Reading this as a software developer, it basically means, there are 3 different kinds of comments:

  • flattering comments
  • suggestions for improvements
  • critical comments

In therory, every comment can contain a set of those comments, meaning we have 8 comment permutations in total (23=8). We assume, that everybody who allows suggestions for improvements is maybe open for flattering comments, too. And everybody who allows for criticism is open for the other two as well; this makes up the list of we currently have.

** software developer mode=off **

What I do not like is this list without further explanation:

No Comments Please!
Polite Comments only
General Comments only
Critical Comments

No Comments Please! Ok, this one is clear.
Polite Comments only All comments should be polite. Actually, shouldn't this be a forum rule? I mean even critical comments can be polite. IMO, this does not make too much of sense.
General Comments only What are general comments? And if this is something different than a polite comment, then polite comments are not allowed? IMO, this is nonsense.
Critical Comments Maybe the 2nd best out of this list. But actually it means all kinds of comments, including critical ones. And of course flattering comments, too. Still, I would stick to the original phrase: "Critical comments; anything goes"

Another finding is the difference between suggestions for improvement and critical comments.
An example for suggestion for improvement is: "You should play this piece slower, because then it would sound nicer."
An example for citical comment is: "This piece was played too fast. I have heard slow versions, and they sound nicer."
Basically both comments are the same. If one gives a suggestion for an improvement, it contains a critical comment as well; indirectly.

If I would make this list, it would shrink it to this:

  • no comments, please
  • flattering comments, only
  • all comments; anything goes

And to get rid of the word "flattering"

  • no comments, please
  • only positive comments, please
  • all comments; anything goes

    WieWaldi I think what’s missing in your three options is the distinction between comment without playing feedback/suggestions, and comments with playing feedback/suggestions. And making that distinction was one of the biggest reasons these comment options were creating at PW way back when.

    I think it’s important to keep that distinction, so we really do need four options.

    So I do think this is the best approach:

    ShiroKuro
    No comments please!
    Comments welcome, but no suggestions for improvement please.
    General comments only: supportive suggestions for improvement, but no criticism.
    Critical comments: Anything goes!

    @rsl12 you started this 😁 what do you think, now that we’ve had several comments about it?

    (Comments about comments, har… 😆 )

          ShiroKuro WieWaldi I think what’s missing in your three options is the distinction between...

          Respectfully I disagree to you, because

          ShiroKuro comment without playing feedback/suggestions,

          "only positive comments, please" resembles this. Of course, we can add the "without playing feedback/suggestions" as further explanation.

          ShiroKuro and comments with playing feedback/suggestions.

          "all comments; anything goes" is my take on that. This includes playing feedback, supportive suggestions for improvement and of course critics.

          ShiroKuro I think it’s important to keep that distinction, so we really do need four options.

          No. Three is enough. The fourth option "Critical comments: Anything goes!" is no difference to my 3rd option "All comments; anything goes". I already stated that criticism and suggestions for improvement are actually the same. There is no difference. You may argue that criticism isn't polite, that criticism is harsh. But this should be a general forum rule, anyway. And if someone writes a negative comment like "I didn't like it!", then this person is offensive. No matter what comment-policy we have. And because we are all adults, I strongly believe, this won't happen anyway.

          Another reason I would stick to 3 very distincitve bullet points over 4 points with a mushy separation: It is not a dropdown box - everyone can extend with own words if this isn't detailed enough.

          Anyway: "Critical comments: Anything goes!". Is this the request to write only critical stuff? Feel free to use the language as you want?" Or does it mean I want to read criticism, but if you want to write kind words, it is ok as well.

          I'd stick to my short take:

          No comments, please
          Only positive comments, please
          All comments; anything goes

          The detailed take would be:

          No comments, please.
          Only positive comments, please no criticism or suggestions for improvement .
          All comments; anything goes! Even critical comments.

                    What a lovely discussion, thank you rsl for starting this! So, after thinking it over, I would agree with WieWaldi.

                    ShiroKuro distinction between comment without playing feedback/suggestions, and comments with playing feedback/suggestions

                    I am actually getting a little puzzled about this too now. Could you mention an example (without getting too personal of course, lol) of why this distiction is so very important that it's the sole reason for implementing them as separate rules? Because I am not able to come up with any scenario where this becomes an issue.

                    For example a comment such as "Overall very smoothly played, but you might want to bring out the phrases more", where would that fit? Or "You might want to play it a little faster, this is a marching tune." Or "It was a bit uneven here and there, a metronome could be helpful". Or "Try to bring out the melody more by playing the RH a little louder while keeping the LH down."

                    Would those be critical, or fall into supportive suggestions for improvements? Or where does it go from "suggestion for improvement" to "critical comment"? I'd say that depends on the tolerance level of the player. Which could lead to some hurt feelings, if the commenter has a higher tolerance level than the player.

