General Bombers Talk Mods - this board is impossible to read

[The Prosecutor]

One thing I don't see raised here is that I think the new system has brought with it an increase in posters getting involved, a lot more activity than normal which is great.

I like the new system, to the OP, use the 'v' symbol next to threads for the latest posts.

Also, the titles also help let you know the latest news, keep it all I say.

 

[Beerfish]

Myabe it's time for a poll.

 

[rines]

I think it is unfair to say 'everyone' liked the new style when asked about it.. quite a few of us didn't like the new style..

and some of us still don't like it.

I think the reality is that the new style suits posters who are on here often and not those who come on occasionally..

clicking "last read" when you were last here 3 months ago hardly helps as you are still left with sometimes 10+ pages to read which makes it hard to find the discussion you want.

However it does seem to have increased the postings in player threads which was the main point.

 

[Howard Moon]

I think it is unfair to say 'everyone' liked the new style when asked about it.. quite a few of us didn't like the new style..

and some of us still don't like it.

I think the reality is that the new style suits posters who are on here often and not those who come on occasionally..

clicking "last read" when you were last here 3 months ago hardly helps as you are still left with sometimes 10+ pages to read which makes it hard to find the discussion you want.

However it does seem to have increased the postings in player threads which was the main point.

agreed, i can barley come on any more.. i was never one to come on every hour anyway but now when i come its tedius trawling through huge threads trying to find what i'm looking for.

the last read function is useless to me, after a few days its pages long anyway.

its easy for people to joke and say oooh wow.. how hard is it to click a button? well not everyone has the time to sit infront of the computer all day long clicking buttons. when you only have small windows of time duing work you need quick easy access to things.

the old method was far better.. the decent threads stayed.. the rubbish ones rolled off into the next page and out of sight right away. ATM even the good threads i want to see end up 2 or 3 pages down the line in no time.

it all just looks messy.. but i uderstand its a trial... i'm sure the best outcome will happen in the end.

 

[Slattery_20]

Don't really mind it either way.
Previously, those threads were being combined into the main player threads after a few weeks anyway, so it's not *that* drastic a departure, nor is anyone *that* badly put out by a few extra clicks.

There's one really good way to have a good say on the running of the board though, Phonque Bonch... they're looking for a mod at the moment.

 

[smcateer]

I think it's working really well at the moment and have been a fan of the merged threads.

But I can also see that the problems the OP has highlighted will be exasperated in the season proper.

At the moment we are unlikely to have much more than one topic related to a given player, but in a couple of week's time this will explode.

Regarding Hurley for example we could have:
1) The contract situation (hopefully this is in the bag by then though)
2) A recent game where he did really well
3) The ongoing discussion about where he should play
4) His new haircut (running out of examples!)
5) And God knows what may come up besides ...

Merging all this into one thread will make it very hard to follow, and as has been mentioned, requests to stay on topic will be meaningless (and that's a can of worms).

Then there's the issue of cross-overs (like "Hurley and Ryder to both stay") - where should this discussion live?

I think that the merging should not occur during the season, but I am greatly in favour of doing it during the off season. Maybe a thread entitled "#18 Michael Hurley - preseason 2012" would have been a better approach. This could be done after the season this year.

Just MHO.

 

[Kong]

Thanks for the feedback; we've been asking for it since we began this experiment.

First of all I just want to clarify a few errors that I've seen writtern:

- "Merging everything into one thread", isn't happening. At all. In fact I can't recall merging a single player thread this entire pre season.

What's happened is the existing player watch threads (some going back to 2007, as noted) have become that player's ongoing discussion thread. Actually, they always have been, it's just been a case of not many using the "Player Watch" subforum. So in essence they've been moved onto the main board, and people have started posting in them regularly.

The thread title has been updated by Mods to reflect whatever the conversation's about at that time; to give people an idea as to whether they want to read/post as it goes.

