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Okay, first off I want you to check out this site:

http://www.launchmyforum.com/

I know there's not much there, but I've been talking to the developer and it SEEMS to be legit but I have a few reservations. First, the site itself is very sparse. Second, what kinds of people would we get from Yahoo Answers?

What do you guys think? Give it a shot? Or pass and see how it affects other sites?


Second, there are several mods I want to get but won't unless you guys like them. The first two are for Facebook or Twitter users who can merge them. So if they make a post in one place it appears in both. They are separate and I don't know how much people would want them. I do know a lot of you are on Twitter...

The next one is a style of game like Mafia Wars only it's more medieval. Like swords and stuff. That looks kinda fun.

The last one is for personalized avatars. You can set them up and then as you post or respond you get points to spend on things like clothes, swords, backgrounds, etc.


What do you guys think of all of these?

can the personalized avatar thingies be shown in ADDITION to the current avatars? It would be crazy if everyone suddenly got a little RPG character thingie instead of the avatars we're all used to.

Calleja said:

can the personalized avatar thingies be shown in ADDITION to the current avatars? It would be crazy if everyone suddenly got a little RPG character thingie instead of the avatars we're all used to.

Click to expand...

It's either/or. Let me see if I can find the page talking about them quick. Not sure you guys can see it, though.

---------- Post added at 02:24 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:23 PM ----------

http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=146200&highlight=custom+avatar

That LaunchMyForum thing looks pretty iffy to me. Basically it seems like they'll be spamming Yahoo with forum links, saying these forums are relevant to your interests, go check them out. I doubt it'll work, and I doubt it'll generate much goodwill towards HF.

For the Facebook and Twitter merging thing, you mean it allows my tweets to be posted to Facebook, and vice versa? Or does it transfer my posts on HF to Facebook/Twitter?

Personalized avatars sounds interesting, as long as it's purely optional. I'm sure some people would like to create little versions of themselves as avatars (me included) but I wouldn't want to force everyone to use it.

No thanks.

Sounds a bit like a GaiaOnline kind of thing, and that had it's fun moments as it grew.

Wow... I took the little tour thingie for the Living Avatars stuff.... that could potentially be AWESOME.

You need to be wary of something, though... it's a posting reward system. This may create "posting a lot just to get cool stuff for my avatar" syndromes. It does, like it says in the site, mean forum activity can go up... but the same could be said of post counts and we all know you hate those.

Just food for thought. I'm all for having the Living Avatars thingie, especially since custim items can be created and there are some very talented individuals in the Halforums that could create awesomeness.

The whole "rare item" thing and etc is really cool... you could also give away Special Limited Edition items for winning Forum contests or something.

GaiaOnline got huge due to it's little "forum avatar" game thing it had going. Raised alot in donations (donations got you "donator items") and random rare items for clicking around the threads. There was "gold" given for posting in threads and such, and then you'd use the gold in the stores for new items and accessories for the avatars.

While I think it would be a fun add-on to the forum, I can see some of our current members being very turned off by the "anime/cute" side of it.

It hasn't to be anime/cute, though, check out some of the packs. Your avatar could literally be a WoW character, with a WoW background.

Calleja said:

It hasn't to be anime/cute, though, check out some of the packs. Your avatar could literally be a WoW character, with a WoW background.

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Sold. (but again, I see some turn off to some of the current membership)

All of those ideas sound absolutely terrible in every way.

The main problem I see is it taking over for normal avatars... that would cause chaos, it's not a secret how many of us rely on avatar recognition to discern our fellow posters... change them all, or most, of those up in a matter of days? I predict unrest.

Charlie Dont Surf said:

All of those ideas sound absolutely terrible in every way.

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I agree with ****face on this.

Please tell me Amy self-censored there... if the profanity filter is fucking up my swearing I'm gonna be pissed off like a motherfucker.

All launchmyforum does is runs a script to COPY existing yahoo answers content and users into your forum.

Please, no. It doesn't actually bring people in - just their content. It does duplicate their username and such on the forum, but they are empty accounts that aren't used once the script is turned off.

Bad, bad idea. You'd drive a lot of the existing users away with all that inanity.

-Adam

---------- Post added at 03:46 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:45 PM ----------

Calleja said:

Please tell me Amy self-censored there... if the profanity filter is fucking up my swearing I'm gonna be pissed off like a motherfucker.

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-Adam

I did not self censor. I was censored.
seems to be hated by the profanity filter for me. which is kinda odd? Ive forgotten where the filter option was, unless it disappeared.

The game sounds ok, but the rest doesn't appeal to me.

****FACE you ****

i am testing the filter. ****s.

