Ignore Button?

Do we have an ignore button? I can really see a use for it, but I'm not seeing one.

Kyrt Ryder wrote:Do we have an ignore button? I can really see a use for it, but I'm not seeing one.

I second that. It is available on many forums, so maybe it isn't hard to add?

What exactly would this button let you ignore?

It would allow you to not see messages posted by people whose posts you don't appreciate or enjoy, perhaps because they are redundant, devoid of content, trite, annoying, repetitive, overly lengthy, redundant, or irritating.

Cassie Langstraat wrote:What exactly would this button let you ignore?

might be me...I interrupted the flow in this thread... https://permies.com/forums/posts/list/40/56107#471832

I think an ignore button might just cause more folks to read a post though.

Judith Browning wrote:

Cassie Langstraat wrote:What exactly would this button let you ignore?

might be me...I interrupted the flow in this thread... https://permies.com/forums/posts/list/40/56107#471832

I think an ignore button might just cause more folks to read a post though.

At least in my case it certainly isn't you Judith.

To clarify what an ignore button does- with an Ignore button one chooses to ignore a user, and never sees their posts thereafter. They can continue to participate in conversations without getting dragged into debates with someone with whom they frequently clash.

Kyrt Ryder wrote:

Judith Browning wrote:

Cassie Langstraat wrote:What exactly would this button let you ignore?

might be me...I interrupted the flow in this thread... https://permies.com/forums/posts/list/40/56107#471832

I think an ignore button might just cause more folks to read a post though.

At least in my case it certainly isn't you Judith.

To clarify what an ignore button does- with an Ignore button one chooses to ignore a user, and never sees their posts thereafter. They can continue to participate in conversations without getting dragged into debates with someone with whom they frequently clash.

I get it now...a personal filter. I was originally imagining a button just telling everyone to ignore a particular post like a thumbs up or down and having the post still visible for all. I think I like the idea and I might have found it helpful not long ago.....I guess you would still see quoted bits and pieces though.

Judith Browning wrote:

Kyrt Ryder wrote:

Judith Browning wrote:

Cassie Langstraat wrote:What exactly would this button let you ignore?

might be me...I interrupted the flow in this thread... https://permies.com/forums/posts/list/40/56107#471832

I think an ignore button might just cause more folks to read a post though.

At least in my case it certainly isn't you Judith.

To clarify what an ignore button does- with an Ignore button one chooses to ignore a user, and never sees their posts thereafter. They can continue to participate in conversations without getting dragged into debates with someone with whom they frequently clash.

I get it now...a personal filter. I was originally imagining a button just telling everyone to ignore a particular post like a thumbs up or down and having the post still visible for all. I think I like the idea and I might have found it helpful not long ago.....I guess you would still see quoted bits and pieces though.

Indeed, and seeing quoted pieces is important to participating in a conversation wherein quotes are used, but at no point do you really see *that person* and have the opportunity to speak to them directly.

Judith Browning wrote:

Cassie Langstraat wrote:What exactly would this button let you ignore?

might be me...I interrupted the flow in this thread... https://permies.com/forums/posts/list/40/56107#471832

I think an ignore button might just cause more folks to read a post though.

I think the ignore button would just be for the person viewing. A bit like not talking to someone at a party. The problem with public forums is there is no way to filter signal from noise.
If, as your post states, you'd rather "no-one made a judgement about what is good for me or not" then surely an ignore button for individual use, is a reasonable request.

I'm not sure how an ignore button fits in with being nice. I understand the desire for one, but I'm not convinced it's nice.

Tyler Ludens wrote:I'm not sure how an ignore button fits in with being nice. I understand the desire for one, but I'm not convinced it's nice.

It prevents conflict when people have repeated clashes.

For example someone recently 'wasn't nice' to me as I see it, and rather than reporting them [because its not in my nature to turn on people like that] or lashing back [which certainly isn't nice], it would be better to be able to Ignore them and not encounter them on the boards again.

Kyrt Ryder wrote:

Tyler Ludens wrote:I'm not sure how an ignore button fits in with being nice. I understand the desire for one, but I'm not convinced it's nice.

It prevents conflict when people have repeated clashes.

For example someone recently 'wasn't nice' to me as I see it, and rather than reporting them [because its not in my nature to turn on people like that] or lashing back [which certainly isn't nice], it would be better to be able to Ignore them and not encounter them on the boards again.

I think the moderation at permies has helped a lot of folks learn to play nice here and members reporting posts is an important part of that. Sometimes someone just needs a bit of a nudge to understand how important it is to allow for all sorts of different thinking.

I wonder how it is done on other forums? Is it like 'blocking' someone on facebook or like not 'following' them during the political season?
Would it be a total block or just a choice thread by thread?

