Should cpaptalk Be Divided Into Categories or Subsections?

[LinkC]

Y'all DO realize this poll is over 5 years old, right?

Just checking...

[carbonman]

Y'all DO realize this poll is over 5 years old, right?

....details.....details........

[Patrick A]

Y'all DO realize this poll is over 5 years old, right?

Just checking...

What woke this up?

[bradb]

Every growing forum eventually has to make sections and/or categories. Some go too far, some not enough. Look at some huge forums like macrumors.com or xda-developers, a couple that I frequent. They have many categories, and it works for them.

I would say that cpaptalk needs at least two forums: CPAP-related, and off-topic banter. Political threads, "what do you think of this healthcare/insurance thing," "check out this alternative OSA treatment," "perverts only," "how do i delete my account," etc etc could all go in the non-CPAP forum category.

Remember everyone that growth is gradual and so can change be gradual. Start with a sub forum for offtopic stuff and see how it goes, and we can change it later.

[billbolton]

Every growing forum eventually has to make sections and/or categories.

No, they don't. It depends very much on the topic area of the forum

[MagicCityDawg]

The topic area of this forum is all over the place.

I asked one of the mods about this, and they referred me to this thread.

As a new guy, I was a bit shocked that a message board as active as this one isn't categorized. As such, we have new topics started on items that have been discussed previously. Also, some people don't want to wade through numerous threads to find the ones that interest them.

As I stated, being a new guy starting out, it wouldn't certainly help to find all the threads about equipment comparisons in one place. As it would insurance issues and general advice.

There is a wealth of information on this board that is being under-utilized due to the structure, or lack thereof.

[heiff]

I used to frequent a forum in which the topic was a particular type of car. It bears a lot of resemblence to this one - a fair number of posts each day, very little moderating (forum admin would step in only when things got really out of control), and a community of regulars that kept the conversations lively...and like here, a single main forum with no subsections.

The way they made this work was that the regulars on the forum agreed to label off-topic posts as such. If it wasn't directly related to the forum's topic (in this case, the classic Mini), the subject line contained "OT" or something similar to indicate that it was off-topic. And this worked pretty well for them, and I would think it would do so equally well here.

One thing that I'd love to see would be either stickied threads in the main forum, or a place where links to well-established discussion threads could be "stickied" in the same manner - I'm thinking of things like, say, the "Repti Heat Cable" or "My Rainout Arsenal".

[StevenXXXX]

I know this topic was started 5 years ago.

But, I vote YES to categories.

[robysue]

I also peruse an apnea forum at http://www.apneasupport.org/index.php and it does have sub-forums and is much heavier moderated than cpaptalk is.

All I can say is that I prefer the free for all over here in many ways. And I don't particularly like having to check the three subforums over there that have topics I'm interested in when I do go there. I personally find it harder to keep track of the threads I'm interested in when they're buried in subforums.

Your mileage may vary ....

[StevenXXXX]

I also peruse an apnea forum at http://www.apneasupport.org/index.php and it does have sub-forums and is much heavier moderated than cpaptalk is.

All I can say is that I prefer the free for all over here in many ways. And I don't particularly like having to check the three subforums over there that have topics I'm interested in when I do go there. I personally find it harder to keep track of the threads I'm interested in when they're buried in subforums.

Your mileage may vary ....

The better option might be to combine all of the various forums that we all frequent into 1 Giant Forum. Let them all fight over who will survice. That way, you would only have to go to 1 location to get all of the information you need.

[LinkC]

I know!!! Let's have a poll to see what all the users think!

Then we could do THAT...

[SleepyInSeoul]

Absolutely, I think sections are a must. I actually don't visit here as often as I would, simply because it is so disorganized. I agree with a previous poster, every other forum I belong to has categories, and I find them very useful and a necessity. it seems I might be in the minority, however.

I wonder if a method exists where the member can choose his/her view? That would suit everyone.

[Wulfman...]

I've always found it amusing that it's always the new users or those with very few posts that complain about it the most. They're the ones that would also be bitching the loudest if their posts sat unanswered for days or longer if the forum WAS categorized.

I belong to another forum (about firearms) that IS categorized. Just today, someone was griping about trying to sell a shotgun and nobody seemed to be interested. I found his first post (from two days before) and politely replied that he had it posted in the WRONG category and there was very little information about it.......including a price. In fact, I even copied and pasted the names of the sections (BOLDED) he needed to post it in. SOOOOOO.......what does he do? He posts it in another section which was STILL WRONG.

I agree with Ron White......."You can't fix STUPID!!!"

Every forum has a "Search" function. USE IT! I highly doubt that there's a subject that hasn't been discussed at length here before. For the majority of the highly discussed topics, find a post by "rested gal" and look in her profile, because the links are listed.

Categorized forums also require much more "moderating" (see my previous example). Nobody here wants that title. And, if you think you want to have the job, we don't want it moderated. SO THERE! It's been working just fine all these years. The success of this forum has been in its simplicity. There are other categorized forums......and highly moderated, too. If you don't like this one, go to the others and see how much help you get or are allowed to offer.......you'll be back. And, if not......oh, well.


Den

[bradb]

There are obviously going to be good and bad examples of both categorizing, and lumping-it-all-together. Sometimes even on the same site. That's why FLEXIBILITY and reevaluation in how things are organized is *key* to organization. It's just like setting up a filing system at work, school, or home; if you make too many folders with too complex an organizational scheme, you won't stick to it, you'll make mistakes, and eventually you'll stop filing or even using it and things will be lost. But we could start with just TWO forums and see how that goes: CPAP-related, and "Off Topic". We don't need 30 forums for things like selling, newbies, etc. If it's CPAP-related, we can put it in CPAP. If it's about politics, sex, ranting about your mom, religion, asking to get an account deleted, whatever, that can be in the "Water Cooler" type of off-topic forum.

Giving a bad example of over-categorization is not an effective argument for no organization at all. It's only a warning not to go crazy with categories. Thus, let's start at two.

[ResmedUser]

I suggest a separate forum for people who are fed up with health insurance and brick and mortar DMEs and want to vent and bash the health insurance industry. I have group health insurance from Bank of America (Aetna from BOA), but they are next to useless.

Mikey