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Chockstone Photography
Australian Landscape Photography by Michael Boniwell
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 Page 1 of 2. Messages 1 to 20 | 21 to 38
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Chockstone CPR and Defib

ajfclark
1-Nov-2021
7:05:04 AM
It feels a little sad that the most active thread on Chockstone is the spam disabled thread, which I can't link to because it's suspicious

Obviously as time has gone on, the software running the forum has got a little long in the tooth and the patches to enhance security have negatively effected functionality. Facebook groups have pulled the majority of users in, but they are actually a terrible platform for any kind of discussion (though that argument can be made for a lot of internet forums).

If the forum software were updated to something modern and decent, could Chockstone be revived?
dalai
1-Nov-2021
8:34:16 AM
Totally agree that FB isn't a good medium for discussions. Trying to find any post is next to impossible the next day.

But various forums across other interests I check are in a similar predicament. Less posts means less people returning meaning even less posts and the spiral continues.

Not sure if forum software will be able to turn around the demise of this or any other forum.

ajfclark
1-Nov-2021
9:28:27 AM
AussieArcade seems to be a success. They updated software and that seems to have revived discussion on there a bit. Though perhaps that's because it's a niche group with a niche interest and a somewhat technical bent that really suffers when you can't search previous posts etc readily.

I'm not overly involved in other forums so I have no idea what the rest of them are like, but I have noticed a general unhappiness with Facebook of late and people moving to other messaging platforms, etc.
PeterW
1-Nov-2021
10:22:30 AM
It probably doesn't help that there's a lot less climbing at present (between COVID and area bans), so there's less to discuss.

But to answer your question, I think the forum software isn't helping. Not so much in earth-shattering major ways, but just throwing little hurdles in the way that make it "not worth effort" of posting anything more than a one sentence response.

For example:
- Not recognising "https:" as a URL identifier so clickable links aren't auto-generated.
(This should be trivial to fix in the existing PHP code!)
- The hassles including images in a post, especially for people unfamiliar with HTML.
- A nasty one is the "suspicious content" filter which seems far too aggressive in blocking legitimate posts. Especially when it doesn't explain why!
(Reminds me of an email filter at work that blocked outgoing emails containing "xxx", not helpful in a programming environment where "xxx" was often used as a placeholder!)

So yes, I think updating or replacing the forum software would help, although I'm not sure it would help enough.

Harold
1-Nov-2021
11:02:48 AM
I am wondering how many people think this is a general problem with people not being comfortable to speak openly on a public forum.

Back when this site was popular nobody seem to care that anyone outside this obscure community would be looking at what was said or even caring. Then came things like political correctness, cancel culture and the safety nazis etc.

But the big drop in interaction on this site seemed to coincide with certain issues arising in the Grampians.

How many don't post here anymore because they are concerned about people outside the climbing community reading it.

ajfclark
1-Nov-2021
1:27:03 PM
On 1-Nov-2021 PeterW wrote:
>For example:
>- Not recognising "https:" as a URL identifier so clickable links aren't auto-generated.
> (This should be trivial to fix in the existing PHP code!)

It's all bespoke ASP/VB stuff, and yes, while that should be a trivial change, I've spoken to Michael about it previously and it's not going to happen.

That's also part of why the input filter is so brutal. ASP let you put in unquoted, unescaped stuff in the code and just exe-cutes it when it pulls it back results from the database. Fixing those issues was non-trivial for Michael so the filter was introduced that pretty well blocks any word that might appear in an SQL query. Sadly, quite a few, like con-text, exe-cute, etc trigger the filter.

E. Wells
1-Nov-2021
4:50:26 PM
Suspicious input > press back arrow.

ajfclark
1-Nov-2021
6:46:44 PM
Binary? Octal?

Duang Daunk
1-Nov-2021
6:50:15 PM
Yep, bring back the heart throbs like ODH, Hex, Eduardo, Widewetandslippery, Simey, Wendy, Mikl, and dare I say it - that master of many aliases - what’s his name again? Oh now I remember; the one sometimes known as Stugang.
TimP
2-Nov-2021
11:49:21 AM
Is it a generational thing? My son tunes into the Crag mostly, he's just looking for boulders and climbs — not really interested in a broader discussion. I swear I didn't put him off by going on about knots and technique and taking "like forever" to set up top-rope anchors...