It's generally total block, though I imagine it possibly could be done on a forum by forum basis.

So for example someone's comments in... Energy might be very welcome, but in... Critters might be a cause of conflict between the ignorer and the person they wish to ignore.

Far easier to make it a simple universal block within the site though.

I understand all of the reasoning, but if you weren't seeing certain parts of the conversation, wouldn't that be confusing to try to read a thread that had missing posts?

Typically no. This option is fairly common in discussion forums and those that use it learn to read between the lines.

Uuuuu, why not just skip over that person's posts? I've never feIt a need to read every post, nor every word in someone's post. Just me, I guess. I've never felt the need for an official ignore button. It just would make things more complicated for me. I'm a big advocate for K.I.S.S.

I think I'm getting tired so this might not make sense...what if you have 'ignored' someone and they haven't 'ignored' you back? They will see your posts and possibly quote them or ask a question and you would never know...that might be one of the 'not nice' concerns that Tyler wondered about? Could cause some unease because then you would know you were being 'ignored'...over thinking this now I guess....

Kyrt Ryder wrote:
For example someone recently 'wasn't nice' to me as I see it, and rather than reporting them [because its not in my nature to turn on people like that] or lashing back [which certainly isn't nice], it would be better to be able to Ignore them and not encounter them on the boards again.

To me, this seems like it would promote not nice behavior, because the not niceness isn't reported and the person not being nice doesn't get a chance to learn nice behavior. I've personally found it a beneficial challenge to try to communicate with people with whom I clash or seem to have a very different worldview. One of these people has become one of my closest friends here on permies, which wouldn't have happened if I had simply ignored them instead of learning how to communicate with them.

Judith Browning wrote:Could cause some unease because then you would know you were being 'ignored'...

Yes, because you might be repeatedly trying to answer a question or respond to something the person is saying but nothing you say gets through because they're ignoring you. It's difficult to communicate this way, addressing someone who is ignoring you. It's frustrating, because they keep saying things, or asking questions, to which you have an answer, but the answer isn't getting through. Conversations can become very repetitive, as people keep repeating things which are repeatedly responded to by the "invisible" ignored person.

Since everyone here knows and understands the BE NICE policy, I can see no reason for an Ignore button.

However, it's not my site, this is Paul Wheaton's site.

Thanks for letting us know of your interest in a button, we will bring it to Paul's attention.

Implying that there may be someone here you may want to ignore does not fully fit with the Be Nice policy as I understand it. I'm locking this thread until Paul can have a look at it.

The ignore button is now implemented as a pie feature.

Basically, in the recent column or any other place a thread might be listed, it will be minimized for the user that has selected the ignore feature for a thread.  

I think this makes things better for users.   After all, there could be a discussion about butchering that comes up and a user is a vegan - they don't want to see that.   So they click on "ignore" and go about their day.  

They are not ignoring users, they are ignoring topics that just are not their thing.

This thread is 2 years old. Has a user ignore feature been added since then?

Most sites offer it for folks that would prefer to take a pacifist approach and avoid being snarky when other users are pushing buttons.

It's not nice to push buttons, so those posts could be reported to mods.

Tyler Ludens wrote:It's not nice to push buttons, so those posts could be reported to mods.

I don't report posts unless they are clearly offensive and violate the TOC or aimed at sparking a flame war (I have never reported a post on this site).

There is a lot of gray area between being "nice" and clearly violating the rules. A series of mildly snarky negative comments with no purpose other than to be critical will eventually illicit a response from me and then I will probably be accused of "not being nice enough".

The rules are simply: BE NICE

How the rules are interpreted is based on Paul Wheaton's understanding of what Be Nice means.  

Lucrecia Anderson wrote: A series of mildly snarky negative comments with no purpose other than to be critical will eventually illicit a response from me and then I will probably be accused of "not being nice enough".

This is an excellent example of when to use the report button.

You could write a response, then others write a response and the moderators have 10 hours of cleaning up the mess.  This is NOT nice.

Alternatively, you could use the report button and a moderator will IMMEDIATELY be notified that there is something to pay attention to.  There are always a handful of moderators online.  A moderator can spend 2 minutes reviewing the post in question and make a decision.



We ask that you remember the be nice rule and the goals of this site when posting.  Use your internal 'ignore' button or the report button when you come across anything you feel presses your buttons.  

I tried using this months ago...I like the idea a lot.
After setting it on a couple threads though, I could see the line that says 'ignored' in the list of recent topics whenever a new reply was posted and my curiosity would cause me to open the thread and peek at the new reply so in some ways it backfired for me.  Now I just try to go with my gut and if the title of a thread or memory of posts there cause uncomfortable feelings I most often attempt to walk on by.

Yeh, it takes some training.