The poll needs an “eye roll, deep sigh, and sad headshake” option.
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Incidentally: the post generated a lively discussion here, but sank like a stone at the other place.
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my vote is for a warm burst of apathy.
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For me, I guess, it depends. If it’s a simple cross post of info like the Dead Celebrity/RIP threads, I don’t think it matters much. And sometimes it might be interesting to see how the two different communities react to the same material. Given both sites talk a lot about current events (or articles from non-BBS sites) there’s bound to be some degree of overlap anyway.
But… we’re attempting to build our own place here, so I’m not sure how much cross-posting is going to help achieve that. And part of me is a little uncomfortable with sharing a lot between the sites. I can’t put my finger on why yet… maybe because so many of us lost trust in TPTB over there to moderate and encourage respectful conversations. I know I feel more comfortable sharing personal things here, and I’d prefer they stay here, unless I choose to cross-post.
I guess that’s the key. Everyone is going to have to choose for themselves what they want to say and where they say it. As long as we respect each others’ boundaries, we should be fine.
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When we first started up, there was one idea of Elsewhere.cafe operating as almost a shadow site to Boing Boing, where we’d discuss their articles here within our safe space.
That idea quickly evaporated as this organized into its own place.
I agree with the “warm burst of apathy” comment from @navarro.
If someone wants to cross post every so often, it’s fine with me - particularly if people want a different read on a conversation over there that’s going in a strange direction; I’m not feeling that Boing Boing is now an important part of the identity of Elsewhere, but it is the place that mothered us, so I don’t want to disown the relationship.
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Hence my earlier question. What is considered cross-posting? In the thread in question, I mentioned that I had posted the same reply on the BBS, but I didn’t link to it, and I made no mention of it there. I would not refer to Elsewhere on the BBS, for the reasons you give.
I’m not really conversant with posting etiquette, and I’m sure it’s evolving, but I see nothing wrong with independent parallel discussions of the same subject on both sites. As you say, individuals can choose what to share and where.
If I’m wrong, please say so. I’ve no wish to cause anyone grief.
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I don’t think you’re wrong. I don’t have any answers. I think we’re all just figuring this out as we go. I’ve been a member of several online forums throughout the years, but this situation (a board splintering off from another board) is a first for me. 
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Cross-posting is just posting the same thing in more than one place (different topic or forum). It’s generally considered polite to note that you cross-posted so that people can look at answers in the other place before putting time and effort into responding and also because they might be interested in the discussion there.
Some people don’t like it, possibly because they feel obligated to follow the discussion in both places, or they’re just very much of the “a place for everything and everything in it’s place” mentality. But I think this is different. If the reply had been cross-posted here and on a reddit thread, would we even be having this conversation? Or if it were “I responded to your youtube comment, but I’ll copy that response here for the sane people who don’t want to read youtube comments”?
ETA:
Possibly in this case it’s more that people who are not part of the other group might feel excluded. But I don’t think that we want to exclude people who do communicate through another channel. Sort of like when some employees do something together outside of work - don’t make it an exclusive in-group that affects things here, but let’s not forbid people from socializing outside because that couldn’t go well.
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I’ve come to a new understanding of my feelings about the BoingBoing BBS.
I think of it now as the old Greyhound bus station on Cahuenga in Hollywood. They had these rows of black plastic molded seats with small coin-operated TVs built onto the armrests, the one time I rode into Hollywood on Greyhound (a 20th century rite of passage I wouldn’t recommend). Anyway, so yeah, I imagine some buddy of mine recommending a particularly talented busker who typically plays at the bus station on weekday afternoons, so I go there to check him out. I happen to meet some cool weirdos there at the bus station. I happen to notice those black plastic seats are kinda comfy and not too smelly, and the screens show everything from the better Sanford & Son reruns to interesting music videos, magic tricks, and single-use kitchen appliance reviews. The restroom’s toilets mostly work, a lot of the tourists and commuters passing through are fun and friendly, the staff is eccentric and tolerant and sometimes entertaining, particularly the shaggy redhaired shoeshine dude over by the vending machines, and after a while, whaddaya know, the Cahuenga bus station has become my usual hangout. Some of us play craps in the corner. Some of us welcome new rubes off the bus from the territories, some of us wave goodbye to old pals who finally have to get their asses on the bus to work, or home with the family, or the long haul one-way ride to Muncie.
