I know I'm not the most senior of mods, and I sure as hell picked an awful time to have a couple days off mod duty to get work projects done, but I'd like to throw some thoughts around.
For the record we're not on a power trip, we're not trying to throw GN a bone, and this wasn't done without a hotly debated discussion. We don't just do things on a whim, we realise what a drastic change this might have made. Our reasoning was that this is TPU, a tech-focused website and forum. We've had rules about non-tech related discussion, but never actively backdated those rules by cleaning out pre-existing threads that didn't follow the rules that didn't exist back then. We have dozens if not hundreds of users report non-tech related posts and threads because they don't follow the rules. We (perhaps wrongly) assumed that as everyone seemed OK with these rules, we'd go back and remove some of the clubhouses that we didn't feel adhered to the general idea of cleaning house. We kept a couple of of the older threads like the TPU UK Clubhouse (for what it's worth, neither me nor Tatty had any say about this, we did not influence that decision AT ALL) because they're incredibly popular and act like a large pillar for part of the community. The Writer's Clubhouse was closed which was a personal favourite of mine, but I accepted that we needed to draw a line somewhere.
Something I mentioned prior to the shutting down of numerous clubs is the stark reality that numerous members visit the TPU forums not simply for the enthusiast tech discussion, but for the community and its members. There are those among us who talk nothing but on topic, however there are equal amounts that are here for the people, and not necessarily the content. The reason people come to TPU and make threads that are not necessarily adhering to the topic rules, is simply because the community and members here are not what's found at GN. GN was designed to keep some of the incessant crap away from TPU, and the problem with cleaning out the crap is not many people want gather around the place you threw it. There's plenty of good content over there, and it was designed to be the place for offtopic clubhouses to exist. People just didn't use it for that because the TPU forums provide what GN can't, and that's a very specific set of thousands of users that aren't found anywhere else.
Some of the Senior mods put in a hell of a lot of effort over this debate and the actions that were a result of the decision. So while some may not be massively happy about it, it was done with good intentions and a fair amount of someone's otherwise free time. We're currently in discussion with all the staff about the change and what do to from your responses - nothing is off the table.
