Please restore the choice of reactions here at IPS!

[Clover13]

[Jordan Miller]

20 hours ago, Clover13 said:

 

Gotta say that one made me chuckle 🤣

Good idea removing the negative reactions, agree they generally spark negative responses/replies.  Also a good point by @Jordan identifying the general positive sentiment garnered from a positive reaction versus provoking users to provide more of a textual response explaining their discontent (rather than leaving it to fester in the brain of the OP they reacted to).

Appreciate that! Thanks 🙂 

19 hours ago, Kjell Iver Johansen said:

I agree. I’m here lurking and seriously trying to read and learn stuff that I can use on my own sites. All this childish noise (like meow and posts with only gifs) might get some members here a good time laughing but it just gets this site less serious for users like myselve. I have enough of that noise on other sites - fb, insta. 
Also don’t forget that there is a lot of visitors around that seriously consider using this software and the discussions you have here is important to showcase what the software can do.

I would like to think that people who are considering using Invision Community software see that we're working towards making our own community more engaging and high vibe. 😸 Think we'll have to agree to disagree that being silly with the kitty reaction or posts with GIFs are childish. Life is short man, just wanting to make people smile and brighten their day even if it's just a little. I don't believe it's inhibiting you or anyone from learning/reading. 🙏 

[Jordan Miller]

18 hours ago, Chris Anderson said:

This is a product support board, not an emotional support board.  Enough with all the touchy feely emojis, gifs and any other means of expressing emotions, whether positive or negative.  All communications should be done in a completely neutral fashion.

To ensure neutral communications going forward, please remove all reactions and the emojis and gif buttons as well from the editor in these forums as a few people can't seem to help themselves from being emotionally expressive.  The old saying goes, a few bad apples always ruins it for the rest...

I hear you @Chris Anderson. Emotions are complex and many times they're difficult to navigate. Neutrality is nice in theory isn't it? Easy and clean. But, kinda boring right? 

Invision Community develops software for business owners and community leaders to build online communities. Emotions and feelings are the cornerstone of communities!

There's a person behind every screen. All human-beings experience positive and negative emotions. Even if you suppress emotion in an effort to be neutral, eventually those emotions will surface, and most likely being heightened. Think of your feelings like a beach ball in water. You can hold the beach ball beneath the surface for so long before it bursts above the water. Instead, just allow the ball (your emotions) to just be and float. 

Re: the few bad apples... there's built-in moderation tools for them 😉 

Invision Community is more than a product support board. We are a community of like-minded people with a passion for this software and community building. 

Now with that said, please feel free to write your posts with a neutral tone. However, allow others the freedom to express themselves in a way they see fit so long as it doesn't break our community guidelines. 

I will always strive for this place and all communities to be as positive as possible and I won't back down from that. I mean that respectfully! Sending you a lot of good vibes. 

[Jordan Miller]

17 hours ago, Linux-Is-Best said:

Of all the things to be upset about or making a formal request concerning. 🙄 Why so serious?

Invision could add a host of new reactions or remove them all. Of all the things to worry about, I think focusing on development and support is more important. Yet here we are debating about emoji reactions.

I like the cat reaction. I tend to use it when someone is like-minded (not something you can agree with, but when someone has posted something that I feel fits). I'm sure someone will argue I'm using it wrong. To which I want to ask them, why so serious? There are so many more important issues. What reactions we use, when we use them, how often we use them, etc... It does not seem to me as something to stress over.

I agree removing any negative reactions was a positive change. There is a reason why most social media sites do not use them. When available, they're abused, and often.  Beyond that point, can we focus on something else?  I feel like this thread was made to complain for the sake of complaining (in my opinion). And no, it is not lost on me that complaining about someone's complaining is too ironic.

I've said my peace.

Appreciate your perspective a lot @Linux-Is-Best! 

[Charles]

For the record: I have minimal emotions.

[Clover13]

49 minutes ago, Charles said:

For the record: I have minimal emotions.

