Hi,

Are Social groups going to be a feature in version 3.2? Social groups is 1 of the most wanted feature, and as Invision Power focuses on community building, I think Social Group plays an important role in community building / forums.


Thank you.

Also want this feature. I am a little saddened that they are getting rid of Linear + too, I use Linear plus, and it doesn't make sense to get rid of it.

Social groups do little or nothing for community building. It is niche.

No vote for me on social groups. There are a lot more pressing things that we need before social groups.

My 2 cents.

3DKiwi

I vote no. I had this in vB, thought it would be cool. It was used for the first week, maybe two, then all activity dropped to nearly 0.

My vote is no as well. Maybe as a modification.

I vote no too. I am a mod on a vB site. It was popular at first, but the admin is thinking of dropping it now.

It's funny how you see the social groups in vB as the "general" way of doing social groups.
Just because vB had a bad implementation of this feature doesn't mean that it's a bad feature. Think of groups in Facebook, it is widely used and often very interesting. I can definitely see this feature as a very good one, IPS just needs to think it through to get the maximal implementation.

Well said Tanax. I suggest members not to compare vb with IPB.

I also suggest members not to compare IPB with Facebook. They are for a totally different market, with 2 totally different uses.

Facebook is a social networking site, thus groups are a must. IP.Board is not a social networking package, thus groups are not necessary.

This should be kept to a modification/application.

+1 or even +3 because handling 3 IPBoards

I vote no.

Since were all voting.

How exactly are people seeing this implemented, what exactly changes with the way IP.Board would work with something like this? Some people say vBulletin does it wrong and we should think of Facebook, others say that's wrong too, so what's the way it should actually work? I've never seen the point to this myself, a lot of what I have heard is what jbart04 said: people think it's cool for a while, then they forget about it.

We are not announcing individual features we are working on for 3.2 until those features are done. We can't say if feature x will be in 3.2 or not.

To my mind something like social groups would be really nice as an addon as IP.SEO but only and only if it gets done by IPS and is properly maintained.

To my mind something like social groups would be really nice as an addon as IP.SEO but only and only if it gets done by IPS and is properly maintained.

I don't see what social groups has to do with SEO. I don't think this would ever be part of IP.SEO, if it were added.

You got it wrong bfarber. What he meant to say was, to make social groups as an add-on app like IP.SEO is.


To my mind something like social groups would be really nice as an addon as IP.SEO but only and only if it gets done by IPS and is properly maintained.

Don't social groups dived a community up and cause problems. Although to think about it, it could be used for rpg sites as classes or races. At this point that is the only use for it that I can think of.

There are many other uses.

I could use it for non English speakers and assign few forum categories so that it only shows to them. Group can be kept open so I don't need to assign each user that group from ACP.

It can have many uses depending on how it gets implemented.

Don't social groups dived a community up and cause problems. Although to think about it, it could be used for rpg sites as classes or races. At this point that is the only use for it that I can think of.

How about a "Charles Fanclub" at IPS forums? Or a "Modders" for those who create or use modifications for IPB.
There are many "non-essential" uses that boosts activity and keep things interesting. Encouraging users to visit your site more.

True.

How about a "Charles Fanclub" at IPS forums? Or a "Modders" for those who create or use modifications for IPB.

There are many "non-essential" uses that boosts activity and keep things interesting. Encouraging users to visit your site more.

so not just a clan or guild add on.

I could use it for non English speakers and assign few forum categories so that it only shows to them. Group can be kept open so I don't need to assign each user that group from ACP.

Yeah, something like would be good.


For example I have general board.
There is a regional category.
Regional category is divided for example to districts (one district = one forum).
Each member has possibility to join to desired district, so member can see new topics only from districts where joined.
For example if I'm not interested in information about Palm Beach district, so I won't see topics from this forum.

I would have a great use of Social groups (btw, I posted the same thread few days ago). I have a multigaming clan with 6 active + 2 test squads and each squad could form it's own social group which would be useful especially if implementing a mass PM option for moderators/admins to be able to send messages to a certain squad ie. social group. It wouldn't really work by just sending PM to a whole member group (for obvious reasons members with the same "rank" ie group may not be the part of the same gaming squad).

And I don't see how can it "harm" IPB? If done properly, it can only add to the overall package.