What should I do? Your opinions please.

[redjak6t4]

Thanks for your thoughts on the subject of feedback, Fred588.

What you wrote there made me remember something about how feedback is handled in other forums.

So I'm my very next post in this thread will be for Dave's attention.

But you triggered the thought in me, so thanks for that.


Redjak.

[redjak6t4]

Hello Dave,


I hope this idea is welcome and helpful. Following on from what Fred588 wrote about member feedback, I recalled the way that feedback was handled in another forum I'm a member of. Nothing to do with quicksand or fetishes or sex. It's a science forum. Here's a link to a typical page.

https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/o ... 40/page-67

If you go through the posts here you'll see that at the bottom of each one, on the left hand side, members have given their feedback in the shape of emojis with their forum name attached.

For instance, the first post is by Collinsmark, showing an astro photo he took. phinds, davenn, Stavros Kiri and 6 other members have responded with feedback. Three emojis are visible. A thumbs up for LIKE, a face with hearts for eyes for LOVE IT and a glowing lightbulb for INFORMATIVE.

Other emojis available for members to use in their feedback are a green box with a white tick for AGREE, an open-mouthed and wide-eyed face for WOW and a quizzical looking face with a raised eyebrow for SCEPTICAL. PhysicsForums is a science forum, after all.


Ok, there are 24 smilies that we can use at the moment, but to my knowledge they can't be used in the same way as the emojis in PF. A member of QSF making a post can use them within the body of their own particular post. But they can't be placed into another member's post as feedback, as is done in PF.


I'm presenting this idea Dave because if I just moaned about the lack of membership feedback and did nothing else, then that would be of no help at all. So, here's an idea for you to consider, with a worked example too.


Thanks very much,


Redjak.

[redjak6t4]

Nope.

After thinking about it for a bit I'm just going to be me. Or rather, I'm just going to be Redjak, the Quicksand Killer and carrying on as normal, not worrying overmuch about feedback. The prevailing opinions of those who have replied to me here or privately is that they just do what they want to do and any feedback about it is a welcome bonus. I can go with that.

My thanks go out to all who have responded and it won't be too before normal service will be resumed at Redjak's secret lair.


Redjak

[dlodoski]

Hello Dave,
I hope this idea is welcome and helpful. Following on from what Fred588 wrote about member feedback, I recalled the way that feedback was handled in another forum I'm a member of. Nothing to do with quicksand or fetishes or sex. It's a science forum. Here's a link to a typical page. ....
Redjak.

Sorry for the late response. It's been a 'busy' week.

I had a look at the link you provided. The board seems to run on PHP code, but it's not clear what the base was. There are many PHP based forum platforms, but I don't know how many are open source.

In any case, many members here will be familiar with two extremes regarding the leveraging of the open source model. On one end was Deep_Sinking, which was heavily modified - in large part to provide ratings and feedback. And then there's QSF (this board), which has been modified very little.

I like the idea of non-verbal feedback, because it allows for member to express themselves easily (and perhaps anonymously). But this type of effort is unlikely to be made here (unless someone trustworthy volunteers). Physicsforums is huge by comparison, and accepts advertising, which generates revenue. Not really apples and apples. The tech admin at Deep_Sinking used it as a development platform for code. So the addons weren't really a gift to community as it were. It was just an unusual situation.

In any case, as I noted earlier, most artwork is self-indulgent, and some artists (certainly not all of them) share their output here. I don't really have an easy solution if you're seeking additional validation for yours. There is so much output now, spread across so many platforms that recognition/validation/feedback is going to spread pretty thin.

On thing you could try is an *occasional* poll. But beware, lackluster participation (or at least below your expectations) could leave you feeling worse off.

[redjak6t4]

Thanks very much for your reply, Dave.


I can see that you've given the issue a lot thought and I'm grateful for that. Yes, now that you mention it, I do remember how Foster Blake ran Deep Sinking. And thanks for drawing that comparison between Physics Forums and here. I now see what you say. Oranges don't really compare with apples.

As you'll have seen, I've given the issue some thought myself, after receiving some helpful feedback from others. And my decision is to stick with my familiar (and self-indulgent) mode of posting, treating feedback, and the possible validation that can come with it, as something unlooked for, but welcome.

