Filter out Articles

[Brock Beauchamp]

13 hours ago, SeaBass said:

Maybe this isn't what people want to hear but would it be more digestible if the transaction articles were simply labeled "Transaction" rather than "Article"? Or "Roster Moves", something along those lines.

Yeah, I've wanted to do something like this for a long time but that level of customization is actually moderately difficult to do. I'll put more thought into it and possibly find a good solution over the offseason.

[Oxy]

Half the topics on the main forum are "articles" yet there is no new information in these articles...it's just longer, re-hashed versions of regular threads with fewer responses and views.  Please put articles in a separate "articles" sub-forum.

[Outlander]

There would be pretty much nothing on the main forum without the articles. There isn't exactly much going on with the Brewers right now.

[Oxy]

15 minutes ago, Outlander said:

There would be pretty much nothing on the main forum without the articles. There isn't exactly much going on with the Brewers right now.

But it's just re-hashed stuff from regular threads the past few weeks! So instead of keeping topics together and nice and organized where discussion about something is in one place things just get scattered into chaos of multiple threads forcing people to re-read and re-post the same information....and any new information or ideas or thoughts get get lost in the shuffle.  It's ridiculous.  I used to be able to keep up with almost everything posted here because it was organized so well.  In order to do that now I'd have to read twice as much stuff of the same stuff in order to get the one or two posts that is interesting/new info/new posts that have something to say.

[Brock Beauchamp]

2 hours ago, Oxy said:

But it's just re-hashed stuff from regular threads the past few weeks! So instead of keeping topics together and nice and organized where discussion about something is in one place things just get scattered into chaos of multiple threads forcing people to re-read and re-post the same information....and any new information or ideas or thoughts get get lost in the shuffle.  It's ridiculous.  I used to be able to keep up with almost everything posted here because it was organized so well.  In order to do that now I'd have to read twice as much stuff of the same stuff in order to get the one or two posts that is interesting/new info/new posts that have something to say.

This is something I'm constantly evaluating and re-evaluating but for the time being, editorial articles are going to stay in the forums. I'll try to articulate my reasoning for this as best I can.

1. An "orderly" forum is often an uninviting forum for new users and/or infrequent users. Having an 18 page thread titled "Corbin Burnes" might appeal to you (who seems to be a "forum completist" in that you read everything) but is daunting for new or less frequent users. But a one page topic titled "Are the Brewers going to extend Corbin Burnes" and another topic "Predict Corbin Burnes' Numbers in 2023" and another topic "My Arguments to Trade Corbin Burnes" is more descriptive and inviting to more users, even though the overlap between the three topics is considerable.

2. Right now we're in "grow the site" mode, which makes #1 really important. I have numbers for BrewerFan going back to 2005 or something like that. Over the past 4-5 years, traffic has been on a considerable downturn to the point where despite traffic bumping upward +100% over 2021, Brewer Fanatic's user count is just a bit over where it was in 2018 and 2019. That's how much traffic has declined over the past few years. If we're not bringing in new users on a regular basis, the site can easily go from "decent but kinda slow conversation" to "ghost town" in a matter of months.

3. We're trying to promote front page content because that's the best way to keep a site lively and active. So far it's working but we still have a lot of work to do in this regard and we're at maybe 20% of the traffic we need to be what I consider "thriving". That means BrewerFan, less than a year ago, was less than 10% of that traffic number.

4. This isn't forever. Right now it's the offseason and nothing is happening. The forums would be a draaaggggg if not for the articles refreshing page one content every day. The same threads would be sitting above the fold for days, if not weeks, at a time. As the season starts ramping up, we'll see a lot more user-generated topics populating the front page.

5. Ultimately, my goal is to have ALL articles go into their own forum. It's what we do on Twins Daily because there's so much content at that site we need to have articles go into their own forum. Twins Daily also has the kind of traffic that the forums - particularly the Twins forum - does a good job of "churning and burning" topics off the first page merely through user-generated content. Twins Daily usually has more than double the number of posts per month we receive here on Brewer Fanatic. As we build up the front page, increase the content count, and bring in more users to participate in the forums, I hope to do the same here. 

[Brock Beauchamp]

All in all, this is very much threading a needle. It’s impossible to please different kinds of users with different behaviors while trying to maximize growth for the health of the site. I try to do the best I can to compromise but ultimately, some goals directly conflict with one another. 

[Outlander]

One specific article that I recommend having in its own forum are those Crew Throwbacks that Reilly does. I think it would be nice to have all of those in one place. I do enjoy reading those but is kind of out of place from the other articles because I don't know if they are there really to generate discussion. Maybe even have one pinned in this separate forum where it would show a list of all player articles done and you can click a link to read an article on a player you are interested in.

