How Can The Forum Be Better? Your Thoughts? (1 Viewer)

[Joe Bryant]

April is a time where we can take a breath a bit and see how we're doing. And maybe see if there are things we can do better.

Do you have thoughts there?

Granted, forums are similar to most social groups in they "self select". If you don't like how we do things here, you're probably not here. So the audience is by definition mostly ok with how things are. Or they wouldn't be here.

But still, I think we can always be better.

If you have thoughts, let's hear them. We're limited in many ways by the forum software and many things aren't changeable. But we're always looking to be better.

Let's hear it. And thanks for being part of the forums.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Also to add, for suggestions, please be as specific as possible. And even better if you can link to another site that is doing the thing you're suggesting so I can see how it works.

 

[C & C]

Well, not exactly a forum change, but I'd like the main site's player pages to have a link to the corresponding player forum page. Variety of ways to approach the issue by your programming team. But simple to do.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Well, not exactly a forum change, but I'd like the main site's player pages to have a link to the corresponding player forum page. Variety of ways to approach the issue by your programming team. But simple to do.

That's a great idea. We've been talking about how to revamp and update the site player pages.

 

[abrunn1133]

Stop letting people change the titles of threads.

 

[Instinctive]

Stop letting people change the titles of threads.

Hard disagree here. It's fun for team threads and especially over in the FFA, and it's nice to be able to update the team name, etc for player threads.

 

[Doug B]

I'll nominate something that took place yesterday as a positive change, and something to keep on doing:

A side-eyed socio-political comment got dropped about two pages deep into a music thread. There was maybe a dozen subsequent posts back and forth before a moderator came in to warn off the bickering. Then ... instead of locking the thread and quashing the music conversation, the bickering posts were simply removed from the thread -- and then the music discussion was able to resume.

THAT was a good bit of moderation right there -- keeping the overall thread while cutting out the sniping. In the past, good, long discussions were too quickly deep-sixed under similar circumstances.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I'll nominate something that took place yesterday as a positive change, and something to keep on doing:

A side-eyed socio-political comment got dropped about two pages deep into a music thread. There was maybe a dozen subsequent posts back and forth before a moderator came in to warn off the bickering. Then ... instead of locking the thread and quashing the music conversation, the bickering posts were simply removed from the thread -- and then the music discussion was able to resume.

THAT was a good bit of moderation right there -- keeping the overall thread while cutting out the sniping. In the past, good, long discussions were too quickly deep-sixed under similar circumstances.

Thanks GB. You saw this in the FFA but I'll post here too:
Thanks. This happens a good bit. And maybe more than folks realize as they're not able to see all the posts that a moderator deletes. But yes, I agree with you that it's best to keep something alive if we can. And also, we don't like giving a troll the satisfaction of getting a thread closed. Fortunately, we're able to salvage a good number of threads that way.

 

[Bankerguy]

Good thread Joe…

Forums used to be the best part here. Lots of good posters have left for various reasons.

I think certain (voted on) members should have team designations. Meaning they are great homers and know their team. It’s a great resource to know who these people are, especially for new posters.

I really believe in crowd sourcing and value the views of many. You guys often post staff ranking consensus stuff. Now also add the same data from your greatest asset - your message board. It would be great to see poster rankings as well and to track to compare to actual results. I’m not sure of the logistics to make that happen. However, to me that is value added.

I also believe your (Joe) recent involvement and commenting is also a nice touch and helps stimulate the right kind of posting.

 

[Chreesto]

This will be unpopular. You should sell ads on the forums. Lots of eyeballs on here, I have to imagine it would generate a pretty good revenue stream. Use the money to keep subscription prices low or give your staff a raise. It wouldn't be THAT annoying to see ads, seems like a missed opportunity. Flame away.

 

[Joe Bryant]

This will be unpopular. You should sell ads on the forums. Lots of eyeballs on here, I have to imagine it would generate a pretty good revenue stream. Use the money to keep subscription prices low or give your staff a raise. It wouldn't be THAT annoying to see ads, seems like a missed opportunity. Flame away.

Thank you for thinking of it that way. It would no doubt be a help financially. But it's a less good experience for the reader without question.

I've always bypassed that revenue as I know it would be unpopular and didn't want to add another unpopular thing to the forums. And honestly, didn't feel like I had the energy to fight that battle.

We might revisit down the road, but for now, it feels like something we'll continue to pass up.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Good thread Joe…

Forums used to be the best part here. Lots of good posters have left for various reasons.

I think certain (voted on) members should have team designations. Meaning they are great homers and know their team. It’s a great resource to know who these people are, especially for new posters.

I really believe in crowd sourcing and value the views of many. You guys often post staff ranking consensus stuff. Now also add the same data from your greatest asset - your message board. It would be great to see poster rankings as well and to track to compare to actual results. I’m not sure of the logistics to make that happen. However, to me that is value added.

