Mr Lucky
Well-known member
I think they could be more useful if they weren't going so fast.
This one I didn't understand, it looks like stock xenforo reactions so I wondered what is new or different about it
Looking for feedback: A new look at forum user experience
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This one I didn't understand, it looks like stock xenforo reactions so I wondered what is new or different about it
NetDoc
Active member
Again, you missed the point. That's OK, perhaps it's a point that you don't need to get.
If I go on a dive boat in the Keys, I'm going to get harangued about posting on FB and TA. They push me to push them. Their returns will be minimal because there's just no Google-fu associated with FB. In fact, I've never heard anyone say "I'm going to FaceBook my next destination!"
They Google it. Too often, we go after the end-user who has no advertising budget, while we're ignoring the very people who can send divers my way and benefit a lot more from that. I'm trying to get to the dive-ops and manufacturers with limited success. The one thing I haven't been able to give them is something that would make their jobs a bit easier, allow them their FB fantasies, but still get them to promote content on ScubaBoard. That's the magic brush I want. I want a way for them to leverage their time on ScubaBoard and reach all the platforms, including Google-fu. I've wanted this for 20+ years.
My Google-fu is the only thing that keeps me alive. and relevant. Without it, I would wither and fold. You might want me to just give up, but I'm not into that at all. ScubaBoard has always been an experiment and I have fun figuring this all out. Hey, you don't understand the nuance here or see it as a benefit to you: fine. So, ignore me and my little pipe dream. The Tom Sawyer approach has been my Social Media guide for two decades now. It works better if you give them the tools (brush) to do your work. Make it fun and even the laziest of users will join right in.
Max Fridman
Well-known member
I don't understand, basically you want a way so your users can share their discussions on your forum easily maybe on thread creation?
Feeds has the option to include a "Forum list" tab, which gives you the normal XF forum list page. You can make that the default tab for all users. Your users can then manually change the default tab if they like.
Another option is to make the "Forum list" the default tab for all existing users, but make another tab the default for new users and guests.
So I think Feeds is friendly enough to the legacy users who can basically ignore the various feeds entirely if they like.
NetDoc
Active member
Are they users? Yes. But they are also Scuba professionals catering to Scuba divers. I want to make it easier for the instructor to post about his classes, for the dive guide to share his underwater pics... and for THEM to push the rank and file divers to my site. I have plenty of professionals on my site, but it's so far been too cumbersome for them to use me as their PRIMARY social media platform to get them to post a lot. They are the influencers in my industry. Every diver idolizes them, their gear, and their lifestyle. My traffic would grow as they start to use my platform. Without the easy brush, that's nigh on to imposible.
Dixie McCall
Well-known member
Hey @Mike Creuzer I'm just wondering what your thoughts are on the recent Facebook announcement and their future tech plans as it relates to forums and the viability of the standard forum format?
Thank you and I hope you're doing great!
Thank you and I hope you're doing great!
Hey thanks! Hope you're doing well also!
We all like to hate Facebook. They are an easy target, in fact I find a lot of people push whatever social issues, relationship issues, anxieties etc onto Facebook in general as a scapegoat. If we stop and recognize that if not the current Facebook then some other company will be playing the role Facebook is doing then I suppose we can start to see it more as the tool it really is rather than an abstraction of society itself. And when we do that we can all determine if its the right tool for us. They were one of the first so yes they have a leg up indeed, but others will come. And others will, and do, have the same issues. I do theorize that attacking the root of this, ie perhaps not having a company at the heart of any social platform, is the true solution, but perhaps for another day. Something Im quite curious about and will share more at some point as I learn more. But moving on.
