Call for Help
My father always told me to never be afraid to ask for help when you need it. Well, we need your help.
Due to a number of factors, it’s been a while since we’ve undertaken any major site changes. Although the site seems to satisfy a still-growing number of visitors, there are a number of feature changes/additions we believe would improve things. That’s where you come in. We need your help improving the site.
What do you want?
From past experience, we’ve learned it’s better to garner as much feedback before implementing changes, rather than thrusting them upon you without warning. With that in mind, and since we’re just beginning the process, we’d like to solicit ideas for ways to improve the site.
What types of features would you like added? How can we improve the way things are configured here? What types of new content would you like to see? How can things be better organized? Would you like to see social network functionality (like some Facebook-type stuff) integrated into our design? Would you like a dedicated section for more off-topic material? Would you like blogs for every team? Again, what do you want?
Alpha/Beta testers needed
We’ve already begun tinkering with some ideas for improvement. Since we’re also sure you’ll be able to suggest nice ways we can improve the site, we’ll need more feedback when your ideas move into tangible features. We’ll also need people to try the stuff out to make sure it works properly. With that in mind, we’re looking for volunteer testers. If you are interested, .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Team Blogs
Dan has been pushing the creation of enhanced team-oriented blogs for some time. We already have a few volunteer editors on board and we’re looking for more. So, again, if you are interested .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Baseball Newsstand
We’re considering moving the Old-School Newsstand back to its own domain, BaseballNewsstand.com, and expanding the links and content. We’re looking for ideas about the structure of the updated design and suggestions for links and RSS feeds that should be included. .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Primer Blog
We’re considering moving the main blog onto its own domain and bringing back the BaseballPrimer.com domain. We believe by moving the blog over to its own domain, it will be easier to spotlight the best daily links. Plus, over the years many people have written to say they miss the old site name. We recognize the attachment, and hope you’ll welcome the return. What do you think?
Contribute a Few Dollars
We’ve appreciated your contributions in the past. With these tight financial times, we’d appreciate your assistance more than ever. We’ve always been dedicated to freely providing all of our content. With the depressed ad market and every-growing traffic, doing so has gotten harder and harder. What would we like you to contribute? Anything you could give us would be greatly appreciated and will help keep the site up-and-running.
Whether you can help out in these areas or just have time to post an occasional link or comment, we thank you for being part of our community and for helping to make this such a fun place for us to hang out.
Jim Furtado
Posted: May 27, 2009 at 06:24 PM |
542 comment(s)
Login to Bookmark
Related News:
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
To be too general, mostly the participants of the political threads. Some didn't like being herded, others didn't like when Dan closed other threads that had political comments so that they would have to go to one thread, meaning that some discussions were interrupted. Plus it would have taken a fair amount of moderation to keep up with that, and that is one thing this site really hasn't had (in my experience).
I'd lay out ten bones for this.
Right, the problem wasn't the creation of a politics thread, it was the closing of other threads. And IIRC, at least once Szym accidentally deleted a thread (or closed it even from reading) when he meant to close it to commenting. I might be wrong about that, but I think that was the source of the uproar -- not that people were herded into a single thread, but that (an?) earlier thread(s) had disappeared.
I fully understand what you say about the site organization. The nice part of taking a break from updates is it gives perspective. I've been able to step back a little to look and think about things. I agree about Blogpen, Newsstand, and Blog. One of my priorities is simplifying the groupings.
I have some things I've been playing around with and will start sharing some things in the new work/sandbox/beta area I'm putting together.
Jim, thanks. I'm glad you've put some thought into it and see what I'm getting at. Please keep in mind that my criticism of the site organization wasn't a dig at you or anything; I know this stuff isn't easy, and when I criticize, it's just because I care about the site so much, too.
boo ####### hoo. The forums were set up specifically to keep off topic threads off the mainland. Why reinvent something that already exists. The excuses "We don't like being herded" and "The interface it scary" is just plain old ######## used by people too stupid, arrogant or lazy to use the forums. Or all three.
Yes, as opposed to people who are too stupid, arrogant or lazy just to ignore threads or people that they're not interested in, and who want a nanny to do their work for them.
