The Forum's future - your thoughts please!

[imtrying]

I could settle for that!🙂

nice compromise 🙂 I like it. I love the pink, but would be happy with purple too 🙂

or as suggested, everyone has a setting option to choose their own colour.

 

[mum2westiesGill]

Just another thought, i think you should deffinately keep the threads

1. Off the subject.....
&
2. Your jokes

Gill

 

[Ellie Jones]

NO to the 'Like Button'

It's an crass idea, sorry but I find forums where the like is introduced it soon creates a 'clique' within the forum...

One of the advantages and niceties of this forum is that on the smaller side, which gives it a much more personal and friendly feel to it.. I used to moderate on a very large diabetic forum full of cliques who constantly tried to overthrow the forum to their way of thought etc... Adding things like, Like buttons just aids and abets them in the crusade..

I wouldn't like to see this forum descend and be destroyed by the same methods used..

 

[Northerner]

NO to the 'Like Button'

It's an crass idea, sorry but I find forums where the like is introduced it soon creates a 'clique' within the forum...

One of the advantages and niceties of this forum is that on the smaller side, which gives it a much more personal and friendly feel to it.. I used to moderate on a very large diabetic forum full of cliques who constantly tried to overthrow the forum to their way of thought etc... Adding things like, Like buttons just aids and abets them in the crusade..

I wouldn't like to see this forum descend and be destroyed by the same methods used..

Actually, something we used to have a while ago (now I remember!) was a 'rating' button, where you could rate a thread. I stopped it because it made some threads appear as though they were sanctioned as 'officially the best', for example, when in fact there may have been other, much better threads that simply hadn't been rated.

 

[Natalie123]

Good point Ellie Jones, I think some of us might feel judged if we have ratings or like buttons.

I could compromise with purple too

Please keep the heros and heronines section, it is important that we can express our thanks to others who have helped us.

 

[Northerner]

Good point Ellie Jones, I think some of us might feel judged if we have ratings or like buttons.

I could compromise with purple too

Please keep the heros and heronines section, it is important that we can express our thanks to others who have helped us.

I don't plan on removing any sections, I think they all work well 🙂

 

[lucy123]

I don't plan on removing any sections, I think they all work well 🙂

Phew! I was beginning to worry about the WLG being removed for a moment.😱 (who have has it happens lost over two stone in less than 2 weeks so far! ...sorry about the little plug!🙂

 

[David H]

Forget any like, unlike, thank you buttons.

Smilies are fine and can convey emotions in a text.

Rating is a No No an off topic or crass joke can get very high views and answers, not because it's good, but maybe peeps just like to jibe about it.

Ratings do not equate to quality and a ratings bar may convey the wrong messages.

If it ain't broken don't fix it!

 

[robert@fm]

Actually, something we used to have a while ago (now I remember!) was a 'rating' button, where you could rate a thread. I stopped it because it made some threads appear as though they were sanctioned as 'officially the best', for example, when in fact there may have been other, much better threads that simply hadn't been rated.

Rating is a No No an off topic or crass joke can get very high views and answers, not because it's good, but maybe peeps just like to jibe about it.

Ratings do not equate to quality and a ratings bar may convey the wrong messages.

I'm also on the Ink Tank forum (to which I linked earlier in this thread, because they have a comprehensive collection of smilies), and the ratings system is active there, but never used by the regular members. Thus, if a thread which was previously unrated (as most of them are) suddenly gets a 5* rating, that's a clear "spam has been posted to this thread" indicator!

On the EmailDiscussions forum (another one I'm on) ratings have been disabled for pretty much the reasons given.

 

[Andy HB]

Actually, something we used to have a while ago (now I remember!) was a 'rating' button, where you could rate a thread. I stopped it because it made some threads appear as though they were sanctioned as 'officially the best', for example, when in fact there may have been other, much better threads that simply hadn't been rated.

Ah yes, I remember the many 'hours' I spent rating every thread in Off The Subject to avoid just that occurrence. 😎

As to the Like button, I do agree that it has the potential to cause unexpected upset in those who will feel slighted if no-one 'likes' their post.

It sounds a good idea to have it, but I'll lay odds it'll become a point of contention at some point. No doubt it'll be used as yet more evidence of the existence of a cliquey forum. "Look at his thread! He's been here 1 year and received 10 Likes. I've only just joined and no-one has ever liked my thread!" kind of thing.

