Guinea Pigs Required

We’ve been experimenting with some new forum software and we’re at the stage where we’d like to get some more general feedback.

If you’re intrigued, you’ve got an hour spare and you’re an opinionated gobshite (note to self - I might need to narrow that criteria down a bit) let me know below and I’ll provide access for you.

The software is called Discourse and you can read more about it and the philosophy behind it here www.discourse.org.

If you’re a geek then you might be interested to know that Discourse was created by the founder of Stack Overflow (Stack Exchange). So he knows a thing or two about how to build communities that avoid unnecessary conflict.

If you’re not a geek, then, look over there, wooosh.

IMPORTANTLY: we’ve made no decision about moving to this yet and we may very well stay where we are. After all, it works well and pap has made it perform now, but I perceive that there are some advantages to the new software that would help with

  • attracting new posters

  • bringing back lapsed posters

  • rewarding regular contributors with increasingly greater capabilities up-to moderation powers

  • keeping discussions ‘nice’

  • automatically intervening when downvotes are detected

  • weaving social media and football content through the site (Optimus Trousers two dot ohh).

I’ll post more info below.

Bletch

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Will this be like a Salisbury Guinea Pig?

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I’ve been "alpha"ing this for @saintbletch and am well impressed by the ease of use of the Discourse board. Obviously there are things that are different but it is a good piece of “forum software”,

Not taking anything away from our @pap , things that he has done here, with a lot of effort, are provided out of the box on Discourse.

For mine I would recommend moving over but that is entirely down to the community…

I have spent a number of minutes thinking about the possibility and have decided I couldn’t give a fuck.

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You’ll be missed.

You know that, right?

You’ll be missed.

x

Who will be missed?

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As long as we can still swear then do whatever you like. Except changing the font, don’t do weird fonts or this place will meltdown.

As long as you change the white background which is like a light if the page stays open when i fall asleep

I think it’s going to have to accommodate Chinese Script…we need to attract an International audience beyond Dubai.

The Far East is represented thank you

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Civilised Discussion? Well that’s gonna fail then.

And if it is still so damned hard to upload photos …

Hell half the numpties on here still can’t do You Tube links

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pfft ‘far’. You want FAR east, you should have come to me.

Tokyo is just northern to me :lou_lol:

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Guinea pig the new site then Phil, all your concerns will be washed away as if you were being bathed in Asp’s milk by a thousand virgins…

As long as it hasn’t got a fucking swear filter, I couldn’t give a shit

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Will these virgins be paid for their services?

Asking for a friend.

Guinea pigs and virgins in the same paragraph

Sun. Headlines and he ate my Hamster come to mind

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You can’t afford me. I’m an official 14th rate web site designer these days…

But yeah be quick it will take me a week to travel back for the semi so only a few days spare

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It’s all flat caps and whippets ya southern softie.

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You have a PM…