I'm all for changing the site and/or Patronus Charm to better suit quests, but there's no guarantee that quests aren't going to fall into the same slump as fanfiction eventually. Then again it's generally already been mentioned that DLP needs to become a hub for all kinds of digital content, so as long as we focus on that I don't think it'll become a huge problem. It'll take some more work and good planning to keep the platform extendable like that, though.

Ceterum censeo Arthellion delendam esse.

 

Guidelines as to what and how your everyday DLPer might be of assistance to bring forth our new glorious world order would be nice. It would be nice to get more readers and, thus, more feedback in here. It's somewhat disheartening to no longer get the shit kicked out of you when posting. ^^

And, as Cato once famously said. "Delenda est Arthellion."

 

uh, it's more like

1 - absolutely not
2 - probably absolutely not
3 - depends on the time of day but probably not
4 - decent
5 - actually fucking good

doesn't matter though, there's something to be said for our enjoyment at the moment. and even if the format dies, we've (speaking as the ffn community on a whole) run on fanfiction for decades, longer than i've been alive. who's to say we still won't be running fantastic quests for years to come in that same way

also @apoc link me the quest or die

 

On the funding issue, I feel a measure of guilt there. I was planning to start contributing a few bucks a month once I got a job, but it turns out RL is expensive and I'm still getting the hang of my budget on a minimum wage job.

 

I think it could be this one - Corvinda Scathes and the Warlocks of the Lantern, which just crossed my search on F.Live and matches.

I like a lot of the thought involved in the original plan, although I intensely dislike the binary voting system proposed. A five point system gives decent flexibility and granularity, without being overly complex. Given that we have a small explanation of what the ratings mean, it isn't even that dependent on the person reviewing.

The ideas on bringing in new authors sounds like they could be really good, but I don't really know how it would work - WbA is supposed to be used almost for beta reading, and as such the feedback can often be a lot harsher sounding than posting the same chapter on other sites. But WbA doesn't fulfill the same role as their "creative writing" section. And I don't think we need a second writing section, but for people who don't want harsh feedback. However, recruiting currently good authors via C2 selection and linking is relatively easy, and pretty inoffensive.

I do think it would be possible, if dubiously wanted, to pilfer SB/SV/QQ users in decent amounts - moderation on here has never really been something I've known to be an issue, NSFW content is allowed (encouraged, if it's quality), but at the same time NSFW content doesn't normally go to CoC levels. I know I've seen some posts complaining about how QQ is basically /d/ in regards to NSFW material, and 'vanilla' stuff tends to get forgotten. Again, this would depend on whether 'QQ, but actually possible IRL' is a label the site wants or not.

 

Will say here what I already said to Sauce in private:

1.

Quality of life improvements are always welcome. I don't think anyone will dispute those.

2.

We should be careful about thinking that provision of features will be, on their own, enough to convert DLP from an HP + other stuff forum to a general fandom works forum. This is far from the first time that DLP has taken steps to "diversify", but providing spaces for those discussions will only actually result in anything if the people are there who want to be having those discussions. DLP was so successful in the HP arena because this was where a large majority of the fandom's quality fics came from, and that attracted other writers and fans alike.

We have to recognise, however, that there are already other forums with established communities which cover other fandoms/media perfectly well. You say, for example, why should people post their quests to SB/SV and not here? But consider the reverse: why would they post here instead of where the established quest communities are located? They get a much larger response on SB/SV. It would be naive to think that improved quality of life would make them switch. G+ is the perfect case study in what happens if you provide a good platform but a competitor already has audience momentum.

So of all the suggestions, I think the targeted invites are the most important part of making DLP 2.0 successful, because a forum lives and dies on its ability to generate discussion -- both in terms of quality but also in terms of quantity. There's nothing more frustrating than wanting to talk about something and having to wait hours for a single response.

We therefore need to handle those invites very carefully, because we only get to invite a person once. We should:

A. Make sure the key UI changes are in place before sending out invites. In particular, the board re-organisation to provide increased prominence to other fandoms/quests, and the posting upgrades (in particular, the import features which help authors upload works quickly).

B. Send out the invites all at once. If we invite people in dribs and drabs, they will come, maybe post something, get a lukewarm response, and not return. We need to achieve a certain critical mass of interest and discussion. We should therefore spend some time collating an invite list and deciding on the best wording for that invite, and invite everyone at the same time.

We could even artificially prepare a number of interesting, "fan favourite" discussion threads to be in place when they arrive, so that they immediately have things to respond to and discuss.

3.

I think there's a significant gap in the plan, which is that -- for all that the OP states that we have focused too much on HP, at the expense of other fandoms -- we have to recognise that DLP has also lost ground within the HP fandom to other sites. There's actually still plenty of HP activity going on (though of course not nearly as much as in the days of peak hype) but it's not happening on DLP. I just checked: there have been 34 new HP fanfic related threads and 268 responses in "the other place" in the last 24 hours. I'm not sure there have been that number on DLP in all of 2018.

