Lon's "State of the Website- 1st Quarter" For Avatar-Forums

[Grif]

Here is my view on the situation, once the changes take place it will be time to cut your losses and move on. Luckily for me this is the place to move on to.

[Isard]

Alright, I just finished talking to Lon about my complaint in IRC. When he meant revert to the default style, he was referring to the button and post layouts. The current background (nice simple black) would stay the same, we would just loose that horrible shiny bar that really didn't fit the forums personality anyway imo.

Other than that, I cant see how the changes can hurt the forum in any way.
(I'm also glad that he's letting people voice their opinions on this stuff before it goes live)

[guyguy]

ohh! i found that i was only a spammer on AF when i got back there looking at that state
since they removed any count posts related to <the game> ( mouhahaha )
i lost 2200 posts to Fan Made games, im ashamed!

[Gunny]

Originally Posted by guyguy

ohh! i found that i was only a spammer on AF when i got back there looking at that state
since they removed any count posts related to <the game> ( mouhahaha )
i lost 2200 posts to Fan Made games, im ashamed!

How do we know how many we lost? LOL! I just checked and I could have sworn I had a lot more LMAO!

[guyguy]

Originally Posted by Gunny

How do we know how many we lost? LOL! I just checked and I could have sworn I had a lot more LMAO!

well i just remember that i was a few short post under 3k gunny, have like 800ish left, nothing else

[Woodsprite]

Originally Posted by guyguy

ohh! i found that i was only a spammer on AF when i got back there looking at that state
since they removed any count posts related to <the game> ( mouhahaha )
i lost 2200 posts to Fan Made games, im ashamed!

DAMN you love the games!

I went from 769 down to 709.

DAMN my posts are meaningful!

Also, just wanted to add a few things.

Originally Posted by Lon

[*]I propose we remove individual forum post counts from the postbit. Why the change? Two reasons: First some members are clearly treated differently with an error of distrust and disrespect largely based on their low post count and this has to stop. Finally some members feel they should be treated differently, perhaps better or with more consideration simply because they have more posts. This also should stop.

This is ridiculous. The post count is one of the primary reasons why I tried to advance myself on AF. I wrote hard to get over 700 posts (and others, much higher still). I didn't respect others more or less who had a higher number of posts, simply because I knew the ones with over 2000 were obviously spending much time in the "Fan Games" section. Anyone feel the same?

Originally Posted by Lon

[*]I propose we remove the donation system. Why the change? I never really liked the idea but it came with the website and it seemed like a clever way to help pay the bills. I would like to remove it permanently because I've learned that when some people donate they end up with a level of expectation that is often not met. This results in friction or an air of animosity between members that I do not want to have. A few members who have donated feel they should be treated differently, perhaps better and with more consideration simply because they made a donation and I would like this to stop.

I don't know about how many PMs he gets per day from people who tell him straight, "I deserve more respect because I'm a donator."

I'm losing money. Wow. I guess I'll get rid of the donation system and make more unwanted changes to the website that the majority doesn't want instead.

^Does anyone follow the above logic? I didn't look up to anyone for their "donator" status, I aspired to be one myself. Seeing the names didn't make me jealous, it made me get a PayPal account. Though, I ended up not donating because of what happened, and because I already had "Gold member" status from winning an art contest.

Lon, IMHO, is no doubt going to lose some of his more faithful members this way. Some of them.

Originally Posted by Lon

[*]...Further all colored titles will be removed so everyone will appear with the same default vbulletin color within the forum. Why the change? Largely to keep egos in check and to insure everyone is treated with the same level of respect regardless of what color their user name is.

What is this, communism now? Everyone gets a trophy; everyone's a winner, and everyone's the same.

Wha-? What does respect have anything to do with post content, exactly? The only colored names are the moderators, the donators, and the administrator. Taking away the color code system just causes confusion; it doesn't solve a thing.

Originally Posted by Lon

[*]I propose we discontinue the rank system. I would like to drop the rank system and just allow members to set their own titles as they see fit. Again this goes back to my desire to have all members appear the same within the forum to insure a level of respect and fair treatment.

Again with the "everyone gets a trophy" communism crap. What exactly are members to aspire to be now? I mean sure, the rankings don't really mean anything, and some members couldn't care less about it (usually the ones who don't post often). But it establishes a sense of accomplishment not only to the user who does care about the forum, but to the person who wishes to be as notable as him (that's what I was like when I first joined).

