From an experienced admin...

[Arnox]

EDIT1: I'm very disheartened to see that... Pretty much none of my suggestions were taken seriously. Or really anyone's for that matter. Even worse, the site (at least for me personally) has now been freezing up on me sometimes. Well, alright. I guess all this is the staff's choice, but I thought ExclusivelyGames was gonna be different. Perhaps the most egregious thing here is that, to my knowledge, none of people's suggestions were even addressed or even acknowledged. If this is not intentional then communication needs to be worked on. And I do get that it looks like I'm just whining because the staff didn't validate my personal suggestions, but please trust me when I say that is not the case. I do want this place to become great, but if the staff doesn't even say anything, then there's absolutely no dialogue, and that is a big problem.

-

OK, so, first of all, I'm not one of those people that wishes to bring this site down. Not at all. In fact, when this video first popped up on my feed, it made me raise my eyebrows a lot because what you guys are proposing is almost exactly what I've trying to accomplish except on a more general scale.

I think I need to be clearer and talk about who I am. The universal nickname I use is Arnox and I administer a site called Sanctuary that is dedicated to freedom of speech and freedom of information. We were gonna start specializing in the games genre as that's what we all had a passion for. But I see you're beating me to the punch already!

This is actually great because if you can do what I set out to do, it would allow me to formally retire from admin duties and just let somebody else do the work of administration and maintenance. Some VERY important pointers though, from one admin to another.

1. Do NOT use vBulletin. Use XenForo instead. XF was made by the old vBulletin team and vB is now just a husk of its former self anyway. I get that you already paid for the license, but this is very important as, of course, your choice of site software will decide how easy or hard it will be to maintain, moderate, add content, and add features to your site, and once it's locked in, it's a bitch to move to another brand of software. You guys still have time. Please don't stick with this crap.

2. Please don't use a reputation/upvote-downvote system. I've been on the internet a long time and they've all stifled real discussion in some way.

3. Please don't have overbearing site rules or moderation. We get enough of that on other sites as well. Have very common sense rules. Make them as streamlined as possible. If the rules are too much, you guys will kinda become the evil you're seeking to destroy. Although it's not my site at all and you guys can do with it what you will, forbidding political discussion of ANY kind sounds like a huge recipe for disaster.

4. I know this sounds obvious but choose your moderators CAREFULLY. Look at what they contribute to the site (besides money).

5. Backup the site constantly. Use your funds to set up an easy backup service with your host. They'll probably have one. This will SAVE YOUR ASS in emergencies.

6. You'll have to give your content producers a reason to choose your service instead of just using YouTube or making their own site or blog to host their content. Realize that this is one of the things you will have to compete with.

7. Try to host the site in Iceland. There's very few internet regulations there and it's not part of the EU either, which will protect you somewhat from spurious American or European litigation. It is more expensive indeed, but it also looks like you're not hurting for money, so I wouldn't worry about that.

-

Besides all that, I wish you all luck. I also sent these suggestions in an email, but the email account I used had a very old and kinda cringy joke-name attached to it and now I want to commit seppuku for not realizing it.

[fenrif]

Monthly bump. I'm very disheartened to see that... Pretty much none of my suggestions were taken seriously. Or really anyone's for that matter. Even worse, the site is now much slower than before. Well, alright. I guess all this is the staff's choice, but I thought ExclusivelyGames was gonna be different. Perhaps the most egregious thing here is that, to my knowledge, none of people's suggestions were even addressed or even acknowledged. If this is not intentional then communication needs to be worked on. And I do get that it looks like I'm just whining because the staff didn't validate my personal suggestions, but please trust me when I say that is not the case. I do want this place to become great, but if the staff doesn't even say anything, then there's absolutely no dialogue, and that is a big problem.

It doesn't look like you're whining at all. The staff so far have been very lackluster. They first made themselves known by deleting threads with no explanation. Then they started closing threads asking for explanation, without explaining anything. When further questioned they said they would only explain in PM and acted like the issue was closed. Locked any threads discussing it. Since then I've seen threads closed for discussing legislation that affects video games and players, discussing games "journalism," and for having some people in the thread post off topic. It's very worrying.

It seems like there's only one guy modding the forum, and he only shows up every couple of days.

[fenrif]

Why doesn't like feel satisfactory but upvote does? Why can you not simply express your support or approval with text. This is a discussion forum, after all.

[Animusisters]

Good luck suggesting the same stuff next time.

[Erebus]

I agree with 3, 4 and 6. I kinda agree with 2. People shouldn't use likes to the point that they're not posting much. I don't know anything related to 1, 5 and 7.

I'll add to it that I think the "comment" option in replying to a post is a bit redundant and disrupts the flow of the conversations in a thread.

[ethansito]

True that. However, I think the lack of communication/development is because the team's main focus right now is developing the website rather than the forums. I mean, they should definitely let us know that they will be working on our suggestions, but they have a lot on their plate right now.

