What are the benefits of the Follow feature in XF?

[Ludachris]

Outside of the News Feed, are there any other benefits to following members in XF? Can you search content of only those you follow? Can you start a discussion and easily limit it to only people you follow or those who follow me? Can you start conversations with those you follow or follow you? How can one use the follow feature most effectively in a forum? What other ways can you interact ONLY with those you follow or those who follow you? Can you limit notifications or alerts to ONLY those you follow?

Seems like the Follow feature has a lot of potential to be very powerful in how a user browses content and interacts with others, similar to social networking.

 

[Mendalla]

Watching with interest as no one on my forum, including yours truly, has ever used it much.

 

[Ludachris]

Watching with interest as no one on my forum, including yours truly, has ever used it much.

How do you track who uses that feature anyway? I can't find any reporting for it in the admin panel. I couldn't tell you how much it's used unless I ask the members, or login as them, or check profiles individually. It would be nice to see how many members have people on their Follow list, or how many members are being Followed. Though since it really only seems to affect the New Feed I'm not sure many forum members really feel the need to use it.

Personally, I feel like this feature has good potential to offer a customized user experience for people who might enjoy interacting with a smaller group of people within a large forum, even if it's just part of the time. It's one of the biggest benefits of participating in social networks obviously - the ability to shape what content you see and who you can share your content with. If we can give them a way to further control what content they browse and by whom, along with allowing them to define who they share their content with, we can bridge the gap between those who are drawn more to social network environments over forums.

 

[Tom]

How do you track who uses that feature anyway?

Check users' profiles - all followers/followed users are listed there? Alternatively, could check the DB table directly if you're only looking for a quantity.

 

[Ludachris]

Check users' profiles - all followers/followed users are listed there? Alternatively, could check the DB table directly if you're only looking for a quantity.

Spot checking will give you a small data point sure, but maybe checking the db table will help give a better picture of total usage.

 

[webbouk]

I think it's also got the potential for trolling

Some members seem to get a bee in their bonnet over a specific member and if they had the option to 'follow' them I can see it causing problems

 

[Ludachris]

True - we have an "Ignore Member" feature that members can use due to that scenario.

 

[dethfire]

I get a lot of confusion of what it does and mostly people wanted to block people from following them for privacy.

 

[Masetrix]

I get a lot of confusion of what it does and mostly people wanted to block people from following them for privacy.

The same here.

 

[Silmarillion]

I get a lot of confusion of what it does and mostly people wanted to block people from following them for privacy.

#metoo

An option like in vB3 should definitely be offered, which allows individual users to be blocked. Or you have to accept the follow-request so that they can follow you. All major social media channels offer this. Our members don't like the current regulation at all and are annoyed about it.