Introduction Threads turning into Personal Bests/Update Threads

[cxinlee]

Some people have introduction threads even though they have been here for a while, which defeats the purpose.

 

[uniacto]

I've checked 3 months worth of posting on the members introduction subforum and I have found the following

Only 3 threads have more than 100 replies
Only 6 have more than 50, one of them is less than 2 weeks old.

So let's be honest, no member threads are cluttering the main page, don't lock threads or overreact in a similar way, either hide the member introduction subforum from the main page or just leave these 3-4 alone, as they are easily avoidable for whoever not iterested in them.

I see 4 threads with more than 200. 2 of these said threads have more than 500 replies. That's 500+ bumps to the home page.

I don't understand your argument.

A thread like this, for example, should not be in the members introduction subforum: http://www.speedsolving.com/forum/showthread.php?41636-Hey-Lchu613-here!-(Even-though-I-m-not-new)

EDIT: from the member introductions guidelines:

2. No posting "late welcomes".

While many of you refrain from posting Welcome Threads when you first arrive, we ask that if you've been here for more then a month or two that you don't create one. By then, most people are familiar with you, which defeats the purpose of you creating one.

 

[elrog]

Anything I would say has basically already been said, but I just wanted to throw it out there that I find these threads annoying aswell. I think there should be another place for these types of conversations.

 

[sneaklyfox]

Is there any way that the mods could stop the threads appearing on the homepage after a certain amount of time/number of posts, in the same way that the Forum Competitions don't get bumped?

I think this would be the ideal way to handle this but of course up to the mods to figure it out.

Who says? It's a community. If people enjoy forming discussions that way, let them. If it's not popular it will die on its own.

As a separate comment, I don't like threads like the accomplishment thread. If all you want to do is publicly log a PB, great, but I never read it because I'm not interested in just a log. I do read Marcel's and others' threads as there is interesting and enjoyable conversation in there.

Feel free to remove my 'Hi, Marcel from Holland here' topic from introductions and move to off any place you like or simply delete it if that makes you happy. I for one like reading other people's personal 'welcome' topics. I don't care much for the accomplishment topic.

I don't really care for the accomplishment topic either but I think it does have its uses for people who do use it. Occasionally I've posted on it because I was really happy with a personal accomplishment, but then I don't really read other people's posts in there. I read Marcel's thread regularly and I think he's got a following. Some others I don't read because I felt like they wanted to copy Marcel on having their own thread and get popularity.

As someone else mentioned, I like the idea of having your own thread where you can update your accomplishments, what you're working on, and other things like that. Not everyone will want to do it. Not sure about best way to implement this though or whether it's feasible.

 

[Noahaha]

I think this would be the ideal way to handle this but of course up to the mods to figure it out.



As someone else mentioned, I like the idea of having your own thread where you can update your accomplishments, what you're working on, and other things like that. Not everyone will want to do it. Not sure about best way to implement this though or whether it's feasible.

As I said earlier, I think (an extension of) visitor messages could serve this purpose. It's already kind of like having your own thread attached to your profile. I haven't really use it though, so I don't know if you can "post" on it without someone starting a conversation with you.

 

[cxinlee]

I suggest that there be "home" threads rather than introduction threads, so cubers that aren't new can still make threads to act as their "diaries" or records.

 

[kunparekh18]

I suggest that there be "home" threads rather than introduction threads, so cubers that aren't new can still make threads to act as their "diaries" or records.

Excellent, where there is a Diary section on the forum that isn't bumped on the home thread.

 

[Kirjava]

Calling them a different name does nothing to solve the problem.

 

[cxinlee]

Calling them a different name does nothing to solve the problem.

If it's a member introduction thread, it's for the member to introduce himself/herself. If it's a home thread, then there are more options.

 

[mark49152]

Calling them a different name does nothing to solve the problem.

Some people enjoy those threads, others aren't interested. Where is the problem? The argument about them cluttering the home page just doesn't hold, when you look at the relative volumes of different types of thread listed there.

 

[Kirjava]

Some people enjoy those threads, others aren't interested. Where is the problem? The argument about them cluttering the home page just doesn't hold, when you look at the relative volumes of different types of thread listed there.

Refuse to reiterate

 

[Kattenvriendin]

Geez, I only read the first post, I am not going to bother reading 50 posts worth of complaints. If it causes so much trouble, move my thread to accomplishments forum already where some folks seem to think it belongs and I will continue to update there.