I wish the Hot Topics didn't include non-baseball-hijack threads. I've reached the conclusion that this would be the best solution to the irritating problem of finding threads ostensibly about baseball but which have actually been hijacked so that, for example, 300 posts are not about the 1994-5 strike.
Those who want to follow such things can bookmark them.
This is my suggestion:
Have an Off-Topic Meter, like a rate-the-thread. As soon as enough people have clicked that it's off-topic, it vanishes from Hot Topics.
I think this might be the best idea so far. If people want to ignore all threads that get into politics, they can check a box and their wish is accomplished. They wouldn't even show up in the hot topics. You could use the same idea to re-integrate the lounge, if you wanted. Have an off-topic of lounge tag for them. Have accounts set up to have topics with that tag ignored by default. If a brave soul wants to venture there, they could, but it would be obvious that it isn't a core part of the site and they should do so at their own peril.
The only reason the Lounge worked in the forums is that Loungers were given no other choice - it was Lounge there or don't Lounge at all. If Jim had kept a Lounge on the main site and also opened the forums as an alternative, I doubt that the Lounge would have changed at all. It certainly wouldn't have migrated full-scale on its own to the forums.
If we shut down the off-topic discussion on the main site, people would use the Forums simply because they had no other alternative.
(As an aside - hijacking baseball threads for off-topic discussions has been implicitly deemed perfectly acceptable for some bizarre reason. If the Loungers had taken a low-traffic baseball thread and made it into a Lounge every day, how would that have been received? My guess is - not that well. Jim would have shut that down pretty quickly.)
btw, robinred i'm older than you. in fact, i'm the same age as kevin iirc. but don't mistake me for him, we're not much alike.
But what is his WARP factor?
FWIW, I agree with you. I could give a rat's ass to get a link every time Rob Neyer decides to take a sh1t. It doesn't cause the least bit of problems if that is what people want to post. If they end up dying on the newsstand, its also fine. If people can't see them because there are too many links, just create a "Rob Neyer" tag and let people ignore it.
I probably would never ignore it, b/c I am more interested in the real content providers of the site, the posters. If I get "Andy on Neyer" its probably going to be worth a read.
I think they should put a donation button on Andy, Nieporent, Emeigh, Jeff K. etc.'s user page, so the people that are interested enough to know the screen name history can give a little something for the effort.
But yes, I agree with both of you. I like it when threads randomly meander in whatever direction the posters take it in. I think that discussions should form organically, and not with a forced "here's the topic, now go" type thing. The reason I come here is because I like the community, not really because I like the site.
However, having the option of being able to ignore every thread that wanders into a USA Politics thread, or every damn Simers column would be wonderful.
Even if an OT thread gets its title changed to "Plaschke: DeWitt is the best [Now: about NBA]" or something like that would save a couple clicks, and wouldn't require much additional programming.
I think you speak for a lot of us here. The variety of perspectives and interests is what makes this such a standout site.
However, having the option of being able to ignore every thread that wanders into a USA Politics thread, or every damn Simers column would be wonderful.
Even if an OT thread gets its title changed to "Plaschke: DeWitt is the best [Now: about NBA]" or something like that would save a couple clicks, and wouldn't require much additional programming.
As long as that's technically feasible, that seems like a good and fair way to go. But leave it up to the individual to do the ignoring. And if a person's too goddam lazy to click a mouse to achieve this end, the nanny shouldn't be required to do it for him. Let him slip on his own sensitivity condom.
-------------------------
I don't think that Neyer gets linked here as often as BL thinks he does. Pinto was linked today. I think that's the first time in ages, but his Musings are more twittery than bloggy.
IMO Neyer's one of the better writers we see here, and I wish we had more of him. He knows and loves the game, provides a good mix of statistical analysis and narrative, and writes fairly well. Same with Posnanski and a handful of others. And more power to the advanced stat mavens like Dial, and the analytical articles from the THT people like Treder. They're a hugely important part of the BFT mix, whether or not we always agree with them.
