Another Little OB Survey

[James]

[color=#606060]I've been thinking about something for a while now and I decided to finally create a poll for it.

It's nothing major, but basically, I've been thinking about how Hardwired and Anime Lounge are structured and I'm wondering if the "one thread per franchise" idea is becoming too restrictive.

Having a forum for each franchise is also difficult, because you have to decide which franchise is going to warrant its own forum (or sub-forum).

I am just wondering whether people have a preference for one system or another. Or if there are totally new ideas about how we could expand our coverage without making it too confusing for members.

What do you guys think? :catgirl:[/color]

[2010DigitalBoy]

[COLOR="DarkOrange"]Way I figure, we done cured that lil' problem in the past 3 days.

I know that personally I have always absolutely hated the franchise forum system. It's ugly, it gives too much to only certain franchises, and it keeps people from experienceing more.

That's why I created the already spastically popular 'what are you watching/reading now' thread (and Revy happened to get the other two in my planning stages of the anime one). It allows for discussion of the minor details of your current anme obsession whereas the individual major details of a series can go in a seris thread.

OB isn't a huge site - it doesn't need oh-so-many forums, and creting something like a 'Naruto Forum' s like utting up a sign that says 'Place Spam Here'.[/COLOR]

[TheResplendent]

[FONT="Tahoma"]Multiple forums for franchises does seem like a bit of a regression as well as a cluttered. I believe using the most general titles as an umbrella for multiple threads to be created dedicated to more specific aspects of that particular subject would be ideal.

Majority of specific franchises that may warrant their own sub-forum or such end up being phases anyway, regardless of how long they last. Like at one point it could have been argued that a Death Note forum could have been made, but not now as the popularity amongst the boards is no longer comparable to when it was first being shown. Same with other subjects like Kingdom Hearts or Lord of the Rings.

Threads for each specific franchise seems like a winning formula, it's working out rather well now. [/FONT]

[Shy]

[quote name='2007DigitalBoy'][COLOR="DarkOrange"]Way I figure, we done cured that lil' problem in the past 3 days...

...That's why I created the already spastically popular 'what are you watching/reading now' thread (and Revy happened to get the other two in my planning stages of the anime one). It allows for discussion of the minor details of your current anme obsession whereas the individual major details of a series can go in a seris thread.[/COLOR][/QUOTE]
[size=1]Did you just use this thread as an opportunity to pat yourself on the back? Really? [i]Really?[/i]

Anyway, I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with series-specific forums, nor do I think that they're more prone to spam than the generalized forums we currently have. Members are unlikely to walk into a discussion that has been going on for 100 posts, so on some level confining all of the Death Note discussion to a single thread hurts overall activity.

To be honest, I find the current system a little limiting. Gaming and anime discussions are much broader than before, and I think that in turn has made those forums less interesting to post in. At one point I needed help with an FFXII boss but my post was ignored because other discussions were taking place within the same thread. If we had a Final Fantasy forum I could have made my own thread and my questions might not have gotten so lost in the shuffle. Maybe OB isn't the right place to look for help with video games, but our goal should always be to cater to the needs and interests of our community.

I almost think that we should have a number of "flavor of the month" forums that are constantly rotating in and out. These could tie into big movies, video games, anime series, etc. that are popular at the time. Then when member interest has faded they can be merged back into one of our existing forums and create newer, more topical ones.

Adding a Halo forum or a U.S. Presidential Election forum might spark some interest, and if they didn't, we'd create new ones to replace them. The forum structure obviously isn't set in stone, you know?

Members could even vote to decide which "flavor of the month" forums are added next. If that's not a cool idea for an event, I don't know what is.

-Shy[/size]

[James]

[color=#606060]The reason I ask this question is because I don't think the current system is ideal. It's good - possibly better than what we had before - but it can be limiting.

If you enter the FFX thread for instance, yes, it's all organised into one specific thread. However, if you have a specific question...it can all get mixed up. There can be multiple discussions going on in the one thread. It can get confusing.

On the other hand we don't want a million forums.

So although I'm asking which style people prefer, I'm also wanting to know if members have suggestions on a good compromise - on what you'd like to see that we aren't already doing.

