Some thoughts about this site.... and a chance to add your own

• Posted by Paul April 13, 2012 - 638 views

  It's been a funny old week on The Skyrim Blog hasn't it?

  We had the 'Cicero incident' as it was called by one member. No sooner had that died down, than we plunged headlong into the whole dust up over in the Arts Group.

  Funnily enough, what happened seems to have galvanised people - we've had more people coming onto the site, much more activity and a general 'buzz' on the site. More importantly, it's made me realise just what we have here. We've built a pretty decent community here on this site. When something goes a bit pear-shaped, it reminds us what we'd lose if this site was allowed to run out of control, or even came to a shuddering halt entirely.

  OK, we've 'lost' three or four members over the past few days, but that seems a small price to pay if its done that one small thing.

  So, now that things have settled down a little, it seems like a good time to look to the future. I'd been intending to give things a bit of a spruce up over the coming weeks. I'm bringing that forward, and looking to make some immediate changes to solidify whats good about the site, and develop a few new ideas.

  GROUPS

  The following Groups have pretty well lapsed into a coma.

  • Skyrim Tabletop RPG no activity for several months, probably needs deleting
  • Skyrim Wallpapers this group will be merged into Skyrim Art
  • Tales from Skyrim no activity, needs deleting
  • Modders Workshop doesn't seem much interest in modding, could be deleted?
  • The Elder Council seems to have outlived its purpose
  • Journeys in Skyrim do we need a group just to collect links to blogs?

  I'm going to message these Groups giving them a final chance to be 'revived', but if there is no obvious response then they will be removed from the Group section.

  FORUM

  Its time to recognise that some of the Hosts have become inactive and need to be replaced with new people. Additionally, I would like to have separate Hosts for the different categories in the Forums, so that the Forums can be made more lively. Therefore I am now actively looking for the following Hosts

  • Skyrim Forum Host
  • Gaming Discussion Host
  • General Chat Host
  • Videos Host

  Julian has kindly offered to replace Skyrim Fan Girl as Host for the Photo Gallery, and - as you have seen - Guy has joined Mason as Host for the Character Build Group. Rune Red is the Host of the 'Q&A Forum', and I'll look after 'Polls & Quizzes' myself.

  What do you need to be a Host? You need to be active on the site and intending to stick around in the future. You need to be willing to start regular topics. And you need to be able to use simple Moderator Tools if that ever becomes necessary (which is only rarely). Contact me or post in the comments if you are interested

  I'd like to say a word of 'thanks' to all those who have been Hosts, most of whom who have been here since November. This is the Internet, and people come and go, so there is no shame or blame attached to anyone who 'moves on' and is no longer able or willing to be a Host. Thanks for your efforts guys, it is appreciated

  IDEAS

  OK, here is something NEW on the site. I have idea a new module called IDEAS, which I found whilst looking for something to help the Character Build Group in their quest to sort out the most popular builds. I can't add it for a Group, but I can - and have - add it to the site.

  Basically, its a 'crowd sourcing' tool. People post ideas, and you can vote them up or down according to whether you think they are good ideas or not. You can also post comments there!

  Anyone can post ideas, and I will adding them too. I'm using this to get feedback on suggestions for the site. So head on over to IDEAS on a regular basis, vote and comment, and have your say....