Categories and Forums Discussion

[Tiara]

oops, I just realized I sort of paraphrased the definition of "participate" given at http://www.burningman.com/participate/

There are many ways to participate. You can create a theme camp or build an art installation. You might put on a performance or build a stage for others to perform on. Check out examples of Playa Events which participants created. Not everyone is an artist or performer, but there are many options for participating. You can volunteer to help build the infrastructure of Black Rock City, both on the playa and year round, including donating your unwanted items. We couldn't do any of it, if we didn't care about our environment and worry about our garbage. Lastly, or perhaps firstly, you can create your own form of participation.

The sticky posts are the top of each Volunteer area could just provide a link and/or text provided by the burningman.com site. examples:
http://www.burningman.com/participate/brc_rangers.html
http://www.burningman.com/participate/greeters.html

And there should definitely be a prominent link to the volunteer questionnaire, as I understand that is the source that each group's volunteer coordinator(s) cull for new recruits.

http://www2.burningman.com/people/

[actiongrl]

Spanky just brought me lunch and we went over the proposed ideas here at my house. I think we came up with a good jump at the next mockup based on what's been proposed...should be seeing it soon.

[tisha2]

thanks a lot for the work, you guys. this place means a lot to a lot of us and we really appreciate what you're doing.

*mwha!*

[natthebat]

I like to talk about what we're going to do for BM this year and less about how we should talk. I'm a bitch. Blame BORG2.

[spanky]

Great feedback guys. AG and I went over the mockup, tried to clear up some of the text. I tried in opt4 to make it a little cleaner (for GE & III), incorporated some of the feedback about order.

One thing: I'm no apostrophe whiz, but isn't "Greeter's" right? It's the station for all of the Greeters, therefore it's possessive and not plural. Like I said, I don't know, but I thought I knew the rule. Correct me if I'm wrong (again)

Here is a link to what I call the Beta version. There seems to be a pretty good feeling about this layout, it incorporates as much feedback in a balanced way as possible. I hear the arguments towards III's design, but it seems to me that having some [more] roadsigns, especially for newbies is good. I think these latest titles are clear as to what should go in them and there's plenty of space for very freeform discussion. I am going to go over the rationale for each title below:

ePlaya Layout Beta 1

(keep in mind this one does not have the new header that I did today)

>>Greeters' Station: Start Here
Your first stop for learning about the ePlaya.
forums:
Overview of the ePlaya / Announcements

The "overview" section will have sticky posts at the top with text very similar to what I'm writing here. An overview of each forum and how it might get used. There will be links to the feedback forums for discussion on the policy, features and problems. Recommended reading. Links to CG & ToS. Possible links out of the board to the website. Maybe this area is ModPostOnly??

Announcements: this section is as it is now, announcements from staff about the ePlaya and hopefully more often, announcements about the event as well. We still rely onthe JRS and website (and survival guide) as our primary method of communicating to our participants, although personally, I would like to see some of the highest level messages get oushed down to the announcements as well.

>> All About Burning Man
Discuss Burning Man...what's it all about, anyway?
forums:
Get Involved! / Politics & Philosophy / Experiences at Burning Man

The general idea of this category is to discuss the nature of the event itself and not year-specific things, although aspects of each year are relevant and will of course fit in here.

Get Involved: This is the equivalent of "volunteer" or "participate" but in language that anyone can understand. Someone who wants to help out can go here and find possibly a few stickies about how to volunteer (link to the VolQ) and we can offer this area to the volunteer teams to work with if they like. No "list of all teams" here b/c that forces each team to represent and then have someone staff that thread. Maybe post-post moderated??

Politics & Philosophy: The place to discuss the underlying principles of Burning Man & BRC as a whole. Talk about Giting vs. Barter, Leave No Trace, etc.

Experiences at Burning Man: The old text is: "Share the sights, sounds and scents as well as rumors and truths found at Burning Man". This is for the "I had soo much fun" or "my neighbors stole my beer" or "I hate rave camps" posts.

>> Preparation
A clean, well-lighted place for getting ready for Burning Man.
forums:
FAQ - Read Me First / Q & A, Tips and Tricks / Share Resources

FAQ: ModPostOnly(??) pulled from the Q&A section for things that get asked over and over. Sticky? Hopefully this area can flesh out into a really good resource.

QA, Tips & Tricks: This is like HowTo's, Lists, and places for people to ask questions. I;m sure we'll get a lot of redirecting people, but people really like to ask questions, especially in their own voice. We can make the really useful posts sticky (maybe a few good lists, structures?)

Share Resources: A forum for obtainium...not that obtainium.net (or is it org?) isn't a great site. People who have something and other people need it. NOT for selling, advertising. Those posts will be pulled.

>> 2005 Burning Man Event
Discuss this year's event, including theme camps, art and performances.
forums:
2005 Theme / Tickets / Art & Performance / Theme Camps

This category is all about the current year. The current theme, buy, sell, trade tickets. Art projects and performers and performances. Theme camp planning and ideas. Just like the titles say.

