I thank adambeauvsais for accepting this debate and wish him good luck.
FRAMEWORK
- more attractive, favourable, or commendable
- more advantageous or effective
- improved in accuracy or performance
Out of 5 definitions, these three are the ones that could apply to a website. These definitions will be used to decide what website outclasses the other in terms of being a better debating platform. I briefly want to mention that these definitions sometimes overlap, but I have no doubt that this will not be a problem.
BoP
PRO is the maker of claims and the bearer of BoP. While I will also argue for Dart being better than debate.org, it is PRO's duty to defeat me in order to win. Unless PRO can adequately present evidence that debate.org is better than Dart, I will win this debate. Remember that the resolution uses the word IS, meaning the present, not the past.
PROBLEMS WITH DEBATE.ORG
Debating
DDO limits you to 10.000 characters, only a third of what is available on Dart. Its text engine lack support for quotes, emojis and compressed hyperlinks. These and a lot of other features simply aren't present on DDO, effectively removing a lot of options for formatting text. These limitations hinder your creative expression, as well as requiring far more effort than needed. On top of that, way more of your space will be eaten up by plain text only needed to replace the lacking options. Your debating structure will look awful. Not only is the text engine too narrow for proper paragraphing, but the profile picture being inside every argument also ensures your first few lines will look backwards and unaligned. The only way to counteract this is by writing directly into the text engine of DDO. In Dart, we have this feature where only letters take up "space", and the text limit allows a little extra text if you need it. On DDO, the opposite is true. Not only is the limit indicator inaccurate, it SECRETLY counts any spacing as text. Not only does this ensure that a lot of the time your argument needs to be re-written, but it also disincentivises proper spacing and structure. Taken individually any of these problems could be slightly annoying. Add them all up, and every argument on DDO looks the same, looks awfully cramped and non-intuitive. It also makes proper reference and sourcing unnecessarily hard. If you skim through an argument, good luck figuring out which source correlates to which quote, if you can even detect the quotes. All in all, the DDO text engine is outdated and bad.
Debate.org is not reliable at all. Anyone can check by visiting the site and trying a few debates. Multiple bugs can and will occur if you plan on using the site regularly. One example is a forfeits locks a debate in the "awaiting argument" sector, where it will indefinitely be unsolved and fill up space on your home page. Another bug I've encountered is that when trying to post an argument, the argument might actually be deleted instead and you need to write it all over again. This ruins the experience as well as making it more time-consuming. If you are not the patient type this might actually make you frustrated and tilted, resulting in you leaving the site just to discover later that you forfeited the round. These bugs are only those I know. People like RationalMadman have actually used the site for a long time. RationalMadman is the most active debater on Dart, which he achieved after spending considerable time on DDO first. His words regarding this topic are law. Here is what he has to say:
DDO has so many glitches it's
literally unusable for proper debating or forum interaction [
RM]
Backwardseden
At first glance, the DDO community might seem safe, seeing as their main job is to have a civil discussion. This feeling of relief and freedom of speech only lasts until you meet Backwardseden. I can only speak for myself, but it only took a single debate for this user to find me and start harassing me in the comments. You shouldn't even care whether or not this user is representative of DDO users. Even if everyone else on DDO were nice as angels his mere presence on the platform makes the DDO community objectively bad overall. You might be thinking, "how can a single user be such big of a problem?". Well, I'll let his words speak for themselves:
I'd accept this idiotic moronic debate if it were not so idiotically moronically tragically flawed by a 16 year old baby brained hipster who has no brain that came up with it who probably did not come up with it and copied and pasted it from elsewhere.[
Backwardseden]
I wish he was the only one, but sadly, he isn't.
Moderation
Debate.org lacks moderation. I would have brought up some statistics and quotes to prove this, but I don't need to. Backwardseden is still active on DDO, proving my point. Even if moderators actually exist in DDO, they remain undetectable to the naked eye. Even if you manage to summon a moderator, it seems unlikely that they are willing to moderate, seeing as Backwardseden is still active. The only logical explanation is that no active moderation occurs at DDO. The implications of this problem is that bad votes aren't removed, which means that debate outcomes are more dependent on how many friends you can notify. Furthermore, you run the risk of being bombarded by users like Backwardseden. The heavily armed moderation force of Debate.art protects the users of Dart from experiencing these problems.
Aesthetics
Once you visit DDO, you are met with a plethora of different graphical elements. The menu is taking up a way too large part of the screen. The entire front site is filled with completely unrelated pictures. The entire page is covered with blue text, white text, green text, grey text, black text. The variation of text is enhanced even more with different fonts, decoration, boxes and alignments -- there is even white text in a rigid black box on top of a picture of a skull. The experience is truly unique. You are lucky if confusion doesn't immediately hit you. Then you start reading the page and discover that everything from the purpose of the site to the titles of debates multiple years old. I promise you, this debate website actually looks ugly. The text alignments are terrible, the rigid boxes distracting, underlined text confusing you and the pixel art is literally pixelated. Couple this with the fact that menus are placed everywhere, and you have a website literally made in the stone age of the internet. Aesthetics is one of the most important parts of any website. If a website hurts your eyes, you won't enjoy the visit no matter how good the content was.
Aesthetics is subjective. I beg everyone reading this text to visit
debate.org right now and post a comment about your experience there compared with here of Dart.
