Puritan Board Discord Chat

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Doulos McKenzie

Puritan Board Freshman
I have recently discovered the PB's new chat feature. It seems like a great idea but It think I might have a slightly better one. What if we instead started a Discord Puritan Board Chat Room? It would be a lot easier to manage and would be much more high quality. For those of you who don't know what Discord is it is an application for you phone or computer that allows you to make a chat rooms that allow for both voice and text chating. It is safe and easy for admins to manage. I would be happy to start the Chat room and help moderate it.

Soli Deo Gloria,

Doulos

https://discordapp.com/
 
There might be some pros but I see more cons.

Some cons:

1) people responding too fast without thinking through the isssues

2) most likely will not be as precise of language used in voice message

3) too many people responding through voice at once

4) anger might be more of a concern through voice when quickly responding


These are just some of my concerns. Any thoughts?
 
There might be some pros but I see more cons.

Some cons:

1) people responding too fast without thinking through the isssues

2) most likely will not be as precise of language used in voice message

3) too many people responding through voice at once

4) anger might be more of a concern through voice when quickly responding


These are just some of my concerns. Any thoughts?
From my experience these are not super large issues. let me explain by responding to each point.

1) people responding too fast without thinking through the issues

Response: This already happens on the Puritan Board anyway, in fact it happens everywhere on any chat or forum site.

2) most likely will not be as precise of language used in voice message

Response: I mean this is true in a sense depending on the topic and people involved. I personally think that by talking it better helps a person learn to be more precise with there language.

3) too many people responding through voice at once

Response: I think the majority of people on the Puritan Board are decent people that know not to interrupt and are able to have a civil discussion. If interrupting every became an issue a mod could step in and mute the offender.

4) anger might be more of a concern through voice when quickly responding

Response: Asian I trust in the integrity of the fellow board members and hope this won't be an issue.


Quick side note: In Discord there are both text chat and voice chat rooms.


Thanks for your thoughtful points. Anything else you would like to say that might help?
 
I'm not interested in voice chat and would likely have it on mute if others were talking which would defeat the purpose. I usually read PB when my wife is in the room and/or something else is going on and it would be distracting. I'm sure that I'm not the only one. I would also think that having it as a separate application rather than integrated into the board would discourage some participation. I'm only moderately interested in chat but will probably pop in from time to time because it's there and easy. I know that I wouldn't if it required downloading a dedicated application or going to another website.
 
I'm not interested in voice chat and would likely have it on mute if others were talking which would defeat the purpose. I usually read PB when my wife is in the room and/or something else is going on and it would be distracting. I'm sure that I'm not the only one. I would also think that having it as a separate application rather than integrated into the board would discourage some participation. I'm only moderately interested in chat but will probably pop in from time to time because it's there and easy. I know that I wouldn't if it required downloading a dedicated application or going to another website.

I mean it is an optional thing to be apart of. It won't replace the PB. And there are multiple text/voice channels in a server. If u font want to use it then don't.
 
Doulos,

I think what you are asking for is blessing from PB staff to create this environment as a Puritan Board sanctioned activity. I would suspect that given how we are jealous of our reputation that we would not likely explicitly bless such an endeavor at the present time.

That said, there is nothing preventing anyone from starting up some new activity that includes the word "Puritan" in that activity. If the activity flourishes and is in keeping with our PB culture, there may even come a time that we would recommend the activity to others or even directly sponsor it, integrate it within the site, etc. After all, we are always thinking about new features or efforts that will drive more eyeballs to our site and increase the edification of members by new content and discussions.

One vital requirement, outside the assumption of Confessionalism that goes without saying, in my opinion for any such future sponsorship is that the participation in the activity is not cloaked behind usernames that hide the identity of participants. PB strongly holds that all are accountable to their local church authorities, so if you were to start this activity up in the hopes of it eventually becoming something PB would adopt, participants in the activity would have to be able to be identified, along with church affiliation, in some reasonable manner. Just a suggestion.

So if this is something you are passionate about, then let that be your guide and leave the outcome in the providential hands of the Lord.
 
That said, there is nothing preventing anyone from starting up some new activity that includes the word "Puritan"

I'm not sure I fully agree.

While intellectual property law isn't my area, the Puritan Board might be able to assert an unregistered, or common law, trademark against an infringer that set up a competing discussion board (or now, chat function) with a confusingly similar name. While unregistered trade marks don't have the same protections as those registered with the Patent Office, there are protections.
 
Just to be clear, I didn't add chat to Puritan Board because I wanted to add best of breed functionality. If I wanted that then I might use some sort of hook into Office 365 or Gmail and set everyone up with their own email system that replaced the messaging system.

This is a discussion forum. It's primarily for long form discussion. One of the things I hate about Facebook is that a really in-depth discussion is really frustrating. It's hard to see where the conversation is with replies and then replies to replies, etc. This platform is really solid toward that end.

I added chat as a way for short conversations that my supplement the board. This is key as well: it utilizes the same board authentication mechanism and identity. I'm simply not interested in the time/expense/work to manage another platform and then tie together identity and acess and keep both patched. I have a wife, 5 kids, a job, and Church responsibilities. I sometimes barely have the time to address things here when they go haywire.

Add to that the Admins and Mods - these are (in my mind) the best out there and they do it for free for love of the discussion. It's hard enough for them to keep up with things and I want them to only have to worry about the basic tools we have here to manage them.

Is chat imperfect? Yes. Is it good enough for what it is intended for? Yes. If it doesn't work out or nobody uses it then we'll abandon it but, for now, use it as you like. If you prefer Slack or some other kind of channel experience then you can do that but the board is here.

I'm not writing all of this to be mean but simply to acknowledge that, on the surface of things, some things look better than others but when you factor in other concerns there are reasons why some ideas are appealing in one context and not another.

Thank you, however, for the suggestion.
 
I've withdrawn my initial complaints now that I've got some control over what shows up where.
 
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