>> Year Round Connections
A place to connect with and stay in touch with Burners far and wide.
forums:
Lost & Found / Regionals & Events / Open Discussion

The year round community category.

Lost & Found: we will add the subfora as discussed in the other thread. i think a "missed connections" might be good in there too for trying to find people.

Regionals and Events: for discussion Decompressions, Flambe Lounges, other not-necessarily-BM-but attended-by-burner events, not to mention Regional events. Apparently the regionals aren't all that active with the ePlaya, but hopefully they will.

Open Discussion: Anyone got a better name? Maybe we break this into two areas (as subforum)? Open Forum and PortaPotty for the shitstarters? This is where the Bar and all the GenDisc go. Maybe we call it "the Bar" after that very popular thread?

>> ePlaya Feedback
Tell us what you think!
forums:
Policy Discussion / Feature Requests / Bug Reports

It is what is says. Feedback specifically about the boards. A place for discussion about the policies of the board, a place to ask for and discuss new features and a place for reporting problems with new mods or existing problems.

And finally...

>> Year's Past
Archives of previous ePlaya posts.
forums:
2004 / 2003

Where we archive everything from the annual sections: Basically all of "2005 Burning Man event" and possibly archiving "Share Resources" each year as well. (??)

One thing I see missing is, like, "Getting There" or "Travel" or "Rideshare". Maybe that's just a thread not a forum? We have a rideshare on the website so maybe it's redundant? Ideas?

So, that's that. Please, let's all vibe on this for a bit so we can set to task tomorrow implementing it. It's not going to be easy to shuffle everything around and it's going to take a bunch of time and work. The quicker we can come to consensus the better. If you have suggestions for making the verbage clearer, or moving things around, or anything...I know there are some concerns about this layout, but hopefully we can all agree to come to a happy medium and satisfy the best of both worlds? I'm not trying to ram this one down, but I also realize that we're not going to satisfy every use-case or opinion. If you have a matter that you feel really really strongly about, bring it up now so we call all talk about it. Remember, in a consensus process not everyone has to agree, but everyone has to not completely disagree. I'm sure it's been phrased better than that by someone!

Thanks for all of your feedback, thanks to Trey and Spectabillis and everyone who threw in their coins. I think we can get this rolled out, barring any major disagreements, by tomorrow evening!

~Spanky

[emily sparkle]

spanky,

this looks great. i have three thoughts on rideshare...

- we should have this topic since i get emailed all the time about it!
- it could be a topic under 'share resources' as a sticky OR
- put it under the "read me first" sticky section in Preparation

emily

[geekster]

I like to talk about what we're going to do for BM this year and less about how we should talk. I'm a bitch. Blame BORG2.

Amen, Natalie

And fuck you too!

[III]

>Maybe we break this into two areas (as subforum)? Open Forum and PortaPotty for the shitstarters?

i think this is an absolute requirement. the open forum would be moderated, the potty area not. (in fact, i'd imagine the potty area to be the only unmoderated section).

i'd prefer to have fewer stickies, as well. too many, and they start losing their specialness.

finally, as a minor layout point, i'd get rid of the <br> after "forums".

oh, and the proper plural possessive would be greeters' station.

[spanky]

>finally, as a minor layout point, i'd get rid of the <br> after "forums".

I added that trying to give the rows a little breathing room after GE's comment that it looked cluttered. When there's no BR, it is a bit tight.

i think this is an absolute requirement. the open forum would be moderated, the potty area not. (in fact, i'd imagine the potty area to be the only unmoderated section).

I was going to go ahead with just "Open Discussion" and start a thread about the Thunderdome/Portapotty/Sandstorm, whatever you wanna call it, area. I think there are concerns about that type of forum that need to be hashed out. with the group.

Oh, thanks for all of your work/feedback during these past weeks. It's been really great.

~Spanky

[GuinivereElise]

>finally, as a minor layout point, i'd get rid of the <br> after "forums".

I added that trying to give the rows a little breathing room after GE's comment that it looked cluttered. When there's no BR, it is a bit tight.


~Spanky

spanky: I saw this, and still think that it could be de-clutterfied a bit. Perhaps taking out the "forums" altogether?? People are smart enough to see that they're links and such...

[bullD]

that's the way, uh huh uh huh, I like it, uh huh uh huh...

[III]

i agree with g.e. (smart cookie that she is) that the line with "forums" on it might be better served by whitespace.

i don't think that's the right place to try to gain whitespace, though. there's other clutter that should go first...

[spanky]

spanky: I saw this, and still think that it could be de-clutterfied a bit. Perhaps taking out the "forums" altogether?? People are smart enough to see that they're links and such...

So, remove the word and leave the BR there for whitespace? I can see that. I liked how forum was black and bold and drew your eye to that line so you looked across the line to scan the links, but let's give it a try.

