New Boards Layout

RDM_83 again

RDM_83 again wrote: »

Same here (am in UK)

I thought boards was broken when the beta first switched on automatically, I guessed there must be amother attack or something

laugh

I spend a lot of my waking hours in front of a computer screen, almost everything I use has been altered to have a "dark theme" to save me from burning my eyes out of my head, I simply wouldn't use that site at all.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

Knex*

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Did you guys see this nonsense posted in Feedback by one of the site leads?



What strain of drugs are they smoking?

So a shite version of twitter? Lovely lads. Exactly what we all want from Boards.

_Kaiser_

Knex. wrote: »

So a shite version of twitter? Lovely lads. Exactly what we all want from Boards.

As I posted over on the feedback thread, it seems to me that boards management are completely disconnected from what the users think / expect of the site. This thing about how it's not a forum and the notion of a random mess of tagged threads is evidence of that imo.

They've lost sight of the reality that it's the core forum structure and discussions that facilitates which have made the site successful in the first place and it's why people come here.

But this approach of plowing on with their revamp into Twitbookdit or whatever they're aiming for will cost them what makes a site like this - its users

o1s1n

Just gave it a go on my phone. What an utter unreadable mess. So much wasted space. I'd find it verging on unusable.

The touch site is currently perfect, for the love of God at least don't take that away.

_Kaiser_

o1s1n wrote: »

Just gave it a go on my phone. What an utter unreadable mess. So much wasted space. I'd find it verging on unusable.

The touch site is currently perfect, for the love of God at least don't take that away.

It's all (desktop, touch and m.boards) going away ultimately as I understand it in favor of this single interface.

Knex*

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

As I posted over on the feedback thread, it seems to me that boards management are completely disconnected from what the users think / expect of the site. This thing about how it's not a forum and the notion of a random mess of tagged threads is evidence of that imo.

They've lost sight of the reality that it's the core forum structure and discussions that facilitates which have made the site successful in the first place and it's why people come here.

But this approach of plowing on with their revamp into Twitbookdit or whatever they're aiming for will cost them what makes a site like this - its users

I'm actually shocked that they don't consider it a forum. Genuinely. That's literally why we are all here.

bajer101

This is unusable at the moment. If this post get's posted it will be the only one that has got through..

_Kaiser_

Knex. wrote: »

I'm actually shocked that they don't consider it a forum. Genuinely. That's literally why we are all here.

It kinda reminds me of how Microsoft tried to turn MSN Messenger (remember that? ) from what was a hugely popular and functional service into some sort of Facebook /social media thing.

How'd that work out again?

Esel

The Wayback Machine, here we come...

12Phase

Honestly, I found the beta really hard to use and I think it would actually put me off using boards entirely.

turnikett1

I don't see the problem :wassat: I like it. It's sleeker.

SterlingArcher

Somebody working for boards is doing a catch me of you can. Pretending they have a clue what they're doing. Think it's time they went back flying for Pan Am.

It looks like the kind of dodgy site you get flung to when you accidentally hit the wrong link on a porn site.

Cookie_Monster

Permabear wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

Legacy works perfectly fine for me in NZ

This was initially rolled out back in October for testing
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057509418

It doesn't look like anything from then was really fixed and the entire piece is still a totally un-useable mess. If this was the first attempt I could deal with it and provide feedback but I've already done that and it's been ignored and it is shit quite frankly

Maximus Alexander

It sort of reminds me of The Homer.

Ave Sodalis

It's actually quite upsetting the total disregard for opinion from what makes Boards happen in the first place... it's users. Yes, there has been a bit of resistance to change in the past, but never to the level against the new beta. It's usually just a few posters, not the vast majority of them. I've spent an awful long time on Boards, made some friends on it... I even have the darn tshirt! But the fact that they're going ahead with this, despite protests from what you could nearly say is the entire community, just shows how little regard the higher ups of Boards have for the reason they have a job in the first place. What makes Boards successful is the user. Not the advertisers. I'm genuinely at a loss as to why they think it's okay to ignore people like that. I don't want to leave Boards. I was even strongly considering subscribing. But Boards is a forum site. That is what it is. It's not some bubbly, cute little app where everything is over sized. It's not a site dedicated to adverts. It's not whatever the hell the developers are now trying to make it. It's a forum site, and a forum site is what I want to stay a member of. Not whatever it is it's trying to be.

Esel

sup_dude wrote:

What makes Boards successful...

Someone in this or the other main thread said that Boards is running at a loss. If this is the case, we can't fault them for trying to change that.

How to do this is a different issue.

I only hope they see fit to keep a legacy front-end (with an optional dark skin!) for the existing established user base.

Also, presuming Adverts.ie is profitable, they should remember where that came from.

DivingDuck

I can't speak for anyone else, but for my usage, the new site is inferior in every possible way to the current one. Here are my complaints:

- The giant image up the top pushes actual content down the page, which is annoying. (I also find it unattractive and unnecessary.)