I also believe your (Joe) recent involvement and commenting is also a nice touch and helps stimulate the right kind of posting.

Thank you GB. I agree the crowdsourcing part can be super fun. I want to encourage that. I offered to try and build up the Mock Draft and get other eyes on it and promote in other places to shine a spotlight on our folks but that didn't seem to be something people were interested in. But maybe there can be some things in the future where people will be interested in doing more content like this.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Someone in another thread said we don't listen. I was reminded on this of a discussion we had a couple of years ago in the Shark Pool about how we organize topics. https://forums.footballguys.com/thr...hreads-on-specific-topics-please-help.798813/.

At the time, I felt like we should change some of the structure and not have the giant threads where each player gets his own thread and all the news stays there instead of creating new threads to talk topics. I don't like it when a story breaks that includes several players and it's difficult to know where to discuss. And I think lots of discussion happens around current events or breaking news that often isn't clear when the forum just lists all the players with no mention of the event.

We discussed it back and forth for several pages and in the end, I listened to lots of different points and we decided to not do what I was proposing and keep the forum mostly organized by player threads. And I think that's worked well. And a good example I think of all sides listening and discussing.

 

[Scoresman]

I have selfish reasons for wanting changes to the SP. I do my own projections and any discussions about any given player has to include discussion about that player's team. For example, a RB is going to be partly or mostly a product of his team's OL, QB, and to a lesser extent, defense. I have little to no use for the individual player threads as they are now. Team threads would be much more beneficial in my opinion and would encompass all of that team's fantasy relevant players including discussion about the team's OL, defense, coaching tendencies, and anything else related.

There would be the added benefit of all the player threads not pushing other discussion off the first page so quickly.

I understand not everyone would like this, it's a drastic change. But it would be my ideal fantasy football forum.

 

[ratbast]

This has been discussed and probably isn’t changeable but navigating through thread to change page requires scrolling, sometimes allot. Can page options be at top too?

 

[mphtrilogy]

Would love to see your FBG team post more in these threads, offer tidbits of insight here and there. That goodwill may pay off in subscriptions.

 

[titusbramble]

Does the forum have the software capability to add tags to thread titles? I normally don't like this feature, but it would be kind of useful in the context of player threads to have the ability to add a positional and team tag to filter the forum for

 

[Chreesto]

This will be unpopular. You should sell ads on the forums. Lots of eyeballs on here, I have to imagine it would generate a pretty good revenue stream. Use the money to keep subscription prices low or give your staff a raise. It wouldn't be THAT annoying to see ads, seems like a missed opportunity. Flame away.

Thank you for thinking of it that way. It would no doubt be a help financially. But it's a less good experience for the reader without question.

I've always bypassed that revenue as I know it would be unpopular and didn't want to add another unpopular thing to the forums. And honestly, didn't feel like I had the energy to fight that battle.

We might revisit down the road, but for now, it feels like something we'll continue to pass up.

I get that and admire the ethos behind that decision. As someone who doesn't always subscribe, but does ALWAYS spend hours on these forums, I certainly wouldn't mind clicking on some sponsors to contribute to the significant cost and effort these forums must require. I think that the level of football discourse has fallen off a bit, in general, across the entire spectrum of human communication; too many hot takes and social-media attention seekers, that said, the level of knowledge and insight on these boards has remained high, and is a real asset. I think the value of that asset would far outweigh the minor annoyance of ads for boner pills, which I might need anyway. You could be doing me a favor, just sayin.........

 

[Joe Bryant]

This has been discussed and probably isn’t changeable but navigating through thread to change page requires scrolling, sometimes allot. Can page options be at top too?

Thanks. I don't think that's changeable but can ask our folks.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Does the forum have the software capability to add tags to thread titles? I normally don't like this feature, but it would be kind of useful in the context of player threads to have the ability to add a positional and team tag to filter the forum for

I'm not sure. Can you link to another forum that does this so I can see an example of what it looks like? I don't participate in many forums outside this one.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I have selfish reasons for wanting changes to the SP. I do my own projections and any discussions about any given player has to include discussion about that player's team. For example, a RB is going to be partly or mostly a product of his team's OL, QB, and to a lesser extent, defense. I have little to no use for the individual player threads as they are now. Team threads would be much more beneficial in my opinion and would encompass all of that team's fantasy relevant players including discussion about the team's OL, defense, coaching tendencies, and anything else related.

There would be the added benefit of all the player threads not pushing other discussion off the first page so quickly.

I understand not everyone would like this, it's a drastic change. But it would be my ideal fantasy football forum.

Thanks but I'm not sure I understand. How would they be different from the team threads we currently have?

