Hey, it's me - been gone for awhile but now I'm back. Noticed something that I figured I would share, hopefully to improve the forum a bit. Too many sections. That's it. That's your problem. It's redundant. You got non-pony art and pony art subsections, and nobody is even using either. Why not just merge them together so that the one person posting in the 'pony art' section every week and the other one person posting in the 'non-pony art' section once a week can get together and then you'd have two posts in there a week! Heck, nobody is using the whole carousel boutique board thing, so you could prolly just merge the art, film, music sections into one section. I don't actually know what those sections are called by the way, but you know what I mean. Just an example. With just a tiny bit of exaggeration. But still, I've been to other forums that have smaller populaces and it doesn't seem as deserted and desolate as this forum. If you cut out excess sections, it will bring everyone together, so we're not so spread out. That there's your problem. Yes, it's pretty simple, almost too simple....but that's your problem. Figured I'd let you know as someone who has fresh eyes and an unbiased opinion. ...everybody gets one. *flies away*
Yes, there are too many sections. I'm going to be combining some of them soon, Pony Art + Non-Pony Art will become Artwork, same goes with the two music forums.
Agreed! I mentioned this somewhere just recently (didn't think to start a thread) I can understand having all of sections to keep things organised but I don't think that translates to well to the real world. Unfortunately I think it causes entire sections to go unnoticed by many, which in turn gives lack of reason for those who are active in those areas to continue doing so. EDIT: Thanks Mike
Very good idea, I concur. This site does lack a certain 'togetherness' most of the time. Sometimes it feels completely dead in certain forum sections. So this change could indeed be a positive one.
I agree with the OP, if this is going to be addressed then great. Maybe remove some of the sub-sub forums as well? I think it would be better to generalise than to make specific set areas, because obviously people are not adearing to what's been set anyway, and I can't blame them, it's a little confusing because the detail that goes into each category is quite narrow and doesn't allow for much open discussion.
To me personally it seems another reason part of the forum is dead most of the time is because some users seem to stay only in the general chat thread and that's it. Yeah and I think the generalisation would be good as it will beaten up the forum and help new users navigate easier.
This was like, a huge area of discussion back round about in May time I think it was lol, lots of stuff went down.
See, this forum... doesn't have too much activity. This honestly feels like it's completely mimicking other, larger forums. Now, their setup works because of their immense size. It won't work with EPN because of just that. This isn't a site where some people feel obligated to come back to (at least, I've always felt addicted to forums. This is kinda weening me off of it.) and post. Now... I love the chat room and all. But this is a message board. A forum. The main goal of this being here is for people to articulate their posts so they may present them to the community. The whole of the community. The chat room will, unfortunately, have to go in due time. Maybe not right now, but having it and the radio takes people away from the forum where they could be posting and breathing new life into said forum. Maybe you should try to support role-players and artists more. I used to always go do a daily check in the art boards (never been much of a role-player, however). Now, on this forum, I feel as though, "why bother?" It just doesn't see enough people, posting content OR support. To be honest, I don't scroll down past the General Chat thread. Ever. I have Carousel Boutique and Artwork minimized. Out of sight, out of mind. If you put it *above* the General Chat thread however... more people would see the Boutique and the Artwork threads. Maybe more people might be enticed to post there...? In any case, you can take this advice or leave it, though I hope I don't have to see a forum in pain when it doesn't need to be. However, I don't plan to put my roots in here yet.
Yea, there are places here (very few, yes, but still there) that I haven't seen posted in for months, I agree with chopping off the excess and streamlining the place, clean it up and make it look nicer
I agree to pretty much all of the above. Some people may think that the general chat thread steals away attention from the rest of the forum, I used to think the exact same thing. But here's the truth of it. The general chat thread is the only place of interest left on these forums, and removing it or hiding it away somewhere won't cause the rest of the forums to get more active. The people who actively post in that thread would just stop posting entirely. The General Chat thread shouldn't be made less appealing. The rest of the forum needs to be made equally appealing.
It's a rather black and white situation. If we don't do anything, everything else will surely die, yet if we chance hiding the GCT or moving it out of the way, then we risk it's death. Heck, what's life without a gambit now and then?
This. If Rarit_E had said this a few months back, a lot of arguments would never have happened. Anyway, I agree with OP. Perhaps even remove a few other sections. For example, the Everypony Labels sub-forum serves no purpose as far as I can see. Everything there is either unecessary or it can be merged with the Announcement sub-forums.
Eeh. I agree that Sub-forums such as "Pony Art" and "Non-pony art" should be put together to make a subforum named "Art". When things are pointlessly divided, it's just gonna divide activity, and to no avail. And cutting down on less useful sections'd be good for making this place less spaced out. I don't think we should go too crazy with this idea though. After all, all it will be truly doing would be compressing the same amount of activity into a smaller area of space, perhaps just making a large mess of threads. I've seen some suggestions about that'd just create clutter.
