In 2012 Greg Reibman and Sean Roche decided to start a Newton blog to discuss all things Newton. Over the last seven years, it has steadily grown in readership, and its place in the community has steadily grown in large part due to the withering of the Newton Tab.
In 2019 it has become one of the few places where the issues of the day can be discussed by all Newton citizens on a day-to-day basis. While we all believe that’s an important resource for the community, it is most definitely not a journalism enterprise. Despite that, in fact it does serve as one of the few places people can learn about various things happening in the city.
The two most common complaints about Village 14 is that it is slanted or biased and also the comments can be nasty or unpleasant. We’ll get to that in a minute but let me describe what Village 14 actually is and how it works.
Over the last seven years Greg and Sean have steadily invited various members of the community to become contributors and post items. All of these contributors are just regular folks with their own lives, families, etc. There is no paid staff. Nobody’s job is Village14. Once you are a contributor you have the ability to post anything you want. You can wake up in the morning and post “I was just thinking …” etc. There is no editorial process. There is no committee involved.
At the moment we have a large collection of contributors – Andy Levin, Amy Sangiolo, Greg Reibman, Allison Sharma, Bruce Henderson, Bob Jampol, Bob Burke, Bryan Barash***, Chuck Tanowitz, Adam Peller, Chris Steele, Doug Haslan, Groot Gregory, Gail Spector, Jerry Reilly, Julia Malakie***, Keith Jacobsen, Marti Bown, Mike Halle, Nathan Phillips, Paul Levy, Sean Roche, Sue Flicop, Sallee Lipschutz, Ted Hess Mahan. *** means that they are temporarily disqualified because they are currently running for office.
Due to circumstances of peoples lives, their proclivities, their interests, and infinite other details, some folks rarely add posts, others post a steady stream of new posts. All are equally able to post as often as they want. Over the years we’ve attempted to bring in a variety of voices and viewpoints.
The way it tends to work is that we have a substantial number of contributors that only rarely post, but when they do it’s usually a great and unique contribution (e.g.Bob Burke). We have a smaller set of people that are ‘bursty’. They may disappear for a while and then suddenly post a whole series of posts. I’m a bit in that category but no one’s more in that category than Sean Roche. Our most recent new contributor has been Paul Levy who has been a great shot in the arm – posting on a variety of topics and getting all sorts of conversations started. Keeping the whole thing moving is Greg Reibman. 365 days a year, if no one else is posting Greg always come up with something to keep the whole thing moving.
The Problem: Slanted and Biased – By their nature, by design, individual Village14 blog posts will tend to be slanted and biased. Remember, this isn’t news reporting or journalism. It’s one individual writing what’s on their mind with the information they happen to have on whatever interest them at the moment. Where the loudest cries about “bias” tend to come is when one of bloggers keeps posting on one topic (e.g. Sean on housing, lately) while the rest of us aren’t posting anything. At those times that one voice appears to be the voice of Village 14. The primary answer, is more posts from more distinct and different perspectives, the secondary answer is for each of us to refrain from re-packaging very similar content into multiple posts.
We already have a large collection (25) of individual bloggers that represent a wide swath of policy and politics in the city. If they all contributed equally we’d have no problem with perceived bias. Since this is a voluntary undertaking that will never happen though. The majority of contributors will always be occasional contributors.
Solution #: Guest Columns and New Bloggers – we’re going to try an experiment. I’m making an open call to all of you to become a blogger and write a post on any topic you’d like. Here’s how it will work. If you’re interested, send me an email ([email protected]) and I’ll send you some simple guidelines. Write the post, send it to me via email. I may or may not give you feedback, then I’ll post it. If I feel the post in anyway flagrantly violates our rules it will be totally at my discretion to not run it, but I’ll let you know why and give you an opportunity to change it if necessary. Note, I have a family, a job, and a life so at the moment this will be a temporary experiment to see if this can be done without becoming a big time sink for me personally.
