OccultForum.org

I'd like to just toss my two cents in and hope I don't anger the forum gods and godesses (that means you nahemah!).

I've noticed that the beginner section has a plethora of information, but it's all mixed in with other questions and conjecture and oftentimes (I'm guilty of this), a certain question shifts the entire topic in a new direction. For a beginner topic, I don't think we should have such a level of variance.

I have a few models I'd like to propose that may alleviate this and make beginner navigation of specific topics easier.

A. There will be a category as plainly written as "Divination". Within you can find sub topics "Runes", "Necromancy", "Tarot", etc.

In each topic, tarot for example, will be a Q&A style FAQ section as the first post. It will help to address questions that multiple initiates have expressed in a concise and clean way. After that, anything below this can be a question that isn't addressed in the FAQ. In order to keep order within the topic, any questions that seem proper to be added to the FAQ, will be. The original post will then be removed to keep things from getting muddled again.

Some may not agree with deletion of posts (especially people who are more interested in post count than ease for the initiate), but it could be a successful style.

B. A model that requires a lot less work on the mod's part would be to have a comprehensive wikipedia entry on the topic which is listed as the first post in the topic. It will have the same base style category, specialized topic style and will contain basic, concrete information on the topic and attempt not to delve too far into theory or personal feeling. Things such as history, basic technique, really anything to pique the interest of an initiate without vomiting too much information at them. Perhaps even a FAQ section on the wiki article can showcase questions from the forum that could yield insightful answers. After scouring the wiki, initiates can then post questions to things not addressed on the wiki.

These models are similar and can be easily tweeked for convenience of all involved. I'm not suggesting reform for all topics, just the beginner ones. I think presenting information in a more coherent way will also help the mods by halting the production of a lot of useless topics created. I would be more than willing to compile wikipedia information or do any other necessary housekeeping in order for this to become a reality.

Thanks for the ideas and input Khelric.

I will flag this for the other staff to look at as we will need to discuss any possible changes.

Vashta is very busy with work atm,so it might take a wee while to come back on this and we have begun initial discussions on other ideas for the forum,made earlier in other topics.I don't make any major changes here without discussing them first with our other staff/the boss.

At this moment,running the forum is the priority [gotta keep on those spammers! Lol,but seriously...] so changing the layout/folder styles etc. is something we've put on the back burner for now.

The FAQ idea I do like particularly. [thumbup]

Perhaps we could get a group of us together to work on a FAQ covering various topics, from different points of view. Such as:

Q: "How do I do x?"
A:
from a ritualist - "You do t + u + s + y."
from a chaosist - "t+u+s+y is stupid, just do Z."
from a satanist - "t+u+s+y and Z are stupid, do whatever you want."
from a spiritualist - "You could try t+u+s+y or Z, but is it what you really want? Do you have a higher purpose?"
from a troll - "PAY TO CROSS MY BRIDGE BITCH!"

And so forth. Could also have links to relevant discussions. I think the biggest thing is if we did get a group of us, that we could modify the first post. That way you aren't relying on one person to update everything. So the few of us that would work on it would need moderator powers over the beginner forum.

Hello,

sorry for the delay getting back to you guys, I have put a little thought into something like this. I agree that a higher degree of integration with the wiki would be a good idea, I've seen plenty of cases where a post turns into an in-depth resource and I do agree that a wiki is a much better structure for navigating complicated interlinked masses of information.

The level of change is a consideration also, whenever something changes on a website there is always some resistance or reluctance to accept the new system; think of how many times you've heard people complain about "the new facebook" - every time there's a major change. So, while I do agree that there is a better way to structure our information, I think that once we've determined the course, it would be better to try to fuse it gently with the current system than to replace the forum format entirely. To many seasoned online occultists, forums are a familiar and accessible format, although I wonder if younger generations might find it cumbersome, I'm not really sure, I'm almost 30 here, and a geek; forums are fine with me

Taking that into consideration, the topic is very much open to discussion before any big moves are made. Your thoughts, opinions, and questions regarding this subject are welcome and encouraged. I think that you have successfully identified a big breakpoint in the site workflow, and it does bear discussion and remedy, but it would be good to hear from.. well, everyone but that's statistically very unlikely, so everyone who has something to say about it ^_^