---------- Post added at 02:53 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:52 PM ----------

FUCK!

I can't say "****"? Fuck that!

...and now we have to wait 30 seconds between posts? I vehemently disagree with this lastest mod... it's in direct conflict with the "addendum post" mod that kills double posting... lots of times I hit post, think of something else to add, and just make a new quick post under it, so it appends to my original one.

Now I have to wait 30 seconds!? Fuck that, too!

Sir. cough.

the basic words are good to go. c word is verboten, as is the racial slur N word.

both words I can manage to get by without using. So, as I said above, I agree with Crotchface up there.

Would the game be an addition to the arcade or would it be a more "Facebook-style" game? I'd be fine with it if it went in the arcade. I don't really like the sound of the other mods though, especially the launchmyforum one.

Censorship should be optional, though... it's in the context of every poster to decide when a word may or may not be appropriate, and forcing some of them out crosses over to the dark side imho.

People who are at work and/or prefer not to see any curses at all can turn the filter on, those who don't care for censorship can leave it off... everyone's happy, no?

censorship is mostly off. with the exception of

which as I said, are words I can do without.

The latter I might... *might* understand, even though it really limits the ability to quote lots of awesome comedians... but force-censoring is still iffy territory for me.

You ****ing ****s.

Hey guys,

Rob from Launch My Forum,

Just thought I'd respond to clear things up a little.

The script isn't intended to be a spammer tool. It's a tool that allows you to populate selected forums with relevant conversations.

It doesn't have to be deployed forum-wide - it could just be one forum, maybe call it that specific 'knowledge base' or 'world opinion' or something, there are so many ways to be creative with it

Rob said:

Hey guys,

Rob from Launch My Forum,

Just thought I'd respond to clear things up a little.

The script isn't intended to be a spammer tool. It's a tool that allows you to populate selected forums with relevant conversations.

It doesn't have to be deployed forum-wide - it could just be one forum, maybe call it that specific 'knowledge base' or 'world opinion' or something, there are so many ways to be creative with it

Click to expand...

Thanks for coming in, Rob! As you can see, my users are as careful as I am. But what does it do? Does it simply bring over their user names along with the conversation and they would sit as an empty registered user or does it somehow promote the boards in a non-spam way. I love getting new content, but I worry at what cost and what kind of cleanup afterward would need to be done.

Pass.

Here's the scoop...

1), You select the forum you want the content to go in to

2), You select what username the content is posted under (pre-created forum username OR yahoo answers current username)

3), You define the criteria of the content to be retrieved (yahoo answers category, most recent, keywords etc)

Rob said:

Here's the scoop...

1), You select the forum you want the content to go in to

2), You select what username the content is posted under (pre-created forum username OR yahoo answers current username)

3), You define the criteria of the content to be retrieved (yahoo answers category, most recent, keywords etc)

Click to expand...

Sorry, but this sounds absolutely terrible.

automating ways of making this place more popular seems like a bad idea. If it's to be done, it should be down with blood sweat and tears.

Preferably mostly sweat.

Crone said:

automating ways of making this place more popular seems like a bad idea. If it's to be done, it should be down with blood sweat and tears.

Preferably mostly sweat.

Click to expand...

Strange that you wouldn't want more blood.

I say we pass on this

Crone said:

If it's to be done, it should be down with blood sweat and tears.

Click to expand...

You stole this line from my standard sex disclaimer, ****** ****!

EDIT: Mine adds "in that order", though.

Alright, what did it censor there now, Jake?

Dave said:

The last one is for personalized avatars. You can set them up and then as you post or respond you get points to spend on things like clothes, swords, backgrounds, etc.

Click to expand...

One question on this. If it is installed, would I HAVE to get one of those avatars or could I leave my current one?

If it'd force me to change my avatar, then I vote no. If it allows those who want to do it the opportunity, but everyone else can still have their normal av, then I don't care.


For everything else, I say no.

Calleja said:

Alright, what did it censor there now, Jake?

Click to expand...

Hint 1: count the letters.

Hint 2: nobody will be able to see it (except mods?).

(For the record, I don't actually think Amy is a ****** ****)

General Specific said:

One question on this. If it is installed, would I HAVE to get one of those avatars or could I leave my current one?

If it'd force me to change my avatar, then I vote no. If it allows those who want to do it the opportunity, but everyone else can still have their normal av, then I don't care.


For everything else, I say no.

Click to expand...

I don't think so. I see nothing in their forums about any compatibility issues.

****ing ****?

counting count!

Still, it is way too 'cutesy' for my taste, and I suspect for the majority of our userbase.