Ways to Make The Forum Better - Suggestions

[Volenta]

What about labels about your religious position and diet placed under your profile (see attachment).

[TheVeganAtheist]

i think I've added it. You can find the field in control panel/ profile

[DDDx8]

What about Vegan vs Meat eater Debates? I know it might seem silly to debate it, but the same could be said about atheism. I think, just guessing, there are more atheist then vegans, so Vegans need to defend and given reasons for their stance as much or more than atheist do. I think Vegan vs Meat eater Debate would be appropriate.

[TheVeganAtheist]

What about Vegan vs Meat eater Debates? I know it might seem silly to debate it, but the same could be said about atheism. I think, just guessing, there are more atheist then vegans, so Vegans need to defend and given reasons for their stance as much or more than atheist do. I think Vegan vs Meat eater Debate would be appropriate.

Will add right away. Good idea.

[brimstoneSalad]

More users, more active users, definitely.

Forums are all about having enough lively conversation to keep them alive- at a certain point they reach a critical mass and are self sufficient, but if they don't reach that point they die.

We need something to encourage the opposition to come and present their cases.

Maybe some kind of limited ability to guest post, so they don't have to register right off?

Like just in the debate sections, maybe. Each IP address can make one guest post without registering.
Then when somebody replies, it will encourage them to register to continue responding.

Also, as I mentioned in my intro post, maybe we could come up with some challenges with rewards, to further incentivize original ideas, and advertise the forum.

[brimstoneSalad]

Also, less is more.

It's much easier to keep track of fewer forum sections. Particularly when there's a small population of posters on a forum.
Fewer sections, with more posts per section = more activity.
Forums with low activity but a dozen forum sections tend to look kind of silly- forums only naturally build up more sections when they have the population to support it, and need to divide topics.

At the very least, it would be good to combine:

Vegan support + transitioning to vegan

Atheist support + transitioning to Atheism


General forum rules is not needed as a forum section- instead, make that a single thread in the forum support section, and put a link to it on every page at the top.


In general discussion, it would be good to merge:

Off-topic + Entertainment

Fan suggestions/requests -> merge into forum support


Doing all, or even some, of that would streamline the forum a lot, and make it much easier to read and follow all of the threads going on.


When the forum is much larger and more active, then it would be time to consider whether it makes sense and serves the community to subdivide the forum into more sections.
Otherwise, it's kind of putting the cart before the horse, and it can inhibit growth through excessive subdivision and dilution of traffic.

[Neptual]

Also, less is more.

It's much easier to keep track of fewer forum sections. Particularly when there's a small population of posters on a forum.
Fewer sections, with more posts per section = more activity.
Forums with low activity but a dozen forum sections tend to look kind of silly- forums only naturally build up more sections when they have the population to support it, and need to divide topics.

At the very least, it would be good to combine:

Vegan support + transitioning to vegan

Atheist support + transitioning to Atheism


General forum rules is not needed as a forum section- instead, make that a single thread in the forum support section, and put a link to it on every page at the top.


In general discussion, it would be good to merge:

Off-topic + Entertainment

Fan suggestions/requests -> merge into forum support


Doing all, or even some, of that would streamline the forum a lot, and make it much easier to read and follow all of the threads going on.


When the forum is much larger and more active, then it would be time to consider whether it makes sense and serves the community to subdivide the forum into more sections.
Otherwise, it's kind of putting the cart before the horse, and it can inhibit growth through excessive subdivision and dilution of traffic.

Agreed

[brimstoneSalad]

Agreed

Thanks.



On the member lists:

Can you include a column on religion and diet?

I'd like to be able to see who is who by just looking there.


Also, default sorting: By highest posts

I always look at that, to see who is active on a forum.

The current default isn't very informative (join date- which says nothing of activity)
I know I can change it with two clicks, but some people don't know that.


Also, in regards to religion and diet:

Can you change it to a drop down list?
That way we can get statistics on that DB field that have some meaning in the future.

[brimstoneSalad]

Make some of us mods please. We have an "I love Bacon" spammer on the loose.

I'm sure that will happen from time to time.

I nominate Dan

[thebestofenergy]

Make some of us mods please. We have an "I love Bacon" spammer on the loose.

I'm sure that will happen from time to time.

I nominate Dan

I agree, Dan is probably the most active person right now (and he has a profile of Naruto, you can't ignore that).
No but seriously, since the admin didn't come since 29/05 it'd be a wise deicision to nominate some mods (obviously trustworthy ones, that don't abuse their power). If it's going to happen that the admin has an inconvenience and can't log in for some days, there must be a mod/mods that take/s over.