Controls
The DDO menu system is not terrible. After all, it's a webpage, and making a menu is literally the easiest job of making a good website. However, there are major flaws. DDO hasn't been updated for ages, which has resulted in there being a severe lack of helpful icons. The same icons are used again and again, or maybe there isn't even a symbol, just text. Combined with the bad organization and alignment of content on DDO, this forces you to read through lists just to find the link you are looking for. The most severe problem of DDO is its lacklustre account menu. What on Dart would take one click might take three clicks on DDO. Not only that, but it appears that DDO has put all information you would even need on the exact same page -- making it practically impossibly to quickly find what you need. The account dashboard of DDO is truly a challenge few can even try to overcome. To become familiar with the system you must put in a lot of work and patience. This unnecessary obstacle severely ruins the experience.
Summary
I have exposed major flaws of DDO. From its awful and outdated webpage design to its bugs, toxic users and inferior text engine. The webpage is so outdated that the moderators have been replaced by bugs. The "moderators" delete your arguments instead of bad votes. Even the controls and menu system feel awkward. Being backed by this enormous amount of evidence, I can confidently conclude that Debate.org is a BAD WEBSITE. I would go so far as to say that Facebook is a better debating website, cause at least Facebook isn't filled with bugs, nor does it feel and look awful.
RESULT
I have made a brief critique of DDO, where I had to leave out a lot of details. I have shown beyond reasonable doubt that DDO in its current state is awful due to the lack of updates. I will say though, that this does not prove my case. The resolution did not say that DDO needed to be a good debating website, only that it needed to be better than Dart. It's unthinkable for PRO to challenge the insane amount of evidence that points towards DDO being a bad debating website. Seeing that DDO is not at all "good", we can flip the resolution to say "Debate.art is a worse debating website than Debate.org". The only option remaining for PRO, then, is to point out an even greater amount of flaws with Dart. PRO now has to prove that (1): Dart is a terrible website, and (2): DDO is a better option for online debating than Dart.
ARGUMENT
I have shown how DDO is a terrible website overall. I also pointed out multiple flaws with the debating aspect of DDO. And I am still making sure that no voter forgets the mere fact that reliable debating is impossible on DDO due to the bugs. But to be fair, DDO is great. Online debating is its main focus, making it perfect for online debating. Even if the website is now only a ruin of its former self, the concept behind it is still the greatest concept of a debating website. Anyone who liked DDO would want a debating site that was exactly like DDO, just improved. THAT IS DART. Dart is the successor of DDO. The concept is the same, the rough structure is the same. Debate.art is basically the update DDO always needed. This site is up-to-date, a fact which shines through in the absence of bugs, misalignments and outdated textures. This site looks better, has a better menu system and all the engine system supports everything DDO lacked. This site is moderated, making voting fairer and removing the threat of Backwardsen and similar users. Even something so simple as removing the ever-present topic-select screen was a good call by the creator of Dart. Dart learned from every mistake DDO made, and thus managed to avoid those mistakes. Every good thing DDO made was improved upon and put into Dart.
This site is just objectively better. This is supported by my logical syllogism:
P1: Dart is an improved version of DDO
P2: If B is an improved version of A, then B is better than A, and not vice-versa
C: Dart is better than DDO, and not vice-versa
The improved version of a product is of course better than the original product. This logic is undeniable.
PRO is forced to argue that DDO is better than the improved version of itself. For PRO to win he must deny the validity of logic.
CONCLUSION
This site is everything good about DDO without any of its flaws. There is no reason why you would start to use DDO instead of this site. This site is just better at everything.
Most importantly, this site works as intended while DDO doesn't anymore. The resolution is thus false, and CON is the victor of this debate.
I wish my opponent good luck denying the validity of logic.
About Backwardseden, I was foolish enough to get into a debate with him(Just because I am a highly religious Christian and I wanted to debate atheists on the existence of God) I posted a really good argument, but he fired a ton of ad hominems, lies, and other logical fallacies. After reading this I said "F**K it" and then posted my last argument and did as the Matthew 10:14 says, which says "If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet." and I left the site and came here. After all, I was not there debate with incompetent idiots who can't defend their own arguments rationally.
I will try. LOL.
I think Brother D Thomas would know the difference. You can tell the difference between a moderate atheist and Backwarsden.
It would be possible to simply copy past backwardsedens arguments into Dart. LOL. I am sure BrotherDThomas wouldn't notice the difference.
Amazingly, this is his response:
"Nevermind. I truly hate the layout of debateart and not only that but it is amazingly difficult to use. I tried posting the simplest of simple debates to get everything started and the website would not allow me to post. No loss. Oh well. However, I truly appreciate the offering. Thanx very kindly.
Please tc and haveth thee fun."
I think he never read this debate.
I do have DDO account as well but I don't use it very often.
Invite Backwarsden to this website if you want. I want to see him go head to head with Brother D Thomas.
Yes
Do you have a DDO account?
Perfect idea
I want to invite Backwarsden here and have him go against Brother D Thomas. I want one of them to get worn out. It's comic relief for anyone who is not either of them.
“Category:Religion”
I agree. Good luck finding anyone that disagrees.
Lol, 'is' as opposed to 'was' makes this a truism overall. DDO has so many glitches it's literally unusable for proper debating or forum interaction. Only the polls and opinions seems to work.