How to make Ripperology better?

[Phil H]

For my part I like the site as it is - ok, you get the occasional troll, but you also get new people like me learning as we go...and generally we all help each other out or argue things through together (usually in a reasonably civilised manner).

In short, I rather like it that this place is a broad church, and fear that if it's altered too drastically we may lose more than we gain...

I think there's a lot of common sense in what Dave says.

If jtr forums has gone the way it has, then I doubt a new attempt would be much better.

As my earlier posts probably indicated, I am worried about the "elitist" implication and the rather invidious process of including and excluding people.

But as i said earlier, I think the first question should be what do we want?

phil

[Jenni Shelden]

Hi Ally,
i guess if it was a 'club' only those in the club, which i guess is elitist, but at least its transparent,

lol

i guess it does go against what i generally believe in
Jenni

[Jenni Shelden]

I would think you would not change the main cb forums at all in the scenerio i was imaging a side arm akin to eg other side arms of the cb, the wiki, podcasts, Cex as was, blogs etc

[Toofew]

Ally, Phil, et al, pardon me for intruding since I only recently returned to the fold but it seems like what you are suggesting is a sort of Ripperpedia. You have a closed area where the editors/administrators work on correcting/proofing submissions with input from the general public. That way you have a largely crowd-sourced database of reliable information with the ability of John Q Public to participate in revisions or as an addendum.

And I nominate Stewart to be head moderator! No one doubts his impartiality or non-political stance. Sorry Stewart but you just happened to post above this and you were immediately on my mind.

Anyway, those are some thoughts off the top of my head. I hope they provide someone the genesis of a brilliant brain-storm.

Best of wishes,

Billy

[Monty]

The cartel has all this in hand,

Don't worry about it.

Monty

[Toofew]

And, I just thought of it but if Spry and the authors of the various biographies on victims and suspects would allow their work to be used at the Ripperpedia, it would have a tremendous head start.


Be good,

Billy

[Toofew]

Ally just kindly pointed out to me that Casebook already has a Ripper Wiki. If people are interested in re-energizing that rather than creating a new product, that may be a nice test bed.

Be good all, it's Happy Hour here in Kansas City!

Billy

[Cogidubnus]

The cartel has all this in hand,

Don't worry about it.

Monty

Hi Monty

I thought it was Messrs Clifford, Ashley, Buckingham, Arlington and Lauderdale who looked after that sort of thing?

All the best

Dave

[lynn cates]

Desires and such.

Hello Ally. Thanks.

"So those who may have genuine interest in the case, but recognizing reality, believe the case will never be solved, they are shut out for not having the right motive?'

Don't think so. I am in favour of world peace. Will that be achieved? No. Would I LIKE to see it? Of course.

"Research purely for the sake of research is not sufficient motive?"

Certainly. But would such a researcher--and may their tribe increase--actually NOT like to see the case solved?

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

optimism

Hello Jon. Thanks.

"I thought the majority accept that we'll never solve the case."

I think the majority, many of whom are silent, have a bit more optimism than that.

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

hope

Hello Cris. Thanks.

Hope springs eternal.

Cheers.
LC

[Nemo]

Ally's correct IMO that any advance would require both open and closed threads on the same subject matter (if that was what you were proposing Ally)

Allowing posters such as Stewart Evans, Paul Begg etc to post to a thread where they don't feel obliged to answer other posters or be subjected to inane comments can only encourage their contributions I think

Their learned views would be more easily available to readers in pure form on such threads and won't be diluted by a flurry of often irrelevant posts

Such threads could run in tandem with a public thread available for general comment

Of course, this would only work for a minority of threads and contributions by such authors, as posts to CB generally require and encourage participation by others

I also think group efforts into research form naturally and don't lend themselves to prior organisation

Perhaps threads with only factual contributions with little or no comment?

For example, it has recently been suggested to form a timeline for a certain character within the JtR case. That is the sort of useful thread that only requires factual input by a collective and would be well received by the general readers I think

Regards

Nemo

[Wickerman]

Since everyone is talking about the deplorable state and shaking their heads, let's hear it.

The deplorable state of Ripperology is not going to be fixed by Casebook.

And, I'm not in favor of enforcing stringent rules to curb free thinking, and/or the exchanging of ideas.
I am in favor of sections devoted to the results of serious research. A kind of repository, for reference. All too often someone comes up with a real gem, or a potential gem, but you try to find it 18 months later.

How precisely can the field of Ripperology be made better. Other than killing off those we don't like, including me:

There's people you don't like?

No-one should be excluded, if that is what you're getting at.

There's NO-ONE on this site that I don't like, just in case you were wondering.
There are a few that amuse me to no end, but when the entertainment is free, why complain?

The deplorable state of Ripperology is the result of attitude, and you can't fix that. We have lost some of the best, most informed, and most helpful members (Stewart Evans, Paul Begg, Martin Fido, etc.) often due to boneheads hounding them with ridiculous arguments.

What would you do? And specifically How to make Casebook better?

I wouldn't worry about there being anything wrong with Casebook.
Implementing changes to control members could backfire and kill the interaction on Casebook altogether. I've seen this happen on other forums.
Creating sections for reference, along the lines of the Press Section, would interest me.

How to make it a more cooperative, shared effort and less dog-eat-dog?

This might be corny, but the more people learn about a subject the more appreciation they might have for that subject.

A couple of examples, there seems to be a great under appreciation for the police, for their methods, how they operated, the breadth & depth of a murder investigation.
If members could learn more about the police they might be less inclined to offer ludicrous suggestions as to what they 'believe' the police would or would not have done.

Likewise, the press.
The Newspaper is such a fundamental contribution to our knowledge of the crimes, and yet we must never forget, nothing published in any newspaper constitutes proof of anything. Newspapers provide opinion, if we choose to think some detail they publish is fact, it must be proven by outside sources.
I don't know how you can fix this, again, it's a matter of education.

[Digalittledeeperwatson]

Read the post above me.

Wickerman. On point. No need to say anything else.

[Damaso Marte]

Three words: Statistical Social Science

We need a quant-focused criminologist who actually understands the case to use big data to shed light on major questions relevant to the case. We could, for example, calculate the chance that a killer would change MO the way the killings changed from Chapman to Stride to Eddowes to Kelly, test whether the old assertion of "facial multilations = the killer knew the victim" actually holds up over a large data set, etc.

Ripperologists today seem like mostly historians by methodology, and while I respect this, the answers aren't out there in some archive. Every once in a while a passing social scientist takes a Tabram-like stab at the question, but always on the basis of a simplified understanding of the case.