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Hello everybody,
In an effort to keep Talkback tidy and structured, we're thinking of changing the categories slightly, but I wanted to hear everybody's thoughts before changing anything.
"Members general chat" is by far the most popular category at the moment, I suspect because the comments are not public, but that makes that category rather a mixed bag and finding a particular thread can be difficult.
Let me know what you think about these suggestions, particularly as to what should and shouldn't be private:
Introduce yourself - Intros, profiles, link your website, etc - PRIVATE THREAD (Exists as "Welcome writers" )
Official postings - forum rules, WM/WN info, etc
Talkback Help
Website problems
Announcements (to incorporate "WN and WM" )
Writing topics
Exercises, critiques - For online exercises or comments on each other's writing PRIVATE THREAD (Exists as "Writing exercises" )
Poetry - Discuss your poetry (Exists as "Writing poetry" )
Writing problems - Where writers help writers with prose problems (Exists as "Writing Problems" )
News and queries- Topics and articles of direct interest to writers, including market information, competitions, and questions about the business of writing (To incorporate existing "Writing queries" and "Writers World" )
Writing tales - Don't be shy, spread your good news, tips, advice and encouragement (to incorporate "Writing successes" and "Writing Tales" )
Reading - Discuss your favourite books, articles, and other writing (Exists as "Writers and Readers" )
Off-topic (ALL PRIVATE)
General chat
Writers' Break - jokes, games, links and articles unrelated to writing
Comments
At a quick glance though, the categories (and which are private) seem okay to me.
(Would it be possible to hover the mouse over an option on the drop down list of categories, and read what it covers and whether it is open or private?)
There have been a lot of items I've posted that should have gone into a specific category, but knowing how discussions can develop and go on to include stuff that it is better not to have picked up by Google- I've erred on the side of caution and put it in the Members General Chat. Obviously that makes it harder to locate threads.
Yes a category for competions announcements wiould be useful.
Not sure whether you can get a mouseover effect on a dropdown list, so if not, perhaps we'll look at doing the list differently.
Also at present all recently posted threads come up by default. I know each one has a category heading but would it be better to arrange the page according to categories rather than most recently posted? That way anyone new to the site will immediately see where to find things. If someone posts in the wrong category a Mod can move it.
It would be good to have a "private" catagory, like the exercises one, where we can post our work and get feedback/ critiques from our TB friends.
*SA*
A front page that goes to the groups worked well on the old original board- that way you could choose to go to a specific section or go to all of them in one.
Personally, I like to see the latest postings straight away after logging in. It's one less click than choosing a category first. Personally I'm not that fussed about categories except when I'm posting a new discussion.
Oh, and is there a way threads can be removed by the original poster? For example, sometimes I post details of jobs related to writing that have definitive end dates. They're irrelevant after a while and could throw out search results. Thank you.
Or like the current 'error, let this drop' thread that hasn't. :)
Sure your capabilities will come up with a happy for all situation :)
As to private threads, I think there should be a private one for discussing poetry and also one for prose, aside from the proposed writing exercises. The reason behind my thought is that sometimes one wants to post a chunk of personal work for feedback. As this is obviously not yet ready for publication I, personally, and I am fairly sure many others, would not want this in the public domain.
I would like to see a category for competitions. It would make them so much easier to find! (even the mag has a separate booklet for comps once a year!)
A competitions thread is a good idea, too.
I would prefer the default page to be the category page as it used to be. This doesnt have to mean we lose the current All Categories page on the old system the default page of categories included All Categories you could click on.
It would be good to see a return to thread topics being posted in their correct categories (as far as possible). The current muddle makes checking threads I might be interested in very time consuming. We all acknowledge that a lot of the muddle has resulted from over-use of the non-googleable Writers General Chat category, hence my preference for making all the writing topics private.
(And then you wouldn't have to worry about checking which ones are private or public either.)
We will always help someone out if they are having problems, but if the info is there we can quickly direct them to it if they have missed it.
*applause* I've been asking for this for years, but have generally been shouted down :)
I like Lolli's idea of a "10 threads most recently posted on" as well, though I suspect most of the time these will be the long-running joke threads!
As for the issue of where to post work-in-progress for comment: perhaps it would be a little more explicit if the thread was labelled "Writing feedback" or "Feedback and critique" rather than the present "Exercises"?
I'd rather not make all the categories private, as we would be unlikely to appeal to casual visitors if they can't see what goes on in the forum, but will post a revised list of categories when I get chance, taking as many suggestions as possible into account.
One thing I will definitely do is add labels to the category names, so that is easier to see whether you're private or public eg. "Members General chat (Private)"
That label adding will go a long way to helping.
It would have been better to have been able to click on a link and that opened the list- like we do when we post a link here and we can open it from where we are, but I assume that wasn't possible.
I'll put a new thread up explaining everything when we're sorted.
I feel liberated ...... wheeeeeeeeee :)