Just to clarify your post a little bit, off-topic posts can be split into three sections:
Unintentional off-topic posts
For example, a topic that is put in development discussion that is more appropriate for #help-and-feedback such as a scripting question
Development Discussion "bug reports"
This happens when often new users of the forum post bug reports in #development-discussion because “it is locked for me” or something like that. These posts do not have any reproduction steps or date first/last experienced dates and are almost always about Studio either crashing or not loading.
Troll posts
Doesn’t need any more explaining. Things like making an Among Us game in the topic or talking about sandwiches. Extremely off-topic and the users who make these posts do it because they want attention.
I completely agree. Development discussion is a shipwreck. I honestly wish they would add a trust level before member that only allows them to view and post in (unless it’s Updates, or any category like that) every category except development discussion so when they do get ranked up they aren’t spamming.
I think the problem is that the Discussion guidelines aren’t clear enough about what to talk about.
We know that it’s okay to talk about anything Roblox development related, but that’s about it.
Rants about Roblox Studio updates and Game Design issues are technically allowed since they’re about development according to the very vague guidelines the Development Discussion category has.
Announcement updates are usually development related so I can also see why people tend to rant about them there aswell.
It’s kinda unfair that new posters are usually blamed and talked down upon by more experienced posters when it’s the vague guidelines that usually cause all this in the first place.
Members can be annoying when making posts in the Discussion category and I can see why so many people blame them, but people should also make sure that Roblox shares some of the blame since they’ve done nothing to prevent this from happening for a solid year.
I cannot agree more with what you have said here. I have noticed some other rule breaking and concerning behavior in #development-discussion that you haven’t really mentioned here that also really needs to be addressed.
Bumping Posts:
I have seen many users bump old topics in #development-discussion that have not been replied to in at least 3 years for no exact reason. 90% of the time I see a topic that has been inactive for 3+ years bumped in DD, it is usually some spam/troll/meme post that is completely irrelevant to the discussion.
Non-contributive and spam replies
Many users will make spam replies that are completely irrelevant to the current discussion. Some common examples are:
Minimodding, policing, and callout posts
Minimod and callout posts are a very big issue in #development-discussion and really need to be addressed. If some user makes a bug report in DD because they cannot post in #bug-reports there will be several users that try to go and minimod/police the user that made the bug report post in DD and publicly call them out for doing it. Here are some examples of this:
The problem with these posts is that members are making these bug report posts in DD since they cannot post in #bug-reports and the users that are telling them to move the post to the correct category are also members that cannot make topics in #bug-reports either.
Arguments, fanboying, and name calling
In the past month and a half, I have noticed an increasingly large amount of arguments and fanboying in DD. Most of these arguments get very out of hand and there are usually a Windows vs. Linux vs. Mac argument and are usually caused by a couple of diehard Windows fanboys that will attack the Apple and Linux users and be very abusive and straight up rude towards them for not liking Microsoft and Windows. Most of the time during these arguments, the Apple and Linux users (and some Windows users as well) are being respectful to everyone and their opinions but a couple of diehard Windows fanboys will be extremely rude to them and start name calling and bullying them for preferring a different computer/OS than them. For pretty much any argument in #development-discussion, at least one person is calling others “idiots” for having a different opinion.
Examples:
One way that this could be addressed is by considering the use of words like “idiot” (when directed at another user) to be a violation of Global Rule 6.1 and give harsher punishments to users for name calling. Another thing that could help is being more strict about the context where the use of profanity would be allowed in private categories (mainly #development-discussion and #forum-feedback:forum-help)
I personally think that the best way to address these issues is to better enforce the rules (especially Global Rules 1.x, 5, 6.x, 8, 11 and 18) and to have responsible community members from different parts of the world that can actively moderate the forum at all hours of the day and on every day of the year (including holidays and weekends)
This seems to be an issue across all categories, but in troll posts, these type of replies intensify and continually bump the troll topic to the top. There was a lot of troll topic a couple months ago and I have many real examples of these kind of posts. Of course, I will change them a little bit so you just get the general gist.
This is off-topic, but keep making those sandwiches because they sound good
This is the best topic on the entire DevForum
aoqjwvojeivhicowhvreuihvichiohcieqhviheiow
nice some random unicode characters spammed here to bypass the character requirement
gee, doesn’t look like the state of a certain setup thread
This phrase sums up development discussion right now
OP, I agree wholeheartedly. It’s very annoying to read through now as 3/5(not an actual number but seems like it) posts seem to be off topic.
What happened to DET moving posts to the right category? A lot of people get mad and keep posting it into the same category.
Actually, I’m kind of not surprised, that the fact that #development-discussion is already a trash hole because the Developer Engagement Team decided to loosen up control and strict rule imposition over the category. They can’t successfully moderate this with the fact of giving freedom for everybody to post there and post whatever they want, at the same time it also destroyed the quality because they can’t moderate the category anymore due to the fact that more and more people make it worst since the opening of the category.
I’m pretty sure as long as the Developer Engagement Team finds a solution to the “No Post Approval” issue, they’ll be able to find some solutions for this problem very quickly, or they’ll impose the new system over the category.
I also kind of find it hilarious, that the people who post trash, call-out posts, off-topic posts, etc at #development-discussion are sometimes the same people complaining here in #forum-feedback
Could someone provide a “Example” post of what’s ok in the development discussion category?
