Forum Update and Reorg

One of the many positives of the rep change is that we got rid of most of the hacks that made the board unstable and unable to upgrade the software. I believe O2C said a couple months ago he would look into updating the software now that those hacks are gone. What is the status of that?

Also before the other thread was locked Lanz said the staff had recognized the need for forum reorganization, but not to what extent and that he wanted to be more inclusive in the decision making* this time around.

Well... then lets discuss it. I think Async summed up the For pretty good:

This is what I have been talking about the whole time. By consolidating forums people are exposed to topics they normally would not and you actually drive UP traffic and participation.

Besides the ever present Status Quo Bias (DON'T GO CHANGIN' NUTHIN') what are the arguments against it?

*That is his prerogative but considering how many people who were against Rep change are now for it after having witnessing the results, I just think he should go on and do it.

Whatever you do stay away from vBulletin version 4. You will regret and rue the day you went to it, and there's no going back.

I use the "# Unread Posts since your last visit" feature so I don't really see the problem with reorganizing the forums into something like Async is describing.

I use it too, after years of reluctance to change my habits, and sometimes don't even notice what forum a post was in.

Still, he is right about the "death sentence" bit...i'm just not sure if there's a way to fix that.

A few questions Ancalagon -

• Why are you still selling the rep change? It's a done deal. And it's much too soon to say whether or not it was a good thing, hence the six month trial period.
  
  
• Why the rush to consolidate forums? Is there some closing window of opportunity you are not sharing with the rest of us?

Oh and this isn't a Help Desk topic. The inclusive thread will probably be started in The Workshop since it will include submissions for new logos as well as new Wordforge lay-outs. And anybody is free to start the thread.

Right. While some people have found ways to work around the poor layout, many haven't and as Async states this lowers exposure to threads (and thus necessarily participation in them).

Another thing is that if we want to attract new members we need to not LOOK like a board that is half dead. For while consolidation and reorg boosts participation by a bit, it increases the appearance of participation by even more. This is important when trying to get people to dive in.

Well the answer is in his post and in mine. Instead of banishing threads to a dozen innactive forums, move them into a couple active ones.

That is not all the answer, though.

I have long argued for differing forums based on differing debate tactics, not on differing subjects. If someone wants a Red-Room style debate on the Olympics, he should be able to have a Red-Room style debate on the Olympics, rather than getting the thread moved to the Green Room where everyone has to play nice. Inversely, if someone wants a nice calm debate on why Obama is the greatest president since George W. Bush, he should be able to start it in the Green Room and have it stay there. (This latter provision has already been enacted, in fact, even though almost no one ever uses it.)

A "no-holds-barred (almost)" forum, a "be nice or be banned" forum, a "talk about private stuff and it won't go any further than here" forum and a forum just for techincal stuff having to do with the board would cover most of what I want from Wordforge. For now, I just don't think we have enough traffic to justify much more than that.

It's an interesting way to structure forums, one I haven't seen elsewhere.

I say we try it out and see how it goes.

[edit] This would also make the Blue Room more than a series of Blog threads. I mean, the Blog threads would be there, but you could have some generic: 'Pics of your Kids' or 'Why I almost strangled my Spouse today' or 'Job gripes' kind of threads.

The more I think about it, the more I like this idea.

Ummm . . . when has this ever happened? Generally we leave threads in the forum where they're started, unless they really obviously belong somewhere else. Sometimes we move threads at request, too, like when somebody says "D'Oh! I thought I was in the Green Room! Mods, please yadda yadda yadda."

^ Not going to look it up, but it has happened to some of my own threads in the past.

How about my thread on Investing which I posted in the Red Room, got moved to Gold, I asked in the thread for it be moved back to the RR (ignored), and then I asked with a Notification that it be moved to the RR (ignored).

