i think the only way to save those site is to stop trying to make it more like HOTT. Please please please stop adding more things daily that make this site less enjoyable. If the short attention span theatre likes battles and chat then leaves them over there and make this its own thing. I keep hearing about how great it works at HOTT. This isn’t HOTT. This is AFN and this thread is so you can see what we as members of AFN would like to see as improvements.
I think you're a bit confused bud, we had plans on updating AFN to this version of the forum software for a LONG time (nearly 2 years) and with these same modifications, it's just the funding and technical side of it weren't there for us at the time (considering a forum of this size that had already migrated from a different forum software to begin with, it wasn't our first rodeo and the road to upgrading wasn't a clear or easy path.)
HOTT was actually created
in response to listening to the growers here (we've always been pretty democratic in my humble opinion, I don't know how many other forums give the considerations to our growers like we do, but if they do, good on them.) Because we wanted to keep the familiarity between the two sites (since it's multiple people from this site running HOTT,) we kept with the same forum software, but it was a no-brainer to put HOTT on the latest version of this software while we figured out a plan to get AFN on the same page. HOTT just happened to get a lot of the upgrades we already (for a long time) planned on AFN getting FIRST, it just happened that HOTT got there before AFN did. And a lot of the features we tried on HOTT were well-received, so we were full steam ahead of trying them out on AFN. Part of this process is seeing how a forum with this size/activity reacts to some of these changes, we were fully aware we'd get both positive and negative comments about things people like, don't like, things that are broken, etc. No one said a single one of these changes will stick, but we've barely had any time to see how they work in this type of live environment, so we're asking for a bit of patience based on this understanding. Also, HOTT is in development (and we stated that from day one,) so again it seems like you're either missing information or just choosing to blatantly ignore the statements we've made about the sites (and I accept your apology if it's the former.)
The current software that the previous version of AFN was running reached
end-of-life. That means the developers no longer support it and 3rd party developers no longer make add-on's or support the add-on's that existed. A rather large amount of add-on's we were running prior were broken or not updated properly (because the update files were no longer available or supported!) on the old version of AFN; it was a mess but in my own defense, a mess I had come into it (I didn't set all this stuff up initially,) so we got by on what we had until we could figure out a plan to get updated. Rather than pass the buck on "whose job is it?" we took the reigns and got the job done (and huge thank you to
@wwwillie , who installed and configured upgrades on both AFN and HOTT, giving up his own personal time to do it.)
The plan for the update was to keep AFN as close to what we could on the old version with what we could with the new software. This worked out only to an extent, the core of the forum and sub-forums were the same, we just lost certain functions (which we anticipated to an extent.) Some of the navigational functions changed because none of the visual styles translated over. It wasn't ideal, but we deal and are dealing
I'm sorry you're not a fan of some of the changes but we're getting feedback, fixing errors and issues, and seeing how to shave off rough edges on new material. If it turns out things don't work well or just aren't well received (over a period of time,) we'll change things back. That's actually been a site motto for admin for years: "If it sucks, we'll just change it back to the way it was." But that's how we try out new things and historically how we've always done things.
I really feel like this thread is just so you can tell us why what your doing is better instead of us helping you make the site more enjoyable.
There is change for the better and there is change for the worse. I’ve seen an increase in my and others disappoint with the new setup. Clearly the choice has been made to move the site forward in a direction not dictated by this thread.
I just went through the pages of this thread and saw numerous replies acknowledging frustrations, fixing things that were asked to be fixed, and at least putting things on the radar to see if others feel the same way. I acknowledged your concerns about navigation (which I told you I would look into.) There are multiple other threads where we've addressed problems, fixed problems, and taken note of concerns. The fact that we even allow a "Criticism" thread at the VERY TOP of our forum should tell you we "kind of give a shit about what people think."
I'm sorry this isn't the "AFN Frenjamin Banklin ON-DEMAND Experience" you think it should be, but there's a reasonable expectation that we'd be given time to address concerns, issues, and problems on the site.
Been doing this a lot of years friend, would appreciate some of the same considerations we've shown many of you.
