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Post by Kara J on Jan 25, 2009 11:34:28 GMT
Exactly. You'll have to clear any taking advantage of me with my wife, though. (Speaking of Miriam, btw - have any of you actually tried to explain the current situation to anyone not steeped in message board lore, history or drama? She just asked me what this long post is about, and why I couldn't come to bed until I finished it . . . so I told her. All she did was giggle at me for 10 minutes. I think I can still hear her laughing upstairs. ) Yes I tried to explain all this to my partner (he's an IT tech) as I was hoping he might know of a way to move all these boards over expeditiously (he doesn't ) and all I got was a blank stare for the five minutes I spent explaining (with lots of hand gestures) followed by a conciliatory pat and a "Yes, dear. These are forums. Why does it matter so much?"
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Post by Blademaster Mystica on Jan 25, 2009 12:11:00 GMT
Right, thought I'd let myself hear before you all think I'm not following, caring or working on my reply to all this. There is a really good reason why I haven't yet and that has everything to do with the utmost respect I hold for both Emperor and Kivam. As some of you may remember, I was one of the more 'vocal' voices in the whole move debacle discussion on DM in 2007 (why Corki keeps referring to 2006 I don't know, but I'm sure he has his reasons). That voaclity has earned me the status of Public Enemy #1 on DM, a reputation I am still paying for today.
Kivam I am working on a HUGE reply on word and will post it once I'm done. I hope though that, after taking the time to write up all that, it won't be jumped over and dismissed as so many of my posts get treated on DM. Only your proven attitude of willingness to listen, read and respond in this thread has given me the feeble hope that it will be worth it.
The Hornsounder in it's current state is my baby, so I'll go over that in length in that post. I'll try to organise the post so that it's reader friendly.
This may take a while, so bare (or bear) with me.
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Post by M-G Corki on Jan 25, 2009 12:16:59 GMT
I think I keep saying 2006 as I still think it is 2008. Either that, or I am going mad. If I have posted 2006, I actually mean 2007. I'll go and change it now to avoid further confusion.
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Post by kivam on Jan 25, 2009 12:29:26 GMT
*dances in new skin* I'm all for the trial idea. There is nothing to lose by seeing how things will work out if we go over to DM for a little while and only everything to gain for us. I think in many ways most of us are looking at worst case scenarios and things won't be as bad as everyone thinks. On the other hand, a move over to DM from my completely non-professional outlook is going to take quite something. A big question is going to be how many boards are we going to be able to have. Are we going to be able to replicate, at least mostly the boards here or are we going to have to seriously pare it down? My understanding is you'll be able to replicate most if not all of the boards here. You may be asked to consolidate some existing boards where possible and sensible. (For instance, your "Casino" has 3 boards with a total of ~25 reply posts in ~7 threads, only one of which has been made since September, and one board of which is for announcing news from DM) - I'm guessing you'll be asked to consolidate those, at the very least. Taking an admittedly superficial look at the Game sub boards (ok, saw Cumadrin's Guide and know what I'm dealing with now - that's freaking awesome), some of those seem like they could be consolidated without much difficulty as well. But when it comes to which boards can stand consolidation and which can't, you guys are the experts, not us. Another thing that might happen (at least, its something that occurred to me as I looked at your board structure 10 seconds ago) we might suggest that some of your boards be shifted out of the Band entirely and onto general. I like the idea of a "favorite quotes" board, but does it really make sense as a Band sub-board, or would it work better as a General Books Discussion sub-board?
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Post by kivam on Jan 25, 2009 12:40:52 GMT
Right, thought I'd let myself hear before you all think I'm not following, caring or working on my reply to all this. There is a really good reason why I haven't yet and that has everything to do with the utmost respect I hold for both Emperor and Kivam. As some of you may remember, I was one of the more 'vocal' voices in the whole move debacle discussion on DM in 2007 (why Corki keeps referring to 2006 I don't know, but I'm sure he has his reasons). That voaclity has earned me the status of Public Enemy #1 on DM, a reputation I am still paying for today. Kivam I am working on a HUGE reply on word and will post it once I'm done. I hope though that, after taking the time to write up all that, it won't be jumped over and dismissed as so many of my posts get treated on DM. Only your proven attitude of willingness to listen, read and respond in this thread has given me the feeble hope that it will be worth it. I hope you've never felt like you were getting that attitude or treatment from me. And I can promise that it won't get jumped over or dismissed. (full disclosure, though: like I said, I'm through debating the decision unless direct questions are posed to me, since I don't think its useful to debate it further. So if part of your post is about what happened in 2007, how it made you all feel, etc., I will read it, and I won't dismiss it - but I won't respond to it, either. Just wanted to make that clear so you didn't think it was ignored, if the post does have any of that stuff) And on that note, my baby just woke up, the twins are about to, and my wife's off running a half-marathon, so you may not see my face around here for a bit
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Post by kivam on Jan 25, 2009 12:42:10 GMT
awww kivam... you make me want to go back to D&D and give it a try again... lol I'm surprised you even remember my presence there. Actually, I was active there BEFORE the Band... crazy huh? You're pretty memorable. Plus, I remember staring at your user name wondering why you were cursing at the Horn. But yeah, get back over there.
