Things You Want Changed

[jpishgar]

Hey all!

You may have recently seen a lot of discussion about the recent acquisition of Anandtech by Purch, and the inevitable inquisitive-minded asking "What will this change?". The response has been a resounding "Little to nothing!" from yours truly up to this point. Over the course of these conversations with users and moderators, we've come to know that insisting nothing at all change for the sake of stability alone is as folly an approach as changing everything. That there are most definitely things you'd like to see changed here in the Anandtech community. With that in mind, and the understanding that any change is best originated from within, we'd like to give everyone an opportunity to tell us what changes you'd like to see happen. If you want to see change, that change has gotta come from you. So now, we're asking the community at large:

What do you want to see changed?

If you have suggestions, recommendations or input for changes you'd like to see to the Anandtech community, we want to hear from you. Please respond to this thread with your thoughts, and I ask that you keep your responses as actionable as possible.

Examples:
• Update the vBulletin theme!
• More emoticons, please.
• Add a Cooking subcategory.
• Change the regularly scheduled downtime to a time with less traffic

Bad Examples:
• Stop being awful.
• Politics and News sucks, you guys should change that

The more action-oriented the feedback and better thought-out the rationale presented for it, the more likely we'll be able to effect the change you've requested. Requests for changes that originate from the community will be subject to debate and review by the consensus (that is, everyone paying attention and responding), so please feel free to vet each other's requested changes. Please note that feasibility will also be a factor in executing the requests, and we'll have to make sure what is requested can actually be done and viable.

For the time being, please keep requests for changes constrained to the domain of the community itself, that is, the forums.

Thanks all, in advance, for your input and hoping for a lively discussion!

-JP

 

[RossMAN]

JP,

Thank you for creating this thread, it's a step in the right direction.

Place holder as I have quite a few suggestions I'd like to share

 

[OutHouse]

Ainmates emotes.

 

[T9D]

https://chaturbate.com/female-cams/

 

[norseamd]

How is Xenforo?

Would it be worth it for Anandtech to upgrade to their software?

 

[soccerballtux]

vBulletin theme itself is fine, I prefer to keep the blue that's always been an ATF staple, but the formatting needs fixing, particularly
-the left column of forums
-the alignment between Post Reply, View First Unread, and the beginning of the threads
-I have a thread about this in personal forum issues

agree with the downtime

it's unlikely these changes will be implemented

fusetalk honestly had much prettier art/direction

 

[Dankk]

It's not a terribly important thing, but... the ability for forum users to pick from different vBulletin themes (colors, etc) would be pretty neat.

Ainmates emotes.

While I certainly wouldn't mind having more emoticons, animated emoticons are pretty tacky and should be kept to a minimum IMO.

 

[Crono]

- Fix the server issues. Erratic slowdowns, random vB errors, synchronization bugs ("time warps") and the weekly "scheduled maintenance" shouldn't be a reality. There are larger and smaller vBulletin forums that don't seem to need weekly maintenance downtime of several hours. Semi-regular monthly downtime for maintenance early Monday morning (3 AM EST) is understandable, especially if it's a reasonable amount of time, like 2 to 3 hours.

- vB themes. We were promised these with the switch from FuseTalk to vBulletin, and they never materialized. It doesn't take much effort to add a dark theme and a few others. Literally minutes to upload and test, and they don't even need to be set as default, just available in the dropdown menu. This isn't just a nicety, it can make a difference in readability and reducing eyestrain, without resorting to kludgy browser plugins.

- Vote in new forum administration. It worked well for the mods who were voted in the last elections, but the ones who were here longer should be retired from moderation, unless they are voted in via new elections or are part of the main site staff. No offense to the old guard, but they seem to take things more personally and seem quick to ban people. I don't blame them given the amount of nonsense that can go on here, but that's even more reason they should be given time off from moderation and administration. Excepting anyone who may be involved in technical aspects (Harvey?) of running the forums, of course.

- Get rid of all the miscellaneous forum administration/moderation titles. "Moderator" is all anyone should be unless there needs to be a Head Moderator or equivalent, and only one Administrator (or at least Admins should only be those with full access to all forum features/privileges, which is how it is on most forums). Nobody knows what the heck Overlords and the random moderation titles actually mean to us peons.

- There should be a moratorium on new forums and categories, especially for ones that would weaken Off Topic. Off Topic is meant as catchall for all the non-tech forum topics to begin with, you don't need fifty new forums to limit forum activity.

- Rename "Politics and News" to "Politics and Economics". There are plenty of economics or business topics better suited for P&N, and numerous "news" topics which clearly belong in Off Topic. I think changing the name would clarify things for new posters or those who aren't sure where to post a new thread.

