(shouting)

1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Topics of particular note that tickle the fancy of users and mods alike.
Dan
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago

1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Dan »

These are proposals, not suggestions. I think the gazebo is a fine place for this thread. I guess this is a thread for discussing how to fix this terrible website. Here's an essay to get things started

These forums have been in decline just about as long as they've been in existence. However, several factors have recently hastened this decline to the point where it seems the forums may not see their third birthday. The problems are very simple, as are the solutions, which shall be explained below. However, first we must examine the issues keeping the talkhaus from realizing its true potential.

Since August 28, 2011, only 117 new users have registered. On that day, TLs4 enacted an unnecessary new rule in response to the recent flood of spambots – all new users must now post in the new user forum and their registration must be approved by an administrator. 117 users in 148 days. In another randomly-picked 148-day period, January 1, 2010 to May 29, 2010, 508 new users were registered (including yours truly). I understand that the spambot problem was getting out of hand, and this rule may be effective as a temporary solution, but there are simpler ways of dealing with it.

There are, at present, two forums-wide moderators, Argumentable and limepie20. Obviously these two could not control the spambot problem by themselves, and really, who can blame them? I propose removing the administrator approval rule and appointing new moderators. Of course, this does not address the issue of spambots registering. This is the current CAPTCHA for the forums: Image
This is easily circumvented and must be replaced. I propose tighter security measures at registration: a CAPTCHA that can't be solved by a one-year-old, perhaps, and additional questions – simple spelling or math questions, maybe – that make it more difficult for robotzz to register.

In almost three years of operation, only 2860 users have signed up, including spambots. That is less than half of raocow's total viewership. Only eighteen of these users have made more than 1000 posts. What was once a bustling forum full of bright-eyed fans united by their love of raocow has become a cynical shithole populated by a small number of regular users who scare off all prospective members. With the aforementioned restrictions removed, I predict that we will see an influx of new users, gradually breathing life back into these once-great forums. A broader, bigger userbase means a revitalized community and an end to all our problems. All we need is a spark – some kind of catalyst to get the ball rolling. I propose that raocow plug the forums again after these restrictions are lifted. The sudden spike in users will start a snowball effect that will make us great again.

Nobody signs up for this place because they don't see anything worth signing up for. Most of the users who signed up at the beginning have either become jaded, left or are only passively involved in the community. If these proposals are enacted, I predict that we will once again have a proper forum.

Title: 29 users (approx. 1%) account for 47622 posts, out of a total of 109570 – approximately 43% of all posts. January 1 to May 29: reporting period picked by http://www.random.org. All proposals concerning CAPTCHA and reconfiguring the registration system: I do not know, or claim to know, anything about computers or internet boxes or anything of the sort. It is very likely that these proposed changes would be impossible or ineffective. raocow's total viewership: averaged from all videos from the past week, excluding today's. The average number of views for each video is 6001. Margin of error on all statistics is “I don't care and I'm bad at math”. Take these numbers at face-value, and before you rage and post about how wrong I am, remember you're on a Youtube let's play forum.
User avatar
kilon
Posts: 3
Joined: 15 years ago
Location: Netherlands

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by kilon »

Take these numbers at face-value, and before you rage and post about how wrong I am, remember you're on a Youtube let's play forum.
Here is one of the bigger issues. It's just a forum for a youtuber with a relatively small fanbase.
And why would people register for this small forum with few active users when they can just sign up (or are already registered) at bigger forums that include a lot more diversity and users.
Time can be an issue for people. A big portion of posts in the introduction thread comes down to 'I'll see if I have the time to hang around'.

I do think it would be nice if this place would get fresh blood, and it could possibly help me become more active again. If it's possible to redo the whole register thing and greet people with open arms it's worth a try at the very least.
Image
Image
Image
Cup
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Cup »

This is a good conversation to have. The forums and irc haven't been great lately, but raocow's viewership has only been growing. It's hard for me to tell where the disconnect is.

I was having a short conversation with argue about this sort of thing just a moment ago, and people are still discussing ideas on irc if anyone would like to join in. A few things that have been suggested are:

-A possible chatbox via the irc that rena is looking into (if anything ever comes of that, one of us will probably get in touch with thissa about it over in the suggestions forum).

-Additional moderators that compliment argue's style and support community projects (Stupid fun stuff like talkhaus mosts).

-More promotion from raocow. Possibly explaining the new registration system and encouraging participation (I know several people have asked on his youtube channel about process so feature a video about it wouldn't go amiss).

-As well as a few techincal suggestions for catpca like reCAPTCHAor the more experimental asirra.

