Subject: Maybe a more traditional forum would be okay...
Author:
Posted on: 2015-07-20 23:58:00 UTC
But then, maybe it wouldn't. Iunno.
Anyway, in Plort terms, here is a fell sigil of that vile besieging race:
((I can do puns too, y'know. =] ))
--~*~--
There is war in Plort.
The Green Ads, relatives of the vile trolls but far more insidious, have blockaded the city of Borrd. They do not have the numbers to bar all access to the city, but their ships and raiding parties are a constant threat. One intrepid traveller might pass without injury, while another is confronted with seven or eight of their warriors, and forced to retreat. Some reach the safety of their houses, only to find hours later that the Green Ads are within, watching and waiting.
Worse still, there are rumours of citizens of the Union being siezed by the Green Ads and borne away to a distant land whose name is whispered as Apstor. Far too often, these are the most mobile of Plort's inhabitants - those very knights and civilians who might expect to escape the threat.
The barons of Plort are in turmoil. Baron VixenMage has closed the doors of Castle Medyantur, venturing out only in direst need. Lady Iximaz and Baron PC rail against the invaders, but their every assault is rebuffed. From the west, rumours fly that the Pass of the Five is barricaded by the Green Ads, leaving Ozerbord entirely cut off; Baron Huinesoron is said to have fled the Refuge, holing up in the fortress of Otik until the crisis passes.
Under the shadow of the Green Ads, the good people of Borrd cry out in appeal to the great gods Kanun Syorn and Spelin Tam-Ara, but the mighty ones are indifferent to their pleas. Before the gates of Otik, a crowd is growing, of protesters from every walk of life. Soon, a great meeting will be held, and the future of the Protectorate of Borrd will be decided.
Some argue for patience and restraint: "The Green Ads are but an inconvenience; let us carry on as we ever have, and their efforts will fade in time. Let Spelin Tam-Ara have her chance, and she will liberate us from them." Among there number are some who urge all the folk of Plort to take up weapons imbued with the power of Brawzer-Ahdunn or Ad-Blawk, though others claim that even these enchanted blades have no effect.
Others propose a great sacrifice to the Gods of Plort. "If we pledge to give to the mighty ones a grand tribute each month, they will surely protect us from the Green Ads, and any other scourge which might come upon us. Our libraries would be safe; we could guard against dire magics; some say we might even shroud Konti-Nyuum entirely in the mists of invisibility, that none might ever assail our shores again."
Many claim that the only solution is to raze the city of Borrd entirely and build it anew. "Let the cities of Probard's design be our guide! Their wide avenues and well-planned parks are more beautious by far than the tangles of Borrd, ancient and beloved though they be; and with high walls we could limit the depredations of the Green Ads." Oft is the argument heard that with a new Borrd and a new start, the Ops of the Republic of Iric might be brought into Borrd, and that with such Muds the Protectorate's borders would at last be secured.
And then there is Sir Tomash. Though he does not stir from his home in Iric, rumours of his work have spread across the lands of Plort. "Let him re-work the wards of protection!" his advocates cry. "You feared cataclysm, yet what disaster could be worse than this? Let Teebor be taken up and brought upon the capital, and our security ensured for all time!" Yet in the grand plans of Tomash and Baron Dann there is a grave flaw, for they have not the arcane strength to lay the new enchantments and bring the new capital to its foundations. Some propose a propriation of mysterious gods to grant their power to Plort; others suggest an alliance with the distant Guggle; still others claim that Tomash's power is greater than any yet know, and that the spells can be laid unaided.
What will be the future of the Protectorate of Borrd, and of the Union of Plort in which it stands? The crowds are gathered before the gates of Otik, and soon, the debate will begin…
--~*~--
Or, in other words:
We have an advert problem on the Board. Multiple people have reported increasingly-obnoxious adverts, including unblockable redirects and what seem to be viruses. My breakdown of the evidence is here.
So… what do we do? I think there are four options, which I've said in Plort-speak above, and will break down here:
1/ Nothing. Continue to ask the YourWebApps team (Sean and Tamara) to do something about it (so far, they haven't approved the post in which I tried to lay out the problem - you can watch for it to show up here). Install AdBlock if you have a serious problem, otherwise just treat it as an inconvenience - the price of doing business. This is the simplest (and default) option. The downside is that it doesn't actually change anything.
2/ Pay YourWebApps for a premium account. The benefits they list are:
*No ads for any of your visitors
*Unlimited messages (you are currently allowed a maximum of 25,000)
*Ability to block users from viewing your DiscApp
*Hide your visitors' IP addresses from public view
*Disable bad word blocking
The downside of this is that the quote is hovering around $90 per month (it's based on traffic), so we'd either need a wealthy benefactor or some means of raising funds. If we stopped paying, of course, the Board would drop back to free mode.
3/ Move to a forum-style Board. I've suggested Proboards because I know it works (as a forum), and have made a simple mockup here. It would get rid of the advertising problem - but the downside is that we would be forced to totally change the structure of the Board. I can't find any other providers who do free boards laid out like The Board, so we'd end up in forum mode, and there's always been strong feelings against that. (Like me, for instance.)
4/ Tomash and Techno-Dann. They created a prototype New Board (aka T-Board) back in summer 2012, which was exhaustively tested by me and others in '13. It seems to still be available here; if you can't get to that, this is what it looks like, and this is a slightly-outdated draft release announcement by Tomash. The really big positive is that it's Just Like The Board But Better (no ads, and some weird tagging functions). It's versatile and easy to control, since the person who made it is, like, right here. The downside is hosting: the current server (Dann's, I think?) is crawlingly slow, and webhosting costs money. I've suggested it might be possible to run it on Google Drive, but I honestly don't know how feasible that is. (The other problem is that Tomash doesn't seem to be around this week, but that's a temporary thing.)
