Poetry Forum Guidelines

I don't know why, but it bugs the shit outta me when people come into this forum, expect feed back on their poems but don't bother to take the time to post to anyone elses threads....
Personally I find that rude and inconsiderate~!
Sorry and thanks, I just had to get that offa my mind.*smooths ruffled feathers back into place*
On that note, it reminds me of a lil ditty from an unknown author....

Conversations often fly,
Brain in neutral,
Tongue in high.

 

I second that notion gdh! It's very rude.

 

~* Really...how hard would it be to just post, liked it, thanks.....and when they whine about not getting any responses....grrrrrrrr~! I find alotta times I end up not reading them because all of the sudden the forums have quite a few from one person and I can see that they haven't taken a moment of their time. My time is just as valuable as theirs. Everyone likes some kind of response ffs... *~

 

Cheers gdh, thanks for speaking out! :sunglasse

 

Yup, and criticism shouldn't be taken as light duty. If you like something, say it but if you don't, for the love of anything that actually might make sense in this world, offer some advice. I see praise in here all the time for efforts that were probably just retrieved from the garbage can. Don't patronize people and poems by being so glib. Nuff said! Kidder, wordsmith, prick but still a nice guy!

 

i couldn't agree more; it's a shame that it even has to be said. half of me doesn't really care, and I'm content to let people do whatever it is they do, as I believe that it's a self defeating practice to run in, drop a poem down, and run off again. I know that I for one, began improving once I started receiving constructive criticism and taking it seriously; and got even better after I was able to recognize how to give constructive criticism.

Unfortunately, most people seem to only want to write for themselves, indifferent to an audience. I fail to see the logic of posting on a public forum if you're not interested in increasing your effect on that audience.

I almost wish there was one of those "you must post two replies to every thread you create" rules; but I dunno. I could also go to another poetry site that does have that rule in place. I don't want to give constructive criticism to someone that doesn't want it. Many people take it too personally.

 

~Ahhhhh, but they aren't indifferent to having an audience. So many whine please read, please respond, but don't bother to themselves. Yeah, the two response thing is nice if for no other reason as to teach people that this is indeed a polite thing to do. Don't take without giving back.
ACK~!!! another pet peeve,lolol...people that post so many at once...ffs~! ummm....can't you spread your treasures out a bit? Give others a bit of time on the front page too? (Must be in bitch mode,lol, the older I get the more I don't mind speaking my mind. Not on the earth to win a popularity contest)

 

Or at least put them in one thread! I know that not as many people reply in them, so throw some bait out there every so often; maybe you'll get some new fans frequenting...

 

We feed, with our attention, that which we wish to grow.

I would rather have silence and fade away due to lack of interest,
than insincere comments made out of obligation.

Act without regrets. Know that these forums are an interactive relationship. Treat each poem as a gift. A thank you is so appreciated, if the gift was enjoyed. This applies to any relationship. It takes time and energy to share, circulating an insightful or positive vibe breaths life into the continuance.

 

No obligation, just honesty. It's a relationship in which we reciprocate, share, grow, relate, help, understand, comfort with words - responses.

 

I find such truth here. The simple "I liked this" comment can bolster a fledgling poet with nerve enough to keep writing and posting. For the majority of poets here, that seems to be all that's needed or wanted.

There are those among us that are skilled enough to give more elaborate criticism, though; but (and this is imo), I believe two things should be figured in first. One: whether the original poster actually wants criticism; and two: how to conduct constructive criticism, if they do want it (and I think this especially important). Maintaining a positive atmosphere is vital when giving criticism. Also, I've yet to see a full blown critique on this forum. I could write a full blown essay on this subject, as I do think that there's almost an art to it.

Anyways, I guess this topic should boil down to this: the regulars setting the example. There's a fantastic group here, with more coming and going all the time. Those who keep coming back are going to see how the regulars operate, and they'll conform; at least according to sociology. A kind and gentle helping hand along the way, arguably, couldn't hurt, tho.

 

There are advantages and disadvantages to having one location for all of a poets offerings.

It seems as if this concept quickly devolves into reading the last post and considering the rest as static.
Yet, posting more than three new poems seems distracting and denies other new poems time to be seen.

How long should a thread be, for accessibility?

Would revisions or additons to the 2nd page of a 10 page thread be noticed?