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Post by Blademaster Mystica on Jan 25, 2009 12:58:55 GMT
understood Kivam. There will be quite a bit of that though, as it's necessary I feel to present a full picture. No need to go into it as you say, just background info.
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Post by M-G Corki on Jan 25, 2009 13:10:46 GMT
*dances in new skin* I'm all for the trial idea. There is nothing to lose by seeing how things will work out if we go over to DM for a little while and only everything to gain for us. I think in many ways most of us are looking at worst case scenarios and things won't be as bad as everyone thinks. On the other hand, a move over to DM from my completely non-professional outlook is going to take quite something. A big question is going to be how many boards are we going to be able to have. Are we going to be able to replicate, at least mostly the boards here or are we going to have to seriously pare it down? My understanding is you'll be able to replicate most if not all of the boards here. You may be asked to consolidate some existing boards where possible and sensible. (For instance, your "Casino" has 3 boards with a total of ~25 reply posts in ~7 threads, only one of which has been made since September, and one board of which is for announcing news from DM) - I'm guessing you'll be asked to consolidate those, at the very least. Taking an admittedly superficial look at the Game sub boards (ok, saw Cumadrin's Guide and know what I'm dealing with now - that's freaking awesome), some of those seem like they could be consolidated without much difficulty as well. But when it comes to which boards can stand consolidation and which can't, you guys are the experts, not us. Another thing that might happen (at least, its something that occurred to me as I looked at your board structure 10 seconds ago) we might suggest that some of your boards be shifted out of the Band entirely and onto general. I like the idea of a "favorite quotes" board, but does it really make sense as a Band sub-board, or would it work better as a General Books Discussion sub-board? A lot of this is work in progress. The quotes project is lifting all quotes that Banders like in order to be put onto your wiki site (originally a website, but that has been scrapped...for now). So this is now in my ball park, and I plan to get the info up on the wiki site. The Casino area...well, it doesn't help that the person running the area isn't as active as before. Most of this stuff used to be on DM, but due to the dislike at posting at DM, the plan was to move things back to get this area used. That is still the plan, and I will be taking the reins for this area for now...unless some other Bander wants to. Now, I am not a great fan of consolidation. I prefer having individual areas for things to keep all like minded things together. Until this year, we didn't have a board for all information/threads regarding The Matrims. But that has now changed, and everything is kept together. That makes more sense to me than having it spread across the general board or in the Archives (the best of bit at the bottom of the site). The ORG game follows a similar structure. I have specific boards to archive games for each year; there are specific boards (which are hidden) for the various Inter-Regimental ORG Game Festivals that we have. It makes more sense keeping all similar things together. So basically, I disagree with consolidation. My room being the only exception, I like things organised so I can find things. I wouldn't be happy with what you suggest. Also, the fact that I have the powers to make the boards as and how I want helps with this. So you can also see why I would be unhappy with having to go through a 3rd person to get stuff done when I know I can do it instantly.
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Post by Paladin Bridmorgan UC on Jan 25, 2009 14:31:37 GMT
Kiv (again) As for the Hornsounder, Manny again is right. There is no way we can do the work we do on DM. We would have to have our offsite workshop to ensure that the quality newspaper we have been putting out stays quality. A lot of hard work has been invested by Band members to make it what it is, and if you ask me, it's top notch. I would not like to see that go down the proverbial toilet. (And like I said, I agree it's top notch) Thanks Kiv. Kiv again: Question - any reason you guys can't let us (and by "us" I mean people other than me, since, again, I'd kill the site if I tried anything) give you as many feature replications as we can, lock the various boards on whatever schedule makes sense, come fully back to DM for a, say, 1 month trial period, and then, if you decide it doesn't work well enough, say "well, we gave it a shot", unlock these boards, and go on? Just a thought. I made this same suggestion on the Sr. Staff boards here. Pretty much exactaly except I said 2 months, figured that would give people more time to adjust and really have a true opinion on how things were going. I think Corki didn't bring it up here yet just so we could get a real feel if it would be worth mentioning, but since you brought it up Kiv. One other thing: Kiv back again First, I think a lot of you are missing the difference between "I don't understand your reasons" and "I don't agree with your reasons". It's clear that the majority of you don't, and probably never will, agree with the decision that was made. (again, I wasn't part of the decision when it was made, but I do agree with the reasons, for whatever that's worth to you). But whether or not you think the reasons are sufficient to support the decision, you should be able to at least understand them. You said we should at least understand the reasons...I would love to, but I still don't know what they are. I'm not trying to debate the reasons or prove they are wrong. I can't do that because I don't know what they are. Maybe I've missed them somewhere in these 6 pages of posting, but if I have, so have a lot of other people. Kiv or Empy, could one of you please list out the reasons for the closing of all offsite boards just so we are ALL on the same page?
