Anybody else wonder if the Vanilla Boards' format influences this forum?

Icalasari

I have a feeling that the forum wouldn't have been successful if it was a normal forum, with everybody squirrelling away into boards that only pertain to their interests

Instead, due to how the forum, by default, shows all threads, we see everything upon coming here, making us interact more and making new members see a wider selection instead of just the most recently posted in thread of each board, if that

Anybody else feel the same way? Or does anybody else have a differing view point?

glennmagusharvey

I definitely suggested this forum format since all the threads are smashed together in one display, rather than compartmentalized into subforums.

Ponicalica

While there are aspects of Vanilla that annoy me, I like that one.

Nova

It probably encourages activity, but it also annoys me, as I can't just stick to my interests without having ten different tabs open.

MillerCross

well, you can, if you exercised self control, but nooooo

Nova

No, I could if I paid any attention to board categories at all, but... fuck that.

DYRE

The only reason this format works is because we have like two dozen regular members.  If we weren't such a tiny forum, this format would... be less acceptable, I think.

LouieW

Icalasari,

I have a feeling that the forum wouldn't have been successful if it was a normal forum, with everybody squirrelling away into boards that only pertain to their interests.

You might be right. Having one main default list of threads is probably preferable to having tons of relatively inactive subforums. 

I also feel like the way post-formatting works encourages shorter posts (i.e., long posts/walls of text are harder to read here than they are on say TV Tropes) too, but I might be wrong about that.

Icalasari

I also feel like the way post-formatting works encourages shorter posts (i.e., long posts/walls of text are harder to read here than they are on say TV Tropes) too, but I might be wrong about that.

Judging by Alex's posts, I'm betting that you may be wrong

LouieW

That depends on the assumption that people actually like Alex's posts.

Nah, I have no reason to diss him, I just feel like the way comments are set up here, especially how there is a lot more empty space to the left and right of posts here and how avatars and text are pretty small, kind of makes long posts seem out of place.

MadassAlex

Yeah, I have quite a reputation for huge posts here, but the formatting makes them "squished" -- on another forum, they might only appear to be half as long. Not that they'd be considered small posts in many contexts, but other formats make them more readable. 

Naas_Human

Now that it's been pointed out, that big white space is starting to annoy me. It's so... empty...

Nova

fucking hell

same here now

MillerCross

On the other hand, they look more readable here precisely because of the compressed form. One of the issue I have with TvT's layout is that the longer the posts, the longer and more intimidating they look. Here, while it looks vertically longer, it also looks laterally shorter, which gives the illusion of a more reasonable length

Central Avenue

The ability to list all the threads on one page is one of two reasons I still put up with Vanilla for Heapers' Hangout. It works well there.

(The other is the multi-person PM conversations. Other forums let you PM multiple people but I like that Vanilla's work like private threads.)

glennmagusharvey

Now I wonder if there's a way to have the page auto-expand the thread text area to as wide as possible, just leaving a bit of room on the right for the categories/bookmarked stuff.