My own preference is for 1 or 4, which I think is pretty clear from the descriptions, but Huinesoron Is Not A GodTM; it's not up to me. So I'm opening up The Perennial Discussion.
hS
(PS: This is not a vote right now. It's a discussion to draw out pros, cons, and other ideas. If we don't magically end up with a clear consensus, there'll be a poll or something.)
(PPS: Please don't respond with Plort politics solution. Yes, I know, everybody has swords, but unless you can come up with a way to literally stab banner ads to death, that's not terribly helpful.)
(PPPS: I apologise insincerely for the French-language pun in the Green Ads.)
*puts on blast shield*
I can't possibly guess what's going on on mobile. However, since some people are reporting really nasty ads on their (presumably Windows) laptops, while others aren't. I think it's possible that some portion of the people who are getting annoying full-screen stuff on their laptops have some kind of malware. This is just a friendly reminder from your local know-it-all nerd that it can't hurt to check for viruses etc. when ads are suddenly more annoying. For true paranoia, download a virus scanner (such as Malwarebytes) on a different computer, save it on a flash drive with an unusual name, and run the program from safe mode.
On mobile, though...hoo boy. Better bug Sean and Tamara about fixing the mobile problem.
If this many people are having trouble with it, though, maybe we could implement T-board anyway? The wiki says that the Other Board (which also works fine for me, btw) started as a refuge from a spam attack, after all... It's not terribly slow for me, either.
Like I said previously, I can't access the Board on mobile without being redirected and I have to hit the back button pretty much all the time. And my guess is that Option #1 won't work out so well if the mods don't have the time or resources to fix the problem. My experience on forums is enough to tell me that a PPC Forum thingy won't work, though. I like a single wall of notifications, thanks.
Probably the best alternative for me would be #4, with #2 being a close second. #4 being the best because if we can get a server that can handle all the data, then we have an ad-free Board. #2 would allow us to keep and fix the current Board, meaning everyone's a winner, though it's not my favorite option ATM because I'm not employed yet and don't have a cent to spend. :(
Actually, option one would work for me. I haven’t seen any of those intrusive ads that try to make me download viruses in months, and I don’t even use ad-blockers. I suspect that some quite complex algorithms are involved with this kind of ads, and that location matters. I’m apparently save for now, but of course this may change every day.
If it doesn’t come out that doing our own thing is either too complicated or more expensive, I wouldn’t like to give my money to YourWebApps for something they should do anyway.
I’ve been on forums, and for some situations, their style is a good solution. But for the PPC Board, I prefer to be able to see everything new by simply scrolling down the page.
So, the T-Board it should be. But I’m not sure how much work is involved in setting it up and maintaining it, and what will happen when the people who did this find something else to do.
(Sorry for being late. I’ve been ill for some days.)
HG
Starting with a slightly off-topic one: I enjoyed reading the Plort story at the beginning :)
Back on topic, regarding the proposed courses of action:
1) Not really much to say about this, as it's basically what we're doing at the moment anyway. On the upside, it's very easy to implement. On the downside, as you noted, it doesn't actually seem to offer a solution.
2) I don't think much of this option - it just seems very expensive for what we'd get out of it. And I'm not even sure it would solve our current problems.
Yes, it says that we won't get any ads, but I don't have a problem with the ads that appear at the top each page. What I've got a problem with is the pop-ups, and the auto-redirects that are almost certainly trying to get you to download viruses. I don't think that these are part of the intended function of the Board, and if they aren't meant to be part of the Board, then I'm not convinced that upgrading will make them go away. Personally, I would expect webapps to protect users from malicious content, regardless of whether they're paid members or not. If it turns out that the only way to get protection is to pay a (high) monthly subscription... I'm thinking maybe it's time we jumped ship?
3) From what I've seen of others, I dislike the forum style. I much prefer the current thread system, where it's nice and easy to follow multiple diverging tracks of a conversation (which tends to happen a lot). The forum style only really seems to work, for me, if you get an initial post and then a series of replies just to that post. When you get replies to the replies, and chains of conversation evolving, it just seems to become very disjointed if you're trying to read through it all - like trying to read a Choose Your Own Adventure novel as a normal book. I know that last time this was discussed, there were many proponents of a forum style Board, but I am not one of them.
4) I remember being very impressed with T-Board when it was brought up before, particularly how easy it was to jump around within a conversation thread, and the way you can expand long replies without having to load up a new page. That made it a lot easier to use on phones.
If I remember rightly, it was also possible to view it in different ways (some sort of preference settings or something?) so that it could look either like the current Board, or a forum. Which hopefully will be able to keep everyone happy with the layout.
In general, I'd still rather that the Board was a free service. I can just see introducing a need to pay being a hassle - if we work on donations, what do we do if we come up short? If we start charging a subscription, who has to pay? What if people can't afford it for any reason*, or if they're young enough that they'd need their parents' permission, who think it's a waste? If we do end up going with something that costs money, we really need to shop around as much possible to get the best possible rate, and then try and come up with a fair system for actually getting that cash.
I also haven't had any problems with ads for the past couple of days, and I was using the Board from my tablet quite a bit last night. Is this just random good luck on my part, or is everyone else noticing an improvement too?
If it turns out that things have cleared up, I'm content to go with 1), if we do decide to go somewhere else, I think 4) is our best bet.
- Irish
* I'm pretty sure that last time this conversation came up I'd been recently made unemployed. I can assure you that if I'd been expected to pay any amount of money at that point, I'd have just walked away.
Under no circumstances will paying be a requirement of being in the PPC, or of being a long-term member, or anything else.