[Chris Anderson]

1 hour ago, Jordan Invision said:

Emotions and feelings are the cornerstone of communities!

Too true, but if you have a small group of members that lack emotional intelligence (the capacity to be aware of, control, and express one's emotions, and to handle interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathically - Oxford Dictionary) then things can go astray.  

I suspect that there are some folks here that don't want to be a part of a "community" they simply want to post a question or suggestion and receive an answer or response as quickly as possible.  They have no interest in getting to know the IPS Staff or other members or engage in various forms of levity. 

While others do want to get to know the IPS staff and members and drop by to engage with them and help out when they can. 

Every time a member logs on they will be in a particular "mood".  Sometimes they will appreciate and engage in various forms of levity and sometimes they won't. 

Reactions, emoji, and gifs and emotions and feelings can add real value to a site or detract from it.  Being too negative or too expressive will lead to troubles as it will alienate some segment of a site's membership at one point in time or another. 

I respect your desire for positivity, but sometimes a comment warrants a less than positive response.  There should be some quick and easy way to express: "I respectfully disagree" or "Please for the love of pizza, no!" (or some other way of expressing lack of agreement or support) for a particular comment or feature suggestion.

Bringing the entire membership into the "know" about your desire for positivity and various steps you will be taking in the short and long term will help a long way towards building a true "community".  All the more important as your role is meant to be a bridge between "us" and IPS management.

Be of good cheer one and all in these trying times...

Edited April 9, 2021 by Chris Anderson

[Clover13]

1 minute ago, Chris Anderson said:

but if you have a small group of members that lack emotional intelligence (the capacity to be aware of, control, and express one's emotions, and to handle interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathically - Oxford Dictionary) then things can go astray.  

What if that describes my one's entire community?

[Chris Anderson]

Just now, Clover13 said:

What if that describes my one's entire community?

Sounds like a great blog topic for @Jordan Invisionto cover.

[The Old Man]

4 hours ago, Linux-Is-Best said:

Come, now. We're much more civilized. It should be live streamed. 😂

 

LOL! Thank you. 😀

[The Old Man]

2 hours ago, Chris Anderson said:

I respect your desire for positivity, but sometimes a comment warrants a less than positive response.  There should be some quick and easy way to express: "I respectfully disagree" or "Please for the love of pizza, no!" (or some other way of expressing lack of agreement or support) for a particular comment or feature suggestion.

You had me at pizza but the other expression is almost as good. In fact, thinking about it, I may start a new dialogue (I promise not to) about why Jordan didn't add a pizza reaction instead of a cat. I mean it cures everything, right? Negativity, sadness, leprosy, people who still say Message Board, senior men's problems, people who still call it IPB and so the list goes on.

🍕

[christopher-w]

Is this the place to request a late addition to 4.6? Only half joking, but thinking granular control of what folks can post in topics and comments might come in handy. I for one am not a fan all of the street furniture that's appeared in this 'community' over the past couple of months, but appreciate of course, that for every one like me, there's probably several who think the complete opposite. With this in mind, catering for both sides of the divide makes sense to me, allowing administrators to control what can be posted beyond the current globally allowed file types.

I do believe @Nathan Explosion has a plugin that achieves some of this (which I hope to purchase in the near future), but it doesn't as far as I know have a 60+ OAP switch allowing oldies like me to be able to browse forums just like we used to 20/30 years ago. On a more serious note, such functionality, both in the hands of the administrator and end users would allow us to control what we see at the individual forum level, beyond being able to hide signatures. Of course hiding or preventing the use of animations and the like (I own a VFX business, so I'm not totally averse) would of course mean that many comments would, for many of us, go unread. Which at the moment some might say isn't a bad thing, plus of course, folks suspecting they aren't being 'read' by the topic's entire audience might well instead resort to that old favourite - letters and words. In saying that, perhaps the creators of Giphy and the like have missed a trick. Shouldn't they have designed (or have they already?) their witty delivery mechanism to include a native alt attribute so that post/comment authors could include real words for those blocking the graphical part of the content. Or, in lieu of this, perhaps Invision could allow our humorously minded friends the option of adding an alt attribute to images of all types (without needing to add a CKEditor image plugin), so that we can see what they meant, even if we decide to block what they intended.