The forums were about as fun as a forum for an LPer could possibly be, but things dying down and changing is a natural progression. The thing is though, that shouldn't be happening yet. If the forums and raocow's youtube channel aren't experiencing similar growth, something's amiss. We need a kick in the pants here. I think a raocow video explaining the adoption of a new captcha system to simplify the process for interested viewers, along with the announcing/introduction of some new moderators might make this place more appealing for any curious users.
User avatar
Bean
Yep.
Posts: 4581
Joined: 14 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Bean »

I just think some people don't really have much to add other than things they say in YT comments. I also think that a part of the disconnect that you're talking about is that people only really want to watch raocow's daily episode.

I don't bother with the IRC because my connection's not exactly the greatest. I do think that less people joining up has to do with the new system, but I was getting so tired of marking spambots that were taking up the majority of front pages on here. I'll gladly take less noise if it's going to be that kind of garbage.

I always do find it amazing though that people still don't know that there are playlists for raocow's stuff right here on this very site. Look over his comments box page every now and then, and you'll see what I'm talking about.
User avatar
kilon
Posts: 3
Joined: 15 years ago
Location: Netherlands

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by kilon »

you didn't need to delete your post don. I still remember the days where mods where green. Good times.

And I'm sad the rest is gone forever.. it wasn't anything special but nostalgia can be weird. If only the internet archive had a snapshot around august 2009 or something...
Image
Image
Image
Dan
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Dan »

Yeah, basically what I'm saying is I'm just nostalgia-ing, but I think it's a Very Important Issue because I've sunk three years of my goddamn life into this place and I'm not ready for it to die

And it used to be so cool! Come on man let's make it cool again
Last edited by Dan 12 years ago, edited 1 time in total.
limepie20
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago
Location: Doesn't Matter

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by limepie20 »

Oh yeah I'm not a really a mod, by the way. I can only delete spambot posts outside of c.e.
Aposke
Banned
Posts: 0
Joined: 15 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Aposke »

You know what?
That's funny. I've written a long text about this exact problem just a few days ago as well.
I shall now post it here, but be reminded that it does not reflect upon what Wareng has posted here before, so it might have a slightly different focus.
Do you sometimes think about the future of the Talkhaus?

I know I do.

That there will be a time, sooner or later, when all of this will have to end, when people will gradually leave this site, these forums behind and move on, and together with them, we will have to move on as well.

We, the few people who have actually stuck, who have clung to this place because we found something here, something that enriched our lives to the point where we did not want to lose it, we, those people, will be forced to move along as well as this forum gets shut down.
It might be a few years until then, or it might only be months.

I've seen this happening, you've seen this happening, and it happens to almost every internet platform sooner or later. Sure, there's the big players, stuff like SomethingAwful, the Newgrounds forums, really any site that is connected to more than just one person.

But we only have that one person.
We only have raocow.

As soon as he stops LPing, which will inevitably happen in the foreseeable future, this forum will fall through an interdimensional rift, never to be seen again.

Right now, we're at our zenith. How long we stay here - or if we can get up even further - is determined by a lot of factors, but especially by three simple ones:

1. The number of new, active users joining,
2. The quality of the big projects the Talkhaus is and will be working on (A2MT),
3. And of course raocow's behavior.

As we look upon the three factors, it becomes clear that #1 is closely linked to the other two, so I will address this problem first:

Our user signup numbers are constantly stagnating.
Now, this is nothing unusual and not bad per se, but it shows that the forum life has kind of "settled down". The "regulars" have taken over most of the discussion in the gazebo and the art showcase, so naturally, newbies have somewhat of a hard time starting connections with other people and usually resent to "lurking" the forums, generally not posting more than once a week, or not at all.
Again, this is not untypical behavior and tends to happen to most forums out there. I encountered this phenomenon as well, and pretty much everyone joining after the beginning of 2010 has.

This brings me to another important point:
Forum evolution.

In 2009, when we started, we had a flock of ~200 users joining in merely 3 months. Most of them were direct raocow subscribers over Youtube, and we only had 5 forums as opposed to 7 like right now.
First-day discussion revolved mostly around LPs and Romhacks, with regulars like BlackDS or SayAnything leading many thread discussions and establishing some sort of "group opinion" on the common writing style of forum users or avatar usage.
People who failed to meet the "group opinion", like strawberrygirl or iviorgoth were ridiculed or just ignored for the most part.
Eventually, this started evening out as more newbies started coming in and just posting what they liked, which - ultimately - lead to the creation of two "sides":

- The "cracker-barrel",
- and the "others".