[Arnox]

Monthly bump. I'm very disheartened to see that... Pretty much none of my suggestions were taken seriously. Or really anyone's for that matter. Even worse, the site is now much slower than before. Well, alright. I guess all this is the staff's choice, but I thought ExclusivelyGames was gonna be different. Perhaps the most egregious thing here is that, to my knowledge, none of people's suggestions were even addressed or even acknowledged. If this is not intentional then communication needs to be worked on. And I do get that it looks like I'm just whining because the staff didn't validate my personal suggestions, but please trust me when I say that is not the case. I do want this place to become great, but if the staff doesn't even say anything, then there's absolutely no dialogue, and that is a big problem.

[monnef]

Locking whole fully rendered page for several seconds (few days back it were minutes or until reload) seem to be a software issue. I would guess forum front-end is waiting for something from back-end to load and is locking whole fully rendered page making it unusable for random amounts of time.

[Forge]

So I can upvote you, because "Like" doesn't feel satisfactory enough.

[EternalFaith]

Downvotes are a little more damning on Reddit where they can affect your ability to post without excessive cooldowns, but the issue for me is that they pre-filter opinions. Popular opinions get upvoted and are seen, unpopular opinions don't get a chance and people will naturally show their disapproval with downvotes, no matter how you try to make people use them any other way. Why does Reddit turn into an echo chamber so easily? The voting system has a lot to do with it.

Being on a forum with upvoting and downvoting is a bit different, but I dislike them for the sake that people may use them to voice agreement/disagreement rather than contributing. On 4chan, where no downvoting exists, if someone says something wrong or unpopular, people have to challenge them on it rather than just clicking a blue arrow.

[Arnox]

Doesn't matter. Will still lead to drama and bias. Honestly, if people want to show their support, they should do so in a post. And also, by doing that, the post will encourage MUCH more discussion than any "Like" system would.

[Arnox]

Thanks for all the support, everyone! <3

I'm indifferent about up/down votes, but what the "experienced" people keep forgetting to mention is that the number of votes a member can give, up or down, can be limited to a certain number per day, voting privileges can be granted upon meeting a certain criteria, like only allowed after a person has made 100 posts, and that voting privileges can be suspended for those whom abuse it.

It's not worth the drama and that still won't stop people being willfully ignorant/stupid/spiteful with their votes. At the end of the day, why do we even want it here, especially when there are so many places that have such a system already?

[Forge]

I'm indifferent about up/down votes, but what the "experienced" people keep forgetting to mention is that the number of votes a member can give, up or down, can be limited to a certain number per day, voting privileges can be granted upon meeting a certain criteria, like only allowed after a person has made 100 posts, and that voting privileges can be suspended for those whom abuse it.

[Chairman Meow]

OK, so, first of all, I'm not one of those people that wishes to bring this site down. Not at all. In fact, when this video first popped up on my feed, it made me raise my eyebrows a lot because what you guys are proposing is almost exactly what I've trying to accomplish except on a more general scale.

I think I need to be clearer and talk about who I am. The universal nickname I use is Arnox and I administer a site called Sanctuary that is dedicated to freedom of speech and freedom of information. We were gonna start specializing in the games genre as that's what we all had a passion for. But I see you're beating me to the punch already!

This is actually great because if you can do what I set out to do, it would allow me to formally retire from admin duties and just let somebody else do the work of administration and maintenance. Some VERY important pointers though, from one admin to another.

1. Do NOT use vBulletin. Use XenForo instead. XF was made by the old vBulletin team and vB is now just a husk of its former self anyway. I get that you already paid for the license, but this is very important as, of course, your choice of site software will decide how easy or hard it will be to maintain, moderate, add content, and add features to your site, and once it's locked in, it's a bitch to move to another brand of software. You guys still have time. Please don't stick with this crap.

2. Please don't use a reputation/upvote-downvote system. I've been on the internet a long time and they've all stifled real discussion in some way.

3. Please don't have overbearing site rules or moderation. We get enough of that on other sites as well. Have very common sense rules. Make them as streamlined as possible. If the rules are too much, you guys will kinda become the evil you're seeking to destroy. Although it's not my site at all and you guys can do with it what you will, forbidding political discussion of ANY kind sounds like a huge recipe for disaster.

4. I know this sounds obvious but choose your moderators CAREFULLY. Look at what they contribute to the site (besides money).

5. Backup the site constantly. Use your funds to set up an easy backup service with your host. They'll probably have one. This will SAVE YOUR ASS in emergencies.

6. You'll have to give your content producers a reason to choose your service instead of just using YouTube or making their own site or blog to host their content. Realize that this is one of the things you will have to compete with.

7. Try to host the site in Iceland. There's very few internet regulations there and it's not part of the EU either, which will protect you somewhat from spurious American or European litigation. It is more expensive indeed, but it also looks like you're not hurting for money, so I wouldn't worry about that.

-

Besides all that, I wish you all luck. I also sent these suggestions in an email, but the email account I used had a very old and kinda cringy joke-name attached to it and now I want to commit seppuku for not realizing it.

I endorse everything that you have said here. Most of this has been my experience as well. When it comes to selecting moderators it I will add that it's usually not a good idea to just go with the forum superstars. Many admins fall for this trap and end up regretting it. Modding is about more than just posting a lot. Look at people's posts and see what their judgement is like. If you can grab a few older more experienced peeps so much the better. An example of a forum that did not follow this advice would be ResetEra, and we all know how badly THAT turned out.

[Keaton]

These are some REALLY good suggestions
Hope they will be taken into consideration