I can't help but notice the torpor of the responses to many threads. I think that in FA a lot of response was generated simply because folks have "favorites" among the board members. I use the term "favorites" advisedly, because sometimes the responses also seemed to be triggered by visceral disagreement between the posters. Be that as it may, where has the liveliness of the discussion gone?
My thought is that there are probably four factors working here:
1) We are still getting used to the new format.
2) The lack of an alternate "tree" structure which spotlights, in a series of single lines, the name of the poster and the general tenor of their post or comment.
3) As has been noted by others, the inability to immediately see who started the thread. Surely that info should be present on the discussion page listings, as well as the name of the most recent responder, as it is now.
4) The inability to "interleave" (for want of a better word), that is, to insert a response into the middle of a thread, which is frequently necessary to target a response to a specific post, rather than the entire thread.
I think that one of the better things about the old FA "tree" format was that it provided an instant overview of the topic under discussion, as well as an immediate overview of the way the responses were trending, thus inviting other posters to put in their "two cents" worth.
Now I absolutely realize that there were many drawbacks to the FA "tree" presentation, and I am very favorably impressed with the development of the MFO site. Any given presentation style will have good and bad aspects. And I want to be very clear here: I both admire and appreciate the tremendous amount of time, energy, and plain hard work being done by the programming staff. My observations might perhaps be given some consideration in the respect of modification, once the main body of the work is under control.
I've no experience programming as such, but i will hazard a guess that number 3, above, wouldn't take too much to fix. From visiting other "blogs" (what on earth has happened to the English language that I grew up with?) I see that #4, the "interleaving" option, is frequently used, so I guess that might be accomplished without reinventing the internet.
Number 2, unfortunately, seems more problematical. Is it even technically possible to have both the present setup and an alternative "tree" outline? I have no idea on that one.
My regards and congratulations to the programming staff. You guys/gals done good.
Old Joe
Comments
I also appreciate the work that goes into a site like this...but if we asked nice and said "pretty please" might you consider Old Joe's requests?
bee
The tree format was much easier to follow. I was able to tell at a glance, even if the topic wasn't of interest to me, who was responding. I have read many a response without actually reading the initial post, or, sometimes the response would generate enough interest to read the original post.
As Old Joe said, you could usually tell the temperature of the discussion, from humorous to heated before you even opened a post. This has also drawn me in when I would have otherwise moved on.
I don't usually read discussion boards unless I'm looking for a specific answer. FA was the exception, been lurking daily for 10yrs. I'm not familiar enough with different boards to know if the tree format was unique to FA. But I really believe it was that format that generated all the discussions.
Regardless of the format, I am grateful to David and others for continuing this forum.
JimR
I am experiencing the same difficulties as you for all the same reasons. Also, as others have noted in other conversations I honed in on certain posters and ignored others which is nearly impossible given the current format. Whereas with the 'tree style' wherein I felt as though I was picking up my book and reading from where I left off, this board format has me starting over at the beginning of the book each time I visit the site. I (at least) have to go through each posting to see what is being discussed and who may have responded to what. It is both time consuming and no where near as engaging. Cathy as noted the lack of a change in text color showing what we had read vs. new posts. I realize the highlighted word "new" shows additions to MFO but I still have to scroll through all of the posts trying to remember which discussion I may have been interested in originally.
You might recall that each time someone on the old FA board clamored for changes they were met with a firestorm of disapproval. I also am highly respectful of all of the time and effort that as been expended in creating this new venue for us to hang out in. However, I find myself less inclined to do so (dunning screams of approval) as each visit now seems more like a chore than a feeling like walking into "Cheers."
I'm also wondering now what made FundAlarm such a nice comfortable place to go most every day. It wasn't being able to embed software. No one seemed to care that FA had a "very cluttered UI... (huh, what's a UI). And I don't think lack of "stability, speed and ease of upgrade" bothered anyone. At least I never heard anyone complain. MFO is a very different discussion board than FA. I guess it has more bells and whistles, but for me, the FA "feel" didn't follow. I hope it is just a matter of working out bugs and getting used to the new look - but I'm not sure.
I guess from the opinions of a few others, there are more conveniences and "wows" available now, but for this middle aged guy, I'd toss it all back in for the ease of following posts and knowing who is sharing opinions within a thread.
Kindest regards,
JR/fundalarm
Jeeze! OJ