On this site there is often very intellectual dialogue from some very experienced traders, professional, independent and otherwise. And then there are cicrumstances where, for example, someone wants to build a trading box and there is harassment such as "What does it matter? In two months when you blow up your account you'll just be sitting there with a shiny new box and nothing to do with it. What are you going to do, take up gaming as a hobby? So just go buy a gaming computer." That is insulting, childish, counterproductive and has a tendency to run legitimate people off. So I'm going to start clicking the "Complain" button when I see these posts and openly encourage others to do the same. I'm sure moderators take care of what they see but if we the users don't bring it to their attention we have to assume it's getting by and will only continue if not accelerate. The expected result is that rogue accounts will be terminated and the site will be better for the sincere users who enjoy it. If rogue users come back under a new account they can be wiped out just as fast. Am I understanding the policies of this site correctly?
1) there is going to be a lot of different opinions on what constitutes something worth complaining about. 2) this is a forum, and the main point is debate, discussion, different opinions on topics. There are some who only like hearing "Happy" thoughts on a topic and dislike dissent. 3) to me, the worst thing here, is uninformed posters. You make an effort to ask a question, inform, give an opinion, debunk, or otherwise develop the thread, and then some follow up with thoughts unrelated to the topic, having zero intellectual value, unprovoked character attacks (rather than focusing on the subject), etc. But again, people putting in thoughts that are clearly useless... 4) just be aware that perhaps half the time, the Complain button is entirely ignored. I used to report spammers that way, and depending on the thread/mod, nothing was done. Reporting here on Feedback usually results in 100% attention... If someone bothers you, you can complain, but the mods will generally tell you the simplest thing to use is the Ignore button.
Thanks for starting this thread mgookin! What you stated is my feeling exactly. There are many "self important" people on this forum. They don't have much (read "zero") value to add to the topic at hand but feel the need to add their comments whose only purpose is to put other people down and poke fun at them. "Moron" and "Idiot" are everybody else's name. "What do you need 20 monitors? Displaying porn on 19 of them I assume..." "Why is the imediate reaction, next comes what a moron! i guess you practice moving your head like some kind of pigeon all day long looking at screens back and forth... pigeon" "What a fucking mess..." The list goes long. Some of these came from posters with over 10,000 posts. That goes to show the number of post is not an indication of respectability. Typically I find that, on the contrary, posters who have been around a long time with low post counts are more solid. And there are those who are Absolutely Authoritative with short answers like "Nonsense!" and "Wrong!". Plus the new threads every month or so saying nobody can make money trading... no retail trader can ever succeed... Exchanging opinions in a civil manner is a good thing. But rejecting other posters' ideas with derogatory phrases and demeaning behaviors are what would drive others away. They would think, because this is what I typically think: "Why would I need to spend time in a shouting match with low lifes?" As the above idea of terminating rogue accounts... good luck with that. I think "Cold" proves how effective that can work. He comes back to the forum with a new handle a few times every month. For people who have been around for a while, they can spot him right away. But probably not for new participants.
Still looking forward to the day that ET puts some kind of minimal verification process in place - charge $1 to a credit card, moneybookers, or paypal, and must be verified account. 70-aliase people like cold and some spammers would struggle to be able to register another user ID