What's wrong with Talk and Groups?

I know, brightcopy may kill me for branching off the discussion yet again. But I think the broader issue needs to be discussed. What exactly is wrong with Talk and Groups right now? It seems like there's a big desire to "fix" something at the moment, conveniently corresponding with the arrival of a new social media person, but it might help to clarify what the problem is first before starting with the restructuring.

ETA: I've also started a sister thread, What's right with Talk and Groups.

Some problems I see:

1. Creators who've long left.
1a. Nobody who feels specially invested the way creators do.
1b. "Creator" links that go to obviously-gone people.
1c. Stale descriptions and crap pictures
1d. New group creation is prevented by corpse of old groups. That is, someone wants to start a group and infuse it with their passion, but they find there's already a group and that it's dead, so they give up.

2. Discoverability
2a. It's hard to find everything you're interested in.
2b. You have to keep doing it.
2c. There are too many damn groups to keep track of, and they are often too precisely targeted.

3. Culture
3a. People know each other well, so some groups can feel forbidding to enter.
3b. LibraryThing has a culture of lashing out rather too eagerly against small violations, scaring away some people who really could be valuable participants.

.... Honestly? I would *love* to know what's "wrong" with Talk and Groups. Because I don't see much.

Used to be I'd come roaring in here with "group search!!!", but that seems to be doing pretty good with the new search system thingy.

From what I can understand in Tim's posts, it seems like lots of dormant/"failed" groups are a big part of what's "wrong", but I'm not really understanding that. Is there really that many non-active groups that it's really that big of a problem? And why is it really a problem? Like, the NaNoWriMo group is only active for 2-3 months out of the year, does that mean that the other 9-10 months there's something "wrong" with it? I don't really understand the whole issue here, and I would really like to know what exactly is being targeted.

But me, personally? Well, I rarely use the "Talk" tab, so I can't say much about that. But I'm hard-pressed to think of anything "wrong" with Groups right now.

edit: Aaaaaand Tim posted while I was typing. Dagnabit.

1) I find it hard to keep up with all the threads I'm interested in because of the lack of a combined Your Posts/Groups/Starred/not Books viewing option. I basically look only at Your Groups, which means I lose track of threads of interest that happen elsewhere. I may want to follow a few people's threads in a challenge group, but I don't necessarily want to watch the whole group. Likewise, while there's occasionally something of interest in Book Talk, there's too much noise for me to watch the whole group and I end up losing the threads I'm interested in.

2) I agree that finding groups of interest can be hard for newcomers, but I'd like to see more done with group tags rather than creating yet another classification system.

3) It can be hard to jump into a fully-established group full of people who know each other (though I think the Supertouchstones will provide a more accessible entry point to Talk).

4) Threads in Your Posts or Your Stars can get lost when the thread has to be continued elsewhere due to length.

More later, maybe.

Okay, in response to Tim:

I'm not trying to be all debating here, I'm honestly confused. Why is it so bad if creators leave? If an active group is going along just fine and we just happen to notice that the creator has left... so what? What is so magical about the "creator"? I'm not a creator of any groups, but I feel damn-"specially" invested in these groups. Are you only talking about small groups that don't have much activity? I haven't seen this so-called creator "problem" anywhere on the bigger groups I'm a part of.

Again, is 1d seriously a problem? There are PLENTY of new groups that get started that are basically the exact same topic as other groups. I really don't see serious effects of "corpse groups" preventing new group creation, because new groups get created all the time anyways.

3. I do agree that LTers can sometimes be too quick to judge/cry spam/whatever, but that's more a product of experience then anything "wrong" with Groups, imo. We have experienced that when a brand-new user with no books catalogued starts posting about a website or a book, it's most likely spam of some sort. We have experienced things over and over again that make us wary of new people who jump in without bothering to read rules or enter books or get to know protocal. I don't think that's something that can be "fixed" by changing Groups or creating "group admin", I think that's a behavior that's been learned, because how often it happens here, and like any learned behavior, you can't stop it by changing how a computer feature works.

It seems to me that only thoughtless people start new groups with high overlap with existing groups. Hence we get a lot of new Twilight love or hate groups, created by people who probably haven't done a group search.

I do agree that LTers can sometimes be too quick to judge/cry spam/whatever, but that's more a product of experience then anything "wrong" with Groups, imo. We have experienced that when a brand-new user with no books catalogued starts posting about a website or a book, it's most likely spam of some sort.

Oh, I'm not arguing it's only bad.

This probably depends on your perspective as to whether it's bad, good, or neither. There's no growth in Talk. I guess one could call it Peak Talk.

Message numbers by month:

May 09- 60,000
Jun 09- 58K
Jul 09- 55K
Aug 09- 58K
Sep 09- 54K
Oct 09- 52K
Nov 09- 48K
Dec 09- 58K
Jan 10- 75K (January Joiner syndrome?)
Feb 10- 65K
Mar 10- 62K
Apr 10- 55K
May 10- 58K
Jun 10- 58K
Jul 10- 58K
Aug 10- 56 K
Sep 10- 52K
Oct 10- 56K
Nov 10- 56K

>7 VisibleGhost: Oh, that's interesting. Hmm.

