Change of tack...

DeVore

Ecksor and I were talking about something a while back that we both noticed.

We could basically make a board about Picking Your Nose and it would be jammed with ardent nostril excavationists.

Some time ago, we're not sure when... we kinda passed some sort of herefore unknown critical mass or something when you go from having to show support for a forum (usually as an existing community or as a dominating subject in another forum) to "if we build it they'll probably come in droves!"

Repli and Dusty basically summed up the two sides that I'm thinking about on the Punk forum... We could build it and they would come. Most likely out of the woodwork!

So now Boards can kinda do anything it wants... so what does it want to do.

Thats a really f*ckin' scary thought you know. Before we've just merrily ridden along with it wherever it kinda wanted to go all on its own. Now we have to make all kinds of *decisions*.

Thats just not on!

Anyway, it appears that we no longer really have to justify a new forum on the basis that it will definitely get traffic. That may very well be a reason to turn the suggestion down but I think just about any topic now will find people on Boards to support it.

What we need to do now is go away and think about what we want Boards to become and then build *that*.
Thats a much harder thing for the admins to do then just sit back and hug each other in fear when the bandwidth bill arrives every month.

Sorry, this isnt an announcement or anything, I dont have the answers just in case you were waiting for me to come to some form of conclusion...

DeV.

GuanYin

Originally posted by DeVore
Sorry, this isnt an announcement or anything, I dont have the answers just in case you were waiting for me to come to some form of conclusion...

DeV.

Bah, thats the second time this week an Oracle has jipped me

[edit] I'll add something constructive[/edit]

I think that in most cases you will find a small group who will post regularly to a board. All the science boards have a small number of dedicated posters who seem to read and reply to everything

I think that mostly streamling would improve the current system, I'm waiting with mouth watering anticipation for some of the add-ons I've heard you guys talk about before

All good things to those who wait......

ykt0di9url7bc3

If you code it in, they will post!

7000+ active members...thats a large population sample!

ecksor

Not sure where you get 7000.

I reckon that in the last 30 days, we've had just over 4000 users come to boards, log in, do stuff. 2700+ of those posted. Perhaps we have 3000 lurkers as well

sceptre

Originally posted by syke
I think that in most cases you will find a small group who will post regularly to a board. All the science boards have a small number of dedicated posters who seem to read and reply to everything

It's worth remembering that many boards (definitely the niche ones) have quite a few "readers" (I rather prefer that word to "lurkers") who never (or almost never) post and mightn't even have registered until they actually want to post. IOFFL gets quite a few of those. I almost never post on the science boards but I rarely miss reading a thread there. It's just another aspect to the community that most or all of us are already aware of (it's probably a good bit bigger than the official figure in other words, even allowing for those who register and never come back).

DeVore

In the past month there has been 3721 unique logins.
Given that at just about any point of the day we have roughly half as many guests as named users that would lead me to expect 1800 guest accounts... those "readers" sceptre talked about.
Giving us a monthly total of about 5,500 unique carbon blobs.

Interestingly enough if you extend that period to 3 months the number of unique logins is 5650 and given the "readers" again, would come to something close to 7000 unique carbon blobs
(I havent increased the number for the Guests as I figure they must be the same people repeatedly... and anyway it means I'm a bit more confident in that prediction )

Initially i thought that this indicated some massive exodus since there were lots of people who hadnt visited us in weeks if not months.... but for the past year I've been quietly keeping an eye on those stats and both numbers have been going north at an alarming rate but roughly in the same proportion.

It would appear we have a sizeable number of people who just read every week or 4!

Curious... neh?

DeV.

Doodee

/me Bops to Jacksons - I want You back.


So whats the user ratio difference to p45 then?

Victor

Originally posted by DeVore
Anyway, it appears that we no longer really have to justify a new forum on the basis that it will definitely get traffic. That may very well be a reason to turn the suggestion down but I think just about any topic now will find people on Boards to support it.

Expand or die! Unless you are under the supervision of a dietician. this paragraph frightened me for a moment. Is it a case of having to hive off some individual forums to a new semi-independant website with it's own admin / super-mod? There, they could not quite micro manage, but put some space between Admins and 200 mods / 20,000 accounts.

Originally posted by DeVore
It would appear we have a sizeable number of people who just read every week or 4!

It's Búbbles keeping the troll accounts alive ....

I'm surprised at the level of comment Commuting / Transport is getting (apart from my spam), it even had it's own flame war last week :rolleyes:

amp

All I ask for is the continent of Australia in return.

mike65

Is it a case of having to hive off some individual forums to a new semi-independant website with it's own admin / super-mod?