- Allow custom titles. I rarely see anyone made "Elite" anymore, and it doesn't seem like it would hurt to allow it. "Ranks" can be enabled separately if needed to keep "Golden Member", "Lifer", "No Lifer", or make custom titles a privilege based on post count (like for Lifers at 10,000).

- An actual Lifer Lounge would be nice if you insist on creating any new forums.

- Mod edits of others' posts should be limited to an explanation of what was changed/what the infracting content was. I'm tired of seeing mods put bolded paragraphs of their own writing in posts. That stuff should be done by PM or in an independent post.

- The rules should be featured more prominently in every forum in stickied or announcement form, and moderators and users should be held to them consistently, not in the arbitrary fashion it seems to be now. Prominent displaying of the rules helps everyone.

- I don't recall if this is still active, but for future anyway: Please no automated referral/tracking code inserted into hyperlinks (e.g. dynamite data). Make a stickied thread somewhere with a referral code to newegg, amazon, or wherever where we can buy products to support the forums if we so choose. That's much preferred to moderately benign but still annoying hijacking of links

 

[sandorski]

D::awe:

These 2 are too similar...other than that I don't see much need for change.

 

[lopri]

All Things Android please. I would have stayed here instead of making 2 extra accounts elsewhere had there been a more informative Android sub-forum.

 

[DigDog]

if we're dreaming, i would have a shout box/chatbox.**

but realistically, i'd rather nothing got changed. this is by far the best forum on the web, works well the way it is, and "if it aint broke".


(**this is basically a small IRC that updates with the refresh of teh page. an auto updating box would be even cooler)

 

[Braznor]

A philosophy subforum would be nice. Philosophy is an essential partner with science and religion. For philosophy freaks like me, we are now currently forced to use the off topic or P&N or the discussion forum, neither of which I find appropriate for the topic we have in mind.

So a dedicated philosophy subforum would be a nice addition to the collection we already have here. It would easily contain both religion and other beliefs our members may wish to share or discuss without being sidetracked or trolled by other people here.

 

[lxskllr]

- Fix the server issues. Erratic slowdowns, random vB errors, synchronization bugs ("time warps") and the weekly "scheduled maintenance" shouldn't be a reality. There are larger and smaller vBulletin forums that don't seem to need weekly maintenance downtime of several hours. Semi-regular monthly downtime for maintenance early Monday morning (3 AM EST) is understandable, especially if it's a reasonable amount of time, like 2 to 3 hours.

- vB themes. We were promised these with the switch from FuseTalk to vBulletin, and they never materialized. It doesn't take much effort to add a dark theme and a few others. Literally minutes to upload and test, and they don't even need to be set as default, just available in the dropdown menu. This isn't just a nicety, it can make a difference in readability and reducing eyestrain, without resorting to kludgy browser plugins.


- There should be a moratorium on new forums and categories, especially for ones that would weaken Off Topic. Off Topic is meant as catchall for all the non-tech forum topics to begin with, you don't need fifty new forums to limit forum activity.

- Rename "Politics and News" to "Politics and Economics". There are plenty of economics or business topics better suited for P&N, and numerous "news" topics which clearly belong in Off Topic. I think changing the name would clarify things for new posters or those who aren't sure where to post a new thread.

^^^I like these

- The rules should be featured more prominently in every forum in stickied or announcement form, and moderators and users should be held to them consistently, not in the arbitrary fashion it seems to be now. Prominent displaying of the rules helps everyone.

Rules are for people that can't think. The finer you grain the rules, the craftier the exploit that "follows" the rules, but still gets around them. Rules should be simple, and enforcement should be arbitrary, and up to the moderators discretion. It goes without saying, out of control mods need to be handled. Great power requires great responsibility, and they should be held to a high standard.

For the most part, I like the administration culture here. They're professional when it matters, and unprofessional when it doesn't. If there were any changes made, I'd prefer the work go towards technical perfection, rather than changing the human element.

Edit:
Oh, and get rid of all the announcements. It clutters the forums :^D

 

[dmcowen674]

A philosophy subforum would be nice. Philosophy is an essential partner with science and religion. For philosophy freaks like me, we are now currently forced to use the off topic or P&N or the discussion forum, neither of which I find appropriate for the topic we have in mind.

So a dedicated philosophy subforum would be a nice addition to the collection we already have here. It would easily contain both religion and other beliefs our members may wish to share or discuss without being sidetracked or trolled by other people here.

Wouldn't the Discussion Club cover what you're looking for?

Maybe tweak it's name to Philosophy and Discussion Club?

 

[WelshBloke]

Lots of people browse on the go so making tapatalk work better with the forums would be great.

 

[bruceb]

Biggest issue right now is slow notifications of new posts to subscribed threads. I am getting notifications of a post hours after it has been posted or I have already read it. Otherwise all is good just as it is.

