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Your Comments & Lost Stories
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By Shovas , Section Wishlist []
Posted on Sat Sep 14, 2002 at 12:00:00 PM PST
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This a repost of a story from the main K5 site concerning two features which I think are very important to integral conversations and quality discussion. At the suggestion of two people, I'm posting it here.
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Your Comments
When viewing comments by clicking on "Your Comments", I propose each comment be organized into threads for easier viewing. Instead of the flat-list style of comments currently available, this would allow for more fluid, higher quality discussions with less participant drop-off and an easier time all around.
As it stands, comments are simply listed by date. Suppose, for the moment, that you enter one thread of a story and you post one comment. A few hours or days go by and you've participated in umpteen more threads, when viewing "Your Comments" you see a simple list of comments, sorted by date. Now, the thread you were in a few days ago is way down there on the list and may even be off the page! Heaven forefend! Even with the number of replies stated with the comment entry, it still leaves holes in the system which degrade discussion quality due to these frustrating problems.
Let's not forget! Threads in "Your Comments" should be weighted by date, so the entire thread with a comment that is newer than any other comment, in any other thread, moves up to the top. Perhaps we'll need something like "ignore this thread", or maybe not: Why would we if there are new threads that we're involved in getting new comments? This way, the newest threads are always near the top.
Lost Stories
As it stands, comments are never lost if the system is acting properly. However, stories can be lost and this has the potential to completely disjoint and stifle discussions. Some stories which are voted down or cancelled are simply lost. I suggest the system be reworked to allow these stories to stay. What good are discussions without the root story? What if we want to refer back to it? Why, I wouldn't know what to do!
The solution is simple: rework the system to maintain voting down and cancelling stories, but put them in an archive where links are updated and when, in fact, they are voted down or cancelled, the same links as normal will then direct to the archives. I knew you'd like it!
This is not a suggestion
In all seriousness, though, these two issues have plagued me throughout my visitations of K5 for the past some-odd years. I believe the "Your Comments" suggestion would be the greatest immediate improvement, as it would allow for old discussions to continue without simply disappearing because people are generally to apathetic to look down their list of comments or even go to the next page to find the comment that their counter-part responded to.
These were put forth in a diary, but the wording caused people scoff and insult. A clarification on the issue received little notice. As such, I felt the need to get this directly in front of a large audience. |
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