Another thing that can be difficult with Talk is that one very active group can overwhelm the Talk page. I'd really like a way to filter Talk by group tag. (And, damn it, I think I'm going to break the rules again and suggest that in the Umbrella Group thread.)

The spikes are all at the New Year. We're starting another one now—2,300 posts today, for example. I think we can bend this curve upward.

Note: I'm doing a seven-day trail on the data. The actual data is much more chaotic.

Considering that many of the most popular groups are yearly challenge groups, it makes sense that they peak at the New Year when everyone starts over.

I suspect that's it.

Also, I don't have the time to run it by words-written, but I suspect it would be more constant.

Number of groups with more than 25 posts in a month. (December not shown.)



Data is similar when you look at >100 LShelby: posts. Basically, we're narrowing our focus--posting similar amounts of content in fewer groups, even as the number of groups continues to grow.

Well, I haven't joined any new groups in a quite a while, but it isn't because I don't know about them. I have just reached my limit of the amount of online posting I can handle in a day. I've belonged to some groups in the past on other forums where the volume was so high all I could do was skim them.

I think what I'm saying is that msg volume isn't the only measure of a healthy group and too much volume can make a group unreadable, at least to some people.

Nope. Number of letters (easier to count than words) shows the same basic pattern.

It's worrying that Talk hasn't grown much in two years. I don't think dormant groups are the main problem; I think the issue is the big leap required to start posting in an active group.

I don't think the solution is to make it easier for people to follow larger numbers of groups in Talk (I'm wasting my breath, I know; I'm constantly hopeful that I'll eventually stop caring so much). I imagine that being faced with fewer posts in a more controlled environment is much easier for a new user to deal with--i.e., I think they'd be most comfortable looking at the group page of individual groups.

I also think you should do more to encourage social interaction in places other than Groups and Talk; I think I mentioned earlier that Supertouchstones should help, because it's an easier process to go from searching for a favourite book and then reading discussions and posting about that book rather than first having to choose a place for discussion, or being overwhelmed with a massive list of apparently unorganized threads.

If Lists include comments, that will help too.

Of course, I also think review comments will help.

Basically, there should be multiple entry points to social interaction, and they should fit naturally into the site-browsing that users would do anyway.

I definitely agree with point 3: culture.
I find I turn off a thread when it is the same-ole, same-ole by the same frequenters, especially when it turns from argumentative to more nasty in tone. And I have noticed many members do not even dip their toes into the area, for fear of strong retribution, even though I am sure they would add significantly to the thread.

The other thing is I left some groups as the posts were overwhelming in sheer numbers compared to my other groups. I would like to be able to limit the numbers of posts from each of my groups in "my groups" on my home page - which I use mostly and then use the 'talk' tab if I wanted to see more. That way I could see more of a variety of my groups postings and not just all the, for example, bug collectors threads and not much else when Tim is on a (huge bug-squashing) roll! :)

I also limit my groups as this site is such a time sink (that is not a bad thing, just a fact) that I do want to find time to read - oh, I don't know what else - perhaps a book! :)

As much as I do not encourage instant gratification I would like to peruse the latest chat in all my groups quickly.

I had posted at one point a request for a filter for the My Groups/Hot Topics/All Topics section of the home page. It would assist those people who log in and don't want to be looking at a list of 50 game threads, challenge threads, inane talk threads that they have no interest in reading.

Just killing one thread doesn't always repair the problem, sometimes you have to ignore the group, and that is more steps than a new user may be willing to attempt.

I tend to peruse the Hot Topics section for threads like this (I don't join some groups for the very reasons above.) But threads on these lists get overwhelmed by the vocal minority on Pro and Con, Hogwats Express, and a Folio Society. (I think these are -The- three most active groups I've seen outside of challenge threads.) At one time, I followed Hogwarts Express, but I couldn't keep up with the output of messages.

I can also agree with #3. Rare instances will have me nose into other groups, but if you post against the group's views (note my sole foray into Pro and Con) the regulars chase you away. Its not a welcome atmosphere in some groups to offer opposing viewpoints. (Even without Oakes there to stir up trouble.) One of the few active groups I follow, we had a poster who tended to trend toward curmudgeon and almost chased me from the group. I still read posts, but I don't offer anywhere near as much commentary as I used to.

Okay, I think I've rambled too much...

This is troublesome. If veteran LTers find most threads either too antagonistic, too dead, or too voluminous, what's on our groups to make them friendly to a newbie? What do we have to offer that newbie to make him or her want to stick around long enough to get to know us? Cataloguing? Perhaps. However, I think that any ideas to make Talk/Groups more accessible to everyone would be worthwhile.

I, personally, find Talk/groups a bit more difficult to navigate now. The ones that are antagonistic drive me away. I've just dropped out of groups with little or no action. If I need to look up something (how to repair a book, for example), I might just google it rather than start a thread for it. In addition, my favorite groups have grown to such huge volumes of users, that they have become almost impossible to follow even my favorite members' threads.