My guess is that some of you will want to write a post(s) on a single topic that you care passionately about and feel your view is under-represented, my hope though is that some of you find that you enjoy writing these and begin contributing on a variety of topics. For me, the ideal Village14 is not just an on-going food fight about the one big issue of today, but rather a constant stream of posts on different topics – some serious, some whimsical, some personal observations, some new-sy and covering all aspects of things going on in Newton – politics, events, arts, sports, opinion, etc. If you find yourself contributing Guest posts regularly and would like to do more, let us know and we can consider making you one of the regular bloggers that has the keys to the machine and can post whenever you like.
Solution #2 – Candidate Columns – We’ll also be inviting all candidates running for office in the upcoming election to submit a Candidate Guest Column. We plan to post these in a steady stream from now through the election.
Problem: Nasty and unpleasant – Lots of people stay away from Village14 because they say that they find the tone of much of it very “unpleasant” , “cruel”, “vicious” i.e. a “cesspool”. Many more folks read Village14 regularly but never comment in fear of being caught in unpleasant cross-fire. I think some of this criticism is overblown since the majority of comments on V14 are quite benign. When tempers do rise on hot button issues the comments can occasionally get quite nasty. That’s a much harder problem with no simple answers because it involves everyone who comments here. We do occasionally pull specific comments if we feel they cross a line. That process of policing comments can never solve the more general issue of incivility though
Solution: Self-policing, self-restraing and occasional enforcement of ‘the rules’ – Most of the answers for this come from y’all. Yes, we have ‘rules’ but perhaps more important are the “guidelines’. Please read them and try to abide by them. The gist of all of this is to try to avoid the most common pitfall of on-line discourse – de-personalization.
Imagine a friend invited you to their house for a curious kind of event. They were inviting a dozen people to their living room, a few of who you knew, and the rest you don’t. Everyone was invited to talk about the issues of the day, some of which can be quite contentious. Inevitably someone will say something with which you disagree, perhaps strenuously disagree. In that context, you’d voice your disagreement but work very hard not to insult the person who expressed it. (If not, you’re not coming to my house ;-). That’s what we should all be aiming for on Village 14.
A great rule of thumb that someone quoted me from a Greer Tan Swiston hosted on-line neighborhood group was “don’t use the word ‘you'” in a comment. When writing a comment, as soon as those three letters appear on your screen – stop!, take a deep breath and try to rephrase whatever you’re writing in a less personal way. Focus on what was said, rather than the person who said it.
Your ideas – What are your ideas of other ways that Village14 could be improved working within the meager resources that we have? Discuss.
Jerry, many thanks for taking this on. And reading your short bio in the V14 “About” section points to your considerable contributions beyond V14.
One suggestion, or perhaps suggestion for a topic, would be whether or not commenters should be required to post under their real identities.
@Jim Epstein – We’ve had that discussion about real identities a number of times in the past. My take on that conversation .
* many people suggested that if people used their real identities it might curb some of the worse rudeness and incivility that sometimes occur. Other people point out that there has not been a very obvious correlation in the past between anonymity and rudeness – i.e. lot so anonymous people behaving civilly, and non-anonymous people being uncivil.
* Numerous people, including some of our favorite contributors, saying that they would stop participating if they had to use their real names – for a variety of reasons ….concerns about jobs, family, and others.
* Many people suggest that if people use their real identities it could prevent anonymous shills with a hidden agenda. I don’t think that’s been too much of a problem and I think its typically fairly obvious when it does happen. A new issue surfaces, suddenly one or more new contributors surface and begin posting relentlessly and stridently on that single topic.
That said, feel free to post your thought on anonymity below.
Have a designated person or persons to take post suggestions. And put that contact email in an easy to see place.
Lots of readers have great post ideas hidden away I think. But don’t know where to send them. You can “credit” the post to a particular reader so folks know where it came from.
Encourage the councilors to all post.
Broaden the audience. A simple flyer in each village coffee shop would do it. But more readers equal more posters.
Weekend roundup: some forums do a weekly roundup of interesting stories but that takes staff
How about a weekly call for potential topics?
Finally it would be good to check if we have voices from each village. A quick sound off of your location post.
