Open discussion about the community.

[adamtemp64]

Leading on from a thread that was derailed after a member stated there views on the state of the community I am creating this open discussion.

I am also taking the view that was expressed in the thread from post 24 onwards http://community.o2.co.uk/t5/Welcome-News/O2-Community-Rewards-April-2014/m-p/661441#M8644 that @Bambino made.

The discussion lead to hints that many long standing members of this community had left for the reasons as stated in the thread linked. I will not duplicate now as the comments are still there.

As this is a customer to customer community I feel it is time that the wishes of the community are acted upon.

This morning I clicked on unread posts and nearly all were in off topic with a few Questions about o2 that were buried amongst all the facebook like talk.

I am as stated before (on previous occasions) and after much concideration thinking of also withdrawing my support for this community as it is not the place it was. After this thread has been replied to I will make my decision on if I stay or go and will post an open letter explaining the reasons I can no longer support the community if I chose to leave.

[gemz4the1]

Thank you @Anonymous and @jonsie 

Also, that is the point I was trying to make (but I'm bad at wording things lol) - something on the technical side should be done so that members can choose if they want to receive notifications for posts in the off-topic thread or not.  Obviously it is not an easy or simple task and it cannot be done in 5 minutes but hopefully a resolution can be found soon

[Anonymous]

Agree with @Anonymous and @jonsie that @gemz4the1 has put down in one post what most of us were thinking.

There IS a place for off topic in the same way that there IS a place for members to be able to select (perhaps via a drop down menu) what categories of topics they are interested in.

If course we all need to recognise that members posting threads (possibly for the first time) may be wanting tech help but may put them in off topic threads (by accident) but if the o2 mods are able to put the changes in to keep most if not all people happy then that is going to have to be the way it is. After all this is a computer system and it won't be able to please 100% of the members 100% of the time.

I also mentioned earlier in the thread that (in my opinion) this thread has broadly run its course and maybe it is now time for @Toby and @Anonymous to close the thread and see what can be done to make the changes members want.

This is a great Community which like all forums has a few minor issues. Let's keep it great.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for all your contributions, guys. Let us go away and see what we can do to improve the experience.

[Anonymous]

I'll be honest, it's not the off topic posts that's been pushing me away from the forum recently. It has changed the way I use the forum, instead of using new posts straight away I go to the boards I can help in individually and then use the new posts function to see what else there is. I think it's a small price to pay for a vibrant bustling forum. I've been a member of forums for as long as I've been on the internet and the offtopic sections do tend to be the heart of any forum and that's not a bad thing.

[Anonymous]

I've been in the States for the past two weeks butr wanted to throw my tuppence worth in as well...maybe albeit too late as everyone else has already given their opinion.

I agree with alot of what @Bambino says in this post , pretty much whole-heartedly everything that @jonsie has stated in this post and have raised my concerns before. I won't repeat what has already been stated with regards to the Rewards programme, post counts and how the community has changed over the past year.

Regarding the off-topic forum, I agree that there should be a place for every day chit-chat to take place, however the amount of drivel thats posted in there including copy and paste articles from other websites (not only restricted to the off-topic forum now!) is ridiculous. I actually makes me grit my teeth in anticipation before going near the off-topic section now and generally leave without even opening a topic. I have been a member of countless forums over the years most of which had an off-topic area however the one on these forums beats them all for pointless posts.

I've stopped visiting alot of the sections within the community and try and keep myself to the "Other Devices" and "Discussions & Feedback" sections now as I'm finding it harder and harder to bite my tongue and not say anything about some of the post padding topics that are created elsewhere.

Sorry, I'm now repeating things from the previous posts that I linked to so I'll stop there. I don't know if I'm included in the list of "knowledgeable members" others have spoken about  but I'm finding myself visiting less and less...

[adamtemp64]

@Anonymous thanks for that.

The issue is nothing will change a community is what this place should be but things have gone downhill in the last 18 months or so and concernes were raised back then http://community.o2.co.uk/t5/Welcome-News/Introduction-and-planned-changes/m-p/242117#M2546 that will give some of the more recent members an insight to the old layout of this community and concernes raised at the time.

Yes things evolve but when that post was done the lithium community was still only a few months old replacing the heavily spammed o2 forum.

Over to @Anonymous @Toby to mull this over and the comments made.

[Anonymous]

I am intrigued to understand what makes the perception "things have gone downhill in the last 18 months"

[Anonymous]

So the solution is to provide a facility that allows for people to select the category or categories that they are interested in whilst still giving the option to access off topic as and when.

I also have sympathy with the Vue that there are a huge number of off topic threads appearing now which means less access to those seeking help.

[Anonymous]

Piper dog said "I also have sympathy with the Vue that there are a huge number of off topic threads appearing now which means less access to those seeking help."



@Anonymous what do you mean. How do people have less access to seeking help ?

[Anonymous]

Hi BoB

Sorry perhaps I wasn't clear. I meant that when people request help they may get "missed" through the volume of off topic.