I'm offering no solutions here. I'm just pondering the changes here at LT and what this site must look like to anyone who is a newbie at this point in time.

One thing I'd like in talk is for on a group page to have the filter options. Some times I'm looking for a message/thread and I know what GROUP it's in and being able to filter by group and say my posts or my starred would be nice.

# Your posts
# Started by you
# Your starred
# Favorite messages
# Ignored

>19 readafew: Yup, I'd like that too.

It's worrying that Talk hasn't grown much in two years.

Why is that "worrying"?

>21 lilithcat: I think sites generally aim at growth. I'm not sure how the Talk statistics correspond to the overall number of active users, but there's at least a suggestion that newer members are not getting involved in Talk.

> 18 - I think these are really good points. If you were just joining LT, would the current Group/Talks structure be welcoming, or intimidating? I suspect, depending on one's interests, probably some of both, but the sheer number of groups and posts would certainly turn me off to a certain degree.

I think Tim's "tents" proposal might help with this, to enable a new user to jump in and get a "big picture" sense of what's out there. As folks are saying over there, it'll need to be carefully done, but having the option to quickly glance through some options seems like it would be helpful.

What might also be useful is having the option, once you've joined a group, is the option to "mark all read." I don't know about others, but I'm sort of neurotic in hating "unread" messages, so if I look at a group that has pages and pages of threads, I'm less likely to join because of the perceived daunting task of reading through them all. One could x them all, of course, but it seems having the option to just mark them all read might be useful.

Then to the "thread management" idea: _Zoe_, I like the idea in #4 of a combined "your starred/posts/groups" option - I know I lose track of things because I have to look in three different places for them, so this seems useful.

Good discussion!

I'd like to be able to set the Talk module on my home page to just see Starred threads without changing the setting on the Talk tab. Tim said in the past that he thought it would be too confusing, but it really makes sense to use the small area on the Home page and the vast area on the Talk tab in different ways.

Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if it didn't take so long to switch the Talk tab from Your Starred to Your Groups.

24 > YES, I've forgotten about that since Tim refused to change it before I've turned off that module.

I agree that Talk can be overwhelming to a newcomer. There are a lot of features that aren't obvious like clicking on the unread/messages column to jump to the last read post, or starring or, perhaps more important, ignoring a thread. And I think a lot of veteran users haven't figured out how to use the Talk tab yet.

The help wiki page is good but I don't know how many people read help. Talk and Groups are so flexible that it might be good to have a walk-through of various ways to use it (I've joined about a dozen groups and almost always use the Talk tab in Your Groups mode. I typically star threads that I want to read first. So when I go to the Talk tab the first thing I do is scan down my unread messages reading the starred ones. Then I start from the bottom and read the rest of my unread messages. That way if I have to stop before reading all of them I don't lose track of my unread threads). I'm sure others have their own methods.

It would be great if Tim could make one of those videos for Talk too. Of course the walk-throughs and videos would have to be someplace that newbies would actually find and use them.

Did Tim ever take our advice to automatically enroll new users in the Welcome to LibraryThing group?

I want paginated threads so badly I cannot even describe it. I know a lot of people do not. But I do! I hate hate hate having to look for part 2, 3, 4, 5.

Also agreed about certain attitudes, but as I've recently seem some of those folks who display those attitudes argue quite vehemently that they do not see at all how their tone might be offputting, I see very little to be done about it, sadly.

Poking around on the groups page exploring the idea of tents and tags:

- Groups need tag combining. It's hard to find groups by tags when the group of 41 tags that displays includes such redundancies as: challenge, challenge group, challenges, reading challenge; authors, author group; site-related, LibraryThing; books, book-general. That's 11 out of 41 tags that get at 4 things. Yes, the lists vary a bit, but the goal here is aiding findability, not protecting unique data, as it is for work tags.

- There's no way to 'drill down' into more specific groups - this is one thing I do really like about Tim's idea. I want to click the 'history' tag and see that I can also click tags for 'ancient history' and 'british history'.

28> If Tim added a related tags section to group tags, as Zoe has suggested, then you could use that to drill down.

When I first joined LT, and was exploring the site, I found Talk and a few groups that looked interesting and joined them. Now, I only follow the site-related Groups and one hobby-related Group.

The hobby-related group is very low-traffic, but that's okay because I get to discuss that topic on another site. I never go, now, to the Talk tab. I peruse the module on my home page, as it is limited to those Groups that I follow. I never seek out new Groups (unless one is brought to my attention, and looks really interesting).

Basically, I have no real use for Talk here. I came here to catalog my books. I participate in the site-related Groups because that has a direct impact on how I experience/use the site. Personally, I find little interest in the social side of the site. I get my quota of online social interactions at other sites, and in fact sometimes discuss related books there. I don't really have any more online social time to spend at LT.