I mean even look here at XenForo.com's community forums. Scale this up into the billions and I dont think this would be any better than Facebook, arguably quite worse. It has nothing to do with the tools, or whatever else, and everything to do with perception, emotions and how people feel when they are on a platform, who is there with them, whether they are making money or prospering there, etc. You can find that anywhere: school, work, the park, online forums, facebook as it is, and yes the metaverse
. If you as an individual do not find that the love is there and that you don't wish to entertain, learn, socialize in that space, then you won't and I highly suspect that means there are plenty of others like you. Enough people share that opinion and the dynamic shifts entirely.And therein lies the power of the internet I suppose.
In summary, while I personally believe in the opposite almost literally as what Facebook is proposing, I won't not give it a chance just because I think I know better than everyone else. If its great, fantastic. If its not, then we'll all know soon enough.
Freddie
Active member
When it comes to Gen Z, using my own children as markers, Reddit is where their toe-dipping into forums starts and ends. I really don't believe anything you do with the forum interface is going to change that. Marketing a forum to them is going to continue to be a crapshoot in my opinion.
Millenials and on down can see the value of a forum is contained in the wealth of specific information that the forum caters to and a properly fostered community. I believe that Gen Z will come to appreciate this as they age and their worldview adjusts.
There will always exist a market for a targeted forum. One where an invested owner stamps an attractive personality over the enterprise. Where an active moderation team fosters an inclusive community.
We should continue to move the interface to what everyone has become accustomed to interacting with on their phone. It's not a dumbing down, but rather playing catch up with what is now popular, across all age groups. Just like you can't strike a new word from a dictionary because you don't like it, you can't control where smartphones have taken us, how people prefer to interface.
Millenials and on down can see the value of a forum is contained in the wealth of specific information that the forum caters to and a properly fostered community. I believe that Gen Z will come to appreciate this as they age and their worldview adjusts.
There will always exist a market for a targeted forum. One where an invested owner stamps an attractive personality over the enterprise. Where an active moderation team fosters an inclusive community.
We should continue to move the interface to what everyone has become accustomed to interacting with on their phone. It's not a dumbing down, but rather playing catch up with what is now popular, across all age groups. Just like you can't strike a new word from a dictionary because you don't like it, you can't control where smartphones have taken us, how people prefer to interface.
Frode789
Well-known member
I think this is a very important topic. For my case, Reddit is definitely the number one competitor. It's so easy and fast to find new content.. Especially from mobile. XF on mobile is definitely behind there.. I use Reddit a lot myself.
I think we really need a proper "feed page" with all content types (filter if desired), real time live updates, content easily upvoted (liked) from feed page, easy to create new content directly from this page etc.. Happy to see @Kier sharing some of these UX challenges, hopefully they have something cool in store for us in XF 2.3 =)
I think we really need a proper "feed page" with all content types (filter if desired), real time live updates, content easily upvoted (liked) from feed page, easy to create new content directly from this page etc.. Happy to see @Kier sharing some of these UX challenges, hopefully they have something cool in store for us in XF 2.3 =)
Wildcat Media
Well-known member
I was just thinking about this as well, but from a different angle.
I've been in forums back from the days when they were text-only, such as on CompuServe and GEnie. While we had forums built on wwwboard (or its offshoots) on the text-based web, UBB came along and changed that up for the better.
So no, changing up the forum interface isn't going to do any of us longtime users any good at all. We were around before the Reddits, the social media sites, etc. were around, and millions of users still using the reliable old format have no issues finding what they need. At all.
My thinking now is to let the young 'uns learn our ways. We need not dumb our forums down to meet them at their level. So no, I'm not about to change up anything that will piss off most users of all the forums I operate. Forums aren't broken, and they don't need a new interface. XenForo styles which modify and rearrange the existing layout in a more organized fashion, and/or adapt them more easily for mobile use (so users aren't forced to download apps on their phones), are always welcome here.
In fact, I will say that I'm somewhat interested in the AC.UI theme that ThemeHouse/Audentio introduced, as it makes some changes to the layout that I like, and also makes the mobile interface even better. But the one thing that makes me avoid it for now is that it is in beta, with no clear path forward as to whether or not it will ever be a paid product we can afford...or even available at all, as its status is vague. I'm not about to put all the dozens of hours of lost billable hours into restyling it for our branding, only to have the rug pulled out from under us again.
