OFFICIAL POLL: SEPARATE OFF-TOPIC FORUM?

lyrick · Post by **lyrick** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 11:40 am

Bloomfield wrote:If we just leave the Poststructural Whistleforum the way it is and add a "Whistle Forum" it will appear the same to almost everyone, because we'd be going from few whistle-related topics to almost none (just a few strays).

And the whistle forum would have the reviews, technical questions and so forth, with no OT allowed. The main benefit would be that the whistle-forum would move much slower.

I think this is the best solution, too--leave this board as is and create a separate whistle forum.

From the "Do you still whistle?" thread and other threads it seems that a lot of the regular OT posters aren't really that much into the whistle--they come here for the fellowship and the chat. That's fine, but I think this makes it apparent that there's a need for a forum for those who are more into the whistle than the OT chatting.

The people who are serious about flute, pipes, or ITM all have forums that stay fairly on topic, why not whistle, too? Didn't this whole thing start out as a whistle site? (In other words, what's wrong with this picture?)

It seems most of the people who are against a separate whistle forum are the ones who don't play whistle that much and are here for other reasons, and most of the people who want a separate whistle forum are here for sharing info about the whistle.

Maybe this should be called the PostWhistle Structural Board, since it seems to be where people go to chat after they move on from whistle to other instruments or to other interests.

ErikT · Post by **ErikT** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 11:50 am

Ok, for real this time... I'm with jsluder. I like "The Chiff and Fipple - a Postructural Pub."

OutOfBreath · Post by **OutOfBreath** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 12:06 pm

I voted yes, but I doubt that it would help, anyway. Too many people just have to make sure that everybody sees their opinions on everything from politics to computer software to what's for lunch. So most probably wouldnt' use the OT forum - especially since I suspect that only a few die-hards would be reading to stroke the folks who posted there, anyway.

I'd rather just see a lot less OT stuff allowed. I mean, the occasional OT post is fine, and I've probably contributed to my share of such threads, but I don't even think of this as a tinwhistle, or even musical, forum anymore. I think of it as a political forum that just happens to be frequented by a large number of musicians. Which is why I don't check in daily, or even necessarily weekly, anymore.

Just my $.02...

Wombat · Post by **Wombat** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 12:35 pm

lyrick wrote:
It seems most of the people who are against a separate whistle forum are the ones who don't play whistle that much and are here for other reasons, and most of the people who want a separate whistle forum are here for sharing info about the whistle.

Oh really? Not by my calculations it doesn't.

glauber · Post by **glauber** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 12:37 pm

OutOfBreath wrote:I voted yes, but I doubt that it would help, anyway. Too many people just have to make sure that everybody sees their opinions on everything from politics to computer software to what's for lunch. So most probably wouldnt' use the OT forum - especially since I suspect that only a few die-hards would be reading to stroke the folks who posted there, anyway.

I'd rather just see a lot less OT stuff allowed. I mean, the occasional OT post is fine, and I've probably contributed to my share of such threads, but I don't even think of this as a tinwhistle, or even musical, forum anymore. I think of it as a political forum that just happens to be frequented by a large number of musicians. Which is why I don't check in daily, or even necessarily weekly, anymore.

Just my $.02...

That's why it may be a good idea to leave the current whistle forum as is, and create another one for on-topic discussions. Hopefully, the current forum would still have the bulk of the postings (on and off topic, mostly off), and the new forum would have fewer postings, but all on topic.

Jerry Freeman · Post by **Jerry Freeman** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 3:28 pm

Definitely NOT have two boards with "whistle" in the name.

If we do that, the two boards will compete with each other and it will be a confused mess.

If you want just whistle info without missing any of the whistle related discussions, you would have to go to both boards, which would be worse than the situation we have now. Imagine, you would have to go to the "Poststructural Whistle Board" and sort through the OT posts looking for any whistle related threads, then navigate over to the "Whistle Board" to pick up the rest of the whistle related posts.

One board will have to be clearly for whistle related posts and the other board will have to be clearly for OT posts. "Poststructural Pub" and "Chiff&Fipple Whistle board" would be two names that would work without confusion. And, as I said, it needs to be easier than it is now to navigate from one board to another.

