some food for thought

[Sid]

SuprBay is a help forum. The customs and practices which have formed here have been in service of that end: to share knowledge with people asking questions today AND with people looking for answers tomorrow. The unintended consequences of success are less posts, in general and over time (as the store of answered questions builds up).

Kat's forum was different: it was a social forum. Designed to promote posting, to give an air of continual action and excitement. Points were given for every post, pages were kept short (increasing the chances of comments being repeated), bumping was encouraged, "ask everything here" threads were encouraged. "Solved" threads were regularly deleted. The unintended consequence of success there were that answers were either discarded or buried in threads that ran for hundreds of pages.

SB is nowhere near the size of Kat and it never will be, partly because we will never allow the practices that were common there to become common here, because we're not interested in become big for the sake of being big. Our goals are different. Not more valid nor less, just different.

You can continue posting in the way you have become familiar with posting on a forum with different goals but you will never re-capture the "action packed excitement" of Kat because there will never be as many people here as there were at Kat.

Or you can make a few small changes, and start building a legacy which will benefit not only the Dazies of today but those of tomorrow as well.

Here is an example of how.

Consider http://suprbayoubiexnmp.onion/Thread-Daz...nical-Talk

Post #1 is a placeholder, of no particular interest or value to anyone

#2 is a question 1 "What is Daz? Such a question, as a thread title, might catch the eye of anyone googling about Daz for years, and thereby lead them into this community. That will never happen, buried in a thread. Replies 3, 4 & 5 are replies to the question.

#6 is question 2 "What is your recommended file format for saving iRay or 3Delight renders". A question which is obviously of interest to Dazies since 7 of you replied.

#7 is the first reply to question 2, but also the 4th reply to question 1 (but would anybody notice, since the thread has moved on?). It's a really good reply, that could actually get total newbies started. [I didn't know you could download the genuine software for free.] But there have been 15 posts in this thread in a week. 6 months from now, when there are over 100 posts, no newcomers are going to start reading through the entire thread so effectively the knowledge is buried.

8, 9, 10, 11 & 12 are answers to question 2, and 12 includes a new question: "anyone here uses LuxRender (either through Reality or Luxus)?". Again, a perfect new topic.

13 is another reply to Q2 and a reply to Q3.

14 and 15 are replies to Q3.

Note that by this time, Q1 has effectively been forgotten, Q2 as well probably, even though they are both great questions with great sets of replies, that could continue to be useful if there were in threads of their own.

And it's no harder for you guys to follow along, since you just have to bookmark http://suprbayoubiexnmp.onion/Forum-DAZ3D and new posts will show up at the top of the board (which is not cluttered by a huge number of stickies, as was common at Kat, or threads you have seen, read and replied to before which have been "bumped" by people who haven't given you anything new to learn from or reply to which was also common practice at Kat.

And the topics will be clear so if you know something (or want to know something) about something in particular you will know where to go, or you will be creating a place where others will come in future.

I think you guys are effectively hiding your lights under bushels, and that is a loss to the world. I'm not going to stop you, and I'm not going to make a campaign of this, but I urge you to rethink the way you post to serve a greater good than mere short term entertainment for your existing 'in crowd'.

And if you think this makes me an asshole, you won't be the first set of former Kat posters to do so.

[ThunderHerd]

One thread per subject, one subject per thread. Not a difficult concept to understand. There was one public DAZ3D/Poser thread (technically for requests) at KAT where all were welcome, but that meant everything was piled on top of whatever nuggets of information were provided by knowledgeable users. I used to hate having to repeat instructions or answers to the same questions that would come up every 2 or 3 months (sometimes every week) because no one wanted to read back through the thousands of unrelated messages. I also hated not being able to find a post I read months earlier that explained something I needed to know now. I think the atmosphere was: create a thread only if it was really important. There was a restricted-access group that did have more specific topic-oriented threads that were easier to use, but participation was, well, limited. Hopefully, we can break old habits and make this forum useful, and make good use of it.