The problem isn't with links to the likes of Neyer; it's with the endless stream of genuinely stupid columns that are little more than snark magnets. I guess they're necessary to fill the page hit quotas (whatever those may be), and they're no harder to ignore than any others, but the cumulative effect of all the Mariotti / Chass / Feller / etc. links on the whole atmosphere of BTF is infinitely worse than the occasional thread that goes "Off Topic." If you could take all those pinata links and stick them on the next Air France flight from Rio to Paris, I doubt if you'd have many people show up for the funeral.
Well said. It's absolutely pointless posting a link to some mainstream media clown having a rant. The only difference between them and some of the people one hears on talk radio is that a fool with too much money decided to pay the columnist. But...
Well said x 2. In the olden days, discussions tended to emerge from the give-and-take of the posts, which was good. Now, like some of these 'Retro' ballparks, they are increasingly contrived. I think the 'forced topic syndrome' deserves more moderation. Today we got a link to Vin Scully saying something about tattoos on basketball players. I haven't bothered to see what Scully said. I am not interested in basketball, nor in tattoos, nor in Vin Scully's opinions of modern fashions. I am therefore unaware of any connection between this link and the subject matter of this site.
Does Neyer ever get linked here at all? I remember regular links to "Rob and Rany on the Royals" but ever since that stopped, I don't see him much. Just doing a ctrl+f on Neyer I get nothing on the first 6 pages. I think HatGuy gets more links. . .
That is the lesson taught to us by rr and Andy. The posters themselves will make the needed "site improvements" for content. We have seen a decrease in Neyer and that is a good thing. As rr mentioned, if people wanted more Neyer, they could link to him.
Letting the site flow, evolve is better than having things imposed by a site administrator.
We have more than our share of baseball wonk threads. Hell, I lit off that Mussina HOF thread this offseason and that sucker went 500+ posts, all squarely on topic. You don't get that elsewhere. That doesn't mean every thread should be like that, even if you could make it so, which history has proven impossible.
boo ####### hoo. The forums were set up specifically to keep off topic threads off the mainland. Why reinvent something that already exists. The excuses "We don't like being herded" and "The interface it scary" is just plain old ######## used by people too stupid, arrogant or lazy to use the forums. Or all three.
The original reason for setting up the forums is immaterial as to whether they are a good or bad thing for the site. (I suspect that the forums were created more for technical reasons than for community-based reasons, but I'm not certain about that.)
For some users, the forums might as well not exist. The interface isn't "scary." It's clunky. It's slow. It's ugly. It's inefficient. I normally wouldn't put that first line but I left it just to show how incredibly simple it is to quote someone without adding tons of useless whitespace.
I'm not afraid of the Lounge. I used to love posting there. I miss posting there. The problem is that I have limited time on the internet, especially now that I'm never working in front of a computer these days. I don't think it's stupid, or lazy, or arrogant to avoid areas of a website where the interface drastically slows the amount of information that I can process in a sitting. I could literally read the lounge no less than three or four times more quickly before it was moved to the forums. It's painful to use that interface and I don't have enough leisure time to spend more time scrolling and waiting for page loads than reading actual content.
If I were in the mood to pick a fight, I might say that only a stupid person can't hold more than one online conversation at a time or that only a lazy person can't click a different thread if it veers off-topic. That said, I think it's pretty laughable for a person who blows off a number of posters in this very thread who give specific reasons why they dislike an interface or enjoy a certain free-flowing nature of the site to be playing the arrogant card.
Obviously I can speak for no one but myself, but I disagree. The posters are almost never the reason I come here. Rather, it serves as a clearinghouse of whatever is happening in baseball on any particular day. I think some of the poster's significantly overrate how many people come here to read their pithy opinions.
I mean, it would be different if some of you ever said anything new or interesting, but that hasn't happened in years, This thread, for example.
You know, it's his birthday today. (True story.)
One thing I've noticed with the Filp number is that people may not RTFA nor RTFT, but they usually RTF Page. I'm certain there is probably a number of diminishing returns, and there are a class of people that care nothing for the conversation, they just want to pile on, or go on record.
RE: Daly's post
I'm not sure I understand your point Daly. I think its virtuous that any non-banninated user can post a thread or comment. I think its wonderful that there are posters that out of love of their fellow posters and without further compensation do post threads and comments. I think of those that do post threads and comments, the items that are of the most interest will generate the traffic, conversation, topics and generally the better content.
