This is a mess.  And it can get worse, I imagine.

Jim

It always takes a good bit of work to get something done, even cleaning up a mess.  My interest is controversial, obviously, but I think Cody's reputation outside of DC could improved.  I really do care about this place as more than a place to spend time.

I took a look at Chris' (Veign) test case.  Simple clear and doesn't add any noticeble "noise" to the experience.  Give it a test-drive!

Link please.
codeTRUCKER, you've been quite prolific, and, I dare say, productive. I think you have done a good job of summarizing and focusing the criteria.
I would like to do something that I do for all my projects. I would like us, the DC community, to come up with a goal statement. This will help to keep the project focused and on track. It should then be broken down into intermediate milestones. We can then take a pseudo-spiral development approach. I also favor a try-then-adjust repetitive cycle.

Some attempts at sparking a goal statement:

• Provide a means for participants to opt-out of conversations they do not wish to pay attention to. (For whatever reason)

We can have secondary or tertiary goals that overlap, or are completely "Free" as any solution to the primary goal will also cover the secondary/tertiary.

Examples:

• Augment existing searching mechanisms.
• Allow readers to see "censored" versions of postings.
• Assist contributers to better classify their contributions.

I have several ideas in my head that I need to organize first, and then I will post them here. If I can find the time I would like to work with Wordzilla on these and try them out individually and in combination to see if they are effective or just add clutter. I'll post those ideas as soon as I can.

I think tagging should be on a voluntary basis by the topic starter.  The only exception should be given to mouser, since its his website, to add a tag if a topic drifts too far away.

What Veign said.

FYI - For things of interest about DC when I'm away, I send "myself" a PM so I don't forget.  Of course, I know you knew that.  I just mentioned it for the benefit of others.

The second thing I wanted to do is create a new user icons, to be displayed like the current icons
[attachimg=#]
that would link to a user's "Content Pledge". The content pledge would be something that is part of a member's profile.

The default would state that the user has not created a personalized "Content Pledge" and the member's Content Pledge icon will signal that it is advised to use discretion when view any posts by this member.

If a member opts to fill out a personalized Content Pledge, they will check a series of boxes for the types of content they pledge to voluntarily refrain from posting. There will be absolutely no means of registering your agreement or disagreement that the user is holding to their pledge. IOW, no way for you to signal good or bad feedback about that member's choice to hold to their Content Pledge. It is up to you to keep your own personal notes about your feelings and I would suggest we implement the SMF plugin to filter out all posts by member name on a member-by-member basis, based on the member's personal "blacklist".

The Content Pledge will be integrated into the forum software so member's can use their personal profile settings to filter out/identify/modify any postings by other members whose Content Pledge is not inline with your personal choice.

For example, (and I will mock this up at a later date) the Content Pledge will have checkboxes for things like:

• I will not post links to URLs that are flagged by the OpenDNS Adult Site Filter.
• I will not use curse words in my postings.
• I will refrain from the use of sexual innuendo.
• I will refrain from posting on religious matters.

I also have grander plans for the Content Pledge that I will expound upon at a later date.

(to be continued...)

I don't like the direction this is going.

It's sounding more and more like censorship and filtering out "bad stuff" (eyes of the beholder etc.) than designing a general-purpose tagging system. I'm all for a general tagging system, but not this.

Well, parts of your ideas are okay, but I reaaaaally dislike the "Content Pledge" idea. Gives me the creeps, to be honest.

Well, parts of your ideas are okay, but I reaaaaally dislike the "Content Pledge" idea. Gives me the creeps, to be honest.

Can't remember what it said now but I think the original sign up agreement includes stuff like that. Even if people do sign up to such a thing how many people read it or think about it afterwards.

Personally I agree with fOdder on the 'content pledge' bit - I think that we should all behave in a civilised manner towards each other (and do so pretty much on DC 99.9% of the time - the other 0.1% being spam that most people never see) without having to sign up to a contract to be well behaved (even voluntarily). If for some reason there is a problem or perceived problem I think the 'reported post' or emailing Mouser or a moderator (such as me) has seemed to work pretty well in the past and situations can be resolved.

The whole tagging thing could be really usful (esp. if you can search on tags too) and maybe there is a little room in there for a 'not for the squeemish' type tag with an opt in filter in the user profile.

Personally I quite like the idea of a bad language filter - I wouldn't use it myself (being of good Anglo Saxon stock where four letter words have been in common use for well over 1000 years)  but there are a lot of people who don't like the use of expletives and find them offensive. Again it could be an opt in function within the user profile and replacing 'naughty' words with **** seems a pretty straight forward way to protect people's sensibilities from such content. There is such a filter included within SMF forums where unacceptable words can be filtered but if enabled it seems to be global - maybe there is a way to make it a user option.

We keep getting stuck on the NSFW thing. 

Here's my last suggestion on that - after this I shall start considering NSFW a four letter word and try my best to refrain from discussing it.

The board already has an unwritten (now a lot of it written) code for handling that kind of stuff. And to be fair I have only seen one person have a problem with the content in general though there are a few threads that have raised more than one set of eyebrows. Maybe the "report to moderator" step though essential, is too drastic. A lot of people would consider it far easier to hit the back button than click on "Report to moderator" and do whatever comes next...whatever that is. What if we supplement this with a softer approach. People can just choose to flag a post as objectionable, completely anonymously. After x number of objectionable votes that post can be automatically contained within a spoiler tag with a button labeled NSFW, the admins may choose to receive an automatic alert after a certain number of votes.

Two thoughts regarding classification of posts based on subject:
1. We generally tend to have long threads but not THAT many new threads daily, I really don't expect subject-wise tagging to be a problem at all even if the original poster doesn't bother with tagging. There are too many older posts to tag but the useful ones still visited would eventually get tagged and show up.
2. Once we have a subject-wise tagging system in place methinks we should also be able to rate threads, that way if I'm looking up posts on any subject I know which threads are more likely to help.

The keyword for all the above is voluntary. It's quite obvious that most people are happy with the way things are and are wary of change. As far as I can tell none of the above would have any impact on somebody who can't be bothered about it. 

None?

I agree.