What do you want here in Adland?
Submitted by Dabitch on Thu, 05/31/2007 - 11:41.
Hey all
Might as well use this as a good place to let you guys vent. There are about a hundred things on my to-do list in order to make this new Adland better and I'm working hard at it. On top of the list is fixing the search which I hate and others hate as well since I've received emails about it and as you can see I'm doing three different kinds of searches now. Google is there to help tide us over until I get one right. Google doesn't know everything about Adland though, but at least it tries. :)
So yeah, go ahead and start a wish list here about things that bug you, from styling to navigation to features. I'll get on it and add to my list....
Have y'all noticed you can subscribe to posts these days? To check comments coming in? We used to have RSS feeds for posts comments, email is better, right? You can also subscribe to forum topics - which I'll do on this one so I get your input in my mailbox pronto. I'm so clever. ;P
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So yeah, go ahead and start a wish list here about things that bug you, from styling to navigation to features. I'll get on it and add to my list....
I'm finding the "reply" feature of the threads can cause confusion, as it messes up the order of the posts. Like in this thread.
"Happiness is overrated. Take a placebo; it might make you feel better."
I disagree. I think the reply feature is a good one, and it serves to organize sub-topics far more than it "messes up the order of the posts." In your example, Ost was replying directly to adlib, and her mention of "boogers" seemed to be purely a humorous afterthought. The comment would have made far less sense if she had placed it after "i like boogers."
Sometimes I want to comment on something someone wrote in a long thread of comments, months or even years after they wrote it. Without the reply function, I might have to place my comment ten or twenty comments down the page, and then it would surely make no sense at all.
Well, the way I read the thread, Ost makes reference to geekhead123 liking boogers, and then geekhead123 says "I like boogers", so, I found it a bit strange. I am used to seeing the last post in a thread as being the newest, and text in a quote box (or something similar) if the post is replying to something someone posted earlier on.
Now, I know you replied to my first post, but if someone comes along and also replies to my first post, your post could be seen as a reply to their post, and not mine. The more posts in between your post and mine, the less things could make sense. That's what I'm driving at. :)
"Happiness is overrated. Take a placebo; it might make you feel better."
Well, since Ost was sitting next to me when she made the comment, I had the advantage of knowing what she was thinking. And she only added the booger line as an afterthought. The main point of her comment was that the explanation of how to access the ads and upgrade is as plain as the nose on your face, so she placed the comment where she thought it belonged. And if you go back and read it again, I think the point of her comment is pretty clear even if you weren't sitting next to her.
My point, however, is that if I want to comment on something that you wrote a year ago, and there are twenty comments after yours that don't continue the same line of thought, it's unlikely that any other readers would connect my reply to your original comment. So it makes a lot of sense to be able to "reply," rather than just "comment."
Merry Christmas. :-)
Tod is quite right. I was replying to adlib, not to geekhead or the booger comment. I don't know why you picked that thread as an example. There are so many others which illustrate your point much more effectively. But c'est la vie. Your point is well taken and I can see the merit in both your and Tod's point of view. Sometimes I'd much prefer to be able to read the comments in the order they were written.
I was just astounded to see another comment saying "why can't I see the ads," or "why does it cost so much just to watch a commercial." Sometimes I want to scream that if you can't afford the 5 euros, then just wait for another episode of Superbowl's Greatest Commercials or Greatest Commercials Ever Made.
Then of course I remember that I asked Tod if I could use his account to watch a spot, and he laughed at me and said NO!!! I knew I should have asked for him to pay for my Super Adgrunt status in the divorce! :-)
I'll be happy to pay for your super adgrunt status. Just say the word. I'll even buy you a full year in advance! :-)
I just pulled that thread out of the air. I didn't have time to go digging to a better example. Now, I regret not doing that. ;)
"Happiness is overrated. Take a placebo; it might make you feel better."
I'm sorry, I wasn't chastising you for using that thread or my comment as an example. But see, now you used the reply function quite effectively. It made a lot more sense for you to reply here than put it at the end of the comments.
Merry Christmas, TDD. I hope you have a great holiday and get all the gifts you're hoping for. Now maybe Tod will buy me a year of super adgrunt status for Christmas! ;-)
Hehehehe. The classic "why can't I see the ads" is something we've been seeing asked for four years now. No matter what I do it seems we'll never have people stop asking that.
I'm actually very torn on the reply-thing as well. My first instinct was to remove it, but you guys both have valid points so I really don't know what is best. I figure this is one feature for the community to decide.
It does make sense to read comments in the order they were posted, and even if we did have the reply to specific comment for years, people weren't using it. Now people are using it (I guess this design makes it clearer then?) and I sometimes find threads a little messy... So, more opinions wanted. One torn, two for and one against as it stands now. (silly me wanted to remove the "reply" simply because there are so many links under each comment now that we also have the "edit" link, pure style-issue then.)
See, now there's a perfect example of why "reply" works. If I had no reply option, I would have had to post that last comment after yours, and people would think I was offering to pay for your super adgrunt status, which is absurd. Not that I wouldn't be happy to buy you a gift, but you have super adgrunt status for life. :-)
But what if my reply to ost was posted before your reply? Would that have made sense? :)
I would like to see a "reply with quote" button. :)
"Happiness is overrated. Take a placebo; it might make you feel better."
