Originally Posted by glg
(Post 27960336)
Your numbers confirm what I found. Chicago and DC had similar traffic to LA, SF and LV. If Chicago and DC get cut, those should be cut too.
I'll reiterate that what really set me off about this is that it was done without announcement. I logged in yesterday to find the Chicago forum *gone*. My subscription wasn't updated to Midwest, it was just gone. As SanDiego1K said, it's tough messing with the structure of Flyertalk, it's going to make people mad. A big way to help alleviate that is communication. Instead of just wiping them out, why not have a separate thread about forum consolidation here (instead of burying it in this thread about forums not having airport codes) and post a link to said thread in each forum that's going to get removed. The CommunityDirector does a great job in considering ideas that could benefit FT. Perhaps doing sitewide announcements on potential forum changes or forum creation could be implemented again by her, so she can potentially garner more input/have things brought up that she might not have considered. Cheers. |
Originally Posted by glg
(Post 27960336)
Your numbers confirm what I found. Chicago and DC had similar traffic to LA, SF and LV. If Chicago and DC get cut, those should be cut too.
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Originally Posted by TWA884
(Post 27960698)
Those consolidations were done in part to shore up the Mid-Atlantic and the Midwest forums which were not very active. The California and the West forums were holding their own.
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For me, lumping Chicago into the Midwest forum clutters it up. I usually don't care about Chicago, but occasionally check the Midwest forum for useful threads or where I might have an answer. If I have to sort through Chicago to find the relevant non-Chicago posts I will probably find it is not worth the trouble.
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Originally Posted by TWA884
(Post 27960698)
Those consolidations were done in part to shore up the Mid-Atlantic and the Midwest forums which were not very active. The California and the West forums were holding their own.
"The Midwest forum isn't really working well. How do we fix that? Ideas anyone?" "Well, Chicago is part of the Midwest, Why don't we shut down the Chicago forum, it's pretty popular." "Great idea, put all those Chicago posts in the Midwest forum and people will think the Midwest forum is a really happening place and they'll start posting about the great time they had in Akron three years ago!" "I like it!" |
Suggestions are welcome, and crucial input for the Community Director.
Snark and sarcasm, however, are never useful and don't fit in with the spirit (and Rules) of FlyerTalk and this forum. Mutual respect is the goal. Thank you for helping us achieve that. Also note that the Rules and guidelines do not allow discussion of Moderator actions (even if putative) unless a forum's Moderators expressly request them. JDiver & cblaisd, Co-Moderators |
Originally Posted by Dovster
(Post 27959779)
Just curious -- where would Buffalo NY (or Niagara Falls, NY) go? They are too far west to be considered mid-Atlantic, are definitely not part of New England, and a bit of a stretch for the Midwest.
The same would also be true of Pittsburgh, PA (and Pennsylvania points west of it). In terms of the FT destination forum re-organization and attempted populating of that part of FT -- an effort that seems to have started in fits and starts even before this thread was started -- I have some doubts about the consistency of approach, the value of the consistency/inconsistency, and under which conditions the consistency is a good or bad thing for FT members in the main. My usual motto is "if it ain't broken, don't fix it". I am not sure how broken the destination forums are/were say two years ago, but I do know that some reorganization efforts don't really work out all that well in improving the time to seek and/or get the (quality) communication desired. Personally, I'd prefer a Chicago forum on its own still. Probably the same for the DC/Baltimore forum. As it is now, it looks like the Mid-Atlantic forum is overwhelmingly dominated by DC area discussions, and the other "Mid-Atlantic" stuff is a drop in the bucket. I don't consider "sleepy" forums to necessarily be a sign of a broken forum in desperate need for being given a helping hand up by more active discussions of a different sort. |
It was a bit startling to find a post immediately after our previous note and which ignored that note. That post has been deleted.
Once more: discussion of moderator actions should take place directly with the moderators in question or with the Community Director. Thank you, JDiver & cblaisd, Co-Moderators |
Originally Posted by Prospero
(Post 27959699)
I am happy to share some of the data collected which SanDiego1K referred to during her review of the USA Destination forums. As you can see, several parent forums (Mid-Atlantic, South, and Midwest) were not receiving very much traffic at all so it is hoped they will perk up as a result of combining these forums together with their constituent child (city) forums.