To the principle reason for commenting. I think Invision Community should be both proud and thankful that so many of its clients are still around after so many years. For example, selecting solely from this topic,  @The Old Man  and @Chris Anderson have both (if I've interpreted their joined date correctly) been here for 17+ years and @Kjell Iver Johansen, for 9+ years, whilst evidently, also caring very much about the platform.  As for me, I'm relatively new here, but older than most it seems, but I share with those mentioned a deep desire to go about my business in the most efficient way possible, if only because at my time of life (61) time isn't an endless resource and I'd rather spend it as frugally as possible.

Finally from me tonight, I do hope the community can pull together here. I've made representations to @Matt about this just recently. I am very pleased to see that an investment has been made in hiring a (semi?) dedicated resource in @Jordan Invision, but I would ask that more care is taken to involve the community as a whole. Otherwise as others have outlined, some of us might find it difficult to contribute. Now although me holding my tongue might suit some of you, I do feel the community will suffer disproportionately if some of the older, more experienced regulars here, stop contributing in the ways that they have done.

Looking forward to 4.6 and beyond. Thanks for a great platform.

 

[Chris Anderson]

17 minutes ago, christopher-w said:

@Chris Anderson have both (if I've interpreted their joined date correctly) been here for 17+ years

I launched my first BBS in 1988 using the Wildcat BBS software. So I've actually been around forums for 33 years.  

[Clover13]

3 minutes ago, Chris Anderson said:

I launched my first BBS in 1988 using the Wildcat BBS software. So I've actually been around forums for 33 years.  

 

[CoffeeCake]

11 minutes ago, Chris Anderson said:

I launched my first BBS in 1988 using the Wildcat BBS software. So I've actually been around forums for 33 years.  

                    __
                   /  \
                  /|oo \
                 (_|  /_)
                  _`@/_ \    _
                 |     | \   \\
                 | (*) |  \   ))
    ______       |__U__| /  \//
   / FIDO \       _//|| _\   /
  (________)     (_/(_|(____/

 

[Kjell Iver Johansen]

15 hours ago, Jordan Invision said:

I don't believe it's inhibiting you or anyone from learning/reading. 🙏 

No not at all.

Just a sidenote:

But english is not my first language and I try my best to understand the humour  and «in between lines stuff» that happens in a language that is not my first language. I guess there are many members in the same situation as me also - so do not forget that you have an international audience. 

I know you have not forgotten, but in my sites I try to think my site as how a new member sees it, and to much «noise» can be a turnoff for some seriously newbies. 

[The Old Man]

@christopher-w

Hi Chris,

I didn't realise those animated GIFs didn't have ALT attributes.

I don't know how useful it will be but there CSS accessibility improvements being more supported in browsers that may help to compliment the granular controls. 
 

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/@media/prefers-reduced-motion

Real early draft, this one...

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/@media/prefers-reduced-data

You may even be able to create a copy of your current theme, say "My-Theme (less clutter)", and make use of the CSS to display: block certain content, more of a sledgehammer approach I know. 

Regards

 

[christopher-w]

1 hour ago, The Old Man said:

I didn't realise those animated GIFs didn't have ALT attributes.

Giphy's mostly do - but they don't necessarily describe the image in the way it's being used, which could lead to some hilarious unintended consequences - unless the poster modifies them to reflect what they would otherwise have said.

Thanks for the links. Looking forward to seeing how they develop.

