Sniper's Unofficial 2+2 Post Count Analysis

[.Alex.]

1) I did use the quote function.

2) I'm very confused what all of you are finding in sniper's post that is so sinister. He didn't make any analysis or draw any conclusions; he simply stated that EDF's traffic went down and TLDR's went up. This, "ElD looks like you have some work to do...," is obviously (at least to me) spoken mostly in jest and is hardly anything to get riled up about. I understand there is a lot of backdrama that is causing this hostility, but as an objective observer who is mostly unaware of what hapenned with him, I didn't see anything wrong with his post.

[Sniper]

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its interesting that the traffic boost to TLDR is due to threads like "TV: What are you watching tonight?", "Ask the 2+2 Ladies your questions", and a POG-esque game thread, none of which are what TLDR was created for.

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Maybe you missed the ATF threads detailing the shift and expansion in focus for TLDR? BTW, in the grand scheme of things, does it really matter what gets people posting/reading and generally spending more time on 2+2?

It is worth noting, that the average age of posters in TLDR, is much greater than the other communities.

The "Ask the 2+2 Ladies" thread is particularly appropriate for TLDR, since many of the 2+2 ladies hang out in there, and th thread has a better quality of post than would appear in other forums.

The TV/Movie/Book threads all support TLDR's long standing Entertainment focus... and support the creation of more in depth threads.

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btw, worth noting on EDF 58.3 Avg P/T, which means all the topics in EDF are great at generating discussion, so all that would really be needed to boost traffic is for a few people to start a few more threads. So if by "ElD looks like you have some work to do..." you mean "keep being awesome" then you're right on.

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It will be interesting to see if ElDf can maintain the high P/T. Fwiw, I think ElDf with 150+ of the top 2+2 posters should be generating more traffic. I am surprised that its traffic steadily dropped as far as it has, as fast as it has, from its big start.

Just an observation, and its early in the game for that forum.

[Sniper]

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6. PF (#33) and MMB (#42) growth trend stopped dead in its tracks. These forums, at last report, are slated to merge in the upcoming upgrade, which will seal MMB's fate, if the merge actually occurs.

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I'm fairly confident that if we can stop MMB from being merged that we will be able to continue growing having now smoothed over the rough patches that took place in transition.

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It was nice to see a good resolution on the transitional links issue.

I obviously made the comment about the merge, because I think its a bad idea, and have expressed that opinion previously.

Worth noting (as you know, but most others don't), that prior to the "transition", PF and MMB were slated to be moved into their own "Finance and Business" Category, which would have enhanced their visibility and helped to attract more players looking to shift to alternative or additional income streams. Now, they are slated to be merged. A major difference that will surely impact traffic.

[Sniper]

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Sniper,

are you bitter?

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I will confirm that diebitter is not one of my mod gimmick accounts...

[Sniper]

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Congratulations on increasing the number of posts in the Lounge. EDF is about quality, not quantity, so you won't be seeing things like daily TV guide listings being posted to increase traffic there. Instead the focus will remain on quality discussion and interesting topics.

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First, I don't think the TV thread itself has had much direct impact on TLDR posting, though there has been indirect impact.

The TV thread serves 2 primary purposes:
1. To encourage more in depth discussion of TV in TLDR.
2. To organize and track the various TV threads across various forums on 2+2.

To that end, I highly encourage anyone making TV posts in other forums to post a link in the TLDR TV thread. I try to do it for many of the popular shows that get interesting threads in OOT, but I don't catch them all.

There has been prior discussion about adding a TV/Movies forum to 2+2. That threads serves to help track the viability of such a forum from the TV perspective.

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The thing is, it's not a competition. If I were competing against other forums for traffic, I would create POG threads and other stuff to generate traffic. But I'm not. So I post threads like this one in OOT where it got over 100 responses, because that was the best place to post it.

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I think you misinterpret, and put too much emphasis on the fact that I mentioned ElD and TLDR in the same line in my monthly comments. I agree that its not a competition, and that wasn't my point. I think I made that clear when I strongly supported the creation of the ElD forum.

I do stand by my comment, that you have work to do to make the ElD forum the best it can be.

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It's amazing that you still just don't get it.

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Maybe you can clarify what it is that I still don't get?

[Sniper]

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6. PF (#33) and MMB (#42) growth trend stopped dead in its tracks. These forums, at last report, are slated to merge in the upcoming upgrade, which will seal MMB's fate, if the merge actually occurs.

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Sniper for mod please

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LOL... Thanks for you support Evan [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[Sniper]

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I'd also be interested to know if there's some way to track views versus just posts. For example, I read the El Diablo forum nearly every day, I just rarely post in it. (No reason to add clutter unless I have something really interesting to say). I'd be interested in knowing how many "hits" the various forums get on average.

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jman, I agree, I'm working on a good way to do this unofficially.

It would be great if we could get actual Google Analytics data for hits to each forum, though.

With a rough average of 0.5 posts/reader/day, we've got quite a lot of silent readers out there.

[Sniper]

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The comparison between EDF and TLDR is made because of the comparison made in the quoted section of the post I made, learn to read.

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As I mentioned in the other post, this was an unintended comparison.

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As for sports, its doing wonderfully, both times polls have been run in ATF to see how the other topics forums were being run, sports got the highest ratings.

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I probably should have mentioned it in the summary... it was good to see Sporting Events back in the Top 10.

[Sniper]

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btw, to clarify things, i think the lounge gaining traffic is awesome. Good job to Carter, katey, and wookie. I simply dislike very slanted "analysis" and like to show the other side of the opinions that are being posted as though they are some sort of in-depth analysis. So good job all, I really like the direction you have taken with TLDR and think it and EDF should coexist well as similar forums with different audiences.

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MEb, I don't think the analysis is slanted, except that it is based on my perceptions, which is obviously based somewhat on where I am spending my time on 2+2, plus things that I specifically look at to help better understand the numbers.

I would certainly welcome additional commentary on the numbers, based on others different perceptions, based on their experience on 2+2.

The forums have reached a point where it is difficult for anyone to know what is going on in all the forums across 2+2. This thread helps to close the gap, but can only tell part of the story.

All comments welcome here... that is after all, the point of the thread [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[Sniper]

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... and think it and EDF should coexist well as similar forums with different audiences.

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I absolutely agree with this. Happy coexistence is the goal here, and some variety among the various community forums that 2+2 now house.

We are indeed de-stressing to a small degree the need for discussion only in the Lounge, and increasing the 'relaxing' part of the equation whilst trying to maintain a fairly adult and respectful tone. Katy has been very helpful and dynamic in all of this, and the forum has indeed hitting the mark, and getting where it intended to move to.

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Agree with all points...