Naturally, the "others" were always "more" in count, while the "cracker-barrel" was basically a small group of like-minded regulars that enjoyed poking fun at newbies and the "others".
Being an admin since the very beginning, Argumentable played a major role in establishing some ground ideas for the cracker-barrel, with other people eventually following him.

Over time, these two sides have barely changed, even though the users they consist of have constantly changed.
A good example is UltraTowel, whose prior time of activity was between late 2009 and mid-2010, after which he disappeared for more than a year, effectively leaving the cracker-barrel and "making space" for new members, as the cracker-barrel by its definition can only hold a small amount of users.

Now, after this long introduction to forum group physics, it's time to specify how those two groups affect the future of the Talkhaus.

Even though the cracker-barrel is the "heart" of the site, since it contains its most loyal members who essentially keep the site running, the "newbies", or simply the others, are the ones who bring "life" and new ideas to the site as a whole.
With just the cracker-barrel members, our art section would've died out a long, LONG time ago.
The ones bringing in new raocow or demo fanart, the ones constantly rebuilding A2MT in order to keep it going, are those "others".
Those, who don't even visit the gazebo, because it basically IS nothing but the cracker-barrel anymore, those who contribute to #2 of the aforementioned list, they are the people who keep the Talkhaus dynamic and push it forward.

But, over the last few months, we've sadly seen their numbers stagnating.
Looking at the first page of people who joined between the 15th and 20th of June 2009, I'd estimate that the percentage of people who have made 0 posts is about 10% of all new members.
Nowadays, they're almost half of the newly signed-up.
Get that.
50% of the new people don't even bother posting in the introduction thread.

Until September 2011, we've had (on average) more than 20 new members per month, but during October - December 2011, we've had less than 10 new sign ups in each of those months.

Talkhaus has reached it's peak capacity. The number of new users will start to diminish even further, and with them, the amount of innovation on the Talkhaus will decrease.
It's almost like an infinite loop that you can't escape out of.
Because we need innovation, we need new projects in order to keep going with this, in order to keep people interested, and joining.

The Talkhaus needs new flesh, because its old flesh is past the point of being able to produce anymore.
Last edited by Aposke 12 years ago, edited 1 time in total.
Blinx
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Blinx »

Don Zanevsky wrote:I deleted it because moonpirate complained. And yeah, basically what I'm saying is I'm just nostalgia-ing, but I think it's a Very Important Issue because I've sunk three years of my goddamn life into this place and I'm not ready for it to die

And it used to be so cool! Come on man let's make it cool again
okay lol
asdf
User avatar
Argumentable
the biggest shit
Posts: 690
Joined: 15 years ago
Location: A butthole
Contact:
https://argu.talkhaus.com/

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Argumentable »

Even when irc was good I don't remember people being enthusiastic about doing anything. The only events I really remember a lot of people joining in on were the mario race and the talkhaus mosts. Usually the actual forum games (except mafia I guess) either fizzle out or have interest lost (including mafia I guess) but whatever.

I may be misremembering this, but I wanted talkhaus mosts 2 to happen but I don't recall anybody being interested in running it, including wareng (especially me). I just wanna put it out there that if you have a good idea for an event nobody is stopping you from making it. kurosaga had a romhacking contest, and it only got four entries after being open for months and being an announcement at the top of the forum. Nevermind the fact that he vanished and nobody actually won.

This is like a half-thought on the whole thing but I'm not sure which direction I want to take this, not that I disagree about talkhaus having gone on the decline.
Argumentable played a major role in establishing some ground ideas for the cracker-barrel, with other people eventually following him
I am not sure what this means or why you would say cracker-barrel

PS ~1380 members have never made a single post. I don't think you realize how many of those new members were either fodder or just never posted anyway. I didn't even count people who have made single digit posts or all of kil's accounts.
I'm on Youtube andTwitter and Discord so say hi to me on there cause I don't really post here also I have sigs off so I can make my sig as ugly as I want and it won't bother me this is my sig btw
User avatar
Alice
Posts: 2367
Joined: 12 years ago
Pronouns: Girl person
Location: Wonderland

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Alice »

For such a small forum, the spambot catching system seems like it really would drive more people away. Especially since when you do make a post it tends to take awhile for you to activated. (Took me 4 days I believe.) Most people who are actually interested in joining are probably going to stop checking back after a day or two assuming they'll never get activated.
Aposke
Banned
Posts: 0
Joined: 15 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Aposke »