Andy 🙂

 

[ukjohn]

I'll put my hand up and admit that in the early days I often felt left out because of the number of views I got on a thread compared to the number of replies, it does not point to a clique as I often thought. It was pointed out to me and I don't think its been mentioned that majority of times there are more visitors than members viewing, so you could possibly get 50 views from visitors that cannot reply.
Some sort of sign up would be good, but then that may deter some from gaining help from the boards in an open forum.

John.

 

[trophywench]

Phew! I was beginning to worry about the WLG being removed for a moment.😱 (who have has it happens lost over two stone in less than 2 weeks so far! ...sorry about the little plug!🙂

Strikes me the WLG are doing their damnedest to remove theirselves without any help from Admin .......

 

[Steff]

Strikes me the WLG are doing their damnedest to remove theirselves without any help from Admin .......

I get that at first i was puzzled but i do get it 🙂

 

[trophywench]

Hope the WLG get it too Steff, otherwise they won't love me any more!

 

[lizabetic]

you know what would be a really cool feature? i twitter-like feed at the side? one that just updates with small status like things that we can post 🙂

 

[sofaraway]

I would like a link maybe, similar to FB that if you create a thread and someone replies, that it gets copied to our email? Sometimes I can post, log off and get delayed in returning, by then my post is pages and pages back, others have made a nice effort to reply to me and then I may appear rude by not replying back?

I used a forum that when you logged in there was an option to click on new posts and the options were
new posts since your last visit
todays posts
new replies to your posts.


The new replies was where I always started, I could see if any thread I had started or had replied to had some new posts.

As I don't log in very often at all nowadays I would find that feature useful

 

[hotchop]

I used to think that here was clique after a couple of " incidents" however I then grew up and saw it for what it was.... a faceless website with tons of helpful support ( in the nicest possible way)

There are always going to be clash of personailities and disagreements in all walks of life and here is no better however I know that I will never actually be real friends with anyone on a computer screen though can see how other people may find lots of comfort from here

I rarely post now but do pop in and read every few days so I hope my opinion is valued lol

Do DUK completely fund this site? If so, shouldnt it be them asking us how they can raise the profile rather than going to them with a begging bowl for extra support to raise the profile ?

The only real change I would make is an app for smartphones that is easier than accessing the full site.. Something with an easy interface would attract a, dare i say it, a younger generation baring in mind that the reason that facebook is so popular is because its trulty accessable to everyone, at all times of the day.

I like the idea of a thank you button.. it would save pages and pages of thanks or hello posts which is nice but really gives the impression of huggy huggy when a lot of people are happy to receive frank and genuine support rather than the false hugs that can sometimes be portrayed.. its an acknowledgement that would make new ppl feel that they have been noticed.

Not sure how I feel about a chat room.. is it really necessary? would probably be a nightmare to moderate and there are plenty of threads that ppl could navigate to if they wanted an instant answer.

ETA: The clique thing would probably stop if we didnt know everyones post count... why is it important anyway? just a thought

ETA again sorry, what i mean by why is the post count important.. its like a ranking report of senoirity when probably most og them posts are not diabetes related therefore maybe off subject posts shouldnt be included in a count?

 

[trophywench]

Depends on forum software, hotchop - some stuff you can turn off (or on) and some you can't.

My 'other' D forum changed software recently and the Mods played with it for a month until we were satisfied it did what we wanted it to - experimenting with fonts and effects and stuff. We had 'Karma' on it, it took us about half an hour to decide Well we'll get rid of THAT load of old baloney for starters!

We previously had some rather good 'custom' smileys and we're sad to have lost them. (eg Patti spraying coffee all over her keyboard; 'Nursie Nightshade', a pirate with a 'Thread Hijacked' banner .........; a crab from when I used to invariably mistype the word 'Carb'; a bottle of red wine .....)

But we did have fairy lights round the banner (twinkling ones at that!) all over Xmas - so that's better than the old one!

There are always things that please or displease somebody. But you can't please all the people all the time so you just have to go with the majority .....

 

[Northerner]

...ETA: The clique thing would probably stop if we didnt know everyones post count... why is it important anyway? just a thought

ETA again sorry, what i mean by why is the post count important.. its like a ranking report of senoirity when probably most og them posts are not diabetes related therefore maybe off subject posts shouldnt be included in a count?

It's just a bit of harmless fun, nothing more, nothing less 🙂

 

[margie]

I used a forum that when you logged in there was an option to click on new posts and the options were
new posts since your last visit
todays posts
new replies to your posts.

There is a new posts link ( though it sometimes seems to get out of synch) it can be found at the top of the screen with the FAQ, Search options. Quick links will give you today's posts.