[Gregg]

I think this forum suffers from too many narrowly focused categories. It gives people too many choices, and they might pick the "wrong" one. That is to say, there might be someone who could answer a post under "iMacs" who never looks at that category, because he/she does not have an iMac. If a new user is having a problem, he/she may not know that it is a generic problem that does not need to be posted under the iMac category, for example.

Also, the preponderance of categories might be a factor leading some to post the same topic and message in several categories, something the moderators are known to request posters not to do. I think that a good time to evaluate the categories, and possibly consolidate them would be when the UBB software is updated. MNN is falling behind the other UBB forums, which are now on 5.42 already.

Just my thoughts... What does anybody else say? (I suspect substantially less than the majority of people who visit this forum come to this category, but that's just a guess.)

[Barney]

Gregg, I agree with you. The moderators of the MacNN Forum should take a look at the MacFixit Forum set-up

[wlonh]

I have news for you, the moderators do not control the amount of Forum categories... we can make suggestions to the administrators just like you members do, though moderators' opinion may have a little more weight if any.

We moderators only answer the occasional query when we can and delete duplicate posts and repost topics from one category to a more appropriate category, etc.

And this is how it should be... division of labor and responsibility.

I personally do not think the forum has too many categories but I really do not care one way or the other... whatever is the majority sentiment in this particular matter is just fine with me.

[Misha]

I personally don't think that there are too many categories... it's pretty straightforward, actually. The "real" forums are in the first section, where it's easy to figure out where to post a problem (iMac related, go there... Mac OS 9 related? go there..) Thankfully we have some great moderators (that's you, wlonh!) that check all the forums and are able to answer a Mac OS 9 question that's posted in the iMac forum, for example, or at least point the individual to the right category. I don't see this happening too often, so I assume something is working ok.

The rest of the forum categories are less formal, except for the software-specific ones at the bottom which are again self-explanatory.

How do you think the categories should be organized?

Btw, we're in the process of updating the UBB software...

[Barney]

My sincere apologies to all the moderators. If I had been thinking more clearly I would have realized that the moderators have no control over the form the forums take. So..mea culpa!

[mkbhatia]

Greg, I'm open to suggestions. I thought the division of categories made it easier for users to focus on their needs. Which categories do you think could be consolidated?

As Misha noted, I contacted our admins to upgrade the board, so within 2-3 business this should be done. What new features are in the recent releases?

[l008com]

I disagree, i think this forum has enough topics, if not too few! The more the better, there should be a topic for ever concivable question, that way this forum can easily serve every mac user.

[disectamac]

mkbhatia, Misha,

I think it's very efficient as is also. The only one forum which I feel could use some sort of split is the iMac forum.
The reason I say this is that sometimes I will see a new post at the top of the forum but by the next day or the day after that post is long gone and burried in the archives. One could easily say that if the post disappeared that quick it probably wasn't important but contrary to that I feel ALL questions are important (I'm sure you all agree)and deserve their time to be seen by the traffic that goes through that forum. What happens is a topic gets burried and someone ends up carelessly posting a duplicate topic a couple of days later adding to the comotion and eventually confusion. I'm no exception, I have posted a duplicate topic once or twice myself.
I would suggest, although it may have its drawbacks, 2 forums. An "iMac Hardware" and an "iMac Software" forum. Although the line between a software and a hardware topic could get blury to a small extent, I feel it might clean things up a bit.

Just looking at the statistics of it, the iMac forum has a 3 to 1 ratio over all of the most post popular topics under it (in posts). About 6000 to 2000

[This message has been edited by disectamac (edited 01-18-2000).]

[Gregg]

I thought my first post did a good job, if only briefly, of describing a possible problem with having so many categories. I guess it's a matter of what the administrators want this forum to be. I visit here, Macfixit, and noWonder daily, and occassionly check out Apple Insider, and rarely, MacAddict.

Of all of these, noWonder is the most vibrant, by far. There is basically only one Mac category. Yes, they have two others, but neither gets much attention. If you visit daily, you get a real dialog going. The list of posts for one day will almost fill the screen. Replies come quickly. New topics of interest to me are found on that one page daily. Here at MNN, each category takes its share of posts, spread out over 10 or so categories. That means, in order to find one or two topics of interest to me, I have to open 10 pages.

At noWonder I find topics on that one page, or maybe only one topic, to respond to. It takes much more effort here to find something I feel I can contribute to. Now, if the concern is that topics will "disappear" too quickly with fewer categories, I'd say that's valid for users who don't visit daily. Page 2 is only one click away though, if you're looking for a post left a few days before. If MNN wants to cater to the occassional visitor, that's the perogative of the administrators. MacFixit suffers, though less so, from the same thing. I see some of the same people posting there as on noWonder, but not as often.

The choice of categories is obviously not up to me. My choice is whether to visit daily, or only every two or three days. I imagine others have taken the second option, as I have lately. That lengthens the time someone who has posted a problem has to wait to find the solution, especially if there's a back and forth dialog established with a regular, but occassional visitor.

My observation is that many of the posts in the iMac category, for example, are not specific to the iMac alone. That gets back to the "problem" I mentioned in the first post. I would bet that most of the people who post there have an iMac, and that's the reason they go to that page. But, they will not get the benefit of others vast experiences who have the same OS, but do not visit the iMac page regularly, because they don't have an iMac.

I would suggest consolidating all machine specific (iMac, G3/G4, iBook, PowerBook) topics into the Mac OS and Third Party categories, and have only two OS specific pages; one for OS 8 and 9 (right now) and one for older systems. When X is released, that changes, of course. It's fun to speculate about X, so some would want that one to stay. Looking at noWonders's low X category numbers, I question how useful it is though.