The options I've been able to come up with for funding a server are:
1/ Paypal button. I think Paypal will hold money for you indefinitely, so if a Paypal account is set up to pay for the server/whatever, anyone can bump a little money into it any time they like.
2/ Adverts. Yes, there's irony there. ^^ But we'd be able to control them much better.
3/ Selling... something. If the idea bouncing about that we could support the Board for a year on less than $150 is right, then something as simple as an annual Lulu/whatever self-published collection of short stories by PPCers (original fiction, obviously - though that could potentially include both Plort and PPC HQ...?) might well cover it - would you drop a tenner a year on having PPCers' writing in hardcopy? One every two years? It could even be a genuine competition to see whose stories get in. ^^ I've toyed with this idea before for its own sake, as you may be able to tell.
hS
If we keep an eye on the advertisements, and shut the bad ones down fast, it would work the best for all of us. A self-sustaining website is the best option.
Not saying I am opposed to buying something PPC related. I just know that I am not likely to.
Could the person with traffic stats do some research and figure out what our realistic monthly ad revenue could look like with, say, Google's text ads?
That's now everyone. ^_^
I also have daily posting counts if you need them, though I'd guess not. The graph roughly matches the IPs one, anyway.
(By the way, in the event that we move to T-Board, please find a way to make this information available. Pretty please.)
hS
I'll have to find some analytics code to put in to T-Board. If anyone has some ideas,
My quick googling has resulted in this pessimistic(?) ad calculation for sticking one of those "Sponsored links" things on T-Board.
200 people/day * 0.5% of them click on an ad * ~$0.20 per click * 30 days/month = around $5-6 ad money/month, if the figures I'm using are remotely accurate.
Also, I had an idea we can play with re: anon posting. Currently, the name change indicator is rather heavy-handed (it puts the real username right on the page). However, I already have a "user profile" page (lists your email, must be signed in to view). I could just change the code to link the author name to the poster's profile. That way, different-name posts won't be glaringly obvious, but you'll still be able to tell who wrote something if you really want to know.
Something like Patreon might be worth looking into, as it would allow people to pledge a certain monthly amount. If ten or fifteen people are willing to toss a dollar a month towards server costs, that should cover it. Or a Paypal would work. I'm willing to support individual artists whose work I like, why not my fellow agents?
Personally, I would pay quite a bit for an official PPC t-shirt, even if no one else would recognize it. You could even do ones for the different departments.
Perhaps ones with the various flash patches printed on them? I'd definitely get me one with the DMS logo, lord knows the last time I tried a DIY the patch snagged and unraveled and then I was teh sads. :(
But yeah, I think even I'd be able to spare a dollar towards keeping the PPC going!
~Ix
Phobos and I know a guy who does custom t-shirts. We might be able to work out some sort of deal with him, if there's interest in that sort of thing. I don't know what he charges, if there are discounts for larger orders, etc., but we could find all that out pretty easily.
I could theoretically make some designs to give him without too much trouble, too, though I say theoretically because my actual motivation toward art has been pretty slim lately. Also, I am not, in fact, a digital artist, which might make the transition from design to product more difficult and less quality; I don't know. OTOH, I want a PPC shirt or two myself, so there's that.
~Neshomeh
If nothing else, they'd be good to wear at Gatherings.
- Irish
I mean, even if we didn't possibly need the money, I think it would be cool. Heck, if several of us came together and offered Plort short stories to be compiled into a book, I think it could be sold. It's just the sort of fun, zany fantasy that a lot of people love. Not to mention, we've got several very good writers on here, and editors.
Hosting: T-Board is not hosted on Dann's server. It's hosted on the free plan of a cloud service called Heroku. This plan would be unsuitable for hosting the Board since it imposes a 10k row limit on the database, which we will outgrow quickly.
Dann may or may not have a server available. I don't know anything about that server, so I can't comment on it. If there is a machine, we can probably host there, and we'll be good until Dann gets hit by a bus or some other such catastrophe. Cost in that scenario is between $0 and about $10/year, depending on whether we want a domain name or not. We might consider having some kind of money stash for new hosting around anyway if that works out.
If Dann is unavailable, reliable servers can be had for on the order of $5 ($10 if I'm misestimating resource usage) a month. Again, we'd have to pay for a domain if we wanted a *.com (or .org etc.) If we don't want to do that, we can probably leech of the dynamic dns services, which hand out things like ppc.nodns.com.
Software: The code has some minor bitrot, mostly because the web framework I'm using has released several new versions since the last time I touched T-Board, and Dann or I would have to update the code to work with the new framework. This is a day or two of work tops (*), but could take a few weekends, since I have an internship at WhatsApp this summer.
Last time I showed off T-Board, there were concerns about the lack of anonymous posting. T-Board is structured so that everyone that posts needs an account. You can put anything you want in the Author field, but if you post under something other than your username, it will show as "Author text". This is sort-of the case now (IP addresses), but T-Board will make it more explicit. This would be a somewhat major change (your posts in RPs and things like the shipfests will be attributable to you), we should discuss. If we decide that we want anon posting back, I'll have to figure out how to integrate that with the registration library I'm using.
Since Reddit wasn't tossed off the table, I can try to explain how moving there might work out for us in another post.
While the citizens of Plort debated about what should be done to end the scourge of the Green Ads, they bade Sir Tomash go to Baron Dann and ready his arcane spells so that a new capital could quickly be raised. Tomash went out to his tower and began to rework his spells, as the alignment of the stars had changed greatly since he had meddled with the deep magics of Waeb.