[Brock Beauchamp]

6 hours ago, Outlander said:

One specific article that I recommend having in its own forum are those Crew Throwbacks that Reilly does. I think it would be nice to have all of those in one place. I do enjoy reading those but is kind of out of place from the other articles because I don't know if they are there really to generate discussion. Maybe even have one pinned in this separate forum where it would show a list of all player articles done and you can click a link to read an article on a player you are interested in.

I can definitely move those to the News forum but any time you want to find all of those compiled together, use the search tool.

Set left bar filter to Articles, then choose "Search By Tags", add the tag "crew throwback", then search. Or just use this link.

https://brewerfanatic.com/search/?&type=cms_records1&tags=crew throwback&search_and_or=or

[edfunderburk]

On 9/19/2022 at 7:39 AM, torts said:

no offense to any of the authors, but I am literally only here for the forum.  Is there any way to have articles in its own section?  If I paid money can I hide articles?  

So I’m not alone & my idea is not a new one

I’d rather pay my Caretaker fee to read the forum without articles … I’d pay an additional fee to hide the articles on the main forum - the only thing on this site that interests me 

[edfunderburk]

On 9/19/2022 at 12:41 PM, Hopper said:

I agree, the forums are not the place to post the articles when there is already a designated section for them.

I agree with torts.

Me too … again, there is a NEWS tab where articles should exclusively reside … no need for even one of them to be placed in the main forum … completely unnecessary & redundant

[torts]

I will say the ads have become much less disruptive on mobile!  I appreciate the detail Brock.  

[Brock Beauchamp]

12 hours ago, torts said:

I will say the ads have become much less disruptive on mobile!  I appreciate the detail Brock.  

It's a never-ending battle and I really do keep user experience in mind - after all, I use the site as much/more than anyone - and appreciate the kind words!

[Playing Catch]

I'm on Brewerfan(atic) all the time. I know everyone has different thresholds of what they are willing or able to pay, but the ad-free experience is awesome.

Now that the minor league seasons have started, I'm feeling the article-overload again, just as an observation. With that said, I LIKE the articles, I think they are well-written most of the time, but yeah, I'm not always sure which thread has the conversations going.

[Brock Beauchamp]

On 4/15/2023 at 8:35 AM, Playing Catch said:

I'm on Brewerfan(atic) all the time. I know everyone has different thresholds of what they are willing or able to pay, but the ad-free experience is awesome.

Now that the minor league seasons have started, I'm feeling the article-overload again, just as an observation. With that said, I LIKE the articles, I think they are well-written most of the time, but yeah, I'm not always sure which thread has the conversations going.

Are you speaking about the MiLB forum being too full of articles? Because I kinda forget to clean that forum up... pretty much every day.

If that's what you're talking about, I'll try to be better about remembering to clean up that forum every morning.

[Playing Catch]

Sorry to have missed your response.

Just like being patient with our rookies on the field, perhaps I need to be patient with myself as a rookie to the new and improved Brewerfan, and get used to how to best contribute and benefit from the community here.

Let's table this for the time being. Many of us (including yourself), need to let the new site breathe a little before we start making tons of changes, or creating unnecessary challenges for yourself.

Thank you for your efforts!

[TURBO]

Articles are taking over the BREWERS TALK page again.  Hoping this is just an oversight.

[Brock Beauchamp]

18 hours ago, TURBO said:

Articles are taking over the BREWERS TALK page again.  Hoping this is just an oversight.

That was me being injured and away from the site for a few days. I'm cleaning them up, thanks for the reminder.

[greeg35]

Sounds like it would be a lot less management if the articles were in their own forum!  I'm sure all the people interested in article content could find them there.

[Brock Beauchamp]

On 5/26/2023 at 9:18 PM, greeg35 said:

Sounds like it would be a lot less management if the articles were in their own forum!  I'm sure all the people interested in article content could find them there.

Ultimately, that is the goal but we need traffic to bump a notch higher before we do it. As the forums self-generate more threads, we'll move the articles into their own forum permanently.

And we're moving in the right direction, it just takes time. Traffic isn't enormously higher than it was a year ago but it's markedly higher. We routinely had under 1,000 people visit a day last year. We last dropped under 1,000 users in a day on March 19th this year.

[TURBO]

On 5/23/2023 at 2:40 PM, TURBO said:

Articles are taking over the BREWERS TALK page again.  Hoping this is just an oversight.

😒

[Brock Beauchamp]

On 8/26/2023 at 5:33 PM, TURBO said:

😒

It's just a matter of when you first hit the forums. I clear out the older articles every morning but lately, it's been happening more like 8-10am because my kids are out of school right now.

[Brock Beauchamp]

We have some pretty big news to announce in coming days and I'm starting to believe we will move articles out of the Brewers forum entirely, possibly starting in 2024. We're seeing enough momentum in various regards that it's becoming possible, maybe even likely, to do so in the relatively near future.