The Thread of Truth

[Guest mcwarre]

All,

I love MoDaCo and thanks to P, the Mods and everyone for making it what it is. But.................

It has changed. There are too many people asking too many questions that have been answered before (yeah P me as well!). It now feels like a Q & A session; whilst worthy we should not be OCS!

I will probably get in the pooh for this; just saying whats on my mind!

Thoughts please...

Answers on a postcard to:

[Guest JabbaTheSlut]

/note to self

must resist tempatation to wait a week and ask the same q again

but anyway, its a good idea, it might calm down when the E200's out, as most of them revolve around when that seems to be, but then it could go the other way, people will ask more and more about x, y and z on the phones new feature list

play it by ear for a bit longer, see what happens, then do it is my 2p

Jabba

[Guest amo]

A lot of it is because of the crap search facility in phpBB tbh

[Guest JabbaTheSlut]

but a lot of the threads seem to be "what-if" and will this, now for a product that hasnt been released yet, i`m sure the people who do know wont be able to/wont want to say

i do find myself sifting through a lot of "what if" and "will it" threads, most of which the answers seem to be guesses, or half thruths derived from rumors

Jabba

[Guest midnight]

yeh, its true, a lot of questions recently have been about the 1.6 update, windows mobile 2003 and the e200, and without either we cant give answers, which then prompts people to get annoyed/upset and ask again, doesnt matter how many times you ask, if no-one knows, then no-one knows :)

[Guest amo]

Perhaps a little more effort just to delete the threads as and when they pop up?

[Guest JabbaTheSlut]

tidys up the forum, but upsets those ones who are the "deletees"

need to find a happy middleground, but a lot of this stuff could be justifyibly(sp) moved to Off topic, maybe a firmer definition of main?

[Guest mcwarre]

Cool,

Though I would get in the sh*t for this, it's nice to know that it is not just me that thinks this.................

[Guest amo]

I suggested an "Orange" or "Network" forum a while back, didnt seem to go down well though, would stop a lot of issues with complaints of orange actually getting in the way of Smartphone based posts.

[Guest JabbaTheSlut]

i never really bother with "main" never has anything useful that the news in the portal doesnt have in it, its just a rebranded off topic IMHO. this thread in particular belongs in off topic, but main isnt really a topic, so you cant go off topic, so main just festers, if you see what i mean............ :s

[Guest mcwarre]

i never really bother with "main" never has anything useful that the news in the portal doesnt have in it, its just a rebranded off topic IMHO. this thread in particular belongs in off topic, but main isnt really a topic, so you cant go off topic, so main just festers, if you see what i mean............ :s

Par le vouz Anglais?? btw

[Guest JabbaTheSlut]

i'm wittering, overly tired from not doing anything at Uni and work i guess, what i was trying to say was, main is poo, as theres nothing good in it, and "main" is too ambiguous so people just think, oh i'll post in there, when it may be better suited elsewhere

[Guest fixit]

People do seem to post some really odd and nerdy sh*t on here. Not that I can talk, I had an original SPV since December '02 and in the first flush of excitement with my new toy was as bad as anyone. However, there seems to be a movement of people continuously asking old questions or speculating on the E200 - who cares? It's only a phone. Go to the pub or meet a nice girl or something.

[Guest Emad]

We need a FAQ.

I don't really come around here that often either.. Dunno, too cluttered I suppose..

[Guest nickcornaglia]

We do have a FAQ. <----click here.

I'm sure we can all sympathize with noobies, to a point, as we were all there a year ago. There is still alot of things that I do not know and believe I learn something new everyday here about the smartphone.

I'm also sure that we have all asked a question before that we could have found an answer to if we only searched.

At this point you have a few groups:

1) Seasoned Smartphone users who know alot about the phone and are waiting for the next new thing to come along.

2) Users who are to lazy to search to find their answer.

3) Users from countries like the US who are new to the phone, new to the site and it's "rules". (For some reason, many think the the MPX200 is an entirely different beast..."Will PocketTV run on my MPx200???") I feel like saying...DUDE...It's a Smartphone! We need to broadcast out that 2002 is 2002, with a few branded changes from Network to Network.

There are currently 20,000 user on the site.

Just say 1/2 of them have been using the phone for some time and 1/2 of them are "experts" on how to use their phone effectively. And 1/2 of the visit and participate on this site on a regular basis.

That's at least 2500 users who will be bored with ANY question a noobie will through out on any given day. But how do you differentiate a question from a noobie, from a question that may be new news? Categories are the only way.

I have also suggested that additional categories be created for NETWORK SPECIFIC topics, because you in the UK could give a flying frog about a problem a US member is having with ATT. And if you did, you could visit the ATT forum.

This would require tighter moderation as there will be a ton of questions/comments posted to the wrong forums, or maybe even those that should be broadcast to everyone as a matter of point. And that's counter productive.

Keep MAIN, Keep Help&Advice....keep EVERYTHING. Just add some Network Specific Categories....that's my thought. Paul has possibly been considering this. Possibly not. It's his decision in the end and he may have reasons against it.

But on the other side of the coin...maybe take an opportunity here and there to help out a noobie witha bit of info that you know. Or politely advise them that they could have used the Search function. Or kindly tell them that the media player on the MPx200 is the same as on the Original SPV.

This is the best online community I've ever come across. There has always been a nice friendly feel and there is a ton of information to share. Let's do everything we can to grow as the site grows and help it evolve along side the platform...without losing any of the original "brotherhood" (and sisterhood) that can sometimes get lost as sites get larger.

Splitting the Network Forums could potentially contribute to this as well and promote segregation....so there is delicate balance that must be taken into account.

[Guest Richie M]

And yeah this should be in Off Topic :(

Moved :)

[Guest amo]

Hahaha! Nice one Richie :)

[Guest]

I agree with encece - this is one of the best comunities online. Some boards if you post a noob question you get flammed - whereas here (most of the time) someone will reply with "Here's the answer, also see this thread, use search next time, welcome to MoDaCo". You will always get people that just want thier question answered instantly, and would rather post than search. Generally the vibe on here is very welcoming - that's why we have so many active posters.

I'm not sure about network specific sections - it could become too overwhelming and people in doubt of where they should post will just post in Main anyway. The flip side though (for experts) is if you know nothing about a US network then you can safely avoid reading anything in the "AT&T" forum - you can direct your expertise elsewhere.

There is a balance to be maintained but more importantly there is the whole friendliness of the board that we should be proud of - let's hope we don't get too big and loose it!

[Guest amo]

Well a network forum wouldn't be too overwhelming at all - simple, if a questions directly related to smartphones, post in main (or software etc) but if its a network issue, such as insurance or gprs problems etc then post in the network forum. Whats so difficult about that?

[Guest]

It should be simple but you might get people who will see a long list of forums and rather than select the right one they'll just post in main.

I could be wrong - the new device specific hardware sections will show if new users find it confusing or not - and will also show how much the mods need to do to keep it tidy.