 

[DigDog]

The finer you grain the rules, the craftier the exploit that "follows" the rules, but still gets around them.

i agree, and have seen this happen in other forums.

 

[dullard]

Stop with all the useless sub-forums. Virtually no one posts in many forums, meaning virtually no one browses them, meaning the few posts that do go there just languish often unread. Plus it is really hard to determine the proper place to post. If your video card is not working on a motherboard in Windows 7 is this a post for "Video Cards and Graphics", "Motherboards", "Computer Help", "General Hardware", or "Operating Systems"?

I would look back over the last few months and eliminate any sub-forum with fewer than an average of 5 new threads/day. Merge them into forums with actual traffic so users get their questions answered and their thoughts seen.

For example, when I click on Power Supplies, I get on the first page posts that are 1 month old (that doesn't count the 6 stickies). That sub-forum just isn't used. Same goes for "Cases and Cooling" and "Peripherals" which all really belong in "General Hardware".

For example, what is the difference between SFF and HTPC? They are essentially one and the same with just a slight tweak in usage.

For example, the "*nix Software" sub-forum only shows 19 threads TOTAL in the last month.

Deleting the useless sub-forums would really help with making the site more clean, give more users more threads to view without having to click on dozens of pages, and give more visibility to new users who put posts in unused sub-forums then quit the site disappointed. And for the dedicated long-term posters, it would help us from loading a page 6 hours later and seeing nothing new (boring). I cut back my posting about 95% when all these sub-forums popped up since it is too boring to see nothing new and too tedious to click on 20 forums that might interest me.

 

[amdhunter]

Lifer Forum

But make it so that every post there defaults to the Comic Sans font.

 

[purbeast0]

get rid of the weekly maintenance that is at one of the most prime times people use the forums. other forums much larger than AT don't even have to do things like that, or do it behind the scenes.

 

[Bubbleawsome]

Themes would be great. I would honestly look very, very hard at other forum software or new vbul before updating. Updating might get a lot of crap, and I can't blame them. The newest vbul looks very childish.

Un-borking a few old emotes would be nice. Maybe add a few. I'll try and link some later.

Maintenance needs to be moved off Saturday night honestly.

Merging and creating subforums is a good idea, but it probably needs more than one post to discuss.

I think mods with special titles should keep them. I like them, they add variety. Some forums I've been to just have "moderator" "admin" and "director" Lacks personality IMO.

Custom title should be an option eventually. Maybe between lifer and no lifer? Maybe after no lifer. (Isn't there a title there actually?)

Also not sure about voting mods.

 

[disappoint]

Stop with all the useless sub-forums. Virtually no one posts in many forums, meaning virtually no one browses them, meaning the few posts that do go there just languish often unread. Plus it is really hard to determine the proper place to post. If your video card is not working on a motherboard in Windows 7 is this a post for "Video Cards and Graphics", "Motherboards", "Computer Help", "General Hardware", or "Operating Systems"?

I would look back over the last few months and eliminate any sub-forum with fewer than an average of 5 new threads/day. Merge them into forums with actual traffic so users get their questions answered and their thoughts seen.

For example, when I click on Power Supplies, I get on the first page posts that are 1 month old (that doesn't count the 6 stickies). That sub-forum just isn't used. Same goes for "Cases and Cooling" and "Peripherals" which all really belong in "General Hardware".

For example, what is the difference between SFF and HTPC? They are essentially one and the same with just a slight tweak in usage.

For example, the "*nix Software" sub-forum only shows 19 threads TOTAL in the last month.

Deleting the useless sub-forums would really help with making the site more clean, give more users more threads to view without having to click on dozens of pages, and give more visibility to new users who put posts in unused sub-forums then quit the site disappointed. And for the dedicated long-term posters, it would help us from loading a page 6 hours later and seeing nothing new (boring). I cut back my posting about 95% when all these sub-forums popped up since it is too boring to see nothing new and too tedious to click on 20 forums that might interest me.

^I agree with this^ :thumbsup:

 

[Jaskalas]

Can vBulletin be updated to display tweets?
I've seen a number of blogs / websites doing such.

 

[Jaskalas]

For example, the "*nix Software" sub-forum only shows 19 threads TOTAL in the last month.

Just because we lack a healthy Linux community doesn't mean it should be merged and ignored entirely.

 

[mcurphy]

get rid of the weekly maintenance that is at one of the most prime times people use the forums. other forums much larger than AT don't even have to do things like that, or do it behind the scenes.

This :thumbsup:

Lifer Forum

But make it so that every post there defaults to the Comic Sans font.

I disagree with this. A lifer forum only promotes more nefing to get a high post count. I have been here and active over 10 years, but I am not a lifer. Yet, people like Neckbeard will have access after only a few months.