So I don't have any personal investment in how y'all modify the workings of Groups or Talk. Just following along as it's part of LT.

Not enough talking about books and libraries.

It seems like nearly all the activity is in mostly-social groups which spend most of their time talking about things other than books. I get my general, not-book-based social networking elsewhere; I don't have the time or the social energy to put into it here, too. I doubt many new users come to LT looking to make it their primary online social network - and I don't think we want it to be, either. So what Talk needs is something to bring people in that isn't just another message board.

There is some activity on reading challenges and read-alongs, but participating in that, also, takes a lot of time and commitment that your average casual user or new user isn't necessarily going to be able to maintain.

What I'd *like* out of Talk is a place where I can go and talk about a book I love or a new cataloging system I'm developing or the eternal woes of lack of shelf space or how much money I spent at that library sale. (And there are a few moderately-active groups that do that sort of thing. I'm a member of most of them. A lot of them have people who go months between posts and never show up on the busy groups.) Even the standing group "book talk" gets fairly low traffic, and threads about individual books are quickly lost and go silent. Talk has a great infrastructure for doing that, in a lot of ways, and there *are* good discussions of library and book stuff happening - but they're a sort of quiet hidden stratum under a lot of other happening.

(How many people here actually us the "your books" filter on talk? How many have found it useful?)

Maybe tihis is just inevitable, that the way communities work is the discussion gets social and off-topic, but I don't think it's what the LT boards need to be, especially if you want to expand outside you core group. The fact that the site-related groups are the busiest should be a clue: a lot of people come to talk for LT specifically, not to talk about their cats and play Mornington Crescent. (--not that there's anything wrong with that, just, like I said, I do my share of that other places, so I'm not interested in it here.)

There's been discussion, before, of setting things up so that individual author, work, tag, and local pages have a standing discussion thread linked to the page (thet way that, say, IMDB does things), an individual work's thread may only have activity on it every few months, or when something new is happening, but casual users can stumble on it while browsing catalogs and add value (even if it's an old conversation) and the discussions don't get lost. It's an idea I have always really liked for LT. Maybe it's time to float that again.

Just chiming in that the lack of an integrated view is one of my frustrations. Sometimes I ignore posts for a while that only show up in Your Posts and not Your Groups. Discourages more casual involvements in groups where I don't want to read most of the subjects.

And on the pagination issue - I think it's something that needs to happen, and it shouldn't bother ANYONE because how many posts per page (10, 50, 100, ALL) should be a user-configurable setting.

What should be in the integrated—your posts AND your groups?

My thought would be posts/groups/starred ...

33> Rather than go through it here, I refer back to one of my first RSIs:

http://www.librarything.com/topic/84824

To be really useful it should be a grid where you could check off each of the kinds of threads you want to see included. You probably think that would be too complicated, but it would be less complicated than having YourPosts+YourStarred, YourGroups+YourPosts, and YourGroups+YourStarred (and whatever other combos would be useful) as separate options.

#31
Not enough talking about books and libraries.

I totally agree. When I joined last January and found there was a whole talk section, I expected to find a place where I could easily discuss individual authors or books.

Even the standing group "book talk" gets fairly low traffic, and threads about individual books are quickly lost and go silent. Like dropping a stone into the water, and seeing hardly any ripples...

(How many people here actually us the "your books" filter on talk? How many have found it useful?)

I tried it and didn't get any good out of it: all the mentions of my books in challenge threads and games totally drowned out any actual discussion.

There's been discussion, before, of setting things up so that individual author, work, tag, and local pages have a standing discussion thread linked to the page (thet way that, say, IMDB does things), an individual work's thread may only have activity on it every few months, or when something new is happening, but casual users can stumble on it while browsing catalogs and add value (even if it's an old conversation) and the discussions don't get lost. It's an idea I have always really liked for LT. Maybe it's time to float that again.

I think this would be great. I have no interest in writing reviews for works like Lord of the Rings or Pride and Prejudice which have so many reviews already, but I'd have lots of things to say if there was an individual forum for each work. Even if there were long gaps between posts, it wouldn't matter when everthing is in one easy-to-find location.

I like the way this thread is going. The book discussion thing should soon be implemented via supertouchstones, and it will be really nice if we can get combined Talk filters too. I don't really care whether it's one Groups/Posted/Starred filter or a more nuanced checkbox system.

36> You probably think that would be too complicated, but it would be less complicated than having YourPosts+YourStarred, YourGroups+YourPosts, and YourGroups+YourStarred (and whatever other combos would be useful) as separate options.

I think it would be more complicated than is necessary, as I don't think those other options are getting pretty niche. I'd say go for the simpler interface. My own personal opinion.

We are working on supertouchstones, don't worry. This isn't an either/or thing. We're raising lots of issues because it's better to have answers while you're redoing something than afterwards.

We are working on supertouchstones, don't worry. This isn't an either/or thing. We're raising lots of issues because it's better to have answers while you're redoing something than afterwards.

(How many people here actually us the "your books" filter on talk? How many have found it useful?)

