Discord

[MXMLLN]

The navigation Discord invite seems to have expired. Are people still using Discord? I'd love to join.

[Ian07]

The navigation Discord invite seems to have expired. Are people still using Discord? I'd love to join.

Welcome! Here's the permanent invite: https://discord.gg/BCuYCEn

[MXMLLN]

I'm afraid it's just me.
The invite opens correctly, but when I try to confirm it I get an error message, "Unable to accept invite".
Have the server settings been changed recently? Are there still new people joining?

[dani]

You may have been banned. If you PM me (or post) your Discord handle I can look it up and see.

I feel like that's not the case though, because if someone's banned it typically says that the invite was expired, not throw an error.

[dbell]

I was reading the latest wiki news and a link to discord was used.

I object to this practice. Unlike the Life forums, discord is not generally usable by normal users.

I don't mind the power users using discord to communicate results among themselves, but it should not be seen where normal users are required to use it.

If a result is important enough, it should be written as an article as part of the wiki.

I for one refuse to use a site such as discord, and I feel excluded.

David I. Bell

[MXMLLN]

Do you mind posting a link to the news section in question, David?

[confocaloid]

Do you mind posting a link to the news section in question, David?

The news section is currently on Main_Page and in Template:CurrentNews. It says

January 10-11: Adam P. Goucher proves that no finite phoenix oscillators exists at periods 3 through 25.

and links to https://discord.com/channels/3579222555 ... 9010104440 (which I cannot open as well).

I certainly agree that information intended for the wider interested audience should be available without having to register/log in.
There should be a forum post, and/or a web page providing the information, and/or a wiki entry (which probably would include links to forum posts/web pages).

[dvgrn]

The information from the Discord link will no doubt eventually get cleaned up and added to the phoenix article, and then the link will get changed. But for the moment, that work hasn't been done yet.

I'll be happy to forward quotations from the Discord discussion to anyone who wants to do that update work but isn't able to access to the Discord link. E.g.,

apgoucher — 1/11/2024 at 8:35 AM
Yes, I believe that the current state of knowledge is:
p2: finite phoenices exist
p4, p6, p8, p12: infinite phoenices exist but finite phoenices do not
p3, p5, p7, p9, p11: no phoenices exist
p10, p13-25: no finite phoenices exist, unknown about infinite phoenices
p26+: nothing is known

Discord-link citations have been finding their way into the LifeWiki quite a bit recently -- there's a template for them, and sometimes that's where the relevant original discussion happened. In many cases there just isn't the spare LifeWiki editorial capacity to do a good job of copying over every relevant detail, so this practice seems likely to continue.

This "Discord" topic seems like a good place to bring up the question: why exactly are many people (it's not just dbell) reluctant to set up an account on Discord, just to be able to follow links such as these and get access to the details of the discussion? I think in some cases there are issues where Discord is blocked in some countries or from some types of institutional computers. Are there other reasons that I haven't heard spelled out?

[confocaloid]

One of several reasons is that as soon as you get used to reading (often jargon-laden) work-in-progress discussions between experts, you are very likely to forget what it is like to be a newcomer, losing ability to understand problems of newcomers.
LifeWiki is written primarily for readers who are interested in Life/CA but may not have willingness or ability to become enthusiasts themselves.
Even if there were no other reasons, I would likely avoid discord solely for this reason.

[dvgrn]

One of several reasons is that as soon as you get used to reading (often jargon-laden) work-in-progress discussions between experts, you are very likely to forget what it is like to be a newcomer, losing ability to understand problems of newcomers.

Oddly enough, that seems to me like a problem that exists to about the same extent on the forums and on Discord. Discord is full of newcomers who don't know any jargon (at first).

It seems to me like there are probably more newcomers on Discord in the average week than on the forums, though I don't think anyone has ever compiled any statistics.

-- Any other reasons anyone would care to mention? I don't mean to be annoying in asking again; just curious, since the "CiteDiscord" template is so well established on the LifeWiki at this point, and it doesn't seem like there's a good alternative to keeping on using it.

[confocaloid]

-- Any other reasons anyone would care to mention? I don't mean to be annoying in asking again; just curious, since the "CiteDiscord" template is so well established on the LifeWiki at this point, and it doesn't seem like there's a good alternative to keeping on using it.

In the LifeWiki context, the big problem is that discord links are not accessible to outside readers. A non-obvious claim can be supported by making a footnote with a link leading to a page with more details. That page needs to be accessible (including technically accessible) to LifeWiki readers. If that is done, a reader can follow the link and verify the claim.

