Frustrated with the forum organization...

[LibertyMage]

This site has been on my daily read list for a long time now. I try to direct people here as much as possible as you can easily see the enthusiasm and support for our ideas here. However, many of the people I direct here - including myself - get frustrated with the site.

There are posts with great information and worthwhile initiatives all over these forums and yet it is nearly impossible to find them all. The "10 lessons" post is golden. That is located in the general forum. "How Supporters Were Perceived in 2008" is a worthwhile discussion. Why is it under "Liberty Candidates"? There is a "For Liberty" post asking for input under "Ron Paul grassroots central". Is that a forum about Ron Paul or what?

My time is limited. When I spend time on the internet connecting with people, I want to learn about worthwhile initiatives, discuss political organizing issues I feel are important or learn about worthwhile candidates I can help out. When people come to this site they should be able to find this information quickly and be able to become involved easily - period. When people can't find what they are looking for, they are discouraged from using this site.

With that said, I have the following suggestions. I hope nobody takes offense, this is how I feel the forums could be improved.



1. Rename "Ron Paul Grassroots Central" to:

Political Organizing
Collaboration of new political organizing initiatives and discussion of topics relevant to the movement.

Justification: "Ron Paul Grassroots Central" is too vague a title and it seems this forum is hardly used because people don't know what it is for. "Political Organizing" gives a much stronger suggestion about the discussions that should belong in this forum.



2. Eliminate "Liberty Candidates -> 2010 Planning" and "Liberty Candidates -> 2012 Planning" and replace them with:

Drafting Liberty Candidates
Discussions on candidates that may represent the liberty movement.

Justification: We need a place to share information about local and national candidates that we may be able to rally behind and yet information is all over these forums. We should have a one-stop-shop for information on potential new candidates. Once we have a significant amount of people rallying behind a candidate we can allocate them their own forum. The 2010 and 2012 forums seem to contain a mish-mash of information. The posts related to candidates can be moved to the "Drafting Liberty Candidates" forum and the organizing related posts can be moved to the "Political Organizing" forum, which should have continual discussion, not just about 2010 or 2012.



3. Eliminate the "Liberty Candidates - Planning" subsection.

Justification: It is just confusing. If a candidate deserves their own forum, why not just push it to the front with the others?



Thanks for considering these suggestions. I sincerely believe a little information organization will enhance our political organization. I added a poll to see how everyone else feels about these changes.

[Son of Detroit]

Sadly, I don't think this forum is for political organization anymore. When half of the members here are against voting and the political process, there won't be much tactical discussion for the elections.

[libertybrewcity]

We could start a thread that takes the most important threads and categorizes them. This way epic threads would not fall to the archives never to be seen again.

[Kludge]

Not a problem for me. I skim through the New Posts titles at least once per three days. This tells me everything going on. If I like something, I can bookmark it. The organization of the forum is irrelevant to me with the exception of it helping me search for specific threads using the search function.

Many don't pay much attention to the subforums. If something's in the wrong forum, write a quick report up suggesting the proper forum.

The current system gives the largest amount of space to the most talked-about candidates, a lesser amount of space to the less-talked-about candidates, and then no dedicated space to those which don't justify a subforum - but puts all of them in one section for people who are interested. But, at least - the first suggestion seems very sensible.


The one organization I dislike is how "States & Territories" often overlaps with "2010 planning." States & Territories should probably be knocked off, with all threads merged into 2010 planning.

[LibertyMage]

Sadly, I don't think this forum is for political organization anymore. When half of the members here are against voting and the political process, there won't be much tactical discussion for the elections.

That is a big part of why I am suggesting this. I do like to read over the "Ron Paul drinks Fiji water-esk" posts on occasion . However, most of the time I don't have an abundance of time and i need to get right to the meat and potatoes.

[damiengwa]

why don't you start a blog where you create pages wiht the best of posts or threads... then direct folks to that. Plenty of room on the inter-network ya know.

Msg boards are for communicating amongst users, we shouldn't be overly concerned what the lurkers who may or may not understand liberty think. the boards are for organizing and sharing info and debate amongst we true believers..

[libertybrewcity]

I agree that more focus should be on political organization, however, I would expect that during an off year, most of the focus would be on news and education.

I think that in time important threads that are helpful will resurface as droves of VOTING Ron Paul supporters return to help in 2011 and 2012.

Non-voting people can either join or stay on the side, or they will be brushed aside. No one will take Ron Paul bashing here.

[damiengwa]

hows about an "epic" board, where a thread can be mirrored to (not moved to but co-listed, if possible). Of course there will be plenty of hemming and hawing over what belongs there and doesn't, so we'd need to come up with an objective manner to get there.

maybe a voting button, to go into epic, and if it gets enough votes it gets co listed in epic.... or some name other than 'epic' that better describes it than epic, but ya;ll get the idea right.

[speciallyblend]

forum seems fine to me and has many uses!!

[Romulus]

Not a problem for me. I skim through the New Posts titles at least once per three days. This tells me everything going on. .

ditto

[Son of Detroit]

Yeah, this doesn't really apply to me. I use new posts, and new posts only. I never actually browsed the forum through the sections.

[Vessol]

forum seems fine to me and has many uses!!

heh, i rarely post anywhere except General politics