Hello all,
First let me say that I’m not trying to criticize anyone or cause disruption. I am simply trying to improve the quality of SPCR’s forums.
Recently, I’ve noticed that there are a lot of posts go unanswered here at SPCR. While I understand that we all are people and we all do our best, but I would like to ask the SPCR community to help reduce the number of unanswered posts. I noticed this issue when I look through threads in SPCR. I normally log in and click “View posts since last visitâ€
Improving SPCR's Forums
Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee, Edward Ng
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angelkiller
- Posts: 871
- Joined: Fri Jan 05, 2007 11:37 am
- Location: North Carolina
Hi Angel,
I can agree with your suggestion to use the "view unanswered posts" more often, but I think that beyond that you are trying to make a casual conversation method too regimented. People are not owed answers, though the forum will certainly be perceived as friendly the more messages that are replied to.
I do not want to wait for days to post when I could post a partial answer quickly, and even say that there are others here that will probably add more details later. In case the person is in a hurry, or checks back soon, I think this can be a small help.
If someone asks an interesting question, it may spark interesting conversation, even though it is not expert material, so I also think that specifying extremely helpful will stiffle the conversations. (Besides, it leaves out most of what Bluefront and Aristide1 say to each other
)
In summary though, I will agree to check the unanswered posts more often.
I can agree with your suggestion to use the "view unanswered posts" more often, but I think that beyond that you are trying to make a casual conversation method too regimented. People are not owed answers, though the forum will certainly be perceived as friendly the more messages that are replied to.
I do not want to wait for days to post when I could post a partial answer quickly, and even say that there are others here that will probably add more details later. In case the person is in a hurry, or checks back soon, I think this can be a small help.
If someone asks an interesting question, it may spark interesting conversation, even though it is not expert material, so I also think that specifying extremely helpful will stiffle the conversations. (Besides, it leaves out most of what Bluefront and Aristide1 say to each other
)In summary though, I will agree to check the unanswered posts more often.
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MikeC
- Site Admin
- Posts: 12285
- Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 3:26 pm
- Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada
- Contact:
angelkiller, your call for more generous responses is cool, and I hope "older" forum members who have more knowledge will respond. I have to say, tho, I think the SPCR forum community is very responsive in general.
It's true that answered posts need to be culled desperately. There are over 4000 of them -- dating back all the way to 2002. I need to call upon the mods to help eliminate most of them, and to be more alert about dumping them sooner. Most forums have a policy of automatically dumping single posts that are unanswered more than a week or two.
In general, queries that are unanswered at SPCR fall into certain categories:
1) they don't actually call for any response.
2) they repeat a question that's been asked a bazillion times in the past.
3) they ask for information that's easily available w/1~5 minutes searching in the forums or on the main site.
4) they ask a question no one has any answers to, or is of extremely narrow interest.
Then there are others that simply get missed because of major attention by some other more compelling discussion that everyone gathers around.
It's true that answered posts need to be culled desperately. There are over 4000 of them -- dating back all the way to 2002. I need to call upon the mods to help eliminate most of them, and to be more alert about dumping them sooner. Most forums have a policy of automatically dumping single posts that are unanswered more than a week or two.
In general, queries that are unanswered at SPCR fall into certain categories:
1) they don't actually call for any response.
2) they repeat a question that's been asked a bazillion times in the past.
3) they ask for information that's easily available w/1~5 minutes searching in the forums or on the main site.
4) they ask a question no one has any answers to, or is of extremely narrow interest.
Then there are others that simply get missed because of major attention by some other more compelling discussion that everyone gathers around.
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angelkiller
- Posts: 871
- Joined: Fri Jan 05, 2007 11:37 am
- Location: North Carolina
Hm. I understand your point. I just want to say that that idea was more or less a suggestion. I didn't want to point out something without suggesting an alternative. And I wasn't trying to make a posting rule or anything.VanWaGuy wrote:but I think that beyond that you are trying to make a casual conversation method too regimented. People are not owed answers, though the forum will certainly be perceived as friendly the more messages that are replied to.
I do not want to wait for days to post when I could post a partial answer quickly, and even say that there are others here that will probably add more details later. In case the person is in a hurry, or checks back soon, I think this can be a small help.
I even like your idea better than mine. Giving any info reguardless of when, will be helpful.
That's what all I wanted. Thanks!VanWaGuy wrote:In summary though, I will agree to check the unanswered posts more often.
Yes, without a doubt. I wasn't saying that they're not or that this is a big serious issue. I saw this as a way to improve the forums with only a bit of energy.MikeC wrote:I have to say, tho, I think the SPCR forum community is very responsive in general.
I just thought that by trying to answer more unanswered posts we could make SPCR even better. Sorry if I came off too harsh.
And sorry for the late response.
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NeilBlanchard
- Moderator
- Posts: 7681
- Joined: Mon Dec 09, 2002 7:11 pm
- Location: Maynard, MA, Eaarth
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