LittleAtari wrote:I agree with godix on this. Why are most of the recent guides in the forums when we have a guides section on the member's page? They should be there. PMing the newly registered users about the guides would be pretty good too.
I do not oppose this. In fact, if it really will mean in increase in the number of individuals who follow the rules, I support it.
If possible, I think this is a great idea to implement. Just have downloads be restricted to members only. What we've seen with previews is that current members do watch and download more AMVs. I believe that making preview public will attract people to become members. Think of it. Someone gets to browse the previews freely and then becomes a member to download the videos.
I don't think this is what we're about, but I do not oppose this. You may consider this a vote of "abstains, courteously."
I think my main beef with the boochsack filter is that I think that it only fuels the hate for the new kids that post it. People still need to catalog their videos to announce them and while the filter does let people know what's up, it seems to be the center for members to make fun of the new kids. So perhaps getting rid of the filter and the whole YT 'ban' would make the Org more welcoming.
I honestly think if any word filter were to exist it would replace hosatchel with an entire explanation of why those links are unacceptable. However, I tend to believe that godix's newb PM would decreases the number of newbies posting youtube links.
Outside of coding, donation and setting the general policies of the site, I really dont know what the role of an admin of this site is.
None of us do, and I do think that is an issue that needs to be addressed. There's no transparency at all. I had always believed the role of the admin was, until recently, to safeguard the status quo. The whole "the government that governs least, governs best" mentality. I support this viewpoint, and in fact, recent modifications to the site have given me reason to believe administration may be doing things "behind closed doors" that I would not approve of if I was made aware of what was going on. This concerns me. However, with Jasper's recent post, and Corran and TJ having stepped down, perhaps I have nothing to fear at all. Still it would be nice to know just who controls site policy. Where does the buck stop?
Just make certain things more obvious.
Concurred.
VidID
Right now, vidIDs are just a little picture of a chain in the video info. There is no clue about that picture being click-able and actually meaning something. I recommend just displaying the vidID info on the video page, similar to how YT displays the embed code and links for their videos in the video description.
I don't understand what you're getting at here. Isn't this why we make posters? Why on earth should vidid need a picture at all? I've lost you here.
Condense related information
I know I already mentioned the guides, but things like viewing Ops given and received should be, viewing alerts and modifying them, journal buddies and my journal, should be in the same place and not scattered across multiple categories. I find it odd that when viewing other people's journals, that I cant directly go to my own journal or make my own entry. Considering a lot of people post in their journals in response to other journals having that option handy would be nice.
I do not oppose this. I don't personally care, but I see your point. As long as it does not allow individuals to post on any pages of mine without my expressed consent.
Star Ratings
I've talked to people that didnt even know that they could check the star average on their own videos. The only way it's ever come up is if I mentioned their rating to them. Since I'm a donator, I can see their ratings, but a lot of people dont seem to know that they can find out their own ratings by going to edit their own videos. Make it so that people can see their own ratings on their video pages or something.
Another example of something I do not oppose but do not want anywhere near my pages. I despise star ratings and want nothing to do with them. This is a large reason I will not upload to LOCAL and why I pay no attention to anything I put on hosatchel.
Social Feedback Outside the Current Features
Any type of social feedback outside the forums, ops and QCs would be good. Right now, the only thing I can think of is for public comments. Basically, I know that there's a lot of people who dont use the forums. Maybe it's because they're intimidated or maybe it's because they dont know about the forums. Either way, I'd like to see something more done for the other 98% of the members of this site to be more involved so that they stick to this site more.
This is where I get lost. Who are these people? 98% of them are not editors at all, just casual viewers. Viewers who never comment, never offer opinions, never post, never even use their journal. Can one of the admins tell us how many ACTIVE users we actually have? Not how many signed up, but those that come fairly regularly. I'm willing to bet it's nowhere near the 700,000 members we supposedly have, and I bet it's not even close to the 45,000 editors we supposedly have, most of whom are one-hit-wonders. I'm not opposed to some sort of "outreach," but in my time on this site I have never seen evidence that any of these people are at all interested in being part of a community. It isn't like we hide from them, and isn't like the forums are that hard to find- Hell, it's right under the title bar marked COMMUNITY. It's not that I don't approve of your intent here, it's just that I think your ideas are misguided. These masses of individuals just wandering around aimlessly looking for the community aspect of the site and not finding it... they just don't exist.
And I still adamantly oppose any type of unsolicited public commentary. Feel free to advertise the use of the announcement forum somewhere on the main site, but do not force public commentary on an unwilling populous.