While he was researching in the famed overflowing library of Stack, Tomash learned, to his dismay, that he had made a grave mistake in his previous work by failing to make the correct offerings to Post-Gress, the god of memory. His mistake would have doomed all who lingered in his new city to great difficulty in remembering what they had said before. Thankfully, Post-Gress has been placated by ritual offerings and the chanting of an ancient prayer during darkest night.
Now, Tomash must change his spells to match the position of the fickle Framing Stars. He must also prepare to raise a new island from the oceans of Weab, for the land in which he weaves his spells, Hero'ku, has begun to reject his magic. If the many citizens of Borrd move to the new island, they will need to make small offerings to the sea-gods, lest their land collapse under them. The barons know this, but generally believe that the gods can be easily kept content with a small portion of the many goods produced in Plort.
I'm not sure why we'd need a paid-for domain name - look at the one we're currently using! I think people can remember to stick a .nodns/whatever in there, and saving money is always good.
Now the awkward question: long-term prospects. I see from my records (I love having records ^^) that you've been around since 2011 or so, which is a pretty long time for the Internet. But... the PPC has been around nine years more than that, and I for one fully intend for it to be around at least a decade more. So: in the event that you leave, how maintainable is the code for people who are not you? I'll assume you've handed the server over to them fully (and also that they know how to code ^~).
As for anon posts... I still think requiring sign-ins is a bad idea. Ignoring all other concerns, I know people have said in the past that their phones refuse to sign in...
hS
I wouldn't mind them, either, but I'm not sure they'd be very reliable. That No-IP thing mentioned earlier apparently isn't guaranteed to work 100% of the time unless you pay for it, and pretty much all of them put on additional ads (and sometimes apparently try to download adware, as with co.vu), which is pretty much what we're trying to avoid. Besides, if we have to pay for a server, a domain name doesn't add much to the price per month.
I'm assuming that when you say people have had trouble signing in from their phones, you're talking about this current Board, and not T-Board? I don't remember T-Board getting that rigorous a testing last time round.
I know this Board apparently has some quirks when it comes to signing in, but I don't see why you should assume that that will be the case with every website. I've just been able to sign in to T-Board just fine from my phone (and very impressed with myself that I managed to remember my password).
Having said that, I always sign in here too, and I can't recall ever having a problem with it. It's probably the only reason I've never made a mini-Boarder of myself, and I like the convenience of getting e-mail alerts when people reply to my posts.
- Irish
Specifically, I was trying not to assume that nobody will have problems. Phones have weird quirks - mine refuses to let anyone other than me sign into Gmail for some reason. No, I don't specifically remember anyone having trouble with T-Board's sign-in; I'm just raising the possibility.
(I have to confess that I don't remember my T-Board password; I may have to test to see how many times I can guess it...)
hS
I wouldn't trust a server of mine for a production Board - I'm on a residential internet connection, which means that things like IP addresses are subject to change without notice, and hardware failure would be relatively catastrophic. I'd much rather put it in the cloud where it belongs. A sadly large number of us are pretending to be Responsible Adults with Responsible Adult Jobs, so I suspect hosting costs could be managed / distributed / ameliorated with responsible advertising.
I would like to revisit anonymous posting, but that's a discussion that can be had independently of the wheres and hows of hosting.
Wouldn't $dynamicdnsprovider do for that issue?
I guess I don't really want a normal part of board ops to be "oh yeah, it disappeared again. Give it a few minutes for DNS to catch up and you might have to clear your DNS cache."
I do seem to remember my residential "dynamic" address being relatively stable, though.
I have a Raspberry Pi that is currently running a test page. I never found the effort to put anything else up. But, it's a surprisingly beefy little contraption, 1 GB ram, a good size micro SD, it could work for something as basic as the board. I think. So, I'll throw it out there that I have the capability to host something if that's the main concern. I'm not sure about how people would like losing anonymous posting, though.
If there are concerns about me dropping off the face of Holy Terra(I know I haven't been active recently, due to hardware failures on my main computer) then I can assure you, I have no intention of simply disconnecting the server. I could also get some more Pis ready(I have way too many) if you still don't think the one that's set up will be enough.
Also, I'd like to hear about your Reddit suggestion. Sounds crazy enough to work if you ask me, and that's a good thing!
if an RPi would have enough computes to run a Rails stack. Also, they're rather vulnerable to bad-power-induced data corruption, aren't they (it's happened to me)?
Because of how simple they are, these things can run stuff that wouldn't be readily apparent as something they could. It tends to be really hit-or-miss, though. And as for the data corruption, it is possible to store all the data on my router, due to its network-wide backup system. That would relegate the Pi to a strictly computational role. I could try to test mine, and see if it can be used for this. It would be interesting, at least, to benchmark its usefulness as a server.
It's a reasonably standard Rails+Postgres app. If you want to try setting it up, go ahead and let me know how it works on a Pi.
Having read everything so far, it seems to make more sense to go to T-Boards. When I was a newbie, the Board's way of organizing posts was a bit weird, but I've since figured out its quirks and, as hS and Neshomeh said, it's pretty intuitive. A traditional forum wouldn't be as accommodating, IMO.
Being that I don't go on Reddit, I know nothing about subreddits, but if it's indeed The Board but Better, and Free as Well, then we might have to consider it.
And does anyone have any opinion on Omega's idea of using the Wiki's own forums?
Reason: Reddit is a cesspool, and the chance of bleedthrough of trolls makes it seem like a bad idea to me. Also, *mobile redirects are anywhere with ads.* They seem to be most frequent here, but I am quite commonly redirected to the App Store. Therefore, I cast my vote for T-Board if we move at all.
That being said, yeah, no Reddit. The upvote/downvote system would be pretty pointless for us, and would only induce more drama. Also, we could miss some threads that don't get on the subreddit's front page for some reason.
But then, maybe it wouldn't. Iunno.