The guidelines are very vague, it should be something that: “Contributes something to developers” and “encourage discussion”. What do you expect that will happen?
In that post, you were asking a question, which isn’t discussion. Besides, there is multiple posts(and one official post) dedicated to explaining how premium payouts work, so your topic would be considered spam.
Dear lord, the amount of rants I’ve seen in #development-discussion is ridiculous. I’ve seen posts that clearly say that it’s a rant, yet they still post it. This is the one I don’t give the OP slack on, as they are intentionally breaking DevForum TOS.
This one is more unintentional, but anyone who looks through the categories will avoid this issue. Most of the time if you ask them to move their topic they will, but in an idea forum environment, people post in the correct category the first time.
I’ve mainly seen this happen due to events, but in one case a user intentionally was spamming exact topic. Spam is more rare then off-topic posts though, at least in my experience with the forum.
Thanks for the feedback, although I disagree, I am sure you can figure out how I can argue that it does encourge discussion, and I understand why you say it dosen’t.
Regarding the spam, the official post is in the “Anouncment” category, I am not sure if you are meant to discuss there. After digging for a while now I didn’t find any post specifically on how the discussing how the algorithm of premium payouts works.
Althought sure, I have found posts where this has been discused as a secondary topic, for example here:https://devforum.roblox.com/t/the-premium-purchase-modal-is-flawed/1028596
Also, would this post of yours count as a valid topic? To have a example of the topics allowed in the development discussion category.
Yes, it is. I asked how people would change Roblox Studio create any plugins that help workflow, ETC. If you don’t think it is fit for that category, flag it and let moderators decide.
You can ask questions in the replies, but it isn’t meant to be a 100% discussion thread.
If you want to continue this discussion about if your topic is justified in #development-discussion please hit me with a DM, this is off-topic for this thread.
I will use my own examples for what is ok and what is not.
What’s OK
This topic that I made encourages discussion, and is about development, and has never been discussed before. so it is appropriate for #development-discussion.
This topic is more of a Game Design question since I was asking for the best name for a high-tier gamepass instead of starting a discussion about it. Since it is about implementing game features instead of a development discussion topic, it is more appropriate for #help-and-feedback:game-design-support. This topic originally was originally in Development Discussion but later got moved to the appropriate category.
Actually these are the most kind of topics that I myself could confirm happening in #development-discussion, but, actually the other problem for #development-discussion is actually the low-quality posting, some posts maybe actually be valid for #development-discussion, I mean like yours, as we see it’s to analyze between cheap or expensive gamepasses and as developers share their experience with the thread, it gives newer or inexperienced ones some resources on what to do whether to make their gamepasses cheap or not.
The low quality posting however is really not getting the attention of the Developer Engagement Team as it formerly used to, and instantly take it down.
I’m actually disappointed by the fact that some developers even make topics such as “what’s the worst thing you experienced in development” in my opinion, this topics should be removed and should be considered garbage because it does not benefit other developers other than degrading them seeing worst and worst things in Development.
The Developer Engagement Team, should actually be taking action against these kind of posts however, since the removal of Post Approval, it gave them huge amount of forum moderation, and in the end, they allowed for some people to post whatever sometimes in #development-discussion, and that makes it more low quality, until they make a new system for Post Approval, #development-discussion is going to get worst and worst.
The only way to stop the trouble is for them to impost a system similar to the Post Approval system on the #development-discussion category.
People really do post things like this for attention, and I have seen much more immature things being posted there than that one example. I even remember seeing a development discussion a while ago that was “how do developers poop compared to normal people?”.
The real issue is, the quality of #development-discussion has been plummeting with the type of posts OP has mentioned.
This is technically one of the examples of #development-discussion problem, people comment things like this, and don’t bother to contribute to the discussion in a more efficient way in helping out to solve the problem, only to say that by common sense we already see that “nobody should post that”.
Sadly to say, people would bypass the #development-discussion rule that since it’s “Development Discussion” they would only add words such as “Development” in their title or topic to find a loop hole to post whatever they want on there, and this trashes the #development-discussion more, and most people are just stat farming which is why they post trash in #development-discussion, making it viewable for visitors makes it more worst, as visitors would be influenced to do the same thing, and the new generation of forum users would instead of making the forum a better place would make it much more worst as the number of rule breaker models would increase compared to the ones who really abide by the rules.
Now, even new generation forum users can’t even decide what to flag or not anymore, as seen when I saw a forum post, that is normally flagged back then by the community, it only ends up me flagging it while obviously it’s off-topic, and others don’t seem to care about it than they formerly did.
I’m also sick and tired of my notifications being spammed with ‘thoughts on x update?’ threads every single time the most subtle updates are released.
I counted more than 12 discussion topics regarding the new studio logo - when there is literally an announcement thread which completely nullifies the need for such generic posts and unhelpful rants.
Please fix this Roblox. I yearn for the day in which I can actually use the category as intended, instead of having to dig through spam just to find an enjoyable discussion.
Edit: Not even a minute after I create this post and there’s another!
(I’m not calling out the users creating these posts. I think the issues lie with the inner-workings of the forum itself rather than with its users.)
And look at that, I just saw another topic about the mouse cursor!
It’s important to add that the “What are your thoughts on the _____ update?” topics are also off-topic, as explained here:
It’s pretty irritating at this point that so many users don’t know how to use Development Discussion correctly. The last and only option we have is probably locking the category to Regulars only (but after they are able to get members to level up again).