Now that's drastic, compared to what exists. But don't look at numbers here (oh my! from ten to four?), look at the reasoning. This is a great forum as it is. It would be more vibrant, and more user friendly (for the reasons described above) if there were fewer categories.

Just my opinion, for what it's worth. It's good to see such suggestions treated as this one has been, even if no changes are implemented as a result.

Gregg

[mkbhatia]

I am considering consolidating ibook and powerbook into a single laptop or portable area. I understand your point, but

>The choice of categories is obviously not up to me. My choice is whether to visit daily, or only every two or three days. I imagine others have taken the second option,

Why not visit daily and check the active category option?

In the short term, I see your problem, but when forums get too long, people don't want to sort through things they don't want to read about. Of course, I prefer you to come daily, so I'm trying to figure solutions for everyone, but I think the active topic listing provides a quick several page glance at what's changed since the day before.

I'm still open to helping cater to the "daily reader" and hope maybe there is some programming solution that would help. Access to active topics by day?

-m

[Gregg]

Why not visit daily and check the active category option?

I'll give that a try for a few days and see if I like it better. For now, I still think consolidation is a good idea. It's the in thing these days.

Gregg

[Gregg]

Well, I tried the active category option for several days. I don't like that at all. There's not enough information listed, and, the cutoff is midnight. If I stop in at noon each day, the active category will not list the previous day's posts from noon til midnight. Also, I sometimes remember a thread by the person who originally posted, and I'll sometimes avoid a post that already has 45 replies if I'm short on time.

So, I'm back to page hopping, and now more than ever think that fewer categories would be better. You know, less is more.

Gregg

[Misha]

The problem with fewer categories is, as Disectamac pointed out with the iMac forum, that quesitons come and go so quickly. As it is, there's at least a half dozen questions posted to the iMac forum that have been answerwed (usually numerous times) in the past. That would only get worse if we merged, say, the iMac, PowerMac G3/G4, iBook and PowerBook forums into one "Mac Hardware" category. Not to mention that if the platform wasn't mentioned in the topic (i.e. "CD Problem.") that wouldn't be very helpful. I check out all the forums and I've also noticed that a lot of people stick to only one or two forums -- those that pertain to their interests (or machines). That would be gone merged categories.

We might merge the iBook and PowerBook forums, as those machines are so similar and neither forum receives a tremendous number of posts, that it would be work.

[mkbhatia]

Originally posted by Gregg:
[B]Well, I tried the active category option for several days. I don't like that at all. There's not enough information listed, and, the cutoff is midnight. If I stop in at noon each day, the active category will not list the previous day's posts from noon til midnight. Also, I sometimes remember a thread by the person who originally posted, and I'll sometimes avoid a post that already has 45 replies if I'm short on time.

Good suggestions. I've already asked for the last 24 hours options (rather than active topics today) and I'll see if it can also display the number of posts. Outside of the context of your request for consolidation, I believe those are appropriate feature requests.

As far as your request for consolidation. I believe that there will be a 'Portables" category to replace both iBooks and PowerBooks. Mac OS 9 will also be consolidated into the Mac OS & System Software forum.

Maybe a "new hardware vs. old hardware?). That might be stretching it. As it is, I hope that with two fewer categories, things will be a little smooth, but I suspect that you are/would be lobbying for even more consolidation.

I think that Power Macs are different enough from iMacs to keep them separate.

-m

btw, I'd be happy to offer you a position of moderator on the boards, if you like!

[Gregg]

mkbhatia,

I appreciate your response to my peculiar preferences for the forum. I believe that the changes you are suggesting are quite appropriate. As far as your offering me a position of moderator, I am flattered. I am not sure what that would entail, and I am really a rank amateur. Everything I know about Macs I have learned by necessity for my home computer (1st one in 1994), and from reading in my spare time. I do work on a (Dell) computer full time, but using AutoCad. I think the forum would be better served by moderators who are really involved in computer troubleshooting more than I.

gregg

[ValVashon]

How about spliting the iMac forum into two parts- one for rev a-d iMacs, and one for the new slot loading models. They are really two very different machines. I totally understand the desire to have the latest and greatest mac model, and some people need/should have that model. For example, I'm trying to get a friend with a Sony DV camera to buy one of the new models, but that's not what I'm interested in getting right now. Plus whenever a computer is released, there are a number of bugs to work out. I feel sorry for the people who have DVD sync issues, but I can't help them. I'm still trying to upgrade my Bondi Blue with a mezzanine card, more memory (done), a Techworks internal CD-R (much more important to me than DVD), a matching scanner, OS 9 and maybe a SCSI laser printer. My computer is plenty fast, stylish and paid for, but any questions I post disappear in an instant behind reports about sync issues, DV camera compatibility and noise issues.

Val

[namannik]

I am surprised that no one has mention the "Saerch" link at the top of each page in the forum. Using that could eliminate having to visit every area to find an answer.

[wlonh]

by George! namannik has got my vote for Forum Member of the Week... yes yes yes, people should use that SEARCH feature far more than they do!!

Please, listen to namannik and do as he suggests!

[Gregg]

Yes, people should use the search feature to seek an answer before asking a question. But, that does not solve my dilemma. I prowl the pages looking for people I can help. I also look for topics that I can just read the answers to, thereby learning something. I can quickly read through a long list of topics, such as at noWonder, and find the few of interest to me; and I can come here and go to 8 or 9 pages to search through the same number (or fewer) topics. For me, the first search is more efficient, more satisfying, more rewarding, more fun. But, this is a great forum as well, and I will keep coming back.

Gregg

[This message has been edited by Gregg (edited 01-27-2000).]