I don't go anywhere NEAR the talk tab. Why? Because when I click on the hot topics or All topics sorts, I still see my ignored groups. If I click on Your Books, top three threads are from groups that I've ignored! No, I won't go there, so I'm stuck with the module on the home page.

implemented via supertouchstones

Can you point to the thread where Tim changed his mind regarding supertouchstones? Last I heard, he was against the idea of another touchstone.

ETA: Never mind, Tim answered this portion.

(How many people here actually us the "your books" filter on talk? How many have found it useful?)

Not me. I don't want to see all those threads with lists of books from challenges and games and "what have you read/bought lately?" threads. It's useless for finding people who are actually talking about my books.

I have to agree on the Your Books tab/filter it isn't very useful at all. When I go into talk first I click My Posts see whats there then I go to My Starred then to My Groups. I love the way Talk is set up.

Maybe I should have posted this over in the Whats right about talk/groups.But here it is.

> 42

Re: supertouchstones and book-based discussions, because you (and others) might find it interesting anyway, the most recent discussion in which a lot of things were hashed out is here: http://www.librarything.com/topic/101776

I am very, very optimistic about things that Tim appears to be working on in this vein!

38,39> Actually it wouldn't have to be that complicated. Just put checkmarks next to or highlight the Your Groups etc. links when they're clicked and allow more than one to be checked or highlighted at once. But I haven't thought too deeply about it. If Your Groups/Posts/Starred is all that's needed then I'll go with that.

46> I can see your side of it, and I'm not adamantly in disagreement or anything. I just find the simpler way the more "marketable" way in terms of convincing Tim. He hates clutter, and not irrationally so. I think the clutter from checkboxes wouldn't be balanced by the benefits for most people.

Yeah, I wasn't around LT for the weeks when the supertouchstones ideas were first floated, and seeing it in these discussions I just went and read through it. That sounds like it might help a lot with making Talk work for me, as long as it's well-integrated to work page. And enough people start using it to jump-start it!

re the "Your Books" Talk filter... *snorts* I never even look at it because I realized a long time ago how useless it is. Looked just now because of this thread, only 2 of the first 25 results are actual book-conversations as opposed to lists/games.

I just went to look at Your Books too, and I actually find it much more interesting than I had remembered. Did it always list all the books that appeared in the thread, rather than giving a snatch of the conversation? This way is much more helpful, anyway. Yes, they're mostly challenge groups, but it seems like a nice way to find people with similar interests whose challenge threads I'll want to follow. It will be especially helpful when we get that combined starred/groups/posts option, because it will then become feasible to follow individual threads in challenge groups that I don't belong to.

I'm finding that my biggest problem is actually that certain groups overwhelm everything else. I frequently find myself going directly to the group pages of important groups, and it's very inefficient. I need more filtering options for Talk, and I think this need must be even more acute for people who use the site less often. I was away for one day, and it's hopeless to catch up or even make sure that I haven't missed much.

Of course if there was a sensible way ro see who else is currently or has Recently Read the same book as you there would be a much easier opportunity to get some discussion about a book going.

51 (Zoë): Yes! And this has been mentioned before, by both of us as well as others, but worth reiterating. I have Talk set to my watched/joined groups, which are mostly the LT feature groups plus miscellaneous other subject groups that aren't especially active. I briefly joined the 75 book challenge, and immediately it overwhelmed the Talk list, so I unjoined after experimenting with options. (e.g. Can I join but ignore? No.) Instead, I made a bookmark for the group, and I've starred threads for particular people, but as a gesture of loyalty I'd rather be an official group member. I set up bookmarks for other groups of interest also. I unstarred some old threads because there were too many and no simple way to know at a glance why I'd starred them. Stars may indicate topics of long term interest (e.g. all of the hierarchical/nested/bundled tag discussions) or short term interest. I've begun marking messages as favorites when books are mentioned (I do not have or want an official wishlist). These all go some way toward keeping track, but bookmarks don't show where the activity is, and each group has to be viewed separately. I like the Talk list; I'd just like it better if I could tag and filter groups and starred threads and favorite messages. I would be interested in knowing how the more prolific participants in Talk manage.

qebo, in a busy group I red x all but about 25 threads I follow regularly. This creates a white and a pink zone on the group page. I can still read threads from the pink zone and even comment on them. Xs can be added or taken away at whim. On my main Talk page that means I only have 25 threads or so showing from most busy groups. In one it's more like 50 threads. That's manageable. When I have time I'll go play in the pink zones. For me it works better than the star system.

54: Seems like a lotta xing, but maybe a useful thing to add to my repertoire. Thanks. I'd think better to wait until people have begun posting their books; currently I have starred only people I recognize.

Just found this thread . . . Love all the graphs Tim! :)
do you have one of # of members? Is LT still growing in numbers?
or is the members graph similar to these group graphs (i.e., is # of members correlated with talk or groups or whatever)?

For me, I joined to catalog books, the talk and groups are just there to answer questions when I have them . . . Other groups occasionally intriguing, but not the main reason I'm here.