Superstu
2-Nov-2021
6:05:23 PM
Facebook is a cesspool of intolerance and misinformation, why people bother with it I do not understand.

I belong to a few tech- related Slack groups that are friendly and fun. I don’t think Slack would suit climbing banter, but the success of those groups I would attribute to the organisers who have put together codes of conduct and are keen to see the spirit of inclusiveness maintained. It’s not political correctness or cancel culture, its about maintaining a space where people feel welcome and safe and able to contribute.

In the glory days of Chockstone I don’t think it was ever that welcoming or inclusive. A few individuals were ready to pounce and rip into anyone who turned up and said something considered uncool by those who decide such things. So when the climbing community began to faced some challenges, not surprising people wandered off.

IdratherbeclimbingM9
3-Nov-2021
7:25:27 AM
On 2-Nov-2021 Superstu wrote:
>Facebook is a cesspool of intolerance and misinformation, why people bother
>with it I do not understand.
>
>I belong to a few tech- related Slack groups that are friendly and fun.
>I don’t think Slack would suit climbing banter, but the success of those
>groups I would attribute to the organisers who have put together codes
>of conduct and are keen to see the spirit of inclusiveness maintained.
>It’s not political correctness or cancel culture, its about maintaining
>a space where people feel welcome and safe and able to contribute.
>
>In the glory days of Chockstone I don’t think it was ever that welcoming
>or inclusive. A few individuals were ready to pounce and rip into anyone
>who turned up and said something considered uncool by those who decide
>such things. So when the climbing community began to faced some challenges,
>not surprising people wandered off.

Although it’s true that some individuals were ‘pouncers’, from what I observed that cohort mainly pounced on each other, and to an extent provided some of our readership on the sidelines with entertainment; so I tend to disagree that Chockstone wasn’t ever that welcoming, inclusive, or indeed generally helpful; as there was/are an overwhelming number of posters (and posts), that tried hard to make it so.
I reckon they are still there but aren’t seen easily as they’re the silent majority these days.

I agree with the thread premise that it’d be good to be able to hang out on Chocky and discuss climbing related stuff (akin to campfire discussions of old), again, … perhaps made possible with suitable benevolent benefactor time and $ input.
Maybe a go-fund-me thingy would work to that end?

@ Harold
> How many don't post here anymore because they are concerned about people outside the climbing community reading it.
@ TimP
> Is it a generational thing?

I think these are related to an extent…
One thing is for sure and that is that people do have opinions, so if Chocky becomes user friendly with high convenience factor software behind it, then those opinions are crying out for a space to be heard in.

Mike
3-Nov-2021
8:14:08 AM
20 years ago when I built Chockstone I was a young man with time on my hands, no obligations and a passion for climbing. Back then classic ASP was all the rage, and I had fun building the site, pouring a huge amount of hours into it over several years.

I'm now 50 and unfortunately my free time is quite limited. However, it there's things I can do that will improve the forum and don't take a lot of time, I should be able to mange it. I've added "https" to auto link thing.

We do need the suspicious word detection code, it's preventing SQL injection attacks. If it's aggressive, that would be me erring on the side of caution. Also telling the user why the input was blocked would give a determined hacker too much information. That said, if there's any words or symbols that are proving particularly annoying, let me know and I could consider taking them off the list.
PeterW
3-Nov-2021
4:35:47 PM
@Mike, thanks for the comments and the change to support "https"!

I understand all too intimately how things (especially coding things) that you once had time for can fall by the wayside over the years. But any tweaks you can provide will be appreciated.

> if there's any words or symbols that are proving particularly annoying, let me know

We would if we knew what they were! :-) :-) :-)