Man.. what a fuss, making a big deal out of nothing. Be glad we're not spamming the forums all over and are keeping it on one place. :rolleyes:

 

[Kirjava]

move my thread to accomplishments forum already where some folks seem to think it belongs and I will continue to update there. :

Why not just start posting there instead anyway?

Also, people are overreacting to this. We don't want you to stop posting, it's not even a big deal. We're just discussing improvements.

 

[littlewing1208]

Why not just start posting there instead anyway?

Also, people are overreacting to this. We don't want you to stop posting, it's not even a big deal. We're just discussing improvements.

Earlier you made a comment about 'a site with this much traffic' regarding fragmentation. Fragmentation aside, this forum/site actually gets very little traffic in the grand scheme of things. There are many other 'average' sized forums that have 1 and 2 orders of magnitude more posts, threads, members etc than speedsolving (as a car nerd, the few I check are e46fanatics.com, bimmerworld.com, s2ki.com, honda-tech.com, rennlist.com) which is going on 7 years old.

Additionally, since speedsolving has an online store, they have a vested interest in not only 'traffic' but 'quality traffic' (as should any forum but some a clearly apathetic). What I mean by that is people checking out the site, joining, posting etc, but in addition, those who are happy or enjoy their time on the site because those are not only the people who will likely become longtime members, but they also are more likely to support the webstore associated with the site/forum. Also, they are more likely to become Premium members to help further support the site.

That being said, I personally feel that MarcelP and Kattenvriendin's threads are some of the more warm, inviting, entertaining, and non-intimidating threads on the forum. Both of them (no disrespect) are not sub-10 hardcore speed solvers but they are passionate about their hobby, share their information freely (lots of videos and how tos), talk about their modding strategies, tension strategies, offer very non-biased reviews of online shops and new cubes/puzzles. These are the exact people and type of threads that are likely to attract the quality traffic that I mentioned above. So rather than discouraging it, I think it should be encouraged. If it needs a new sub forum or facade, then so be it. But to jumble these threads into the terrible OQOAT or Accomplishment thread, will be a disservice to this site.

 

[~Adam~]

I don't see it as a big deal at the moment but it could easily escalate to the point where 80% of the topics on the homepage are these 'introduction' threads because of just a handful of extremely frequent posters.

Maybe make a blog sub forum where the topics don't make the most recently posted in topics list.

 

[mark49152]

That being said, I personally feel that MarcelP and Kattenvriendin's threads are some of the more warm, inviting, entertaining, and non-intimidating threads on the forum. Both of them (no disrespect) are not sub-10 hardcore speed solvers but they are passionate about their hobby, share their information freely (lots of videos and how tos), talk about their modding strategies, tension strategies, offer very non-biased reviews of online shops and new cubes/puzzles. These are the exact people and type of threads that are likely to attract the quality traffic that I mentioned above. So rather than discouraging it, I think it should be encouraged. If it needs a new sub forum or facade, then so be it. But to jumble these threads into the terrible OQOAT or Accomplishment thread, will be a disservice to this site.

Very nicely said! I agree completely but you did a much better job sticking up for those threads than I did, so thanks for that.

 

[Kirjava]

A site doesn't have to have the highest post rate on the internet for fragmentation to be an issue. Just because other sites have more traffic does not mean that this site has none.

But to jumble these threads into the terrible OQOAT or Accomplishment thread

OAQT does a hell of a lot of good on this forum, please do not call it 'terrible'.

Their threads are fine, but it's not desired for every user to to have their own personal update thread on this forum.

 

[littlewing1208]

OAQT does a hell of a lot of good on this forum, please do not call it 'terrible'.

Terrible might have been harsh, but OQOAT actually encourages 'one and done' users: They find this forum and are new to cubing, start an individual thread since search failed to get them their answer due to the merging strategies practiced on this site, and then within 30 minutes, their post is merged into OQOAT. Then they go to that thread and refresh.....refresh....refresh.....hoping to get an answer to their question and all the while 3-4, maybe 10 posts are created since their post on completely different topics/subjects. Generally the question never gets answered and said user is intimidated by the strict policies on this forum and then they wither away into the ether and don't repost the question. In the chance their question is answered, they still have to wade through the dissonance of other posts to find the replies to their specific question....assuming the people answering the question quote the original post properly. I personally think this is encouraging poor quality traffic and does not incentivize joining this forum and becoming a member of the community.