- The limited number of threads on the first page is disappointing and doesn't differnciate between Latest and Most Active threads. Those two tabs were very useful for knowing which threads were active currently and active generally, and gave a great flavour of the site and current affairs generally. I've learned of quite a few breaking news events through Boards from the availability of these tabs.

- I personally don't like the way the new menu takes up the entire page.

- Conversely, actual posts now take up way less screen real estate width-wise, which means more scrolling and annoying wasted space.

- Not being able to see the list of users who thanked a post without clicking is a useful feature unnecessarily hidden. It's not as though the information is now private, as you can see it with a click, so why make it harder to see?

- Some of the forum colours (like the After Hours green) are so glaring they actually hurt my eyes. I do like the idea of being able to quickly discern which forum you're posting in, but some of the choices are poor and visually offensive.

I don't know how successful Boards is, but I do believe that what makes it run at the level it is now is that it is NOT just another FB clone. People come here for something different from the FB/social media experience available on other sites. I appreciate that the comparative popularity of those sites is probably frustrating to the admin/owners, but the reality is that an older site trying to become one of those more popular sites now is never going to be successful. They will only alienate their existing user-base while failing to draw users from other sites as they are too similar to those sites and offer nothing different.

Is this preferable (for me, for other users) to Boards closing and disappearing completely? Possibly. Probably. Is it better (for the users, for me) than the current set up? Hell no.

If it's possible to reconsider this decision, I would really implore the admins to do so. Users come to Boards for the forum experience, not Another Social Media mess where it is impossible to find information or coherent organisation.

franklyon

Logged in tonight after work....horror, wtf? Read the announcement, found the legacy button. sigh of relief, do not make this crap compulsory please....

Discodog

Boards need to decide what they want. If they no longer want it to be a forum site then we should come up with an alternative. If Boards don't want us then there are more than enough of us to be a valuable asset on a proper forum.

gandalf

Discodog wrote: »

Boards need to decide what they want. If they no longer want it to be a forum site then we should come up with an alternative. If Boards don't want us then there are more than enough of us to be a valuable asset on a proper forum.

This makes sense. If boards wants to become Boardsbook, faceboards or bwitter then fine just be honest and do it. Stop jerking around the people who create the content that actually attracts new users to this site via internet searches. The way this whole rollout has been mismanaged stinks of absolute disrespect of your userbase and content creators. It's a lesson on how not to roll out upgrades on a live site.

12Phase

This could be as big a mistake as changing the formula for Creme Eggs or New Coke.

Both of those went really well ..

12Phase

The things I would have changed about boards would have been fairly subtle.

Maybe build in an element of social media as an opt in by making the user profiles and friends etc a more developed service.

Allow more linking to Twitter and Facebook to share posts.

You could modernise the layouts but keep the general existing form.

The whole thing about boards is the individual forums are communities. To encourage people to see more of them if just needs a better trending system and a lot easier access to finding the forums.

The beta actually seems to make finding forums significantly more challenging and they were hard enough to navigate on the older system.

Really it should be building on the old; think Apple with OS X and iOS being iterations incorporating new technology not Windows 8 which implemented a one size fits all 'we know best' GUI and took no feedback and nearly collapsed the PC industry as loads of people opted not to upgrade .

kenmc

this new interface is hideous, particularly on mobile devices. there used to be a mobile friendly layout, but can't find it here now. will be visiting less frequently for sure. ah well, was fun while it lasted.

there's an age old saying, "if it's not broken, don't fix it". wise words.

Marje

kenmc wrote: »

this new interface is hideous, particularly on mobile devices. there used to be a mobile friendly layout, but can't find it here now. will be visiting less frequently for sure. ah well, was fun while it lasted.

there's an age old saying, "if it's not broken, don't fix it". wise words.

I use m.boards.ie which is great for using on mobile.

They were going to get rid of it a while back but posters objected and it was kept.

Kaizersoze81

To echo all of the above, the new layout is horrendous. No disrespect intended but it looks like a 3rd year college computer project.

maudgonner

Maximus Alexander wrote: »

It sort of reminds me of The Homer.

Hmmm, it might be more like the 'IT'?

gandalf

Marje wrote: »

I use m.boards.ie which is great for using on mobile.

They were going to get rid of it a while back but posters objected and it was kept.

It's in the cross hairs again so don't hold your breath. I use it on my mobile and tablet also. I like the fact it loads quickly and is unbloated. It doesn't suit the boards management agenda because they can't pump a load of ads at you through it thou.

Ave Sodalis

Esel wrote:

How to do this is a different issue.

Exactly. If it's because they are running at a loss, how about encouraging more subscribers, or having a fundraiser every year like wiki?
This still doesn't change the fact that it's the people on Boards that have made it successful. Without them, there simply wouldn't be a Boards. The success of any forum is having users. Most fail due to lack of users so you should not go against what just about the whole site wants. To be honest, I think this would be site suicide for Boards.