Happy Birthday, Unofficial BBS!

[Samantha]

It's just after midnight here, and look at how prompt I'm being!, but my Thursdays are hectic and I didn't want to forget to make this post because it's an exciting one. The Unofficial BSS turns two today! Woo! Hardly seems like it could be true, eh?



Reminders:

-Let's not forget about our system of giving and taking "benes." I'm guilty of forgetting about it, too, but I haven't noticed much change in peoples' numbers lately. Granted we haven't had much activity, but the great thing about this system is that we can reward people for being helpful, or reprimand them for people unhelpful/rude/etc. For those of you who don't know, you can give or take a "bene" once every hour.

Announcements:

-This actually doesn't apply to anybody but Cayla and me at the moment, but I've updated the RP character application to include a section entitled "Activity." Since an active role-play has the potential of changing threads, and since it might be hard for you as a writer or you as a reader to keep up with a character's story, this "Activity" section should hopefully make it very simple. The point is to allow the creator of a character the opportunity to link, in chronological order, to all of the different threads that his or her character has been involved in. I suggest just going it numerically: 1 | 2 | 3, etc.

I've gone through and added an "Activity" section to each of the approved character, so anybody with a character should now see that on their original application.

Suggestions:

-Membership retention and member activity are two things that I have thought about quite a lot in regard to how we could improve either and/or both. I think an issue we have here is that we don't have many things (like projects or events) that bond us together as a community. We don't have much to look forward to. We have role-play, but obviously that doesn't appeal to everybody, and it also requires a fair amount of dedication and time on the part of the writer.

I'd love to have some sort of annual event or contest or program or anything (or even a few of these, maybe a winter and summer or fall and spring, etc.) that our membership could know is coming up and could be excited for. You know what I mean? But I haven't been too full of ideas. I thought of perhaps something along the lines of the Summer Showcase, or perhaps doing a forum-wide Round Robin Legacy. But those are just two ideas, and perhaps they're both terrible, in which case you are more than welcome to tell me so. But I definitely want to try to introduce something in the next couple of months, especially because the summer's coming up and that's generally when people have more free time. Any ideas?

-On the same note, I found a code for the forum that will allow for staff members to give members awards, which are just small little icons that are displayed in the mini profile (and the profile, too, I think). I was thinking that these could be used to show what forum events that a member has participated in, although I haven't worked out all of the details yet (such as, should the icons be unique to each event, or should there be a general icon used for them all?), or even if this is a good idea.

-Does anybody else have any suggestions regarding the forum as a whole, whether for the shop, the RP board, anything at all? Complaints? Perhaps grievances? I'm open to anything so long as it benefits the forum as a whole. If you're ever unhappy about something here, or think that something isn't working as great as it could, then please don't hesitate to speak up.

[Caitlin]

Oh, wow! I can't believe it has been two years already
Happy Birthday, Unofficial BBS!

I don't really have any ideas on making this forum more active, but I like the idea of hosting more Showcases.. and the Round Robin Legacy sounds like a really fun and entertaining thing to do with all of us members! The idea of what would happen each generation is really entertaining.

The badges also sound like an entertaining idea. I'm crazy about collecting achievements/badges, so I'd probably feel the need to contribute in every event... though my contributions may not be the best.

I just want to say thank you, Samantha, for all of the effort you put in to trying to keep this forum active. It's much appreciated

[Samantha]

^ Yeah, there's so many different things that we could do with a showcase, I think. And I, too, really like the idea of a Round Robin Legacy. I've always wanted to be a part of one myself.

Haha! And that's the point of the awards section, you see.

You're very welcome! Thanks also to all of the members who have stuck around.

[legrande]

Oh Round Robins are great! I took part in one last September (but it seems to have gone by the by now). I'd love to do a forum one, or some kind of showcase. It'd be nice to get a little activity again I must say. I'll hold myself partly guilty for going totally quiet. I'd love to be more active but I haven't played more than three hours of Sims in the last few months and I've been neglecting the community. (Six weeks to go before finals and some semblance of a life outside calculus and essays! )

I can't believe it's been two years! I daresay we are about due another showcase. I think it's a good idea! The icon things also seem a fun idea.

But yes, I do believe thanks is in order to everyone keeping the comm. running and to you, Samantha, for all your maintenence work.

[Zoe]

Although I haven't been too active with both the forum and the Sims, I saw this thread and it made me smile. A whole two years! I've been very busy with embedded assessments and preparing to sign a song in my American Sign Language class, so I haven't had much time. I will March 30 - April 7, though, because that's my spring break time.

I'd love more showcases, to be honest. I think a Summer Showcase would be great (once I get a new laptop, or at least get my current one fixed ). I think a gift exchange--like the one they have at GOS--would be awesome, as well.

I don't really have any ideas as far as getting more traffic, unfortunately, but I'm sure we'll think of something... eventually.

[Samantha]

Mar 24, 2013 0:41:03 GMT Zoe said:

I think a gift exchange--like the one they have at GOS--would be awesome, as well.

I think their gift exchanges are great. I'd love to give something along those lines a shot, but I definitely wouldn't want to do anything too closely similar to theirs. If anybody could think of something unique that we could do, we could definitely try it out.

Which reminds me of one idea that I had a really long time ago. I thought that we could have some sort of tutorial/experimentation week, where people created CC tutorials for the things that they knew how to make, and then participants had to try out something that they'd never done before/knew how to do. Does this sound like anything people would be interested in?

If we did another showcase, I'm 99% sure that I'd try to narrow it down so that it would have some sort of theme. "Showcase" seems just too general. It wouldn't be confined to the summertime, either.

[Caitlin]

Sorry if this is a little late. xP

I like the idea of having themes. We could even have a poll like over at GOS. We could all list a bunch of theme ideas, pick a few every Showcase, vote on 'em, etc.

I also like the idea of having a tutorial week. It would be nice to learn how to make more then* CC hair recolours.

[Samantha]

^ I'm planning to do a poll for the theme. I started a Word doc the other day with potential themes, and so far I've got twelve. If anybody has an idea for a theme that they'd like to see in the poll, let me know and I'll jot them down too.

The poll will probably be posted sometime mid-May, since ideally I'd like to have the showcase throughout the month of June (so this way we can do another event toward the end of the summer). Unless that month is generally too busy for people?

The more that I consider it, I actually really like the idea of a tutorial week. We'd probably only be able to do it once--since after a tutorial's been written, there's really no need to write another one on the same topic--but we could always do the "create something you've never created before" idea more than once.

[ElCamino1996]

Happy birthday!