While I slightly wonder at the need for sooooo many
obscure topic forums (or at least stuff which culturaly I can't connect with!) they should all remain within the general ambit of boards.ie and open to all (except the private ones of course!!!). A sub boards developing
would be a bad thing, and certainly not very community minded I would say.

Less "them" and more US!

* me overcome with hippy-dippy happyness*

Mike.

vinnyfitz

Originally posted by DeVore


What we need to do now is go away and think about what we want Boards to become and then build *that*.

Wow that's all a bit heavy for a happy go lucky place like this!

As an input to the admins deep reflection I wonder would it be worth preparing and conducting some sort of survey of members - where we heard about boards, what we came for originally, what we have ended up doing here, what we also wished we could do, how we go about encouraging other people to sign up ...... ("readers" could be surveyed too)

Just a thought.

V

Victor

.... once all the TPS forms are completed and decision procedures are adhered to, this department would have no objection to ....

On a more serious note, what about some way of grouping forums across the main headings. For example house insurance can and does fall under B/E/F and Accommodation / Property, Commuting / Transport has lots in common with Cycling and Motors.

Moriarty

What i really think is missing is a (deep breath... hold...... .... .... exhale) cross-posting (erp!) feature. Probably only allowed to be implemented by mods, but i see quite a number of threads that fit equally well in two or more forums at the same time. Each time it gets a reply it gets hupped to the top in both forums, along with all the other normal thread antics. Although maybe this is already on the feature list for (hah!) vb3.


Would cuba do, amp? I hear its going cheap.

Victor

Originally posted by Moriarty
What i really think is missing is a (deep breath... hold...... .... .... exhale) cross-posting (erp!) feature. Probably only allowed to be implemented by mods, but i see quite a number of threads that fit equally well in two or more forums at the same time. Each time it gets a reply it gets hupped to the top in both forums, along with all the other normal thread antics. Although maybe this is already on the feature list for (hah!) vb3.

It would be interesting, although one might have to watch out for self-feedback, with people getting to e-mails to a thread the have subscribed to.

Sometimes what I do is create a thread with my starting post. Then I create a second topic with the summary and "discussion here" at the bottom with a link to the first post. I then lock the second post and send it to the appropriate other board. I try to advise the other mods of the existence of the second thread.

Overall it means the regulars on the other board get a heads-up on the particular topic, without creating two parallel discussions, with people repeating and/or contradicting themselves.

Moriarty

Originally posted by Victor
It would be interesting, although one might have to watch out for self-feedback, with people getting to e-mails to a thread the have subscribed to.

Sometimes what I do is create a thread with my starting post. Then I create a second topic with the summary and "discussion here" at the bottom with a link to the first post. I then lock the second post and send it to the appropriate other board. I try to advise the other mods of the existence of the second thread.

Overall it means the regulars on the other board get a heads-up on the particular topic, without creating two parallel discussions, with people repeating and/or contradicting themselves.

As far as i can see, email subscriptions are handled on a per-thread basis - its not linked to the forum(s) its in at all - and this one would be a normal thread in every respect other than its shown in the thread list of two forums at once.

Evil Phil

I too would like to know the post ratio in relation to p45.net and any other irish communities out there.

I'd also like to request a Give Evil Phil Money forum k, thanks, bye.

DeVore

what do you mean by "post ratio" ?

I doubt we'd ever split boards but we might have to find a better interface for navigation.

I think we need for people to be able to fashion their OWN boards.ie out of some greater set of selections...

I dunno... it might even be that we have to go back to the active navigation for one thing I'm thinking.


DeV.

CuLT

Centralise everything that's decentralised and decentralise everything that's centralised.

Combined with an efficient and cost effective strategic forward looking plan I think we will see the totalitarian image obscured into an equivocative riddle of Irish political apathy that will span the next fiscal year!

echomadman

I'm with Cult on this
We must move forward, not backward; upward, not forward;
and always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom

Paddy20

"Freedom" Did 'Echo' just use the word "Freedom" . Whats that ?...:eek:

Roller Toaster

Explore. Discover. Build. Conquor.

irishgeo

Originally posted by DeVore
Thats a much harder thing for the admins to do then just sit back and hug each other in fear when the bandwidth bill arrives every month.

DeV.

What is the monthly bandwidth bill?

i am getting the feeling that Boards has become bigger than anyone even the admins thought and its reaching a crossroads.
It bet is nearly a full time job running it and what a great job they do.




:cool:

Atreides

I notice that each forum seems to have its own critical mass, after which it explodes into mindless backstabbing and bitching. Its like you can only have X amount of people on a forum who know what there taking about before egos get huge and in the way of a constructive forum, in the same fashion you can only have Y number of people without a clue before those with a clue start to get recent of not being able to converse with people of equal standing.