We will continue to do hardware estimates and report on shipment figures and player totals from official sources. It would be a long way off as it requires a lot of work to do, but we have some ideas on making it easier to find the latest shipment figures and player totals.

If retail polling is not an option (Circana, distributor or retail partnerships perhaps?) then any shipment or official data will need to be very accessible (as you noted) and usable.  More tools to make those numbers calculable in various scenarios.  These numbers are the heart of VGC.  More effort should be put into how users can work with the numbers than should be put into a site/forum overhaul.  

Basically do things that aren't or can't be done elsewhere. 
A place to discuss games and stuff - All over the place.
The Excel of video game sales data - Unique.

Any way we could add a delete button for forum posts? (Editing to say “dupe” works fine…but it just kinda creates clutter.)

As well adding receipts of when comments on articles are edited? (To avoid scenarios of an individual saying something, being responded to, and then the original post being edited. Not super common situation, but good feature worth considering.)

I also remain adamantly *against* the current voting system, in that some reform should be entertained (I feel the comment sections and forums are highly toxic here…though **far** better than Twitter. Users such as Hardstruck Platinum are essentially beaten senseless, “motivated” individuals will weaponize the voting system to suppress folks they either find annoying or who hold opinions which contradict their own (something as simple as “I think NSW2 will sell for $500” received heavy downvotes in an article, for instance), etc.), though I completely understand and respect the choice of those who run the site not to entertain this option.

Regarding upvotes and downvotes, I'm not sure I see the problem. 

I get that a system like that can be abused. But I'll just say I think the downvotes are reasonable in this scenario. 

"Again, it’s a flawed system, and is especially stressful for somebody such as myself who fights (or has fought) severe social anxiety"

prolly best to keep this discussion short since I literally just instigated a conversation over this last time I was here lol, but I do believe that the upvote/downvote system is responsible for Hardstruck’s provocative remarks, not the other way around.

And looking beyond him, the general concept of “downvoting/upvoting” system is problematic on its own. For real-life example, if I make a remark to professor during lecture, and the response includes a portion of the class looking at me with disapproval, I would feel very upset and worried to speak again. Analogously, if I leave an innocent comment on here just to come back w/ net [X] downvotes, I feel very unwelcomed and discouraged from commenting again, or I’ll have to “strategically” comment in a popular manner. (I’ve begun to notice most on here leave these kind of empty popular comments: Nothing of substance, but agreeable to the community.)

Again, it’s a flawed system, and is especially stressful for somebody such as myself who fights (or has fought) severe social anxiety. This is actly why I’m keeping comments to a minimum going forward. It just feels disgusting to comment with the intent of catering to an audience and or dealing with aggression. I believe reform can occur, we need not comments rid the voting system as a whole. I have ideas if anybody is actly open to hearing, tho I’m also fine just not commenting.

If we assume someone is a troll,  not saying anyone is,  I don't think anyone is going to stop them from trolling without a ban hammer. At least this gives the community a way to hide comments they feel are in bad faith or just stupid.

As for the rest, I don't disagree but I see that as a feature not a bug. It allows the community to discourage content they don't like. Yeah that can lead to some degree of group think but if there is a way to make a community that fairly evaluates every utterance, I don't think we're going to discover it with about 2 staff members on a shoe string budget. This may be as good as it gets.

While I do have some social anxiety issues and I sympathize, I think a thumbs down is a relatively gentle way to give feedback. And yeah that may upset some people but at the same time... that's the world. If people don't like what you say they might let you know.

This is something I questioned as a mod. Believe it or not we did (imo) want to help people figure out how to contribute productively and recognized some people may struggle with certain issues that make that tough. But ultimately I just don't think the mods/developers are really equipped for that. I think the comments upvote system is a fair way to outsource some of the power to the community itself. It's not a perfect system but I don't really see a better option.

prolly best to keep this discussion short since I literally just instigated a conversation over this last time I was here lol, but I do believe that the upvote/downvote system is responsible for Hardstruck’s provocative remarks, not the other way around.

And looking beyond him, the general concept of “downvoting/upvoting” system is problematic on its own. For real-life example, if I make a remark to professor during lecture, and the response includes a portion of the class looking at me with disapproval, I would feel very upset and worried to speak again. Analogously, if I leave an innocent comment on here just to come back w/ net [X] downvotes, I feel very unwelcomed and discouraged from commenting again, or I’ll have to “strategically” comment in a popular manner. (I’ve begun to notice most on here leave these kind of empty popular comments: Nothing of substance, but agreeable to the community.)

Again, it’s a flawed system, and is especially stressful for somebody such as myself who fights (or has fought) severe social anxiety. This is actly why I’m keeping comments to a minimum going forward. It just feels disgusting to comment with the intent of catering to an audience and or dealing with aggression. I believe reform can occur, we need not comments rid the voting system as a whole. I have ideas if anybody is actly open to hearing, tho I’m also fine just not commenting.

This has nothing to do with the system being bad. It has to do with you.

You have to understand a forum is a web of opinions and some will agree with those opinions and some won't. That is the very core of the internet experience. Stop being scared of people not agreeing with you.