Anyway, in Plort terms, here is a fell sigil of that vile besieging race:
((I can do puns too, y'know. =] ))
Generally speaking, if the T-Board is a viable option, I support it (though I don't think I'll be able to monetarily support anything right now — ask me again in four months and you might get a different answer); it's basically this Board, only better.
If the T-Board isn't practical and the ad problem doesn't get solved (it doesn't really affect me, I'm a dirty rotten AdBlocker), I'd prefer moving to a forum-based layout like Proboards.
Paying YWA sounds iffy and if we're paying we might as well pay for the T-Board (though, then again, I won't be able to fork any money in the next few months anyway), and I don't know Reddit or whatnot, so I'd rather do something else.
The wiki actually has a forum built in, it just needs to be turned on. Has anyone looked into it?
Because the Wiki is blocked at work. ;)
hS
(PS: Also something about how an add-on forum probably won't be much good, and maybe something about using it on a mobile - but mostly simply that I'd be blocked from using it.)
I'd be up for any, although the "crawlingly slow" server of number 4 bothers me. Also, how much more (or less) would we be spending by moving to a new Board? If it's about the same, slightly less, or slightly more than the 90$ fee for number 2, then I suggest we pay that instead and stick with our current (and faster) Board.
The third option is the one I like the least. The forum style just makes me go... ick.
As someone who has both used this format and a more traditional forum I much prefer this format for what we do. Are there things that could be better? Sure, the sub-threads can get pushed off and hard to find again, or just inconvenient to do so, but I do like the format we use currently.
Now to each of the previously provided possibilities. As to keeping it the same, I think this is acceptable. However, I do not have the add issues, because I have an Ad Blocker. However, I do agree with several sentiments, that I do not like the IP address visible to the public.
Paying YourWebApps. I cannot at this moment afford to support anything, so I am not in support of this idea at this point. In three or four months, I might be. But are we even willing to use YourWebApps? They do not seem to have been particularly helpful.
As to ProBoards, I think it could work, but we do have a risk of fragmenting. And while, as pointed out by others we have some minor fragmenting it is not as pronounced as it could be on a more traditional forum. I also feel like forum style will slow down the posting, and I like the speed certain threads move, particularly our RP threats. And I have tried a Forum Based RP, and it just did not feel entertaining. It could work, but this would be probably my third choice at this point. I have seen a few places that they have adds that are just as intrusive as the ones here. Though, I cannot confirm that.
The T-Board. This is an intriguing idea. It would theoretically solve the problem, but there are costs associated with it. It would eliminate our problems, but you need bandwidth, domain names, and the like. It would cost a monthly fee. Though I think others more knowledgeable than I have suggested that it would be less expensive than upgrading with YourWebApps. And it should solve all our problems, while keeping the format similar enough. This seems like the best option all around to me.
Sub-Reddit, well I do not use Reddit so I do not know how effective it would be. I do know, however, that Reddit has a few internal problems going on right now. Further they seem to be closing down on quite a few sub-Reddits. Now most of those are things we would other wise ban ourselves, but the problem I see is that, in just a few weeks they went from a policy of keeping things largely open and allowing a great many things, to shutting it all down. This seems a bit arbitrary to me. Who knows, maybe a future head will find all sporkings offensive and decide to shut us down. I would prefer to avoid them.
And for Google Groups, I do not know enough to have one opinion or another.
But I think the real question is, do we have enough active members to warrant moving to paid hosting?
I think ultimately I would prefer, if anything the T-Board. But I am also willing to take a wait and see approach as well.
T-Board works, but it needs some tweaking first. I would be down with moving, but I would not be able to help in paying for server space. Nor, I think, would many others. And I hate traditional forums. We would segment as a community. IRC and Board has shown that much. I don't want it to break apart any further.
If we can't find easy solutions for 4, I say Reddit. I gave more detail below as for why.
I don't see "doing nothing" as a viable strategy. I doubt YourWebApps is going to make changes that would affect their bottom line (their first response to the issues suggested that fairly well). Relying solely on AdBlocker is just ignoring the issue; it's like looking at a wall riddled with termites and rot and saying "Just slap some spackle and new wallpaper on there, it'll be all right." Not to mention the facts that one, AdBlocker is uneven from platform to platform; and two, it doesn't really help the folks on mobile.
I would prefer Option 3, as those are the kinds of boards that I enjoy. I like the organization inherent in them. No longer would missions disappearing off the front page be a major concern. I'm not holding out hope for that one getting a lot of support, though.
So yeah, Option 4. If there's a way we can do it, I'm all for it.
I'm going to address this one, because we actually tried it.
Yes, we switched on thread-bumping for the Board a few years back, because of the vast numbers of people who said that if we did so, Everything Would Immediately Be Amazing.
It wasn't.
What we ended up with was:
-One mega-badfic thread taking up 9/10ths of the front page.
-Two people having a long conversation on a thread.
-Oldbies seriously and genuinely telling people to stop posting badfics and stop talking on the PPC Board.
So we switched it off again. It was a ruddy nightmare.
The mega-badfic thread wouldn't necessarily be a problem if we just said people should post each in a separate thread (though then you'd just have 'flurry of badfic drives everything else out'). 'Stop talking because your thread's annoying' would be, though.
hS, historical archive
That wasn't what I was trying to suggest. What I meant (and very poorly communicated) was that the forum system would ideally have one place dedicated to new missions, thus going around the problem altogether.
The main issue with that, though, seems to have been that each reply is listed out on the page. In a normal forum style, every thread takes up the same amount of space, regardless of how long it is.
I don't have a problem with the way the Board works now. But 90% of the online groups I belong to use a standard forum setup, and there's never been that kind of issue before.
