Shoutbox Feedback

[Groddil]

I agree with Skarzs. Besides, I've always hated group chat features because they're confusing and random and make no sense.

On the right hand side, next to the date, there's a little arrow. Click it.

One problem though, is that you (and Skarz especially) never really use the shoutbox. The people who do should be the ones who help decide. A lot of conversations on the box just aren't as possible on the boards. It takes too long for a reply, and clogs up the topics.

[Lady Ashenwyte]

True, but many more discussions that could have taken place in the Cellars have taken place in the Shoutbox. It's taking away waaay to much activity from the forum.

One problem though, is that you (and Skarz especially) never really use the shoutbox. The people who do should be the ones who help decide.

The problem with that is that most people who use the shoutbox will have a bias, and so we should take the feedback of all the members to see the other perspectives on the shoutbox.

[Skyblade]

Since most of what's said in the Shoutbox doesn't interest me, I tend to keep it closed. I open it on occasion to see if anything cool is happening or if I need to call James. And I'm not bothered by it.

I can see the arguments for and against. Personally, I think it's a good thing. Due to it's convenience, it gets more traffic, and that allows members to bond more than they otherwise would have.

If there's one stark disadvantage to the Shoutbox, it's that - unlike the posts - it isn't archived (at least, not for the members). This can be a bummer, and it's one reason I do prefer sticking to the old-fashioned threads.

Perhaps I'm blind, but the forum - boards and all - seems healthily active to me.

[The Skarzs]

Regardless of whether or not the shout box is there, people need to make more effort to post, at least a little bit. What happens is a compound effect. I'll give a scenario.
Six out of twelve people don't post all day. That's half the activity. The last six find less of a reason to post because of lack of activity. Then there are eight people not posting. The last four get bored with only each others' company, and decide to find something else to do to take up their time. Less posts. Eventually, that leads to new people seeing that there is no activity, and drift away. Other members get discouraged, and don't post, and the situation gets worse until there are almost no posts every day.
That's what I don't want to happen.
I don't like using the shout box, so I keep it closed. Others are of like mind. So if we have that choice, do we need to force ourselves to find that activity when all it would take to have some is a little more posts by other members? The shout box can be accessed on every board, even when you're in the middle of posting. I feel there's no need to give it your full attention.

[James Gryphon]

There's a lot of commentary here, and it'd be tricky to quote and reply to each and every one. I will make some points, though, that I hope will respond to a lot of what's been said.

Fatch's point, that the forum is hard to get into, or Soren's statement that the shoutbox is better for mobile users, do highlight weaknesses in the existing format. Ideally, though, that shouldn't have anything to do with the shoutbox. If there are problems with the forum, like the interface, they should and can be addressed for themselves. In this case, the box seems more like a band-aid covering up the real problems of the forum.

I'm not sure why the argument that the shoutbox is much easier to post to than the other threads has so much endurance. Maybe it's because it's at the top of every single page. It could have something to do with being AJAX (meaning that it constantly refreshes and shows new content without user input). Objectively, I can't see why it is that these features should have so much appeal. That said, I do understand. I use the shoutbox as much or more than any member on the forum, and it does feel 'easier'. Rather than being evolutionary, though, I'd suggest that this might just as well be a form of devolution, degenerating from the ordered structure of the regular forum > board > topic format to the chaotic, freewheeling shout box.

That leads in to another point. From a moderator's perspective, the shout box has not been a good thing. Of all the content on the board that must trigger a staff response, the vast majority (say, 80% of problematic or controversial things) of it has been on the shout box. Some people would say that this is because the box is cannibalizing, or to put it more gently, "taking over" the other boards' regular activity. That's probably true to some extent. However, I have extensive experience with what the chat environment can do to people, and my opinion on this is that a good part of this activity is probably being generated by the shout box itself (or more accurately, how people react to it). More respected members (some even past or present Season Namers) have gone berserk on the box in the few months we've had it up than ever did in the entire four-year period before it was introduced. Is that a coincidence? I doubt it. This certainly goes hand-in-hand with the idea that the box is contributing to a degeneration of the community.

The forum's decreased activity in terms of posting isn't just a matter of opinion or an abstract feeling. It's an incontrovertible fact that, by that standard, the forum has experienced a profound lull these past few months. Comparing this forum's activity to the old forum (which is possible because I happen to have statistics showing forum activity from 6/2011 to 12/2014), we see that this past May was the quietest full month on record, with the next-quietest full month having been December 2011 (comparatively booming with 101 new topics and 3837 new posts). June seems on course for another historically low performance, with less new posts than any full summer month ever (the next-worst would be June 2014, with 125 new topics and 7310 new posts, or almost twice as many as we're set to get right now). Now, is all of that because of the shoutbox? Maybe not... but the fact is that I've got more than 50 megs worth of shout box material sitting on the server. (Edit: Now, it occurred to me since I made this post that a lot of that is from the code involved with the shout box posts, not the actual conversations. However, the general point still stands.) I think it's safe to say there is at least a correlation between the activity on the shoutbox and the lack of it everywhere else.

