FalcFans Forums

I don't know if it's because it was 2 AM, but I was thinking briefly about reducing the # of forums on the site. I know the vast majority of people read just the Falcons Huddle forum. And thus a lot of interesting topics get barely discussed on other forums. So I was thinking about combining a couple of forums. I was thinking about getting rid of the Fantasy World and NFL HUddle forms, just having them meld into the main Falcons Huddle forum. Figuring just to have one main forum for football. Not so sure about whether I should do the same with the War Room which is where draft & college football get discussed. Basically have 1 forum for pro football topics (falcons, other NFL teams, fantasy football, etc.) and another one for the draft & college football. Or maybe people think they shoudl all be melded into one, so that all football topics get discussed in one forum. What are your thoughts?

I also thought about making the FalcFans Lounge (non-sports, off-topic stuff) and the Sports Bar (sports, but not football) one forum as well.

In the end it'd probably wind up meaning that it's just 3 or 4 overall forums.

3-forum format: 1-Welcome, 2-The Huddle, 3-The Lounge
4-forum format: 1-Welcome, 2-The Huddle, 3-War Room, 4-The Lounge
current 7-forum format: 1-Welcome, 2-Falcons Huddle, 3-NFL Huddle, 4-War Room, 5-FalcFans Lounge, 6-Sports Bar, 7-Fantasy World

Basically give me whatever feedback on if you are OK with such changes, or you like it the way it is. Or any other suggestions that I haven't thought of...

Id bring some of the league stuff into the Falcon Huddle; have you guys that love draft
talk another place. Less Is More!! I take about 90 minutes a day just to catch up when I've missed two days and its a matter of time with me. When the season starts
I want to post more and see topics other places but think if I move there it will take too long to catch up. I guess its according to a person's free time and their desire to talk football!!



I'd love 3 forums---you must do your best thinking late night (:

Actually I do. My brain seems to be at optimal efficiency between the hours of like 10 and 2.

Is Cyril the only one that cares enough to comment? I assume not from the small amount views this post has gotten.

I would like four forum format, that sounds just about right.

I don't have an opinion. I don't know if it's just me but it seems traffic is down on the site. Is it because Atlanta's fair weather fans don't care? Or are other sites taking posters away?

This site's traffic generally peaks around draft time (March/April) and at the end of the season (November/December).

But then again, maybe my negativity is driving people away.

Well I got impatient so I decided to do the merge without waiting for more feedback. Unfortunately in my haste, I accidentally deleted the posts/topics in the Sports Bar subforum without moving them to the FalcFans Lounge forum. Sorry, but it's not like people had been posting much in there anyway. I guess the biggest shame is that ridiculously long baseball thread between thescout and fun gus about MLB needing a cap is now lost.

I have a backup of the database, so it's possible that I could slowly and surely restore some of those posts. But let's be honest for a moment, I'm probably too lazy to really do that.

I'm also thinking about pruning the all but the last 3-4 years of posts on the forum. One of the bigger advocates of not deleting the archives of this forum no longer posts here (i.e. BirdBrain). The point of that would be to make the database smaller and have a slightly less server strain. Not to mention, in the event of some catastrophic event, the smaller the forum database, the easier it will be to restore it.

Let me know what you guys think about that. And that you can have a bit more time to stew about...

I like the new format! It makes a lot of sense. Merging the Huddle with other NFL news is good because we most often talk about things going on around the league in the context of how they relate to the Falcons. Also think it's a smart move to combine the college and draft forums together. Good job, Pudge!

As for the appearance of the forum, while the color scheme works, I think there needs to be some sort of graphic in the header. I liked the photo of key players from the previous design. At least include the logo or something. Just looks too barren like it is now.

We don't need years of archives...Its mostly wanted to show someone was right years ago--who cares?? I sincerely think being real negative can have an effect. I can take your place because I'm not happy about anything with the Falcons. No runner, no lines,
and a Qb that can't hit a deep open receiver.... and that's the positive stuff (:

If I'm not too busy before the game, I'll try to get something up. If not then I'll probably be able to get something up next week.


I think it's interesting mainly because you can see how opinions have changed over the years. Attitudes and perspectives can change over time. Someone that is optimistic now could have been very pessimistic just a few years back, and vice versa. Also because of the way our memories work, it's hard for us to recall specific details as more time passes by. I know I have a problem with that when it comes to certain games. I think it's nice that if you can go back to a thread talking about a game from 3 years ago, that you only remember 2 or 3 big plays from but don't quite recall some of the other 2 or 3 smaller players that also had impact on the outcome of the game.

