Some Changes Coming....

[MattBrady]

Hey folks –

As we’ve been hinting and outright saying for a while now, we will be making some changes to Newsarama in the coming weeks. Yes, we know, “change” is one of the things that is least liked around here, but we think most of you — especially those who’ve been around from the start — will agree that it’s time to move things forward, technology-wise. We hope these changes will greatly improve site functionality…thanks for your patience over the years!

For those who’ve been here awhile, you know the history of Newsarama has always been one of change and growth. With change is always some instant pay-offs and a few bumps in the road. We wanted to let you all know what lies ahead.

We’ll save discussion and previews about what the main page will look like for a little bit (it looks really, really good), and focus on what is happening with the message board system. We’ll be moving on from vBulletin. It served its purpose admirably for many years, but as Newsarama has grown so have our technical needs and vBulletin just doesn’t support the full experience we want to give you. In the coming weeks we will be moving over to a Pluck-based message board system. It’s the system used by our sister sites LiveScience, Space.com and Aviation.com. Now, I see those wheels spinning. Don’t worry, all your brilliant posts aren’t disappearing into some bottomless abyss. We’ll be archiving the current boards as read-only. You’ll be able to view them at: LOCKED forums at forums.newsarama.com. To be totally clear the existing topics and posts will not be moving to the new boards.

Unfortunately, we’ll be losing a few favorite features of vBulletin such as Private Messaging (we know, we know.) Hopefully, you’ll appreciate the great new features that Pluck brings to us, and we’re trying to get PMs back.

For most of you, the transition will be pretty smooth. The good news is that almost everyone will have their IDs moved over to the new system, so when the time comes, just log in like you normally do, no need to re-register. (You’ll have the same User Name and Password.) You will need to create new avatars and sig files. We know some of you are really fond of yours, but feel free to re-create or hey, see this as a challenge to be even cooler and wittier. Also your post count will be starting fresh.

A few of you will encounter registration issues, but don’t worry, we’re handling these issues ahead of time. We'll be contacting you directly in the coming days to work out the kinks, one-on-one.

Because your feedback and involvement are so important to us, we've set up this new vforum to handle all your questions. Along with our colleague doublehelix, we'll do our best to address them as quickly as possible. doublehelix will be here to help you throughout the transition.

On a final note, what made the current Newsarama community (particularly "Talk@") so active and vital, wasn't the technology (which was never impressive), or the forum structure (which still is fairly basic), it was all about you. It was your passion, initiative, and sense of community that built it from the ground up into what it is today.

So, while no change is perfect – this one included – we hope our long-time members most affected by the transition will also see this as an opportunity … an opportunity to not only affirm and re-establish what makes the Newsarama community so great, but to make it even better. Starting soon it will be a wide open field, i.e. more than ever, whatever you want it to be and make of it.

It's in all of our hands.

As always, thanks for the continued support,

Matt Brady
Mike Doran

[Terram]

What about the epic flame wars over Thor vs. Superman?
What about the the banal Talk@ megathreads with the hundreds of thousands of low-content posts? Are they going to roll over and die?
What about my postcount?!!?!

I'm scared!

[Timberoo]

We're all going to get Plucked?

[C20Percent]

Oh NO...not...CHANGE?

http://images.starpulse.com/Photos/P...ark-tv-b77.jpg

[Punchy]

Starting post-counts from the beginning seems to be a good idea, that way, everyone is a noob, and there'll be less baseless accusations of new posters being trolls.

[Shiro]

That's probably a bigger change than most people anticipated.

But, you're right, the vB technology doesn't handle a board of this size very well. I don't think it helps that the entire site traffic runs through forum posts and it's great to see the site moving forward to deal with this.

Locking off all the old threads is pretty major. I've been on boards where this has happened before and it can make the transition a little strange. Losing the 20+ thread and all those 200,000 odd posts will be sad, but I'm sure the guys can come up with some way to make it work. I'm adamant it's the biggest thread on the internet and was only ever going to get bigger.

Keeping sigs and avatars is great, losing post counts isn't ideal, but what can you do?

The technology is the important thing for the future of the community right now and I'm delighted to see positive steps being taken towards solving the previous problems. Cool.