                    With WieWaldi's three points, a suggestion like above could only be mentioned if they pick "even critical comments". Because if they pick the one before, they want no suggestions whatsoever. Couldn't be clearer. They all fall into the 3rd category:

                    WieWaldi No comments, please.
                    Only positive comments, please no criticism or suggestions for improvement .
                    All comments; anything goes! Even critical comments.

                    Which leaves the second one (only positive comments) for nothing but praise... "Well played", "I enjoyed that very much" or even "What a lovely painting on the wall behind your piano".

                    I think we all agree that "oh boy, your tempo was all over the place and your fingers are as elegant as sausages" is unacceptable, period. I have NEVER seen such a comment anyway, I too believe we're all way too mature to say that! So even "critical comments" should be courteous and gentle, as well as politely stated.

                          Sophia ShiroKuro distinction between comment without playing feedback/suggestions, and comments with playing feedback/suggestions

                          I am actually getting a little puzzled about this too now. Could you mention an example (without getting too personal of course, lol) of why this distiction is so very important that it's the sole reason for implementing them as separate rules?

                          The distinction between comment without playing feedback/suggestions, and comments with playing feedback/suggestions might look something like this:

                          • Comment w/o feedback: "wow, I really enjoyed that, it's a beautiful piece and you played it really well"
                          • Comment w/ (supportive) feedback: "wow, I really enjoyed that, it's a beautiful piece and you played it really well. You might try bring out the dynamics more."
                          • Anything goes/critical comment: "This piece is supposed to be a march, so I recommend you practice with a metronome and make sure you bring the tempo up. Also, the second half is supposed to be forte, but it sounds like you're barely playing mezzopiano. So you really want to work on the dynamics as well"

                          Sophia "Overall very smoothly played, but you might want to bring out the phrases more", where would that fit? Or "You might want to play it a little faster, this is a marching tune." Or "It was a little uneven here and there, a metronome could be helpful". Or "Try to melody more by playing the RH a little louder while keeping the LH down."

                          I would call these mostly "supportive suggestions for improvement," although I suppose when there's less "you did this really well, but could improve on that" and mostly only "you could improve on that" then it maybe shifts from "supportive feedback" more towards "critical comments." But as you say

                          I'd say that depends on the tolerance level of the player.

                          There's a lot of fuzziness in the boundaries between "supportive feedback" and critical feedback."

                                ShiroKuro The distinction between comment without playing feedback/suggestions, and comments with playing feedback/suggestions might look something like this:

                                I think we can agree on that. The line between both is very clear.

                                My point is the difference between Comment w/ (supportive) feedback and Anything goes/critical comment. You wrote two similar examples, but the latter one had a harsher tone. And more of the suggestions/critics. Albeit, the phrase "You might try bring out the dynamics more." is a critic about missing dynamics. Just phrased very politely. And this is what I'd expect anyway in a forum.

                                  ShiroKuro Thanks so much for providing those examples 🙂

                                  So, taking them one by one, I'll ty to match them to WieWaldi's suggested scale:

                                  ShiroKuro "wow, I really enjoyed that, it's a beautiful piece and you played it really well"

                                  That would fall under "Only positive comments, please no criticism or suggestions for improvement ."

                                  "wow, I really enjoyed that, it's a beautiful piece and you played it really well. You might try bring out the dynamics more."

                                  "This piece is supposed to be a march, so I recommend you practice with a metronome and make sure you bring the tempo up. Also, the second half is supposed to be forte, but it sounds like you're barely playing mezzopiano. So you really want to work on the dynamics as well"

                                  Those two would both fall under "All comments; anything goes! Even critical comments."

                                  But, thinking about it some more, you could even change his guideline to something like "All comments; anything goes! Suggestions for improvement welcome."

                                  This actually emphasises the fact that the performer would appreciate pointers on how they can do better. It's really not necessary to include the "critical comments" phrase, because suggestions for improvement are by definition critical. And we already established that we all need to be nice at all times too ^_^

                                  In that case, we might be able to simplify the comment policy even more:

                                  No comments, please.
                                  Only positive comments, please no criticism or suggestions.
                                  All comments; anything goes! Suggestions for improvement welcome.

                                  How's that?

                                        Sophia I like this.
                                        Maybe as another wording for the middle comment policy: We could replace "positive" by "supportive". But this is something, the native English speakers should decide.

                                          Sophia How's that?

                                          My only concern is that now we’ve collapsed the last two categories, and I would want to make sure the people who actually use those two categories are ok with that. People who heretofore picked the fourth category won’t care, but is there anyone who always picked the third category who will worry? I don’t know because I never pick either of those categories.

                                          Again though I think this concern is a holdover from PW. Maybe it’s not a problem at PT?

                                            Haha yes it would be nice to collect more opinions 😁

                                            Btw I love the word supportive instead of positive 😊

                                            This conversation grew larger than the scope I originally intended, but I think it's a good discussion. Let me try and summarize everyone's points. For the sake of brevity, I'm only going to list each point once, even if multiple people agree with it:

                                            rsl12 thinks "General Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement" needed to be more clearly written. I also suggested taking out the phrases to the left of the colons for concision.

