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Would you use an "Ignore Thread" feature?

Nymphae

Banned
If I have no intention of ever participating in a specific thread, I would like the ability to hide it from a subforum's topic list. I think this would increase people's engagement in threads they do enjoy, and it might even curb some shitposting that occurs when someone posts bile in a topic they don't really care about simply because it's an active topic they keep seeing.

Very specifically, there was that botched circumcision thread awhile back, and I had no interest in posting in it, and was getting really sick of seeing it every time I came into Off Topic. I don't think this feature would have many negative side effects, if any.
 
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It's a feature on a forum I used to visit.

With regard to here, if you put the thread starter on ignore the thread will vanish for you.
 

DadEggs

Member
dont think i would tbh, I just ignore it on my own if i'm not interested. not much reason for me to have to add it to an ignore list.
 

iconmaster

Banned
Yes! It’d stop me from having to ignore a user outright, which is often more than I really want to do.

Just get the thread off my page and keep reading his other stuff.
 
The inability of some people to simply tune out and ignore that which doesn't interest them/offends them astounds me. Safe spaces breed weak minds with no innate ability to set boundaries. We should steer away from such mental handicaps.
 
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Nymphae

Banned
The inability of some people to simply tune out and ignore that which doesn't interest them/offends them astounds me. Safe spaces breed weak minds with no innate ability to set boundaries. We should steer away from such mental handicaps.

I fail to see how me hiding a dumb thread I have no interest in is effectively any different than me simply "tuning out that which doesn't interest me"

I was reading "Two boys almost bled to death in botched circumcisions" several times a day and didn't really want to, how is me putting that thread on an ignore list hurting anything? I'm not going to engage with the thread anyway, and now I can see more threads I might care about. But please, pat yourself on the back for having the mental fortitude to not care. This would not negatively impact any conversations here.
 
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slugbahr

Unconfirmed Member
It could be a useful feature if it effectively bumped up the next thread. That is, if one on the first page was being ignored, it would show the first thread from the second page.
 

Nymphae

Banned
It could be a useful feature if it effectively bumped up the next thread. That is, if one on the first page was being ignored, it would show the first thread from the second page.

If you ignore a user, their threads do not show up in the list, so threads further down are 1 higher up in the list. It's not going to grab a thread from the next page, it's just going to bump the order of everything up 1.
 

iconmaster

Banned
Safe spaces breed weak minds with no innate ability to set boundaries.

I'd submit you're operating under a false dichotomy.

On the one extreme, there is excluding everything with which you disagree -- and making sure to exclude it for everyone else as well. That's the current college "safe space" model. On the other extreme, there is exposing yourself to everything in the world, everyone's voice and content at all times, regardless of how distasteful you find it.

Surely there are some points along that spectrum, and perhaps even a middle range where we could find common ground.
 

Ailynn

Faith - Hope - Love
I would definitely use this feature...especially in the Politics section.

I don't like the idea of outright ignoring a user, but sometimes thread titles can be a bit obnoxious and I would rather clear the space for more topics I'm interested in.
 
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Uhtred

Member
Honestly, since politics has its own section, I would be less likely to want to use it. Other forums though, its a must.
 
I fail to see how me hiding a dumb thread I have no interest in is effectively any different than me simply "tuning out that which doesn't interest me"

I was reading "Two boys almost bled to death in botched circumcisions" several times a day and didn't really want to, how is me putting that thread on an ignore list hurting anything? I'm not going to engage with the thread anyway, and now I can see more threads I might care about. But please, pat yourself on the back for having the mental fortitude to not care. This would not negatively impact any conversations here.

Was this causing undue mental stress? Yes/No? If yes, then fair dinkum. If no, then you're just being fussy.
 

Nymphae

Banned
Was this causing undue mental stress? Yes/No? If yes, then fair dinkum. If no, then you're just being fussy.

What would the potential downside be in letting me hide a thread that I have absolutely no interest in? If you can't think of one, you're just being a prick.
 

Nymphae

Banned
He is being fussy either way.

Personal responsibility and self control should become a factor at some point.

Again, if there are no negative effects of letting users filter threads they see, why does it matter if they want to be fussy? It's literally just a mechanical way to do what I would do anyway, ie. not look at threads that don't interest me.

In fact I have listed potential benefits that this feature would provide. I don't understand the pushback against a potentially beneficial tool, you're not even telling me how it would be bad in any way, just calling me names lol
 
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iconmaster

Banned
It occurs to me that "just ignore the thread-ignore feature" would be pretty equivalent to "just ignore the thread."

I can't see why either would take ethical precedence. You don't like the feature -- you ignore it. How hard is it to ignore stuff that offends you, right?
 

Wings 嫩翼翻せ

so it's not nice
Would you use an "Ignore NeoGAF" feature?

tenor.gif
 
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Mr Nash

square pies = communism
Nah, but boy would I have been tempted yesterday with all with all those Google console threads Voost was posting.
 

red_shift

Neo Member
More tools are better than less. It's not like anyone gets forced to use them.
I generally use the hover over menu to ignore users but whole threads would be a good option too.
 

