Intensive

[busker]

I forget the reason why it was password-protected in the first place, but is it time to revisit that decision?

[dukealien]

I forget the reason why it was password-protected in the first place, but is it time to revisit that decision?

As I recall, the reason for password-protecting Intensive was that too many newcomers were submitting their first efforts on Intensive.  They were surprised and unhappy with what they got, and (frankly) something of a trial to their critics.

My suggestion then was to let everyone *see* the thread, but not participate until the mods judged them ready for it.  This would let newcomers get a feel for what they'd be getting into with Intensive, and how to respond appropriately.  But this was not technically feasible (and may not have been a great suggestion anyway).

The quality of the present crop of newcomers is quite high.  On the other hand, that means they're giving evidence of being prepared to get he password; our luck with new members may not hold up.

[Tiger the Lion]

I forget the reason why it was password-protected in the first place, but is it time to revisit that decision?

As I recall, the reason for password-protecting Intensive was that too many newcomers were submitting their first efforts on Intensive.  They were surprised and unhappy with what they got, and (frankly) something of a trial to their critics.

My suggestion then was to let everyone *see* the thread, but not participate until the mods judged them ready for it.  This would let newcomers get a feel for what they'd be getting into with Intensive, and how to respond appropriately.  But this was not technically feasible (and may not have been a great suggestion anyway).

The quality of the present crop of newcomers is quite high.  On the other hand, that means they're giving evidence of being prepared to get he password; our luck with new members may not hold up.

Hey Busker. I am just bumping this because I didn't want you to feel that it passed by ignored. The issue can certainly be revisited. Duke's explanation summed it up for the most part. It may have been an anomaly at the time, but we were being bombarded with newbies' grade school quality poems that were getting grade school quality responses from other newbies. The intensive forum was in danger of degrading beyond repair, but for Quix who spent a lot of time moving threads, and messaging the new members. (who generally don't care and don't respond, only create more work) So the PW idea was a sort of stop gap to prevent intensive from becoming a joke. I have yet to refuse anyone the PW, so it's not about intensive being a special club. All you really are required to do is follow the rules for ten minutes. Having said that, the visibility of the forum is a problem. Feel free to PM me if you have ideas.

[busker]

I forget the reason why it was password-protected in the first place, but is it time to revisit that decision?

As I recall, the reason for password-protecting Intensive was that too many newcomers were submitting their first efforts on Intensive.  They were surprised and unhappy with what they got, and (frankly) something of a trial to their critics.

My suggestion then was to let everyone *see* the thread, but not participate until the mods judged them ready for it.  This would let newcomers get a feel for what they'd be getting into with Intensive, and how to respond appropriately.  But this was not technically feasible (and may not have been a great suggestion anyway).

The quality of the present crop of newcomers is quite high.  On the other hand, that means they're giving evidence of being prepared to get he password; our luck with new members may not hold up.

Hey Busker. I am just bumping this because I didn't want you to feel that it passed by ignored. The issue can certainly be revisited. Duke's explanation summed it up for the most part. It may have been an anomaly at the time, but we were being bombarded with newbies' grade school quality poems that were getting grade school quality responses from other newbies. The intensive forum was in danger of degrading beyond repair, but for Quix who spent a lot of time moving threads, and messaging the new members. (who generally don't care and don't respond, only create more work) So the PW idea was a sort of stop gap to prevent intensive from becoming a joke. I have yet to refuse anyone the PW, so it's not about intensive being a special club. All you really are required to do is follow the rules for ten minutes. Having said that, the visibility of the forum is a problem. Feel free to PM me if you have ideas.

Makes sense. The only issue I find is that because I'm not logged in to the Pen all the time, it's easy for me to miss 'Intensive' because I can't see what new posts are in there. Once in a while I do log in and check it out, but for the most part it's out of sight out of mind. Projecting my experience on to others, I would guess that 'Intensive' is losing significant traffic as a result.
The best solution would be, as duke said, to keep it visible but restrict posting rights. But that appears to be technically infeasible.
Anyway, I don't feel too strongly either way on this issue, so happy to run with things as they are.