[Poolman]

The sky is falling!!!
Run for the hills!!!

I hope this new system is far more stable than the one we are using now.

At least the 20+ thread will be remembered as the biggest forum on the Internet ever (that we know of ).

[doublehelix]

Originally Posted by Timberoo

We're all going to get Plucked?

Ha! Nice one!

Hi everyone - doublehelix here. I'll be here to answer questions you may have and help you out with whatever I can. I'm leaving the office in about a half hour, so don't worry that I'm ignoring you - I will not do that. I'll be back in the office tomorrow morning to answer the many questions you probably will have. So don't worry! I am here to help.

-dh

[Omega Flyer]

Will there be more moderaters coming with the switch too?

And why doesn't Pluck have a PM system?

[doublehelix]

Originally Posted by Omega Flyer

Will there be more moderaters coming with the switch too?

And why doesn't Pluck have a PM system?

No more mods than we have, though that could potentially change.

Why doesn't Pluck have a PM system? I wish I knew. Like Matt said, though, we are working on getting this crucial element going.

-dh

[toolverine]

Will there be more of what seem to be subforums that are paid for by publishers to promote their books?

[Kid Impulse]

Just wanted to say thanks for saying what's going to happen outright and explaining everything thoroughly

I look forward to see where we go from here

[doublehelix]

Originally Posted by toolverine

Will there be more of what seem to be subforums that are paid for by publishers to promote their books?

Can you give me a "for instance"?

[toolverine]

Originally Posted by doublehelix

Can you give me a "for instance"?

Starship Trooper Online, Spider-Man: The Icon, and Atomika@Newsarama.

[Twigglet]

Reset post counts Im' ok with. It it resets my join date, I'm going to kill someone.

[Kent Horton]

[quote=MattBrady]Hey folks –

As we’ve been hinting and outright saying for a while now, we will be making some changes to Newsarama in the coming weeks. Yes, we know, “change” is one of the things that is least liked around here, but we think most of you — especially those who’ve been around from the start — will agree that it’s time to move things forward, technology-wise. We hope these changes will greatly improve site functionality…thanks for your patience over the years![quote]
I feel old now - I've been here off & on since 2000.

Originally Posted by MattBrady

We’ll be moving on from vBulletin.

Originally Posted by MattBrady

In the coming weeks we will be moving over to a Pluck-based message board system. It’s the system used by our sister sites LiveScience, Space.com and Aviation.com.

I have no idea what that means. I'm so MB code illiterate.

Originally Posted by MattBrady

A few of you will encounter registration issues, but don’t worry, we’re handling these issues ahead of time. We'll be contacting you directly in the coming days to work out the kinks, one-on-one.

Damn you Tony Stark!!!!!

Originally Posted by Punchy

Starting post-counts from the beginning seems to be a good idea, that way, everyone is a noob, and there'll be less baseless accusations of new posters being trolls.

90% of the time those accusations proved true.

[capjr]

Cool beans....I'll be around for this one...

I wonder if it'll cause a proposed Mass Exodus(which never happened) like The Sub-Forum Explosion of '05....


The memories....

[Twigglet]

First person to get 1,000 posts on the new site is a legend!

[Shiro]

Will HTML be allowed in posts on the new board?

[Kid Impulse]

Originally Posted by doublehelix

Can you give me a "for instance"?

http://forums.comicbookresources.com/index.php

[Ken B.]

WIll there be a limit on signature size? Please? I don't need to see 4 or 5 1000 x 1000 boxes of some comic character with funny text.

Also, you keep a post count? I thought that was hip in 2003 or something? Or let me put it this way, people who pad their post counts with meaningless fluff was hip in 2003.

[Punchy]

Man, the avatars on those message boards look small, is that the standard, or can you keep them the same size as we have now?

[Shiro]

Originally Posted by Punchy

Man, the avatars on those message boards look small, is that the standard, or can you keep them the same size as we have now?

I'd imagine the admin options will allow the size to be set to whatever Matt wishes.

[Zain]

I'm scared......someone hold me

[Forbush Man]

Seems, fine, I'll just miss my post count.

But I won't be a troll! and we can talk about the good ol' days.