There have been a lot of toxic threads lately.

I haven't been on much this past week coz I'm swamped with work, but I've noticed several threads that seemed particularly trollish, baity, or intentionally controversial. I've also noticed a few people talk about doing it in hopes of winning threadmaker of the month.

The threadmaker rules favor toxic inflammatory threads since it disqualifies most other types of topics that would typically get high post counts. Basically rewards trolling.

I wish there was more positivity in the forums and pleasant interactions between users from different fandoms.

Quote from bunnyviolet

yeah I agree with this. More controversial types of threads naturally get more attention than the positive ones.. guess that's because we're naturally drawn to the negativity and chaos. So naturally more of these types of threads will get made.

Wish that wasn't always the case.

That's true. People do love drama. I also wish that wasn't the case, but I guess people are just more likely to comment if they are emotionally invested. Nothing gets people more emotionally invested here than defending their faves from criticism or flaming others.

Quote from Kataphract

I wonder if we can do snowball threads or something or a joint kpop song writing sesh lmao (BRING THE STUDIO BACK)

but yea there isn't much to say on a thread where its praising an idol. The ones that make you think are the ones splitting hairs over missteps or botched things.

Something like the kpop song thread wouldn't qualify. The TOTM award only rewards certain types of discussion threads. Due to those guidelines, it will most likely always be a contentious thread that wins.

Quote from QueenMaknae27

Good thing we didn't have threadmakers of the month back then when akp was full of trolls

On the bright side, it's gotten better compared before but yeah we should have a section or place where

everyone can just get along

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LOL, we didn't need this award back then. The forum was full of trolls trolling for the fun of making people aggravated and causing trouble. I, for one, am glad that there isn't nearly as much trolling now as back then. I find akp a much more pleasant experience now overall. Stuff like this though seems almost designed to bring those days back.

It amuses that you would like to have a section where people could just get along but with an angry face lol.

Quote from dummi

I thought you get disqualified if ur thread ends up in garbage fire

That is my understanding, but a lot of negative and/or toxic threads won't rise to that level.

Quote from BEYBLADE

i aspire to make a thread so wholesome it ends trolls and baits forever

i want to change mindsets

i can fix yall

lol, I know you're joking, but I would love to see more people creating threads that are fun or thoughtful or anything else that doesn't rely on shade, baiting, or negativity. Even if it doesn't become a lengthy thread, short threads are important to have too.

Quote from unbannBLACPINK

there's a problem

people like commenting on negative threads to show their moral superiority or to attack the OPs

not possible in positive threads, so they die out fast

I do have to give credit to some of these OPs and how they are able to withstand getting shamed and piled on for so many pages. It makes my stomach hurt just thinking about it. I get secondhand anxiety.

Quote from FeLiNa

i agree with this, planning something big and positive.

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gunning for TOTM a second time

Great to hear! I can't wait to read it :)

Quote from tetetete

not true

MissBehave 's thread are positive but are still entertaining

Thank you I really appreciate that. It's always nice to hear that someone appreciates my spamming lol. There actually was a thread a bit ago here in the lounge that someone was nice enough to make about how much they enjoyed my threads. It actually got me thinking about this, because a few people mentioned TOTM but I know that my types of threads would not generally be in the running cuz they don't get long enough. Well, actually, one of my threads was long enough to be considered for third place last month, but it was disqualified for being too "game like".

Quote from chounim

Wow, I felt that

I wasn't trolling and I definitely wasn't trying to score a thread of the month. I didn't even expect the thread to go that far.

Your thread is high profile right now because it got super long and is likely to win, but I wasn't specifically talking about you. There have been plenty of threads over the past couple weeks that were negative or trollish that didn't gain the traction that yours did. I have talked with a few people that told me they either wanted to try to win or that they wouldn't even bother trying because the threads needed to be trollish to win. One user even posted in last month's award thread that they posted a troll thread in hopes of winning TOTM. I feel like the guidelines of the award encourage a certain type of thread to proliferate on the site.

So, I'm not saying you specifically had that motivation, but in order to win, a thread generally will need to have a certain contentiousness like yours did. That either could be from trolling, bashing, shading, or just being willing to have a triggering, unpopular hot take like yours and then being willing to get dogpiled on for 20 pages. Mind you, I'm not saying that you shouldn't be allowed to make threads like that. You're allowed to state your opinion and others are allowed to disagree with it. I just don't think the site should ONLY be rewarding threads where people are fighting.

