my rant on forum usability

[spacefem]

so we're here to talk about usability, so I thought I'd ask your opinions on forums. they could be so easy and friendly but i see sites all over the web screwing them up horribly, you know? the biggest things that drive me nuts are:

Bad idea #1: tons of forum categories. New users have no idea where to go to jump into the conversation and old users grow impatient with keeping up with every part and end up just reading 2-3 favorite sections. It's impossible. Unless you have a community of thousands, over-categorizing a forum makes for bad usability.

Bad idea #2: tons of buried sub-categories. Need I say more? Not only is it impossible to see what's new and cool at a glance, which we all know is a must have for a website that people will stay at, but people with slow connections have to wait for X pages to load as they bury themselves deeper and deeper in your organization. No one likes to do that.

Bad idea #3: FAQs that read war-and-peace proportions. Who's going to read that stuff? My solution was to keep the FAQ, because you never know, someone might get bored, but take a marked-up screenshot of my forum and use that as an introduction to where to go and what to see. Help that's not fast is no help at all.

alright, what do you all think?

[kwvarga]

Bad idea #1: tons of forum categories. New users have no idea where to go to jump into the conversation and old users grow impatient with keeping up with every part and end up just reading 2-3 favorite sections. It's impossible. Unless you have a community of thousands, over-categorizing a forum makes for bad usability.

Its alright.. if done in a nice way.. custom themes usually.. when its annoying is when sites have 0 posts in most categories and say they need them.. its also annoying and bad when they have a 5page front page.. scroll for content, not menu.

Bad idea #2: tons of buried sub-categories. Need I say more? Not only is it impossible to see what's new and cool at a glance, which we all know is a must have for a website that people will stay at, but people with slow connections have to wait for X pages to load as they bury themselves deeper and deeper in your organization. No one likes to do that.

saves space on front page.. yes stinks for dialup, but come on it is so much nicer than front page or overloaded categories.. i hate that when u post something and immediately 5 other things are posted above it.. people that only get on in mornings wont see stuff posted after they got off.. too much stuff. likely to give up and go away

Bad idea #3: FAQs that read war-and-peace proportions. Who's going to read that stuff? My solution was to keep the FAQ, because you never know, someone might get bored, but take a marked-up screenshot of my forum and use that as an introduction to where to go and what to see. Help that's not fast is no help at all.

good call.. i agree with that.. short & simple.. maybe link off to explanations of some of different stuff (like why this forum doesnt allow sig images)

[Johan007]

For very small websites and shops a phpbb style forum is just too big to manage.

For small websites I like a small treaded forum like this:

http://www.posteverything.com/community/

it works so much better for them than a site like this would.

[LazyJim]

good observations and good solution on #3.

[theNetPlace.com]

Originally Posted by Johan007

For small websites I like a small treaded forum like this:

http://www.posteverything.com/community/

it works so much better for them than a site like this would.

You've hit the nail on the head there. I'll be changing theNetPlace.com forum to a threaded message board while it is still young. Good suggestion.

[SVB]

Hmm. How do you rate this:
www.gampelayzone.com/forum

It has alot of categories, but they are all for specific topics, not too general. And the forum is kicking off now, new users seem to be joining more often.

[spacefem]

Originally Posted by unrealfragmaster

Hmm. How do you rate this:
www.gampelayzone.com/forum

It has alot of categories, but they are all for specific topics, not too general. And the forum is kicking off now, new users seem to be joining more often.

I would rate it: too many categories. sorry, but this is just the type of thing I'm talking about. Here we are halfway through february and you've got entire forums that haven't had posts since last months.

Those main categories you have should be the forums. They shouldn't have sub-forums. If a forum hasn't had a post in two weeks, dump it. Users won't want to post in there for fear their stuff won't be seen.

There's just no reason to break up "PC gaming" into five different categories when you don't have the users to support, say, two. Combine combine combine.

[sim]

#1, to many categories suck, but some of them are needed whether there posted or not. #1.a. its more organized.
#1b. If phpBB had sub categories, id probally have 100 sections on my site =)

#2. I would rather use a custom php forum that looks nicer where users dont have to register.

[spacefem]

Originally Posted by sim

#1b. If phpBB had sub categories, id probally have 100 sections on my site =)

that's all well and good, but how do you think 100 sections would help people use your site? How many vistors do you think want to take the time to flip through 100 sections of a forum?

this is just what I'm talking about... fewer forums means fewer clicks for users to look at what they need to see. It's easier for them.

[sim]

If you run a good gaming or anime site, or a big entertainment site. It would be nice to have sub categories

Anime
Gaming

then sub categories under that
PC
PSX
GAme cube

Then sub cats underthat

list every game


wouldnt that be better then having
100 forums on main page or just a page that says PC.

[SVB]

I listened to you, and made changes to my forum. I took out all the "Game Hype" forums, and moved all the console hardware, game talk and hel into one forum for each console.
The forum is smaller now and neater. What do you think?
www.gameplayzone.com/forum