I have followed this company forum for a while now.
Contributed financial and have not missed a podcast. Unfortunately I feel as if any realistic speech in this community seems to get silenced with a us vs them style mentality.
It has become almost a propaganda site that I no longer respect.
Although I say this, I would like to say I have appreciated the individual conversation and discourse from the general member.
I will be leaving the xbox community
Thank you and goodbye,
Before you leave may I suggest muting threads where the topic of conversation is usually quite negative/toxic and seeing if that changes your perspective?
I would consider myself a forum regular but I don’t think we have had the pleasure of interacting before.
Having a quick glance at your profile I can see the threads you have interacted with are the ones I pretty much immediately muted.
For example:
Rumor about Xbox publishing elsewhere (going 3rd party)
What to actually expect from Xbox
Discourse after Starfield is negative
I personally found muting these types of thread the best course of action as (for me) it just turns the forum into a negative place, muting them immediately and being naive to this discussion has made the forum a much more enjoyable experience and somewhere I want to visit. There’s actually really good (positive) discussion in most of the threads.
While I’m not going to leave, I sympathize entirely with @anon17639285. There’s been times in the last several months, maybe longer, where this place has started to feel more and more like many other cesspools on the internet.
It comes across like some weird combination of inferiority, AND superiority complex, coupled with a pinch of persecution complex too.
I don’t know when the shift started, but I don’t feel like this place had that vibe when I joined in late 2021. Maybe when the ABK saga began?
Anyway, it is what it is. Perhaps it’s inevitable human nature when groups are formed. I don’t see a way out of it without some extreme, draconian moderator action, but I don’t necessarily know that that would be any better. I think it’s one of those things that kinda have to resolve itself naturally. If it’s going to resolve itself at all, that is.
In the meantime my approach is to do my best to ignore it and focus on positivity. I don’t always succeed, but I can’t think of what else to do.
Resetera is a cesspool of politics and agendas over playing games. Gaming is secodary to other things.
Neogaf is a Sony centric forum that shits on everything Xbox at every opportunity. They have driven out all the Xbox players, and the few that do remain like AdamsApple know their place and watch what they say, and how they say it.
I think Xboxera is trying to be a pro Xbox site, a safe haven for Xbox gamers. That can be the issue as well. As has been seen lately, Microsoft makes stupid decisions, and needs to be criticised when they do. The ultra Pro Xbox posters dont like that, and will flag posts to stop discent.
Management I guess are trying to get the site in the good graces of Microsoft, and having people laying the smack down on them isnt going to make that happen, so they tend to moderate in a way to also stop too much negative posting on Microsoft.
One thing they havent done yet, is to turn into the ban loving moderators that Neogaf and Resetera are.
I guess the site is trying to find its way, and trying to do so with as little drama as possible.
Personally, I feel like this happens a lot with online communities.
There will always be folks that, rather than having a civil discussion, that will just go straight for the throat or undermine another’s comment. Sometimes its because of the heat of the moment, sometimes its annoyance, and sometimes I just think there are folks that seem to forget (or worse, don’t care) that the person they’re talking to is an actual human being.
I’d recommend taking a break or maybe posting less on here. I did something similar due to some people’s behavior (especially that ABK thread) and left Twitter for the year because its been more of a negative distraction.
Only you know what’s best for you, but whatever choice you make I wish you the very best. If you ever need to talk or anything, feel free to shoot me a DM. I always like making new friends.
Imagine having a new hobby like bird watching; and any time you want to talk about the birds you’ve watched with the community online, you must read hundred of messages stating how many folks Swaroski has laid off this month, how a rumor says the Zeiss quaterly report won’t have anything in the double digits, and that the eye-piece you just love is getting review-bombed (but somehow “they deserve this”). Wait — what about birds? What kind of god-damn circus is that? Xbox gamers shouldn’t tolerate that. This constant negativity is insanity and sites who care about you as an Xbox fan are mindful of it.
I get that. Having your goals of what you want the forum to promote, and then working out how to moderate to achieve that, without being authoritarian and dicks like we see so blatantly on both Era and Neo, would be a fine line to try and tow. While I might think aomething might be a bit over reaching to close a thread or something, I do understand that you are trying to keep the place from turning into what the other places are.
I think over all you guys do a great job, and I understand that sometimes I might think something different could have been done.
Its not a big deal.
Watch any live podcast back, you will see that you promote xbox above all else. Negative for everything else. Watch the game show awards. That is a great indicator. No offence. Just saying it straight.
I get what this dude is sayin. All the best mate. We love you too!
Above all else doesn’t mean they are negative for all else. If so, they wouldn’t talk about great games on Switch (almost every time Nick talks) or Playstation that they play, and they do talk about those. They’re not negative on everyone else, but with an Xbox focus it’s going to be primarily about Xbox.
Do you have any specific examples, I would suggest XboxEra is one of the most fair podcasts when it comes to giving credit / criticism where it’s due for all platforms. There’s obviously going to be a slight bias towards Xbox as it’s in the name.
I would argue most of the big Xbox centered podcasts are reasonably fair to other platforms compared to how many of the Playstation/Nintendo podcasts talk about Xbox in comparison.
There’s only 1 possibly 2 Playstation podcasts I can listen to now because of how toxic they are.
We had a general goal to provide a good place to talk about Xbox, because on most forums, it’s severely lacking. But we can’t control peoples emotions, how they feel, how they communicate, nor would anyone try to.
Personally, I don’t get affected by online discourse - if something reads as stupid to me, my brain goes “that’s dumb” and I move on with my life. Others feel the need to debate, to disagree, and then you have this constant avalanche of opinions back and forth.
I guess my point is - if a conversation at any point is too negative, or doesn’t feel good to you - don’t engage with it. Go play some video games or something.
I don’t know… this is the most civilized gaming forum I’ve come across in years. Other communities are generally so much worse. Including Xbox-centric ones like TrueAchievements. (Love the tracking, hate the forums these days.)
Nothing wrong with an Xbox site being positive about Xbox. Isn’t that why we’re here? (Obviously no one should be putting a positive spin on something inherently negative. But I don’t recall anything along those lines.)
Indeed, it’s the only place I know of where you can discuss Xbox like a normal topic. The discussions in general are also so much better than elsewhere. Moderation has also improved lately with a more coherent and consistent approach.
I think it’s important this does not turn into an Xbox version of ResetEra too though. It is possible to discuss both positive and negative things like normal people.
A positive way to look at this situation is that pulling back from using social media is usually a good thing. I usually free better after taking a break from social media, YouTube, etc. and instilling some long term habits in the vein of digital minimalism.
Here’s the thing, this is an Xbox-centric site so I would expect some bias. There are plenty of places to get the absolute most negative takes on Microsoft and Xbox. If you want to rip MS/Xbox to shreds you will be welcomed there with open arms, you don’t need this place to do that. Not saying this should be some echo chamber where negative news is silenced, but there is just not a need for the negativity here when it is overflowing elsewhere. Anything news that could possibly paint MS/Xbox in a negative light will be on the other sites, so it isn’t like they aren’t being held accountable.
This is ultimately a safe place for Xbox and yes that is going to come with bias towards Xbox. You are going to run into some people heavily biased that way and that is just the nature of coming to a place catering specifically to one console. You aren’t being silenced when someone else disagrees with you unless the admin/moderation team are deleting your posts?
Anyway good luck to you on finding a community to call home.
Best of luck.