Originally Posted by Lon

[*]I propose a reversion to the default vbulletin forum style. Why the change? This change will insure future software updates are error free and allow for expanded content without the need to code or design additional forum elements, which can later become buggy. Currently it is very difficult, expensive or impossible to add additional content or forum features because we utilize a completely customized and sometimes buggy forum skin. I propose we dump our current custom skins in favor of the default vbulletin skin. This will insure an error free environment and a consistency that allows us to expand and enhance the community with little effort.

Ok, right here you can tell he only cares about himself with this. I need not explain what we're all thinking about this one...



The rest of his "address" seems like an RDA attempt at money-making if I ever saw one, honestly. All he cares about is advancing his personal profit through expansion by whatever means possible. And his IRC chats concerning the changes are a facade; he's going to do what he's going to do no matter what the concensus is. We've seen it before, and we'll see it again. The IRC meetings are just a way to try and make the whole situation calmer.

[xcrunner08]

The logs from the IRC conversations are up. Seems like there was some good stuff going on. I understand somewhat the removal of the donation system. People do actually feel entitled to know more if they donated, not EVERYONE, but some ruin it for all. Some demand to know whats going on with THEIR forum, as Lon mentioned in one of the IRC chats.

As far as post count goes, well I don't care if he removes the posts from the games section. I always found it annoying for people to boost their post count with "Count to a million" threads. And to be honest, threads like that PROVE his point, that people do care about post count and use it as a sort of status symbol.

Overall, yes it is more business like but its his to do as he wished. I don't spend much time on there at all anymore so it doesn't directly affect me. Though, it appears he is trying to listen to the community a little more. As I said, though, I don't use the site for anything anymore except to just check what the recent changes are :/

[Txum_kali'weya]

Originally Posted by xcrunner08

As far as post count goes, well I don't care if he removes the posts from the games section. I always found it annoying for people to boost their post count with "Count to a million" threads. And to be honest, threads like that PROVE his point, that people do care about post count and use it as a sort of status symbol.

not always true.

i was in the forum games section a lot on AF, but it was because i wanted to, not for post count. if it was just that, then i would have more posts here. But unlike AF, the topics in the other forums are too good and i havn't been in the forum games section. Who even pays attention to post count anyway?

[Loverofnature]

Originally Posted by Woodsprite

DAMN

Ok, right here you can tell he only cares about himself with this. I need not explain what we're all thinking about this one...



The rest of his "address" seems like an RDA attempt at money-making if I ever saw one, honestly. All he cares about is advancing his personal profit through expansion by whatever means possible. And his IRC chats concerning the changes are a facade; he's going to do what he's going to do no matter what the concensus is. We've seen it before, and we'll see it again. The IRC meetings are just a way to try and make the whole situation calmer.

about the being expensive and hard to add addons to etc his his own fault, his fault being changing the original good skin and making it vb4

[Human No More]

Originally Posted by Loverofnature

about the being expensive and hard to add addons to etc his his own fault, his fault being changing the original good skin and making it vb4

That's true. there was no need to upgrade to vB4, and certainly no need to go for a skin like the one he did.

[Txum_kali'weya]

Originally Posted by Lon

The forum postbit, which is the details about you that is shown in your posts will be moved to the left side of the post instead of on top of it. Why the change? Many have complained that the details eat up too much of the page and people has to scroll unnecessarily far to reach the bottom of the page. It's a simple change to move it.

that is one of the reasons i love ToS. the stats being on the side is just... feels weird.

[Human No More]

I don't really mind that one... I'm on forums with both. Some work with it one way, some with it the other way.

[Woodsprite]

Well, just posting to update: if anyone still hasn't seen what's happened so far, you might wanna take a look now.

The only change I'm really for is the names on the side (very convenient). Other than that, it looks like almost all of the proposed changes by Lon have been made complete. All except the default Vb4 format. ...I think.

[Isard]

He made it available, however you can still keep the old layout if you want. (It just doesn't always like to work correctly)

A good compromise imo.

[Loverofnature]

me and stan actually discussed this and came to the conclussion that he had once been a person who had the gift of sight, but lost it and now only thinks about money becoming a Tawtute, Skyperson, once again. think about it he says it is to expensive but then decides to stop the donation option, other bad descision, why not just remove the colours but keep the donating? everybody that can live the layout wins, personally i dont think that AvF has many users like us over there, despite that almost all of us are converts from AvF to ToS