Quote from Ves

Well, I've had a very busy week at my IRL job, but I can breathe a bit more now since my project is dev complete, this >< close to release and just waiting for deploy! Seems I missed a lot

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Seems a bit like the wrong time to cheer for myself, but I am just blindly relieved to be about to hit the finish line on a project that had almost everything go wrong and I am actually still standing.

Congrats! It's never a wrong time to celebrate a hard won achievement.

I'm also happy that I made it through a super crazy work week.

And you really didn't miss anything. It wasn't that dramatic. It was just that I was noticing a certain tone to some of the threads (even though most didn't "hit") and when I talked to some people, I felt like I had an idea of why this was happening.

Quote from pinkcerise

yes it's been obnoxious especially all the talk of making the next baity thread within a baity thread. i hate totm lmao

yeah, i've noticed the baity talk too. seeing several baity threads in one day just makes me sigh and close the tab tbh

Quote from ripia

There really hasn't been much hit threads lately not sure what you're talking about imo not enough people are trying to go for thread of the month.

Besides activity is the main goal on allkpop any rule breaks won't be nominated for thread of the month so there really isn't any problem.

Though later this month I'll update how it will be it's more exciting th

an the last for sure!

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But TOTM doesn't reward activity. It only rewards a certain kind of activity. If it rewarded activity, you wouldn't have disqualified me last month for being "game like" or the taeyeon thread for.... I don't even know why. You never answered that one. You chose to not even give out a third place prize instead of rewarding higher activity because you didn't feel like you were getting the kind of activity that you prefer.

Fighting threads are not the only kind of threads that bring activity. You want to know a time that I saw a lot of activity and engagement? The EXO bside battles threads. Those threads easily hit 30 - 40 pages each and attracted many posters, not just exotic guild members. When those were going on, I remember being excited every morning to come on to AKP and check how the polls were going and to discuss and debate the merits of each song in the running. Those battles gave so many page views and inspired others to do those battles too, which brought even more activity. People loved those threads because it was so much fun to talk about the music together. But, my understanding is that a thread like that wouldn't even qualify for TOTM, no matter how many posts it got. Would it?

You want to see activity and engagement, but do troll threads really bring that outside of the thread itself? Most of these troll threads end up being like maybe a dozen users fighting among themselves and slinging insults for multiple pages. Sure, some people do enjoy watching the drama, but others don't. When you get a lot of threads like that, it can actually turn off users from the site. I know plenty of users over the years that have either lessened their use of the site or left the site entirely due to the feeling that akp was too toxic or that the users here just loved to shade and bash instead of having fun and positive interactions.

Speaking personally, what attracts me to use the site is a seeing a variety of different topics being discussed and a lot of threads being posted and used. I want to be able to log in and see that the front page has new, interesting threads to comment in. I do not give a crap about a single thread hitting 30 pages when that thread is just filled with negativity. And if I see that there's barely any new threads except for hot takes and shade? Then, I just close the page tbh. I want to talk about music and the fan experience. I have no interest in fan wars or insulting users.

Quote from KaiRismatic

I agree with you and ngl I had to try some threads because I wanted to win threadmaker but I understood it's not worthy anymore if all it needs to win is a troll thread but without being too obvious. That event should reward interesting threads and not shady ones, even if an interisting thread has just 3-4 pages

Ngl, it crossed my mind more than once to come up with something shady or trollish. I mean, I want a custom badge too! I won the poll for threadmaker in the AKP awards and I just got a regular static badge of my choice. I could work all year trying to come up with many threads and users could enjoy them and feel it enhanced their experience here so that they would vote for me to win that, but it still would be considered lesser (in terms of prizes) than one long troll thread.

And I enjoy making threads. I love talking to all kinds of different users about music and the fan experience. I have to admit though, getting disqualified two months in a row left a bad taste in my mouth. And then I started to feel like I should change and be competitive, that I should try to be more edgy and controversial. But then, feeling like that make me feel bad too. And that kinda sucked some of the joy out of creating threads.

I loved seeing you making more threads. I know that you worked really hard to come up with interesting topics and I enjoyed quite a few of your threads. It's sad that you don't feel like making more threads. Would you feel motivated to make more threads if there was another kind of incentive to making threads? .....I mean besides the single extra akorn? lol