 

[Scoresman]

I have selfish reasons for wanting changes to the SP. I do my own projections and any discussions about any given player has to include discussion about that player's team. For example, a RB is going to be partly or mostly a product of his team's OL, QB, and to a lesser extent, defense. I have little to no use for the individual player threads as they are now. Team threads would be much more beneficial in my opinion and would encompass all of that team's fantasy relevant players including discussion about the team's OL, defense, coaching tendencies, and anything else related.

There would be the added benefit of all the player threads not pushing other discussion off the first page so quickly.

I understand not everyone would like this, it's a drastic change. But it would be my ideal fantasy football forum.

Thanks but I'm not sure I understand. How would they be different from the team threads we currently have?

Ease of navigation.

For example, say I want to talk in depth about Deebo Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk. Right now, they have two different player threads. With two threads, if I want to talk about how the O line changes help or hurt each other, how their reception splits look, or how the new coordinators affect them, I pretty much have to duplicate it for each thread. If there were a team thread for the SF 49ers this wouldn't happen, and there would be less threads in general to bump other topics off the page. Player discussions wouldnt happen in a bubble like they kind of do now, they would happen in the context of the whole team and it's outlook which I feel is important to look at when projecting/analysing.

I know we already have team threads, but these are mostly all just news.

I know this isn't a change everybody would want though. Just throwing something out there.

 

[Hu-Tang Clan]

You mean like this one?

 

[Joe Bryant]

I have selfish reasons for wanting changes to the SP. I do my own projections and any discussions about any given player has to include discussion about that player's team. For example, a RB is going to be partly or mostly a product of his team's OL, QB, and to a lesser extent, defense. I have little to no use for the individual player threads as they are now. Team threads would be much more beneficial in my opinion and would encompass all of that team's fantasy relevant players including discussion about the team's OL, defense, coaching tendencies, and anything else related.

There would be the added benefit of all the player threads not pushing other discussion off the first page so quickly.

I understand not everyone would like this, it's a drastic change. But it would be my ideal fantasy football forum.

Thanks but I'm not sure I understand. How would they be different from the team threads we currently have?

Ease of navigation.

For example, say I want to talk in depth about Deebo Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk. Right now, they have two different player threads. With two threads, if I want to talk about how the O line changes help hurt each other, how their reception splits look, or how the new coordinators affect them, I pretty much have to duplicate it for each thread. If there were a team thread for the SF 49ers this wouldn't happen, and there would be less threads in general to bump other topics off the page. Player discussions wouldnt happen in a bubble like they kind of do now, they would happen in the context of the whole team and it's outlook which I feel is important to look at when projecting/analysing.

I know we already have team threads, but these are mostly all just news.

I know this isn't a change everybody would want though. Just throwing something out there.

Thanks.

This is what I'm talking about https://forums.footballguys.com/thr...ting-with-aiyuk-not-discussing-trades.807808/

 

[Joe Bryant]

Index here that is pinned to the top https://forums.footballguys.com/thr...and-team-threads-now-updated-for-2023.805460/

Awesome work by @Player Index

 

[titusbramble]

Does the forum have the software capability to add tags to thread titles? I normally don't like this feature, but it would be kind of useful in the context of player threads to have the ability to add a positional and team tag to filter the forum for

I'm not sure. Can you link to another forum that does this so I can see an example of what it looks like? I don't participate in many forums outside this one.

So this is a screen grab of the search of my main forum (hope this works, finding working image hosts on mobile these days is a nightmare):

Screenshot-2024-04-02-20-16-22-103-com-android-chrome hosted at ImgBB

Image Screenshot-2024-04-02-20-16-22-103-com-android-chrome hosted in ImgBB

ibb.co

Basically I've set the tag to be "confirmed", i.e. what we use for news that is not rumours, and put in a random player's first name, and it will only give me results that are related to that particular tag. Now I don't know if any forum has the ability to use it as a pure filter outside of a search, where at least when I tried it here I needed to put some search term in, but the use case would be something like "Breece Hall just tore his ACL again, let me select "Jets" and "RB" so I can easily find discussion about potential backups". Or, especially pertinent right now, I could pick something like "College" and "RB" and drill down to threads that are of a position I want to select often in next month's rookie draft

 

[Harjiran]

This forum is the single most useful and informative fantasy football resource on the internet, in my opinion. Some of the suggestions are interesting but above all, I would be careful not to try to fix what isn't broken.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Does the forum have the software capability to add tags to thread titles? I normally don't like this feature, but it would be kind of useful in the context of player threads to have the ability to add a positional and team tag to filter the forum for

I'm not sure. Can you link to another forum that does this so I can see an example of what it looks like? I don't participate in many forums outside this one.

