Restructure The Pack forums?

[Kaebora]

For the past year I've seen many suggestions and complaints regarding the number of forum sections we have. Guess how many seperate forums we have...

40!

Yes, we have 40 sections. Most other forums top out at 20 or less. So I ask two questions.

1) Shall we condense the forum back into fewer sections for easier navigation?
2) If yes, how shall we organize it?

Here's the organizational chart from what's been gathered so far:

Code: Select all

--General Discussions
Moderators and Admins Only Forum  
Introductions 
General Stuff 
  | Feed the Beast
The Pack- General Business 
  | WEBSITE UPDATES 
Pack Meetings & Conventions
  | Conventions
Film, Music, TV Shows & Other Multimedia
  | Film & TV Shows 
  | Music
Games
  | Video Games 
  | Role-Playing Games  
Forum Games   
Tech Support  

--Werewolves
What should a werewolf be? 
Werewolf Legends & Lore 
Werewolf Film, Comics, Novels, Etc.
  | General Werewolf Novels 
  | General Werewolf Comics 
  | General Werewolf Films
  | H. O. D. 
Freeborn & Anthony Brownrigg's Films
  | OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENTS!!! 
  | Synopsis
  | Responses from the director 
  | FILM TITLE CHANGE 
  | Werewolf Final Facts (i.e. Silvers Corner) 
  | Replies to Silvers Corner 
  | CASTING 
  | QUESTION AND ANSWER 
  | Comments on the Screenplay
  | MAKEUP TESTS  
  | RED VICTORIA 

--The Creative Den
Artwork (Pictures, Sculptures, Costumes, Websites etc.)
  | Costumes/Prop construction 
  | Artwork (werewolf based) 
  | Artwork (other) 
  | Links to other art/story sites
Creative Writing
  | Creative Writing (werewolf based) 
  | Creative Writing (other) 
Classifieds 

--Roleplaying
  | Informal In-Character Role Playing  
  | Formal In-Character Role Playing 

These proposed changes will be edited as new ideas are put forth.

[Spongy]

Personally, I feel no need to change it.

[Berserker]

I think all the Freeborn forums and the RED VICTORIA forum should all be moved under one "Anthony Brownrigg" category. That would reduce the clutter and scrolling just a little bit. Besides, aren't these forums to the point where archival is more appropriate anyway?

I think the WEBSITE UPDATES forum should be rolled into The Pack - General Business.

Also, the Music forum has a surprisingly tiny amount of posts. Why not roll it into the General TV forum and create a new forum called "General Entertainment?" I submit that the Videogame forum and the Roleplaying RPG games forum, could also be combined into one forum entitled "Games." (This would also be inclusive of any random board-game related or similar post.)

[Gevaudan]

I agree with Berserker on all of his points.

The "Links to other art/story sites" could also be archived or discarded. Links probably should be posted in the appropriate forum, instead of being sectioned off on their own.

I don't want to get rid of "Feed the Beast," but I think it's a bit of a stretch.

Should we also combine "WEBSITE UPDATES," "Tech Support," and "The Pack- General Business?" They all deal with The Pack as a forum.

[Kaebora]

Pritty much any forum that has less than 100 entries is rather useless, except Tech Support, which should be seperated and thus easier to find. Condensing the Freeborn and Red Victoria threads is definately a good idea, because most of those areas haven't been touched in ages. AB hasn't even made posts in a long while.

The exclusive threads for other comics and movies (H.O.D., etc) should all be merged into their own general sections.

Thus here's the proposal from what's been gathered so far:

Code: Select all

--General Discussions
Moderators and Admins Only Forum  
Introductions 
General Stuff 
  | Feed the Beast
The Pack- General Business 
  | WEBSITE UPDATES 
Pack Meetings & Conventions
  | Conventions
Film, Music, TV Shows & Other Multimedia
  | Film & TV Shows 
  | Music
Games
  | Video Games 
  | Role-Playing Games  
Forum Games   
Tech Support  

--Werewolves
What should a werewolf be? 
Werewolf Legends & Lore 
Werewolf Film, Comics, Novels, Etc.
  | General Werewolf Novels 
  | General Werewolf Comics 
  | General Werewolf Films
  | H. O. D. 
Freeborn & Anthony Brownrigg's Films
  | OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENTS!!! 
  | Synopsis
  | Responses from the director 
  | FILM TITLE CHANGE 
  | Werewolf Final Facts (i.e. Silvers Corner) 
  | Replies to Silvers Corner 
  | CASTING 
  | QUESTION AND ANSWER 
  | Comments on the Screenplay|
  | MAKEUP TESTS  
  | RED VICTORIA 

--The Creative Den
Artwork (Pictures, Sculptures, Costumes, Websites etc.)
  | Costumes/Prop construction 
  | Artwork (werewolf based) 
  | Artwork (other) 
  | Links to other art/story sites
Creative Writing
  | Creative Writing (werewolf based) 
  | Creative Writing (other) 
Classifieds 

--Roleplaying
 Informal In-Character Role Playing  
 Formal In-Character Role Playing 

Any thoughts on this?