One is basically unworkable (we can't expect everyone to use AdBlock like I do, especially newbyes who don't know that there is this problem), and paying the premium account is really an extortion more than a premium account (Want to get rid of those ads that make your site unworkable? Pay us lots of money!)
I have no problems about switching to a forum, but I would also be able to spare some money for the upkeep of the T-Board (in fact, if it is 5 dollars a month I would have no problem paying all myself if the need arises.)
That's my two cents. Or two dollars, if we start the fundraising.
I'd vote option 4. Examining the T-Board, it solves almost all the problems I have with the current Board, and a few minor issues that don't bother me in particular as well. However, I don't have any ideas as to how to go about solving the issue of hosting. I'd be willing to contribute some money myself, but I don't know a good host or anything.
That said, I do run AdBlocker on my laptop, and even when using a computer that doesn't, I haven't been overwhelmed with ads. So I'm not really the target audience you're addressing.
I'll give a State of T-Board post after I get off work (~evening PST).
Also, I know this is a rather odd idea, but could we do a subreddit? Reddit has the threading style we like, and it doesn't cost money.
I've never been able to look at it long enough to figure out how it actually works. It just strikes me as inside-out, backwards, and more full of reposts than actual content.
Unless I'm thinking of Tumblr, which I don't get, either. They're pretty much the same thing in my head. I'm sure someone will educate me on the differences shortly. {; P
~Neshomeh, not generally into social media, period.
I've only been on there once or twice, and I didn't like it at all. It also seems to me that a good chunk of its content is inappropriate, and I don't think that's the environment the PPC should be in. I mean, having a wiki with NSFW pages is one thing, but being surrounded by potentially unmarked NSFW pages is another.
That being said, I have no idea how a subreddit works. It might bypass all of that, and actually be quite fun. I just don't know.
As such, it has dark places, but only if you want those dark places to show up for you. A subreddit is a subsection of the site specifically made for one topic or another. If we were to have the PPC there, we would not have to worry about a flood of NSFW things, because that is not what we are there for. We set the rules, tell Automod to block all NSFW things, make it clear what our rules are, and move on. Reddit is only a platform. The site itself (rarely) moderates itself. That is up to the individual moderators of the subreddit. The site respects the right of subreddits to make their own rules, however strict or loose they can be.
Here is part one of a video series that explains what Reddit is and how to use it. Watch it, and understand a little better.
Honestly, I have been thinking about it for a while. It's not that hard to get a handle of, and we could even make it look closer to the Board if we wanted. There would be some things that change, but it might be for the better. It would take care of the classic forum problem, so no sub-forum cliques. And we no longer have to worry about posts falling off the front page; only loosing interest in the thread itself.
Solves a lot of problems to me. That said, I still think T-Board, if it gets larger servers, would work the best. It's The Board But Better. Problems, yes, but if we can solve them, it is our best option.
It is now not uncommon for ten identical ads to pop up on top of one another, and I'm forced to close them all one by one. I suspect that's also the reason for the now ridiculous load times (30+ seconds!).
I say hold off until we hear from the admins, but if it gets worse, we'll have to likely look into moving. I don't want to change to a more typical forum; like Nesh said, I also like being able to see what's going on just by scrolling down the page. Unfortunately, as a poor college student financially dependent on my parents, I wouldn't be able to contribute to funding yet.
If they won't try and change the ads to make the board useable, I'm not inclined to want to pay for it- especially not that much a month! Especially since we aren't asking for the ads to be removed, but to not be dangerous for our computers and to allow us to actually use the board.
What I think we should do is look into how much it would cost for server space somewhere for hosting, and then the domain name. I'm fairly certain it would come to far less than their quote of 90 dollars a month- they aren't just factoring in the cost of hosting the board, but
also how much money they make from having those ads on our board in the first place.
There are enough of us, and enough of us with a wee bit of money for discretionary spending for that matter, that we should be able to handle the cost, I would think.
(Also, please check your email.)
First of all, the Board isn't a security problem if you take steps to protect yourself, such as AdBlock (which you can enable ONLY FOR THE BOARD if you really want to, I promise, it doesn't automatically make you an unethical jerk) and a decent anti-malware program or two. It's harder to do that on mobile devices, granted, but who likes writing posts on their phones? I only do it if I don't have a choice and really feel strongly about posting right this minute anyway. If your mobile device is all you've got... I dunno. How many people are actually using the Internet primarily or exclusively on a phone?
That said, I'd be fine with adopting the T-Board if we can find a way to make it work. I'd propose that we might be able to work out a way to spread out the costs of hosting among those of us with both stable jobs and a stable presence here (e.g. me and Phobos), so it wouldn't be too onerous for any one person. Plus maybe a PayPal account or something that other folks could use to chip in as/when they're able—could maybe serve as an emergency fund in case someone can't make their payment that month for some reason. And we could all sign something that says we agree that even though we're paying for server space we don't own the Board and won't get all weird about it, if that's a concern. We've traditionally been rather queasy about Actual Authorities.
Above discussion of money could also apply to simply taking the current Board premium, too, if it turns out that would cost less.
I'm pretty firmly against moving to a ProBoards-style forum. They're so chunky, and I like being able to see everything that's going on just by scrolling. And of course there's the concern that people will form sub-forum cliques, and never venture out to see what people are talking about elsewhere, thus diminishing the community spirit.
That's my two cents.
~Neshomeh
Using my phone isn't ideal, but both it and my tablet/laptop run android rather than Windows, so I'm on one or the other of them whenever I'm not at home on the desktop.
The ads are bad and getting worse- there's one up today that's doing the app-store redirect on every page load. There are also html/css errors - as I write this, I'm actually writing under the "check here to get daily updates" checkbox label, which is huge and on top of the message text box for some reason.
