: Screw it, we're probably not going to come to an understanding on this. Percy
: and I prefer more cordial interaction, and I suppose you guys are a bit
: more.... rough. I can see how some would derive enjoyment from such
: interaction, and you're not especially terrible, so in this case I'm
: willing to just go our separate ways. I'll hang out with my kind of people
: and you yours.
I'll give my two cents on this. The primary purpose of the Pfhorums and Simplic7y is content creation; the primary purpose of the Story Forum is discussion about Marathon. There is a potentially bigger payoff with content creation, but also a much steeper learning curve, and a vast difference in the quality of the members' work, which creates a much clearer sense of a "pecking order" that people have complained about over the years. It is simply much easier to sound stupid in the Pfhorums than it is in the Story Forum.
For these reasons, it is not hard to see why the Pfhorums is a harsher environment than the Story Forum; some of this sharper criticism is important in order keep people producing higher quality content, although it does quite often spill over inappropriately to name-calling, cussing, and the like.
I'll admit, when I first started lurking the Pfhorums more than a year ago, I was shocked at the incivility, often perpetrated by some the more prominent members of the community. But I've taken a somewhat "meta" view of this recently. The Pfhorums, it seems, was started by a unique group of young college-aged guys, all reasonably intelligent with some skills already in coding and mapping, and having a common bond of playing lots of multiplayer Marathon. Since that time, a lot of people have passed by through the Pfhorums, and the vast majority produce no content at all (I am one of those people that doesn't map at all---I'm too busy with work and family to learn this), or produce low quality content, and/or make a lot of noise to gain attention. Only a very few liked mapping/content creation enough and had the work ethic to actually become decent mappers/content creators. So while the impatience of the people on the Pfhorums is not necessarily justified, it certainly is understandable.
