So I know this community is extremely small in comparison to the dota subreddit, and it’s unlikely that we’ll see many users move over here for now, but I just want to say I’m glad to be part of this place, and I hope that the culture here will be a lot less toxic, unforgiving and grumpy than the one that seems to plague the dota subreddit.
I dropped by the sub today and all I feel as I read the comments is frustration and more frustration as I see people hurl insults and vitriol at players and the organizers and each other. Team Tundra and Betboom had a marathon of a game, and armchair quarterbacks crawl out from the woodwork to tear down Sneyking and the team.
I’m not saying that there’s nothing to criticize, or that we should censor criticism, but my point is that that sub has just turned into a black hole of negativity, and whatever that’s good about anything happening at the Bali Major or with dota in general gets overshadowed by all the badmouthing and trolling that goes on there.
So even if good content may come few and far between here, I’m at least looking forward to good, meaningful conversations here, and a more mature and refined culture to follow. And if you haven’t, watch the highlights for that BB vs Tundra g2. Cap and SVG owned the commentary, and both teams played their hearts out.
I don’t think this place would turn out any better without moderation and even with it, it would be an extremely hard task. With time, the people within it would turn out to be the same, specially considering that many people would also be, well, the same people, there really aren’t “new” dota users out there.
Let me explain. What we see happen on the subreddit is the result of an “hands off” approach. The moderators are, despite it all, not the kind to frequently put a stop to users’ ranting. Chains of [removed] and verbal warnings are extremely rare. What we got is just people on their default attitude with one another. So if we want something different out of the same userbase, the question becomes: What rule to enforce to foster a better community? And there’s the problem. I don’t think anyone in the sub has individually broken any rule. I don’t think anyone was individually so much of a little shit gremlin that they primed everyone else. There was no perceptible turning point and no apt place for a moderator to put their feet down.
I do recommend reading less eSports-focused threads. That’s where the highest concentration of people collectively being said gremlins is found, except maybe within matchmaking whining threads. But yeah, right now, in the middle of a Major, a Major with several TI-slot decisive matches, I understand that it’s hard.