The Home page is getting rather cluttered with seven stickies or announcements.
Presumably we don't need the "Communities Downtime" thread anymore or do we?
The Paddy's Pond thread has been there since September and in that time has had one !like". Why is it there? I suggest it's removed.
How about merging the "Etiquette" thread and the "Terms and Conditions" threads into one thread suitably re titled.
I'm not sure whether the Forum Map which I did several years ago is still relevant or up to date. I have no means of updating it. Do you have any way of monitoring how often its accessed to assess its usefulness.
For those of us that access the Forum mainly though the Home page less clutter and more live threads displayed would be very helpful.
While I'm on a bit of a roll there's one further point. I've noticed that many people continue to "attach" photos rather than embed them in posts. There are two disadvantages to this:
I can only conclude that people are not reading the "How To" thread. What about making the title of the thread a bit more eye catching along the lines of :- How To : Post Photos, Videos , Create Links and other tips and tricks.
Other people may have different views I just want the Forum to run more smoothly.I leave it to your good judgement what to do.
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Tony
My Flickr Photostream
I couldn't agree more with TJ, The stickies are rather tending to dominate and not sure all are either useful or used very much; a bit of housekeeping to simplify the main display pages would be not only be helpful for navigating quickly to the forumites threads but also be more welcoming (rather than confusing and off-putting) to new Members or site visitors to the rspb. It is so frustrating to scroll through a load of Stickies to find what you want. Is it possible to have another header tab for RSPB notices and a Help Page and leave the Community Home/Wildlife/Chat tabs clear for posts ? So often we hear from new visitors/members to the Community that they can't navigate around or find relevant information quickly and therefore give up and don't return, surely, this Community is all about encouraging new members which may lead on to Membership of rspb by some but even more importantly, people often visit this site for vital help or assistance when they seek urgent information. If a page "hit" counter could be incorporated, it would give an idea of which pages in particular are used and how popular they are and therefore prioritise the stickies which are used/helpful.
I'm beginning to waffle on LOL so let finish by saying, from a personal point of view, it would be nice to have a simpler format to the Community, combine some notices into one sticky as TJ so rightly suggested and make this site less navigationally confusing to newcomers especially.
Thanks for reading this, will now leave you to ponder over it lol
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Regards, Hazel
Hi aitch & TJ, my way is to always select the 'unread' option & there are no stickies showing as, once they are read, they simply disappear ... I find this the simplest way to see all current posts! It is quite easy to flip between all these options!
2013 photos & vids here
eff37 on Flickr
Hi Wendy, thanks for your tip; To be honest, more of a concern to me is the confusion experienced by newcomers to this site who may just require some helpful advice rather urgently and they just don't know how to navigate through the quagmire and cluttered tabs/pages; others would love to jump in with their own thread and maybe upload a few photos (in one go ! ) but as TJ says, so many have attached photos instead of embedding them as they don't always know (the How to: Struggling? See if we have the answers) includes information for media uploading and it requires scrolling through other Stickies to get to the right place often putting people off. Direct and simple How to insert Photo/Video header (under a Help tab) would be better as that appears to be the most popular question asked by many new members. What worries me is that I see a lot less activity in general on the Community these days and fewer or no replies to threads compared with six months ago which leads me to the conclusion that a lot of members have become disenchanted for various reasons whilst new visitors are finding it difficult to navigate through the various tabs, some of which could be removed or replaced with Help tab for a direct and quick link.
Another concern is that we used to get more regular input from Moderators who would even share a reply or two if they had a little time to spare (and Moderators, I do know and fully understand that you have imporant work to do within the RSPB which is and should be the priority) but I feel that "recent events" have had an effect on their involvement with us which makes me feel somewhat sad as I enjoyed their helpful/interesting/jovial input.
:( guess there is nobody at home Sry you didn't get a response TJ.
I have wondered whether eventually they would like to phase out the forum & put it all on face-book. A lot less grief for them all!
I entirely agree with your comments Hazel & TJ. It's complicated for a lot of people, but especially the 'silver surfers'. LOL (I used to think LOL was Lots of love, so that's my level of literacy)
Best wishes
Hazel in Southwest France
Hazel C said:I have wondered whether eventually they would like to phase out the forum & put it all on face-book. A lot less grief for them all!
Miraculously I know what LOL stands for - it's stuff like IMHO which has me scratching my head.......!
Our herring gulls are red listed birds. Think about that the next time you hear some flaming idiot calling for a cull of them.
Hi-
quick input-
I had to 'attach' photos because I couldn't get the old embed function- it came back a few days ago-
I agree there are less visitor type posts and the Community IS difficult to get to from the home page- My son who designs / writes code for web pages etc for a living thinks it's a mess and designed for geeks not crinklies :)
Hopefully it doesn't all go to Facebook- I keep FB for business only, to stay sane :)
S
For advice about Birding, Identification,field guides, binoculars, scopes, tripods, etc - put 'Birding Tips' into the search box
I certainly hope the RSPB community forum continues, as I use facebook very little. But what has worried me is the lack of the moderators Imput lately and after reading a number of posts about this subject in this thread, I hope this is not a sign that this forum is going to be discontinued.
Regards,
Ian.
Have 'tidied' a little. Hope this meets with approval. We (the moderators) are around and are reading posts.
Claire
Thanks MrsT. A useful bit of housekeeping.
What about putting a line in the How To thread about ensuring that the Content Editor is set to Enhanced under the Settings>Advanced Options tab. A lot of people still seem to have problems posting photos.