Who's driving this ship?
Debbie Forte asked a question out of frustration, wondering WHO HANDLES TECHNICAL ISSUES FOR THIS SITE?
Well that would be me. Debbie asked why we only have 10 blog posts showing since they can disappear quickly. We changed recently from showing the first three lines of content to just showing the title so we could show more than the 4 or 5 that sometimes were possible with massive pictures included. But I did just change it to now show 15 – we’ll see how that works.
Debbie was also frustrated that her group of Nashvillians is never seen on the front page. Here’s how the different functions work.
Blogs – seen by most recent posting. So no matter how much activity or response they will move down chronologically.
Forums – these move back to the top as there is activity. So a question posted two months ago can still be in the top two or three because people are still responding.
Groups – these move to the top anytime there is activity. So if you want your group to keep showing up you have to generate some activity.
We can change any of these features – but these are what we’ve selected currently.
Incidentally I still monitor pretty much everything here. I review and welcome each new member and ban the inevitable naked ladies and spamming attempts, checking several times a day and more than that on holidays and weekends – when spammers like to hit. I see anything posted as an issue on 48Days and respond to multiple posts each day. Yes, it’s growing rapidly – and yes, I’m open to suggestions to handle growth and success for everyone.
I’m a writer – I'm not a techical guy and not a website administrator. Perhaps it’s time we had an advisory board, or a central page to highlight the many kinds of businesses now represented. Jon Dale set this site up initially but we are one of many clients that Jon has and while he’s available to me, he’s not looking to be constantly monitoring what’s happening here. A lot of clear leaders have emerged with their activity here – they’re easy to spot and are already monitoring groups and leading discussions.
As we plan for 2010 perhaps we could consider weekly teleseminars, live events in Nashville, our own business expo, group trips to seminars and workshops, or just fun get-togethers in exotic places. I’ve seen the synergy and exponential power of working together – and how everyone benefits. I think we have the opportunity to be innovative in this social networking space – and do something spectacular.
I’m open to your ideas.
Well that would be me. Debbie asked why we only have 10 blog posts showing since they can disappear quickly. We changed recently from showing the first three lines of content to just showing the title so we could show more than the 4 or 5 that sometimes were possible with massive pictures included. But I did just change it to now show 15 – we’ll see how that works.
Debbie was also frustrated that her group of Nashvillians is never seen on the front page. Here’s how the different functions work.
Blogs – seen by most recent posting. So no matter how much activity or response they will move down chronologically.
Forums – these move back to the top as there is activity. So a question posted two months ago can still be in the top two or three because people are still responding.
Groups – these move to the top anytime there is activity. So if you want your group to keep showing up you have to generate some activity.
We can change any of these features – but these are what we’ve selected currently.
Incidentally I still monitor pretty much everything here. I review and welcome each new member and ban the inevitable naked ladies and spamming attempts, checking several times a day and more than that on holidays and weekends – when spammers like to hit. I see anything posted as an issue on 48Days and respond to multiple posts each day. Yes, it’s growing rapidly – and yes, I’m open to suggestions to handle growth and success for everyone.
I’m a writer – I'm not a techical guy and not a website administrator. Perhaps it’s time we had an advisory board, or a central page to highlight the many kinds of businesses now represented. Jon Dale set this site up initially but we are one of many clients that Jon has and while he’s available to me, he’s not looking to be constantly monitoring what’s happening here. A lot of clear leaders have emerged with their activity here – they’re easy to spot and are already monitoring groups and leading discussions.
As we plan for 2010 perhaps we could consider weekly teleseminars, live events in Nashville, our own business expo, group trips to seminars and workshops, or just fun get-togethers in exotic places. I’ve seen the synergy and exponential power of working together – and how everyone benefits. I think we have the opportunity to be innovative in this social networking space – and do something spectacular.
I’m open to your ideas.
Tags: administration, blog, forum, group
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Archie Winningham on -
I'll help! And thanks Debbie, your questions are relivant and vital to the success of this awesome community. Thanks to all for making this a great place to be! And thanks to Dan for your vision of creating such a great community that I thoroughly enjoy.
Archie
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Permalink Reply by Wade Beasley on -
Typically what is done on forums and blogs is you would assign 1-N people with moderator status to monitor the content to make sure nothing inappropriate is in them. You could have 2 or 3 people watching the blogs and another 2 - 3 watching the forums.
Hope this helps!
Wade Beasley
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Permalink Reply by Rob Orr on -
Dan - if you need help here, I'd be glad to assist in any way I can. This is a great site and I believe one that will only become more important as the world around us changes. I spend a lot of time on forums and blogs of various kinds so I might be able to offer some help.
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Permalink Reply by Melissa Madsen on -
Hi Dan,
I like the ideas of group trips to seminars and workshops and fun get-togethers in exotic places! The other thing that would be fun is to do a business expo as you suggest. It would be nice to be able to access or see the various types of businesses represented. Happy 2010!
