Suggestion re: reorganizing forum categories

[Helen Glazer]

Hi all,

I've noticed that since the move from list to forum MapHist isn't "working" as well for me. When I used to post a query, I'd get at least one response. Now they seem to disappear into the Internet ether and I don't know if no one has an answer for me or no one is seeing them. I also feel that the current forum organization is too fragmented -- some questions don't fall so neatly into 19th vs. 20th century for example. So what do you do? Post twice? What if instead of all the subcategories, you had two: "Announcements & News" (which also would encompass "Maphist Forum" and "Miscellany") and "History of Cartography." And if instead of one reminder until you logged in again, you could get a daily digest of "Still Active Discussions" that had new posts, like LinkedIn forums do (see example below)?

Regards,
Helen

FROM: Scientist Artist Collaborations
SUBJECT: [6] Comments on LinkedIn

July 14, 2012
Still Active Discussions (2)

Short video document of my mural art project at CERN
Started by Josef Kristofoletti
3 new comments

Is scientific knowledge when used by an artist to create considered a science art collaboration? I'm wondering what this forum means by collaboration. Any incite would be appreciated.
Started by bill smith
3 new comments

[Jay L]

I certainly agree with your opinion on how the new forum is not "working". I really miss the listserv version of MapHist. As far as your posts getting lost in the ether, that's not the case. Are they being seen? There's a column in each forum that shows how many views each topic has had. With the old MapHist, everyone received the email, whether or not they actually read it. Now, unless one chooses email notifications and/or diligently scours the forum on a regular or at least occasional basis, one can easily miss the posts. I activated email notification for just about everything for fear I might miss something of interest. Unfortunately, the emails don't always have sufficient info for me to know if a new post is or is not of interest to me.


Suggestion re: reorganizing forum categories
by Helen Glazer » 17 Jul 2012, 10:41 1 Replies 5 Views Last post by Jay L 17 Jul 2012, 11:12

[Helen Glazer]

Hi Jay,

I posted two in 19th century cartography, one in May and one in June. The one in May got 103 views, the one in June 43 views. 103 is decent, but 43 doesn't sound like a whole lot to me given the size of this list. Of course, I know that just because someone receives an email doesn't mean they opened it -- I probably didn't open 90% of the Maphist emails when it was a list because I could see by the subject line that it wasn't something I needed to attend to. But I still had a daily snapshot of what was going on, and I definitely read more of them then than now. It was less effort to keep track of the discussions that way.

--Helen

[LuisRobles]

I have the same feeling. This forum is much less lively than the MapHist listserv. I am in favor of reducing the number of categories, as proposed, but doubt that such a move would be enough to improve things significantly.

I think the problem is deeper. A "community of practice" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_of_practice) had formed over the years around the MapHist listserv, but the migration to a different format somehow impaired communication between its members. Why? First of all I see technical reasons:

• I guess that everybody who is reading this knows how to write an e-mail. Posting to this forum, on the other hand, is more complicated. (e.g. how does one associate a hyperlink with a word or phrase? where is the help on how to use the editor?)
• E-mails can be downloaded, read and replied to off line, using Outlook or similar software. A forum requires access to the internet to read and, what is more cumbersome, to write replies.
• E-mails can be read from a cell phone. Navigating a forum from a cell phone is a challenge for one's eyes and fingers.
• While e-mails come to you, forum posts you have to go find them.

Besides I suspect there also exist psychological reasons:

• E-mails gave a false impression of privacy whereas in the forum it is clear that every post is written for the entire internet forever. I say 'false' because I often read mails to MapHist whose authors seemed to believe that only subscribers to the list could read them. In actual fact MapHist's e-mail archives are public so anybody can read what any of us wrote (which by the way I find great for future research).
• Anonymity was allowed in the listserv but not in this forum.
• Having to go through the list of forum categories in order to select the one on which to post requires some time and thought. This may prevent the type of spontaneous messages (e.g. "have you seen this???") that sometimes popped up in the listserv.

Feel free to brainstorm other reasons. If we agree on the diagnostic then maybe we can think of possible solutions.
Best.

[John Docktor]

The solution is to go back to a listserv service. I preferred the old maphist listserv format. I might check this forum once every two weeks and I miss the timely posting of messages.

John Docktor

[Strebe]

Honestly I do not miss the frivolous postings that the list serve encouraged. Liveliness consisting of stream-of-thought and spontaneous chiming in did not contribute to my enjoyment of the list. I deal with a lot of e-mail during a typical day. Meanwhile very little content on MapHist is, or ever was, sensitive to time. If MapHist is important to me, then I am willing to check it now and then. If it is not important to me then I don’t know why I would care anyway. Sure enough, I check it now and then.

Just so people understand there is an alternative perspective…

Regards,
— daan Strebe

[MatthewEdney]

For Jon and others -- if you are concerned about missing new posts, because you login to this bulletin board only occasionally, then you should set your user profile so that the board sends you an email whenever a new post is made -- unfortunately, you have to do this for each category, I think. I do it for several categories (18c, new books, etc.).

Of course, this is still an imperfect solution.

Best,

Matthew

[Helen Glazer]

And that's my point -- I do what you suggest, and it's not working for me. Too many categories, and you only get an email the first time a new post is made in a given category. After that, unless you log in, you don't. If there's not going to be a listserv again, I'd rather have an email for each post. I never found it a problem to go through a list of emails and delete the ones with subject lines that didn't interest me without reading them. That takes a lot less time than going through the various forum categories.

--Helen

[quote="MatthewEdney"]For Jon and others -- if you are concerned about missing new posts, because you login to this bulletin board only occasionally, then you should set your user profile so that the board sends you an email whenever a new post is made -- unfortunately, you have to do this for each category, I think. I do it for several categories (18c, new books, etc.).

Of course, this is still an imperfect solution.

[Doug Fisher]

Hello Matthew,

There is an easy to install mod for phpBB forums called Board Watch which I believe would provide the feature Helen is requesting.

http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/board_watch/

I am not certain which version of phpBB this site uses, but the mod is compatible with phpBB versions 3.0.4, 3.0.6, and 3.0.8.

Here is the description of the mod:

This mod gives users a 'board watch' option to receive notifications for posts made anywhere on the site (analogous to forum watch but for the entire board). Each user can choose between two ways for board watch to work: (1) send notification of the first post since the user's last visit and send no further notifications until the user revisits the site (analogous to the way forum watch and topic watch work) or (2) send notifications of all posts. In addition, each user can choose whether forum watch and topic watch work in the normal phpbb3 way (analogous to (1) above) or instead send notifications of all posts or replies in the subscribed forums or topics. The ability to choose between these two ways of working for boardwatch. forum watch and topic watch can be turned off in the acp. This mod also slightly changes the wording of the regular phpbb3 notifications to let recipients know how to change their notification settings, and it changes the post links in those notifications so that they lead to the earliest unread post in the topic in question (which I think is a more logical destination than the most recent post in the topic).

-Doug

[Helen Glazer]

That does provide the feature I'm looking for! I wonder if it can be added here.

--Helen

[quote="Doug Fisher"]Hello Matthew,

There is an easy to install mod for phpBB forums called Board Watch which I believe would provide the feature Helen is requesting.

http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/board_watch/