[Silverclaw]

*nods* I think that looks good. We could use a trimming down on the number of sections we have now.

[Kaebora]

In regards to Anthony's section of the forum, I'd be extremely careful to sticky and mark the threads that should stay on top, such as the Announcements thread.

[Midnight]

.

[Wingman]

I see a notable lack of mention of books in the werewolf forums...

Should be easy to add Books into the Films, Comics, and etc.

I know that this thread is concerning condensing the forums, but it is the most sensible place to ask. Would it be possible to set up a usergroup and dedicated section for the anthology that I suggested?

[Kaebora]

Considering the fact that we're talking about getting rid of most if not all of the 'dedicated' forum sections, I'd advise against that. If a forum section potentially can't get more than 75 to 100 topics over the course of a year, its not worth having in my opinion.

I also am contemplating that we could keep the art section divided into werewolf and non-werewolf. They both seem to be highly useable sections. I also find it hard to compress Anthony's forum sections, as they are structured specificly for easy feedback. I'm not entirely against only compressing some of the content rather than all of it.

[Set]

Since you have a Games section on there you may as well throw the Forum Games in with it. Slightly less clutter that way.

[outwarddoodles]

YES!

*ahem*

I've been considering bringing up this topic for quite some time -- but was afraid that others may not have reciprocated my opinion on the subject. The Forums REALLY need to be re-ordered in my opinion -- they're awkward, and the excessive amount of them clutters the index.

I'll expand upon my opinions in this matter when I have more time. But for now, I think we seriously need to focus on what we're going to do with the "freeborn" section first...

[Kaebora]

Since you have a Games section on there you may as well throw the Forum Games in with it. Slightly less clutter that way.

No can do. The reason its seperate is because that section is set to not effect post counts. Originally it was needlessly buffering post counts.

After looking at the Freeborn forum sections again, i think we can safely combine them all together, so long as I sticky all of the major announcement threads, including Silver's "Factoid Conclusions" thread.

[Vagrant]

I find that I can't -- in good conscience -- vote yes on this, or add my voice to it in any positive way. If a reconstruction of the forums were to happen, then we'd need to form a committee whose purpose it was to do so, rather than one person (Kaebora) taking on the responsibility for this.

Ideally this committee would meet in IRC and discuss their thoughts on each of the sections, proposals would be put forward on sections to be merged, dropped, or even added, and this would be voted upon by all involved, and only a passing vote would allow for any action to be taken.

The reason I say this is because yes, there are some good ideas here (merging the Anthony Brownrigg subforums, for example), but there are also some poorly considered ones as well, that perhaps would not stand so well under scrutiny, such as...

"Considering the fact that we're talking about getting rid of most if not all of the 'dedicated' forum sections, I'd advise against that."

In the same breath, Midnight's request for a Books subforum was shot down as well. A forum is a smorgasbord (smorgasboard?) for general discussion based on an overarching topic; in this case, were-creatures. By removing sections without sanely considering the consequences, we are removing relevant avenues of discussion which lessens the growth our board can achieve.

I'd say that we should even be talking about expanding the board, too, to take account for other were-creatures, as this would breathe new life into the board. Hence a Pack Forum Efficiency and Growth Committee, or somesuch. Like when we did a poll for new moderators, we could vote our favourite people who are inerested (admin/mod or not) into the committee, and then the committee could guide the future of the board (as described above).

This is my opinion anyway, if we go about this in the wrong way then we stand to ruin the board as opposed to anything else. So I vote no for now, but I'm certainly open to this if we go about it properly.

[MoonKit]

I see no need to separate Werewolf Art from Non Werewolf art. I mean the topic of the thread will say if there's a werewolf or not.

And the same goes for the Werewolf movies vs. Non Werewolf Movies. And the Writing sections too.