While I understand that detailed error messages can be used to map out internal info, it might be worthwhile having another "Help:" page (like "Adding Links" and "Adding Pictures") warning against some of the more common problematic words and maybe symbols. Presumably this wouldn't teach anything to an SQL injection attacker that they didn't already know!
gfdonc
4-Nov-2021
6:01:17 AM
> Also telling the user why the input was blocked would give a determined hacker too much information.
I get why you'd take this stance (I work in infosec), but it's probably not adding much risk.
TimP
4-Nov-2021
10:52:58 AM
Yeah a generation thing I think M9 — based on a small sample of my son and his mates (20 year olds). Trad was climbing when I started and sport was a small subset, now it's the other way around and they love the focus on the physical achievement. He's learnt a bit of trad but is not supper interested in the finer details. I was hungry to learn more when I began climbing and being a second or campfire yarns was the only way, you had to build and store the info in your head. Discovering Chockstone when I returned to climbing seemed a cool progression of that mode. Now there is so much info instantly available I think they search YouTube on their phones when they need to solve problems – though I have had a couple of calls from the crag!
One Day Hero
6-Nov-2021
10:50:06 AM
I think Chocky has had its time.

It's really strange to me that Superstu thinks Facebook climbing groups are a "cesspool of negativity" or whatever. I find them to be drooling, idiotic, utterly predictable circle jerks of supportive and meaningless jibber jabber. The few times I attempted to inject a bit of ODH nonsense, I was instantly banned.

The whole premise of the ODH persona was to insert a ridiculous macho caricature of a climbing hardman into the "modern" (2005) wussy world of an online climbing forum. And when I started climbing, there were madmen like Keith Bell and Fantini at the crag spouting pretty similar stuff, but backing it up with bold deeds. It was clearly ridiculous, and to this day I have no idea how much was real and how much was those guys putting on an act. I just frigging loved stepping out of boring polite suburbia as a teenage punter into a scene which was full of oddballs and characters from a bad novel. So then I imagined 1980s Fants sitting down at a keyboard and reading a bunch bumblies crapping on about slider nuts or something and just going off his nana.

Anyway, big thanks to the Chocky mods for not squashing this site into another pointless polite piece of crap. I reckon some really top shelf climbing comedy happened from time to time. I even made some friends on the internet and went climbing with them (which I swore to f---ing Christ when I first looked on here that I would never ever do).

I think it's done, most climbers these days aren't looking for humour and they're too detached from the time and place which produced comedic situations at the crag anyway.



chalkischeap
10-Nov-2021
1:33:03 PM
A discussion forum in 2021 needs likes and "care emojis" so that people can say virtuous things and bask in the glowing feedback. Kinda the opposite of old-school chockstone.

E. Wells
10-Nov-2021
5:24:26 PM
Ok. So chockstone is cactus, now, is it too soon to comment yet on .........modern rubber crack gloves....

gordoste
18-Nov-2021
11:17:39 AM
On 6-Nov-2021 One Day Hero wrote:
>I think Chocky has had its time.
>
>It's really strange to me that Superstu thinks Facebook climbing groups
>are a "cesspool of negativity" or whatever. I find them to be drooling,
>idiotic, utterly predictable circle jerks of supportive and meaningless
>jibber jabber. The few times I attempted to inject a bit of ODH nonsense,
>I was instantly banned.
>
>The whole premise of the ODH persona was to insert a ridiculous macho
>caricature of a climbing hardman into the "modern" (2005) wussy world of
>an online climbing forum. And when I started climbing, there were madmen
>like Keith Bell and Fantini at the crag spouting pretty similar stuff,
>but backing it up with bold deeds. It was clearly ridiculous, and to this
>day I have no idea how much was real and how much was those guys putting
>on an act. I just frigging loved stepping out of boring polite suburbia
>as a teenage punter into a scene which was full of oddballs and characters
>from a bad novel. So then I imagined 1980s Fants sitting down at a keyboard
>and reading a bunch bumblies crapping on about slider nuts or something
>and just going off his nana.
>
>Anyway, big thanks to the Chocky mods for not squashing this site into
>another pointless polite piece of crap. I reckon some really top shelf
>climbing comedy happened from time to time. I even made some friends on
>the internet and went climbing with them (which I swore to f---ing Christ
>when I first looked on here that I would never ever do).
>
>I think it's done, most climbers these days aren't looking for humour
>and they're too detached from the time and place which produced comedic
>situations at the crag anyway.
>

Typical self-centred crap.

People who have suffered at the hands of people trying to fulfil masculine stereotypes in their real life go online to escape that crap. But hey, they should just toughen up so that you can have your puerile fun.

Good riddance to ODH and his ilk.

If this pisses you off, maybe you shouldn't take things so seriously, I'm just having fun. :) :) :)

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