I think there needs to be a “General Discussion” button on top. It’s too hard to go from here to GD. There is some market segmentation going on.
I agree that this would help, although we now have general discussions for each exam separately. Perhaps a general discussion with a drop-down menu (CFA, CAIA, FRM)
bcad, your posts make it sound like black swan was some completely reasonable guy who just wanted to get along with everyone and had no extreme points of view. this is so far from reality and i would argue there is no one on the forum in the last 3-4 years that i have been active who has been on the complete opposite end of that spectrum.
he routinely got into head to head arguments over stupid stuff with people concerning his athletic prowess (running “ultras”, “hucking ledges on skis,” etc I could go on and on. just absurd stuff.
i remember a thread where he seemed to believe if the world came to an end he was just going to get into his car and casually drive off on the highway to his cabin in the middle of nowhere with all of his guns and live a completely self sustained existence. you can’t make this stuff up.
he was an interesting character, but when i say “come back” it’s partly because the village needs it’s idiot back. greenman just does not cut it.
This is really big for me. I used to post here like 2 years ago (even played in the AF Fantasy League once) and stopped once the site converted to this new format. It became a lot harder to navigate and I think a lot of people who used to post stopped for possibily the same reason. I came back recently for the fun of it, but it does seem a little different. I think that it’s easier to click on Water Cooler than to go into CFA --> CFA Forums --> General Discussion, so I find myself frequenting the WC more often.
That’s not exactly how I remember it, but whatever.
I think the important thing is to ensure the quality of the CFA boards. This site is about the exam after all, so those are the boards that should facilitate helpful, quality discussions. Just because the WC is the most active board it shouldn’t be confused with the overall tone of AF. The whole purpose of WC is to have an outlet for these, uh, lower quality discussions.
If we’re looking for more broad financial discussions, maybe we should change Investments to something more general, say, General Financial and Economic Discussions. I love having an Investments board (and pat myself on the back for suggesting it to begin with) but it really doesn’t get the love it deserves. Having a dedicated general discussion board for financial topics would be great and then we could keep WC for the completely asinine-but-much-needed discussions on what kr’s possible cup size is.
Edit: I believe this qualifies as forum feedback. Please move to the appropriate forum.
This is a great idea.
I agree with some of Bchad/BS’s points, but not with some.
The elitism is extremely annoying. Sure, there’s a bit of satire with the the “Top-2 MBA” thing, but it’s not far off point. The same thing with the “Lake Wobegone effect” that I posted about a while back. In fact, one frequent poster gave us his fitness regimen a couple of months ago (and I called BS on it at the time), then recently told us that he does a totally different fitness regimen. He can’t even keep his lies straight.
I do think that the profanity needs to be curbed. A little cussing here and there isn’t too bad, but we should try to keep it at a PG-13 level. (And things like “fcking cnt” are still profane. Eliminating vowels does not change what you’re trying to say.)
The choice of topics could also use a little clean-up. EG–The “no-fap” thread is almost 1000 posts long–about twice what any other thread is. The sheer amount of discussion about strip clubs, sex, self-mutilation of genitals, and fecal matter is a big turn-off. (I fully admit to taking part in it, somewhat ashamedly.)
That being said, I disagree with some of Bchad’s statements about “political incorrectness”.
When BChad says that some “discussions that had a tendency to tilt from “politically incorrect” into outright racisim, as well as sexism”, I’m sure that was directed at me–at least in part. I brought up “The Bell Curve” in a thread that eventually got nuked. And I was vocal in the discussion about why women make less money than men.
In the first thread, I brought up the idea that there is a well-documented statistical difference between the IQ’s of blacks and of whites. This idea has not been refuted by any poster on this board, any scientist or economist, nor by the American Psychological Association (at least to my knowledge). And in the second, I mentioned several reasons why women make less money than men, voluntarily, and of their own accord. This is a far cry from saying, “all niggers and bitches must die”. (Although judging by the volition of the other posters, you would have thought that I HAD said that.)
I bring this up because these are both threads in which BS and BChad have voiced their displeasure, even though they were both derived from reknowned economists and political scientists. (Namely, Thomas Sowell and Charles Murray.) Why that should be blacklisted and treated as “noise” is, in my opinion, worthy of discussion.
I guess I’m just musing here. But I do echo BChad’s sentiment that we should curb the “noise” and have more real substance. But the line between “noise” and “substance” sometimes seems to be blurry.
I orginally wanted Investments to be something like General Financial and Economic Discussions, and that’s actually what it is (look at the description of it here: http://www.analystforum.com/forum).
The problem is that we couldn’t find a one or two word label for it that could fit a button. If someone can come up with one, it shouldn’t be too hard to change it (though I’m not 100% sure on that - if the code is well designed, it shouldn’t be too hard to change it).
The exam forums seem to work well for answering exam problems (though I haven’t been there in a while), and that’s the purpose they serve, so that’s good
What we need is a kind of “Finance Lounge” for people who have finished (or stopped) taking the exams, and for peopel who are doing different exams (CFA/CAIA/FRM) to come together.
Structure maybe like
_ AF _
* Exams
**CFA
***L1, L2, L3
**CAIA
**FRM
* Lounge
** Careers
** Investments and Economics
** Water Cooler
That’s actually pretty close to the current structure, but easier navigation betwen fora would help a lot. The link-bar on the upper right section is helpful, but perhaps it could be more extensive or have dynamic tree that folds and unfolds.
The challenge is that Investments and Economics doesn’t get enough good traffic or ideas. There doesn’t seem to be a critical mass of stuff to talk about.
