The Verge is the best, The Verge is the worst.

Posted by Fumetsu on May 1, 2012 01:55 am 28

I posted this as a comment on a story stream, but I decided to cross post it here in the hopes a staff member will take a look and hopefully take some action to restore civil discourse on the site.

I am "On The Verge" of withdrawing from this community and possibly leaving the site altogether. There seems to be no desire to cull the rampant flaming, FUD spreading, and personal attacks against other members on nearly every single comment thread on every news story. I don't know if it was the Lumia review that brought a buch of malcontents, or if it has just risen with the popularity of the site, but every post seems to descend into an anti-Google, anti-MS, anti-Apple flame war with personal attacks on other posters and a complete lack of moderation or any attempt to make this community a good place to have a rational discussion on anything. When The Verge launched, the comments section fostered spirited, but constructive, debate over tech companies that many people have strong feelings and opinions about. But any semblance of civility is long gone and the comments sections are now nothing more than FUD, flamebait, or personal attacks.

It saddens me to see what was once a great site become just like CNET, Engadget, PC World, or any number of tech sites that do nothing to stop flamebaiting and personal attacks. I no longer see the Verge as a place to have a constructive discussion on tech news.

Josh said that the staff was going to start cracking down on this, yet the same people are posting the same thing over and over again and I don't see any attempt to change it. The Verge went from being the best site with the best community to being just like all the others. And that's sad, because it had the potential to be so much more, and the staff pour a lot of effort into making the site a notch above any other tech news site out there, but the comments section ruins the experience.

Just my two cents, and I expect to probably get flamed for it. I'm just disappointed that rational discourse is gone. I don't expect you guys to fix the nature of the Internet, where anonymity gives people the courage to say things they wouldn't say in person, but I do expect you to foster a community of constructive debate without the same people being allowed to post the same attacks over and over.

Thanks for listening.
-Andrew