When we first brought up the idea of trying the shoutbox, I'll be upfront: it was intended to leech off from the Cellars. A respected staff member said, and I quote, "it may be able to fill the role of most of the Cellar's weird chat threads." What it wasn't intended to do was to take over everything else: discussion about people's private lives, chitchat about up and coming real-life news, or OOC chat for RPs. However, I don't think anybody who's spent any amount of time on the box can deny that it has, in fact, taken over all of those roles. And I don't think that's a positive development.

When this issue comes up next with the staff, I intend to strongly recommend (probably with a post making some or many of the same points above) that we dismantle it. That said, I will do my best to find new ways to address the problems we have, and contribute to the ease of use of the regular board, so that none of you will go into shock if this happens.

[The Skarzs]

Is there a way to put a time zone on the shout box? Like an open for chat for two hours three or four times a day to accommodate time zones? That way, there would still be a chat box, but it wouldn't be open 24-7, and would potentially give people more reason to post.
Of course, that may also lead to people holding out until the times the chat box is open, but there's a possibility for everything.

[Skyblade]

I guess I just didn't open my eyes wide enough to notice the decreasing activity (Or maybe I'm so used to Fiver's; we don't have as many posts there, so anything that happens here is staggering).

Nothin' wrong with getting rid of the Shoutbox. I'm a bit sad to see it go, and I just hope this brings discussion to the boards rather than make it disappear completely. My only concern is how members were able to so easily bond using this mechanism. But at least the forum is more organized without it.

[Søren]

If the shoutbox was supposed to "leech" of the Cellars, can it be placed only in the Cellars? That way it won't distract away from the Redwall boards, but still be available like it is now?
I think there is certainly something wrong with getting rid of it. We wouldn't be able to understand one another in the same way without it. I would hate if the staff got rid of it.

More respected members (some even past or present Season Namers) have gone berserk on the box in the few months we've had it up than ever did in the entire four-year period before it was introduced.

* Søren thinks he is at fault a bit

Yeah, sorry. If you're referring to anything that I've contributed to that, I do apologize, when I posted anything "edgy" by forum standards, is because I felt comfortable with the users on at the time, and thought it would be taken in a more jovial sense.
My bad.

[James Gryphon]

That's an interesting idea.

We can certainly consider that, along with other options.

[Matthias720]

This isn't permanent, guys. It's only until James and I can figure out where to go from here.

[Hickory]

Darn it.

[Kitsune]

Honestly, please keep it down. My opinions are in the Shoutbox Funeral topic if you care to see them.

[Aimless Gallivanter]

*Aimless Gallivanter is very upset

[Cornflower MM]

I am really, really late on this, but oh well my opinions are goin' up anyway. *Rolls neck in preparation* Let's see how quick Corny can do this, eh people? Because I do wanna practice today.

I liked the shoutbox because it was fun, yeah, I could have more real-time conversations and I could have reasonable, nice conversations without them turning into/being influenced by "universe-ending death battles" (As Kit so nicely put it). I liked it because I could talk to people without all that endless GMing and PPing coming into play. . . And because most of the activity these days is in the Cellars (Probably because we were all in the shoutbox, hah) and in those tiring repetitive stupid silly battles. Which I hate. (A little of it is fine, but all the time, guys? Why? Just why?)
Half the time there were people on the shoutbox that never posted anymore.

I didn't like the shoutbox because we're no where near as active as we used to be in the first place, and when it went up, whoosh! I could sit for hours and no one would post. This place became BoredomVille. Also, when five people are on it at once? It becomes chaos really quick. Especially when one or more is spewing nonsense.

Any other opinions I have were nicely summed up by Kit in the Shoutbox Funeral.


Maybe a shoutbox with rules would be nice. You know, rules like no spamming.
My thoughts have fallen apart now. Dang. Oh well, I'm off to enjoy some pain.

[The Skarzs]

Fatch was saying that he liked the shout box because it allowed him to get to know members more easily. That may be true, like having a real life conversation, but if others want to know about him (as an example), most of what he would have said is now lost to the histories of the shout box, instead of in a board where anyone can go back and read about him.