Ah, there it goes. I can see again! But the point still stands - the board is basically unusable from a mobile device. It's also unusable without a good ad blocker. It seems to me that there comes a point where we should put effort into making our home less of a minefield for ourselves and our guests?
In other words, I am a fan of option four.
In port, at least. It is exactly as much of a pain as you might think it is.
And actively seconding the idea of having someway to chip in for costs.
I like the layout and the design (Which is the perfect example of "The Board, but better"). We'd have to pay for hosting and (probably) a domain name, sure, but we could at least slightly offset the cost by putting in some non-intrusive ads. (As for Google Drive, apparently, it doesn't allow for things like PHP, which might be a problem.)
Thanks for the link on that.
Does anyone have even a vague feel for how much it would cost to host something like the Board?
hS
a VPS for $5 or $10/month (depending on how resource-intensive T-Board ends up being) + ~$10/year for a domain name. There might be cheaper, but I don't know of any places off the top of my head.
(I actually have $100 credit with Digital Ocean (the guys I got that price of) because student deals, which gives a temporary bridge over the money issues.
...but if people do vote to move, Google Groups is a nice compromise between this type of board and a forum-style one.
I seem to recall it's... pretty much a forum-style, but with no sub-forums and automatic quoting of what you're replying to. Can it be made to look different somehow?
hS
As well as all the old Usenet stuff, Google Groups also allows you to create your own, non-Usenet groups.
The important thing is there's the option of displaying a thread's posts using an indented "tree view" to keep the ageing Usenetters happy. (Click on the little down triangle next to the "X posts by Y authors" at the top of the thread page.) This allows you to find the "Ixamax's raiding gear" subthread in the main "Ixamax's dress" thread.
OTOH you'd still have to click on the thread title on the main screen to bring up the thread page and its tree in the first place, so it's not quite the same as here.
That might also be an alternative worth looking at.
That puts the set of external hosts at
#3 Proboards et al. (not liked)
#5 Google Groups
#6 Reddit
We can end this advert problem here and now and we will never have to have this discussion again.
I personally find this Board's "splitting threads" feature father confusing-- I'd settle for a conventional style posting board any day. Plus, it would be easier to organize topics and such with the proposed Proboard model.
Furthermore, I know that some of the ads that pop up on this Board sometimes carry redirects or viruses-- a few years back my antivirus kept on blocking intrusions until I installed an Adblocker on my browser. If we move, we won't have this problem anymore-- and I also really, really hate the fact that this Board leaves IP addresses out in the open. In the name of security, I favour uprooting the Board and transplanting it to a new forum style board. In my eyes the benefits far outweigh the negatives-- all of which are security hazards for our computers.
-I disagree fairly vehemently with the idea that a 'conventional' style would be better for the PPC. My three arguments have always been:
1: Division
Splitting different types of thread into different forums reduces interaction between the people in them. I've got new data on this - because I do it myself! Specifically, I routinely avoid the 'General Discussion' or 'Chat' areas of forums - I'm there for a specific fandom or whatever, after all, why would I go into the place where they don't talk about that subject?
I don't want the PPC to fragment that way. This Board exists for all the fans of the PPC to get to know each other - not to create several groups who barely interact. Plus, it would run headlong into the Permission process, which requires newbies to, y'know, interact while the PGs are around. ;)
2: Off-Topic
The PPC is all about going off-topic! How often have we seen mission plugs lead to a discussion of tea? Badfic threads which turn into mini RPs? Science geekery which becomes plans for a Gathering? There's no reasonable way to split things up, because we don't - and shouldn't - divide our threads that way. And without threads which can be conveniently sorted - what's the point of sub-forums at all, except to make me click more times to see everything?
3: Threading
Let's take Iximaz's dress thread as an example. If you wanted to read the discussion of her raiding gear on a forum-style Board, you'd have to skim over the entire thread to find the bits scattered around (hopefully identified by quotes, but you just know that Lacksidacksical can't get the hang of the quote function, and Summertide has one of her weird ideological problems with it). Here? You just read it, straight down the page. I've never understood the idea that the Board's threads are confusing - I find them the most logical way to have conversations on the Internet!
hS
(PS: Security. Well, obviously I agree about the adverts - that was the whole reason this thread exists! But IP addresses are an incredibly useful tool for spotting trolls. Could you explain what the security risk is in having them up there? I'm not familiar with it, so.)
I will write a full post on what options I think would be best in the thread in just a moment. I wanted to respond to something these first.
1: Division
I would argue that there is already fragmentation in the PPC; it's just easier to ignore because of the structure of the board. Wait long enough, everything vanishes. Going my my observations, fans of different properties tend to flock together regardless of how things are put together. If a LOTR thread pops up, the LOTR fans have a little powwow. Missions in continuums that don't have a lot of followers on the board tend not to get read as much as something from Harry Potter.
Even despite that, I'm still not particularly concerned about a drastic breaking apart of the community for two reasons. First off, the PPC is not exactly huge. It's currently what… about 25 to 35 regular posters, just as a guess? It's hard to make disparate groups when numbers are low. If it were at least doubled, then I would be a bit more wary.
Secondly, while it is true that people tend to rally around their own fandoms, you need to remember that we are all here for one fandom in particular: the PPC itself. I would like to believe that the members of this community have enough of an interest in this world to actually interact with their peers. If the idea of a "general discussion" area bothers you that much, it doesn't need to be included here.
2: Off-Topic
I don't really have an opinion on this one; it strikes me as part of being that "creativity in chaos" idea that's been talked about on the Board before. I don't hold with that concept, but to each their own. I will say, however, that having to "click more times to see everything" is not really all that great of an excuse.