                                            Sam kindly provided the history of how those comment categories came to be.

                                            ShiroKuro feels the core descriptors of the categories are to the left of the colons, and in particular that the second category should clearly indicate that polite comments are encouraged.

                                            Sophia noted that politeness is something that should be expected in all categories of comments, and not something to be singled out for a particular category. Also, these commenting categories are just suggestions to recital participants, and they can easily make up their own commenting policy.

                                            ShiroKuro responds to Sophia's second point that if technology allowed it, it would be better to prohibit user-made commenting policies, to reduce the chances of misunderstandings.

                                            WieWaldi notes that there is functionally no difference between a suggestion for improvement and a criticism, and therefore one of the commenting categories can be removed.

                                            Like Sophia, I'll be happy with whatever is decided, though I hope the "general comments" category is more carefully worded because I'm still not sure my interpretation of it is the same as everyone else's interpretation.

                                            Regarding the point Wie Waldi brought up, I can see the value in both Wie Waldi and ShiroKuro's arguments. I agree that simpler is better, and whatever information is presented as a suggestion for improvement could be easily reworded as a criticism, and vice versa. But I agree with ShiroKuro that there is kind of a difference. In my opinion, the difference is that the recital participant will react differently depending on how the information is presented. In an ideal world, all commenters would know how to present their criticism in a palatable way, but in reality, I think some people might need the extra guidance of a "suggestions for improvement, but no criticism" category to guide their hand. The fact that so many participants pick that category is evidence that they would prefer their criticism presented in that way. On the whole, I lean towards four categories, but I would be fine with Wie Waldi's three.

                                            So if I were to try and incorporate everyone's feedback, I would phrase it like this:

                                            rsl12 You may use the template to specify the Comment Policy:

                                            • No Comments Please!
                                            • Please give me only positive comments, and no criticisms or suggestions for improvement.
                                            • Positive comments and suggestions for improvement, but no direct criticism.
                                            • All comments; anything goes!

                                            And to help ensure that all commenters remember to be polite, Navindra adds the following text to the first post of each recital:

                                            When commenting, remember that ALL comments must be polite, even when the performer has stated that any comments are allowed. If you need help making your criticisms polite, refer to <insert link to helpful document>. Thanks for helping to maintain a friendly environment!

                                                            Some data from recital #3 in PianoTell. I tried to color them into the original categories as follows:

                                                            • No Comments Please!
                                                            • Polite Comments only: no suggestions for improvement please.
                                                            • General Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement.
                                                            • Critical Comments: Anything goes!

                                                            In my opinion, the majority belong to the "anything goes" category. The other two are about the same number and thankfully there is nobody in the "No Comments Please!" section.
                                                            I made the copy&paste policies bold and I would say, about 40% stated a self-written text anyway; blurring the lines even more. Or maybe less.

                                                            Any and all!
                                                            Anything goes
                                                            Anything goes!
                                                            Anything goes.
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes!
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes!
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes!
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes!
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes!
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes!
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes!
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes!
                                                            Critical Comments: Anything goes! Strong honest feedback helps me.
                                                            Friendly comments only: no suggestions for improvement please.
                                                            General Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement.
                                                            General Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement.
                                                            General Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement.
                                                            General Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement.
                                                            General comments, polite comments only
                                                            General comments, polite, supportive suggestions for improvement
                                                            Open to all comments
                                                            Polite Comments only: no suggestions for improvement please.
                                                            Polite and Supportive comments only - thanks!
                                                            Polite comments on the piece are welcome. There are some performance slips caused by recording nervousness.

                                                            Side note: I like the "Strong honest feedback helps me." - addon by Navindra. Actually, this is true for me, too. And I am really thankful if this happens. Unfortunately this kind of comment is quite seldom, I got it only 2 times in all recitals in both forums.😔 Therefore I would consider to make the last policy like this:

                                                            • All comments; anything goes! Strong honest feedback helps me.

                                                              rsl12 When commenting, remember that ALL comments must be polite, even when the performer has stated that any comments are allowed. If you need help making your criticisms polite, refer to <insert link to helpful document>. Thanks for helping to maintain a friendly environment!

                                                              I really liked WieWaldi's suggestion of "supportive" because you can also be polite and say "I humbly suggest you find yourself another hobby since it seems you don't have what it takes to play piano." Which technically polite, that's not very supportive. Again, this has not happened and I don't think we should expect it, but... you know. Humans. So how about

                                                              When commenting, remember that ALL comments must be polite and supportive, even when etc

                                                                @WieWaldi , cool thanks so much for doing that!!

                                                                WieWaldi and I would say, about 40% stated a self-written text anyway; blurring the lines even more. Or maybe less.

                                                                😆 well so much for consistency!! I guess we could spend a few weeks tweaking the comment options, and then people are just gonna write what they wanna.... 😅

                                                                btw the way

                                                                there is nobody in the "No Comments Please!" section.

                                                                I wondered about that. I can't imagine very many people would go to the trouble of submitting but then not want any comments of any kind.