Things groove okay for a few years, more or less, but then the landlord gets crusty. He doesn’t do well in the dice games. People keep sticking disparaging reviews on his vending machines. Nobody reads his band fliers, people keep turning the TV channels away from his favorite old shows, nobody admires his shiny old German van in the parking lot, and all those people who keep playing the games and planting flowers in the windowboxes and sweeping out the roaches and organizing the poetry slams over by the Departures board never actually seem to buy any goddamned bus tickets… so he starts kicking those people out. “This is a bus station, temporary shelter and minimal comfort for the weary but valid-ticket-holding traveler,” he proclaims. “This ain’t no party. This ain’t no disco. This ain’t no roadhouse. This ain’t no art gallery (except for my fliers over on the bulletin board). Greyhound business only. And stop ragging on the snacks in the vending machines. Buy 'em or ignore 'em. Stop changing the channel. Find your own garden, or get on the bus.”
So yeah, a bunch of us left. It was fun for a good while, but y’know. Couple of the folks mentioned they had a new hangout we could drop in on, one where we didn’t have to worry about the crabby-ass bus station manager. It’s… I dunno, sort of a combination warehouse/rooftop/garden party/pool hall/backyard/rumpus room/rec center/basement bar kind of joint, only with a bookstore/coffee bar/arcade/beach blanket sort of headspace to it. Whatever it is, it has those same strangely comfortable bus station seats, with better channels on the TVs, and nobody to tell us we can’t put our feet up on the furniture or make out down on the benches by the platform. Honestly, I don’t miss that damn bus station at all. It was a space that happened to contain a particular blessed circumstance for a while, one that allowed me to meet all of you. Which was great, especially now that so many of us have moved the party away from Cahuenga.
Huh. Or was it on Vine? Yeah, I think it was. Vine. Huh. Doesn’t matter.
Anyway. I kinda miss that redhaired shoeshine kid.
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A-fucking-men.
(and I miss the ginger, too)
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Good description, but the angry manager wasn’t the only problem at the bus station. There were the mean drunks breaking bottles on the floor and pissing in the flower boxes, there were the loud brain-damaged types interrupting conversations to rant about their personal obsessions, there were those creepy cultists telling women to dress modestly and not talk so much. The manager didn’t help with these issues, but many who left did so because of the hassles, not just because of him.
Now some wonderful folks have created a space that for some is a sanctuary as well as a cool hangout. The question is how we prevent the lowlifes from following us here. Do we rely on obscurity, invitation-only, strict moderation, or a combination of these?
(I think I saw the redheaded shoeshine kid stick his head in and say hi a while back.)
Dude. Not cool.
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Reader Poll: How do you feel about duplicate posts here and on BoingBoing? Choose up to three.
don’t go there, so don’t see them
Okay, if we were building a business here, and if we and BB had a great deal of duplicate content, I would care a lot. I might even go so far as to
demand a completely different angle on the write-up
But for now
don’t care
(Edited for clarity.)
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@honeybunches is the username- though what with his new spawn I’d imagine him to be plenty busy.
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you didn’t have a “eh so what” response.
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Okay, this is an artifact of how Discourse displays conversations, and this hasn’t been the first time I’ve noticed it, but maybe the first time I’ve noticed it with something I had just posted. And that is, visually it appears that my post 32 is in answer to and rather dismissive of @teknocholer’s post 31 rather than both of our replies being in two different parts of the same topic.
And the reason I bring this up is that, especially when there is a topic folks feel strongly about, a not entirely clear visual presentation can lead to a lot of hard feelings and some righteous indignation.
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I didn’t take it that way, so no harm done, but it emphasizes the importance of quoting the text that is being replied to. I probably tend to do this more than strictly necessary, but it avoids confusion.
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I noticed just yesterday how bare bones this post looks:
https://bbs.elsewhere.cafe/t/welcome-to-discourse/8
I was wondering how to update it to better reflect what this place means. I’m not sure I could have done a better job than that. Any interest in using that story (mostly) as-is or using it as a jumping off point for something else that fills the role of welcoming new users and sort of explaining what this place is (and isn’t) trying to be?
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Who, me?
Hmm. Well… okay. I see I’d better be brief (never my strong suit). Let me see what I can distill down and post here later today. I got an idea.
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The landlord seemed kinda’ proud of his snowglobe display, however he blamed other’s lack of interest on the popular guy who stood in front of it delivering one-liners…
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I made a slight mod from “Welcome to THE Elsewhere Cafe” to “Welcome to Elsewhere Cafe”. It sounded better to me.
Is it The Elsewhere Cafe or Elsewhere Cafe?
Since the domain name is Elsewhere.cafe, I thought no The.
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