As for the anonymity question, I think it doesn’t take much to fake a real name. And if you really research each participant the forum grinds to a halt. There is a reason why newton forum slowly died, everyone on the site agreed with each other…and only about 10 folks posted or commented.
I think sites like these serve a vital community purpose. And I think every public square needs rules for order and opposing viewpoints. Allowing folks to post anonymously has its drawbacks but it is far outweighed by the overall improvement to the conversation.
I’ll also note, in a small quiet voice, that the folks that tend to insult and disparage often use their own names. They just feel their outrage justifies the personal attack.
I also feel that the longer folks post here the more likely they are to moderate their behavior. Anonymous or otherwise.
@Fignewtonville – Great suggestions. I just implemented the first one.
There is now a new “Guest Posts” menu item at the top of the Village14 page. It tells you everything you need to contribute a Guest Post.
My three cents, likely worth even less because I’m largely a lurker who occasionally posts a comment:
1. The guest columns idea sounds good. I look forward to hearing from additional voices, and maybe even submitting something if there’s ever a topic I’m motivated by. Similarly, I look forward to columns written directly by candidates.
2. I would be happy to share my real name, email address, and even physical address with other Newton residents, i.e. participants in this site. What I don’t want is for Web searches by the general public to turn up this information. So maybe there could be some means to accomplish this distinction — more detail available to logged-in users, a human gatekeeper to answer specific queries, periodic V14 physical meetups for the purpose of 1-on-1 introductions, etc.
I do feel that anyone who writes an actual post (guest or otherwise) (as opposed to comments) should identify themselves by real name unless they can express a good reason not to. And I feel strongly that pseudonyms have a long history and legitimate place online — as the 1993 New Yorker cartoon put it, “On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.”
3. I think a bulletin-board type discussion forum might be a good addition to the site. Such a forum could hold longer-term discussions on specific news items, projects, topics, etc. and be a repository of facts, viewpoints, and discussions.
Sean Roche’s recent multiple similar top-level posts triggered this thought in my mind — in a bulletin board forum, he’d simply have made a few related topics, interested parties would participate in the discussions, and nobody would complain about the rate of posts or their similarity. And when there’s minor news about some project or issue (the recent non-announcement of schedule for the West Newton Square reconstruction comes to mind), there’s a place for it without needing a whole new blog post or commenting on a months-old one, which hardly anyone will see.
But forums like that thrive (in my experience) only with thoughtful moderation, which is a lot of work. Perhaps volunteer moderators from the community would be sufficient.
* still an occasional contributor.
@Adam Peller – Ooops, sorry
@Doug L – We have just invited each of the candidates for contested elections to submit a single Guest Post about their candidacy. We’ll begin running them shortly.
You know the posts I like the most? I like the reminder posts that tell me what is going on around town. Posts on the biking event, Nomadic theatre, village days, etc.
Why? Because I never remember to go to those events unless someone posts about them.
Hence why I’d love a Friday “what’s cooking Newton?” post. And then folks can write in “Harvest Festival” “Donut pop-up” “farmer’s market” “nomadic theatre” ” Newton North theatre performance” “zombie roundup” “robot fest”, etc, etc, etc.
Sort of like Doug L’s BB but just one weekly post on Friday.
I’d do my best to participate
Also, why can’t folks like Amy post a link to her newsletters in that same weekly roundup? Other folks also do a monthly newsletter or email, having links to those is good too.
We’ve got to take our sense of community where we can find it folks. The Tab isn’t it anymore, much to my dismay.
I’d be happy to let the people who run/moderate V14 know my full name, etc. (and several already do), but I am not willing to put it on posts. I am one of the people with a good reason not to want any random reader of V14 to know my identity, and I also believe I’m an example of someone who’s posts are civil – I don’t call names or cast aspersions, in contrast to some people who use their full names.
@Jerry – would “guest posts” also be a place to send the kinds of news items that are often posted with the byline “Village 14”? I’ve occasionally read notices of events that I think blog readers would want to know about but had no way to share them.