[321gfxisme0]

I was never a member of the daz3d group there at Kat I tried several times, but posted torrents anyway. I help where I can. I can't see an exclusive jump through
all the hoops and over hurdles that was required. I was there for some things and not many that I had not already bought. I just hope that
this will grow. The hidden member only thing blows. I don't know how many here remember Melonez big forum gone now. I was one of the founders of the melonez poser clan and it was fun at first then it got kinda stupid so I left it. Might as well join one of the many pay me to download daz3d sites which really suck.

I have only been using Daz3d for a little over a year I was a die hard poser user since poser 4 and have bought content thru the years and am happy to share it.

Anyhow Sid yer not an asshole I respect you and this forum for be honest and straight forward with us. Thank you.

[wolfenspiel]

Sid- first off, you're no more an asshole than I am....not that that's really saying anything encouraging....

I see what you're saying, and we do have a bit of an issue with off-topic posts that go astray, and Q&A's that would be more useful in their own thread. That being said, I'm noticing another problem along those lines.

As people start their own threads, and we have more and more Q&A's and general discussions, some of the more important information gets pushed back. We have 2 pages here now, and already some of our more important info like how to structure our torrents (because DAZ itself uses a specific format, for example, in folders inside archives, in order to install properly), are already on the second page.

Our problem is basic forum structure. I've looked at some of the other forums and sub-forums here to compare what SuprBay is accustomed to using, and what we could likely stand to gain from, as well as to aid in organization and benefit from your own suggestions, is a forum structure similar to maybe your General Discussion forum, or your Tutorials forum, with a section for Important Threads separated from Normal Threads, and/or with sub-forums where we can specify Poser-related information and Daz-related information, a Requests area, and an Uploads area (I think your Music and/or Movie forum has something similar.

It might not be necessary "right away", we do only have 2 pages currently, BUT...if we were to treat the community as simply a General Discussion with everyone adding new threads, the entire forum will end up being flooded with no real organization, and some of the more important info will be lost and buried. True, this isn't KAT, and I fully agree that the whole point system was poorly structured, more to promote quantity over quality in activity. Sometimes people with the highest "rep points" didn't know their ass from a hole in the ground. However, one thing Kat had, albeit in the private communities, was structure...and Suprbay has it as well in other forums, and it works for those forums. Our own community also benefits from similar structuring.

[Sid]

A timely and well-considered post--it's been about a month so we have some actual threads/posts to discuss now.

A pro-tip first: if you click on User CP in the top left hand corner of this page, then on Edit Options half way down the left hand column you can change the 'threads per page" from the default setting of 20 to 50. [So, for me, you still only have one page of threads.]

And a disclaimer: the word "you" is used within this post to refer to the Daz community in general rather than to you personally.

My thoughts on thread sequencing? There are two types of "important" thread:

1. Ones like the requests and uploads threads you're running. They don't need any help remaining visible as the continual flow of new posts naturally "bumps" them. The mistake made at Kat was allowing "bump" posts (containing nothing but the words "bump" or "thanks") which meant that unimportant threads regularly usurped the top of the forum.

2. Threads like the 'torrent structure" ones which contain valuable info but which aren't updated often so they sink into oblivion. Those we can "stick" to keep them at the top. The thing is we don't want to have too many of those because a) saying everything is important is the same as saying nothing is important and b) they're actually only interesting to the small minority of new users. You, for example, have already read that thread and probably won't do so again (unless something new is posted there which ,if it weren't stickied, would naturally bring it to the top/your attention anyway). Pushing it in your face every time you visit the forum (and thereby effectively hiding other threads which you might actually be interested in) is less than ideal itself.

Anyway, I've stuck the torrent structure threads. Let me know if you think others require sticking.

My thoughts on sub-forums? We don't have them for Music or Movies so I'm not sure what you're talking about. You have chosen to keep requests and uploads in monolithic threads. Personally, I think that's a really bad idea, particularly for requests, but it's what you guys are choosing to do. Nobody is forcing you to do that and I'm not going to force you to stop doing it (by creating a sub forum and closing the thread you obviously cherish).

