The old and the new

Okay, to make a quick rundown on a little story:

My site, the anime one, is a 'fork' of the original one. The original one was abandoned by it's creator, for a period of time it was left to a guy (Kuri) who pretty much caused chaos to the site, because of this many members left, but regardless his drama and and constantly ignoring the users kept the site alive. One of the moderators back then 'made' that admin mad enough he actually left and pretty much 'threw' the site at my face for me to deal. He demodded all the moderators from the chat and I had to gain adminship from the chat so I can remod them, also I Kuri has denied to give me access to the FTP and we were running on a old MyBB version, it was getting filled with bots(recently). all this happened a year ago, since then, the site has slowly died. The users of the site wanted change and they wanted the site to be functional again, I was in charge, I had college and I had SD, so I rarely visited the site. After quite some time, I announced here that I was planning to re-open an old site of mine, and I turned my Anime blog to a forum, so the users can start ANEW and they can have fun.

So I got vB which I think it was more suitable for my site and has proven to be, and I got a pre-made design, AnimatedArena I customized a lot and I'm still customizing, but I am planning on making my own once I get the hang of the vB system.

---My problem: The users keep wanting the old site. After they all say they want change, they want change, when they get change they say 'Leave the old board open'. I have made the old boards re-direct to my new site, thing is, I REALLY want the drama to be left behind! I want no trailing of Kuri, no old admin, no nothing! I've expressed quite a few times that the software is new to me, so I'm finding it puzzling to look up some stuff, also we're focusing on actually getting the site to work rather than playing around with permissions, the site is not even open completely yet, it's only open for posting to SOME members.

There was a post made by one of the members:

They don't want to say what they want updated but they want it to be updated?

Being an admin is a thankless and unrewarding job, but I can use that vB license as my demo site on Setsou, so I wouldn't be losing anything.

Seriously, what should I do about these members?

 

ignore? I would just tell then 'thanks! great idea! we are taking things off line for a little while'.

I seek out advice from people I trust regarding certain things for 'round 1' or alpha 1, then seek a slightly larger group for 'beta'. Then when things have been discussed and agreed to, then show the public.

If you just toss something out then it will be kaos, with the backing of the people that have reviewed it then it would lend credence.

 

I can't ignore, I won't be putting the old forums back, so it's not 'putting things offline for a little while'. I wasn't seeking for advice from the users on my board, they can post but they can't just use a certain section of the site plus we're fixing the e-mail issues.

My site is not a 'business' so I don't need these alpha releases, me and Dave are just fixing the technical back-end issues and me and some mods are fixing that *special* section of the forum.

 

I would explain that details are needed in the suggestions.
Communicate the desire to start fresh and let them know why it's important. Surely they remember the drama and want to leave that behind as well.

 

These types of things are hard for me to understand without seeing things myself. If you want to PM a link to the site I could give better input.

 

I agree with StateDog regarding setting the tone for the new site. Depending on the tone w/ them and how it might be received, sometimes lack of background works...meaning say how it is now, rather than remember before and this is why we are moving this direction? It's definitely not an easy path. Some will be more sensitive while others may not be.

You might even lose some ppl unfortunately.

Other thing to consider is maybe have them actually participate for one of their suggestions. I wouldn't say necessarily like Abomination, but in concept still. Sometimes people suggest things that may not be practical or applicable. It's not enough to explain why to them. So you give them the reins for that effort to indulge and they can learn and understand a bit more. If they are not going to get off the pot, then it shows that they were not that committed to the idea and/or they at least gave it a shot and learned something.

 

Before I moved the site and re-directed the old domain, I made several threads explaining why we're moving, to where we are moving and if they accepted the suggestions plus I gave them time to say yes or no, 1 year or heck even more.

The most recent things that have been coming up are permission issues which I stated we were focusing on the technical side, that everything worked right before we added features, but I listen to user suggestions, to some extent, and I have change those permissions as quickly as I can.

 

I apologize, I think I misunderstood the state of the new site.

Given that you are now a site under development actually, here is one way to maybe to tackle this, especially since you have some legacy members, and that would be to layout a rough schedule.

This schedule, for lack of better word, would be set in some sort of priority, but does not have to be. Meaning, for you on the technical side, you have in your mind what order you will be working on things. Some of them have dependencies, some of them not. Not all of these things need to be relayed to the members.

I think its fine to allow for receipt of suggestions/implementations, however, some of them may be misguided for a time if users are not familiar w/ the new site and more so may have some entitlement feelings b/c of the previous site participation. So, now you get some suggestions from people and basically maybe respond with...added to the "wanted" list or the "needed list". Could be a simple 1st level categorization for you.

Then maybe every 2 weeks or whatever, you go through the lists and see what will be implemented and such.

The big thing here is to set forth, how you will receive input, how you will determine its use, and some timeline/feedback to the members. No one likes to not receive feedback. Durr, as admins, we know. But then again some time of reference is important (i.e., it is on the do list, or it will be reviewed in x week's time, etc.).

Just food for thought there if that helps more. I realized that my earlier suggestion made no sense as your site is not ready for more hands to be configuring. Sorry.

 

I'm in complete agreement with this.

It's important to set the proper tone now that you're on the new forum. You may have given forewarning and such on the old forum, but now on the new forum, you need to explain 1) what your intentions are, 2) what is up for discussion and what isn't (i.e.: What is surely going to be done your way and no other? On the other hand, what things are you willing to let the members help form and develop?), and 3) why it is important to keep the tone that you have set.

The members may want the old forum back, but explain that it's gone (you have no intentions to re-open it) and why. Unfortunately, if they aren't satisfied with that answer, then they can go somewhere else and complain because you can't do everything to please everybody. There are points where you must make the decision.

These members seem to really be a handful, so maybe it's good if most of them end up leaving... and you can find some fresh members who actually appreciate your efforts. :shrug:

Is there any harm in closing the board while you work on these vital areas of the site? Could you possibly dedicate a day or two out of your week to finally finish off these tasks (while the board is closed), and get it done once and-for-all?

 

Yep, we'll be having a staff meeting on Sunday to actually set down rules, policy for the mods and to actually set the tone for the forums and what are we going to do with the old one.

As for closing the boards, I get what you mean, but if it wasn't because of some users we wouldn't have found some bugs, I told them, when I gave them the link, they could start posting but that they should remember it's still early and that we're testing everything at the moment, I guess they thought I was lying?

But I'll defo take in some of you guys suggestions, it was helpful.

Thank you.