It baffles me that anti-Apple people would bother to go to the trouble of registering for an Apple news forum.
That said I don’t understand people commenting on any news or YouTube channel in the way they do.
Maybe I’m getting old.
3 Likes
100% my experience. I looked up a couple of people who trolled me and this one guys posts three times a day on anti-apple rants and has for about two years. I’m thinking his ex-girlfriend (maybe pretend girlfriend) must have really like Apple. That site has become almost unusable. Thankful for this community for sure.
3 Likes
I’ve posted there since October 2009, 4706 posts but only 7 this year. I don’t use that much new Apple gear nor the latest OSes, which is where most of the activity is on MacRumors. Never had any problems with trolls, but I rarely post or read the forums on the News. Since MPU forums came on line I spend far more time here.
3 Likes
Even Reddit has good discussions on specialized topics - although they’re not easy to find.
I was active on the MacRumors forums until a year or two ago. I only go there now if I’m doing a quick search for experiences related to weird hardware or software issues that I’m seeing. The MPU discourse forums are both a better community fit for me and have better navigation tools. And, yeah, there was something weirdly random and not particularly helpful about the behavior of the moderators on the MacRumors forums that I sometimes found irritating.
3 Likes
I think comment sections (and therefore forum comments) all over the web can be pretty rough. I see some pretty brutal treatment out there.
It makes me incredibly thankful for this discussion group. Every now and then a topic may get a little heated here, but it’s nothing like other parts of the web. People here treat people with respect and dignity — quite refreshing!
Thanks to the mods including @RosemaryOrchard for that!!!
8 Likes
The software is Discourse, and it provides a really nice forum experience. A lot of software developers have been using Discourse in recent years for their forums.
Katie
I follow Macrumors to stay up on Apple news items, software updates, new third party products, etc. The Macrumors forums on Apple-related products and their use or troubleshooting can be helpful at times as well. With their large user base, those forums are also useful to spot early problems with Apple software updates. But the comments from some users there are sometimes snarky and not helpful, especially if you are trying to get help with a problem. Topics often veer off course, and it takes a lot of effort to go through some threads to glean any useful information.
Macrumors is a for-profit site as far as I know, so getting a large user base and having a lot of clicks makes sense for them financially. For the user, however, it can be an unpleasant experience. And their politics thread is a complete dumpster fire. There are about 10-15 regulars who post dozens of rude, intolerant and insulting messages at all hours of the day, every day, and the moderators tolerate it for financial reasons in my opinion. Personally, I think those folks have some kind of pathology about being online, similar to a social media addiction. I’d much rather spend my online time here with happy productive people.
4 Likes
Consulting the MacRumors buy/don’t buy advice is an essential step when planning any Apple upgrade. I don’t read their forums. I get Apple news through RSS and the MacRumors feed is one that I follow. The one I go to for in depth articles is Appleinsider and I also enjoy their podcast and the related Space Javelin podcast. I tried posting to Appleinsider forums about a specific issue I had but I didn’t find it a useful experience.
1 Like
As self selected and cloistered as this and really all online groups are, they are still part of this world and therefore reflective of the world. The ills anywhere are an expression of what is incomplete and unfulfilled within each of us. There’s really no escaping our connection with each other. The lovers rejoice in their experience of connection while those who connection is diminished seek that experience in any way they can.
I suggest seeing their struggle with compassion and take it as the highest expression of love they can currently muster. This compassionate embracing of our own and others incompleteness will melt whatever is there. Miracles will occur. The lotus takes the muck and sludge from the bottom of the lake and transforms it into something beautiful. Each of us can do the same.
It takes something to do this. Sometimes I find it helpful to remember this quote by Rilke~
"“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”
5 Likes
A few months ago, I began an article (about something I’d found in the Ars Technica forums) with these observations:
“It can be hard on one’s psyche to visit the comments sections of many tech-oriented Web sites, particularly when people are in a nasty mood about something, and most particularly when the trolls come out brandishing their typical ‘I-hate-this-and-Imma-gonna-tell-ya-why-for-the-millionth-time-with-what-I-consider-to-be-my-clever-wit’ approach.
“MacRumors, I’m looking at you, bud.”
1 Like
Undying company loyalty - or disloyalty - has always been illogical to me.
Whether its Ford vs Chevy vs Honda vs whatever or Android vs iPhone or Apple vs Dell, these are all just companies.
Companies have brands. The brands are partly based on reputation and word of mouth and partly manufactured by the company to make you believe certain ideals about the company and its products - whether they are true or not. Actual track record is the only component of the brand that should be considered. Throw away the marketing and the rest and make the saying “actions speak louder than words” hold true.
Companies are collections of people, who constantly change, and are operating in environments that force companies to constantly react. No company is the same today as it was yesterday, despite our sentimental human nature.
Apple made some objectively terrible computers back in the day and it could be argued that the reliability issues of the primary input device (butterfly) for the recent MacBooks make them less than good (to the point that a lot of “fans” hesitate to recommend to friends and family). But, Apple in 2019 decided to listen and changed the keyboard on one model. Apple in 2018 decided it wasn’t worth changing course on the keyboard. (Maybe they couldn’t due to supply chain but all that matters is the product offerings at that time.)
The point is that companies are dynamic entities and while you can factor in track record to try and predict whether such an entity will or will not do the “right” thing by customers but it’s still a guess.
I believe we should respond to any company‘s products and services as they exist today because that’s all that really matters. (Of course we should also applaud a track record of good decisions over time but it can’t excuse current anti-customer behavior.)
Lovers and haters who blindly apologize or bash, respectively, do consumers no favors. That behavior provides no market accountability which is the main thing, that forces companies to strive to exceed their customers needs and desires.
I think the MPU fam is generally rational in this way and it’s one of the many great things about this place! 
I’m beginning to agree with the sentiments of others on this forum. MacRumors does not seem like a friendly place at all, being full of disrespectful users.
I hope that other people share a similar opinion.
3 Likes
Can’t share the opinion because I don’t ever go to their forum and am even less likely to after reading this 
- what I can say is this MPU forum is a fantastic, supportive, helpful and positive community that I am grateful to be a part of.
5 Likes
I think we can all agree on that. Maybe we are a bit biased, but that’s okay. 
3 Likes
I have wanted to say the same thing since I first joined. So far, this forum is active and has a large community of polite users. Other forums are often inactive or riddled with impolite users and trolls. Mac Power Users has the best of both worlds. 
https://talkedabout.com/threads/macrumors-prsi-forum-allowing-right-wing-trolls-to-ruin-the-experience-for-everyone.672/
2 Likes
I agree wholeheartedly about this forum, it is a great place.
As to other forums and comment sections of social media sites, I simply ignore most of those. Sadly, on most internet sites people are far more inclined to complain, criticize, and attack than to share positive helpful information. I for one have decided that I’m not going to take time out of my life for the trolls and the naysayers.
5 Likes
I’ll give a big amen to that!
I agree with several others that this forum is far more pleasant than many sites — and I have been on it longer than most others. But it has the benefit of requiring to be admitted — and you can be de-admitted
But the other aspect is that it is not one-sided on almost any topic. You get the good, the bad, and everything in between. This makes it valuable (in addition to being friendly).
3 Likes
In the private school arena we refer to this as “losing one’s enrollment privilege.” 
1 Like