I don't find the snarkiness intimidating, but I tend not to go back to a thread once I get snarked.
Life is tough enough already.

I think that the number of members would be pretty meaningless since it includes anyone who joins and tries it for a few days never to return. A better indicator might be the number of books added but I don't know that Tim would be willing to release a graph of such information.

57>

A better indicator might be the number of books added but I don't know that Tim would be willing to release a graph of such information.

Well, he has released the numbers, so a graph is pretty trivial. Grab your tab-delimited export and take a look at the "book ID" column; that indicates the order, across all users, in which it was added to LT, a globally unique identifier. (Since this includes deleted books, it's higher than the total number of current books on LT.) Plot this against date added, and you'll get a measure of the growth of LT. It's been almost frighteningly linear since about October 2006.

Worst thing about talk and groups: the people who reflexively disagree or criticize anything they didn't think of already themselves . . .

Sigh. Some of us are just trying to help. Why do you see that in a negative light?

59>

What exactly are you referring to? You said you'd like a graph of LT member growth. jjwilson61 said a graph of book growth might be better. I told you both how to *get* a graph of book growth (and both of you have been here long enough for the method to provide good data; I can see that it wouldn't be useful if you'd only joined a few months ago). How is that "reflexively disagree{ing} or critiz{ing}?"

62> I think he's referring to the subject of the thread.

WOW!!!! this is so confusing! "is" confused!

"It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is..."

So is there a way to limit the thread postings...then the admin of the thread can open it up as needed? And close it to avoid dormancy/taking up space. And post a final thread note to copy or download thread if needed before deletion? Just a thought. More admin. I too skim through heavy threads. Actually found the less visited and some dormant thread more interesting.

I definitely do not want deletion of dormant threads.

As several people on this list have mentioned, my biggest hurdle with Talk is filtering through the very active groups I'm not interested in, or even just not interested in at the moment. My "hot groups" tabs seems forever dominated by challenge groups. My "your groups" tab is often overwhelmed by RSI or Bug collectors--both of which I like and want to "belong" to, but there are many days when I'm more interested in discussing books than discussing the inner workings of LT.

So I'm in favor of having many options for "drilling down" to find more specific groups and threads of interest, and I think as a rule it is wise to have several ways to accomplish similar goals: "Umbrella groups" and tag search filters. "your books" and "your favorite authors" filters, etc. etc.

I'd also love to have a kind of "temporary ignore" option that, for example, hides all the posts from Bug Collectors for the duration of a session.

I think it might also be worth having more ways to get to Talk on the site--to integrate the conversations more with the book data. Someone mentioned links from work pages or author pages. But what about a link in your catalog view that showed recent threads? Or on the "quick edit" view when you add books?

I'd also love to have a kind of "temporary ignore" option that, for example, hides all the posts from Bug Collectors for the duration of a session.

Each group has an "ignore this group" option which can be found on the individual group's page. You can find it on the right hand side of the page, box down, red icon).

Hope that helps!

>69 SqueakyChu: Yes, but I'd like not to have to navigate to a different page to ignore anything, and I don't want to permanently ignore groups, just for a discrete period of time.

68,70 (southernbooklady): I agree. It's more a matter of filtering than ignoring. Groups have different levels of activity, I have different levels of interest, sometimes I'm more focused on LT features and sometimes I'm more focused on books, but Talk is a steady stream of everything I'm watching, all mixed together.

Since joining the 75 Book Challenge, I abruptly agree very strongly about filtering options!

I wonder if it'd be possible to have a drop-down box in the sidebar (The World, Your World, etc) that listed every group you are in, which you could use to toggle between posts /only/ from that group. So I could see things only from 75 Books, or RSI, or Book Talk, or Talk About Library Thing right from the Talk page without having to navigate over to Groups.

I know it might seem silly, but that extra page load really does make a difference.

I do not belong to my challenge group for that reason. My challenge threads are listed on my profile, and I star them. Occasionally I check the group page for interesting topics.

How about if we had Collections for groups that we join or watch?

That way, you could put the LT site groups, like RSI and Talk about LT in one collection, the Challenge groups in another collection and more narrowly focussed groups (e.g. Tea Drinkers, Pro and Con, etc. etc.) in another collection. Then you could click on each collection separately to see a list similar to what we have now.

I think that would work.

k4k

edited for miztaykez

74 (krazy4katz): Yes, "collections" seems a good way to describe it. And I'd want options for viewing all threads or starred threads or highlighted messages within a collection. I've set up a bunch of bookmarks and tabs to keep things organized, but like MarthaJeanne I do not belong to my challenge group, which really seems a sign that the available tools are inadequate.

>74 krazy4katz: That would be great. I'd also be happy to have that functionality with tags.

This is a long thread. Perhaps talk and groups can limit the amount of words/characters posted. That would make it easier to read what's on the writers mind and respond. Verbose individuals are a deterent to enter a post, really who wants to read 500 messages especially when some are essay length or a short story? Also the creator should be the admin and monitor the thread and close it when they think it is time to move on or if a consensus is taken by admin via a post and if a majority agree move on, close it. and delete it.

