1. What we've learned from interacting with really active forums is that owners want the user to just post the content. Then the moderators can do the rest of the work. Their primary focus is content generation and engaging users. They don't want their users to be confused and get demotivated to post. The heavy lifting of organizing it can be done by their paid staff.
I really disagree with that. On a busy forum you should not need a mass of moderators just to do the following every day of the year:
- move many off topic posts out of threads
- move many threads to the correct forum
- add thread titles to threads currently titles 'an urgent question'
- move threads/posts from forum to other content types(profiles,conversations, blog, articles, wiki, tickets, etc) and vice-versa. Mind that often there is no functionality for this.
We do not have any paid staff on my big board. You are assuming a perspective that does not apply universally.
3. What about the What's New page? Doesn't that help?
It requires one page with all new (relevant) content, in an organized layout, with refreshing. 'Whats new' unfortunately doesn't come close. What we need is something that looks like new-posts, showing any content type of relevance. In XF1 I use a modified recent-activity with auto-refresh and lots of events hidden in there. Which helps somewhat. But it also shows unread content and its not visible to guests. In XF2 we can make it visible to guests which is a step forward.
5. This is also something that I've been thinking of solving as a ML problem. A recommendation engine for forums which categorizes its users and when somebody who matches their persona interacts on a thread, they receive a notification.
There is a developer working on something similar. However, when there is no interaction it should already be clear what content a member is interested in. There should be profile functionality for this.
It doesnt just relate to forums, but addon content is just as important. I think that addon content will become dominant over forum content in coming years. I am already seeing a shift on my big board.
6. Create a new page wherever you think that it's suitable and easier for user to upgrade. Maybe add a template modification linking to the page just below an ad(where the upgrade removes the ad).
We will never run ads.
You cannot link to a specific user upgrade.
There needs to be different upgrades for single payment, recurring, and one for each term. In reality its just the same upgrade. This makes any upgrade page messy. if you have 4 upgrades, available as single payment and recurrent and in 6 terms, then you have 48 upgrades on a page instead of just 4.
A user upgrade cannot be upgraded to a higher one. Lets say a member has a $5 a month upgrade subscription and they want to change that to $10, then this is not possible. They will need to cancel the first one.
This is why you will often end up with 48 upgrades, so that users can see the different options they have.
Anyway, my point is that if a function is not available, because its a paid function, then there needs to be a button for members to buy it. They should not need to go find out that they can get the function, how they can get the function and where. It should be simple: click and buy.
7. How do you think that it can it be automatized?
That is a broad question as it pertains to a lot of things. I have posted a lot of suggestions on the topic.
Almost all moderator functions should follow the same KISS rules:
- All information the moderator needs for a decision should be presented to the moderator without having to look it up. For example: always display accounts on the same IP when looking at a report or giving a warning. Or display homepage for users awaiting moderation. Or if members report Spam, then prefix the report as such so that moderators know they need to address this report first.
- Resolving the situation should be in a few clicks. (like the spam cleaner or predefined replies in @NixFifty 's Tickets)
An example of how moderation actions can be automatized:
https://xenforo.com/community/threads/wmtech-sticky-multiple-account-info-paid.72646/page-10
Another example is in
@NixFifty 's tickets which can automatically post a predefined reply if the user posts a specific text phrase.
Another example would be that if more than X members in usergroup Y report a post as Spam, then moderate post and if more than X members in usergroup Z report a post as spam then trigger the spam cleaner.