Virtual Dr. seems more than a little sick: "Member Participation Issues"

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Exactly, what im asking is does anyone have a proposal on how to fix this? We have no control over what people post.

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Ah. Sorry I misunderstood ya BJ. You are right, no one (mods or members) can control what people do or don't post overall. And given this, it does indeed present some difficulties and limitations in terms things that tangibly can be done to raise the bar (so to speak) and diversify in the area of postings. I sure haven't been able to come up with "the" answer.

A few things that could perhaps contribute to the desired end though...

- Perhaps, as LindaHewitt touched on, there is a need for some new forums devoted to certain topics/areas.

- Efforts could be made (mods taking the lead role) to initiate threads specifically targeted at promoting discussions and information exchange on topic/areas of interest to members.

- Efforts could be made at times (again, by mods) to intercede in to existing threads and (once the user had gotten their answer of course) perhaps attempt to steer them in a more expanded or broad based direction.

Like I say, just a couple thoughts. And even if they were all done they would not offer the full solution.

As I recall here it has been mentioned by some that they feel that there are competing, better, more specific resources or forums out there from which to get answers/help. In terms of what? If there are areas/topics/interests/questions in which you do not see vdr as a viable/useful resource for then what are they? What in these regards is vdr lacking (or others offering)? I know some have offered up examples/info on this (Linda just did, again), but...

We did discuss the the idea of adding some new forums to the site in our Moderators forum a little while ago. We wanted to get the upgrade done first, but we are certainly open to suggestions.

DrMDJ,

Here is something else that VDR could do. Set up a conference and maybe a link from the homepage to a webpage, which has the best quotes. Quotes should be much as you would expect to see on a book jacket but there could be a link to the conference / thread with the success stories. Success stories would reflect how VDR saved my bacon, etc.

Obviously, VDR might want to set up a conference for this and then pick the best ones to post on the webpage, which is linked to the VDR homepage. What is posted on the webpage, should be short comments which are extracted from the conference thread.

Is there a way that there could be a success story thread in every conference, which would stay at the top of the conference. I know that VDR can do stickies but users cannot post into these threads. Is there some other category, which would allow the thread to stay at or near the top of the page and allow members

This would be great for visitors and it would be great for the registered VDR members who are posting.

Linda

Hi Linda, stickies are generally use for info only & they are locked but they can also be left open. BJ

And some of these suggested forums would be on going educational types as we have talked about.

If people come to Virtual Dr initially for help then it stands to reason they would stay around to learn more if there to learn. I wonder if that is where we made a mistake. Not growing with our members. How many have we got? 74K plus? Why ignore a huge ready made resource that is already in place?

Let's see we get our upgrade, get our search terms right for the search engines, and give our more experienced members something to dig their teeth into. And we might just be leading the pack after awhile. Thank you for all who have posted so far. I plumb love it. :) :)

As usual, All I see in this Thread are what i call "The Usual Members" The Long Time Members..Quite a few Mods n Seniors have still not poped in here to Express their views...Loads of the Members from the Majority of Forums either can't be bothered or don't care less....Hows about some of you Smooth Talking Mods, Seniors giveing them a reminder!! Just a sugestion!
I must say that lots of those Links that's been given within this Thread to the Related Sites, Don't Interest me n are slow...I still Prefer VDRs Layout to theirs..Just my Personal Likeing..

Maybe it's worth changing the name of this forum to "Feedback about this site" or something more obvious.

I think that this title is just fine, although I might have picked something else in the beginning, I think that it does the job. After all, in a few short days, we have gotten over 10 papes of comments.

I think people click on threads because of the number of posts and views. Everyone wants to know what is going on.

Linda

But as has been mentioned, the responses are from long time users, not too many newbies. Speaking for myself as a user, The forum/thread title(s) influences me a great deal in determining what I click on and what I pass by.

Discussion Home , although that is the correct wording, most folks do not realise it means the "list of forums" as is the case here at vdr.

Possibly a better way of naming it so folks can recognize it for what it is might help.

Just a idea, but have run into the discussion misconception before.

Where are you referring to exactly?

I think the suggestion about threads that are resolved, that Linda and others have mentioned, can be a powerful tool for this forum......people who are looking for the solution are in a hurry, because they can't stand their pc not functioning properly.....and that alone I think will attract people.......and for those who want to go deeper the threads are in their respective forums.......and of course a link to this kind of thread should be prominent on the home page.
poppy

edit:....that was synergystic....I linked to where Train posted below me, and using firefox, the tab says..."Virtual Dr A community where computing problems get solved.".....so somebody at JM....recognizes the value of 'solved'......:D ....nice layout btw.

http://www.virtualdr.com/

In the left pane.

Believe He's referring to the home page on the left "Discussions Home". Seems pretty weak to me...

Ah ok. As I said, the main site page is outside my purview. I can pass along some of the suggestions to the site editor though. Perhaps "Tech-help Forums" would be more apropos