I have seen debate boards fail and succeed, no matter what the rest of the board is doing. Sometimes members do not want to participate in debates, and sometimes that's all they do on the forum.
So on your forums niche, is a debate board something that is needed or do you leave debates in the general discussion board?
Honestly, I don't think debate boards should be on all forums. I mean, they may work for some and while they do, they don't work for all. For example, a new forum shouldn't have a debate board. Wait until your forum is big and there are a lot of active members showing interest in debates. Just my personal opinion. I've seen too many new forums fail because of debate boards. Sometimes they turn people away from forums if there are controversial debates.
A majority of religious and political debates attract members with the excuse to troll on other members for their beliefs. So I don't partake as I'm not open to confrontation. If I believe in something, than I shouldn't feel the need to debate them with someone just to change my mind about it. What is the point? They will believe what they want versus what I believe no matter how much time them and I go in circles about it.
We don't have a debate board, we leave all discussions of that nature in a general chat section. I don't think we have many debate topics for the record. I think it's better that way. 😛
They work if the owner doesn't start getting pissy over free speech.
I've seen it happen before. Someone has an opinion on something and the admin snaps.
They work if the owner doesn't start getting pissy over free speech.
I've seen it happen before. Someone has an opinion on something and the admin snaps.
I think many admins make a debate board and then suddenly forget that people will debate with you. =P I've been banned from a few threads because an admin has decided that disagreeing with them wasn't allowed.