OB isn't a huge site, but forum layouts can stunt growth at times too, especially if people feel that the current system is too confusing.

So yeah, I'm really trying to promote some discussion here. Members have solved some problems in the past and submitted some great ideas, so I figured this would be a good thing to open up to public discussion.[/color]

[Delta]

[COLOR=#35425e][FONT="Palatino Linotype"][quote name='Shy'][size=1]I almost think that we should have a number of "flavor of the month" forums that are constantly rotating in and out. These could tie into big movies, video games, anime series, etc. that are popular at the time. Then when member interest has faded they can be merged back into one of our existing forums and create newer, more topical ones.[/size][/QUOTE][b]+1 Vote[/b]

I don't know about Hardwired but I really think that Anime Lounge should be broken down into bite-sized subforums along the lines of: Pre-production, New Releases, plus anime genres like shounen, yaoi, slice of life, cooking, bartending, etcetera, etcetera. And maybe you can set up a Recommendations/Help! subforum (there's always at least a couple of such threads out there).

[/FONT][/color]

[Retribution]

[quote name='James'][color=#606060]The reason I ask this question is because I don't think the current system is ideal. It's good - possibly better than what we had before - but it can be limiting.[/color][/QUOTE]
[font=Arial]The current system isn't ideal, but it's better than franchise-specific threads.

If you have broader and more general categories it ultimately allows for more freedom than if you were to limit things to "Xbox 360, Wii, PS3". What if a user has a general question, or a question that includes all three platforms? And could you not continue to create an infinite number of these forums? Imagine if we tried to reinstate anime-specific forums again.

It seems like a better idea to maintain general forums with threads that have tags in the title. So for a gaming forum, you could write "[Xbox] Title here" to have things more easily identifiable.

Perhaps if you broke the forums up in a different manner it could work, but genre/franchise seems like a bad idea.[/font]

[Petie]

[quote name='Shy'][SIZE=1]I almost think that we should have a number of "flavor of the month" forums that are constantly rotating in and out. These could tie into big movies, video games, anime series, etc. that are popular at the time. Then when member interest has faded they can be merged back into one of our existing forums and create newer, more topical ones.[/SIZE][/quote]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]I think this idea actually has a lot of potential. It opens up more possibilities for discussion about what's popular at the time while not having a ridiculous number of permanent forums on the main page. The only concern I had is that when merging a forum based on a specific video game back into Hardwired, you'd have a lot of threads about that game now in the list but I don't think that would be a problem since when they're merged, those threads would have become less active anyway.[/COLOR][/FONT]

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]Like Petie said, it would be a pain to have flavor of the month forums while keeping the regular forums organized because a bunch of threads all on one subject would constantly be getting dumped in them. There's also the issue of people then not being able to find things, both because the threads would be in a different forum and because the thread titles would make little sense outside the context of the subject-specific forum. That would be a big pain for anyone wanting to post about the subject after its forum had been merged. And how do we decide when a forum has run its course and should be removed, since even the old anime forums rarely died out completely? The idea itself sounds good but the logistics of it sound like a nightmare to me.

Also, I've seen plenty of instances of new members jumping into threads that already have lots of replies with no problem. I'm not sure that's really a problem with the current system.

The only way I can think of to strike a balance between the single thread and multiple forum methods without being a huge pain to manage is simply removing the one thread per subject rule from the current forums. If a game/anime/whatever gathers enough discussion to warrant multiple threads, let people make them. And if similar/repeat threads pop up moderators could either merge them or leave them be at their discretion, the same as in forums like Otaku Lounge. We might get a main discussion thread, a help thread, and a favorites thread about whatever's particularly popular at the time, for example, but I can't see there really being a need for more than two or three threads per subject.

