Post Count
 

The purpose of Zelaron (in my opinion) is the progression of ideas, the spread of thought, and the discussion of important topics.

When Zelaron experienced the rollback recently, people were dissapointed. I understand this as I was dissapointed myself. I was not angry at anyone for the crash.

The only things I view as a loss are the ideas that were lost because of it. The discussions that were active before it happened are no longer present.

The main complaints, however, that I saw from other users was that their post count had gone down or their activity bar had receded.

Guess what I saw right after the rollback...

I move that post count should be removed completely. I'm also adverse to the activity bar, but this thread isn't concerning that. What do you think the post count is good for?

The members here know who has been here and who hasn't. We know who is active. We know who has contributed with good posts and who has spammed. What do we need a post count for?

It isn't hurting anyone being there. Big deal if they complained about lost post count.

Also, you say the people here know who has been around and such. That may be true, but what about new members?

It's funny, members were more worried about a number then the acually threads being lost. I don't hear anyone saying. "Man, i made a really helpfull thread, and now it's gone". I here, in my own words: "Man, i lost a stupid little number".

If it was gone, i wouldn't care much at all. I've been here for about 1yr 1/2 now, and i broke the 1000 mark like 6 months ago. That should show what i care about a number.

I also don't think they will get rid of it, seeing that WetWired created a nice little hack to use images as the numbers, instead of using text. So i don't see it going anywhere, anytime soon.

And if they used cron jobs, this would have never happened. :p

Like he said tho, people do make threads/posts just to get the count up. I have to filter threw all those just to find a good thread/post to reply to.

LW, you don't like it, but because you think they won't remove it, you voted no?

I think they should just leave it alone. It won't slove anything.

I voted no, just because there are too many underlying issues that people will get all disgruntled about, and possibly leave for. I myself have been an avid supporter of getting rid of post count in the past, and now I just see the complete uselessness of even attempting this issue. Not because it won't happen, but because post count, for most people, at one time or another was probably a big reason for wanting to stick around.

Just because we've (Members of like 50% Longevity, give or take an arbitrary %) gotten over the "Oh my God, I want to get my post count high high high!!!" stage of Zelaron, doesn't mean that everyone else has, or that new members will.

I should close this, for it has been discussed numerous amounts of time in the public, amongst Staff, and amongst Admins, but I won't because these topic do bring up interesting points every once in a while, could spark new ideas, and reinvigorate certain issues members have.

Continue on all...

I'm with titusfied on this one...

I vote no.

The previous discussion of a topic is no reason to close a thread of the same topic. I am not copying a thread, nor do I care what was decided in the past.

As I see it, people wanting to get a high post count is no reason to have post count around. Posting simply to get a number up is a waste of posts. If someone has an idea they wish to share, it should not matter if it raises their number by one, deletes it, or turns it blue for all the logic I can throw at it.

You just don't understand do you? Yes, initially people tend to care about post count. Yes, they may make bad threads and posts in the beginning. What you fail to comprehend is that not everyone here has been around as long as a lot of the members. Sure, they may be annoying at first, but eventually turn into a quality member. Isn't that worth it in the end? I think that is more than enough reason to keep post count.

Again, nothing you could possibly say, or even have up to this point is an original idea. This topic has been discussed verbatim way to many times, but for arguments sake, it will stay to get others inputs.

Activity is simply an indicator of how often you visit and show interest at Zelaron. That isn't harming anyone, its just a gauge on member's activity, obviously. So why should that be taken away as well?

We do use cron jobs to back up the databases. The incident happened because our web host was installing a control panel for the server, and he backed up all the files on the site plus the wrong database (zelaron), when the real database (zelaron_test) was not backed up. The daily backups were deleted, and restoring the board from an incorrect database obviously didn't work. Now, the backup I had on my hard drive was 9 days old... Well, you get the idea.

Anyway, I do not think the post count should be removed, we simply need a way to make users care less about keeping it high. It's just a number. I have some ideas in mind to get users to post for other reasons than keeping their post count high. For instance, it would be possible to check the length of every user's post and determine an average post length value, but that would likely just hamper the board activity, as you'd either have to post something long and useful, or get your average lowered to 10 characters per post and officially be declared a "foolish spammer". Setting a trend for book-length posts isn't good.

However, with some new board features coming up soon (such as zajako's RPG hack, which is getting really nice with random monster battles and everything), users gain gold to purchase items for every post and new thread they make. New threads, which normally require some innovativity to be made, let users gain a lot more gold than when making a simple reply. Well, it's just one example of how a board modification could alter the urge for a high post count and get users to post more interesting threads instead.

Other ideas include a download section with the latest game demos, patches and files, which may only be accessible by active users who visit the board often.

I'd be very happy to hear ANY ideas about getting the post counter to become less important.

I think post count should stay bcus it signify's seniority and participation which lets new members know who is the most knowlegable about the forum or most participant member in zelaron so that they can ask them for information and/or get a different perception on there replies/posts. Of course if ppl abuse Zelaron w/ spam and useless garbage, then they should be punished

Thats what the activity, longevity, & Member icons are all about, right?

Yes but people can spam and become so called "seniors" over people who been here for a long time.

I voted Yes but I meant no. Don't think I love post counts or anything, but they're just a part of EVERY forum I've been in. It is something you naturally assoiciate with forums.

Being diffrent is the key!

i would have to say that post cout is not a big concern of mine and neither is the activity bar because i mean i found it interesting at first with the activity bar and i know that personally it cause me to make some "spam" post that i would not have normally made but i realized that what i was doing was not helpful. i mean i have been here a while and do not usually post unless i have something help or insight full to say, or if i need help with a problem and then i get tire of people either bring a thread that i am looking for help off topic or just filling it full of spam. so overall i have personally realized that activity and post cout dont matter to me becaue i find it slightly strange that anyone should have 100% or close to it activity it makes me wonder if they have no life outside of zelaron because i mean face it most people cannot be at or near a computer 365 days a year just to visit a site and make atleast 4 posts.


also as a side note i liked how on the old version of the forum you got a title for somany posts. this was an interest to me because i just wanted to see what the next title i got was. i know that you could change it if you wanted but i always left it the way it was because i kind of thought of it as a ranking system which was cool.

I don't care about a stupid little hack to use images instead of numbers. While I hold that postcount has some amount of usefulness, I have absolutely no objection to getting rid of it, if the proposition has enough support.

Yes
Acer, Kuja`s #1, Medieval Bob, WetWired 4 33.33%
No
!King_Amazon!, Chruser, HandOfHeaven, LiveWire, MarkiX, mjordan2nd, Penguin, Titusfied 8 66.67%