Criticism in itself is valuable. Constructive criticism may be more valuable, but one a flaw is pointed out, someone else might start being constructive about it.
Some criticism is valuable, but some of it isn't.
Criticism in the true sense of the word ought to be totally factual and unemotional, but a lot of the time it's just used as an excuse for being insulting or provocative.
How is starting a thread saying "this community/device/platform sucks" valuable?
How is accusing the entire forum of being "fanbois" valuable?
How is implying that a device or platform is "garbage" valuable?
Also... This site, I mean "talk" specifically, isn't a volunteer community any more! It is maemo.org - the best resource for finding/downloading software for maemo products. The best resource for reading more about bugs, and definitively the best resource for fixing them. I doubt 5% of the people that use maemo.org and talk.maemo.org contribute in form of code.
It's a user community. May not be ment to be, and may not have started out as one, but now it is.
This is wrong.
I'll use RevdKathy as an example.. I hope she doesn't mind. She is not the type to contribute here in the "form of code" as you specify. However, she very much has helped a great many people. She does not get paid for it, that I'm aware, and she volunteers her time to assist others.
This entire community is made up of users, developers, and systems engineers or administrators. There are users who just ask questions, users who ask questions and help others, and users who do nothing but whine and complain.
All of these people receive nothing in return but whatever feeling they get from either whining to people .. or helping other people with problems. It's all volunteer work. We all volunteer to be here.. nobody is forced.
One: Is is possible that these people are trying to be the squeaky wheel? Perhaps they assume (right or wrong) that Nokia pays some attention to this community and perhaps if Nokia sees enough consternation about *insert what you please* they will fix it, or at least are more likely to fix it.
The problem with that is that it has repeatedly been stated that as far as Nokia are concerned the organs of feedback are Bugzilla and Brainstorm. Most of the people making most noise are unwilling to use those, even with help or support.
Nokia don't take much notice of what happens on t.m.o. If it's not in Bugzilla, it's not a bug. It would be impossible to count the number of posts made directing people to Bugzilla but they prefer to go on ranting.
As for this now being a user forum: that sounds like a case being made for separating the volunteer/developer community off from the users - and I personally believe that would be a tragedy.
Criticism in the true sense of the word ought to be totally factual and unemotional, but a lot of the time it's just used as an excuse for being insulting or provocative.
How is starting a thread saying "this community/device/platform sucks" valuable?
How is accusing the entire forum of being "fanbois" valuable?
How is implying that a device or platform is "garbage" valuable?
Actually, I believe all data is valuable. I.e. the percentage who calls a device garbage can be compared between the N97 and the N900. Based on that, you can evaluate if your experience with the N97 should prevent you from getting a N900 device.
Despite being unable to use Newegg for buying stuff, I often use Neweggs comments while doing research. There's especially three things I consider: The percentage of people giving a product 5 stars - should be above a certain level. 1 stars, should be below a certain level. Then, I will read only the 1 star comments.
If the 1 star comments were all like whathisname's threads, I would happily buy the product. If they were saying stuff like "incompatible", I would not.
The problem with that is that it has repeatedly been stated that as far as Nokia are concerned the organs of feedback are Bugzilla and Brainstorm. Most of the people making most noise are unwilling to use those, even with help or support.
Nokia don't take much notice of what happens on t.m.o. If it's not in Bugzilla, it's not a bug. It would be impossible to count the number of posts made directing people to Bugzilla but they prefer to go on ranting.
Ok, all makes sense. So my next question is...do any of you (responsible members of the community) check whether there are any bugs and/or genuine issues that deserve to be addressed that show up here in the rants but are not present in Bugzilla? And I don't mean in a systematic documented this-is-my-job sort of way, I mean, what have you observed? Are the subjects of most of the rants (the ones that actually have subjects) documented in either Bugzilla or Brainstorm?
Ok, all makes sense. So my next question is...do any of you (responsible members of the community) check whether there are any bugs and/or genuine issues that deserve to be address that show up here in the rants but are not present in Bugzilla? And I don't mean in a systematic documented this-is-my-job sort of way, I mean, what have observed? Are the subjects of most of the rants (the ones that actually have subjects) documented either Bugzilla or Brainstorm?
The best answer to that is "We try to". It's by no means 100% and generally depends on the available time of the respondent.
On the other hand, there's a sense in which always doing it for people means they won't learn to do it for themselves. If Mr Angry is going to become Mr Useful Contributor, he could start by doing his own bug-searches.
I'll use RevdKathy as an example.. I hope she doesn't mind. (...) We all volunteer to be here.. nobody is forced.
You just now described pretty much all forums I am part of... It doesn't even matter if it's owned by the manufacturer or not, there would be no reason to sign up on any forum if it weren't for the fantastic individuals like Kathy. I don't think having a core of users that contribute above all else is in any way different from every other forum.
What is unique about this forum, is that a very high percentage of the volunteers, Maemo platform contributors is active in one central forum. Also, that the platform has had very few users, actually, so these contributors are very visible. Sadly, eventually, there will be many more like me and a lower percentage of texrat.
The higher percentage of valuable contributors, the quicker will it attract non-contributing users that will make the high percentage of valuable contributors lower :B
I help people too, from time to time. I even consider discussions like this to be part of contributing in some way
As for this now being a user forum: that sounds like a case being made for separating the volunteer/developer community off from the users - and I personally believe that would be a tragedy.
I agree completely. I often do when you talk.
I don't think talk.maemo.org is a developer forum, I don't think it should be a developer forum and I don't think it ever again can be a developer forum. It's too important to the maemo users now. The curse of being the biggest forum for Maemo is that it will attract all the... special cases, too.
I am kind of getting confused by the question iamNarada.. but me personally: If I've seen a Bugzilla or Brainstorm article on a person's rants - I will link them to it.
I know many others do this as well as I've seen it. There is a few threads here that follow the format:
"This sucks, I can't do XYZ."
"<link to brainstorm>"
"That doesn't solve my problem!"
Ya know what? You're right.... and there's the door. At this point, brainstorms and bugs are what we have.
If someone comes on here and is venting as Tex described, and we get on there and explain that it's a known problem - we are trying to fix it as a community and/or are hopeful for the firmware update.. then a normal person should calm down. And better yet, go vote on the brainstorm or add a +1 or whatever to the bug report. But instead, increasingly more common unfortunately, they decide to start ranting or attacking Nokia, Maemo, Us, whoever they pick randomly from a hat.. for whatever reason they choose to want to come up with.
I refuse to understand, defend, or respond to that kind of attitude.
