Some issues regarding the site

1) The choice of language at the top doesn't work anymore. The slash between the domain name and the language is missing (.comen instead of .com/en)

2) Live-streams links to german version of the site, even if one originally was on the english version

3) There are quite a lot of 5-star posts that really do not deserve them. Solution: only show star-rating if a certain minimum number of votes is cast (say: 5) Also, rating always takes at least one star, where sometimes 0 would be more appropriate.

4) Recently, due to an influx of newbies, the forum is flooded with bumps of old threads, which makes the 'recent posts' option rather useless. Make it less obvious to reply to an old message, like by popping an alert when one pushes the reply button on a topic that has been dormant for more than a month.

A few very recent changes that may not be apparent:

1. The member contribution to the Multimedia content (from the top menu) has been removed. This action is regretted but lately the facility has been vastly abused with totally in-appropiate content.

2. The moderators now have the ability to move individual posts between topics. Previously, only complete topics could be merged with other ones. This should make the forum experience much better.

There are many other new features planned including private messages. But please be patient. They do take time to incorporate

well... still waiting (with a bit of strange 'impatience') the running of the private messages system.

will it be started within a month ?

@elmo: upload bug fixed, thx for the hint.

@ghostwriter: it will be available somewhen ...

Oh I almost forgot to mention, I added another feature today: every member can edit his personal profile and share his favorite model, channel and other things with other members. A public profile page for every member will be available soon.

You can also upload a profile picture / avatar. If you have troubles using the new feature please clean your browser cache or press CTRL-R.

[hidden link - please register]

@elmo: I will check the picture upload and keep you up to date.

hallo Mr Pink,

thanks for the new feature the direct addition of the image. You have changed something, yesterday I was only able to replace the first image with the second resulting in 2 of the same image using Firefox 3.5.1 Mac. Today I did both together for the first 2. I will now add a third - there should now be three different images

Sorry for the site being unavailable for some time, but I added a handy new feature today: attaching images to topics and posts. Please take care and do not upload images larger than 1 MB. If you have troubles attaching images please report the bug here. Also make sure to clean your browser cache to make sure all files and website extensions are up-to-date.

This feature doesn't work in Safari yet since Apple's browser (my prefered one btw) unfortunately has a bug which is still not fixed. There's a workaround and I will try to fix this issue as soon as possible.

I also improved the language switch, if you change the language you will stay on the same page of the selected language.

Thanks again for all your input, if you have more please post it here.

@ OldGrizzly

Thanks for your answer . I read in your answer , that there was thought about that !

But be sure , I wasn't asking for lesser posts . Everyone should be polite at this forum.

Thanks

Firstly, the 'thank you' is not designed to reduce posts. If, you read this topic, and looked closely at some of the recent posts, certain memebers were doing just that - saying 'thank you' to very old posts. A post will always bring the topic to the top of the stack but if the post is very old, there is really no purpose to do this and it just buries the current topics.

It is true that a member who requests a video cannot simply post a 'thank you' but most of these members are capable of writing more than two words and will acknowledge the response in an appropiate manner. And most members will do just this as we are not trying to reduce their input. And if that member wants to address a certain poster rather than comment on the topic as a whole then he is more than welcome to do that.

We did consider a 'thank you' for all posts within a topic. I am assured that will create considerable storage problems for the site. And, taken to its conclusion, that could make the whole forum very unreadable as there could be these thanks boxes all over the place.

@.GHOST*

Yes , I was also thinking how to discribe this "problem"

There are more members who bring in vids , but if you click Thank you , WHICH member or post do you mean ???

Sorry , but this seems for me a "problem" !! Maybe a bit else the rating ( or thanks) ???

Now I see still post a message about what a member means . And the posts will NOT get lesser ?!

thank you for thank you!

Me do the programming ?. No comment.

Speaking aloud though, with the little knowledge I have of the structure, restricting newbies from opening threads would be relatively easy to implement. Restricting any member to the number of posts he could do in a set period would not. But, again, I am not the programmer so it may be posssible. I am not sure though if that really is desired - I certainly did not endorse it - as it really does impose a restriction on those 'real' contributors who you want to encourage to post and not to deter. Like I said, for the majority it will still be one post and gimme the links.

Doesn't sound bad to me. The only problem I see there is about how one would define a "usefull" post. Unless of course you have it all figured out already.

I think we can summorize that thusfar all contributions to this thread seem to agree on a few simple things:

- new users should not be allowed to open new threads

- new users should be restricted in the number of posts they can make per day

Now if anything useful is to be gotten from this thread, we need some information on the programming backgrounds, as I live under the impression that the board is not running any 'out of the box' software, i.e. any improvement we suggest (and of many suggestions we still have to wait and see if they actually make an improvement) need to be implemented by -probably- the Old Sheriff or Mr. Pink.

If the above two suggestions are easy to implement, we may continue on that path. If the above is difficult, than we might need to think orthogonally, and we might need some suggestion of the board admins on what is and what is not feasable.

One way to determine if a user is a valueable contributor to the board would be to not only rate threads, but also postings. This could be done using the 'thank you' option that was also suggested earlier. A poster would reach a higher level more quickly if his posts are widely appreciated, (or may even be restricted if he receives general disapprovement.) This last option would ofcourse implicate that I would immediately sink down to the level of newbee...

This is turning into one of the better topics so 'big thumb' to all the people who are taking the trouble to contribute.

Now 'serious' contributors will be encouraged to post in the main forums as quickly as possible. We have considered allowing them full access from the start but since the majority of the majority's one and only post is not exactly useful that will only serve to clutter those forums. So better to have them in one place. Of course if you have any suggestion of a better way we could implement a minimum of one post rule then we are always happy to read it.

The main problem at the moment is that too many topics are being opened here and, as you say, most regulars will not read this section. So one thought, it may already have been mentioned, is not to allow new members to open any topics until they have made a certain number of useful posts with the majority of these under full moderation in the main forums.