Annoying things on other forums?

[Soliloquy]

Sorry I upset you Tom, I won't suggest alternate words again.

[Nick]

Originally Posted by Chris M.

Tom, cool it.

Originally Posted by TomZilla

What do you mean, cool it?

Since you seem to be so keen on debating the definition and usage of words, let's see...

Originally Posted by The Dictionary

cool it (become quiet or calm, especially after a state of agitation) "After the fight both men need to cool off."; "It took a while after the baby was born for things to settle down again."

In the future, please try harder to exhibit respectable amounts of self-control.

Originally Posted by Soliloquy

Sorry I upset you Tom, I won't suggest alternate words again.

Michelle, please disregard the confrontations you've encountered in this thread. Matters have been dealt with accordingly.

Let's keep this thread on track from this point forward. Thank you.

[TomZilla]

Mich, you didn't upset me.

[Nick]

Originally Posted by TomZilla

Mich, you didn't upset me.

Originally Posted by Nick

Let's keep this thread on track from this point forward. Thank you.

[merk_aus]

I hate going to websites that are filled with advertisements, next to the banner, under the navigation bar, in between forum categories, after every 2nd post, popups, full page ads... it's ok to have some ads but don't overkill it.

I also hate when people want you to check out a website, or you stumble across and you go there and there is that hover bar that follows you everywhere you go that says "I see you are unregistered, click here to register blah blah blah blah" you scroll down and it follows you you go up it follows you it makes me feel like I am being stalked and hounded to join your website and will make me click out of there as quick as possible.

Just to clear up something Tom said about the ads where users can use forum cash to buy advertising space - vBCredits.com have just released vBAdvertiser which looks awesome and wish I had the funds to get it.

That is the system these sites must be using - it allows credits to be spent on purchasing advertisement spaces... The way this works is I have brought a professional mod from vBCredits.com that allows people to BUY Credits, spend $20 or whatever to buy credits.

And so what I can see the uses of having a system like this is:
A) Make your advertisement prices high so people have to buy Credits to purchase advertising spaces.

B) If they dont want to spend money they need to post more on your website to get the credits together....

So to narrow it down - 1 - You will make money from people buying credits, 2- your forum will get more active by people posting to earn the credits.

[Chris]

Originally Posted by merk_aus

I hate going to websites that are filled with advertisements, next to the banner, under the navigation bar, in between forum categories, after every 2nd post, popups, full page ads... it's ok to have some ads but don't overkill it.

I'd have to agree with you on that - it makes it harder to navigate.

[kevin]

One of the things that bothers me is a lot of subforums. When I go to a site, I do not want to have to worry about posting in the wrong section and getting in trouble.

Some forums are so divided that I scratch my head and wonder "just where am I supposed to post this?"

Those are the kinds of forums I stay away from.

[3Phase]

I don't spend time on many forums, but one that I do visit has just two things that do discourage me from visiting and participating more often ...

- the forum is sponsored by a magazine and is therefore treated as a bit of an afterthought by management - it merits a good deal of development and topic sub-forums, but they aren't going to nourish it any further, heaven forbit those greedy members would get something more they would find interesting and worth visiting (kind of a backwards attitude toward the customers, I wonder if their advertisers realize)

- a fair handful of the frequent posters (not the majority) are ... don't know if 'troll' is the word ... but quick to post the most snide, snarky and denigrating comments about Big Names in the field whenever the opportunity presents itself - if and only if those BN's don't post on the forum (or aren't known to, they could be in disguise of course) ... they come across as immature and jealous of more successful people, and not interesting to read ... currently they are gleefully kicking and pulling down a BN who nearly died of a serious head injury last year and continues to need charitable support, how low is that?

- there is one more thing that isn't bothering me at the moment but really stops people from connecting with a forum ... if one member makes themselves a sort of gatekeeper, and makes it a point to post critically against any new member ... maybe even worse than newbies being ignored ... I don't remember the term for this behavior

- another one more thing, trolls should be addressed by management and not be derailing otherwise good discussions ... I don't have to see how mods take care of business and prefer not to


I enjoy forums where members are knowledgeable, interesting, have a good sense of humor and can offer criticism maturely and objectively, without emotion. Who do not personalize their comments, assume they are always right or show intolerance for what others say. That's interesting to read even if I'm not posting.