3: Threading
Like SeaTurtle said, I prefer one topic with one chain. The layout of the Board has always struck me as an ugly, confusing mess. Trying to find anything specific is near impossible without searching for keywords. And if it's fallen off the front page? Forget it.
It's at the top left of the page. I use it often, because I'm a flake with the memory of a walnut. {= )
~Neshomeh
Does anyone else have trouble with it? Just the other day I tried to find a certain post (I searched the exact title) and it didn't show up. Which is annoying, because the post had pertinent information. And when I search my own name it doesn't show me all of my posts, only a few.
Only titles and content. If you searched MY username, you'd see every post I've made going back as far as it goes, because I always sign my name. You'd also see any post where someone mentions, me, too.
As to the post, which one was it? I'd like to give it a try, if you don't mind.
~Neshomeh
I searched "Galadriel" and it came right up. Thanks, though!
-Alleb
I needed some info on Galadriel, and who you gonna call?
I always wondered why some people signed their names. I thought it was an oldbie thing. Huh.
-Alleb
Like hS, I turned up both the original post and the one I now reply to.
Signing has nothing to do with searching, though. It might be an oldbie thing, though I don't think it's necessarily an oldbie PPCer thing. I'm pretty sure I got into the habit on the Farscape fan forum I used to hang out on. That's where I got the Pilot carapace on my smiley, too. {= )
~Neshomeh
Typing in the words calling huinesoron gives me two responses: this post, and that one. On the flip side, typing the and only throws up a handful of responses that include that exact string (sometimes as part of 'the Anduin'). So it looks like it reads all text as a single unit; you can't do multiple keyword searching.
hS
I search I did earlier for 'beta' came back with 22nd May 2015 as being the earliest result, and I was pretty sure that term would've come up further back than that.
For a moment I was worried that our archive allowance had been slashed again, before I noticed that other common search terms only returned 100 results.
So if you're searching for stuff from a little while back, it'll help to use the most obscure terms you can think of that might be relevant.
- Irish
... the admin interface has a gorgeous search function that lets you check every field independently. Why haven't they brought it across to the main page? Who knows!
hS
Isn't it? I check the Board repeatedly throughout the day. I click in, scroll down looking for new posts ("Hey, hS, that highlighting feature you found is really useful!" I know, me, I'm pretty fond of it mself), and then click out. Simple and quick, and lets me keep track of things.
Compare that to click into the main page, click into the PPC DIscussion sub-forum, click on every thread that has a new post to see whether the new post is in any way interesting ("Is this about that cool picture Oaken drew...? No, it's just 464646 going on about her obscure fandom, oh well, hope Oaken picks up her half of the thread soon."), click back out to the main page, click the Plug and Badfic sections - oh, and someone's asked a Question too, it's Lacksi with the uninspired title of 'Please help!!!' so I'd better click into that as well, and is that a Permission Request in the Permission sub-forum? No, it's a question about Permission, so I'd probably better point out they're in the wrong section-
"What are you doing? Don't you know you're supposed to be working?!"
And then I get fired and live in a box. A box, PoorCynic! You don't want that, do you? O_O
hS
Replying to this separately, since I missed your PS.
With them being publically available, not just viewable by mods, I can simply go to this website, copy in the IP address, and figure out roughly where you live. While this may seem like a nifty feature that allows you to figure out where your friends are, a stalker could quite easily exploit it. You don't even have to be logged in to see this information - if someone uses their pen name on multiple websites, a quick Google search might turn up the Board. And if one of those pen names has their real name, but not their location connected to it, a stalker might be able to combine the two, and turn up even more personal information. I know that's a worst-case scenario, but it's still a risk.
As far as troll-spotting goes, there's little the average user can do about them anyways, aside from ignore them. And then, I think the contents of the post should be enough to solve that issue without checking IPs. A moderator should still be able to see IP addresses on other boards, or at least I've seen mods on other boards track down IPs for users that were suspected to be trolls/sockpuppets.
I'm a very private person on the internet (my gosh, I didn't reveal my gender for a bit because I'm female and I was afraid of potential creepers), and that's just... scary. If anything at all is done to alter the Board, or if we move, I really want my IP address and everyone else's hidden.
I don't think it's required for you to have multiple subforums on a proboards style forum. It's just an option. We could just have one big subforum and put all the threads in there, if we wanted to.
Another advantage of switching to a different system is that we would no longer have to worry about threads eventually falling off the Board. I know I was very disappointed to find that an RP I was particularly interested in reading was no longer available, and I had to make do with the archived version, which was much more difficult to read.
Finally, the openly available IP addresses are a serious issue. They were almost enough to stop me joining the Board in the first place when I found it.
With respect to your arguments:
1. That is a good argument. I really don't have to say anything against this; one of the strengths of the current Board is to regroup anything and everything under one roof. That being said, I'm a fan of organization and I like having all of my topics neatly categorized.
2. Ibid.
3. Once again tying into my preference of having one topic, one chain. I like being able to open something and scroll down and see everything in a neat, chronological order.
With regards to security: someone having an IP address is like giving them your home address. With that sequence of numbers someone can attempt to directly attack your computer and the general area you live in. Yes, an IP address is no big secret and yes, one can find it with enough work but I'd rather not have it in the open just like that.
ProBoards also uses adverts to bring in funding. I think they're a larger company than YourWebApps: are you saying you think they'll vet their advertising better?
hS
(Further comments withheld for the sake of discussion)
That and an Adblocker would greatly improve security in my mind. Granted, I have no ideas how internet ads work so I might be talking out of my hat but if Proboards is a bigger community, then they must have proportionally bigger tech support and thus we get help faster and more efficiently.