Suggestion: A reduced number of forums

[Guybrush]

Originally Posted by Frownland

Did you ever get those deets on what exactly the vbulletin update would entail? The site's mobile functionality seems fine.

Advameg runs vbulletin forums for a living, so it should be well within their power. The explanation last time was vbulletin costs money and MB isn't profitable enough to make it worth the investment.

I still think it should be asked about - and repeatedly. The last time significant updates were made was in 2009, I believe, and it wasn't a full version upgrade.

To say the mobile functionality is fine seems backwards to me. The site basically predates the smart phone and obviously hasn't been optimized for that technology. If anything, it's smartphones' old ass webpage functionality which is fine. That still doesn't make phone-posting on MB as easy as it should be.

Originally Posted by Frownland

We don't have tagging but we implemented notifications for when your posts are quoted, which is close. You have to enable it though.

Hey, cool! Didn't know that. That's great.

Originally Posted by Frownland

Never noticed the whitespace, we can look into that.

I cleaned them up and presented them to Yac a long time ago. He was able to change the forums around, but couldn't or wouldn't just overwrite these old gifs with my new ones.

But again, there's a new Yac now so I definitely think it's worth asking again. I also don't think NOs should be accepted indefinitely, but I'd rather die on the vbulletin upgrade hill.

Originally Posted by Frownland

The censorship is an advameg requirement for our SEO, can't undo that one unfortunately.

I know, but they need to update it a bit. The word G A Y should definitely be taken out, probably a few more too. Maybe some should be added.

Edit:

Hey, the word gay is allowed now, so that's years of annoyance to Gloria Gaynor and Marvin Gaye fans eliminated. Thanks to whoever made that happen <3

Originally Posted by Frownland

Don't let me keep you from congratulating your hypothetical initiative as a mod though.

I don't even understand what this means. Am I congratulating my hypothetical initiative as a mod?

[Frownland]

Originally Posted by Guybrush

Advameg runs vbulletin forums for a living, so it should be well within their power. The explanation last time was vbulletin costs money and MB isn't profitable enough to make it worth the investment.

I still think it should be asked about - and repeatedly. The last time significant updates were made was in 2009, I believe, and it wasn't a full version upgrade.

To say the mobile functionality is fine seems backwards to me. The site basically predates the smart phone and obviously hasn't been optimized for that technology. If anything, it's smartphones' old ass webpage functionality which is fine. That still doesn't make phone-posting on MB as easy as it should be.

Yeah I don't know what changes the update would include either. Let me know if you find out.

I know, but they need to update it a bit. The word G A Y should definitely be taken out, probably a few more too. Maybe some should be added.

...the word gay is not censored. Problem solved!

I don't even understand what this means. Am I congratulating my hypothetical initiative as a mod?

Yeah I would call this paragraph self-congratulatory in that aspect.

If I were running things, you bet I would be on Advameg to implement these things and more. However, I fortunately am not riddled with the headache of running things and that mostly spares me from a continous uphill battle against a community where most of the people who wanted more for MB have already left and the people who stuck around are the guys who seem completely complacent or even happy with the admin neglect and abandonment that has turned MB into a sinking ship in a losing battle against social medias and other music forums that are able to update and implement welcome changes. Whatever the deal with admin is, the most disappointing thing about MB, by far, is that nobody left seems to care about its' wellbeing.

[Guybrush]

Originally Posted by Frownland

Yeah I would call this paragraph self-congratulatory in that aspect.

Alright. That's not a term here, but sure, why not. The content of the paragraph still seems fine to me

[Frownland]

There's a better term for it that I can't quite place atm. It overstates the problem as a way to bolster your suggestions when they're criticized or ignored.

[rubber soul]

It's not that we don't care, Guy. It's just that the few of us that are on here just come on to post and may kibbitz a bit. As such, we tend to not want to be bothered when dealing with changes that will never be made on the forum or when a certain member tries in vain to get us to join in on his latest project. In other words. we're just here to relax basically.

Having said that, I do like the idea of expanding the PM capacity. I'm reluctant to send PMs in general because my box would load up too quickly, especially since they count sent PMs as well. I don't know what the capacity is for a mod, but it has to be frustrating to have your PM box stuffed with the various PM's they might send or receive. It was never an issue for me when I was a Mod at the writing forum. We could send as many PMs as we wanted and my box could hold 20,000 PMs by the time I left. Even a regular member could hold 500 PMs. Anyway, that's the one thing I'd recommend.

[Trollheart]

Yeah I think what Frown is getting at, and you might not realise, is that you're kind of saying "look at me. I think this place can be better but you bunch of lazy gits won't help. Wake up! Think as I do." And we're all blinking and yawning or rolling back over going "Mmmfff? Yeah yeah, five more minutes, honestly. Is that toast I smell?" Like, nobody, so far as can be judged by the responses here, sees a major problem in how the forum is now. Everyone would of course rather it was busier, more active, but that won't be fixed by a few cosmetic upgrades. Again, it's moving the furniture (or, as you say, getting new stuff) without the people to sit on it.

Forums probably are dying, and that's not a thing we can change. I personally prefer them to FB or Cheep or Warble or whatever the other one is, and don't get me started on Grannygram. Instagram. Sorry. Definitely not Grannygram. Something entirely different. Never mind what it is. Where was I?

Oh yeah: your initiatives and suggestions, Tore, sadly and probably unintentionally always come across as a little, um, arrogant maybe? Preachy? You guys don't know, sort of thing, or why can't you understand, that sort of line. And I mean, to be fair, look at them all: every one of them has been more or less shot down. I see this going the same way. It might be better to contribute in a way you can, now, like with some new thread or discussion, rather than a big drive to overhaul the system. I really can't see the benefit. Sure it will be tidier and more pleasing on the eye, but isn't this, again to go on with the metaphors, like someone who opens up say a coffee house and nobody - or very few - comes in. So he thinks I'll add some pictures, paint the walls, bring in a jukebox - all very fine endeavours, but the problem remains: no customers because his coffee is ****e.

That's what it's like here. We've basically become a collection of old - I don't necessarily mean in terms of age, but in terms of how long we've been here - mates and/or adversaries who have been here so long we're stuck in our ways and that's just how we likes it. Another analogy is kind of like one of those old gentleman's clubs they used to have in England, everyone reading their paper and smoking and nobody paying much attention to anyone else, looking over the top of the paper with a frown and a raised eyebrow at any new members.

It's a problem we're unlikely to fix. I don't see any way to, certainly not by doing a spring clean in December. I'm happy to go along here as we are, annoying everyone with my constant threads and planning to foist more and more journals on them in the coming year. It's not a perfect place, but it's our place.

Perhaps, if it ain't broke, y'know?

Oh, and by the way, gay may not be banned but *** is, which is annoying when I did my review of The Nightfly by Donald ***en, and will be when I constantly have to keep getting around how to write the name of the bad guy in Oliver Twist when I get there in my Dickens journal!

[SGR]

[rubber soul]

They banned the word ***? What do they have against British cigarettes?

[Plankton]

The fact that MB is still here and not completely deleted and forgotten is a testament to the miniscule amount of earnings this site still brings to Lech Mazur through data mining.

[Trollheart]

Or due to the existence of some very incriminating photographs held at a secret loc - uh, yeah. Data mining. That sounds better.