Tech improvement – is there anyone who actually pays attention when contacted about tech glitches? I’ve tried numerous times to get someone to fix the problem that if I’ve accidentally checked “Notify me of followup comments via e-mail” when posting, the instructions on each notification for stopping them don’t work. This has been a problem for months.
Newton needs another forum for debates between council and school committee candidates. I think it would be great for V14 to schedule a blog where candidates for a position can either 1) have a debate in the spirit of Lincoln-Douglas, or 2) have a debate with a moderator who takes questions from the V14 community.
One thing that stands out is the limitation of the linear commenting. For “lively” discussions on a post, it can be a bit much wading through all the comments, and that’s too bad because folks have a lot to contribute.
Reddit has its problems of course, but its method of nesting comments and up voting/down voting is useful. It has its downsides of course (separately owned, needs another account so not as easy to comment, needs moderation as well,etc)
I have some background in IT systems engineering and I’d be happy to help with this if this is a direction you’d like to explore.
To expand on figgy’s comment, a Newton calendar would be cool. Or just a listing of events.
More diversity of opinions would be really helpful here. One thing that I find to be a turnoff of V14 is the tone of Sean and Chuck. They use a scolding “I know more than you” tone in all of their comments. I’m pro-development and pro-biking etc, but they rub me the wrong way so much that I end up getting riled up even when I agree with them. Greg’s tone can be snarky but I find it palatable. Jerry, you are my favorite of the regular contributors here. I wish Marti would post more.
I submitted my comment too soon! I meant to add that guest submissions would be a great way to help solve this.
1. Guest posts are awesome – great idea.
2. Thanks to Jim for starting this discussion. In case you needed further proof that people who don’t agree on a lot can work together to improve their mutual experience, here you are.
3. I miss posting, and look forward to continue contributing – either as a City Councilor or if I (hopefully not) don’t win, going back to being a blogger. At least I’ll get back in the saddle with this one candidate guest post.
@Bryan Barash – As for #3, you’re in luck. You should have received an email earlier today inviting you and all your co-candidates to write a Candidate Guest Post.
A few people have suggested a mechanism where people can suggest topics for blog posts. I can’t speak for other bloggers but I know that wouldn’t be something I’d ever use – i.e. being given writing assignments. If any other bloggers think they would be interested in receiving suggested topics let me know and we could figure out a mechanism for that.
My preference would be if you have a topic, just write up what YOU’d like to say about it and send it in as a Guest Post.
Jerry,
This is a much welcomed thread and I appreciate the effort to seek feedback from readers and posters alike. A few thoughts:
As for anonymous commenting, I’ve used “Lisap” for years – actually going all the way back to the Newton Tab blog when there were 3 posters named Lisa. Greg asked us to find a way to differentiate ourselves because it was too confusing and – voila, I used Lisap. (Tip o’ the hat to Greg.) Having done so, over these many years a bunch of people have contacted me personally and I don’t think it was hard for anyone who wanted to find me to figure out who I am. I understand that there are some here who, for many reasons – some simply privacy, others who may feel their employment would be in jeopardy, can only speak from behind a pseudonym. I can think of several whose comments I have greatly enjoyed over the years and I think it would be unfortunate if they were driven away by the requirement that they post their full names. This is a topic that has come and gone many times.
Posting etiquette: The reference to Greer Tan Switzer’s forum is spot on. I was a member of her parent forum for years and Greer’s “sandbox rules” were extremely helpful and productive toward facilitating thoughtful discussion that avoided ad hominem. But, it was more than simply avoiding the use of “you”; the moderators pressed participants to focus on ideas and not personalities. I’m really not interested in sparring with anyone (especially where I just spent literally my entire summer from July 1 – August 28th on trial.)
Redundant posts: It is easy enough to skip over posts which relate to the same topic. Sean is very passionate about his views and, as you noted, there are times when he creates multiple threads in close proximity. That to me is an editorial decision concerning content; should there be a self-imposed topical limit? I leave that to you and your ad hoc editorial board. I draw the line, however, when posters here make redundant posts about a specific person. I’m not going to discuss this in depth, but there have been numerous threads here which in my view have targeted a specific councilor for her views, have related her views to her employment, and appear to single this individual out for treatment that is disparate from other members of the City Council. Does that create the appearance of bias? I certainly think so. I cannot view that sort of writing as anything other than placing a target on a particular individual to invite derision of the person and not discussion of ideas. As Eleanor Roosevelt so eloquently put it, great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people. Perhaps that wisdom may help guide this forum.