The USA destination forums are still relevantly quite corners of FT being finely diced geographically, especially when compared to the European and Asia forums which are generally carved into larger geographical or denser populated regions. So, I think we can see that a very gentle approach has been taken following the review. Previous USA destination forum structure Number of active thread topics during 2017 (data collected 15 February 2017): USA 21 New England 11 Mid-Atlantic 5 New York City 40 Washington DC 15 South 5 Florida 14 Orlando 3 Midwest 2 Chicago 15 Texas 11 West 18 Las Vegas 15 California 13 Los Angeles 16 San Francisco 11 Hawaii 23 Alaska 2 Revised USA destination forum structure Number of active thread topics during 2017 (data collected 26 February 2017): USA 25 New England 14 Mid-Atlantic 23 New York City 43 South 28 Midwest 21 Texas 14 West 14 Las Vegas 18 California 18 Los Angeles 19 San Francisco 14 Pacific Northwest 10 Hawaii 24 Alaska 2
Originally Posted by TWA884
(Post 27960698)
Those consolidations were done in part to shore up the Mid-Atlantic and the Midwest forums which were not very active. The California and the West forums were holding their own.
Originally Posted by glg
(Post 27961100)
That logic is just backwards. You shouldn't look at the regions as needing "help". If you want to go with regions, just go with regions. Instead what you've done is made it look ridiculous with a handful of very arbitrarily chosen cities having their own forums. If it was just NYC and LA as the country's two largest cities, fine. But leaving SF and LV makes no sense.
Originally Posted by jerry a. laska
(Post 27961734)
I agree with glg, just because the Midwest forum isn't that popular doesn't mean taking the active Chicago subforum and lumping into the Midwest is the solution.
"The Midwest forum isn't really working well. How do we fix that? Ideas anyone?" "Well, Chicago is part of the Midwest, Why don't we shut down the Chicago forum, it's pretty popular." "Great idea, put all those Chicago posts in the Midwest forum and people will think the Midwest forum is a really happening place and they'll start posting about the great time they had in Akron three years ago!" "I like it!" It appears as if the most active city forums fairly closely aligned with those that have the largest tourism numbers annually. To lump some in with regions while segmenting out others does not make sense from a user experience perspective (particularly since foreign visitors are less likely to know what region of the country a specific city is associated with). I'd also argue that from an external perspective, I cannot understand the need to boost a less active forum by rolling it into a more active forum. Alaska, for example, has as many active forums as the previous Midwest forum, but it still stands alone. Adding Midwest posts to the Chicago forum is unlikely to change the number of non-Midwest threads. |
Originally Posted by SkiAdcock
(Post 27960616)
In the past when Talkboard existed, when changes to forums were considered or up for votes by TB, there was a public announcement to give FTers a heads-up & ask for their input before final voting/decisions.
The CommunityDirector does a great job in considering ideas that could benefit FT. Perhaps doing sitewide announcements on potential forum changes or forum creation could be implemented again by her, so she can potentially garner more input/have things brought up that she might not have considered. Cheers.
Originally Posted by LostInAmerica
(Post 27961579)
For me, lumping Chicago into the Midwest forum clutters it up. I usually don't care about Chicago, but occasionally check the Midwest forum for useful threads or where I might have an answer. If I have to sort through Chicago to find the relevant non-Chicago posts I will probably find it is not worth the trouble.
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Please put Chicago back :)
Please give us our own forum back :)
We'll promise to post more :) |
Some additional tweaking may be required. Just clicked on the "Americas" link in the destination thread, and this incomplete list appears.
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Originally Posted by Prospero
(Post 27959699)
I am happy to share some of the data collected which SanDiego1K referred to during her review of the USA Destination forums. As you can see, several parent forums (Mid-Atlantic, South, and Midwest) were not receiving very much traffic at all so it is hoped they will perk up as a result of combining these forums together with their constituent child (city) forums.
The USA destination forums are still relevantly quite corners of FT being finely diced geographically, especially when compared to the European and Asia forums which are generally carved into larger geographical or denser populated regions. So, I think we can see that a very gentle approach has been taken following the review. Previous USA destination forum structure Number of active thread topics during 2017 (data collected 15 February 2017): USA 21 New England 11 Mid-Atlantic 5 New York City 40 Washington DC 15 South 5 Florida 14 Orlando 3 Midwest 2 Chicago 15 Texas 11 West 18 Las Vegas 15 California 13 Los Angeles 16 San Francisco 11 Hawaii 23 Alaska 2 Revised USA destination forum structure Number of active thread topics during 2017 (data collected 26 February 2017): USA 25 New England 14 Mid-Atlantic 23 New York City 43 South 28 Midwest 21 Texas 14 West 14 Las Vegas 18 California 18 Los Angeles 19 San Francisco 14 Pacific Northwest 10 Hawaii 24 Alaska 2 USA 21 Cities NYC 40 DC 15 Chicago 15 Las Vegas 15 LA 15 States California (ex-LA) 24 Hawaii 23 Florida 17 Regions New England & Mid-Atlantic (ex-NYC and DC) 16 South, Midwest, and West (ex-Florida, California, LV, and Chicago) 36 |
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