[outwarddoodles]

Vagrant: I see absolutely no need to seperate other were-creatures from werewolves.

Also, the purpose of this thread is to act as a "Committee" for generating ideas and opinions regarding the restructuring -- although IRC generally tends to be more efficient in these sort of matters. If anyone wants to set up a particular day for working this out, I agree that the re-organization should be a community project.

The plethora of forums here is ridiculous, IMHO; I wouldn't advocate adding more.

My input: I'd really like to tryout Kae's proposal here. Although I'd like to see a lot less subforums. In fact, we could probably merge General Werewolf Novels, Comics, and Films under all one section -- considering there isn't much activity in these sections, anyway. And The artwork sections could be split in "Werewolf-Related Creativity" which includes ALL form of lycanthropic artwork, and then a "Non-Werewolf Related" creative section. I'm really against excessive itemizing in this case.

[Vagrant]

I was probably being a bit confrontational there, so I've edited this post.

But all I'm saying is that I'd like a large variety of opinions to be represented, not just 'Cut it down to size!', but those who want to see a more efficient board layout, those who want to see merges, those who'd prefer things to stay as they are, we need a good collection of people to offer different views, and we need it to be enacted upon by a vote, rather than just the favourite ideas of the person (or small group of people) responsible for the restructuring.

[Xiroteus]

There are too many forums that are hardly used, a merging would be welcomed.

[Midnight]

.

[Vagrant]

I like Midnight's proposal and I'd second it.

To refine the idea of my committee though, I'll just add a little bit more to it...

- Someone suggests a proposal (like Midnight's).
- The committee meets (according to a schedule) and discusses the pro's and con's of each proposal.
- Each proposal is put to a vote, and if there are any changes to the proposal cited then those changes are put to a vote for that proposal as well.
- For each proposal (and changes) that pass a vote, action is taken.
- The log of the discussion is put up in a thread so that people know that every decision was carefully considered and discussed by a group of people, and wasn't acted upon rashly.

[Xiroteus]

Do not see why Freeborn still needs so many forums, some are not even relevant any longer.

[outwarddoodles]

I'd rather have a general "Werewolf Section" which would include both the "What Should a Werewolf Be?" forum, the Werewolf Media-Related forums, and discussion about werewolf lore and the like -- instead of treating 'What Should a Werewolf be?" section as a "Pack Project."

[Kaebora]

I'll just say this right here and now. I'm merely trying to act as the mediator of this project, taking in ideas and compileing them into the new forum structure, which is all I have been doing. Once we are at a majority agreement in this thread we'll act on it. Any overthinking of how we discuss and modify the plan would just take forever. Thus its just an open thread discussion. IRC gatherings have not succeeded much in the past due to everyone's hectic schedules and technical issues.

And the only ideas I had been shutting out completely thus far is adding new sections. The purpose of this thread is to decide what to do with the sections we already have. If you want to add your own section for a project or subject matter, it is best proposed in a seperate thread.

No more good cop bad cop please. I mean this as no insult to anyone's credibility.

[Kaebora]

My thoughts on some recient ideas. Using subforms (if the PHP forum allows it) could be an option to explore, and I'll tamper with a hidden subforum for testing to see what other settings I can squeeze out of it.

I of course agree with keeping the artwork forums seperated, but at the same time, would prefer to see the Creative Writing and Costumes / Prop construction forums compressed into their prospective sections. Also, it would make sense to turn the Freeborn section into the Anthony Brownrigg Films section, so that it can also cover Red Victoria, Red 5, and any other such films he may want to add later.

I'm kind of scratching my head at the H.O.D. section, as it could be merged with werewolf films. Werewolf Novels, Comics, and Films could easilly be merged into one "Werewolves in popular culture" section, perhaps called "Werewolf Multimedia". Lastly, Video games and Role-Playing games could be mereged into a single gaming forum that would be colletively larger on its own.

Any good?

[RedEye]

That is an idea; Werewolves in Multi-Media would cover a lot of disparate sections that take up space now.

You might also try:
Werewolves in Print: Comics, Novels, News, etc.
Werewolves in Media: TeeVee, Movies, Games (as commentary)

There are obvious repeat sections that are now separated only by a philosophical wall; combine them, too.

And you can MAKE a sub-forum by creating a forum and then locking it. That way, it becomes a title.

And why not "retire" the forums that haven't been written to in a year or longer? They are just taking up metaspace on this board, now. Tuck them at the bottom of things as a title only.