Argumentable wrote:I may be misremembering this, but I wanted talkhaus mosts 2 to happen but I don't recall anybody being interested in running it, including wareng (especially me).
Actually, on that note, I was wondering what had happened to the Talkhaus Mosts last year too, and I would definitely propose a round #2 in case people want to actually vote.
I'd also be free to take over the organization stuff (should this happen before May 2012) if someone else works on the banners and the likes.
User avatar
Argumentable
the biggest shit
Posts: 690
Joined: 15 years ago
Location: A butthole
Contact:
https://argu.talkhaus.com/

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Argumentable »

Also I told this to Cup in a PM and I'll say it here, too, if you want tech stuff like catchpa you're better off contacting TLs4 directly (somehow) or maybe even thissa cause I don't know any reliable way to get in touch

I really don't think new members will help anything, so don't get your hopes up either way
I'm on Youtube andTwitter and Discord so say hi to me on there cause I don't really post here also I have sigs off so I can make my sig as ugly as I want and it won't bother me this is my sig btw
User avatar
raocow
the death of the incredible huge
Posts: 4078
Joined: 15 years ago
Location: maybe the Wizards are the most complex, and the sales guys are up their daily
https://raocow.talkhaus.com/

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by raocow »

Yo.

Uhm... yeah.

Honestly, though, 'regulars lethargy' is a powerful, powerful thing. Like, anytime sometimes happens nobody really plays along; the text anytime happens, but it's like there's already this lethargic momemtum going on and even more nothing happens. I dunno, but it had got to the point where it's affecting me too.

I have ZERO idea how forum things work on a technical level, so I have ZERO idea how to fix any of that. The truth is I was approached about creating these forums, and I said 'okay', and that's it. Even if we had brilliant ideas I wouldn't where to start to the 'how' of implementing them.

You're right that I really need to make an explicit, clear 'how to join' video thing, though.

Hmm...
the chillaxest of dragonsImage
Image
Image
User avatar
Thissa
Posts: 0
Joined: 15 years ago
Location: BC, Canada

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Thissa »

Cup wrote:A possible chatbox via the irc that rena is looking into (if anything ever comes of that, one of us will probably get in touch with thissa about it over in the suggestions forum)
Argumentable wrote:Also I told this to Cup in a PM and I'll say it here, too, if you want tech stuff like catchpa you're better off contacting TLs4 directly (somehow) or maybe even thissa cause I don't know any reliable way to get in touch
You'd have to talk to TLs4 about that, not me. I only control everything.raocow.com and the spot where it gets embedded into the homepage. TLs4 does everything else (like the talkhaus and the rest of raocow.com). Also I can never get in touch with him either... still waiting for him to sign off on everything raocow 2.0 :P

Anyway, speaking as someone who used to run a pretty big internet forum a few years ago, to drive engagement you need to convince people that they should take time out of their day to come visit and chat on your forum. And why should they do that when they can just comment directly on raocow's youtube videos? Or maybe they're committed to SMWCentral where people have been discussing mario romhacks since before this place existed. The IRC is going to be even harder - why go there to chat when you can just chat on the forums? For every new thing someone has to sign up for and/or configure, the less likely they are going to be to do it.

Here's my suggestions:
- Petion raocow to disable comments on Youtube, making Talkhaus the de-facto place to discuss them. He's not going to lose any viewership, the casual commenters who don't have anything constructive to add aren't going to bother registering for a forum, and those who want serious discussion are going to jump over.
- Kill the IRC, which IMO adds nothing.
- Replace the image captcha and approval system with a set of custom questions/answers (see: http://blog.phpbb.com/2009/06/27/3-0-6- ... s-and-you/ near the bottom, i.e. we could have "Complete the raocow Catchphrase: Freakin' _____ ) so that it's easier for new people to register.
- Get the mods to crack down on any trolling or hivemind/injokey behavior outside of the gazebo. This kind of stuff discourages new members. HOWEVER, don't get rid of the gazebo, every message board needs its' FYAD contained somewhere or it will leak all over the rest of the forums.

Now all that being said, what happens the day raocow finally stops LPing? Either Talkhaus is going to die with it, or it will evolve into a general gaming forum with a focus on mario romhacks and Japanese platformers. I guess it all depends on the state of the community at the time. But don't feel bad if it does just die off, really. There's a lot of other forums out there.
User avatar
AUS
Toni#4796
Posts: 483
Joined: 14 years ago
First name: Toni
Pronouns: they/them/their
Location: アース

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by AUS »

Thissa wrote: - Kill the IRC, which IMO adds nothing.
Killing it won't add anything either. It's not bringing the forum down as far as I can tell, and it'll probably piss a few regulars off if that happens. :lol:
Image
"oh no my best friend was replaced by a evil demon shadow monster"
"argh i am the evil shadow monster demon shadow"
Vip is pronounced "Beep"
nostalgic realtime nitroid let's play playlist
Blinx
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Blinx »

Thissa wrote: - Kill the IRC, which IMO adds nothing.
Do this.
asdf
Dan
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Dan »

Thissa wrote:
Hey, more nostalgia - now I remember when everyone was complaining that raocow should disable comments. Good times.

