should we get rid of the topic icons?

[mouser]

im wondering if we should get rid of the poster-selectable topic icons.. im not sure if they serve much of a purpose.

ie:

[edbro]

All I can is that they mean absolutely nothing to me. I'm not going to decide to read a topic just because it has a thumbs up or smiley face icon.

[mouser]

yeah they seem a little like distracting noise to me, that's why i ask.  i find myself occasionally choosing a random one just for variety, but i think it may just serve as a distraction.

[Deozaan]

Be rid of them!

[KenR]

You can. I don't think they affect much one way or the other. People that don't want to set them can leave the default. People can ignore them when they are set.

Ken

[Josh]

Dont see much of a point really, so my vote is yes

[app103]

I am already blind to them, so I won't miss them if they are gone.

[lanux128]

is it me or are the icons already gone? because i can see only one column of icons..

[mouser]

yeah sorry my image is from "unread" posts screen which shows both the topic icons, and then another column of icons releated to how "hot" the topic is.

i'm suggesting getting rid of the ones you showed, and replacing them all with a standard image (the image on the first row in your screenshot)

[lanux128]

oh, okay.. i'm all for the less is more idea..

[tinjaw]

I too vote for loose em. 

[f0dder]

If you're going to keep the icon but replace them all with a standard icon, my vote is to keep them... and include even more icons, all the suitable ones from the standard emoticons (including the ones visible after pressing the [more] button, the R.I.P icon could be cute when making threads about symantec-purchased software).

One of the main problems with the thread icons is that there's too few to choose from. Or perhaps that the ones present aren't always fitting. Perhaps coming up with a set of icons that would make sense for donationcoder.com could be an idea.

Anyway, if you're going to lose the icons, lose the column entirely, otherwise it's kinda pointless imho.

[mouser]

here's what im thinking currently:
1) remove ability for users to set topic/post icons (will always use standard icon)
2) keep the column
3) allow admin to set icon

idea will be that 99.99% of (new) topics will use the standard icon
an occasional post by admin can have an unusual icon to set it apart.

but i do agree that the icon choices sucked and we could bring it back if we had more informative icons.

[Cpilot]

Personally I never even really noticed them.
I don't think they even get noticed by most people, so having them or not IMO wouldn't even have an impact from what I can tell.

[tomos]

I think they can be helpful -
KenR, for example, (I think!) always uses the ThumbsUp for his reccomendations or "Finds"
If someones reviewing/commenting on something they can give relevant symbol.

[dluby]

I never paid any attention to them, so I'm happy enough to see them go (reduce clutter)