Given the general "just curious but unlikely to change anything" attitude, though, it doesn't seem like there's much difference between stating more reasons here vs. not stating them.

[dvgrn]

In the LifeWiki context, the big problem is that discord links are not accessible to outside readers. A non-obvious claim can be supported by making a footnote with a link leading to a page with more details. That page needs to be accessible (including technically accessible) to LifeWiki readers. If that is done, a reader can follow the link and verify the claim.

Given the general "just curious but unlikely to change anything" attitude, though, it doesn't seem like there's much difference between stating more reasons here vs. not stating them.

Hm. Well, maybe I should describe the issue a little differently then. I didn't say "unlikely to change anything", or any words to that effect, but it sounds like it came across that way.

I'm looking for reasons why the current CiteDiscord template is causing any problems that need to be addressed. So far I haven't found any workable solutions that could reasonably replace adding occasional Discord links. However, if problems that I don't know anything about are significant enough for enough people, then it's certainly possible to do something differently.

My current sense is that Discord links, for people who can't or won't make themselves a Discord account, are very similar to academic references that point to content that's behind a journal paywall. Everybody knows that that's where the information is, and anyone is free to choose to go through the steps needed to access that information -- or choose to not access that information. It's still extremely useful to have a link available to the original source of the information. This is especially true in the Discord case, where a substantial fraction of the audience can very conveniently access that information with no difficulties at all.

The background details for a CiteDiscord link are sometimes fairly technical, not at all easy to summarize. Even if a summary is attempted, any new questions that come up can generally be answered much more clearly and authoritatively by going and inspecting the original conversations.

If it becomes especially important to have some additional background details copied to some slightly more public location, it's very easy to create a Discord account (in my experience) to go and get those details. There's no need to download a Discord app, or sign up for anything that costs money, for example -- I've never done either of those things.

It would also be a reasonable option to make a request for Discord-related information, here on the forums. Would it be useful to have a dedicated thread for requests like that?

[confocaloid]

I'm looking for reasons why the current CiteDiscord template is causing any problems that need to be addressed.

Whether or not the CiteDiscord template is used is completely irrelevant. The recent news item does not use the template, but it still has a link from a page aimed at everyone interested in Life/CA (the main page of the wiki) to an opaque location potentially accessible only to those who can and will register.

If some discovery, proof, disproof is mentioned in the news on the main page, then it is already more than sufficiently notable to explain it on the forum (so that readers can read about it freely), and probably explain it in some wiki article as well.

[dvgrn]

If some discovery, proof, disproof is mentioned in the news on the main page, then it is already more than sufficiently notable to explain it on the forum (so that readers can read about it freely), and probably explain it in some wiki article as well.

Absolutely agree. I'm sure that will happen as soon as somebody has time to write up the new result.

EDIT:

Whether or not the CiteDiscord template is used is completely irrelevant.

Meaning, it's irrelevant to the specific instance of the phoenix CurrentNews item? Right, I agree.

I can't fix the CurrentNews item right now -- I don't understand some of the details, so it would be a lot of work. My question about the CiteDiscord template is a wider question, maybe mostly for dbell, but also for anyone else who might want to speak up on this thread to mention feeling excluded by Discord links.

However, as you say, it's still mostly irrelevant whether a link is a direct non-template link to a Discord post, or a link using the CiteDiscord template. My original question was intended to be about Discord links in general, not specifically about the temporary link that has just showed up in CurrentNews.

[amling]

[W]hy exactly are many people (it's not just dbell) reluctant to set up an account on Discord, just to be able to follow links such as these and get access to the details of the discussion? I think in some cases there are issues where Discord is blocked in some countries or from some types of institutional computers. Are there other reasons that I haven't heard spelled out?

I'm just one guy, but you seem to be asking individuals with objections to step forward, so for my part: I'm not keen on my participation in the human quest for knowledge being captured by corporate interests. When Discord starts demanding phone numbers, credit cards, social security numbers, etc. I do not want our work held hostage.

[snowman]

why exactly are many people (it's not just dbell) reluctant to set up an account on Discord, just to be able to follow links such as these and get access to the details of the discussion?

Well, one thing about putting things on the wiki instead of Discord is that as time goes on, it will be harder to find the proof on Discord, as more posts use the word "phoenix" and others, cluttering the search. Whereas, I could type "phoenix" into the wiki search bar and scroll a little and click a citation link to a forum post, or something. Discord doesn't really have a great way of organizing posts like a wiki or forum does.

In addition, the wiki is usable without making an account or joining some public server.