Personally, I prefer the single thread method over having multiple forums. But I wouldn't mind removing the single thread rule and managing the Entertainment forums the same as the others, either.[/color]

[Shy]

[quote name='Desbreko'][color=#4B0082]Like Petie said, it would be a pain to have flavor of the month forums while keeping the regular forums organized because a bunch of threads all on one subject would constantly be getting dumped in them. There's also the issue of people then not being able to find things, both because the threads would be in a different forum and because the thread titles would make little sense outside the context of the subject-specific forum. That would be a big pain for anyone wanting to post about the subject after its forum had been merged. And how do we decide when a forum has run its course and should be removed, since even the old anime forums rarely died out completely? The idea itself sounds good but the logistics of it sound like a nightmare to me.[/color][/QUOTE]
[size=1]I don't think it's a huge logistical challenge. Yes merging newer threads into an existing forum might be tiresome for moderators, but even if a Transformers forum is wildly successful (for example) it's only going to have a few dozen topics at most. In cases where several discussions are still going on when the forum is closed just merge those active discussions into one super-thread and move it to an appropriate general forum. As for the inactive discussions, you can always close those threads, archive them, or outright delete them.

As for deciding when a forum has run its course, we leave that up to member voting. We have bi-monthly votes covering a variety of topics that members have suggested, and the ones that receive the most votes win. If one of the current forums doesn't get enough votes, then it's switched out with something more popular. Chances are that if members aren't voting for it then it's not going to be terribly active, anyway.

The prospect of having a Harry Potter or Politics forum for a few months really excites me. I don't think adding two or three series-specific forums would make things cluttered. Chances are they'd be more active than what we have currently. If anyone has any ideas on how to make this more workable feel free to contribute them.

-Shy[/size]

[Semjaza]

Really, I think the random forum idea is a lot better. I don't think it would be that difficult to decide when it's become slow enough to be archived and then just turn into a singular thread when that time comes. I'm not big on separate forums if they're not necessary (such as when the games sections were getting so slow that there was no need for them to be separated by company any longer), but I think this would [I]encourage[/I] a lot more posting than anything else. And I'd say that's the goal of any forum.

I don't come here a lot any longer, but I still think having new members (or even less common visitors) sift through some sticky threads to make sure it's not ever been talked about before is pretty ridiculous... and I don't know about anyone else, but I feel stupid resurrecting a thread that's not been used in 6 months, even if it is the "official" one.

Plus, I really think that sometimes even if something is about the same general subject (be it a game, or whatever), there might be some completely different ideas addressed in there. Essentially, we wind up with one thread containing 10 different lines of thought and it gets incredibly confusing and becomes very difficult to respond to. If something is separate enough in construction to warrant two threads on the same overall subject, I do not understand why that is considered a problem.

It also eventually ties into being restrictive over what can even be talked about in these threads. I know in hardwired that if there's any inkling that a person is trying to get people together for a group or play a game together that there's kind of this basic threat of "this isn't allowed, it'll be closed if that happens!". This happened with the Chromehounds thread, for example. I just find it bizarre when games are becoming more online based and there's been some attempt with the (super messy) "hardwired online" thread.

Maybe some people think that's off-topic, but I think it's something that is important to discuss when considering singular threads versus other methods and the general restrictions that go along with that. It's just an example.

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]I just don't see how a single thing, or even a series, warrants its own forum?and the trouble of swapping them in and out?anymore. In the past, most of the threads in the Otaku Series forums (Zelda, Final Fantasy, and Pokemon) were either discussion threads about a single game in the series like the ones we have now, help threads, favorite threads, or stuff along the lines of, "omg Sephiroth is so hot, who else likes him?" At present, the first three would be fine within our current forums if we lifted the single thread rule and the last one would get closed/deleted.

Even if we got a good system for rotating forums going, though, I don't think that's a very good solution to the actual problem. It still leaves any subject not wildly popular enough to get its own forum in the same situation we're in now, with a single restrictive thread. Rotating forums is an interesting idea in itself but I think dropping the single thread rule within our current forums is a more fundamental solution. It also needs to happen first in order to be consistent when merging the rotating forums back into the main forums.

Also, Tony, getting people together within a game's thread to play online should be fine. If that sort of thing isn't being allowed, PM me with the specifics and I'll look into it. Hardwired Online can be used for that but it was never intended to be the [i]only[/i] place people can organize online play together.