Plus, I have a degree in history, so I have a tendency to like documentation of the past.

I like the smaller number of forums because yes, I only read the main Huddle, and maybe one or two others. Always found something to comment on in the others if I went there, but that didn't happen much...

And your pessimism only drives away a few folks......

I'm only here for Falcons news and opinions, and liked how that news was separated out from the other teams. Now I'm back to parsing through headlines; I'd like the huddle and Falcons huddle separated back out of each other, honestly. I really don't care if Kenny Britt or the Cowboy diva is the bigger asshat, but I've felt the need to check the article because it should have something Falcons-related. It doesn't. Wasted time.

Just my sense, too.

Thanks.

Value your opinion samedi but I'm not going to re-separate them unless several more people have a problem with it. As I was posting that Britt piece, I thought to myself, "Yeah, this post is exactly why there are 2 separate forums." But the reason why I posted it is because the Titans for whatever reason have been one of the bigger topics of interest in the NFL Huddle forums this summer, from talking about Britt, Jared Cook, Taylor Thompson, Hasselbeck, and Locker. And I figured the handful of people that had read and commented on those posts might be interested in that story.

How about this...if I post something about an NFL team that has absolutely nothing to do with the Falcons, and I'm drawing no strands, I'll try to put "NFR" in the thread title so that people skimming thru the forum know they can skip that?

After seeing it for about 4 days I miss the " The Huddle" being in a spot just for Falcon
news.....

To me its too long to look down the list, and with about 25 threads (I didn't count); but
I did count only 5 threads have 20 replies or more. I think with "The Huddle" we should
have more debate about the Falcon organization; that should have more posts?

If you think about it, the folks who like "the lounge" and the other choices won't care
where they are; or co-mingled with The Huddle....... When I at first thought about other NFL news I didn't realize I would think of so much of it as meaningless....I realize to many its not meaningless.

I can't name or care to name anyone who has stopped posting; but I don't think this has helped us.... I would consider asking again now that we're using it.... If most like this as much then great, but I doubt that.... Lets make sure we get it right because this is a JULIO type trade for the board.

You're doing me a favor by collecting all the ATL news, so that'd be gravy . . . but appreciated gravy if you do it.

Thanks.

I gotta say... I miss having the Falcon forum broken out from the rest of the league topics. Usually when I'm on the board I'm running through it quickly because I'm being a slacker at work or in between tasks. Mixing all the Falcon posts and NFL posts under one board makes quick glances at the FF Forum a pain.

I thought it a good topic for open discussion!

There's a commentary thread for the forum changes at the top of the page.

I agree with you on this.

Read above for Pudge's take.

I understand that it can be an issue if you only visit the forum once a week because there's the potential to have 15-20 new threads that you'd have to peruse. Most days you're only going to see 2-3 new threads, and after a moderate amount of time that can add up.

The initial merge, I can get why people didn't really like it because a bunch of forums were thrust together. But now that it's been several days, there really aren't many non-Falcon related threads at the top. As of posting this, 19 of the 20 most recent posts/threads are somewhat Falcons related.

I guess if you're casually browsing, you may miss that. Like the thread "Could Bucs be trading Blount?" upon first glance may not seem so, but it's basically a thread wondering if the Falcons should try and trade for Blount.

But I guess if you're only casually browsing, you may not get that, and you may need a thread titled "Should the Falcons trade for LeGarrette Blount?" to get that.

If you're deciding to read/comment in certain threads and not in others based entirely off the title, then so be it. I won't tell aanybody not to do that, but I do think if that's what you're doing, then you're probably missing a lot of good discussion. Which is why I think the merge is a positive thing, because posts you may have previously skipped or ignored are potentially more on your radar.

Another issue that may only exist in my mind is that I also think clicking on the Forums and seeing like 6 or 7 forums and a large number of other subforums could have been intimidating and difficult to navigate for a number of newcomers and guests, and thus make it less likely that people would register and begin posting.

With basically only 3 forums, I think that is no longer an issue.

Better now?

Thanks for the graphic, Pudge! Looks great!

http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/standings/

Scout already conceeded defeat

I like the new forum, tho.

Don't know if this helps, but I come here for 2 reasons:

1) To talk about anything and everything Falcons related. For this I go to the Huddle.

2) To talk about everything else. Was this movie good? What weird thing happened to you today? Who wins in the shallow end of a standard swimming pool: 2 Grizzlys vs. 1 Great White (I'm taking the2 Grizzs in the shallows)? For this I go to the Lounge.

I tried talking Hawks and whatnot in the bar in the past, but those boards seem seldom visited.