If there is a determination by the site admins that WARP factor threads are inherently greater than Hat Guy threads, I'm sure there are plenty of people you can pay for WARP factor content. I don't think there are a heck of alot of WARP factor content on the internets that doesn't get linked. I'm not advocating less Neyer content. I'm just not terribly interested in reading him calling people Grimace, posting somebody else's research and commenting on it, or calling some GM an idiot. If people like that, more power to them. If it generates good conversation then I'll probably join the conversation.
I've never advocated less content in any means. The only times when I thought there was too much content is when we had people that had their own blog, who would join a thread, poison it with vitriol, then post an original "article" in their blog (which didn't cover the subject matter of the blog) to divert or dilute the conversation. The biggest offender no longer blogs here and the second biggest offender has not done that in awhile.
Where is our disconnect or disagreement?
I thought it was on Thursday.
I wouldn't have asked if I'd known. Not that I'm lying awake nights trying to figure it out. I can probably think of about a hundred BTF names I'm familiar with, but that's not one of them. I guess he's some sort of a chess champion.
But Happy Birthday, whoever you are. I just told Matsui you were in the hospital and he told me that that 3 run dinger was just for you.
I do miss the Cookie Monster
But perhaps I (and everyone else) are missing some deep joke.
Yeah, but it's almost all been in the lounge and game chatters. I can see how somebody who spends all their time on the regular site wouldn't see much of him, though I'm still kinda shocked that Andy has no recollection of rLr.
I don't think it's been a problem at all, and so disallowing it would be at best a misallocation of resources. We've already been asked nicely not to use other people's names/handles, and nobody has abused it, so I think we're fine.
Really, it's kinda impressive how well the community here has behaved when asked. There are a number of things any of us could do to really break the site, and nobody does any of that stuff. I much prefer this solution to technical solutions.
I hardly ever look at the lounge and I hardly ever game chattered even when they were thriving, but I've recognized his name for years. He's had plenty of posts in the mainland to be recognizable (to me) for many years.
Whatever, it's silly to argue over what Andy knows or doesn't know. Even though we all know he knows a lot, so we know he must know rLr.
You have to do it with all lower-case.
Jeez, read the Lounge. Um, his hair (his self-proclaimed Jewfro), shiftlessness, his Yankee fandom...
For the moment, Crispix is demonstrating otherwise.
Yeah, but it's almost all been in the lounge and game chatters. I can see how somebody who spends all their time on the regular site wouldn't see much of him....
That probably explains it. Since game chatters died out, 100% of my posts have been here on the main site. And the truth is, I didn't really know rLr was a Yankees fan---like all people of good will, I just assume that about all Americans until proven otherwise.
Really? A dying brain cell seems to recall something about the lounge generating just too much traffic and page reloads, and crashing the site. I guess that was a dirty lie spread by those who cared only for the freedom to post topics so vile that the general internet audience took a step back and said "hey, that's a little much."
With the Lounge being limited to registered posters, for all I care, posters could write fan-fiction about raping Santa Claus, which is something that would be discouraged a good deal more strongly on the mainland.
Is that really worse than posting this?
Really? A dying brain cell seems to recall something about the lounge generating just too much traffic and page reloads, and crashing the site. I guess that was a dirty lie spread by those who cared only for the freedom to post topics so vile that the general internet audience took a step back and said "hey, that's a little much."
If the reason for moving the lounge was to allow for more slash fiction, why does the lounge have a nanny?
Bernal wets himself. As does the night crew after tipping back a few.
I'm not sure what you mean by that, but well-fed Yankee fans often have opposing fans for pre-game dinner at the Stadium's fashionable Boar's Head Deli, whose chefs treat them with all the lavish attention they deserve. This partially explains the number of empty seats you may notice once the game begins.
Did you use to have another handle, OB. Or did you lurk for a while?
rLr stated the other day that Mets fans are either sex offenders or mental defectives. The truth is out on both fanbases.
Yes, but as you should have noted from the above post, at least we give them a nice meal or two before doing so. Whereas Red Sox and Mets fans just rummage the dumpsters at the abortion mills for their pre-game meals---but then what else would you expect from sex offenders and mental defectives?