That's a concept. I'm sure there's a solution that will make everyone happy. (Even though happiness is overrated.) :-)
I'm sure your right. :)
I can't believe I created this big discussion all started by someone posting, "I like boogers".
Three card monte? Sure, I'll play! ;)
"Happiness is overrated. Take a placebo; it might make you feel better."
Oh, and about Christmas; I like, A Christmas Carol and The Grinch Who Stole Christmas but I dislike the endings. ;)
"Happiness is overrated. Take a placebo; it might make you feel better."
TDD said:
That can be arranged - question is, should the reply go downthread then? Like this? :) And with a link to the quoted reply?
Well, if you were going to change it to "reply with a quote," then I suppose the point would be for the reply to go "downthread," and not appear directly after the comment one was replying to. I still think that it's not a perfect solution, because it takes the reply out of the context of the mini-thread it belongs in. I suppose there may not be a perfect solution though, and this is certainly one which might satisfy everyone.
Wow, Tod. You're being so uncharacteristically diplomatic. First you wouldn't comment on the Terrorist Fireworks ads, and now you're endorsing compromise here! Will wonders never cease. I think you've probably had one too many glasses of champagne today. :-)
Okay, let's leave it as is. I can see the other point-of-view. I'm the minority on this, anyway. I withdraw my submission. ;)
"Happiness is overrated. Take a placebo; it might make you feel better."
This thread says everything about this place, one member comes with an idea, others weigh in and Dabitch comments on possible solutions that might please everyone on Christmas eve three hours before her kids open gifts. Somebody pay her for this job already.
Hear hear. Though you can't buy that kind of dedication, lets try.
...yes I realize that I'm commenting on Christmas Day. I'm in the den where the smokers are exiled to doing a little surfing between meals. I'll go back to the mad family gathering in a minute. This is also why I'll never quit smoking.
Hahaha, well as you can see, you are not the only one exiled to Adland on the holidays - you're in good company here! And thanks. God jul.
Ha Ha Ha!!! Tod is just sitting here itching to let everyone knows how he really feels about the Muslim Fireworks spots. But since he exiled himself with the "Christmas Cease Fire," he'll have to wait until midnight. Plus, our real Christmas was yesterday. But then he's an American and he's never been able to wrap his head around that concept.
Just six hours and twenty-three minutes to go.
At my house we eat reindeer and smoked reindeer heart for Jul. Have him try and wrap his head around that. ;)
(The Jultomte has a cart pulled by a Goat!)
At least he's spent enough time in Sweden to know what a tomte is. Tod loves reindeer. I'm not sure that he's ever had smoked reindeer heart though. You should offer him some the next time you see him. And I understand that his Norwegian wife talks to reindeer in the woods. Crazy Norwegians. :-)
This is one thing I hate about the internet.
Here we are communicating from all over the world, and yet we can't be eating together! We could be having turkey, and ham, and reindeer, and all kinds of other great food!
And here I have the Christmas turkey I was given by my employer still sitting frozen in my freezer.
"Happiness is overrated. "
And the brussels sprouts I've been peeling for the last hour, which I'm about to saute in butter and garlic. :-)
I want food here in Adland. That's what I want. Food. "Feed me!"
"Happiness is overrated. ."
Ost's B-sprouts are killer. In more ways than one since she uses about a pound of butter to make them. :-)
There's a place where the taste-tabs I just commented on might come in handy if we could email them!
Yeah, I'm waiting for those smoked reindeer heart taste tabs before I jump in with both feet! :-)
I thought I was going to be the only person logging in (apart from ever present Dabs) on Christmas but the party is hopping in here with four people logged in right now.
Cool.
I'll have some of those garlic and butter drenched sprouts, a slice of reindeer some ham and a bit of that frozen Turkey to chill my drink with. I brought some Macallan 30 year old scotch with me, which is my only tradition. Who else wants a wee dram?
TDD said:
Ah, so it boils down to this. While the "reply" to specific comments works in some cases, it can create a real mess, and in a recent thread (lets not mention any names lest they come here as well) the whole thread got rather messy as some user(s) figured "Reply" meant that they simply had to reply to every single comment ever ... and the thread is now a mess.
I've removed the "reply". It's flat comments all the way now. At least for now.
In reference to the other messed-up thread, that is what I was originally trying to communicate could eventually happen. It's too bad that it did happen, as I am able to also see tod.brody's and ost.macka's point-of-view on the subject.
One of the problems with my "reply with quote" idea is that the whole message could be quoted (many might not edit the quote) when someone is only typing a few words in reply. If the quoted message is long, that can really be annoying for people reading the thread. Also, images and links could get caught in the quote as well, adding to the aggravation of readers.
I'll try to use the users name in my post I am addressing:
Dabitch,
or use:
"Happiness is overrated."
Yeah, that other thread got way messy. My hack to remove the reply right now isn't ideal, I'm checking other ways of doing it.
The "Reply with quote" can get painful as well, like you say people could quote large comments or even images, so I don't think I'm implementing that, I've seen it get ugly too many times.
Replying to people with an "@TDD" usually works, and I've seen some people here alrady in that habit actually. No quote needed.
How about a thread where users can post minor Adland related problems they are having without bothering you with an email?
Like this one:
"Happiness is overrated."
Fixed. Meh, what a pain it seems to do that every second upgrade.
Starting a "minor Adland related problems" thread for tweaks since this is getting big... see here though you'll find it hard to miss as it's "sticky".