Melissa Madsen
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Permalink Reply by Thomas F. Swift on -
Dan,
My experience with blogs, forums and group sites, that my wife is an active member of, has proven to me at least that they are best policed by their own members. People who are serious about and willing to devote an hour or more a day during a particular time slot to overseeing site activity. These people would be entrusted with tasks related to site integrity. My wife and several other site members take turns policing new members profiles and granting limited access to blog postings, and in this case uploads of scanned scrapbook pages. They routinely pull the profiles of suspected spammers and jokers who are not at all serious about what they are willing to post. The owner of the site now can get so much more done instead of babysitting the site. Just something for you to consider.
Tom
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Permalink Reply by John Farrar on -
Let me make a shameless plug to offer assistance. There are many ways to exchange services and value. Sometimes I feel like my technical abilities are misplaced because trading for the services and goods of others has as much or more value to me than money. (As long as we have money to survive of course.)
With that said I am the author of "ColdFusion 8 Developer Tutorial", a public speaker on web development (covering HTML, JavaScript, CSS, AJAX, Flex/AIR and more). I have worked with small business and large enterprise companies over the years. Adobe added me to the community expert list because of my proven abilities.
So knowing that we are different members in the body (yes, my personal faith is in Jesus Christ) and I see that no matter how much skill comes from me the skills and perspective of others is crucial to any task like this. If you would like me to throw in my hat and see about taking some of these things to the next level let me know. Above all your work changes lives and it is meaningful. It would be an honor to help others get a view of who they are. Help them to learn how to find ballance in a way that helps them travel from day to day in the fast changing world we live in.
My suggestion is to pursue the board of skilled and knowledgeable community members. You want experienced, learning and proven members. One of the things that seems like it would have the most value right up front would be to do some usability testing. They say a wise man knows more than he knows. He knows what he doesn't know. Usability testing is a wise pursuit of social technology. Lastly knowing who you are, who 48Days is, who the visitors are and everyone's goals. You take those answers and locate or create a solution that answers the core objectives of the community. It's not about the best geek solution but rather about the right foundation and a path to grow without creating an unstainable mess.
Hope others kick in and help you do something big with this. Learned about 48 Days about a month ago and we have been promoting the book to people who seem ready to listen. Pointed a couple of people to the web site. Would point more but don't see a cohesive connecting point with the average user out there. Would like to see you have more than a presence. I would like you to find the right solution that lets you manage the services and reach those who you can reach through this community.
John Farrar
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Permalink Reply by Dan Summers on -
A technical forum for the site might be helpful. I know there are techies that could help non-techies make their pages look better and add new apps or elements.
I like the ideas you have in your last paragraph. I am hoping that 2010 allows me to get to Nashville. As for fun get-togethers in exotic places let me suggest my hometown, Detroit. Love to have you all here, there are still a few of us that do business here.
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Permalink Reply by Justin Lukasavige on -
Archie would be a great person to help with this Dan. I even noticed he jumped on here first to comment. He's been involved for quite a while.
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Permalink Reply by Kathleen Rokavec, MD on -
You are doing a great job Dan - this is such a valuable site, one of the few I look at every day!
As for the "get-togethers in exotic places" - how about Hawaii? I am a great organizer and would be happy to host such an event!
Kathy
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Permalink Reply by Jonathan Tollefson on -
Dan, I am excited to hear that you are trying to improve a site that is so great already. I know you monitor everyone who comes on the site, but what about the groups that have been created, but are not contributing to the site anymore. I don't want to hurt the groups feelings, but it seems like a person could get lost in all of the different groups, and end up spending time in groups that really are not connected any more.
Other than that, I think weekly teleseminars would be a great idea. Maybe capture a top producing group every week and have the leader of the group on the teleseminar with you. Really start highlighting the people who help so many other people on this site! Thanks for all that you have done, and I am looking forward to 2010!!!
Happy New Year
Jon T
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Permalink Reply by Peter Brissette on -
Dan,
It has been amazing watching how this site has grown. It is like an incubator for many people just getting started and provides a real opportunity to try things out and see what they are all about.
I would be glad to help with any thing at all. It may be a good idea to set up certain monitors of areas or topics to help share the load of maintaining the site.
It is great to see you take on this adventure that really is breaking new ground from what you have done in the past. Nice work!!
PeterB
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Permalink Reply by Greg Hull on -
Dan,
Thanks for all you do. I haven't been near as active on this site as I shoud be for the past several months as I've been following a dream. Now that my business is almost ready to open I'll get back involved, I think this is a great site and will be glad to help in any way I can. I;ve been getting a lot more involved with Linkedin and several local social networking sites and I still look to this as a great example of what can be done with willing participants.
Greg
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