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Post by fhornofvalere on Jan 25, 2009 14:42:12 GMT
awww kivam... you make me want to go back to D&D and give it a try again... lol I'm surprised you even remember my presence there. Actually, I was active there BEFORE the Band... crazy huh? You're pretty memorable. Plus, I remember staring at your user name wondering why you were cursing at the Horn. But yeah, get back over there. lol... was being memorable a good thing or a bad thing? I seem to remember getting in over my head on a few things, wishing suddenly that the topic experts I got information from were sharing my computer with me.. ;D I do have another question though.... how many subboards can we have? For instance, in the Cavalry, we have 3 boards. Those boards all have sub-boards. Some of those sub-boards have sub-boards of their own. While we could possibly eliminate a few of them (by making them their own board visible to cavalry only), it would not really work with all of them that are placed where they are for some obvious organizational reasons.
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Post by manriva on Jan 25, 2009 14:42:49 GMT
Instantly?
Might we compromise Mr. Jr. Accountancy Man and agree on... shall we say; "in Corki Time" instantly? ;D
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Post by kivam on Jan 25, 2009 15:47:21 GMT
A lot of this is work in progress. The quotes project is lifting all quotes that Banders like in order to be put onto your wiki site (originally a website, but that has been scrapped...for now). So this is now in my ball park, and I plan to get the info up on the wiki site. Ok - I guess my suggestion with that is why not have a DM wide "Favorite Quotes" board or website (within the General DM Book Discussion Board category), as opposed to one that resides as a subset of the Band boards? I mean, aside from it being a Band idea in the first instance, it doesn't seem like it's something inherently Band-related, does it? Literally just typing out what I'm thinking, so I could be wrong . . . OK - but does the Casino really need 3 boards now, for instance? I understand wanting to plan for future expansion (when I get assigned a new case at work, I set up a series of folders as a matter of course, even before I have documents to put into them, since I know the docs will come soon enough). But there's also something to be said for planning for the expansion by saying "when the traffic warrants it, we'll split off a board just for XYZ" and then waiting until the traffic makes it necessary. Don't get me wrong - as I said, I'm not a tech guy, so I don't know whether consolidation would be helpful from a tech perspective. Just throwing it out there as a possibility to consider. I'm pretty sure that if you throw the request up on the Staff board, one of the people with Admin access - Emp, Kath, Mat, Owen, Raeyn or Seggie - will make sure it gets done quickly (I leave myself out since I have no idea how to add boards). And I know Emp is pushing (hard) for someone to develop a way to allow you (and all Org leaders) Admin type access to your own Org.
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Post by emperor on Jan 25, 2009 16:07:50 GMT
What Kiv said. I agree that OLs should have as much power over their own boards as the Admins. If you can find a mybb plug in that fulfills this, let me know. I will push for it. But it isn't fair to give Corki Admin rights over ALL boards at DM just so he can handle his org.
You can have as many boards as you desire. Down the road if you don't have activity on certain boards, I may talk with Corki about consolidating. If Corki has a good reason to keep the board, then I won't touch it. I am just adding on to what Kivam already said.
I don't think of Mystica as public enemy number 1.
I hate your quote feature over here. I need to get a magnifying glass to read them. *g*
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Post by Rob Anybody MacDemon on Jan 25, 2009 16:40:49 GMT
Another solution to Empys comlaints about these boards that are so easy to overcome... Press view, then Zoom... All text on the screen magically gets bigger. Takes a matter of seconds. Or even easier, Press and hold Ctrl and scroll in or out using the scroll wheel on your mouse.
No need to thank me... My services are free! ;D
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Post by daetirion on Jan 25, 2009 17:25:32 GMT
Ok i'm from a very similar viewpoint to Horn etc. before me. DM aint treated the Band well at all, and there doesnt seem to be a benefit to either party by forcing this. The others have passed the main points across rather eloquently.
Essentially the single problem with disaffiliating would be recruitment. But look at Myndjack. Recruiting entirely through MSN pretty much, or PM's, and i really dont think the Band would have too many problems. As it is, we would still siphon some new DM'ers just through being active, and recruiting friends.
In fact, i can see nothing but benefits to leaving. Having said that, i'll be willing to throw my support behind whichever solution certain key members decide upon. I'm not one of those given to thinking things out thoroughly so... i'll let wiser minds decide.
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