my list of things ning migrators will mkiss
Installation and Configuration
Strumelia:1- first, we need a centralized place on the site's main page and in the nav links where members can simply click on the "Group" naviagation link and see the various groups at one time, like:
http://mountaindulcimer.ning.com/groups
(the grid view helps rather than a single column view that I think JR shows, so one doesn't have to click on too many pages to see all the groups...so annoying)
This isn't a problem and is already support - just need to update the list template.
Strumelia:2-then they click to go look at a group, join it,or post in it, and they come to that particalur group's page or location, for example:
http://mountaindulcimer.ning.com/group/oldstyledronenoterplayers
If you look there you will see some basic group features:
a) a nice list of the group Members (and their colorful hotlink avatar pictures which is awesome- hover over their pic, see the name and then checkout thier profile page)
b) that group's description and information/guidelines at top
c) an optional text box where the group admin or site owner can place interesting things, video embeds, images, text (the text box is nice but not critical if you can put such rich embeds in the upper Description text area)
d) the group's Discussion Forum, where group members can start and hold discussion threads. Supremely important.
All this is what I think as well - this is already here (for the most part)
Strumelia:e) a group Comment Wall, where members can post QUICK things- quick questions, and joke around but not really needing to start a thread about whatever it is they are thinking. Members LOVE this, especially if they are newbs and don't even know how to start a discussion thread yet.
This would have to be new - we don't a "Ning Wall" module. I wonder if it is really needed? Maybe instead of a wall we have a "default" discussion that anyone can add to? I mean a "wall" and "discussion" are flip sides of the same coin - somewhere for people to post their thoughts.
Strumelia:f) every network is different, but notice here that the "Pages" in this group I've linked only has a few specific instructional pages which were posted by the Group moderator (who I assigned)- otherwise you get hundreds of random weird pages posted by just anybody, about their goldfish's funeral etc.
So do we need the ability to limit page creation to a subset of group users? I'm thinking the profile owner can choose WHO can create pages in the group. And does that need to be different for each group? Or is it global?
Strumelia:In my ning site a new group nowadays is created only by me, after considering whether the subject merits a whole group that is not adequately covered or made cohesive through the regular site forums area.
Speaking for my own experience from running sites, I'm worried that we are pushing users into all sorts of different places to post their thoughts:
- "site" level forum
- "profile" level forum
- ning groups with individual forums ("discussions") inside
- comments on all items
I understand that this is what you've got right now in Ning 2.0 and you're used to it - but are all these places really needed? We can certainly develop this, but I'd recommend taking the opportunity to see if we can't structure things a bit differently so that once you're on Jamroom you actually have an improved experience. Note that's just my suggestion, and I know not everyone would agree, so if you don't that's no biggie - I know we need to ultimately replicate as much as we can as some sites are going to want things to be exactly as they are, but just wanted to throw that out there.
Strumelia:Now we have about 60 groups and they are all very focused on certain aspects of dulcimers and dulcimer playing. This creates a site where members can very easily meet others with their particular interests, and also get help faster without getting lost. Too many scattered subject groups just make it harder to find what our members need, so for me I need to be able to be the only person able to actually create a new group. (I often will assign a group moderator who is a member with limited editing power but only can edit/delete/add things in that group, not site-wide. That's a nice touch Ning added) Our biggest most active group is "Beginner players".. not surprisingly.
And yes, I must be able to set private groups.
"Too many scattered subject groups just make it harder to find what our members need" - that sort of reinforces my point above. I want to make sure that we come out of the other end of the tunnel with something that is awesome, and ideally has
improved upon what you currently are using.
Strumelia:so for my own situation, the most important group features are the member list, the group forum area, the Comment Wall, and the ability to allow only admins or moderators to create new groups and group Pages.
Having an option for group members to be able to send message to all other group members is very handy too.
So I can join a group and spam other users? We actually take a pretty hard line on this with our Private Notes module - you can only send a message to another user if they have FOLLOWED you. This is how most online systems are setup. This is also based on years of experience dealing with JR4 sites that had a heck of a time dealing with spammers that would join just to send bulk private notes to users.
Strumelia: I myself chose to turn that off long ago because spammers went orgasmic over that ability and were beating down the doors to get in during the time when Ning was having more spam than it does today. But it's a great feature to have as an option. A member in the New Jersey Group can message everyone about a concert in NJ, but not bore members in Germany with that message for example.
I should have finished reading the rest - I'd prefer to not create that option, as in my opinion nothing good will come from it.
Thank you so much for taking the time to lay things out and clarify things for me - everything I believe is doable, but we're going to need to re-engineer some things here to get it working correctly.
Thanks!
updated by @brian: 12/29/14 09:23:54AM