No rug was pulled from anywhere. We stopped selling a specific selection of add-ons on a per-license per-year basis as we've done for now 15 years. We are still going to support anyone who purchased them for 18 months from when we stopped selling certain add-ons. Lifetime licenses were never guaranteed, ever. And we only removed add-ons that really didn't need to be supported much anymore (we open sourced them) so others can sell them if they wish, and they have. I actually think maybe ALL are supported now by other resource devs, at least most. I also stated that if anyone needed help to simply make a ticket with us and we'd do what we can. But that all gets missed of course.
I couldnt disagree more, but it depends on who you mean to please. Do you wish to keep current power users happy? Dont change a thing, ever. Do you wish to attract more people, thus hopefully allowing easier monetization and growth opporunities? Change for the better. So I suppose I agree with you if you want to simply keep power users happy and not account for people changing how they consume content. But otherwise, couldnt disagree more in general sentiment as I think when people look to make change at all its to invest in the future of their site, make more money, make progress, attract new users, be competitive, the list goes on.
For moving forward I'm still somewhat interested in releasing AC.UI, and if we did it'd be a free license. But Im hesitant to do really anything here anymore. Time will tell I guess. Maybe the folks at Tesla Motor Club can share their experience with AC.UI/Feeds (as they have it live at https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/) - I talked with them today and they seem to be using it well. They even added their own blog feed.
Max Fridman
Well-known member
This it's not ideal from a business perspective, i work for reduce uncertainty not for making things more complicated to manage. AC.UI + Feeds is an approach i personally id like to implement in our site (Xenforo still doens't have a proper "Newsfeed") but id like to have a clear statement about it (open source? yearly costs? free for ever?) and development schedule (no commit to updates? 2 updates per year minimum?) before committing to it.
Redoing all our theme is a big thing plus integrating a deep change in our infrastructure is a big commitment for an indefinite period of time, probably for ever if our users like it.
Looking forward to read more from Audentio.
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Well I would, but its XenForo style hystorically at least to kinda launch big things as a surprise and one of my concerns, or at least thoughts, is that they will release some type of large new theme update in 2.3 and I kinda (just based on being here for 12 years) think they have taken a close look at our feeds system and might attempt their own. If they end up not doing that or something, maybe we release it for free and supported indefinitely.
But Im tired of building something, having the "rug pulled out" on the time we invested in that, and having to do a "Plus" version of it which requires complex data migrations, removal of features, complex code checking on dozens of permutations, support needs from everyone who adopted it but now (rightfully so) wants to use the native version, etc. Other developers may be OK with that type of work, but its just not something Im interested in personally. The straw that broke the camels back on I suppose us releasing things blindly (without waiting for XF roadmaps) here was when I asked Chris if they had plans of doing a native app, he made no mention of a web app and essentially gave me his blessing, and not 4 days later this thread was launched. So yeah, Im hesitant. Im going to see what the HYSs are and go from there.
So this thread serves more as a discussion on some of those ideas Ive had for XenForo. Yes there could be a product in the RM at some point, but Id (I hope reasonably) prefer to wait to see what XF has cooking up
Max Fridman
Well-known member
This hurts again because we should have one, or at least a Trello with planned features without a specific timeline, running a forum is becoming complex and this platform (that i personally like) still let me and my fellow admins in the dark. We are trying to spend our time developing things that Xenforo will probably never implement and hope for the best, but i can see that trying to anticipate the "base version" of a framework is tiresome.
We will wait together, developers and admins. I hope that at some point the Xenforo team abandon their HYS type of reveal and give us a light in the darkness.
For the record, you absolutely did contact me and you absolutely did ask if we had any plans of doing a native app, and I gave you a candid answer on the point you asked about - a native app. I confirmed it was something we had discussed, but there were no immediate plans, and I explained what might be our approach if we decided to work on a native app.