The problem, of course, is that DLP has stopped being the place with a large number of active discussions. It used to be that there would be many new HP-related threads a day, and you'd get a large number of responses immediately. Now people post elsewhere to get those responses.

I would diagnose a number of causes for this:

A. Standards for entry to the DLP library are too high. It's difficult for a fic to even get into Almost Recommended. At that point, a story thread is deleted. So if people want to discuss the guilty pleasure fics that make up 95% of ongoing activity in the HP fandom, they can't do it at DLP. The threads simply get deleted once the fic fails to meet the high standards to enter the library. Most of the time, knowing that the fic is nowhere near good enough, people don't bother making recommendations.

B. Thread consolidation. DLP has moved towards a trend of mega-threads: a thread for pet peeves, a thread for reviews, a thread for wizards vs Muggles, a thread for canon questions, a thread for plot bunnies etc. But megathreads stifle discussion. They have a long discussion history which is inaccessible, and they don't offer people the fine-grained ability to draw attention to their own ideas by making a specific thread about the topic they want to discuss.

C. Active discouragement of repeat threads. DLP members are old hat. We've discussed most everything there is to discuss about the HP. But the fandom is still receiving newcomers. If someone new to the fandom comes to DLP, wanting to discuss a topic, 9 times out of 10 the older members will shut them down, or direct them to a thread where the issue has already been discussed. Again, this stifles discussion and effectively redirects new members elsewhere.

D. Low toleration of idiots. Many new members, especially those who make lots of threads, end up banned for shitposting.

E. Hazing of certain preferences. DLP is not a welcoming place to fans of certain concepts or themes. Slash is the obvious one, but stuff like manipulative Dumbledore is another example. Fans of these ideas will often find the forum hostile towards them.

I'm not necessarily saying these should all change. Some of them are key parts of DLP's traditional identity. I'm just saying we need to recognise the causes of why other sites are now much more active than DLP in the HP discussion sphere. If DLP wants to capture some of that traffic back, then the causes would have to be addressed. But that requires a conversation about how much DLP is willing to change in the name of attracting traffic.

4.

On the topic of forum re-organisation and consolidation, I think General Discussion and Fanfic Discussion should be merged. They're both essentially "HP Discussion".

 

Taure is smarter than I am.

I particularly agree with his points on what would need to change to attract more users. We mock idiots, we're tired of newbs posting threads on topics which have been discussed to death, we shun certain tropes. Our standard of entry into any discussion around here is generally pretty high. That, by necessity, means that we will never be as big as SV/SB and other platforms unless we're willing to nerf the entry gauntlet. I for one would err on the side of preserving what we have than trying to be too much like other sites.

 

Some of the generic threads (TOMD, Funny pics) make sense. It'd be silly to make a new thread for every funny picture anyone finds. But I agree quite a few could probably be locked.

I know it was mentioned in the 'Other Fandom Needs You' thread, but I like the idea of doing something with the AlmostRecced threads, because they eat a lot of new recs that don't end up getting posted for review.

 

A thing I notice is that in a lot of the story search threads people rec fics that aren’t in the library and they don’t submit them. While many of these they preface as a clear YMMV or guilty pleasure, a place for those 3/5 fics to be shown - though clearly separate from the Library - would be good to have. While that thing exists and is called Almost Recommendable, renaming it would make people feel less bad about their recommendation winding up there.

Also, if there’s some way to prevent people from rating without posting a review that’d be perfect, especially for outliers.

 

Did I just become a meme?

 

That's what the Almost Recommended thread used to be for. If someone was unsure what DLP would think about a fic, or just wanted to throw one out there without judgement, they could post it in the thread as a quick recommendation. I read so many interesting stories from that thread and it's where I most looked for new fanfiction. Then it was changed so that if the OP thought the fic was over a certain rating (3/5), it HAD to be posted For Review. I believe this was because everyone was just posting fics in the thread and not bothering creating a new thread for them, but instead it killed the discussion entirely. Now no one posts those fics here because the poster doesn't want to or has enough energy to a create a new thread when the story can just be voted down.

If we're changing things, I would like the thread back to the way it was, just as a test-run. We can be more proactive at posting fics For Review after we've got a taste at how the fic might do in the New Recommended thread.

 

This problem could possibly be solved by making the Trash Bin public rather than hiding it in a deep, dark corner of the website. This could give people a way of discussing stories that have been deleted without disturbing the "quality" of the Almost Recommended section.

 

Wholeheartedly agree with this and believe this is the most glaring issue of DLP. Though I'd say it's not that the standards are too high, but that the willingness to discuss is too low. There are some great fics in New and Almost Recommended Fanfiction that still do not have their own thread. Why should a story have to wait (for example) the mark of 150k words to get a thread? Even with only two, three chapters there might be someone who would like to talk about it.

I believe the Review Forum should be used more for actually reviewing stories, rather than a gateway to the Library. As Taure said, most of the time people don't put recommendations for review simply because they know it won't get into the Library.

 

Then I've got to say it: thanks.

 

That can't be cheap.
You're doing God's work.