A Final Solution to the Proving Grounds Problem

[Trollita]

I lurk. (Finally squatted my favorite screenname because I’m being spoofed and figured I’d plant a flag here.)

I know no system is perfect, but I’m inclined to believe PG functions as a containment area. Just lending my perspective as a humble lurker here.

 

[Jack Awful]

Combine the two.

Delete the board and have the promoted autists format the threads that have potential, but have shitty OPs.

 

[Mushroom Soup]

Turn PG into a section for inactive/uninteresting cow threads. New threads are made in the Lolcow section, if they are inactive they get moved to the Aborted Lolcow section. If they become active again they get moved back into the regular Lolcow section, etc.

 

[mindlessobserver]

Rather then nuking proving grounds, perhaps turn it less into a development hell and more into an entry forum. All new threads go in and after 48 hours a mod will move it to the relevant forum or delete it if it's objectively terrible. Make the standards more realistic as well. If a thread doesnt have enough material to sustain itself it will fall to the bottom of the forum and be forgotten about anyway.

 

[Clockwork_PurBle]

I tend to agree with Trollita: it's shit but I think it's probably better in the long run to have a containment area for the shit.

However, there are also plenty of active threads out of proving grounds that have shit OPs, or at least OPs that haven't been updated in forever and are missing a good 70% of the cow's "story" or current state (like the Onision one).

 

[Zvantastika]

I don't think that mods need to format OPs thread for it to work, instead just make some sort of a list that mods can check and let OP know what it lacks for the thread to work. A simple list should do, like:

• Title with cow most used username(s), no real name required.
• When did the cow started being exceptionally relevant.
• How did it got found out.
• WHAT makes it a cow.
• Why is it still funny.
• 2 examples of most recent meltdowns or shenanigans.

We don't need a full bio of the cow, we don't need to know every single thing the cow has done since its birth, we don't need a million screenshots of the cow face or reuploads of its content, we just need a very quick summary of why it is funny, the rest will come after it catch people interest.

Anyway, I guess having a better guideline on how to properly make a thread and making it more simple for the OP instead of manually correcting them is the way to go.

Purge the old threads tho, nobody cared then, nobody will care now.

 

[whatever I feel like]

Glad to see it go, it really has led to stagnation.

 

[ThinkThankThunk]

From my admittedly little time on the site, I don't think I've seen any noteworthy threads come from the Proving Grounds in the last year or so. If anything the opposite is true - most of the high volume threads I've seen lately are made in Multimedia or General Discusssion to sidestep PG, with little or no information added to the OP at first. ProJared and the Weeb Wars shit come to mind - they're high traffic and have very dedicated readers, but I don't think for a second most of what those threads started out with would have made it out of PG in time for them to take off.

I have a small anecdote that while irrelevant to most other users experiences, I think it highlights my problems with PG. My only attempt at trying to write an OP for Proving Grounds was making a Mumkey OP before any of the big drama hit. I had a chronology of his fuck-ups and friends written, but it didn't have any doxes and it seemed poorly written so I just shitcanned it. A week or two later someone made a thread on him in Multimedia circumventing PG and only had an embedded video and only wrote something along the lines of "this is Mumkey, here's a video about him". It soured me on the idea of the Proving Grounds because even with a very blah start, the thread and OP turned out great; almost certainly better than mine would have been because it gave other users a chance to add their own understanding of events to the discussion. If better and more popular threads can be made without PG's restrictions, why bother with it? I say get rid of Proving Grounds, and if it floods other boards with low quality shit too much just reinstate it as is.

 

[Twinkie]

OPs can always be improved later. The chantal thread has one of the worst OPs on this site and it might hit 2000 pages before 2020 someone is working on an OP right now and it's gon b gud

 

[Zebedee]

Rather then nuking proving grounds, perhaps turn it less into a development hell and more into an entry forum. All new threads go in and after 48 hours a mod will move it to the relevant forum or delete it if it's objectively terrible. Make the standards more realistic as well. If a thread doesnt have enough material to sustain itself it will fall to the bottom of the forum and be forgotten about anyway.

Seconded, only the strong threads survive.

 

[Burning Fanatic]

Honestly, I don't think PG is in such a terrible spot. I've seen a number of users, myself included, offer feedback toward improving OPs. Sometimes the Original Posters listen and try to improve it right away, while other times they ignore it and do nothing. In which case, I think it's best as to promote OPs that have potential (in terms of substantive subject matter) and throw out ones that go nowhere.

Ultimately, I'd like to help out, though would rather not have to reformat or rewrite for other people entirely via Option 1.

 

[Freya]

It's lame to put in work making a new thread only for it to be deleted along with a mod barking at you about how you're
butthurt and nobody will find your thread interesting.
If you build it, autistics will come

 

[The Cunting Death]

Option 2 Electric Boogaloo
Also happy early birthday null

 

[StrawberryDouche]

I think whatever you decide, there needs to be standards, or there needs to be no standards at all.

For example: is archiving videos and SM accounts a standard or not?

If there are no minimum standards to be met, then it's just going to be an exceptional free-for-all of vengeance threads and low effort unfunny shit. It sounds like that would be making work for yourself and your mods and no one needs more work.

I really like the idea of The Pitch. If the pitch is good, then there can be a group effort (if need be) at writing and gathering and archiving info. Then, someone who is good at formatting can post it. Maybe put the pitch up for a vote first to see if it moves forward into writing and compiling?

For example: that Molly Woodward thread has a damn good cow just languishing because the OP is absolutely unreadable rage wanking SHIT, BUT, there is a poster there who seems to be open to doing some work.

 

[BrunoMattei]

Option 2 Electric Boogaloo
Also happy early birthday null

Option 2: The Legend of Curly's Gold.

FFS man.

 

[Lesbian Sleepover]

Leave it intact with refreshed guidelines.

 

[Horus]

I am leaning towards keeping PG, however, have some clearly defined rules for a post there. These new hypothetical rules don't have to be super strict, but it also needs to be more then just a screenshot and a link to a social media account of some kind.
Basically some info on the person in question, and a basic argument on why said person is a lolcow should be enough to "prove" the thread and move it to the appropriate area of the site.
This can be followed up with some sort of inactivity timer. If a newly moved thread is not getting traction, it can be moved to an archive dump.

 

[BSV]

Rather then nuking proving grounds, perhaps turn it less into a development hell and more into an entry forum. All new threads go in and after 48 hours a mod will move it to the relevant forum or delete it if it's objectively terrible. Make the standards more realistic as well. If a thread doesnt have enough material to sustain itself it will fall to the bottom of the forum and be forgotten about anyway.

this right here, I think it wise to have at least a small buffer.

 

[Freddy Freaker]

Option 2. Besides, we might get some nice milk from idiots who think we're the alt-right doxxxxxxxxxx squad or something

 

[lightswitchdoll]

Rather then nuking proving grounds, perhaps turn it less into a development hell and more into an entry forum. All new threads go in and after 48 hours a mod will move it to the relevant forum or delete it if it's objectively terrible. Make the standards more realistic as well. If a thread doesnt have enough material to sustain itself it will fall to the bottom of the forum and be forgotten about anyway.

I voted option 2 before I read the rest of the thread but I actually think this is a better idea. And if it stays dark then it still gives people 48hrs to archive everything before the cow nukes their shit.