So while yes, it is a "mega thread", no, nothing has been merged. The only thing that has changed:

* the threads are now on the main board, and
* the thread title reflects the current line of conversation

I start at 2007

- As pointed out, clicking the arrow pointing downwards, immediately to the left of the thread, takes you to your last read post. You should never go back to the start of the thread, presuming you've been reading the player watch threads before. If you haven't, then why now?

 

[Kong]

Now, as for the genuine concerns:

- It pushes other threads back a page or three

As has been stated, clicking the "no prefix" thread will remove all "player watch" threads, making the board basically was it was before the change.

I really don't know why this is hard for people, so please, help me here. Why can't/won't you do that?

- It's too hard to keep up with the conversation

This one I agree with/get. As somebody else said, this board's been far, far more active since the change. Player discussion's higher than in my 5 years here. However, I appreciate that discussion changes direction often daily in a thread, so for those not stuck behind desks all day with nothing better to do o), it would be difficult to get involved when the topic's already changed. Perhaps the biggest con of this all, IMO.

- No other team boards do it, why us?

It's being looked at. We're not just doing this for a laugh. We're doing this as a trial, for our board, and the outcome will help determine whether it's worth doing on other boards.

 

[Kong]

Which brings me to the most important point of all:

This is a trial

It has been from the start. We're not saying it'll always be like this. The board generally struggles over the pre-season, particularly with no more training reports.. Last year we trialled having more non-footy related threads, which was received poorly by the majority, so we scrapped that.

This is the same. We're trying something different.

So far, as far as board activity goes, it's been an overwhelming success. Player discussion is far greater than ever before, as is discussion in general. When I log on each morning, three quarters of the page is "unread", which was never the case previously.

However.

There are still concerns that other threads are being pushed aside. Again, I ask that you use the "no prefix" filter at the top of the board. I also ask why generally those people with this issue didn't post more often before these changes. A quick look at posting history suggests no difference at all.

My biggest concern in all of this is those more casual posters/readers being turned away. As I've said, discussion as a whole's up, but that seems to consist of around 30-50 regulars.

If this is going to prevent new people from reading/posting, then that's obviously an issue, so I definitely want to address that.

 

[Kong]

As I've said from the start, we want to trial this properly before deciding. Just as we haven't decided this is permanent, we aren't going to suddenly scrap it because of the concerns of a few.

I ask that you all be patient, and allow the trial to reach its conclusion. The real test will be once the season starts; we'll obviously still have "game day", "review", "roast: umpires", "Toast: Hurley's 10 goals" etc.

It could well turn out that the player watch threads that are going on right now become redundent. If that's the case, we'll probably have our answer.

But unless we do this properly, we'll never know.

I think Round 2, being 3 weeks away, is a decent timeframe to wrap things up.

 

[Slattery_20]

Put up a poll after you've done the trial. Have you got a screenshot of what the board looked like prior to the trial starting? Might be worthwhile.

 

[smcateer]

Now, as for the genuine concerns:

- It pushes other threads back a page or three

As has been stated, clicking the "no prefix" thread will remove all "player watch" threads, making the board basically was it was before the change.

I really don't know why this is hard for people, so please, help me here. Why can't/won't you do that?

- It's too hard to keep up with the conversation

This one I agree with/get. As somebody else said, this board's been far, far more active since the change. Player discussion's higher than in my 5 years here. However, I appreciate that discussion changes direction often daily in a thread, so for those not stuck behind desks all day with nothing better to do o), it would be difficult to get involved when the topic's already changed. Perhaps the biggest con of this all, IMO.

- No other team boards do it, why us?

It's being looked at. We're not just doing this for a laugh. We're doing this as a trial, for our board, and the outcome will help determine whether it's worth doing on other boards.

Thanks for the clarification.

I don't know if this is possible, but it would be better if the options were:
1) All
2) Player watch only
3) Hide player watch (as opposed to hide all prefixes)

Although personally I don't have an issue with the player watch threads floating around so long as that (imagined) merging is not happening.

