Suggestions to revive & keep it alive going forward

[Racheling]

This seems like a good time for people to post suggestions for changes they thing would help the guild or different directions that might make things better going forward. smile

I'll start things off.

My main thought is that there are too many sub forums.

I think one problem is that there are far too many sub forums breaking up all of the different topics. I remember stopping in to see if there were new posts or anything I wanted to comment on -- but to do that, I have to click on 13 different links. I think the main guild forum could be used more effectively. If the main page was full of threads on different topics, I think that would help keep the guild active.

With a small membership base, it's hard to be spread out across so many narrowly defined forums. Writing Styles is a topic that will probably really only generate a few thread threads for example. This also means that the first page of the main forum will be full of consistently updated topics and older ones will fall off the page. That will help because it will be full of recent topics.

I suggest something like this:

Main forum:
For all general writing talk, including plot, characters, writer's block, help, etc. Reduce stickies and announcements to the few most important ones (or combine some of them) so that they will be noticed more easily.

Subforums:
Post your work: original
Post your work: fanfiction
Member and character journals
Contests (if there are plans to keep that part active)
Off topic chat

Thoughts?  

[DesertRoseFallen]

I agree about the sub-forums.

Perhaps combining the 'Post your Work' two together, just make sure people say if it is original or fanfiction.

Member and character journals...member journals are more important and popular so maybe a vote to keep character journals? If not, another combination is good.

I don't want the home page forum clogged with posts and would like to keep it clear from anything apart from introductions and important information. Maybe we could combine a few of the sub-forums into one such as Help etc but I'm worried it will be as mismatched as the Writing Forum is at the moment. We need to combine some together, I agree very much however.

 

[Psychotic Maniacal Sanity]

I agree that we could definitely combine some stuff. I wouldn't want to lose Member Journals though, because that was one of the most helpful subforums for me. However, I think Desert is right; Character Journals was hardly ever popular so we could put that to a vote.

I also agree with combine the Post Your Work without losing too much.

I don't really like the idea of clogging up the main forum too much either, because that could make it look untidy and mis-matched. However, we could have a couple of big discussion threads in there for new members to take a look through before they go to the subforums? :3

Edit: I'm also wondering if we should unsticky the Member Updates thread in the main forum. This might sound odd, but I imagine a lot of people assume that stickies are more likely to be announcements and such, and if we're not going to have many threads in the main forum we probably don't need it stickied. I think we could sticky some of the annoucement threads, and unsticky some of the stickied threads, and we'd realise we have a quite a lot going on in the main forum. This is nitpicky, but... Just a thought. ^^  

[DesertRoseFallen]

Okay well I have combined the fiction forums together, but I don't know how to get rid of the sub-forum...

We need a decision on Character journals...I was thinking of making that just a sticky in member journals? Or a different sub-forum.

I will unsticky the member updates, good decision. Again, the main page I think would be best uncluttered. I just need help in how to get rid of these left over sub-forums ack!

 

[Psychotic Maniacal Sanity]

Well, first off, I'm not sure how much we need a whole subforum for editing. Could we move that into the "Help" section? Or even combine it with something else?

Also, are we going to keep the RP subforum? It's not seen a lot of use.
One thing I would like to do (feel free to shoot me down) is to have a "Character Cafe" thread, perhaps even on the main page, which would be essentially all the role play I think anybody could need. We have one in the SuWriMos forum which is crazy popular, but if this one didn't work we could just get rid of it. I'd set it up, if you think that would be cool. Because I really don't think we need a whole subforum for something that people aren't really interested in. :3

As for Character Journals, I think making it a sticky would be fine, because people don't really use it - but that way it's still accessible for if any of the new users fancy it. ^^ (Heh, the new users... XP)  

[sour_sharks]

I agree that the character journals were not all that useful and the RP was almost next to nonexistent. I'll be honest I didn't use the

The editing and help subforums could be combined but I can't think of anything else that could be merged.

Just wanted to put my two cents in... ><  

[Kita-Ysabell]

I know I'm new here, but I've been looking around, and it might be useful to have a permanent business/ask the crew thread somewhere. Unless we should do that in the rules sticky? Like, I there's a thread in the main forum that probably belongs in a sub-forum, but do I post in the thread to tell the OP, or do I sit on my thumbs and wait for it to be taken care of?  

[Psychotic Maniacal Sanity]

Usually we're pretty informal about that kind of thing - and until now I think crew members have usually just cleared things out before anybody has had the chance to notice they're in the wrong place. XD I think, though, that you could PM a crew member about it (only because that way it's a bit more private), or ask the person who created the thread to get in touch with us. Either that, or post in the rule thread.

I'll leave it up to Desert to decide which of those is best (or come up with something else). :3 But if for now you want to PM one of us, we can move it if we haven't already. ^^  

[DesertRoseFallen]

Okay well, they are brilliant ideas PMS smile editing would be great as a Help sticky. I was thinking the same about the RP forum...it's not very popular and your idea of the 'Cafe' is a good idea, it will be your baby hahaha smile

Thanks Ouhi, our members input is vital during the clean-up as it's now as much your guild as ours. smile

Kita I think an 'ask the crew' thread may be something useful, for now if you have any queries just message one of us or post up in the main forum for our attention smile

Also, does anyone know how to hide/delete a sub-forum...it looks messy?

 

[Psychotic Maniacal Sanity]

I was just googling, and apparently there is no way to delete a subforum. You could make it crew-only, though? idk.

Yay for the Character Cafe! *throws a party* XD  

[DesertRoseFallen]

I have made them crew-only but don't know if they can be seen by the members sweatdrop

 

[Psychotic Maniacal Sanity]

They can probably be seen, but at least they can't be posted in. Apparently the Gaia staff/techies have no intention of implementing a feature where you can delete subforums because it would mean a complete guild overhaul which would knock out the guild system for weeks. =/  

[DesertRoseFallen]

That sucks, which means it will still look clunky sad

 

[Kita-Ysabell]

Can you change subforum names to something like [empty] to make it a little cleaner?  

[Psychotic Maniacal Sanity]

I don't have the power as a crew member to do that, but I'm sure Desert can. =D