I don’t want to offend anyone but can I ask for a favor?

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As a relatively new member of MPU Talk I am hesitant to mention this, but I feel like I need to ask this of everyone and let the “chips fall where they may”.

I found Mac Power Users kind of by accident, however as a recent member of the Mac/Apple community (long time Windows user) who wants to get more than just basic use from my tech gear, I have really enjoyed finding the podcast, David’s great training materials and this community. I really appreciate everyone’s willingness to help others, especially newbies like me, out.

There are so many lousy groups on Facebook. I just couldn’t find one that was as knowledgeable, friendly and helpful as this group is. That makes me appreciate the group even more.

However I was recently following a post that really seemed to go “off the rails” with the replies. I don’t want to elaborate on the topic as I don’t want to point fingers or blame anyone, but to summarize, the OP was asking for some software/service alternatives to those they were currently using. The OP’s post went on to explain that they were frustrated by their current vendors actions regarding a current events issue.

Due to the nature of the original post, the replies stated out providing many good alternatives for this user, but the topic quickly devolved into a banter about social/political issues.

I obviously speak for no one in the group other than myself, but I am personally very tired of the seemingly unending political vitriol that has consumed our nation. I know everyone has their opinions and views, but what I have learned is that almost no one is going to change their personal views due to debates (or arguments) in online forums. They inevitably end up in nothing more than name calling and insults with nothing of value being resolved.

I know social media and Internet forums are ripe with so many forums where activists and others with deeply held convictions can exchange ideas, however I don’t think MPU Talk is the appropriate venue for those topics.

So my request of everyone is that we all, as a community, avoid discussing these issues that can be so divisive and instead focus our comments on our common love of our Apple devices and learning how to get the most out of them.

I recognize that as a new member I may be out of line posting this and if I am and this post was not appropriate, please let me know. If these political/social discussions are part of what is normally discussed I may have selected the wrong group to be a part of…and I am more than willing to look for a different group with no hard feelings. I am not trying to change the group dynamic or limit the free expression of ideas. However I am personally not interested in political/social debates.

I would love to hear your thoughts and replies. I sincerely hope you all understand where I am coming from and that I have not offended any of you.

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While I completely agree with the sentiment - this is a tech centric forum and is best kept that way, please don’t fall into the trap of assuming US-centricity. Mac Power Users - and this forum by extension - is international!

So by saying “our nation” I assume you are not speaking about “my nation”, which is Australia.

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@Drewster our country is Australia :slight_smile: - it’s funny you mention US-centricity, the recent Relay adverts have been very US-centric (e.g. Bottomless coffee delivery), as have some of the subjects on the shows, but I guess it’s expected when the presenters are American!

I love the community too and would like it to stick to Apple-related tech issues and not veer into politics.

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Yep, politics free, please.
Let’s just geek-out together.

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Yes, keep politics out of this forum. Thank you, @RosemaryOrchard, for locking the offending thread.

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We get this question sometimes. We strive to work with sponsors with an international reach, but it isn’t always possible. The bulk of the audience is in the US (as is the company itself) so sometimes we do have sponsors who just focus on that market.

I agree with the rest of this. That thread went off the rails and Rosemary did the right thing by locking it. The most inflammatory thing here should where you put your macOS Dock and how keeping it at the bottom is wrong.

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Them’s fightin words :wink:

Seriously, I’ve tried it in other locations and keep putting it back on the bottom because there’s more space there for the icons I want in it.

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I try to be as politically inclusive as possible and generally vote (at least once) for every candidate on the ballot so that nobody feels left out.

(Dock on bottom of screen, autohiding. It’s the only sane way to deal with multiple displays :stuck_out_tongue: )

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Who still uses the dock, anyway? I thought that everyone had switched to Alfred(not that other one).

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Welcome @rhuleva

This forum rarely goes off the rails. That was a first as I have seen.

—
JJW

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I deleted my Facebook and Twitter accounts. Even though MPU was on there at the time. They were one of the first to leave and entered the annals of ‘cool kids’ accordingly.

I would advise anybody to do the same. I agree with the policy on this site. There is often not a clear line and it is not always possible to police every comment, the moderators do a good job as do the community, I did slip up myself in response to what I took to be a strong political statement once. It was slipped in, as so often, as ‘objective fact’. I self censored though after a long reply.
Now is advising to delete Facebook and Twitter accounts ‘political’? :wink:

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Yeah the community does a good job of self policing really. Quite unusual in that way. I did slip up myself once and self censored you might say after a lengthy reply. I would say that strictly speaking the exchange was ‘political’ in some sense though. It is hard to draw a line. "Party political’ mostly people mean in America by ‘political’.

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Agree that our group is a cut above,
and pretty well self policed.

Something I have always appreciated
is that often (not always, but more often
than not) folks provide feedback on their OP.

Did xxx work for Tom’s problem?
Was Sally’s explanation helpful?

Too often these are left to the users imagination.
Mac Power Users close the loop. Thank you!

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Agreed, wholeheartedly.

Apple is also one of the most “political” companies out there. They are obviously encouraging its customers to engage in these topics. Odd for the biggest (and best!) forum out there to have such a disengaged stance.

I’m here to chat about where to place the dock. I don’t see myself bringing up these “divisive” issues. But I also won’t tolerate another user posting drivel about human rights issues. And mods, I think you need to be ready to deal with those issues, too.

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Would those of you who want to discuss politics like you would on a general forum consider two things?

  1. It takes up more time and thought of our hosts/forum moderators. That’s going to affect the podcasts and writing they do.
  2. It sucks the air out of the room — people will participate less in the other threads when they comment in or read political threads.
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It’s just…what happens to topic-focused forums when they broaden the discussion. If you want that, that’s fair. Apologies for assuming it hadn’t been considered.

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Thank you for saying something, this forum is not the place for anything other than tech conversation. If one wants to “get political” then there is another forum somewhere on the internet for you to do so, but I agree that closing that topic before it got out of control was the right thing to do. Thank you @RosemaryOrchard!

@ismh the dock should be on the right side and not hidden with no magnification, just sayin…

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As a first approximation we can at least keep political discussions confined to technology issues. Particularly Apple-related technology issues.

I’m politically active in my non-MPU life, and often post political opinion to my personal social media feeds. But that’s not what I come here for.

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Facebook is a good example of the problem; their activity and user engagement are declining. Facebook’s changes to make the newsfeed more focused on personal life and less engaged with pages (many of which political) are an attempt to counteract that.

Metafilter is another good example. They are a larger community than this one, but they have long forum threads, like Discourse’s. They started allowing some large political threads in 2016. Some users measured activity and were able to show that the political threads reduced activity elsewhere on the site. The site staff also measured how they spent their moderation time and found a disproportionate amount was being spent on the political threads. This summer, they disallowed those threads and have seen those two negative trends reverse. MetaFilter is a bit famous among community managers for their considered approaches to these things.

An empirical case for maintaining the old level of activity per thread would be tough to make unless you could get existing users to spend a lot more time here or get a bunch of new users. You’d also have to make up for the people who would leave in response to the change. I respect that members like Wolfie recognize and intentionally choose to pay those costs, but I don’t think ignoring them or hoping to be an exception to the rule without a plan is wise.

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I think we can all agree to be kind to one another. Gonna close this before it gets weird.

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