Foe'd. Though I agree, Ban us all, then the traffic can drop in earnest and we can start the brave new world where Slashdot is ghost town that makes no money.

Shut up Lysander Spooner.

Creating a site with a coherent and congruent purpose for the people using it at least establishes clear compatibility for users going forward. People who agree with the founding principles will want to become involved, and people who don't can GTFO.

And your hyperbolous mythical monsters of bigotry by a majority are extremely unlikely. How many mainstream sites do you know of that are openly racist or misogynist? And I don't mean the sort of soft bigotry of disagreement being pushed as equivalent in academia, I mean hardcore 'minorities are evil' bigotry, since that's what would be predicate to your fantasy scenarios of a white male only power structure.

Exactly, I've pointed the same things out in every survey, to the feedback mail, etc. etc. Almost everything has been ignored/broken for months. Unless we see a real timeline and real results and not just more of the same "we care, but we're not going to do anything" gloss and bullshit, it's going to be a brief period of gnashing followed by exodus.

Exactly this. I gave all sorts of detailed, constructive feedback during the early stages, and then nothing happened. I'm sure I'm not the only one, because for all its faults, the /. community is much more intelligent and helpful than the average gaggle of facebook rejects on blog posts using the ubiquitous Disqus. Indeed, I've met a lot of Slashdotters at the anniversary parties, and you can tell they're a different lot, inheritors of the spirit of the early internet from before Endless September.

I don't need an Engadget clone, especially since I almost never go there either anymore (coincidentally they became shitty after being bought be AOL, pattern much?). I've seen several people talk about starting spiritual /. successors, and some are taking action.

I suppose this was all inevitable. It's just sad to see one of the pillars of the internet finally start falling after more than fifteen years. I've been reading /. since it was featured in some brief minute long segment on ZDTV when I was in high school. If I'd registered back then I'd probably have a four or five digit UID, but I didn't like registering for anything I didn't have to and didn't bother until it was necessary for the 10 year anniversary parties. Oh well, now UIDs aren't going to mean shit, so I guess I won in the end? Yay? Ugh.

So you're saying it's about developers? Developers, developers, developers?

Your rhetoric smells of lamp-wicks, Demosthenes.

I would venture to note that the great classical rhetoricians had equal if not more respect for those who mastered the extemporaneous mode.