Also, I think I mentioned in my Worst Post Ever that I deleted that the IRC is dead is because the forums are dying too. I used to blame skypehaus but honestly at this point most of them were never on these forums to begin with. Just to make this clear: I'm not asking anyone to "fix" the IRC, because I think if we can revitalize the forums then the IRC will just naturally grow again.

I'm glad so many people have responded to the thread, this is really what I was hoping for when I wasted my time writing that dumb essay that could have been summarized in one paragraph. Hopefully, though, this doesn't end up like another suggestion box thread that gets discussed and never acted on. The forums still don't have a favicon.
User avatar
O-Card
what are you doing here
Posts: 1
Joined: 14 years ago
Pronouns: he/el

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by O-Card »

if anything, the irc is WHERE the initiative to revitalize the forums is coming from

you rarely see any suggestions that pertain to the forums themselves from regulars who only post on raocow's lp threads

but then that's another issue altogether, the great majority of the people who would join the forums are only there for the convenient raocow discussion, the only way to make them interested in the forums themselves is by organizing group projects, initiative, that sort of stuff

but then, raocow is right, we are a bunch of lazy fucks/trolls
talkhaus: the singening
you must sing
Image
Image
Image
MAFIA
yo yo yo play the game
User avatar
Bean
Yep.
Posts: 4581
Joined: 14 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Bean »

Thissa wrote: Here's my suggestions:
- Petition raocow to disable comments on Youtube, making Talkhaus the de-facto place to discuss them. He's not going to lose any viewership, the casual commenters who don't have anything constructive to add aren't going to bother registering for a forum, and those who want serious discussion are going to jump over.
I will disagree with this one pretty strongly. Don't take away commenting on videos because that won't make people join here. In fact, it annoys me when I see some LPs from SA that do this. I know most people think Youtube comments suck, but why stop them? They're participating in their own way.

I do think there needs to be a better registry system implemented though, but again, nothing that can let bots sneak through as often as they were.
User avatar
AUS
Toni#4796
Posts: 483
Joined: 14 years ago
First name: Toni
Pronouns: they/them/their
Location: アース

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by AUS »

Thissa wrote:Here's my suggestions:
- Petion raocow to disable comments on Youtube, making Talkhaus the de-facto place to discuss them. He's not going to lose any viewership, the casual commenters who don't have anything constructive to add aren't going to bother registering for a forum, and those who want serious discussion are going to jump over.
I don't know if disabling comments would help much. it's like, do people care so much that they would sign up, or would people just then do nothing about it ie less response for videos.

Plus, it would no doubt attract [at least some] people to sign up solely to complain about it. Which is good...if your only goal is to have people sign up.
Image
"oh no my best friend was replaced by a evil demon shadow monster"
"argh i am the evil shadow monster demon shadow"
Vip is pronounced "Beep"
nostalgic realtime nitroid let's play playlist
limepie20
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago
Location: Doesn't Matter

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by limepie20 »

I'm against getting rid of the IRC (even if it was possible) too because it would most likely only do bad for the forums.

I think a step in the right direction would be getting someone who exists to manage the technical side of the forums. Other than that, talkhaus enthusiasts should just make many colorful posts.
User avatar
O-Card
what are you doing here
Posts: 1
Joined: 14 years ago
Pronouns: he/el

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by O-Card »

get those guys in the lets play forum into the goddamn gazebo

and get some good topics in the gazebo

(here I'll start)
talkhaus: the singening
you must sing
Image
Image
Image
MAFIA
yo yo yo play the game
Dan
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by Dan »

Yeah one thing that could be done in a hypothetical raocow-plug is mention that hey, forums exist outside of the two LP stickies in Let's Play. Because there's apparently still a modicum of activity in there. I don't know, I never look
limepie20
Posts: 0
Joined: 14 years ago
Location: Doesn't Matter

Re: 1% of the Users Control 43% of the Posts: Fixing the Forums

Post by limepie20 »

I thought thats where a lot of the forum activity was.
Locked