What is the purpose of moving threads? Unless someone makes a mistake the thread is in the room they want it to be in. Leave it there. The other rooms are dead, moving an active thread to a dead room isn't going to change that. It just kills the active thread. If you want to pick up discussion in the other rooms consolidation is the only realistic option. As many others have stated there simply isn't the traffic on this board to warrant a dozen forums.

Another common tactic people have come up with to workaround our bad organziation/policy is 'anchoring.' How many times have you seen a topic which could go in another room finished with "Oh and RickDeckard is a fucking communist fuckslut and Uncle Albert turns tricks for half a pack of Kool's and some Doritos" just to keep it RR? Here's a radical idea. Want to promote debate and discussion over flaming and trolling, DON'T REQUIRE FLAMING AND TROLLING. Step back and look at that from an outsider's perspective. How retarded is that? You open up a thread about the Olympics and right off the bat there is basesless and childish mudslinging.

And no, not every thread has that but when flaming and trolling becomes the de facto way to make threads Red Room, what does that say about the Room itself? What tone does that set?

^ There is much wisdom in what the man says. I would flame him unmercifully in order to keep this in the Red Room, but it isn't in the Red Room...

Forums based on behavior instead of subject matter? By Odin's beard I think he's got it!

Forums defined by style rather than substance seems good to me. Just one caveat: If we're also still interested in gaining new members, it might be a good idea to find some other way to show some of our typical topics. We used to be a Star Trek board spin-off; other topics have come up regularly since; and so there is still some coherence to the set of subcultures and objects, outside of flaming political debate, that you'll find here. The current list of forums communicates some of that. If I were new and considering joining, I think having some inkling of that would help me decide: I'd see there's a Media Central, I'd see there's a Gold and Iron Room etc. Otherwise, we're just this group of people that know one another('s fictional online personas), which is nice, but not a selling point to others.

You know, I think the internet is getting past that. My facebook and twitter feeds are a random hodgepodge of all my interests; sports, politics, music, humor, food, agriculture, firearms, etc. Getting rid of specific would open Wordforge up to the steady, varied flow of information we've become used to.

Aye.

And it's not like anyone ever just stumbles into WF from out of the aether. They follow a link from another forum, or a person tells them about it, etc. As such just presenting GOOD discussion is probably the best way to go about it. Don't make them look through a dozen forums to see what we talk about, just have a couple of highly active, diverse forums.

I'm not sure how highly I'd value the sort of visibility that would attract the Facebook/Twitter crowd, but I guess it ain't up to me.

So true.

Knock it off. If you've nothing to contribute, stay out of the thread.

I have lots to contribute. Every time we do this exact same threads my responses become more meaningful than before.

I still think the Blue Room needs to stay separate and hidden and not cluttered up with basic community stuff. It's a special and specific case and should remain that way.

And as a hidden room, it's hardly going to be part of the "draw" anyway.

Why not?

I guess it makes sense to have the logo/layout design discussion going on in there, but why restrict the topic of this thread to The Workshop as well? This topic fits in perfectly in The Help Desk and it makes no sense to put it in The Workshop.

Unless you're deliberately trying to kill any discussion regarding forum consolidation by putting the discussion in one of the least active forums.

Like Asyncritus, I've had this happen in the past as well. That's why when someone posts a non-RR thread in the Red Room they include a line such as: "To keep this in the Red Room, so-and-so is a douchebag."

What's up Ancalagon I thought you wanted to discuss this?

^I figured he ignored your questions because you're setting up some fairly specific strawmen. From my interpretation of his post, he is neither "still trying to sell the rep change" nor in a "rush to consolidate forums."

Oh yeah I completely agree with keeping it hidden. As to the 'general' discussions think of the WF Church thread. I don't think it detracted from the room at all.

Which is precisely why I included a "talk about private stuff and it won't go any further than here" forum in the list of what needs to be kept.

Merge all the forums into one big one. Call it "New Posts."

If this was "New Posts," I could flame you heinously for that suggestion.

It's too bad it's not "New Posts"...