What'd ya think?

As Talk threads go, this one is actually pretty short. None of the messages is particularly verbose, and there aren't very many of them.

I do agree that threads should be restarted more often, with the restarter summarizing what's gone before. This one isn't nearly at that point, though.

Close and delete? No. I think deletion like that is a non-starter. It would come at an extremely high cost of member anger for very little benefit.

77>

What'd ya think?

You want short?

No.

Actually, this is rather a short thread. Usually, when a thread is over 250-300 posts, someone will create a new thread, not necessarily the thread creator.

I think there would be a lot of opposition to having any word/character limits on posts. On a lot of threads, especially the challenge threads, people like to post their reviews, which are often substantial. People like to read them! Sometimes it takes a longer post to state "what's on the writers mind."

Deleting threads is right out - many people refer back to old threads, especially those with problem-solving in them. That is why there is the ability to search Talk.

77>

For people who aren't pre20cenbooks, and thus don't respond to anything of more than a sentence or two with "tl;dr" (which I think is a horrid, pernicious capitulation to the dumbing-down of society):

I sympathize with people on slow connections, and agree with _Zoe_ that long threads should be restarted, with links forward and backward. But that's not really what this suggestion is about. The really problematic threads that are both long and fast-moving are relatively rare, usually about a new feature or proposed feature, and I don't think it's worth lobotomizing Talk for the convenience of infrequent visitors for those particular threads.

It's difficult to even talk about the proposed post-count limit, which wouldn't be too horrible, because of how it's all tied up with a post-length limit, which is just beyond awful. I like hearing what other LT members have to say, and yes, sometimes that means reading more than a few paragraphs. This is, after all, a book site. (Ironically, pre20cenbooks doesn't seem averse to wordiness in book form.)

Close-and-delete is an Absolutely Not for me too. Monitor the thread and start a Part II, sure, and most people do that for long threads. (The exceptions are the ones started by staff, sometimes, and the weird ones that accrete posts very slowly -- they may be 500 posts long, but they're also three years old, with posts in spurts every few months.)

There's a recently-started group called "A Quieter LibraryThing" that may be of interest to the verbosity-averse (pity pre20cenbooks won't be reading this far down), but it currently has two threads on the Hot Topics list; maybe an "Even Quieter than That LibraryThing" group is in order! :-)

The really problematic threads that are both long and fast-moving are relatively rare, usually about a new feature or proposed feature, and I don't think it's worth lobotomizing Talk for the convenience of infrequent visitors for those particular threads.

To be clear, I don't think any feature is required; I'd just like to see general community encouragement that the second page of a long thread include a summary of what's gone before. This is especially the case in RSI threads, and even more so in those started by Tim; often the idea has developed after the first 200 posts and new readers could benefit from a fresh start that re-stated the proposal, including mention of various pros and cons, and didn't force them to read over hundreds of already-obsolete old posts.

It's difficult to even talk about the proposed post-count limit, which wouldn't be too horrible

I think it would be more a negative than a positive, though. Already, it can be awkward when someone (often Tim) edits a post to add significant new content; the addition can easily get missed. I'd much rather people post a new message soon after the first, so that everyone will see it.

I'd hate to have my contributions to a long thread "summarized" by whoever happens to start the continuation thread.

82>

(Referring to a hard posts-per-thread limit)

I think it would be more a negative than a positive, though.

Oh, I agree. But it's a sprained ankle, not a broken neck like the Twitterizing "character limit per post" would be.

>83 jjwilson61: The thing is, you could easily repeat anything that you think was missed/misinterpreted and still relevant. If anything, I think the process would clarify people's understanding of the different positions.

Also, remember that I'm strongly against thread deletion. The old thread would still be there for anyone to refer to, but the barrier to participation in the discussion would be lowered.

I think it would lead to one person summarizing followed by 50 posts from people clarifying what they're position really is.

>86 jjwilson61: I can't believe that the summarizer would be wrong on every single point, and that every single thing said in the original thread would still be relevant.

The summary wouldn't replace the discussion entirely. But if it could reduce the discussion to 50 posts rather than 300, focusing particularly on the points of disagreement, I think that would be a huge benefit.

Regarding the proposed word/post limit, I agree that it *can* be hard for some people to follow longer posts or threads, but I don't think that anyone on LT should be forcibly silenced. Just as LT can welcome diverse opinions, LT is big enough to welcome all kinds of conversation, short for some and longer for others. Every group will not be suitable for every person, but we can form different groups for different styles, and we can find ways to improve Talk options to make it more flexible. In my opinion, the best approach is not to set limits or take things away, but instead to add ways for people to keep up and participate, particularly with respect to site-related conversations. This was part of why I created "A Quieter LibraryThing," although as lorax mentioned it's been more active than anyone expected. Many people (active talkers and the less vocal) agree that customizing Talk navigation could help a great deal.