In the case of the Chromehounds thread, though, it was more a case of not allowing advertising than not allowing people to organize online games. Posting a thread solely to get people to join your clan/guild isn't much different than posting just to advertise a website.[/color]

[Gavin]

[SIZE="1"]Odd that I was just looking through the last OB Survey yesterday evening.

Personally I'm against decentralising forums again, even it they would be just a "flavour of the month" variety. I think like Des already said, it would just end up being a messy affair when there are very few topics which get to the stage where they might require a forum of their own. And as BK said, often it's the case that they're only fads for a while and go silent again. DBZ for example was a staple forum on this site for years before interest in it waned.

The removal of the one-thread-per-franchise rule seems to be a better system in my mind, as it would achieve the same ends as the "flavour of the month" forums without all the extra work needed to manage them. Perhaps another approach might be to have a series of threads on the one franchise for example, Final Fantasy XII could have a discussion thread as well as a help thread, each of them catering to a different audience.

I don't think we'll ever get a perfect system of this, as we're a general site that deals with a lot of different franchises.[/SIZE]

[Semjaza]

I really wind up falling back on my singular discussion issue. I don't know that any of the proposed ideas are [I]perfect[/I] obviously, but you have to bring up the merits and downsides each of them to really get to any final conclusion. I think the basic idea can result in some good final action.

For my side (which is essentially in agreement with Gavin), let's say there's this game every one wants to talk about. And let's say one group wants to talk more about the characters and the others want to talk more about the battle system. And let's say both of these topics are well developed and interesting.

With the current format they'd just be completely meshed together. It's extremely difficult to jump into existing conversations that are going anywhere unless you were part of it from the onset because at any given time all of these points (and more) are being addressed in one singular place. It very much makes me wonder whether or not many people avoid posting entirely over this.

Then there's the expectation that you should have read every single post in the thread before you posted... which would be a hell of a lot easier if it contained one real major idea. Instead if contains many and it's just confusing and time consuming to sift through 40 posts that are quoting 10 different people and discussing 5 related topics simultaneously.

Certainly one thread reduces the [I]number[/I] of threads in each forum, which in turn reduces clutter. Yet I do not think that this method reduces clutter [I]within[/I] the actual threads whatsoever. I personally think rectifying the latter is a bit more important... but at the same time, I don't exactly want to see 15 threads on Harry Potter either. I think that the modship will have to look at these individually and continue to decide which can live in harmony and which cannot.

To me there must be a reason why a forum of OB's apparent size sees the same cliques in every single thread over and over again. And I think part of that is people just have a really hard time joining in on anything.

Maybe I'm alone in this thought. If I am, whatever, there's obviously no real need to address my points lol.


[quote name='Desbreko'][color=#4B0082]In the case of the Chromehounds thread, though, it was more a case of not allowing advertising than not allowing people to organize online games. Posting a thread solely to get people to join your clan/guild isn't much different than posting just to advertise a website.[/color][/QUOTE]

There's not really any difference in games on XBL between joining your friends list so you know when someone is online and joining a "clan" though. I mean, what is really the differentiation there? You have to have people added to your list and meet up in game to even [I]do anything.[/I]

I find this extremely confusing and I think it's very clear that current set up is simply not working. Even that thread is hard to follow as the opening post contains a bunch of information only mods can edit, but nothing new is added into it... people are talking and posting their information and it becomes a chore to cycle through all of it. It's basically an example of what I'm referring to above.

[Gavin]

[quote name='Semjaza']With the current format they'd just be completely meshed together. It's extremely difficult to jump into existing conversations that are going anywhere unless you were part of it from the onset because at any given time all of these points (and more) are being addressed in one singular place. It very much makes me wonder whether or not many people avoid posting entirely over this.[/QUOTE]

[SIZE="1"]That's pretty much exactly what I was getting at, with some franchise threads you end up with quite a few different discussions going on at the same time and as you said Tony, unless you've been in the thread since the start it can really get confusing.

As I recall though, didn't we centralise the forums to try and encourage posting the last time ? It seems odd we'd revert them for the same reason.[/SIZE]

[Rachmaninoff]

I'm not in favor of switching to forums that are specific to one series or franchise, but then the team I'm a part of for the Survivor rp is currently doing an article on the old Yu Yu Hakusho forum so I've been running into a lot of material indicating just how much of a mess that system was.