 

[smcateer]

Put up a poll after you've done the trial. Have you got a screenshot of what the board looked like prior to the trial starting? Might be worthwhile.

I disagree that this should be a democratic decision. Any such decision would greatly favour the casual masses, who don't really have a stake.

Rather the Mods should take people's opinions into account and make the right decision.

Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on who's for dinner. Not everything should be put to a vote.

 

[Jade]

I enjoy the new format.

I think having a running 'history' of players (which is what the player watch threads are) is good.

I'm particularaly pleased with the frequently changing titles to the threads, which indicate the 'current' situation.

Big thumbs up from me.

 

[The House]

For what it's worth i don't like the new format much....

....yes, information is still accessable and there's been a few things i've taken the extra effort to sift through, however with time constraints at work there has been plenty of times i've looked at the board, decided i couldn't be bothered and gone to the AFL board or another site for a quick read.

Again it's only my personal experience, but that experience has already lead me to spend less time on the essendon board than i did previously.

.......

 

[The House]

add to my last post - i did try blocking out the player threads for a couple of days, but because these where more prominant it seemed that i was missing out on a lot of the newest info, therefore i had to put them back to keep in the loop!

Personally i just thought it worked far better and was more user friendly for me personally last season....

 

[Kong]

Can I ask why people didn't use the Player Watch board previously?

 

[Jade]

Can I ask why people didn't use the Player Watch board previously?

I know why I didn't, it was 'tucked away' on a sub board. If I had something to say about a player, chances are good that only a few, or perhaps none would see it and discuss.

On the main board however, its bumped to the top and has stimulated quite a bit of talk about players - I'm all for it.

 

[Lord Nicholson]

Can I ask why people didn't use the Player Watch board previously?

Because any meaningful discussion about a given player was already on the main board.

 

[Kong]

Thanks.

So you'd prefer to have a thread for contract talks, a toast, a roast, an injury thread, whatever it is?

I get it. It's easier to come on and see that. While our thread titles quickly tell you what we're talking about, it won't necessarily say "Hurley kicked 5 goals" because that was 2 days ago, and since then he's re-signed.

I guess what I've personally enjoyed in this experiment is much, much more talk on players. It's ongoing, rather than just a thread when a new event rises.

 

[Shane Hird]

Can I ask why people didn't use the Player Watch board previously?

It's a tricky thing to explain.

The NFL board is a good example. They had a sub-board going for a couple of years with a thread for every one of 32 NFL teams..but no one was ever on it.

You would go to this board and hardly any posts were being posted..but on the main NFL board you would have hundreds of posters discussing teams all the time.

Strange..

 

[Lord Nicholson]

Well, in case it wasn't clear, I think the current system is a dramatic improvement on what there was previously. It's far better organised and far easier to know what topic to bump (and knowing that there is pretty much always going to be a topic to bump when it's related to a player) than what we had previously.

That's all I'll say.

 

[The Prosecutor]

The AFL Main Board has the same problem with sub-boards, where particulary with that board that everything is just too categorized, that you're left with the crap "your favourite" series which is just the same boring crap, and conversation dies.

Its why I like the current system, everything is on the MB for Essendon, and you don't have to keep clicking on sub-forums to find what you want.

That's not to mention how it allows conversation to flow, under the old system you would multiple threads with a similar discussion, and when the issue was no longer relevant, it would just cease.

People by nature don't like change, I feel if the system is left in, this board and BigFooty will be much better for it.

 

[Kong]

Honestly, I thought this board already had adapted to the change.

It seemed (key word) to be going really well. I know there were a couple still against it, but you can't please everybody.

This thread really has shocked me, but I want to be as open as I can be here.

 

[Howard Moon]

as somebody just said.. people are usually against change by default.. we are creatures of habit and get used to things how they are. When it changes its a jolt to our system.. usually takes a little while to bed in.

For the people that are on here every minute of the day they would be used to it by now and would be all for it.. i guess the people that are on a little less are taking time to adjust.

I'm sure in time everyone will get used to it and it will prove to be a winner.