(I am not really great at writing, so this may be a little hard to read)

Absolutely agree. I'm sure that will happen as soon as somebody has time to write up the new result.

Of course. The proof on Discord might be less organized and, judging by the amount of changes to the lower bound over the past few days, in multiple posts, so it'll take some effort to collate that into one place. My main concern is that some very nice results will be buried and inaccessible, although it seems like there's relatively few thus far. As long as the proof makes it to the wiki eventually, that'll do.

[Andrew]

I'm also in the not-interested-in-Discord camp. Not for any great ideological reasons -- I just prefer to keep my use of social media to a minimum, especially on sites that require me to register and login.

Speaking of which, I'd prefer it if the patterns included with Golly didn't have links to Discord. I suspect the vast majority of Golly users don't use Discord (some might not even be able to join), so it might be quite annoying to see those links. At the moment there are only two offending patterns:

Non-Totalistic/Spaceships/whiteboard-17c2415-spaceship.rle
Non-Totalistic/sweet-revenge.rle

If the links are just to a simple announcement of the pattern then I don't see the need for any link. If the link points to some interesting discussion of the pattern then I'd prefer to see a summary or simple copy of that info.

[Sokwe]

I'm the one who added the Discord link. I added it because it was the only primary source for the result. I have been trying in vain for quite a while to get people to cross-post their potentially interesting Discord posts to the forums quickly. I prefer that the original poster do the cross-posting, which is why I don't cross-post other users' posts. Discord is a terrible place for archiving Game of Life content, and any platform that requires users to log in to view content is extremely annoying to new users.

Regarding this particular Discord link, there is interesting content on how the result was achieved that can be found higher in the feed, so the links may be useful to those who have Discord accounts. I've been waiting for calcyman to post to the forums so that I can change the source link.

[very]

unrelated, but here's an archive of all messages in the cgol channel, in json format - i've tried formatting it in some better format, to no avail

this doesn't include the attachments either, but hopefully this will at least partially alleviate the "being held hostage by discord" thing

https://github.com/SuffixAutomata/uploa ... n/cgol.zip

[confocaloid]

A quick Python 3 script to convert from json to text, relying on the assumption that I understand the structure correctly. No warranty express or implied, etc.

Code: Select all

import json
import re

with open("out.json", mode="r") as f:
   s = f.read()

j = json.loads(s)

with open("out.txt", mode="w") as f:
   for item in j:
      if item["author"][0] == 959676203650920448:
         continue   # Caterer
      if re.match("^!sim [0-9]+$", item["content"]):
         continue
      if re.match("^ca.sim [0-9]+$", item["content"]):
         continue
      f.write("---\n")
      for k in item.keys():
         if k != "content":
            f.write("{}: {}\n".format(k, item[k]))
      f.write("content:\n{}\n".format(item["content"]))

[MXMLLN]

Well it seems like we're all on the same page.
Except for the fact that everyone hijacked my original post.
I still cannot get access to Discord. Should we move my problem to a new thread?

[dvgrn]

Well it seems like we're all on the same page.
Except for the fact that everyone hijacked my original post.
I still cannot get access to Discord. Should we move my problem to a new thread?

Heh, you picked such a nice name for a thread that it was just irresistible to use it.

The moderators on Discord have changed since the last time you mentioned a problem. I'll ask around and see if anyone can help figure out what's going on. I take it you're still getting the "Unable to accept invite" message when you try to confirm, using Ian07's invite link?

[MXMLLN]

Everyone hijacked my original post!

Heh, you picked such a nice name for a thread that it was just irresistible to use it.

That's a good point I generally don't use such generic titles, but it didn't seem like there would be much more to say than "The Discord link doesn't work"

I still cannot get access to Discord.

I take it you're still getting the "Unable to accept invite" message when you try to confirm, using Ian07's invite link?

Yes, exactly. That's the error message I'm getting

[dvgrn]

Yes, exactly. That's the error message I'm getting

Possibilities mentioned on Discord include

banned on an alt, maybe?
banned in general?
IP banned by coincidence?

without a discord user id to go off we can't really establish anything in that regard

So it looks like the next step is to give the Discord mods the specific user ID that you're trying to log in with. Either post it here, or send me a private message and I'll convey it.

[MXMLLN]

banned on an alt, maybe?
banned in general?
IP banned by coincidence?

So it looks like the next step is to give the Discord mods the specific user ID that you're trying to log in with. Either post it here, or send me a private message and I'll convey it.

Discord username: InvasiveBeasties

Maybe my country is blocked. It's hard to imagine getting banned from a server I was never able to join.
Anyway, I really appreciate the help!