Do you prefer to see 3 individual poems surface once, and then disappear, or is it a nice surprise to read them as a unit?

Should poems only of a certain theme be grouped?

After two weeks if comments of thanks turned into a new poem would you find it disrespectful?

Does a multiple poem thread turn into a status of ego rank with stars and views detracting from a present living vibrancy?

I would like to hear from others on this.

 

My opinion on this….

There are definite advantages to having all your stuff within one or two threads that are continuously being updated, especially if you write a lot of poetry. Having all your work in one thread keeps all your work visible to a larger amount of people. In my case, my favorite work is in my first two big threads which I don’t update any more. So they’re getting pretty much no exposure. On the other hand, I was only getting comments from the same few people, usually. That’s not why I killed those threads, but yeah, posting stuff separately definitely nets more viewers who’ll comment. So I guess there’s plusses and minuses depending how you look at it.

I think three poems in separate threads, all posted within the same day, is a little rude to the rest of the community. Mind you, I won’t react offensively to it, I just won’t read the thread(s)... usually. I don’t think there’s any limit to how long people should make their threads, if they even choose to make one.

I don’t think revisions like that will get noticed too much with the big threads. With the smaller collections, though; when someone new comes along to take it in, of course they’re going to see the revised version; so yeah, that’s beneficial.

I like the theme idea, personally. But I also write a lot of multi-part pieces. There are also days where I’ll write a whole slew of poems, and I’ll usually throw them up as a group as well. I’ve had good results doing this, as well, when it’s all thrown up at once.

I think no to both of these. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a battle of ego’s in here… or maybe I’ve not been paying attention well enough… lol. Also, I wouldn’t find it disrespectful to take peoples comments and revise a poem and post it again. I think if it’s off the first page or two and someone wants to post up the revision, especially if they made drastic changes, that’d be great. I don’t think I’ve seen hardly anybody here do that. It’s a shame, too, that’s a great way to improve your poetry, imo.

This should be a stickied thread. There’s a lot of ways in which this community could better itself if some good guidelines were discussed and implemented. Alas, we’ve no mod.

 

Thank you for your well reasoned insight, Fulmah.

Does anyone else have an additional stance on this?

 

I think you should post them all seperatly. But not like 10 in a row. I post every couple of days if i feel like it, I would post in a set if i had several at a time.

As far as not reading them based on multiple posts seem a bit prickish and pretentious, i read based on the title, regardless of how many posts the person made, maybe they just didnt know any better.

 

hmm, would there be a way to get a mod to merge people's threads so that individuals would have like one thread each for their poems? i mean...it's just an idea, but if everyone did it....it would seem less complicated...

like..if anyone's been in the UK forum, there's this thing called a 'flyology' which is basically one thread per person which is updated....

 

Here's my take on it. If you post a lot, or if you don't post a lot but, on a given day, are going to post multiple poems, it should be done in one thread. In the first case, it keeps all your work in one place. It's not so bad if the first few pages become "static" or unnoticed, hopefully they were read when they were new. Besides, if you were to post them seperately, the older ones would never get read anyways, as they'd be buried in old pages. At least in the single-thread method, your old stuff has a chance to be seen. In the second case, this keeps your multiple poems in one thread, so that you don't clog up the front page all at once.

But if you're like me, who generally only posts one poem at a time, and not incredibly often (every few days, maybe), then posting individually isn't so bad. Plus, it's nice when you go back to read the comments to know what poem they will be referring to, often I'll put up a poem hoping for criticism on how to improve (though usually don't get any).

I also agree that I wouldn't mind seeing reposts of revised poems, since, as was said, it's a great way to improve. People can see the old one, then the new one, and the poem (and poet) grows as a living thing. There's always room for improvement, they say, so I wouldn't mind seeing more revisions.

 

good idea. also, on the subject of comments and critiquing....i think it would be a good idea if you see a post that hasn't had a reply and be the reply to that post. makes me feel guilty when i see lots of noughts on the right and gives you a sense of wellbeing

 

wanted to make this a sticky but i don't know how! I jsut think it would be so much better if people commented on at least one other poem on here if posting their poems too. You like having comments, so do to others as you would have them do to you! Comment especcially on those with 0 comments...

 

i've emailed Skip about moderators or stickies or something so we can get some guidelines up here. and named a few of the regular posters like sylvanlightning, fulmah and SvgGrdnBeauty