Continued QCs
I already mentioned this before, but I'd like to be able to re-QC a video. Sometimes I'll watch a video and just rate it to get it off my star ratings que, but then later on I find that I have something to say. Sometimes, even if I have QC-ed a video, I find something else that I want to say about it. I look at this as opening up more room for feedback. It also makes the creator feel that their video has gotten more attention.
We have this. They're called opinions.
Get Rid of the Stuff We Dont Use or Revive them
I'm thinking specifically of things like Interviews, Newsletter, and Software Reviews. Those things havent been updated in ages and only add to the clutter on the front page. You guys can have an archive section or something for stuff that is old. Still though, I'm thinking that it'd be great if we actually got this kind of stuff up and running again. They made the site more valuable in that it was more information being put out there. Especially in the case of the Interviews and Newsletter, those represent a part of our community's strength. Getting people who are interested to start working on that stuff again would be great. Reviving #amv-review would also be great. Kio and Godix kinda said that I should try running my own review and I'm going to try it. Mind you that this was just mentioned a few days ago, but I'm looking for people interested in participating. Shoot me a PM, if you're interested in being part of a review session. (I'll probably end up making another thread for the AMV-review bit because i doubt people are sifting through this long post)
Now this I support fully. I will even assist. This is a job for groups of individuals to just DO, and present the final products to the admins/mods, who have been more than willing to do the simple task of putting it up on the site somewhere. This is where energy about improving the site should be directed, not some massive overhaul of the org's political ideologies.
Interacting More with the Other AMV Sites
While I'm sure there are people that have pride in their home sites, I'd like to encourage more awareness of and interaction with other AMV sites. The goal of this would be to draw in members from other sites and create a richer AMV experience for everyone. Note that this would require Admin/Mod activity.
I don't oppose this. I don't particularly care, but I might participate if it happens. I am more curious to ask who it would require mod/admin activity. I don't see why it has to.
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b]Inter-site Competition[/b]
One major one that I can think of is any of the award winning videos of each site can be collected and then voted on by all members of each site. Basically, the general thought of the VCAs are that these are the best videos of our community. I'd like to see how the best videos of each community fairs against the other.
See above.
Displaying the Top videos of Each Site
It'd be pretty cool if our Top videos were displayed on Akross, AMVFrance, AMVNews, etc. In exchange, we would also display their top videos. The links for the videos on these lists would go to their respective site.
Window dressing. Sure. I don't oppose this. It's not really an issue. I have my doubts the other sites would agree, or that the admins/mods don't have some sort of objections, but I couldn't really care less.
Something else to make more obvious are the URLs of the profiles that contain a person's user name. There is nothing on our profiles or on the site that tells us that feature exists. Just display it on the profile page or something. In general, I think the Org has a lot of amazing features, but I question how many people know how to use them or even know that they exist.
And I question how many of those features are actually ones I ever advocated for or particularly cared about when they appeared. I'm sure the org has features I don't know about. I can't very well imagine they're features I need. All I need is:
Login
Profile Page
Catalog
Opinions
Forums
...Yep, that's about it. Anything else? Pure fluff.
In addition, I noticed that in AMVNews videos a lot of people tend to include the address of the site. Can we encourage putting the Org Logo and Address in AMVs? I doubt that we can actually mod this. So I'm thinking that it could just be something noted on the upload or enter video page. For example, somewhere on the page have it say "Did you remember to put the Org logo and your profile URL in your video? It's not required, but it could be helpful to you to include that in your video so people know where to come back to look for your videos and it helps this site out"
I oppose any undue command influence. Credits are still creative areas. We certainly can't mod this, nor should we. Nor do I believe we should do anything that would imply to an editor that they may find themselves punished for refusing to do so. I have never put the org address in my videos, and I am not about to now. It just isn't how I do things. My videos are not produced for or by "a-m-v.org," I am a private "citizen" and as such see no compelling reason for this.
On a much more personal note, advertising the org at all leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Maybe it's paranoia owing from my generation, but the idea of the org being marketed puts the fear of attracting attention of People We Don't Like in me. I'd just as soon avoid that.
Also, it'd be neat if contests like the ones on AMVnews were organized for the Org. It seems like every 2 months, they have something going on over there. I think it encourages people to make more videos and mini contests like these generate recognition and more AMV discussion.
This happens all the time. Iron chefs are all over the place. These things occur at a much smaller level, which is where they belong. Another case of Power to the People. If you want to see more of these, I encourage you to run them.
In addition, I want to ask knowname just what he thinks my "views" are. As stated, I have no problem with new members, I just expect that they be able to meet a certain set of standards or at least do their genuine best in attempting to meet those standards. If sending a general FAQ to every new member helps accomplish this goal, I do not see how it violates my stated philosophy.