General Discussion Threads

[politicus]

This is a list of the current versions of our general discussion threads. Please consider using them before you set up new topics on small stuff. Putting general news and minor topics in the appropriate GDs secure order and continuity and is generally user friendly.


National or Multinational General Discussions

Asia:
- China General Discussion
- Japan General Discussion
- The Great Korea Thread
- The Great Thailand Thread
- Indian Politics and Political Parties - General Discussion
- Israel general discussion

Oceania:
- Australia General Discussion

Americas:
- Canada General Discussion 1.5: The Countdown Begins
- The Great Brazil Topic

Africa:
- Gully Foyle's African News Thread
- South Africa General Discussion

Europe:
- Russia General Discussion
- France General Discussion II: Living under Marxism
- Spain General Discussion
- Greece General Discussion
- UK General Discussion: Cameron 2.0  
- Northern Ireland General Discussion
- Ireland General Discussion
- The Great Nordic Thread
- The Big Bad Swedish Politics & News Thread


National threads on International Elections

- German Elections and Politics
- Italian Elections and Politics, 2015 ed.
- Spanish elections and politics
- Austrian Elections and Politics
- Swiss Elections and Politics
- Dutch Elections and Politics


Other General Discussions

- International Military Trade and Deliveries General Discussion
- International thread for shootings
- Europe-Middle East-Africa Refugee Crisis General Thread


Other General Discussion threads on International Elections

- Electoral type events
- Small Island Developing States Elections


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Comments and suggestions:

Germany and Italy both have threads on IE, but a Germany GD here might not be a bad idea, since we have quite a few small Germany related topics. Antonio's Italy thread is de facto a general thread about Italian politics and should probably be on this board - whereas the Austria, Switzerland, Netherlands and Germany threads on IE are more strictly about electoral politics.

If the thread creator is interested the India thread could be broadened to an allround GD.

The old Brazil GD should probably be merged into The Great Brazil Topic to secure a bit more continuity - both threads are relatively short and there is only half a year between them.

[politicus]

So we have a Sweden and a Nordic megathread? lol

We started out with a common one (The GNT), but there was a lot of Swedish stuff compared to the other countries, and most of it soon ended in the Swedish General Election and Monarchy Poll thread, so Sweedish Cheese and I decided to break up the "Kalmar Union" and declare Sweden independent

Posters can rename their own threads without moderator interventions.

OK, that makes it easier. Its a bit like the Kalmar Union with Sweden seceding long time after gaining de facto independence, just without all the wars.

There, done and done. Sweden is now free and indipendant.

[politicus]

Who made you mod? I was thinking earlier of making some snide remark as to how you sought to turn the IGD board into a monotonous collection of "general discussion" threads, but, well... here you are!

I don't have to be a mod to come with a suggestion and its not about reducing all discussion to GD, but to have them collected in a stickied thread, so you can find them.

I think GD threads are an advantage when it comes to highlightning areas that don't get enough attention (= non Europe/Anglophone world, non-Middle East), so I suggested Africa + Japan and then CrabCake and Hash had a few other ideas.

I would actually be against Middle East (too many crisis related/case by case things) and Eastern Europe (too diverse) GDs. Africa would be to highlight the continent and I think more Africa stuff would be written if we had a specific thread.

GDs should not be used for all things, but its good to have them for important countries - they help avoid cluttering with small/medium importance stuff and secure continuity.  

There are two discussions here:

A. Do you support a stickied thread with GDs?
B. Should we have more GDs?

The last one is different, because any poster can make GDs if they feel like it - so its more about exchanging ideas.

[politicus]

I have tried looking at what kind of national GD threads that has been made before, and apart from a couple of old South Africa threads, a China, a Russia and a Brazil etc. there has been a number of threads made for country's that no longer have a national GD:

Zimbabwe June 2008-July 2008
Wales March 2008-February 2009
Scotland September 2009
Pakistan December 2009-August 2010
Gully Foyle's African News Thread January 2010-November 2010 #
Poland July 2010 (2 days!)
Middle East December 2010 #
Egypt August 2012-September 2012
Greece December 2012
Austria June-July 2013
Israel June-July 2013 #
Sri Lanka (1 post!) July 2013

# for ones we have talked about

So a lot of quick deaths, so they need to have link and be about a major country or one with a large interest.

Maybe we could start megathreads in particular issues that pop up again and again (like, say, gay marriage to avoid new threads every time something happens).

That might be a good idea, but it should only be a few topics and its even more important with links for them, since they tend to die quicker.
Afleitch made one about Devolution, that never caught on. I suppose EU and UN might be possibilities. Generally I am a little sceptical of this, though. I think they are harder to maintain  than big country GDs. But it would be worth trying a handfull to see how it goes, if they are linked to.