I know, I updated the site’s core software last night and I think it broke the plugins I had installed. That’s why the logo is white on the dark theme. Working it…
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Yay! Reactions are back!
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General update. The site has been updated to the latest major release. Three things I think might be useful to users are:
- Support for multiple emails in your profile
- Support for native timezones (for those traveling users)
- Drop support for Internet Explorer 11
Read all about it here: Discourse 2.5 released! | Blog
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I’ve got some feedback against myself as well as an ask to some of you folks. There’s a poll below for those with trust levels 2 and above.
The COVID-19 pandemic has been rough, I don’t care where you fall on it from a health perspective or political perspective. It has been a topic that, a few months ago, I considered to be on topic. You can’t deny that it has had an effect on downtown Raleigh. For myself, I was doing a lot of reading about it, locally, nationally, and internationally. As all science goes, there’s learning involved and things change. That’s the very nature of a practice built on experimentation.
As time has progressed and entities like the city consider canceling all events through the end of the year, I do regularly think about how I’d like this platform to address the topic.
- Is it still on-topic?
- Should we share more COVID news?
- Should we have less?
Less COVID chatter means that I’m trying to use the Community to focus on the original mission: To discuss all things downtown Raleigh but really, the foundation has always been about development, urban planning, transit, local culture, and all kinds of civic-related “weedsy” topics like zoning and development text changes. Parking too. 
Maybe I’m experiencing COVID fatigue, fine. How about I ask those that have put the most time into the site, those with trust levels of 2 and higher. Should we encourage more COVID chatter as a means of an outlet as others, like me in my earlier days, used as a method of understanding? Or should we steer more toward focusing on local topics that we had before.
We of course can’t ignore what’s going on but perhaps we can use the Community to talk about getting things going again. Or maybe I’m missing something.
I appreciate any feedback on this. I’ll close the poll this Saturday night.
- More COVID
- Maintain COVID
- Less COVID
0 voters
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I’ve gone back and forth on this a fair bit. This is such a great community, and I’ve learned some great information about the pandemic here. Its also allowed me to vent my frustrations about this crazy situation. However, this thread is locus of a lot of bickering, attacks and I am afraid growing bad feelings. I don’t want to lose what is special here. I think we, well you Leo, are better off at this point keeping this focused. I am not sure I get to vote (I think I do, lol). But there are my two cents.
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Appreciate the feedback.
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I agree. I’ve got a few threads here muted because they don’t interest me (endless debates of soccer vs baseball, tax policy, etc) but I had to mute basically any thread that gets too deep into the Covid-19 topic. Most reasonable people can agree that there is a balance between public health and keeping our local businesses afloat, and that this whole issue has become insanely politicised (I think unnecessarily). But regurgitating the same arguments just drags everyone into it, and creates a lot of bad feelings because it is personal for all of us. It’s not what I come here for, so I’ve just chosen to remove myself from the conversations. But if it’s becoming a problem, I don’t see the reason to keep it. There’s a million outlets online to have faceless arguments with people about the pandemic, the response to it, politics, etc.
Just my 2 cents.
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I don’t know how open this discussion is, or how open you want it to be. I’ll be glad to delete my response if you’d like.
Exactly. Gold star and full points for you sir.
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I have mostly appreciated the updates on hospitalization numbers for the specific local hospitals. Not sure where else I could get that information.
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I’ll admit that one answer makes my life, as moderator, a lot easier than another choice so maybe there is some self-serving motivation behind this. 
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Try this, will have to do a little digging for local info, but huge amount of information on covid-19 for all over world.
COVID Live Update: 270,909,263 Cases and 5,326,858 Deaths from the Coronavirus - Worldometer
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This is what makes it really hard for me to find my opinion on this, too. 
I guess my thoughts cancel out out my vote to 'maintain COVID'...
If we assume COVID is a continuing interest of this website, then this sounds less like a strategy/design issue more like a moderation problem. @dtraleigh could you try to apply special, specific rules for COVID-related discussions? For example:
-
create special threads for COVID-related questions and updates -viewable to everyone, but only open for replies to people with trust levels 2 or higher
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making or maintaining separate COVID threads (one for healthcare impacts, one specifically for businesses, another for local communities downtown and beyond, etc.)
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requiring posts made in COVID-related threads to be manually approved by you or one of us regular community members (who would only moderate these special threads)
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The thread with the most Covid posts has forced me to see how some people on this forum think … and because of it I have all but disengaged. That’s not a vote up or down, just sharing. I loved this forum … so educational. Then two dark clouds hung over it …
- Almost everything anyone is planning on building is too small and too ugly, and…
- Everyone is a Covid expert. I kept reading that thread to read what @dbearhugnc posted because he’s living it everyday and I respect his observations and opinions.
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These are good suggestions but I think it still doesn’t help because if COVID had its own thread then this would be a DTR Community and COVID world-wide website. It’s like two loosely coupled topics on one site. You can probably pick up where my I’m leaning as my heart is one, not the other.
And I agree. It is a moderation issue as I stressed for a few days earlier this year on how to handle it on the site. What a crazy topic to create so much debate and anger, right? The general news thread is almost like a pressure valve for the other topics and it SEEMS to be ok.
And to the point made by @R-Dub, it really is some armchair expertise like no other. I mean we talk about urban planning and development and we almost work together to figure out the city process and zoning codes. It was collaborative. It was great.
I just didn’t realize so many fans of city council meetings and development were also practicing epidemiology during their day jobs. So why have it? 
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@dtraleigh Whatever you decide, most here will respect it. You have done an awesome job with this forum and I have full faith that you will continue to do so. I admire your ability to bring a great balance to many topics.
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Thanks all. I’ve “felt” it but it looks like it’s just a smaller group that is fine with the COVID chatter while a lot more prefer to keep it elsewhere.
Let’s try and ramp up some chatter on other topics. Since things have been quiet on a variety of threads, may be time to just check back in.
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I have taken a break from the forum because of the COVID stuff. That said, we can’t completely tease COVID out of development in downtown Raleigh at this point. The pandemic is affecting everyone and everything.
My opinion is that any pandemic discussion should try to focus more on solutions and how the city and community can innovate and adapt to make things better in response to the current public health problem and going forward. The new outdoor dining spaces are an example of this that I’d like to see more of. We don’t need to discuss daily numbers or the science here. There are experts on those things that we can and should defer to.
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Exactly. This is absolutely on-topic as it is local and works towards the problems or highlights challenges we face.
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Good call.I got drawn into the covid discussion a few times. But I think the site is better without it.
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