I'll skip the poll option unless very special circumstances call for it.

So, it's business as usual for me (and my hooded alter-ego).


Thanks again,

Redjak.

[Sandy Place]

Not sure how helpful this will be, if at all, but here's my perspective as a non-contributor.

I find some of the AI (and still) work interesting and perhaps I'm being lazy to not mention it when I do.
Will what I offer, intended as constructive criticism, give offense?
I don't know.

So I don't.

Is this laziness? Perhaps.

I prefer more realistic scenes, so the women with quadruple-Z busts are not interesting to me.
Should I say something and risk offending redjack (or anyone else) and perhaps cause them to stop sharing their work?

I don't blame artists for shifting from this site to DA because of the lack of feedback; it's a perfectly reasonable response when one's work appears to be ignored. (Not to digress, but I find the DA site utterly maddening (using Firefox) as video clips never, ever play. Likely user error, but chasing it down isn't a priority for me, so nobody on DA gets my feedback or my money despite my wish to offer it.)

If you are producing art - whatever form it takes - my suggestion would be to do what interests you.
In the end, you're probably far more critical of your work than anyone else.

If you're seeking in commercial success, that's an entirely different circumstance that (typically) puts artistic expression at odds with commercial success. That struggle is as old as humanity and has, as far as I can tell, no right or wrong answer.

[redjak6t4]

Not sure how helpful this will be, if at all, but here's my perspective as a non-contributor.
I find some of the AI (and still) work interesting and perhaps I'm being lazy to not mention it when I do.
Will what I offer, intended as constructive criticism, give offense?
I don't know.
So I don't.
Is this laziness? Perhaps.


Hello and thanks for expressing your opinion Sandy Place.
You won't be giving offence by offering it because that's exactly what I asked for. The fact that it's constructive criticism is even better.


I prefer more realistic scenes, so the women with quadruple-Z busts are not interesting to me.
Should I say something and risk offending redjack (or anyone else) and perhaps cause them to stop sharing their work?


I'm not offended Sandy. The rule that seems to apply in this forum is, 'each to their own'. So if my preferences don't align with someone else's, then no problem. Each of us looks for and clicks on what we want, filtering out what we don't.


I don't blame artists for shifting from this site to DA because of the lack of feedback; it's a perfectly reasonable response when one's work appears to be ignored. (Not to digress, but I find the DA site utterly maddening (using Firefox) as video clips never, ever play. Likely user error, but chasing it down isn't a priority for me, so nobody on DA gets my feedback or my money despite my wish to offer it.) If you are producing art - whatever form it takes - my suggestion would be to do what interests you. In the end, you're probably far more critical of your work than anyone else.


A very good point and true to (my) life. When I was photoshopping QS images about 1 in 5 of my efforts actually made it here. The rest were consigned to oblivion. Now that I'm using AI I can quickly generate dozens and dozens of images and perhaps 1 in 50 might make it here.


If you're seeking in commercial success, that's an entirely different circumstance that (typically) puts artistic expression at odds with commercial success. That struggle is as old as humanity and has, as far as I can tell, no right or wrong answer.

No thanks. I've been content to contribute only here at QSF for years and here I'll stay.


Thanks again for your input,



Redjak.

[dlodoski]

...Yes, now that you mention it, I do remember how Foster Blake ran Deep Sinking....

Not to put too fine a point on it, there were three guys responsible for Deep Sinking.

Foster Blake started the Deep Sinking Yahoo group, which morphed into the Deep Sinking message board.

Jiminy Thicket was the technical admin and wrote all of the feedback protocols (ranks and so on) as well as Sinking Island.

As far as 'running the place' goes, the moderating fell to me mostly. That's where the heavy lifting (and learning) took place. Jiminy created the Cesspool for beating up on people. In reality, moderating should be (and now is) a quiet affair that is rarely noticeable.

[redjak6t4]

Ah, now that you mention those names Dave, you've reactivated long-buried memories.


Thanks for helping unearth them.

And also thanks for clarifying my somewhat muddy mental picture of the workings of that place.

(Hmmm... nice metaphor, considering our mutual fetish.)


Cheers,


Redjak.

[Helen]

This is all very fascinating!