However, at the same time I'm not completely in favor of the single thread format either. I'm more inclined to do what Des is suggesting and allowing more than one thread per series or franchise. Obviously if a couple of threads are too similar they could still be merged, but other wise people could still have the freedom to go off on a tangent without essentially taking over the thread.

A good example that comes to mind is some of the lengthy debates I've seen in the Twilight Princess thread, those could have easily had their own thread.

As for the current format keeping people from joining a thread, even if it's older? I guess that could be true, but since it was like that from the moment I joined I never thought anything of it and simply located the thread in the directory and posted. I've seen other examples where reviving an older thread didn't stop anyone from joining the conversation.

[James]

[quote]There's not really any difference in games on XBL between joining your friends list so you know when someone is online and joining a "clan" though. I mean, what is really the differentiation there? [/quote]

[color=#606060]I think there's a difference. Based on what Desbreko is saying I think he's pointing out the difference between having one dedicated/official thread where everyone puts up their Xbox Live details, versus one person creating an entire thread about their private clan. So I'd say there was a difference based on Desbreko's reasoning.

I suppose it would be a bit like someone posting a thread saying "Join my forums!"

Anyway, I digress.

Your overall points I agree with 100% - I have similar concerns about a single thread per franchise concept. It was something that was worth testing. We tested it...and now I'm convinced we can do more, which is why I'm asking for people's views.

But yeah, I think the earlier example you brought up is very valid. And it's probably my number one concern with the current system.[/color]

[quote]As I recall though, didn't we centralise the forums to try and encourage posting the last time ? It seems odd we'd revert them for the same reason.[/quote]

[color=#606060]Well, yes and no.

We collapsed forums because a) we didn't feel we could justify having entire forums that weren't terribly active (i.e. Yu Yu Hakusho) and b) we wanted the site to be cleaner/more organised.

At this stage I'm wondering if we can't try to strike some sort of balance - either to try something new or to go back to having multiple sub-forums...but perhaps with a different focus or something.[/color]

[Aaryanna_Mom]

I have to say that I like the single thread concept, but then it's because having a directory makes things so easy to find instead of having many different forums, that just seems like it would get chaotic very quickly.

If I understand what's being said correctly, allowing more than one thread seems like the better solution or having the main anime forum with the series threads and then a sub forum for stuff that is specific like discussing an episode in depth. But still that just seems pointless if more than one thread was allowed on a series.

Though again I don't fully understand how one would be better than the other. But to see lots and lots of sub forums for a specific series or franchise just seems like it would get messy real quick. But then the more centralized format here is easy for me to follow.

I understand the concern about being lost in a single thread due to multiple discussions between different people, but it seems to me that having the threads separate and in a different forum would ultimately be just as confusing for keeping track of what's going on. It's just another form of separation that has just as much potential for being confusing as it was when in the same thread.

I guess in the end, I just don't see how splitting things up would encourage more discussion, allowing more threads I can see but the other seems to be a bit overboard as far as generating more interest and activity.

[Shy]

[quote name='Rachmaninoff']I'm not in favor of switching to forums that are specific to one series or franchise, but then the team I'm a part of for the Survivor rp is currently doing an article on the old Yu Yu Hakusho forum so I've been running into a lot of material indicating just how much of a mess that system was.[/quote][size=1]I don't think the Yu Yu Hakusho forum suffered because the franchise-forum system was bad, it was just that we didn't have enough member demand for that type of forum. If members really care about the subject matter there is no shortage of threads and discussions they can create.

As others have mentioned we've had great franchise-specific forums like Digimon and Dragonball in the past. Those two series in particular had a lot of member interest in their heyday, so I think creating new franchise-specific forums is a good thing as long as the interest is there.

I really like my 'flavor of the month' forum idea, but maybe that's just because it's mine. We're obviously never going to come up with a perfect solution, but I think lifting the 'one thread per subject rule' is a good start.