If you choose to start creating separate request (and/or upload) threads then we'll have a decision to make. But the ball is in your court.

[Trety]

First off, I'd like to say you are one of the most open admins out there. I have dealt with admin who basically pull a "because I said so" no explanation, no discussion, just done.
To be honest, I have been more active here then I was at Kat, mostly because I didn't even know there were forums there.. oops...
so to touch on things you said.
thread tip. Thanks for that! had no idea we could do that.
Topic 1: I like thanks posts because it shows people are grateful. That being said, there are a few forum mods that let you click a thanks button on the thread it self and it adds a little thanks line under the thread. that might be a good option to have.

Topic 2: Is there a mod that lets us sticky stuff for our view? That may be useful.

Topic sub forums: It is possible that we have a single thread for uploads and requests because we don't have a sub-forum. My vote would be to make 2 sub forums and see if it is a "build it and they will come" . or maybe take vote in a poll?

[Sid]

Thanks. I'm glad someone gets that I try to be open. All too often people take it as merely adding verbosity to dictatorialism.

1. I've already written a lot about this recently so (short dismissive answer this time): no. Read (and contribute to) this thread http://suprbayoubiexnmp.onion/Thread-A-c...sts--66452 if you want explanation and debate.

2. Not that I've ever come across. I doubt such a mod would exist because that is what the bookmark/favorites feature of your web browser is for. And it does a much better job of it because it's "cross site" ie. all your personal "sticky" stuff is in one form in one place rather than having different stuff stuck in different ways in different places.

Certainly it is possible but there has never been anything stopping people creating multiple threads. They have simply chosen not to do so. I've consistently argued against it, and we already have requests and uploading sub forums which people are welcome to use and, again, they're choosing not to make any use of them. I'm not flogging a dead horse.

[Trety]

It may be me, but I don't see a requests or uploads sub forum...

[Sid]

https://pirates-forum.org/Forum-Requests
https://pirates-forum.org/Forum-Promote-Your-Shares

[sikotikxiii]

https://pirates-forum.org/Forum-Requests
https://pirates-forum.org/Forum-Promote-Your-Shares

Ah. For some reason, whether it was your word choice, or a presumption on my part (and presumably at least one other person's), I got the impression you meant that in this (DAZ3D) sub-forum there were upload and request subforums. Not that I particularly mind either way, just pointing out why there may be/have been some confusion on some user's parts.

I wasn't aware of those subforums' existences, and I doubt many DAZ3D/Poser folks would bother with them either (which may be a big part of the confusion for some of us that found this particular subforum by word of mouth in the first place, and never bothered exploring further as it was the place with what we were specifically looking for). This particular group, for lack of a better term, is unintentionally specific to a point it's kind of exclusionary without meaning to be. Anyone who isn't already messing with these programs or similar wouldn't bother downloading anything related, as they have no use outside of these programs. Likewise, if one is predominantly looking for just this stuff, it's (admittedly, incredibly minor) just extra work searching through or searching via box (something the people who frequented Kat forums, in particular, were notoriously inept at, I might add). It also feels (or seemed that way in many other places) a little out of place to post it with general stuff, since it's such a relatively small subset of users. It's not like music, where collectors will just pick it up and seed it, whether or not they ever listen to it, or movies with the same basic premise. Throwing it out in the general hubbub serves only to make it take more steps to find it for the few actually looking for it. Though I admit the monolithic threads can likewise be overwhelming after some time, at least they are contained to one specific place to search through, or browse, if one is just curious what's out there. I'm not saying it's the right or wrong way, by any means, but it did kind of grow this way for a long series of specific reasons, and will likely stay this way without some sort of catalyst causing it to change. 

Were those two subforums mirrored here as their own dedicated sub-subforums (is that a thing?), I for one would probably use them as such, as it makes far more sense to me to do so, but I may be in a minority, and have no idea how much effort it would take for possibly no payoff. At the end of the day, it's pretty much like you said above, there's no harm in how it is, but it could be better, theoretically. *shrug*