Forum restructuring?

[ZeroCool]

So I suspect that since the Reddit drama and everything in these forums has likely changed focus rather than having a more Development focus, this place is likely now serving a more casual and disjointed role. Things like 'what hardware should I run', 'how can I do the thing', 'how should I format my drives' things that were once a casual random Reddit post, are now coming here and are kinda awkwardly finding various homes. (I have noticed this with a bunch of forums who had Post-Reddit user influxes.)

So I wanted to throw the question out there for discussion. Obviously, it's up to the mods to consider, decide and implement whatever they see fit, but I don't think it would hurt to ask the question.

Is the forums currently well-structured for what you (want to) use it for, and how could it be improved?

[Revv23]

Coming from the internet of the late 90's early 00's...A.K.A. the good old days - I grew up at a time when forums were the only place to learn something, and every hobby had it's own forum...

I also watched the rise of reddit / youtube with much frustration, as the rise of these platforms coincided with essentially the death of others.

However, I don't believe that it was because reddit was so good that so many old school forums died... I think that in any cases it was because reddit was so BAD that it succeeded. Everything just dumping into the front page no matter how hard you try to moderate. Meaning even small subs seemed to have lots of activity.


The way I see it, a forum only needs 2-5 subs unless its got a massive user base... When mods try to sort out a different subforum for each specific topic, you end up with a bunch of DEAD subs, which discourages people to visit your forums.

I think in it's current state, you could reduce this forum into 4 quite easily:
Announcements/ Guides
Support/ Questions
Development
Off Topic/homelab/media

If any of these subs ever got so busy that page one posts are getting buried before users could see them (which would be awesome because it would mean we had lots of users) then that is when you can break out more specific subs.

For example, Development has 11 subgroups and 41 total threads. Without the "new posts" feature of the forum no one would ever see a post in these areas... not to mention most people in development are already participating on github or somewhere similar... So I think a General development forum with a broader scope would get people from seperate projects talking to each other more, encouraging more collaboration and a stronger community as opposed to everyone living in their own sub with just a few posts.

All of this just IMO of course, I've been on ground floor of many new & slow forums before & I hate to see them die from trying to over organize everything.

[awake]

I'm missing some kind of "quick questions and answers" thread just like the "daily" or "weekly questions" threads on reddit because I think not every question is worth a new thread. On the other hand, if you use the search function of the forum, you'll get the right thread right away if there was one in the past.

[ZeroCool]

So I think things like hardware / devices type discussions are going to be pretty critical. I understand this form is/was very development focused. If this is going to replace something like a sub-Reddit, then it is probably going to need to pivot more towards a more user focus. Heck, even something like 'AliExpress Finds' or something to encourage discussion and community.

Obviously, what is here is great and has been great for what it is, but one of the key parts to JF growing is going to be forging a great community. Forums like this one are going to need to be a critical part of that.

[timeslip1974]

whilst i understand the ethical reasons for leaving Reddit,I cant be the only one to think the communities kinda died a death since moving over the forums. Case of point being a new version of the music client Llama music player - developer dropped a message about it a week ago about where to post it, didnt hear from a moderators and since then nothing - so new client out there and no way for the community to get it. wheres the buzz and excitment on the forums ? there isnt any.....

[xiNe]

whilst i understand the ethical reasons for leaving Reddit,I cant be the only one to think the communities kinda died a death since moving over the forums. Case of point being a new version of the music client Llama music player - developer dropped a message about it a week ago about where to post it, didnt hear from a moderators and since then nothing - so new client out there and no way for the community to get it. wheres the buzz and excitment on the forums ? there isnt any.....

It's not just you here. I'm also having trouble getting used to this old-fashioned forum style, but it seems like others don't want to spend their time on it either. For me, the main issue is user experience. A forum is only useful when there's a huge user base, which was possible in the 90s because people didn't have other ways to get information and chat with each other. Nowadays, there are tons of ways to get information and communicate, so people don't want to actively search for things that don't matter to them unless they have a need. They just want to browse, stay informed, and quickly leave comments. That's why I think Reddit is more popular than traditional forums - it saves time. Personally, I don't think this forum can attract and keep users.

[fromage9747]

Reddit was great. Got notifications on posts, and it was in my feed on my phone. I am going to try hard to keep communication regarding my Music player as best I can. Unfortunately due to not getting notifications from this forum, it slips my mind.

I have created a Subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/llamafin/

Just have been super busy at work lately.

Jelylfin has Twitter. Perhaps that's how we can get communication out?

Got an epic update coming. The app is super slick. It's currently under review with Google play.

🦙

https://imgur.com/FpJ4cy4

[Revv23]

So I think things like hardware / devices type discussions are going to be pretty critical. I understand this form is/was very development focused. If this is going to replace something like a sub-Reddit, then it is probably going to need to pivot more towards a more user focus. Heck, even something like 'AliExpress Finds' or something to encourage discussion and community.

Obviously, what is here is great and has been great for what it is, but one of the key parts to JF growing is going to be forging a great community. Forums like this one are going to need to be a critical part of that.

I think that is a problem with the forum having way too many subs.

when the user base is small you just dont need it. Forcing ppl to post in dead subs make the busy areas slower too.