[Big Dan]

High signal to noise ratio..Log in hit new posts and a majority of the posts are either off topic or are in otherwise useful threads that have spiraled into back and fourth joking.
To many ads
To many forums/subforums
To many lock downs (no sigs/avatars/pms)

Admins that give back, what I mean this is forums where admins will try every trick in the book to try and get you to promote their forum then won't link out or credit articles.

To much activity, I'm probably in the minority here but I'm not a big fan of really large forums. If I make a thread and an hour later it's buried on page 2 or 3 of the thread listing, What's the point no one is likely to see it anyhow. Plus with forums that large you loose the community feel (everyone knowing each other) that I love so much about forums.

[Nick]

Originally Posted by Big Dan

To much activity, I'm probably in the minority here but I'm not a big fan of really large forums. If I make a thread and an hour later it's buried on page 2 or 3 of the thread listing, What's the point no one is likely to see it anyhow. Plus with forums that large you loose the community feel (everyone knowing each other) that I love so much about forums.

Good point, Dan. DigitalPoint is an example of this. I don't know why I waste my time there, but any thread I post is usually nowhere to be seen by the end of the day. It's sad, really. It kind-of kills the whole point of a forum - and that is ongoing discussions; not get an answer or two, and then into the archives you go.

[MomCafe]

Originally Posted by Nick

Good point, Dan. DigitalPoint is an example of this. I don't know why I waste my time there, but any thread I post is usually nowhere to be seen by the end of the day. It's sad, really. It kind-of kills the whole point of a forum - and that is ongoing discussions; not get an answer or two, and then into the archives you go.

DP also has a huge lot of ones that PM you with spam now too. I still get PM's off an on.

[Nick]

Originally Posted by MomCafe

DP also has a huge lot of ones that PM you with spam now too. I still get PM's off an on.

Yeah, me too. About once a week at least.

[Savage X]

I could go on forever, but some of my two biggest annoyances:

1. I usually hate the forum structure of every big-board sized forum. They have great content worth being there for, but it has such a shitty layout it kind of evens that out.

2. The lack of professionalism on a lot of big-board sized forums. The reason a lot of these forums are so big is because they are very old and one of the first in their niche. Everything else about them (besides their content and activity) completely sucks. I'd love to see some modern and newly launched forums with awesome innervations and creativity to grow at a much faster rate.

[FullMetalBabe]

When they look ugly. It annoys me to know that I could make that place pretty and the owner doesn't let me to. I offered my services to the owner of certain anime site so I could design the whole site for them, main page AND forum. The design was an html/css design, which can be seen here Dbz-Zone | Watch and Stream Full English Dubbed/Subbed Anime Online , it also had JS and it was easy to use. For the forum I offered to re-make it completely. But the person is so hard headed, he didn't let me! Or well he always say 'maybe' but never tells me concretely. I am a mod at his forums and I can't go in there!! It frustrates me I make so many pretty banners but the forums make my banners ugly!!!

[BananaQueen]

im probably the fussiest person ever when it comes to forums.....i really dont like

☺ admins who lock/delete/archive threads older than a few months-im bad for bumping old threads, and i like looking back at things
☺ cliquey forums-some forums, unless your in the popular crowd, you dont get replies to your threads or anything, and i hate it.
☺ pop up ads-one forum i am on, used to have an advert (weight loss i think) of a fat lady dancing that went over the post button-luckily the admin removed it when everyone complained
☺ smileys that replace words...it makes some words unreadable
☺ forums where theres trolls, flame wars and fighting and the staff dont care (or sometimes even join in the trolling and enjoy banning members who have opposite views to them)
☺ forums where the moderation is too strict, and your afraid to post in case you are banned
☺ a design that makes your eyes bleed. or one where the text is unreadable against the background
☺ mispellings and text talk in forum descriptions (now thats just lazy)
☺ too many sections-makes a forum look empty, and your never sure where to post things