So this is a screen grab of the search of my main forum (hope this works, finding working image hosts on mobile these days is a nightmare):

Screenshot-2024-04-02-20-16-22-103-com-android-chrome hosted at ImgBB

Image Screenshot-2024-04-02-20-16-22-103-com-android-chrome hosted in ImgBB

ibb.co

Basically I've set the tag to be "confirmed", i.e. what we use for news that is not rumours, and put in a random player's first name, and it will only give me results that are related to that particular tag. Now I don't know if any forum has the ability to use it as a pure filter outside of a search, where at least when I tried it here I needed to put some search term in, but the use case would be something like "Breece Hall just tore his ACL again, let me select "Jets" and "RB" so I can easily find discussion about potential backups". Or, especially pertinent right now, I could pick something like "College" and "RB" and drill down to threads that are of a position I want to select often in next month's rookie draft

Thanks. I'm not sure there and we can ask our folks to take a look.

 

[Scoresman]

You mean like this one?

This is usually just news. Right now, if I'm projecting the 49ers WR corps I have the team thread and each individual player thread to discuss in and it ends up being fragmented. That's all.

 

[Scoresman]

Also another nitpick about player threads is that they all go back multiple seasons. It would be great if player threads were archived and remade for each season. Right now, if I'm clicking on a player thread for the first time, I have to guess what page the current season discussion starts on.

 

[Joe Bryant]

You mean like this one?

This is usually just news. Right now, if I'm projecting the 49ers WR corps I have the team thread and each individual player thread to discuss in and it ends up being fragmented. That's all.

But it doesn't have to be just news. I think team threads like this are a great place to discuss how players will perform together. Or what to expect from a new coaching staff and such. Most of the discussion is related to news (For instance, Falcons replace their staff) but takes off from there.

I think the Team threads are a great place to do that.

 

[titusbramble]

Also another nitpick about player threads is that they all go back multiple seasons. It would be great if player threads were archived and remade for each season. Right now, if I'm clicking on a player thread for the first time, I have to guess what page the current season discussion starts on.

The counterpoint is that if I was to search for, say, Stefon Diggs, I'd then need to search though lots of threads to work out which one is current. Clicking jump to new and/or just jumping to the last page doesn't seem overly difficult

 

[Bri]

Y'all used to hire people from here and we'd get all excited for them.
I miss that. It was fun to root for them. I still think Wheels when I see Jeff Haseley on X.

I don't like that the promoted guys don't usually return to the board. I'm sure there's a business decision behind the scenes decision but simply put, I tend to miss them.

I miss signatures. They got absurd and overbearing. For a time though, it was cool to see this guy's work or that guy's graphics or music etc. It lead to some convos and longtime friends. Bryant's boats! My goodness those boats were beautiful.

I know policing here is such a chore and ...I guess I wish for a world where it wasn't.

Can you get the longtime staffers to go into that reddit AMA? Where's Woodrow to ask about Eagles Qs? MTs Chargers are in a rebuild. Aaron's Bills are shuffling their deck.I saw Bloom and his Steelers. I'm like the Titans guy here but there used to be someone for lots of teams. Idk I'm rambling.

Love this "place" since day one and I thank you so much for it

 

[Scoresman]

Also another nitpick about player threads is that they all go back multiple seasons. It would be great if player threads were archived and remade for each season. Right now, if I'm clicking on a player thread for the first time, I have to guess what page the current season discussion starts on.

The counterpoint is that if I was to search for, say, Stefon Diggs, I'd then need to search though lots of threads to work out which one is current. Clicking jump to new and/or just jumping to the last page doesn't seem overly difficult

The old ones would be locked and archived so it shouldbe easy to search.

Also "jump to new" only takes you to what's new since you last read, and it doesnt work consistently. I'm mainly talking about when I want to read up on a player for the first time in a seasonand need to keep guessing before I find that this year's discussion starts on page 87. Also have to do this when "jump to new" isnt working.

 

[Scoresman]

You mean like this one?

This is usually just news. Right now, if I'm projecting the 49ers WR corps I have the team thread and each individual player thread to discuss in and it ends up being fragmented. That's all.

But it doesn't have to be just news. I think team threads like this are a great place to discuss how players will perform together. Or what to expect from a new coaching staff and such. Most of the discussion is related to news (For instance, Falcons replace their staff) but takes off from there.

I think the Team threads are a great place to do that.

I'll try to do that more this season. I think I tried once and someone said to take it to the player threads which is what I dont want to do.

 

[Joe Bryant]

You mean like this one?

This is usually just news. Right now, if I'm projecting the 49ers WR corps I have the team thread and each individual player thread to discuss in and it ends up being fragmented. That's all.

But it doesn't have to be just news. I think team threads like this are a great place to discuss how players will perform together. Or what to expect from a new coaching staff and such. Most of the discussion is related to news (For instance, Falcons replace their staff) but takes off from there.

I think the Team threads are a great place to do that.

I'll try to do that more this season. I think I tried once and someone said to take it to the player threads which is what I dont want to do.

Thanks. The team threads can be a great place for that kind of talk. Please do lots of that.