Best regards,
Lisap
@Lisap – I totally agree about the unhealthy redundant posts about specific people. Not good
@Jerry – I didn’t mean to say that I’d like to suggest posts for other people to write. I was referring to the kinds of posts that are usually bylined “Village 14” such as a local school/synagogue/church/organization having an event/fair/performance/fund raiser next week. If I saw something like that, I’d be happy to write a paragraph and suggest that V14 might want to post the information, and I imagine others would too at times. I wouldn’t be asking for it to run as a guest post under my name, just an FYI.
As to threads – you can have threaded posting without up-and-down voting, keeping threads chronological which I find useful as a reader. Universal Hub does that and doesn’t require membership or anything like that.
Jerry, thanks for initiating this issue as the blog had definitely gone off the rails recently with numerous personal attacks and snarky comments. I’m new to this blog, so I’m not sure if this is a new problem or is a recurring one-I get the impression recurring -so I hope the commentators follow your initiative and do not use this blog as a vehicle to attack any individuals.
I suggest a rule where a post cannot be about/directed at a single individual. This blog should be about sharing information and news about Newton-there are plenty of things going on all the time. It should be about rating whether someone is the best at one quality or another.
If you’re going to post statements from candidates, I suggest you indicate that comments are not allowed. Again, let’s not get into who’s our favorite candidate or who’s ideas are the best. I can already predict the back and forth on that and its really a waste of time.
I think limiting folks to initiating one column a week would be good as well. I think increasing the variety of voices and ideas should be encouraged. I’m glad to see the guest columns today.
If you get a number of different folks to contribute, it would make this place a lot more successful. Good luck!
@Arthur Jackson – thanks for the suggestions and feedback.
No posts about an individual – That’s a lot more problematic than it seems when it comes to elected officials. A quick scan of recent posts shows that maybe 1 out of 4 or 5 are about a specific elected official (e.g. “Mayor vetoes pay raise for electeds”). I think the vast majority of posts related to a single elected official are perfectly fine. In my view, there have been a small number of problematic posts about individuals but its difficult to formulate a simple rule that applies only to them. That’s more of a “I know it when I see it” sort of thing that maybe should be handled a little more carefully internally be the Village14 crew.
Limiting one column per week per poster – Unfortunately that would bring the site screeching to a halt. Here are the counts for the last week Paul Levy-4, Jerry-4, Villag14-3, Sean Roche-6, Chuck Tanowitz-2 Gail Spector-2, Greg Reibman-3, Marti Bown-1, plus 3 or 4 guest posts. Week to week these change drastically. There are probably some weeks where Greg alone posts more than 10 items. I think perhaps the real issue is not “posts per writer,” but “posts per writer on a similar topic”.
Arthur:
I respectfully disagree with your post.
Personal attacks? Snarky comments? I think sometimes folks get upset when folks disagree with them, and confuse that with personal attacks. But the most controversial issues tend to generate a bit of heat, namely development, pot, schools, contracts, and lately NewCal. And we are in the midst of an election as well, and partisans on both sides will post more often and with more intensity during the next 4 weeks.
The one post lately I didn’t like was the post that was focused on Emily Norton’s comment from twitter. I just thought it was silly as a separate post myself and I said so. But Emily is one of the most well-known of our political figures, probably second only to the mayor. I think it is fair game to talk about any politician. And looking back on that post, absent the complaining about the focus on Emily, I just don’t see the negativity.
No comments on political guest posts is another thing I don’t agree with. I’m excited to have them post, but I’m more excited about the discussion that follows.
I think if you feel uncomfortable with what you consider snarky comments or insults, call it out as such in real time. No harm in that in my view. A simple “I think that was a personal attack”. But I also think that there are fewer insults than folks are willing to admit.