Are you trying to claim that the very simple nature of a PWA - a web standard - is in any way comparable to the complex nature of a native app which would need to be developed and maintained for two major operating systems? I know that you're more intelligent than that, and you know full well there is a world of difference between the two.
If you'd have asked me specifically about whether there were plans to implement a PWA - given clearly the proximity of the announcement was close - I absolutely would have mentioned it. But the difference between a native app and a PWA is so stark, it didn't even cross my mind to.
We welcome criticism and your criticism is as valid as any other feedback and we will always take that on board and strive to do better. But this is frankly one of the most disingenuous things I've ever read, made worse by the fact that in the nearly two-years since, this is the first I'm hearing of that specific interaction being an issue for you.
Well I could screenshot the conversation but to my knowledge that would be against XF rules and probably for the best. Its an app, and the coincidence you would respond without mentioning it and four days later release a PWA, its just not "cool" at least and I think thats not a leap to assume that if I ask a question regarding apps you might casually mention that. Nothing I would have said would have changed it nor would I want to have changed it, I was asking and nothing more what the plans were. It just clearly showed how resource authors could expect to be treated and Ill interpret that as I will, right or wrong. I am but a mere member here and replying to someone asking why we arent releasing anything new or if/when we are, and justifying that decision. Not everyone would agree, but that doesnt matter as its my own justification for how I feel.
We can debate whether something should or should not have crossed your mind, but it is what it is. But that type of behavior made it so I, personally, do not feel comfortable releasing anything until I see the HYS videos or roadmaps. Thats my personal opinion on it.
I know you know the rules, but it'd be great if I didn't feel I needed to quote the official rules as to how people should be interacting with each other. You likely will argue if I dont type this that its not passive agressive, but I'd prefer to get ahead of the issue as this is after all your community space. Let alone the fact Im not even arguing what you are claiming I am, a strawman argument I think they are called?
The fact you think a web app and a native app, which both service similar UX fundamental goals (such as a home screen icon, push notifications, etc), was not worth mentioning is your business. You have every right to treat people that are politely asking for information with whatever information you choose, and I have every right to disagree with the way you went about it. The technical differences are not at all the point I am making, I've never said they are and most of your post is with respect to that. Ive no issue with PWA from XF (it makes complete sense), I have issue with specifically how I was treated and that leads to how I choose or do not choose to release more products here. It is quite that simple.
I spoke with Mike/Kier about it fyi. Im not asking for anything to be done about it at all, I just voiced my feedback is all
Thanks for the reply as always!
Walter
Well-known member
Come on... I feel you but.... Its not an app. Its a compromise, a link on the screen, but in no way would any developer speak of this as an app.
Anatoliy
Well-known member
You mean it's not a native app. Otherwise it should be renamed into PWnotA. )
Forsaken
Well-known member
There are trade offs between native apps and PWA, but PWA close the gap between just a responsive forum and offering some form of native app experience enough that most people do not need a native app. Native applications cannot offer support for every mod easily, while a PWA can; PWA cannot offer full feature integration to phones, while a native app can. The experience can be vastly different, depending on the application.
I get where Mike is coming from, especially when you consider that his overhead is drastically higher than every other developer is on this platform due to the number of people working at ThemeHouse/Audentio. At the very least, tens of thousands were probably invested into the native app solution they had worked on to only have a PWA release, and this is after several other add-ons they had developed were also integrated into the core such as reactions and one or two others. There are some features that have been added to the core that developers had to integrate, which required giving up their own implementations which were arguably better.
Lack of transparency has always been a complaint, and has been something that has been requested from resource providers. When you cannot make informed business decisions on where you spend your time, you just will not spend your time on something
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They spent tens of thousands on a native app solution in the time between when I was asked about a native app and us announcing the PWA functionality i.e. four days? Come on now...
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