lonely posts

[ffolliet]

have been browsing various boards recently and noticed sadly that more an more posts are threads of 0,1 or 2 long. it didn't use to be this way. strikes me there are always lots of reasons. as a board gets more popular people post more frequently and consequently new posts will drop rapidly "out of view". sadly some of the posts repeat over and over simple queries that the poster hasn't been able to get a quick answer for. the reasons for that include not searching, not understanding how to search, not using the faq and probably not even understanding how a board works. senior users then may get bored of helping every newbie with the sameoldsameo and the thread sinks.

any thoughts?

(and hopefully this won't just sink straight away eh??)

[chris]

have been browsing various boards recently and noticed sadly that more an more posts are threads of 0,1 or 2 long. it didn't use to be this way. strikes me there are always lots of reasons. as a board gets more popular people post more frequently and consequently new posts will drop rapidly "out of view". sadly some of the posts repeat over and over simple queries that the poster hasn't been able to get a quick answer for. the reasons for that include not searching, not understanding how to search, not using the faq and probably not even understanding how a board works. senior users then may get bored of helping every newbie with the sameoldsameo and the thread sinks.

any thoughts?

These are all very valid points. I think the issue stems from the Holiday Season. I know that between shopping, travelling for xmas, etc. ...that I haven't been as active as I normally am on the forums. I did notice the same thing this morning ( multiple posts with less responses) and plan on making a concerted effort to help out more. I think people like Everything Treo because it's not intimidating and new users are welcome. As a Senior Member (and Admin), I never get tired of answering the same question. The search feature, while good, can also return a ton of results. That's simply due to the amount of posts here on ET.

I think there are ways to improve the forums and look to do just that in 2006. Call it an early New Year's resolution!

Any suggestions you might have on how to improve the site are always welcome.

-Chris

[chris]

I also think part of the issue was related to a technical problem with the boards. In the past few weeks, the New Posts option wasn't working correctly. I believe that I've pinpointed the issue and it's been resolved. Once you Mark All Forums As Read through the Quick Links, the forum will automatically show you New Posts. This allows Senior Members and everyone to quickly see what's happening since they last visited the forums.

-Chris

[millerhifi]

Originally Posted by chris

Once you Mark All Forums As Read through the Quick Links, the forum will automatically show you New Posts. This allows Senior Members and everyone to quickly see what's happening since they last visited the forums.

-Chris

You da man! Thanks

[chris]

You da man! Thanks

No problem. I'm glad it's fixed. It works great for me and I really see how useful this feature can be..

Let me know if you have any problems with it.

-Chris