Booman Tribune is brand spanking new. So, I haven’t received any questions yet. However, this is a SCOOP site, and many of the questions I anticipate are common to all SCOOP sites.
The greatest of all SCOOP sites is Daily Kos. This site is designed to be familiar to regular visitors to Daily Kos. It shares many features in common with dKos, and it may be useful to examine the dKos FAQ web page (especially for HTML related questions). Just remember that a lot of the information there is specific to his site.
I will be developing a community guide for BooTrib soon. In the meantime it will be helpful to refer to Pastor Dan’s dKos Community Guide. If you have a question about what Trolls are, Pastor Dan explains it well.
Some immediate differences between this site and dKos need to be explained.
During registration users are divided into ‘Americans’ and ‘others’ in order to allow a separate ‘Recommended Diary’ category called ‘Recommended World Diaries’.
‘World Diaries’ are those diaries submitted by non-American registered users. They are judged according to a different standard in order to compensate for the general tendency of Americans to show more interest in domestic issues. It also helps compensate for the fact that this site will have more American users than users from any other single country.
If I become convinced that an American has registered as a non-American in order to try to game the system, I will banish that user.
All diaries, irrespective of the residence of the diarist, are eligible for making the ‘Recommended Diary’ list. This will sometimes result in a diary being listed in both the ‘Recommended Diary’ list and the ‘Recommended World Diary’ list. This is anticipated and not considered a problem.
Another feature of this site that is not shared with dKos is the regional open threads. The regional open threads are accessible by clicking on the ‘Midwest’, ‘South’, ‘East’, ‘West’, and ‘World’ buttons at the top of the Home page.
Anyone can participate in these open threads, but they are intended to promote coordination among users from similar regions. They are open threads, so anything can be discussed on them. However, if you want to talk about the Pennsylvania gubernatorial race you should probably not do it on the southern thread. And PLEASE don’t waste time fighting over whether Kentucky is in the Midwest or Colorado is in the West. Let people decide where they live.
What’s the Deal With the Rating System?
There are only two differences between this site and dKos for the comment rating system and they are minor. He calls serious idiots ‘Super Trolls’ and I call them ‘Mega Trolls’. I just like ‘Mega Trolls’ better.
The other difference is that he calls the (2) rating ‘Marginal’ and I call it ‘Warning!’. I discourage people from using the (2) rating as an indication of disagreement. Use it to tell someone that they are nearing the line of offensive, impertinent or trollish behavior. If you disagree with a post, but do not find it offensive or trollish, just don’t rate it at all.
…more on the flip
What’s This Site All About?
This site is not affiliated with the Democratic Party. However, the Democratic Party is the only institution in this country that is capable of combatting the Bush administration’s agenda, or of offering a realistic alternative to the GOP’s control of both houses of Congress.
Therefore, this site is committed to building the Democratic Party, raising money for the Democratic Party and its candidates, finding and promoting promising candidates for state and local offices, helping to shape the Democratic Party’s agenda, and holding Democratic office holders to account for their votes and their ethics.
The site is also committed to doing some of the investigative work that is so desperately needed with the GOP in control of the oversight committees.
If I don’t consider myself a Democrat, am I welcome at the site?
Yes. You are. Everyone is welcome at the site regardless of political self-identification. I don’t care how you are registered to vote, who you have voted for in the past, or who you plan to vote for in the future.
The only restriction on non-Democrats is that they be respectful of the mission of this site, that they don’t post Bill O’Reilly-like talking points, and that they don’t engage in trollish behavior. Again, if you have any doubt about what is acceptable behavior, seek Pastor Dan’s pastoral advice on etiquette.
If you are pro-life or anti-gun control, no one should down-rate your posts or make you feel unwelcome at this site, or in the Democratic Party. This site is not for the enforcement of any orthodoxy on its members. Principled disagreement is always allowed. Just don’t act like Sean Hannity and be an idiot.
What’s with the Frog?
“It’s of keen interest to me, to see whether or not we can get Karl Rove frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs.” – Joseph C. Wilson IV.
To learn the etymology of the term frog-march you can read this column by Bill Safire. He may have spent his career shilling for the Republicans and our intelligence services, but he is a reliable source on language.
In any case, Booman Tribune encourages its users to band together to do the investigative journalism that the mainstream media has forgotten how to do.
The frog is a reminder that politicians do occasionally get drummed out of office for corruption or unethical behavior. And we would like to speed that process along.
In fact, our motto is “We Won’t Rest Until They’re Frog-Marched Out”
So, even if the amphibian is a criminal, you must learn to love the frog.
[Note to MSM-types: I understand the difference between real investigative journalism conducted by trained professionals, and whatever it is that partisan online communities can do. That is why I call it: Collaborative Open-Source Investigative Journalism]
So what about cross-posting diaries from other web sites?
I don’t care if you cross-post. If you want to add a note that you have done so, go ahead.
Some other notes:
Please be forgiving if you encounter problems, or if you find that all the bells and whistles don’t work right.
One thing I have gained as a result of creating this site, as though it were possible, is even more respect for Markos than I already had.
He has made dozens of technical decisions on how to configure and develop his site, and they are almost all dead-on correct decisions.
I have attempted to create an atmosphere that is familiar to Kossacks for a very simple reason. I am a Kossack myself, and I like how dKos works. But he has been developing his site for years and creating all kinds of neat features like dKosopedia. I hope to develop this site too, but for now, it can’t compete with dKos for sophistication and ease of use.
If you find something broken or just have a suggestion for how to make something work better, there is a Suggestion Box Diary.
Please keep in mind that andyschm is a contractor and not a paid employee. He is under no obligation to respond to your suggestions. However, he will read them, and we will eagerly consider all the feedback we get.
So that’s it. That’s my introduction. Feel free to get started and post away! ;o)
