Sub forums would make too much sense. Shame on you!

If it's not broke, don't fix it.

One could argue that the lack of subforums make this kind of like fb in the sense that it's all about recent posts. One can't go into a forum of specific interest, so the only thing people see is the threads that have posts from the last day or two. Alternately, they can use the Search function and get a million hits for threads that don't deal with their area of curiosity.

Structure to the forum makes it easy for folks to find threads of lasting value. Ah, that occurs, right? Threads of lasting value, I mean.

That was a joke, honest.

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Books @ Amazon
"If only he had used his genius for niceness, instead of Evil." M. Smart

You mean these?


"T3" - http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...ost=4092051#p4092051

"Gorilla" - http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...ost=4597045#p4597045

"Trucker Hat" - http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...ost=5124120#p5124120

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"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin

ST can only understand jokes if they are pink.

In my opinion, more often than not sub-forums make it harder to find what you're looking for. They divide up the conversation into multiple different areas and often things don't fall neatly into one category so you end up having to look all over for things.

The "Timeline" effect of a single-forum is much more fashionable and appropriate these days, noone's writing a reference manual for racing triathlons here.

Many forums with subforums look deserted because there doesn't seem to be much happening unless you delve into all the topics.
Slowtwich keeps it fresh with varied and continuos new material.
It also exposes everybody to a topic that they may not necessarily have gone looking for and broaden the user experience.

we've had this discussion many times over the more than 15 years this forum's been in existence. the readership, as a whole, does NOT want subforums, except for those we have:

lavender room (off-topic)
womens
classifieds
jobs
notices
bike fitters

what i DO think is overlooked here are HOT FORUM TOPICS, because this is new functionality. they aren't subforums but they are aggregations of the best threads on a topic. i'm still in the process of building these out. they will make navigation a lot easier for those looking for a specific topic.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

There is also the coaches forum!

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Once, I was fast. But I got over it.

Development forum too

How does the Ms Stretton thread measure-up compared to those 3 you listed?

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29 years and counting

In my experience, subforums only create a place where people will say "I don't ever go in that one; it's too scary/weird/intense for me"

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"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin

I've seen them...and have wondered how content gets into them.

This seems like it could be a good way to address the common problem that is shared by community forums on (pseudo/semi)-technical topics...how to retain the lore generated by the community. Sticky topics have always been the defacto method. But, after a while they become just as unwieldy...I've been to some forums where the first 2-3 pages are nothing but sticky topics! Alternatively you have sticky posts with lists of posts by topic. These are marginally less unwieldy that directly sticky-ing, but the overhead of maintaining the meta-posts often causes them to fall behind.

But, the issue is always how to curate the content. Its usually not too bad in real-time (a collective vote by the participants in a thread usually erupts at some point and a Mod gets emailed to add it to the "list". make it a sticky, etc)....but, its massive to try and retrospectively curate a collected archive (obviously ST has a pretty large history). Without an army of willing slaves, or a giant pile-o-cash (to pay less than willing slaves) its a daunting task. I tried to do it, once upon a time, on a much smaller forum than ST for my own personal use...But, as a relatively uniformed member, I wasn't astute enough to recognize the really good threads on the really good topics until I was half-way through reading the archives. By then, I realized there were numerous threads the I "should" have marked, or categories/topics that I should have included. So, even the slave/paid army has to be curated to ensure the requisite knowledge and perspective.

i tried to crowdsource the populating of this tool. in the end it was much easier for me just to do it myself, catch as catch can, as time allows. i think it would be great if the members here would help. but, honestly, two-thirds of everyone reading this doesn't even know the utility exists even tho their eyes pass by it every day, several times a day. i can make a resource. i can't make people use it. i can't even make people see it.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

I've never seen anyone post "Hey, where's the link to the Amy Stretton thread?"

That should tell ya something

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"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin

No twist I guess, and the subject is in absentia.

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29 years and counting

Ok, THAT thread is funny. More than anything the fact that you (of all people) expected better of the interwebs! I too have been around since the days of usenet, gopher, ftp and vt52 terminals (not in triathlon, mind you...but, computer science).

I'm knew round these parts...so, I like to tread lightly in that phase of forum life. I try and understand things before I ask a stupid question or 4.

I will say that I was/am confused by the title of the drop-down. "Hot" made/makes me think that it is a listing of the "'currently" most-active threads. When I poked around and looked at the content, I couldn't correlate it with the threads that were at the top of page-1 (or even ON page-1). So, I couldn't really figure out "the algorithm" for what was in the list. Now, I know that my mistake was my interpretation of the word "hot". Noting that this is a feature that is substantially different from any other forum I've frequented (thus its not in the common vernacular of forum visitors), some explanation might be warranted rather that assuming people will figure it out. I'm more curious than most (I think); I actively tried to figure it out; I failed to make sense of it, gave up, and just went back to reading the first few top pages (or using the search function).

I think a name that is something more akin to "Slowtwitch Greatest Hits" that more accurately reflects the curated historical archive nature, might result in more usage/better understanding. Having a sticky forum post, or other explanation of the feature might also help people figure it out. Further, I think a "how to add to this list" (both for new category suggestions, and nominating threads for inclusion) included in the drop-down might also help. Maybe I'm wrong, and now I'm likewise putting too much faith in the interwebs.

Sounds like a pretty good description of Slowtwitch to me.

OK then: a subforum is a scary/weird/intense place, within a larger scary/weird/intense place

How's that?

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"What's your claim?" - Ben Gravy
"Your best work is the work you're excited about" - Rick Rubin

Woah, I've been around for a while, and I'm just now noticing this. Literally blended into the fray, my eye never caught it.

hidden in plain site!

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman