Though fed up with reporting about what's going on with the site, I feel a need for an update from a previous blog post, PREPARE FOR PASSION, a post that was initially denied but later approved.
With plans of the new site afoot, my initial strategy was to take one look at the site and give some, hopefully constructive, feedback, and then walk away until the new site is launched.
The site is being beta-tested, which I've been told is a good thing. And I'm sure members like @JN63JPN and @rdy2try are doing a great job, and a much better job that I could do, in making suggestions to make the proposed new site a better site.
With his promises of a new adult social media site, his philanthropy and his treatment of the site's community liaison officer, I find it difficult to be civil towards the site's owner. And I reasoned it's probably best I don't get too involved. (He also wanted to be interviewed by me three times, and after many hours of preparing the interviews, the questions went unanswered!)
But I've had a change of heart. The issue that prompted my change of heart was that the alerts feature doesn't seem to be replicated with the new site. Alerts are the way in which bloggers navigate themselves around blogland. Arguably alerts, as well as tags and Club 7, are the most positive features of the Community side when it was launched a few years ago. But alerts may be no more, hopefully I'm wrong.
I decided that I should spend some time today to explore the proposed new site again and give more feedback. After seeing a dog's dinner (do Americans have that term to mean a mess?), I gave two more bits of feedback. My second bit of feedback, quite detailed, is presented as a first comment. Please note that this is my feeble attempt at making this blog post less wordy! My third and last bit of feedback was:
"This is my third attempt at checking out the new site. It is thoroughly confusing.
I couldn't find my alerts (or activities as they may be now called).
Alerts are the way in which bloggers navigate themselves around blogland. Without alerts, it's impossible to find out what's going on with followed blog posts, etc. Alerts are essential in fostering a sense of community. I do hope alerts will be reinstated.
I appreciate that new code is needed, particularly for the Dating side of the old site. But the new site is far more than new code. It's a new site with a new layout and new terms.
As things stand, the new site makes it unnecessarily difficult for existing members to use.
I strongly recommend that you simplify things and that you put yourself in the shoes of members (whether daters, bloggers, groupers, storytellers, or cammers) when designing the site.
I've tried to be as positive as I can be while realising something new often meets resistance from those familiar to the old."
If you rely on alerts in blogland, I hope you'll give feedback to that effect on the planned new site via a link posted on the site's owner's Club 7 group post. This is the time, while things are being planned, to have the most influence.
I'm very conscious that the site's owner doesn't readily listen to and, more important, doesn't respond to member feedback. I've not received any reply to my first bit of feedback I left on the proposed new site. Such feedback to feedback was promised! Perhaps I need to get an IT qualification to find such feedback amongst the site's gobbledegook. I'm interested to know whether anyone has received feedback on their feedback.
I'm also very conscious that the site's owner likes to complicate and even over-complicate things. The engineering principle, KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid), means little to him. What the site's owner has unveiled so far, allegedly partly written by AI, is a new site and not the old site written in new code. He's not thinking about existing members in the design of the new site. If existing members can't follow his new site, presumably he's banking on new members joining the site. I guess those new members will be promised to be laid twice tonight if they join today! (I told you I'm not the best person to front this out, I'll just be pleased if this blog post gets approved.)
Just to end this post on a positive note, I wish all fathers here a Happy Father's Day. My stepson has decided not to mark the day!
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19 comments
EYE TEST
The EXAMINATION TEST
Does New site offer what a person wants?
Is the new site easy to manipulate and manage allowing a member to find what a person wants?
And the one thing that I feel is the most important Criteria is...
Does the website pass the EYE TEST?
Is it well laid out and Not overwhelmingly packed
and crammed with too much information all at once?
Does the place draw your gaze in,
wanting you to stay and look some more??
One might think sex is easy to sell, But most attractive active inviting Places Embrace the Ambiance of sex and the Mystery of sex....
more than the "nuts and bolts" of an overwhelming amounts of choices and information Barrage!
a member is able to move to&fro without thinking too hard about it.
Currently....
DOES THIS NEW SITE PASS THE EYE TEST??
NO,
it does not
You're very right in that it fails the eye test. Opticians throughout the world will be disappointed!
making my eye appointment now
wink
@spunkycumfun
Thanks for sharing this information my friend, I had an email from a friend here asking me if I have been invited to the new site, and that you get three months of free gold if you do. I am not sure how one would get invited.
I hope your Monday continues to be a momentous start to your new week..?
If you go to the Club 7 group you'll find a sticky post pinned at the top from Andrew Conru. That post gives a link to the new site.
I think it's only one months of free gold given if you submit feedback on the new site.
@spunkycumfun I scored 3 months FOC
@stonnerking That's good to know. I don't know what I scored.
Thanks for giving us some info on what’s going on.
Mon plaisir. If only the new site was a pleasure!
Hmmm, 1st i am hearing of a new site. Will they keep the fakes.scammers away lol
I suspect the fakes and scammers are here to stay!
I think the best replacement for Alerts is "Post replies", which is the second item on the sidebar. Post Replies does NOT include new posts made by people who you follow, but those are found easily enough by looking at the top bar labeled Posts (might only be visible when you're in Community) and clicking on Followed.
Methinks "Recent Activity" was supposed to replace "Alerts," but the design is flawed and not all features in "Alerts" have been integrated.
I don't understand why the terms used here aren't used there. It's just making life difficult for existing members.
PS. I didn't get an alert for your comment, perhaps it disappeared in the night!
@spunkycumfun Probably. 🫤
@smartasswoman The mystery deepens. I didn't get an alert for your reply to my reply. It seems you're not alerting!
@spunkycumfun this afternoon all of my old alerts that I had been saving to get back to posts, reappeared. I wonder if you will get an alert for this comment?
@smartasswoman I had a few disappeared alerts reappear. I did get an alert for your comment.
I would NOT let my dog eat that bowl of garbage! Yuck.
As usual, I am waiting to see what happens with the site ....
I hope your expectations about the new site are set very low!
Andrew is NOT paying attention to his Club7 post. He won't respond to anything posted in Club7, either. So, encouraging people to respond to Andrew's post in Club7 is bad advice.
Andrew only responds to the feedback submitted via the Shift+click feature (hovering the cursor over Recent Activity, then Shift+click). Complaints will continue to be ignored, but detailed feedback for a specific feature will get attention.
I have submitted numerous feedback regarding the Alerts. Some of the features in Alerts have been implemented in Recent Activity, but there's still a lot of work to be done before Recent Activity can effectively replace the Alerts. Hell, the entire rewrite needs a lot of work before it's viable.
I realise Andrew Conru won't read or respond to comments left on that Club 7 post. What I wrote, or at least what I meant to write, is that feedback can be left on the new site via the link he posted on his Club 7 post.
I cannot find my Recent Activity.
@spunkycumfun
Recent Activity should be on the right when you go to the Community page in the beta rewrite.
However, the design is highly flawed and the activities keep on disappearing after a certain period of time has passed. I'm continuing to nag the developers to make Recent Activity function the same as Alerts. The more they get nagged, the better the chance all features currently in the Alerts will be integrated in Recent Activity.
@JN63JPN I looked quite hard but I couldn't find it. I've also noticed that the new site is different whenever I enter it. There was one time I couldn't even find my blog, but I've now spotted it since.
@spunkycumfun
It's right there on the right of the Community landing page.
@JN63JPN I've found it now. It wasn't there when I once went into the new site.
It's incomprehensible to me how the blogging community can be kept running without the Alerts. I'll leave it at that, clear and simple.
I wholeheartedly agree with you.
Though I can't find my alerts, others can find their alerts, which suggests the alerts (or whatever they're called) aren't in a prominent place.
@spunkycumfun See why I don't like to learn "new apps" or software
@AuraAviatik6 I'm not going on the other side again until I'm forced to!
As a standard member I have no say so on feedback. I do rely on Alerts. If I follow 20 bloggers do I have to check all 20 everyday? What if they post multiple times a day do I have to keep checking not knowing if there is a new post. As for me I have written over 700 posts. Some reply/comment to old posts. How would I know if there is no Alerts?. Sometimes I write 3 or 4 posts a day. What if I have 12 posts in a 3 day period. I would have to keep checking them constantly. People who want a response to a comment or reply might get overlooked and think I am ignoring them. Maybe the new site will be end for me here.
Alerts are still there, it's just not very user friendly when we're used to the existing site.
They have combined the 'dating' side with Community. Some features are better so its not all bad. On the phone 'app' there's a Try Beta option in the header, that will take you to the new one if you've not tried it already?
Alerts are essential to navigate blogland. I just can't understand why the alerts aren't there or at least not very visible if they are there. It's pathetic.
Here's my second bit of feedback about the new site to the site's owner:
"My understanding is that the proposed new site is currently being tested, and a few members are involved in such testing. I'm presuming or at least hoping that the proposed new site will only be launched when it is functionally ready. If not, I think that will be a recipe for disaster.
Though the new site is being tested, I'm aware that a few members are already using the new site either as part of the testing process or to familiarise themselves with the new site. I have a few (well, eleven) questions for the site to answer hopefully before the new site is launched and the old site is 'killed off'.
First, if someone posts a blog post on the new site, will it trigger an alert on the old site? And, if so, will that alert take the member to the new or old site (or both) to read the post? The questions also pertain to replies to comments. I'm hoping that the two sites, the new and the old site, are joined-up, otherwise there will be a hybrid system with some members on the new site and some on the old site.
Second, does the site have a target date or an approximate date for when the new site will be launched? If, so what is the date? Linked to this question, I'm hoping that the site can inform members when the new site is to be launched before its launch. Site Support
Third, can the site assure members that all stuff posted on the old site will be migrated to the new site? I'm presuming all blog posts, both text and images, (plus comments and replies to comments) will be migrated to the new site.
Fourth, once the new site is officially launched, will members still have access to the old site? This is particularly pertinent if not all stuff has been successfully migrated over to the new site. Bloggers, including myself, are rightly quite precious about their content. It would seem prudent to allow members to access the old site for a limited period of time before being shut down. This was the case when the Community side was launched.
Fifth, will there be a system of alerts (eg alerts to new posts of followed bloggers/groups, to replies to comments etc, and to tags) with the new site? Having had a look at the new site, I can't see an alerts feature. Perhaps it's called something else - if so, what is it called? Alerts are the way in which bloggers navigate themselves around the site or at least the Community side. The introduction of alerts on the Community side is a big plus, before alerts bloggers had to scroll for highlights in a feed! Likewise, tags are a useful feature on the Community side. Alerts and tags work, or at least normally work. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Sixth, will members be allowed to create sticky blog posts, that is blog posts pinned to the top of their list of blog posts? Also, will gold members still be allowed to make a blog post (eg mailbox) private?
Seventh, will bloggers be allowed to schedule a release date for their blog posts?
Eighth, can the site stop the practice of having to simultaneously press 'Ctrl' and 'Enter'? From where I'm standing, this isn't normal everyday practice. 'Enter' denotes a line-space and not a command to submit. Just as members have no doubt learnt this unusual practice of line-spacing, I'm sure members can soon unlearn this unusual practice.
Ninth, I'm hoping that to block a member on the 'new' site, one block will work site-wide. At the moment, two blocks are needed, one for the Dating side and another for the Community side. Also, I'm presuming that my list of blocked members (mainly abusive MAGA trolls) will be carried forward to the new site. I'm not sure I want to be called a liberal dipshit, a retard and Eurotrash all over again, though I wear the Eurotrash badge with pride!
Tenth, will the Club 7 group still exist in the new site? And if so, will it continue to be monitored by Site Support. This group has proved to be very useful in highlighting glitches and communicating with Site Support.
Eleventh and finally, does the site have any plans to issue guidance on, say, how to blog, how to mail, etc, on the new site. Will the # key continue for a blog post title header? Will [ image1 ], etc, continue to post images on a blog post? Will ten images per blog post still be allowed for gold members? Will double asterisks surrounding text denote bold, and single asterisks surrounding text denote italics?
Clearly a lot of time, and maybe even AI time, has been spent on developing the new site, perhaps so much so that the site's development team aren't fixing basic glitches on the old site. It may be a coincidence but the number of glitches and unfixed glitches have increased significantly since the proposed new site was unveiled. Alerts on the old site are particularly glitched, perhaps connected to the developing of the new site. A balance is needed to keep the old site functional and developing the new site. I'm not sure that the correct balance has been struck.
Ran side by side, blog posts and alerts appear on both. The emoticons even work on the new version (old site comment)
@spunkycumfun Ran side by side, blog posts and alerts appear on both. The emoticons even work on the new version (new site comment)
🤩😜😎🤡💩😋🤩
@stonnerking Despite looking several times, I could not find my alerts on the new site. Clearly I need an IT degree!
@spunkycumfun aye it's far from good!
@stonnerking At least things are being tested, which isn't always the case with this site.