The marketplace of ideas on this forum does tend to produce a bit of friction, but that’s a bit different in my mind. I’m also less concerned about snarky comments than insults, but folks can disagree on that.
No disrespect meant on any of the above, we can of course disagree on the right path forward for the forum. Happy to have you as a recurrent poster.
MMQC, thanks for asking me to post more. It’s nice to get feedback like yours – mixed in with the negative feedback I receive.
I will try to post more. With the large number of posts lately, it seems to me everything is being covered. I will say that I started a new post on a subject someone else was posting on, but was told not to start a new post – just comment on the other one. So I ended up posting a comment that was way too long and probably wasn’t read anyway.
Are there specific issues you would like for me to post? I will certainly try to do so.
I would like more posts with in-depth analysis on hot topics with links to more information from the person who posts, for readers who want to explore the issue further before commenting. Can V14 have a separate place where people can post white papers on topics that can be linked to a shorter, snippier post?
@Laurie – Yes, see the Guest Posts link above. As part of a guest post we can definitely format a guest post with a short snippier summary and then links to voluminous documents. That’s not a problem.
Personally, I like the way this blog works. I like best the varied discussions that follow posts. I don’t see a point to having a post by anyone, particularly a candidate or incumbent in an election, without having a conversation afterwards. I wouldn’t have asked “how the blog could be made better” (Jerry is nicer than I am) because I do like it the way it is and don’t think many of the suggestions here would make it work better in the long run.
And if anyone is annoyed by serial posts, all they have to do is disregard them. I don’t care if some people call the blog names, such as cesspool, or claim the blog is one-sided because it’s plainly not either of those things.
I find that those who are passionate about the issue posted, posters and commenters alike, can sometimes get more heated and go a bit off the rails. As long as they attack the position and not the person they disagree with, I still think it’s a good discussion. I also think that people confuse the two and call out a comment or post as being an attack on the person when really it was a disagreement over the position the person stated.
I know that sometimes I can get overly passionate about an issue and have to apologize but as long as a person takes responsibility for their inappropriate remark, I think that is OK too. What good is a discussion if folks can’t hash out their differences?
Anonymous posters have their reasons and I think we should honor those reasons, knowing what they are or not, rather than lose their commenting. I started posting soon after this blog was started and at that time I posted with my first name only because I was a single baby boomer, new to Newton in 2009 and wanted to get a feel for them place before I used my full name.
One suggestion made here that has already paid off are the Guest Posts. We’ve already had three new voices with three new topics. Keep them coming
I like the guest posts. I did not mention them in my comment because we had already had several of them before this post. I agree that guest posts help make the conversations more interesting by bringing up either topics that we volunteer regular posters were not aware of or by presenting other viewpoints. Great idea to have an easy way to accomplish this goal.
I do think that comments have been more constructive and respectful on all posts recently. I think this post and discussion are a big part of that. Thanks for making the effort to improve this site.
I retract my comment from yesterday about comments on V14 becoming more constructive and respectful recently. (see current post about Ward 2 campaign). Ack!!
There may be something that could be done to warn supporters of certain candidates not to be disrespectful and occasionally dissembling in their comments about competing candidates. Or that may just be the nature of the beast, and we just have to put up with it or ignore those columns for the next month.
Jerry,
I think your post asking commentators to tone down their personal attacks has paid off for the most part over the last week-Thank you. Obviously, you can’t control random posters, but it appears that “the leaders” have been a lot more respectful in their comments and I think that sets the tone for the blog. The buck always stops at the top.
Also, it is definitely nice to see posts from different authors and see some different perspectives. Another improvement. Thanks and good luck.
Laurie:
The next month is going to be tough. You can have a great back and forth going and within 5 posts it goes a bit south.
Criticism in my view is ok as long as isn’t based on lies or false information. But once the conversation gets personal folks should take a breather.
I think we all tend to identify personally with our chosen candidates. And take it personally when they get criticized.
I’ll note some of the folks posting on these elections are super involved in individual campaigns in question.
I keep reminding myself that we will all be neighbors after election and that lots of our kids read the forum.