what's going on now?!!

These are user-to-user help forums, the point of which is to get help as quickly as possible in as efficient a manner as possible. When someone is having a problem getting an image placed properly in their design, they don't give a shit at how pretty (or indeed how childish) a forum looks. I'd rather have it with as minimal amount of visual distraction as possible, just give me my answer, let me read all the replies I possibly can on one page without having to scroll endlessly or click "next page" too often, etc. Basically, from a design standpoint, keep it as efficient as the good ol' adobe forums. The content and its efficiency in delivering it is THE MOST important thing to someone who is desperately trying to get an answer to their problem.

Oz,

The forum you are quoting from is very much cleaner, and therefore efficient, than what we seem to have waiting for us.

No avatars, just the name, optional information about loction, nember of posts.

That relative simplicity does not even seem to be an option; at least unless it is possible to opt out of the ornamentation, which I have asked about more than once, and hopefully get a comforting answer to.

There is suffering and suffering.

By the way, my guess is that the number of posts reflect the whole set of forums, not the number in the particular forum in question. The latter would reflect the actual relevant activity there, as does the present number of posts shown when you seacrh the name. The former rather shows how much time you spend in all forums, and the lounge.

They were users of audio software bought up by Adobe, whose forums were then amalgamated with these. They would have been a mixture of professional and non-professional users of the software, and certainly they would have been long-term users of the Syntrillium forums.

Their attitude was of course partly influenced by the circumstances, but part of the problem was a reluctance to work out how to use this type of forum for best results. People may not be prepared to invest the time. We simply have no idea how often people come, look, and walk away saying nothing. The only place I know of where one can see the reactions of a group of non-users to the look and feel of these forums is the place I extracted those quotes from.

Maybe it comes down to the image you want.

This is obviously a very complex issue...or...are folks making it more complex that it needs to be.

Those comments you posted from various people criticizing the Adobe forums.. Who were they? I think that matters, don't you?

> The people who frequent these forums are not typical internet users. You have a very large professional community here.

Well, I'd counter that by questioning whether the format has encouraged the participation more by professionals than by other users - and if so, is the type of participant actually representative of the majority of Adobe software users? Should we have two lots of forums, one for the pro users and one for the rest (eg anything Elements would go in non-pro).

Heh, there's another way of testing - enable it for the Elements forums first. No, that's not a real suggestion!

> 4 - The forums should look not unlike the majority of typical modern internet forums.

Oz, I am commenting on this in this thread because it fits into the present conversation.

I think you are forgetting something. The people who frequent these forums are not typical internet users. You have a very large professional community here. I can't imagine what would happen in the Apple forums for instance if you turned it into a typical forum. I don't like everything about the Apple forums I am trying to make a point. You have to consider the people who make Adobe first.

We cross posted. See #121

> Cindy, though what if the people over there iron out the wrinkles to their own satisfaction, and the people over here are then presented with a non-negotiable result?

The whole idea would be to create the forum "over there", perhaps add a Mac Photoshop (or whatever) forum leaving these intact getting more people involved. The whole idea would be not to just have the MM DW and Flash forums but add a couple in that format that could be worked on. You would soon find out if its going to fly or not.

You could do this at no loss whatsoever. If you have a good product, people will come around. If you don't have a good product it won't live.

Attract rather than push.

It's an interesting suggestion, Cindy, though what if the people over there iron out the wrinkles to their own satisfaction, and the people over here are then presented with a non-negotiable result? Or having worked through the issues there, and got it running smoothly, then the users there are faced with further changes requested by users here? The only way to really discover how a forum (or other software) functions is to use it for real - and how would we do that if the subject was the ex-Macromedia products? Form is only one aspect - function is another major component.

In other words, IF you have confidence in your plan, be willing to try it out in a less critical arena. How hard can that be?

It might mean you backtrack a bit but it could only help to do things that way. And you might get more people involved in a real solution to this as obviously Adobe regulars have not been willing to play around with Adobeforums on that level.

Even so Oz, that still does not mean it isn't a good idea to get the MM forums likable and functional and then move this over possibly when everything is running as it should be with the consensus of as many people who are involved as possible. It would be a perfect trial ground.

You basically changed the subject with your argument. So whatever. You might have an open mind to my suggestion in post #115.