If the original post was left alone and people answered the question accordingly, then it would be exponentially easier to logically skim the thread to pull answered/conclusions from it. Then since you didn't waste time on OQOAT, you might check out a few more threads and start to enjoy the site. Similarly, a few days later instead of a different person having to search OQOAT which is a mess, you would search the forum and find a discrete and definitive thread with all the answers you want. Then you're more likely to actually browse the site even more since you didn't have to post since search completely identified your problem and answer.

Anyway, on my birthday, I get 30+ emails from forums I've joined over the years on topics like automobiles, cooking, knives, gardening, home repair, appliance repair, exactly 0 of said forums exercise the aggressive merge policies into 'lump a bunch of *semi* related questions into a monster thread' (thorum like someone mentioned).

Making it hard to extract information from a forum actually makes double/duplicate posting worse....not better. I've never seen a person reply to a post on this forum in the following fashion "Did you even search? Please see: link1, link2, link3, link4, link5, link6, link7" where link* is a link to a single threads in OQOAT in a manner such that the noise of other posts are removed and exactly the question and answer(s) are posted in sequence. No one is going to do that and hence duplicate posting is going to remain an issue. However, if a single search query results in a discrete, well developed thread on a given topic, then it's easy to push people into searching (and actually being successful at doing so).

 

[cxinlee]

I'd say don't make a member introduction if your not new.

 

[Kirjava]

Terrible might have been harsh, but OQOAT actually encourages 'one and done' users: They find this forum and are new to cubing, start an individual thread since search failed to get them their answer due to the merging strategies practiced on this site, and then within 30 minutes, their post is merged into OQOAT. Then they go to that thread and refresh.....refresh....refresh.....hoping to get an answer to their question and all the while 3-4, maybe 10 posts are created since their post on completely different topics/subjects. Generally the question never gets answered and said user is intimidated by the strict policies on this forum and then they wither away into the ether and don't repost the question.

I'd appreciate it if you didn't use outright lies to try and enhance your points. You cannot possibly say that 'generally the question never gets answered', questions have an extremely high answer rate in that thread.

In the chance their question is answered, they still have to wade through the dissonance of other posts to find the replies to their specific question....assuming the people answering the question quote the original post properly. I personally think this is encouraging poor quality traffic and does not incentivize joining this forum and becoming a member of the community.

The alternative is lots of threads containing the same questions over and over again. I think your comment about poor quality traffic is completely wrong and much prefer this format.

If the original post was left alone and people answered the question accordingly, then it would be exponentially easier to logically skim the thread to pull answered/conclusions from it. Then since you didn't waste time on OQOAT, you might check out a few more threads and start to enjoy the site. Similarly, a few days later instead of a different person having to search OQOAT which is a mess, you would search the forum and find a discrete and definitive thread with all the answers you want. Then you're more likely to actually browse the site even more since you didn't have to post since search completely identified your problem and answer.

This all relies on the fact that the OAQT is 'a mess'. It's easy to search and find information in it, especially if the related information comes from a post you have made.

Anyway, on my birthday, I get 30+ emails from forums I've joined over the years on topics like automobiles, cooking, knives, gardening, home repair, appliance repair, exactly 0 of said forums exercise the aggressive merge policies into 'lump a bunch of *semi* related questions into a monster thread' (thorum like someone mentioned).

Good for them. We do things differently here.

A lot of this stems from the fact that we don't believe these questions /deserve/ their own thread. It is indeed clutter - it was bad before the thread existed, and I dread to think what it would be like now if we didn't merge like we do.

Making it hard to extract information from a forum actually makes double/duplicate posting worse....not better. I've never seen a person reply to a post on this forum in the following fashion "Did you even search? Please see: link1, link2, link3, link4, link5, link6, link7" where link* is a link to a single threads in OQOAT in a manner such that the noise of other posts are removed and exactly the question and answer(s) are posted in sequence. No one is going to do that and hence duplicate posting is going to remain an issue. However, if a single search query results in a discrete, well developed thread on a given topic, then it's easy to push people into searching (and actually being successful at doing so).

Aside from the fact that that thread is easy to search anyway, the thread only contains simple questions like asking how notation works and is usually covered already by the wiki.

Threads that contain unique questions or are not mundane repeats are left alone to enjoy their own places.

People seem to disagree with a lot of these 'heap' threads.

The 'Random Cubing Discussion thread' actually ended up producing a lot of content that would've otherwise gone unposted as most of us do not believe in creating a new topic for frivolous ideas.

The 'The New Method / Substep / Concept Idea Thread' is wonderful for collecting all the topics we used to get of people posting the belt method over and over and over and over and oh god kill me now.