I don't wet myself, I used to #### myself. Get it right Fonzie.
That was a problem, too, especially earlier on, but the big thing for the lounge movement was to try to remove it from Google. The chatter was more of a page issue, simply because it was an additional couple of thousand of extra posts a year, so we tested out a beta of a java chat applet, but decided to go with the regular chatters after that. The site has a lot more bandwidth than it did then, so it's not as much of an issue now (our problems are more provider-based than OMGTEHDATABASE VOMITED nowadays).
Well I searched for an answer on my before asking it. And of course immediately after asking it here, I finally stumbled upon the answer.
If the reason for moving the lounge was to allow for more slash fiction, why does the lounge have a nanny?
The "Word Censoring" setting in the Sysadmin menu only allows on and off, not specific on/off settings for individual modules (the forum is under the same software as the mainsite, it's the Discussion Forum plugin).
That's an entirely different thing. It has been a long time since my tech days, but I'd be very surprised if there were no solution that didn't involve the drastic change in interface. Unless it's one of those things the average person doesn't find at all bothersome and I'm on an island over here with the few other <strike>sane people</strike> nitpickers and tech snobs.
The setup isn't perfect, but there will never be a perfect setup. Ultimately it's all about trying to come up with something that satisfies as many people as possible within the site's budget.
I truly want to better the site for as many people as I can, so I appreciate the many comments posted here. As this process evolves, I hope to get as much feedback as I can. I just hope people recognize I can't satisfy everyone.
Thanks for the feedback so far.
And when I click on the "newsstand" link at the top of this page in order to return, I get a "The page you're looking for is either temporarily unavailable or no longer exists" message. I feel a bit like a Cuban who just wants to visit his relatives in Florida.
Yes, and frankly I'm stunned that it took 493 posts in the "help" thread for someone to point this out. I've never had to relog in anywhere else except to post in this thread, which I've had to do a half-dozen times.
It was pointed out earlier in the thread.
I had to log in again to post that. Fitting.
Makes sense. I obviously missed it.
Not sure if this is "help" worthy, or remotely relevant, but the fantasy baseball girl in the top right corner is just skinny enough, just underdressed enough and just dirty enough to make me feel uncomfortable when it's on screen in my office.
Actually, I do not now, nor have I ever had this problem. Could it be browser-related? I've been on Firefox the the whole time and this problem you describe has literally never happened to me.
I use almost nothing but Firefox myself, but I've had a similar problem when I've switched to IE. And as I said, it's totally random. I've been back and forth a few times since I made that complaint, with no problems.
Ditto.
Although I've installed FireFox on my work computer and a little adblock-plus should take care of that . . .
Sorry Jim.
Everywhere else, it is www.baseballthinkfactory.org. The site is trying to get way too cute with domains, and cookies hate that. Similarly, try this: get rid of all your cookies, go to baseballthinkfactory.org, without the www. Then log in. Then surf somewhere else. Then go to www.baseballthinkfactory.org. You will not be logged in.
For that matter, from this thread, click one of the links on the thick red bar: Forums, Newsblog, whatever. It won't work, because it uses relative links, and we're on a different domain.
THIS is what the improvements to the site have to be. We can talk about changing all sorts of things about the content of the site, but until the hosting and coding are up to any sort of presentable standard, it's wasting time.
Also, someone needs to get J. Walter Weatherman on the case to teach happysky a lesson about posting on the newsblog.
I raised that objection in a previous Haw Haw thread, but it seemed I was largely alone in that sentiment. I think if you want this to be a place where people, including those in the media, feel welcome to come and discuss baseball issues, mocking them in the thread title is a piss-poor way to encourage it.
I'd go one step further and advocate the NTNgod apporach of including the frist name in parens when a common last name is in the title.
Totally agree.
I try and edit some of this stuff out or just delete them, but a few get through.
Jim, you're a mensch!
I agree about that and we should also act that way as posters. I personally know its difficult sometimes to respond to a particular column without taking it beyond healthy criticism, but I think reining in ourselves is the better course in those circumstances, IMO.
I was knocked off on FireFox yesterday for the first time in months. So far so good today.
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main