~Spanky

[spanky]

i don't think that's the right place to try to gain whitespace, though. there's other clutter that should go first...

yeah, when I was sitting with AG today, we were trying to reduce the number of forums, but it got stuck at 18.

I also thought of removing the little page icons, but they do a good job of alerting you to new posts.

I did increase the cellpadding of the rows. That helped a little.

~Spanky

[GuinivereElise]

i agree with g.e. (smart cookie that she is) that the line with "forums" on it might be better served by whitespace.

i don't think that's the right place to try to gain whitespace, though. there's other clutter that should go first...

sheesh. now I'm all blushy.

I don't know a thing about where to gather other whitespace, but I would rather have the br as whitespace than have the "forums".

[emily sparkle]

you could put a style="margin-bottom: 8px;" on that element to give it a little breathing room at the bottom, but not as much as a full <br>

[Tancorix]

I'm curious...since I didn't see it mentioned but will the original eplaya, ie: the old pre-graphics interface one still exist and be available to us?

[Zane5100]

What do you guys think of having a thread specially designated for the more pugnacious among us? This would be a "take your nasty battles here" place for folks to suggest as an alternative to cluttering up every thread with interpersonal conflict.

Does such a place *invite* conflict, or is it just a good way to siphon it off and keep it out of everyone else's face? Love to hear some thoughts on this.

I think it's a great idea--as long as someone is willing to moderate it regularly.

I've moderated a thread that encourages lively, passionate debate about everything under the sun, and it gives people a place to go to if they are cluttering up other threads with their debate.

Having an open flamewar/mosh pit--I'm not sure how that would go, but I know that I got tired of seeing in my thread, so now I'll block those that don't take the hint to calm down.

I think having the space to do that is a good idea, but it takes some work on both sides for it to thrive as a viable space.

[actiongrl]

It's a sticky wicket. On the one hand, if you're going to have a place that's designated no-holds-barred, and send folks there to fight their battles, it almost seems that you can't really turn around and moderate it because things went too far. OTOH, if things go too far, where do you step in even if you're not assigning a "moderator" to keep it under control?

I dunno. I just appreciated the sentiment behind this idea: "some folks are just going to be nasty to each other anyway, might as well give them a place to take it so the rest of us don't have to experience it unless we want to..."

[Zane5100]

I guess that if you create a thread for the strict purpose of flaming, then there it is... but what happens if civilized conversation erupts--boot them out?

IMO, I think there should be a gradation of threads, not just one that's supposed to be a catch-all for debate/pedantic blathering/dispute/flames/and general nastiness. Some impassioned debate can walk the line of out-right hostility, but with a gentle nudge people can get back to the subject.

On the other hand, a mosh-pit that alows for everything that's legal, well, it strikes me as a good idea in theory, but my gut reaction is that it would burn itself out--and people would need motivatation to get out of the thread in which they are currently flaming in, and that would take some skilled moderating.

[theCryptofishist]

I guess that if you create a thread for the strict purpose of flaming, then there it is... but what happens if civilized conversation erupts--boot them out?

You apoligized! Get your civilized ass out of here, prettygrrll.

[Zane5100]

I guess that if you create a thread for the strict purpose of flaming, then there it is... but what happens if civilized conversation erupts--boot them out?

You apoligized! Get your civilized ass out of here, prettygrrll.

I love it when you talk dirty to me...

[theCryptofishist]

I guess that if you create a thread for the strict purpose of flaming, then there it is... but what happens if civilized conversation erupts--boot them out?

You apoligized! Get your civilized ass out of here, prettygrrll.

I love it when you talk dirty to me...

Then how dare you get sexual jollies from my rancid rants!!!

[III]

to correct zane - it's not about threads - it's about sections where people can create threads - you have a much courser gradation available to you.

i think the moderated/unmoderated distinction is acceptable. i don't think the ptb would approve of 3playa style ownership...

[Zane5100]

to correct zane - it's not about threads - it's about sections where people can create threads - you have a much courser gradation available to you.

i think the moderated/unmoderated distinction is acceptable. i don't think the ptb would approve of 3playa style ownership...

Thanks for the clarification.

[spanky]

UPDATE: I'm home sick today and don't think I will get everything done, so I regret to say that the full re-opening will be tomorrow. I'll try to get some things done now, but it will take more time than I have.

-typing from bed

~Spanky

[Tancorix]

Get well Spanky. And seriously thanks for doing all of this for us.

[actiongrl]

I KNEW I should have told ya to stay away yesterday. Sorry guys! At least it gives us one more day to get down the road of moderation, too.

[keepercurrent]

I really hope our "dream thread" gets reinstated! I mean with this years theme, and all those dreams, certainly it may be not only fun, but important? Anyone wanna concur or do a dream telling?

[III]

am i the only who thinks that ticket exchange and rideshare might be better served by other applications other than a bbs?