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wigglesmalibu

Talker

Joined: Feb 11, 2009
Posts: 94

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 21, 2009 - 10:54 PM
Post subject: Allow voting on Comments

People should be allowed to approve or disapprove comments made on the forums. Much like YouTube you can have a thumbs up or thumbs down icon to click on. This will allow many posters to express their opinion without having to weigh in with a repetitive or trashy comment.

I've seen some websites move their forums to this model and the quality of comments improves (as people psychologically want approval...thumbs up) and trashy/idiotic comments are minimized (nobody want 50 thumbs down next to their name) Also the volume of comments cuts to about half.

This is crucial because ShanghaiExpats' search feature has been rendered useless as a specific search query often results in 30,000 - 50,000 matches which are completely unrelated. This means that when a person can't find the info he's looking for ....he simply posts the topic again compounding the problem.

Also once this is fixed, there should a forum search bar on the home page. You shouldn't have to click twice from the homepage to get to it. Next, the moderators should delete as many useless posts as possible.

Congrats on establishing a quasi-monopoly on expat forums in SH. Now please fix this barbaric site.

p1atl10

Shanghai Royalty

Joined: Mar 18, 2005
Posts: 8585
Location: Shanghai
Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 22, 2009 - 12:21 AM

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Magnolia
Board Biatch

Joined: June 01, 2004
Posts: 31550

Posted: Sep 28, 2009 - 10:31 AM

start your own site and you will no longer be subjected to the barbaric shanghaiexpat.

the information can be found if one knows how to search.

btw... one of the reasons this site has a strong following in shanghai is because it is not stictly an informational site. a lot of people are friends.... it is the human interaction and connection between users that make this site strong.

wigglesmalibu

Talker

Joined: Feb 11, 2009
Posts: 94

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 28, 2009 - 05:26 PM

Magnolia wrote:

btw... one of the reasons this site has a strong following in shanghai is because it is not stictly an informational site. a lot of people are friends.... it is the human interaction and connection between users that make this site strong.

That's stating the obvious. You have completely misunderstood the concept.

Don't worry you can still troll these forums under the 'voting' scheme. The reason why all the top web sites allow voting on comments is because it enhances the readers experience thus increasing traffic. The reader can save time by selecting the most popular/useful comments to view first. Are your comments so vile and useless that you are afraid of having it judged?

The fact of the matter is that in some discussions people feel the need to paraphrase comments just to strengthen one side of the arguement. More often than not they will be just as happy voting on the comment they agree with.

The search feature is often useless. You can sometimes search for the info you're looking for if you're willing to scroll through 30 pages of results.

bhbernstein

Reacher

Joined: July 28, 2009
Posts: 347

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 28, 2009 - 06:05 PM

If you approve of disapprove a comment, you can always use the quotation and then post your own comment. OR you can just slam the poster

Swiss-James

Post Roaster

Joined: Jan 05, 2007
Posts: 4323

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 28, 2009 - 06:14 PM

Wiggles- this forum is based on the MaxDev forum software which I don't think supports voting on posts. Migrating such a huge site to different forum software would be a massive task, and since like you say- this board dwarfs any rivals, I'm not sure why the owners would take the risk.

Which forums have you seen that allow voting on posts? A comments section is pretty different from a forum, I can't think of one that works on the thumbs up / thumbs down model.

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wigglesmalibu

Talker

Joined: Feb 11, 2009
Posts: 94

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 28, 2009 - 07:19 PM

James, the last time I spoke with the shanghaiexpat guys at their wed. mixer they mentioned that they are giving the site a complete makeover. It's not such a huge risk if you're currently redesigning the site.

Comments sections and forums are quite similar imo, people having a discussion or sharing opinions on a common topic. Off the top of my head, YouTube, The Economist, the Globe and Mail and Amazon are site's that allow readers to vote on comments.

Michael

Moderator

Joined: Mar 22, 2002
Posts: 6100

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 28, 2009 - 11:09 PM

It is a bit of risk.. but a bigger risk to stand still. We are migrating the forum, the userdb, the content to a brand new platform. We've been working on it for 6 months. forum migration is one of the first things we tackled and will be able to convert the current forum the day before launch. There will a lot of nifty new features, there will be bugs to work out. You will all see it soon. Hopefully within a month. Will be inviting some beta testers, let me know if you want to.

In terms of voting on comments.. I think voting on content is overrated. But there maybe a plugin for the forum we are working on. .will probably look at adding more features if there are stable plugins available, but after the launch and we get our initial rounds of feedback.

Swiss-James

Post Roaster

Joined: Jan 05, 2007
Posts: 4323

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 29, 2009 - 10:06 AM

Wiggles- I had a look at the sites you mentioned. All of them allow voting on comments, but don't have a forum- I've still yet to see a message board that allows voting.

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wigglesmalibu

Talker

Joined: Feb 11, 2009
Posts: 94

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 29, 2009 - 12:53 PM

lol ....i love debating trivial specifics. Again, comments and forums are much more similar than different. Do you disagree? Can the two benefit from similar strategies? Definitely worth investigating don't you think? but if you must know of a 'pure' forum model check out virtualtourist.com. I don't spend much time on 'forums' so i'll leave it up to you to do more research.

I'm not an internet pro but I think my suggestion merits consideration.....not just the it's too risky mindset. Or 'I haven't seen it applied to other forums so it must not be good', mentality. you can lead or you can follow James.

Michael

Moderator

Joined: Mar 22, 2002
Posts: 6100

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 29, 2009 - 01:00 PM

Probably a key factor is who has a written a plugin that works with our new board and if someone did, is it any good. If we had to develop it, it would never happen. There are probably ways to do something similar.. as with the social bookmarking sites.

Magnolia
Board Biatch

Joined: June 01, 2004
Posts: 31550

Posted: Sep 29, 2009 - 01:04 PM

hmmm... even the forums on virtualtourist.com don't allow for voting on comments/posts (they do allow for reporting) but i've not been on that site in a long time and couldn't be bothered to recall my log-in/password so am only viewing without logging in. while i may be wrong, i think Swiss-James was saying that the ability to vote on individual posts (thumbs up/thumbs down) in a forum is not prevelent. the ability to post comments (thumbs up/thumbs down) on comments has been around for ages. but this isn't a comment based site.

Swiss-James

Post Roaster

Joined: Jan 05, 2007
Posts: 4323

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 29, 2009 - 01:19 PM

Wiggles- I guess I'm coming at this from the point of view of a software engineer. SHExpat don't write their own forum software- and like Michael says, they ain't about to start.

It would be nice if every time I replied to a post, a lemon meringue pie popped out of my CD tray too.

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Magnolia
Board Biatch

Joined: June 01, 2004
Posts: 31550

Posted: Sep 29, 2009 - 01:28 PM

hush! don't be so barbaric!

Very Happy

Michael

Moderator

Joined: Mar 22, 2002
Posts: 6100

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 29, 2009 - 02:58 PM

Quote:

It would be nice if every time I replied to a post, a lemon meringue pie popped out of my CD tray too.

If you get that plugin.. send it over... Smile

wigglesmalibu

Talker

Joined: Feb 11, 2009
Posts: 94

Status: Offline

Posted: Sep 29, 2009 - 03:09 PM

Well it's been good learning a few things about this forum.....like how many people are dependent on it for their social well being.

But I still wonder how many more users could be attracted to this site if trolls didn't slam posters with serious questions 5 times before they get a useful reply. I guess its a trade off between bread and butter trolls or the occasional user who wants info and opinions from time to time.

Considering social dynamics and financial limitations perhaps it's not such a viable improvement after all.