Careers gets decent foot traffic, though it is depressingly the same questions over and over. One could try to combine Careers and Investments to increase the rate and hope that Investment questions improve. I’m not sure that that’s likely, but it’s a thought.
I always felt that there ought to be a clear place for questions like “how do I get excel to do X, Y, and Z” and the like. Currently, Water Cooler is it, and that may be the one useful thing (aside from the quarrantine effect, and possible entertainment value) that comes out of WC. Maybe it’s fine to keep it there.
Ummm…thanks? I think?
Which brings me to another point–why we continue to let people continually insult others and make personal attacks, I have no idea.
I was even told that I was a “chubby dude from backwards country as a chicken coop Texas” in one thread. (This coming from a poster who has freely admitted that he has plenty of skeletons in his own closet.) I could have responded in kind, but didn’t want to resort to such junior-high-type behavior.
By my count there are 7 threads on the front page of WC that could appropriately be moved to a “general finance and economics” forum. It would take some initial moderating to be sure everything is where it should be, but I think there’s plenty of conversation around financial topics for decent traffic.
I really like that Careers has its own forum. I think that’s as good as it’s going to get.
My comments about racism were not specifically directed at you, Greenman. My point was that there is “political incorrectness” which I try not to intervene in, because I do think that political correctness can be stifiling, and then there is outright racism, which often involves epithets and assertions that one race deserves more or less stuff simply because it is superior as proven by IQ scores, how well they can jump, because their moms age nicely, whatever. One can start innocently enough and then things morph into more.
The line between the two is very blurry and any time one tries to enforce it, someone is going to say they would have drawn the line elsewhere (or not drawn one at all), and quite honestly it is exhausting. But it is important that there be a line somewhere, even if you are never quite sure where it is. Just because we can’t tell when twilight begins and ends doesn’t mean there isn’t day and night, and that these things aren’t important.
I had not noticed excessive elitism here, but that may be my own blind spot. I do have some credentials that can be considered elite, so perhaps I don’t feel as sensitive about it. My own impression is that there are plenty of quality posters that have worked hard and say useful things and I have no idea whether they have elite educations or not.
There are some people whose thoughts are clearly unstructured and incoherrent, and almost certainly don’t have elite credentials, but I personally try not to slam them for it, unless they start personally attacking me or other forum members in a more than argument-counterargument way.
Yeah, I don’t really want to combine careers with Investments, either. It was just a thought to increase the traffic. But I suspect it increases the wrong type of traffic anyway.
In terms of moderating powers, I don’t see how I can shift events betwen fora, or maybe I just don’t see where the buttons are to do that. Sometimes people request a moving, and I think it is a good idea, but I don’t see how I do that. I think only Chad and the tech guy can do that.
However, if I do get the power/ability to do that, and people want me to move those things into Investments, then I’m happy to do that and see how it works.
The benefit of Water Cooler is that it attracts regular commenters, who talk about all kinds of topics. This builds a sense of community and encourages repeat visitors. Water Cooler provides a convenient one stop forum for a variety of topics of interest. Some people want this - we visit the forum to see what is there. We do not show up looking for any single topic.
Anyway, who are we kidding? How has the quality of posts on AF “deteriorated” over time? In fact, I remember some time in 2010 or so when Chad basically banned everyone because the posts were not deemed to be up to some standard. People sitting around here talking about “good old times” on AF is like a bunch of 65-year-olds talking about how 1970s America was the best America, for reasons that exist only in their increasingly senile memories.
So ohai, what are the really good financial or industry-related discussions you recall lately?
I mention that because in “the good old days,” General Discussion combined all the fap-conversations with discussions fo Fed policy and such. Now we seem to be all-fap-almost-all-the-time.
I get what you are saying about old guys remembering how the 70s was so great, and yes, we tend to forget the worst conversations and remember good ones, but it feels like the good ones are fewer and farther between.
What I’d like is (in order of priority)
- More interesting thinking (or even just questions for to think about) in the Investments and Economy forum
- Less hate and arrogance in the WC forum.
- Less palpable schadenfreude in the Careers forum.
Perhaps I can work a bit on item #1 myself (though not this week)
We’ve gotten a bit apathetic for sure. We really don’t debate about much anymore.
Hell, we don’t even have good libertarian debates anymore. I had assumed that was becuase everyone conceded victory to me, but maybe we’ve just gotten lazy?
Just this morning when palantir made that homer comment about Bernake, a year ago I would have ripped into his Keynesian fanboyism. Now I just shrug my shoulders and recognize he’s just that guy.
Maybe we need new blood?
Agree the quality has diminished. I bet if you would have done demographic polls you would see a trend towards unemployed recent college grads with no experience on the forums, which is why nobody has anything to say, as there is just less knowledge here now. Its a vicious cycle, cuz there is no reason to post in investments when you dont think many people have decent input anyway, the value is just not there.
With that said this is the water cooler, so I dont think it should be held to much of a standard.
This. Plus no one is obligated to participate in a thread if he/she doesn’t like the topic.
I agree there should be less profanity and fewer personal attacks. It turns people off.
Perhaps create an additional forum called “adult swim”, or some equivalent, and make it invite only. This way you pretentious intellects can see how bored you get of one another and how fast you come running back to the WC section craving the mindless entertainment.
Ok, just say it. You’re all hating on the brother for stirring the pot!
I post what I post due to the fact that this is a nameless medium with some intelligent people. We can have those conversations pertaining to race without anyone compromising their real identity.
I’ll bow out and allow the standard of AF to increase exponentially.