Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Pastimes : SI Beta Site Launch - 7/01/99 -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: jbe who wrote (1090)	7/31/1999 2:01:00 PM
From: Susan G	Read Replies (6) \| Respond to of 2340

I agree with your post that most of the complaints about the new SI are because people resist change.

To: jbe who wrote (1090)	7/31/1999 3:54:00 PM
From: Lizzie Tudor	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 2340

jbe, you make some good points and I think you are presenting your views in a constructive manner. However let me point out a couple things just to stir the pot a little. First of all, the minute the beta site came up there was a whole bunch of negativity. Cheeky was one guy who was negative on the new site but was actually trying to help. Otoh there was a whole cast of characters that just came here to vent about things like performance, which was laid out pretty plainly as an issue on the beta test from day one by the team. The next issue is that of "style". I believe most UI people would say the old site looks old. Of course it is what users are used to but that isn't any reason to let your site look obsolete. I believe most of the comments from users of the beta revolved around visual issues trying to get the new site to look like the old. Really, this is a waste of time. I truly believe that if people used SI with the "no box" option for about 2 weeks, and then an upgrade with boxes was issued, they would complain about the box. There is no value add in sitting here going back and forth on stuff like that. Peripherally related to this is the issue that some people can't make up their mind on what they want, and then some things have the user community divided. The "ignore" option is like that, also the vertical bars and left v. right menus... oh tons of stuff. Unless there is a consistent voice about some technical direction, you can't do much of anything. Options for every little thing that people can turn off and on are problems technically, you never want to do that. You wind up with a whole bunch of branches on your tree when it comes to upgrades etc, not maintainable. I don't think its too much to ask for a consistent request from the user community and if they can't come together, what can you do? I believe a huge improvement for the new site is the folders in the messaging system, this right up there along the lines of the "read 10 at a time". The next item on my list is the improved charts. I think taking out the "search this subject" is a big mistake on their part.

To: jbe who wrote (1090)	7/31/1999 4:14:00 PM
From: John Biddle	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 2340

Excellent post JBE, one I hope SI takes to heart. Content is indeed king here at SI. I continually find it amusing that some talk of leaving and going to RB or MF or some other site because of a missing box or a color scheme they don't like. To them I say "don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out". Why, because people who can't see the real value in SI are not likely to contribute much to it, and I for one won't miss 'em. The kinds of things that I want to see added to SI are things that focus on improving the usability to get at the content. Things like: Multiple messages at a time. SI's new "Next 10" is a start, but why not "All Remaining"? BrowseMaster has that and it's wonderful. And even the "Next 10" feature is poorly implemented. Two problems are that if you use it, SI can't reliably see that you've read various messages, so it can't accurately keep your SubjectMarks accurate. It's frustrating to click on the little number in SM which purports to indicate the number of unread messages on that thread only to find that you've read some or all of them already. A related problem is that you can even reply to messages addressed to you and yet in Message Center they show up as not having even been read, let alone responded to. How about the ability to have two SubjectMarks pages, not just one? That way you could keep everything you were interested in on one, and those you were most interested in at this time on the other. That way the one with the subjects you were most interested in would be smaller, load faster, and maybe even fit on a page. The capability to manage moving subjects between these pages would need to be added. You could use one when you were pressed for time and the other when you weren't. How about an ability to add, optionally, a current stock quote to a message? That might make the message more valuable for future reference to many, and makes it easier, and more accurate, to do for the poster. It should not be editable, other than to be removable by the original poster within his/her std 15 minute edit window. How about adding features to PeopleMarks to make it act just like SubjectMarks? In SM you can go back all the way to the beginning of a thread, why not within PM? In SM you can search within subject, why not within a person? In SM you can jump from one subject message to the next message within that subject. Why not do the same within PM and jump from one message by a person to the next message by that person? Why not add a checkbox associated with each message to let members indicate if it's a high value message. Then if an optional filter were added to read high value messages only (within a given thread) someone new to that thread could quickly catch up with the thread's most important information, in the eyes of that thread's other readers. There's a risk for the person using this because he/she might miss somethng good, but the average value of the messages read would probably be quite high and they might find the time to do that where they couldn't find the time to read all recent messages. Once caught up, the member could switch the filter off and read all messages from that point on. Or, he/she might decide to continue to read only messages ranked highly by others. It would be their choice. This latter approach is less valuable because until many have read a message it would even have had a chance to be flagged often enough to beat the high value criteria. And what would be the HV criteria? I don't know. Maybe a certain number of positive hits, though this has problems on heavily read threads. Maybe the top 5% or 10% of messages, though that would punish the high S/N threads unfairly. Maybe the top half or 3/4 of those flagged, i.e., the most frequently flagged. One other problem will be keeping people from flagging more than once. I'm sure some bright person can solve that one, though. And let's not forget adding an ignore feature. I've said plenty about this and don't wish to repeat myself, so I'll just say that the important issue is not freedom of speech, which "ignore" would not harm in any way, but enhancing SI from the perspective of its users. SI should deliver what we want, not what they think we should have.

To: jbe who wrote (1090)	8/1/1999 4:59:00 PM
From: JF Quinnelly	Respond to of 2340

One of the fans of the New SI reinforces your impression: What gnet has done, imo, is turn SI from a discussion site with a lot of additional financial information, to a financial site in which discussion is an important component. This is exactly what I want: the facts first, and then the interpretation of those facts (not the other way around). I'm happy as a clam! Message 10760725 What we like about the Classic site is what the Beta lovers want to change.