No doubt, this is the hardest challenge: to make sure that decisions about the site itself consider the wishes of the broadest sampling of members and consider as many ramifications as possible of a change. Threads on Recommend Site Improvements and Talk About LibraryThing can get overwhelming fast, even if you're on daily like I am! It's good, if sometimes overwhelming, to have passionate discussions, and it's good, if incomplete, to have polls that don't expose members to harassment for their opinions and count everyone equally. We can improve Talk and Groups, but the solution isn't to take away expression but to make it more diverse and easier to navigate.

77: Freakin' heck no.

That's the ONE reason I hate Twitter so much.

How are proposal-threads or feature-threads suppose to function if everyone is limited to a certain number of words? I know *I* would be turned off to posting altogether if I was forced to keep it under a certain wordcount. A lot of us users have very strong opinions about this website and about certain proposals around here, and I think the entire dynamic of that would be compromised if we had to keep to little limited soundbytes.

I voted NO, because I never had a problem before, but after joining Club Read 2011, I can see the problem.

k4k

I joined the 75 Books Challenge this year and then promptly left again. I'll still take part, but I'm having to do it in odd ways because I simply can't read Talk with that group on my 'My Groups' page.

>92 Aerrin99:. I did exactly the same on the 75 Books challenge! Shame as there are a lot of interesting folks on there but there's no way I've the time, or the inclination frankly, to keep up with all the minutia chatting that goes on there. Just have to rely on checking occasional touchstone lists and starring those I want to read/ follow. Some sort of twitter thing to track those people whose "jib" I particularly like the "cut of" would be excellent!

>91 krazy4katz:. I'd say to bear with the Club Read 2011 though. It has a reasonable level of volume normally but it's the start of the year so there is a deluge of thread starts at the moment.

By the way, we're putting together what I've started calling the Threadbook on the 75 Books Challenge group wiki. It's a list of members with links to each one's reading threads. You could use it as a jumping off point for occasional thread browsing.

http://www.librarything.com/wiki/index.php/Groups:75booksin2011#The_Threadbook

In response to Melannen, I would like to make LT my primary social network. I'd like it to turn the tables on Facebook like the mammals did to the reptiles.Why would I want to socialise with the general public who either dont read, or read best seller nonsense like the Davinci Code?

>90 _Zoe_:/92/93 I joined the 75 Books Challenge in 2009 and 2010 to follow specific people, and both years I eventually left because it was too overwhelming - even with the ability to ignore specific posts. Even though there are people I'd like to follow, I won't join again this year.

One idea - In keeping with the current structure of Talk . . . it would be nice to have the ability to view a combination of Your Groups and Your Starred. Then I could follow the groups I belong to "in full" (no starring necessary) and also follow individual threads across LT.

I voted no, but I expect to be leaving the 75 books challenge after I post to most of the threads I want to follow.

Otherwise I follow a lot of groups and read pretty much everything in all of them.

Robert

I voted no, because I rarely have an interest in the social side of LT. Rarely, at least in comparison to the volume of social activity that's grown up here. I prefer to do my social book activity face to face.

I voted yes because, as other people have noted, joining a busy group overwhelms the Talk (Forum) Topics list on the Home Page. I once joined Bug Collectors and Talk About Library Thing but had to unjoin because suddenly my Home Page talk notifications contained nothing else. Now I just drop by those groups regularly to see what's happening. Even a moderately busy group can have sudden spurts of activity and overwhelm. With the new Group Recommendation feature I'd like to join a lot of group but am leery...

I have a suggestion. What if the Home Page Talk Topics notifications didn't list the individual thread links but instead was something like:

You have recent unread Talk Posts in these Groups:
- Bug Collectors (32 posts)
- Chapel of the Abyss (12 posts)
- The Globe (3 posts)
- Pro and Con (1 post)
- Literary Snobs (4 posts)

... and the live link was to the group where the individual posts could be read. "Recent" unread posts could be, oh, unread stuff from the last two weeks.

Then I'd join lots of groups...

I had to say yes.

I am one of those people who joins the 75 books challenge, starts a thread, stars the important group threads like the introduction thread, and all the threads of people I know I want to follow, and then quits the group again.
I've done that three years in a row now. I think it works nicely, but I gotta admit I do feel a little disloyal when I click the button to un-join. It's not that I don't want to be part of the group, its just that I don't want it overwhelming my groups page.

#97 "Otherwise I follow a lot of groups " Pah! You're not even into 3 figures yet.

#99 That's very nice. I like that a lot. It would be especially good for highlighting the quieter groups that get a rare post that is easy to miss.

Yeah I am and have been for a long time. I believe it's about 150.

Robert

>99 Crypto-Willobie: I like that idea. It might be worth starting a separate thread for it since I think it's likely to be lost here.

99, 103> I've been asking for it off and on (mostly off, recently, though) for about 3 years. Though I don't think I ever came up with the 'recently' trick...I just wanted it to say if there were unread messages in a group. I would _love_ this.