I may feel more like part of the in crowd if I attended Butt-Blast and other events. I attend my local Eggfest but I'm retired and can't afford to run all over the country to attend events that sound more like a drunken campout than an Egg event. I don't drink anymore so I doubt I would fit in even if i had the money to attend. That's the problem with retirement; you finally have the time but not the money. Just the opposite of when I was working.

I know how forums work having owned and run my own forum as well as being a member of one of the first major internet forum experiments (Badger Pond). Forums do go through growing pains and they do sometimes die a painful death. I just want to see this one hang around and be useful.

TEXASBGE2018

SaintJohnsEgger said:

I'm not wanting to outlaw off topic threads. I'm just pointing out that they get way more emphasis than BGE questions. It is almost Christmas and we are bound to get some new people here. We should be anxious to help them instead of arguing over Chik-fil-A's stance on marriage. And we we did want to debate that it should remain civil.

Yes, I may feel more like part of the in crowd if I attended Butt-Blast and other events. I attend my local Eggfest but I'm retired and can't afford to run all over the country to attend events that sound more like a drunken campout than an Egg event. I don't drink anymore so I doubt I would fit in even if i had the money to attend. That's the problem with retirement; you finally have the time but not the money. Just the opposite of when I was working.

I know how forums work having owned and run my own forum as well as being a member of one of the first major internet forum experiments (Badger Pond). Forums do go through growing pains and they do sometimes die a painful death. I just want to see this one hang around and be useful.

I think this one will be around for a long time to come. Yes it does wander off into "the dark side" but eventually it comes back into the light. Everyone contributes their part whether you or I agree with them or not, but like the country most of us live in. There are things we hate and things we love. The best advice I can offer is to stay in the light if that's where you like being. Cause those on here that dwell in the dark arm pits of this forum like the stink and ain't interested in deodorant.

JohnInCarolina

SaintJohnsEgger said:

Yes, I may feel more like part of the in crowd if I attended Butt-Blast and other events. I attend my local Eggfest but I'm retired and can't afford to run all over the country to attend events that sound more like a drunken campout than an Egg event. I don't drink anymore so I doubt I would fit in even if i had the money to attend. That's the problem with retirement; you finally have the time but not the money. Just the opposite of when I was working.

So a couple of things on this.  I will say that I don't think you really need to attend one of these kind of events to get to know people fairly well here.  I do interact regularly with a bunch of people here that I haven't met in person.  I feel like I know some of them fairly well, and I hope they feel the same way.

Secondly, while there is a bacchanal aspect to Butt Blast, we regularly have people there who aren't drinking much or even at all.  I don't think you have to imbibe to appreciate things like Nola stealing my pizza turner to stir his crawfish boil and other kinds of shenanigans.  You definitely don't need to be drinking to appreciate the food, although it does help to have had a good amount of bourbon before trying anything Brent puts out - just from an antiseptic standpoint.  I kid.  

I don't know man, this place is what it is.  It is unlikely to change anytime soon.  My advice is to try and focus on the things you value and ignore the things you don't.  I think that's generally a pretty good way to go through life.  

YEMTrey

nolaegghead

People really need to have more empathy.

DoubleEgger

I’m not getting into people’s feelings and the other hoopla, but to say that a question asked on this forum doesn’t get answered is simply not true. 

SaintJohnsEgger

As of earlier this morning there was one on the first page.

Legume

SaintJohnsEgger said:

As of earlier this morning there was one on the first page.

So answer it then.

DoubleEgger

SaintJohnsEgger said:

As of earlier this morning there was one on the first page.

I’m sorry that I had to get some work done this morning. I’ll jump right on it. 

nolaegghead

DoubleEgger said:

I’m not getting into people’s feelings and the other hoopla, but to say that a question asked on this forum doesn’t get answered is simply not true. 

I think you will understand people better if you try to understand their feelings and point of view, as we try to understand yours.