-Shy[/size]

[Aaryanna]

[COLOR="goldenrod"][FONT="Comic Sans MS"][quote name='Shy'][size=1] I think lifting the 'one thread per subject rule' is a good start.[/size][/QUOTE]That's what I'm thinking, instead of having more sub forums. Simply broadening the current discussions. After all it would be pretty simple to merge threads that are far to similar, but obviously there will be reasons to have separate threads on the same show. I like that idea better than having sub forums for different animes or franchises. It opens up the discussion without the need to determine which shows or franchises warrant their own forum. [/FONT][/COLOR]

[Sandy]

One more suggestion I'd like to throw into the mix, since I really liked the subforums when we had them. ;D

How about if the subforums to AL and Hardwired were not based on franchise or platforms, but rather [B]genres[/B]? I think that way there'd be a good amount of subforums that would cater to almost everyone's taste (threads that don't fit the genres could be left in the main forums, such as threads about uncategorizable anime and gaming platforms).

*is left dreaming about a roleplaying videogames forum*

[Dagger]

[quote name='Sandy']How about if the subforums to AL and Hardwired were not based on franchise or platforms, but rather [B]genres[/B]? [/QUOTE]
Wouldn't work for anime. Too many series are sci-fi & romance & comedy & fanservice & whatever all at the same time, without a clearly dominant element. I suppose it would be possible to divide them into shounen/seinen and shoujo/josei. Doing so would defeat the purpose, though, in that it would lump together diverse series that have nothing in common other than being shoujo or shounen.

ETA: Of course, it would be possible to cover some easily identified areas (mecha, magical girl), although that would still leave the majority of shows uncategorizable...

~Dagger~

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]That's the problem with separating things by genre; it can be really subjective when they fall into more than one. In the end I think it would just make it harder to find what you're looking for.

I don't think it would really encourage more posting or allow more freedom, either, since it would just be taking our current threads and splitting them up into subcategories. We could also split them up by company like we had before with the Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft forums, but that only stunted posting because people were never quite sure where to post about multi-platform titles. I imagine splitting threads up by genre would have a similar effect.[/color]

[Petie]

[quote name='Aaryanna_Mom']I have to say that I like the single thread concept, but then it's because having a directory makes things so easy to find instead of having many different forums, that just seems like it would get chaotic very quickly.[/quote]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]This plays into my next idea actually.[/COLOR][/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]Des, I do see what you're saying about temporary, topic specific forums and maybe they're not the best way to go. The directories are definitely helpful already and if we had things set up where multiple threads for a single series fell under one category in the directory (see example below), it would be a good balance between the two current choices.[/COLOR][/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]Because DBZ was brought up and makes an easy example, here's what I mean:[/COLOR][/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue][B]Dragonball Z: [/B](Link to a general thread if it exists)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]- The Cell Games (Link to saga specific thread)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]- The Namek Saga (Link to saga specific thread)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]- The Frieza Saga (Link to saga specific thread)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]- Etc. (Whatever else fits in this category)[/COLOR][/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]While other, more general threads, can still have single listings in the same directory. It requires a little work setting things up but once it's up and running, this could work pretty well. Your thoughts?[/COLOR][/FONT]

[Shy]

[quote name='Petie'][FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]Because DBZ was brought up and makes an easy example, here's what I mean:[/COLOR][/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue][B]Dragonball Z: [/B](Link to a general thread if it exists)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]- The Cell Games (Link to saga specific thread)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]- The Namek Saga (Link to saga specific thread)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]- The Frieza Saga (Link to saga specific thread)[/COLOR][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]- Etc. (Whatever else fits in this category)[/COLOR][/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana][COLOR=blue]While other, more general threads, can still have single listings in the same directory. It requires a little work setting things up but once it's up and running, this could work pretty well. Your thoughts?[/COLOR][/FONT][/QUOTE]
[size=1]That's pretty much exactly what we had in the .hack//SIGN forum back in the day. It was the first forum on the site to have a thread directory, and it turned out to be pretty effective and popular.

I don't think the directories in and of themselves are a bad idea. They can be applied to a lot more than the standard 'one thread per series' we've been using so far.

-Shy[/size]