What has happened?

The perceived downside is that it encourages cliques of "click buddies" where merit has nothing to do with it. Facebook is a case maybe, if that's the model that's on your mind.

So if having posts liked makes us feel loved, what will no likes mean? And we're back to the same problem.

Things are what they are and all is equal and fair, that's the policy and I don't see anything inherently wrong with that.

I don't "do" Facebook and am happy to say that I've no idea how it works.

If you need the approval of your photographic peers to feel loved, there is something missing in your life.

Life really is too short to worry about who likes what - if that is what matters most to you, perhaps you are in the wrong place?

John, I think you need to participate other forums and see how they work. I have several different forums in mind ALL have some method of approval for posts and contributions.

Having the background of lurking likes will dilute any buddy cliques, they already exist with friends commenting on other friends posts. Currently lurkers outnumber logged in people 4:1.

At least some people will feel liked and get approval for the good they do and the visitors they bring and the advertising revenue pulled in for the site owners.

It is real life to get a pat on the back when you do something good. A stroke, a compliment, bon mots. It is unreal not to mirror this, in a similar way to just about every other forum.

I can't post now for another 20 years and 2 weeks. I'm off to watch Scumbag College on on university challenge.

I doubt there is any member on this forum who likes every image they view, I certainly don't. It's the same with threads, you have the option to read it and add a comment or not.

I'm glad John sees the problem. I'm on Facebook, I have four kids and a stepson. The ability for people on the forum to make their disdain as obvious as my kids do on facebook fills me with dread.

There's probably half a dozen people on this forum who will interact with me, fair enough, but I don't want it making more obvious with a like button and it's complete lack of use in my direction.

The same goes for ranks, gongs, special treatment etc. Users and Mods will do me just fine.

Really? If that were true we'd have a "General Chat" forum that meant what it's name suggests instead of the "General Chat" forum that we do have which is definitely not for general chat in the globally accepted sense of the meaning of "General Chat".

1. I'm unsurprised some people don't do facebook, I'm surprised when they don't have the mental agility to apply the principals of social networking to social networking sites. It smacks of a closed conservative mindset.

2.I don't need the approval of Anybody, my posting probably illustrates this.

3. There is only one UK Pentax forum (currently) and I'd love it to become a bit more dynamic and interesting. This thread seemed to be about the forum becoming boring, a bit of a classified advert forum etc etc. I'm glad you are engaged in the thread and progressing the discussion in a positive and friendly way.

Huh?

You like a post, image whatever. I don't understand. Do you think everybody has to like everything?

You could ask for an ignore button? I think I might suggest it too.

Disdain is usually communicated through words. I'd imaging the lack of a like is not transmitting disdain. The use of a "like" as far as I have seen across many forums has only ever been positive.

You have no idea how many forums I or anybody else are involved in, so assumptions don't really help very much.

As for a General Chat forum, as several members have been told who asked, it's under consideration for the future. Peter, you have already been told that as well.

All sorts of things could be done and development and upgrades are considered very carefully. Pentax User is actually a very successful forum.

I'm glad I started this thread as it has stimulated some sensible discussions and interesting points of view. I hope it doesn't descend into bad feeling and farce like some of the other recent threads have. I do think we have collectively managed to inject some more vigour into the Forum, some positive changes may also occur, so thanks to everyone who has contributed. Thanks also to the mods for letting this one run, it wasn't intended to provoke any extreme reactions and I don't think it has.

Regards
David

How is that measured John. Against which benchmarks?

This made me think you participate in very few forums.

The site has barely changed in the time I've been here and it's like riding about in the internet equivalent of a Rover 75. (this millennium not last).

There are many possible benchmarks, but the one we use at ADAPS for example for our own forum is traffic. We know when the figures are high that someone finds it worthwhile visiting and we can also see how many unique visitors there are, so there will be lots of statistics available.

We could also measure quality of content, a more subjective thing perhaps, but clearly some forums are full of drivel and some are not.

I don't speak for Pentax User in this regard, but from many points of view it's very successful. I've seen plenty of deadly quiet forums, even those supporting quite major marques.

Pentax User has a pretty unique pedigree in the way it arose, so I'd think enjoying what we have here is a good place to start.

Have you anything statistical that you can quote John, as opposed to your own anecdotal evidence

For example:
Growth in members online daily
Growth in average daily posts per member. And a comparison with other fora
Growth in visitors to the site
etc, etc