My thoughts on it.. In no particular order: It would be really good if there was some way to easily make a forum post into a wiki page, like with one click would be ideal. Maybe a vote system?
It would be really good if there was some way to mine the thread for references and counterpoints, although this can be a bit fuzzy and I think would require either an AI capable of understanding the conversation (bearing in mind how frequently spelling and grammatical errors occur every day, and everywhere) and writing a precis on it (automatically structuring knowledge into wiki pages), which I'm not entirely sure is even possible right now.. Or provide an easy way for a human to mine a thread for references and structure the article from various posts.
One alternative to this could be simply turning the best post into a wiki page and manually reworking it from there, but I think some level of assistance in mining the thread (and other threads on the subject) would be a big help..
It would be great to have maybe some kind of FAQ in each forum with a hierarchical breakdown of each subject and links to relevant wiki content, stickied in each forum, and maintained by a person, or generated from wiki content.
I think it would also be good to have some kind of suggested wiki reading lists in forum posts. Kind of like how blogs suggest related articles. Maybe people could suggest references, and maybe the system could scan threads for keywords (using the list of wiki page titles as its keyword list) and find related wiki pages? Not sure, but it would encourage use of the wiki, which is the goal of this exercise
Something else, brought up in a discussion with Khelric: something to help new wiki users get started would probably help a lot.. tutorials or references, maybe tips to improve your writing?

Aaand, manpower. It's beyond my skills to write an AI that can do this for us, although that would be awesome beyond awesome. We're going to need to work together and continue working together to keep this project up, and it'll take as many writers as we can find to really get it going. A thorough and well-maintained wiki is a BIIIIIG project, you're effectively writing an encyclopedia, we need to crowdsource big time to really make this happen. Cant hurt to talk it through and decide on a destination together at any rate, but I do agree the premise is sound ^_^

A wiki would be doable, but do you have the software to set it up? I would think if we can't get the manpower to write a faq we can't get enough for a wiki. Would people be best if we try to get an faq working first. Would still be good to have and would be good practice.

We have a wiki

The login is integrated, so if you're logged into the forum you're also logged into the wiki, but that's where it ends, you can't wikilink or transclude or fun stuff like that. I don't think plugins exist for that but it might be possible..

I'm tying to work on the faq right now but I can't edit my posts with more information. Could you either make me a mod for that section or make me a new group that can edit their own posts. Kinda pointless for me to work on an ever expanding faq if I can't edit my post with updated or more information.

You should be able to edit your posts now.

Yes, yes I can. Muhahha. But being at work on my tablet means I can't do anything yet.

Ok, so, in the spirit of a wiki, the FAQ threads need to be edited by multiple people, this means we need to grant elevated privileges to some peoples accounts so they can edit the FAQ thread, need to have a think about how to apply these permissions. I think I'll create a new rank with custom permissions, call it Editor. Not 100% sure how granular permissions in phpbb are but will cook up something for it. So, who would like to be an Editor? And.. what colour do you want your names to be?

Ok, so, I've created the role Editor, which is currently dark green but we can discuss that. The role has the ability to edit, delete, move, split, merge, and issue warnings to users. If you wish to apply for this role, you must agree to some basic moderation guidelines.

In the case of clear-cut spam, a post can be deleted. The editor role doesn't currently have banning permissions, but we might need to discuss this further.
Posts that badly violate the terms of use should be reported, and we should discuss what to do with them (maybe create a private moderation board), and the user should be issued a warning at least. Three warnings become a ban.
You will have the ability to edit any post on the forum, don't abuse it
You will be part of a team, and we will work together.
The main responsibilities of the Editor role are maintaining the FAQ threads, and encouraging use of the wiki, through either doing or encouraging and helping others to do things like building well-structured wiki articles out of insightful threads, and adding them to the FAQ.

If you could also PM or post something like a cover letter, explaining why you want to be an editor, any experience you feel is relevant (straight A+ english lit student, previous wiki management experience, previous moderation experience etc).