Ideas for the website

[Alan Montague]

What do we want?

[Sven Veine]

The latest replies should appear first in the Discussion area.

All the best,
Sven

[Leif Hansen]

I agree, not sure if I can change that...will look into it thogh.
I also hear you about your other point...perhaps there should be a site or page somewhere that is more professional and designed for those outside the network. I had brought up this issue in a previous post, asking it as to what is our main audience for this site?...insiders or outsiders/clients. Good Q Sven...

[Sven Veine]

Love the new site - miss the old one!

This new site is our social site and it's wonderful in that way, however working with the upcoming European conference I really miss the old site's "seriousness". I felt so confident giving the old site's adress away to connections outside the network. Uptil now I have hesitated in doing that with the new site. How be constructive in this matter? Is it possible to keep both? What I really liked about the old page was the effective and individual presentation of people in the network, main focus on the conferences and serious articles on impro in business.

Have a wonderful day,
Sven

[Johnnie Moore]

Just for the record, I've reset the old site to work like this:

Anyone going to appliedimprov.net, just like that, gets redirected here.

Anyone going to a specific page in the old site - and there are lots of inbound links from various parts of the web to those pages, still gets the old page. That's handy for seeing old blog entries, info on past conferences etc. I've added a loud banner at the top to let them know that they're looking at old pages, and need to come here for the new stuff.

But please, start a new biog here because we may start closing that section of the blog soon to make sure everyone gets in here.

[Leif Hansen]

Differentiating types of messaging, and some basic suggestions...

"Comment Wall" at the bottom of your personal profile page.
-These messages are public and can be left and viewed by anyone
-They're a way of leaving quick little hellos and public messages, encouragement, etc.

"Private Email" little mail icon at very the top left of the page (when new message is here, there's a "!")
-These are, uh, private. So if you don't want anyone to see, use this or a person's real email address.

"Blog entries" -at bottom of main page, and at bottom of each of your profiles
-Think 'public journal'. This is a place for you to share your expertise, or your creativity, or whatever personal ramblings you want to share with others. We'd ask of course that you'd keep it pretty darn related to applied improv and your experiences/work/thoughts related to AIN (this should be obvious about photos and videos as well, this is the AIN site.) Unless you've changed the default, or mention in that specific post's settings, these are public and will go at the bottom of the main page for all to see, as well as gather at the bottom of your own. And, again unless you've specified elsewhere, anyone (or "just my friends") can leave comments about your posts.
Underneath the "Hello, " section, click
"Profile Settings"
Here you can control many options as to who can view and comment on your photos, videos, blog, etc. You can also control what kinds of things you receive notifications about.

"Forum Topics" -see "forum" tab and featured in middle of main page.
-Think community discussion center. If you have a topic, or see a topic, that you can imagine a number of people wanting to discuss and add Q&A to, then join or start a new topic. Go to "Forums" menu and click "Start new discussion". These are public and can be commented on by anyone. They can be 'closed' when/if it is appropriate. I'm experimenting with how to decide which topics get featured on the main page (options are "Most Recent Replies", "Most Replies", "Newest Discussions", "Featured" (a setting only admin can set) As of now I've chosen "Most Recent replies" so we can quickly see which discussions have new content.

"Chat Box" -In the lower right corner,
This is a silly, but potentially fun/ctional place, to connect and "shout-out" publicly to those who you notice are online at the time that you are. Again, comments are public and record is kept. I may change the software being used in there at a later date.

[Katherine Lawrence]

Hi Leif,
Is there any chance that the email settings (in my profile) could be set to send a daily digest? Not that I don't love hearing from everyone, but this generates a LOT of email these days!
Thanks,
Katherine

[Daniel Cohen]

Hi Leif,

I'd like to be able to set my time zone so that the time of day is correct.

Thanks,

Daniel

[Leif Hansen]

There are privacy options for the site, as well as some paid options. I thought pictures would be worth a thousand words. My suggestions would be to keep everything open UNTIL we have a problem, then start restricting and/or moderating. As for features, I'd prioritize: 1)Change to old domain, 2)Add bandwidth, 3)Remove Ads (or add our own). I don't see a real need to remove 'create your own networks' as I think that could be a feature members want to try out. So, tell me what you think....

[Leif Hansen]

Thanks for starting this Alan.

A few things I didn't mention.
-Big one I neglected to mention yesterday --notice that this new site has it's own built in messaging system. Cool.
-Almost all of the elements on the front page can be reconfigured (e.g. moved up or down, to side-bars, to center, 'show most recent discussions', 'show 5-20 members', show what activity gets logged, etc.) So any suggestions would be helpful.
-Your profile (and the main page) can also have, for the less tech-oriented person, extra little widgets. See Alan's page for a Shakespearian example.