Kadayi

Banned
Unlikely. I don't enter threads unless I have a stake in the subject, which is why you'll rarely if ever find me in a PS or Xbox thread unless it's related to a specific game.
 
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DKehoe

Member
Not really. I’ll usually give most threads at least a passing glance to see what kinds of things people are saying. Sometimes the threads you initially have no interest in can be the ones you learn the most from.
 
Absolutely, if would make the browsing experience much more enjoyable. I don’t need the daily AOC/Transgender/Sony is Doomed thread in my life. I don’t want to ignore the topic creators outright, so ignoring threads would clean my forum list nicely and still keep conversations possible in relevant topics
 
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Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
I'd love it. Used it heavily when I was on Era. I'd use it much more lightly here as there aren't as many annoying threads and less clutter with it being a smaller community.

But it's still a nice feature to have to get shit you don't care about off the front page so you see more threads you're interested in reading (I rarely browse past the first page when I check forums). For me with the gaming side I just want to see the news threads, review threads, preview threads and game OTs. I don't give a toss about social/political issues in gaming threads, the console warring/sales debate type threads and bunch of other crap that tends to make up a lot of the front page so I'd love to hide that crap.
 

paparazzo

Member
I’d use it for sure. I prefer not having to ignore a poster outright because of a thread that hangs on for days (i.e. the numerous poop threads).
 
I wouldn't, I don't like phasing out things. It's not like seeing a thread or an opinion annoys me and things that are bad like spam or other things should be dealt by moderation. Might be something that might be good for the mental health of some for sure, but it also carries its own price as well for an overall community. Implement it if you want, but I prefer just handling things I don't like being there by reading them, then going on or replying to/in it. Sometimes I'll just put a reply to a thread on hold as well, because I can't be bothered answering in the moment as well.

On one hand there's lots of interesting benefits to be able to just get the threads that interest you be given visibility, on the other hand that makes you sort of phase yourself out of the overall community discourse.
 
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Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
On one hand there's lots of interesting benefits to be able to just get the threads that interest you be given visibility, on the other hand that makes you sort of phase yourself out of the overall community discourse.

It doesn't really as you still see the threads and have to enter them and hit the ignore options. It's not a filter to auto hide threads.

People aren't going to hide threads they want to read and/or post in. They're just hiding things they're all ready manually ignoring by never opening, which as you note just de-clutters the first page for them.

In any case, Evilore just posted in another thread that they're going to enable the ignore thread feature so moot point to debate now. :D

 
It doesn't really as you still see the threads and have to enter them and hit the ignore options. It's not a filter to auto hide threads.

People aren't going to hide threads they want to read and/or post in. They're just hiding things they're all ready manually ignoring by never opening, which as you note just de-clutters the first page for them.

It doesn't really solve the problem I described. Not only does that mean that they are hiding things that they might just look at with a glance, but it also means that things they hide that annoy them, they'll fall out of the loop of and isolate themselves. It also works against a curious spirit in regards to threads, whereupon it might not be something that really interests you much, but you might gravitate to exploring it on a whim.
That's why I said it comes with a price, along with its benefits.
 
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Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
It doesn't really solve the problem I described. Not only does that mean that they are hiding things that they might just look at with a glance, but it also means that things they hide that annoy them, they'll fall out of the loop of and isolate themselves. It also works against a curious spirit in regards to threads, whereupon it might not be something that really interests you much, but you might gravitate to exploring it on a whim.
That's why I said it comes with a price, along with its benefits.

Meh, I just don't see it. Any thing I've ignored on forums with hide threads was 100% something I was never going to read or post in. I don't explore things on a whim, I'm not much interested in debating people online very often (unless bored like I have been a lot while recovering from an injury and surgery). I just want to see game news I care about and OTs for games I'm playing on the front page as much as possible. Hiding all the social/political/SJW/anti-SJW nonsense, all the console warring/sales numbers threads and what not helps. Especially here were game OTs outside of huge AAA releases tend to sink like a stone and the controversial topics stay front page for days or weeks.

But that's just me. I'm old, closed minded at this point and don't give much of a fuck about others opinions, so I like having ignore options to keep the gaming page to the news, previews, reviews and OT threads that do interest me and leave the bickering and debating to those who find that stuff enjoyable. I wasted too much time on that shit in my teens through 30 or so and have mostly noped out of it from my mid 30s on.

To each their own of course and it's an optional feature people don't have to use. You'll see any worries over discourse/debate declining are unfounded. Nothing changed on other sites I was on that enabled it, as again the people hiding threads weren't posting in those kind of topics before anyway so there's not impact to the community. Maybe a decline in shit posts as some trolls that get trigger opt to hide something rather than blowing a gasket and shitting up the thread--which is a positive change.
 
lol this is hilarious. what are you a mental giant now bc you read some random's thread regurgitating a news story?

No I made that quote up because it makes logical sense. Kids who are pampered/constrained in their formative years typically don't know how to manage their open ended affairs as adults. They often engage in excess to make up for their years of confinement. I've seen it with family and friends. Safe Spaces make for weak, maladjusted peeps. It's as damaging as letting your kids run wild and free to be raise by the streets. Just the other extreme.
 
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