Best wishes,
Jerry

TomB · Post by **TomB** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 3:35 pm

Jerry Freeman wrote: When the new OT forum is created, please arrange so that you can go from any forum to any other forum with just one click, without having to go back to the index page and then go from the index page to another forum. That should help to keep the various forums from becoming isolated.

Best wishes,
Jerry

Jerry- You do know that you can do that now, right, using the "jump to" feature? You probably mean something else, and I'm being too dense to understand, so wanted to make sure you knew you could just "jump."

I guess really that isn't one click, so it's not what you want.

All the Best, Tom

norseman · Post by **norseman** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 3:37 pm

Jerry, I agree with nearly everything you said, but I have a question. You say it needs to be easier to navigate to other forums. I guess I've never had a problem navigating between forums. Doesn't everyone just use the "Chiff and Fipple Forums Forum Index" link at the top and bottom of the page?

Bob

norseman · Post by **norseman** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 3:39 pm

TomB wrote:
Jerry- You do know that you can do that now, right, using the "jump to" feature? You probably mean something else, and I'm being too dense to understand, so wanted to make sure you knew you could just "jump."

All the Best, Tom

Thanks, Tom, I never noticed that! It's faster than what I was doing.

Bob

Darwin · Post by **Darwin** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 3:43 pm

Jerry Freeman wrote:Definitely NOT have two boards with "whistle" in the name.

If we do that, the two boards will compete with each other and it will be a confused mess.

If you want just whistle info without missing any of the whistle related discussions, you would have to go to both boards, which would be worse than the situation we have now. Imagine, you would have to go to the "Poststructural Whistle Board" and sort through the OT posts looking for any whistle related threads, then navigate over to the "Whistle Board" to pick up the rest of the whistle related posts.

One board will have to be clearly for whistle related posts and the other board will have to be clearly for OT posts. "Poststructural Pub" and "Chiff&Fipple Whistle board" would be two names that would work without confusion.

I agree.

And, as I said, it needs to be easier than it is now to navigate from one board to another.

I don't have much of a problem with the way it is, going to the forum index and selecting a forum there. Anyhow, I'd probably try to stay on the whistle board at that point, and I'd just have a link for that.

glauber · Post by **glauber** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 3:53 pm

Jerry Freeman wrote:Definitely NOT have two boards with "whistle" in the name.

Yes, that's important. Rename the current one to "The Postructural Board" and leave it in the same position (top). Create the new one as "Whistle Forum".

Loren · Post by **Loren** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 4:00 pm

dubhlinn wrote:Strikes me that there may not be enough ON-T threads to sustain a dedicated forum.
D.

Typically (of late) 25-30 of the posts on a page of 50 are on topic, that's plenty to sustain the forum, so we'd go through 1 page every 2-3 days, instead of 1-1.5 pages per day - hardly a dead or dying forum.

Loren

Jerry Freeman · Post by **Jerry Freeman** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 4:07 pm

Regarding the navigation ...

I'm proposing that links be placed at the top of every Chiff&Fipple board so you can navigate to any of the other boards with just one click.

That's half as much navigating as it would take to go to the index page and then go from there to the forum you want. Believe me, extra clicks and page loading times count, especially for people with dialup or people with limited browsing time where even the time of a fast pageload matters.

There would be no need to change anything else -- the index page can function just as it does now -- you would just add a row of links across the top of each board page, just as we have "main website," "free email newsletter" and "live chat" links now. (I don't know what the "jump to" function is. It may be great, but we need to offer something easy and fast that people don't have to be trained to use.)

Best wishes,
Jerry

Loren · Post by **Loren** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 4:20 pm

mvhplank wrote: It seems to me that an off-topic forum is a grand experiment, like Prohibition, with a limited shelf life and about as easily enforced.

M

Many on-line (musical instrument related) forums have done it succesfully.

norseman · Post by **norseman** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 4:34 pm

Jerry Freeman wrote:Regarding the navigation ...

(I don't know what the "jump to" function is. It may be great, but we need to offer something easy and fast that people don't have to be trained to use.)

Best wishes,
Jerry

Jerry, the "Jump to:" feature is a drop down list of the forums at the bottom right of the page. I never noticed it until Tom pointed it out.

Bob

OFFICIAL POLL: SEPARATE OFF-TOPIC FORUM?

Would you like to see a separate forum for Off-Topic posts?