 

[Morrigan]

On 4/8/2021 at 8:29 AM, Jordan Invision said:

My logic for removing the "sad" and "confused" reactions was two-fold. For one, they were extremely underutilized according to the reports. More importantly (imo), if someone feels confused or sad, we want to encourage you guys to write out a response. Those are more fragile emotions, so I felt, and still feel, that if someone is sad or confused about something, that it's important they take the time to respond why they feel that way. If they're confused, it gives them an opportunity to seek clarification from someone in a reply. And if they are sad, it allows them the freedom to explain why. 

I don't miss the confused reaction but I do miss the sad reaction. We are living in a tumultuous time right now with a global pandemic, and more. You don't always have the words to express that you are feeling for that person's difficult time and seeing a bunch of empty "I'm so sorry"'s in a thread I think is just as damning as no one replying at all to someone's rough time. The sad reaction gave people a means to offer support, show that they read the post without replying with an empty platitude that means even less than a supportive reaction.

 

23 hours ago, Charles said:

For the record: I have minimal emotions.

[The Old Man]

On 4/10/2021 at 5:16 PM, Morrigan said:

I don't miss the confused reaction but I do miss the sad reaction. We are living in a tumultuous time right now with a global pandemic, and more. You don't always have the words to express that you are feeling for that person's difficult time and seeing a bunch of empty "I'm so sorry"'s in a thread I think is just as damning as no one replying at all to someone's rough time. The sad reaction gave people a means to offer support, show that they read the post without replying with an empty platitude that means even less than a supportive reaction.

As ever, Morrigan you are spot on. This is what I was rather clumsily attempting to get across.

I could live without the confused reaction here, but the saddened reaction is missed. Being saddened to read a piece of content is not simply about being negative or giving a negative impression of a community, it's about being emphatic too, sometimes showing solidarity, and I think being supportive of fellow members in a 'community' is just as important as 'liking' what they say.

That said, my earlier pizza instead of cat observation got no likes, or cats, so clearly I know very little. You know, I could really eat a good pizza right now. Even though it's 9am.

[Chris Anderson]

@The Old ManYour original posting could have benefited from further elaboration.  After many comments its becoming quite clear that the issue you brought up is a lot more complicated and nuanced than it appears at first glance. I gave your pizza comment a "like".  Speaking of pizza, its great 24 hours a day hot or cold.

Everyone:

A community can add value to a conversation via commenting or reactions and sometimes both. "If" reactions are to be added to the mix then they should offer a wide variety of ways to express support or lack thereof for a particular comment or exhibit various emotions.

As humans express a multitude of good and bad emotions there should be means of expressing them in ways that convey an emotion without the weight behind it that might stir an overly averse reaction from receiving it.  If a reaction choice is a tad on the negative side it should convey a value of 1 out of 10 scale.  Using such a reaction should be meant to make a subtle point not as a means of moderation.  That's a job that should be reserved for the forum administrators if someone shows a propensity of straying outside of community norms.

In those cases where a reader is feeling less than positive about a topic or situation being described there should be a way of expressing that via a reaction.  Doing so shouldn't mean they feel less than positive about the commenter overall. We can agree to disagree on occasion and still get along if we are to be a successful community, whether here or your place.

If you limit the reactions too much you limit their overall usefulness.  If you click on the reaction button there should be an option for every conceivable "useful" use case. Their usage should be of value to the recipient as well as the rest of the community. Limiting reactions is akin to asking a wordsmith to limit themselves to only using 1000 random words to convey every conceivable thought or emotion.  It's simply too limiting.

If a reaction appears to be under utilized it might not mean its a poor choice for inclusion in the grand scheme of things, it simply might mean there were few instances where that reaction was appropriate. The choice of reactions should be readily identifiable by the whole community and shouldn't be tied too closely with any particular administrator as they come and go. 

If someone reads an old comment and sees a bunch of reactions from a prior community admin they might not understand the significance of a "cat" reaction for instance, or some other favored reaction from the past.  That's not to say reactions can't be fun and whimsical, I'm simply saying they "might" have a short life span of usefulness or understood by the whole community, especially if it has an international membership.

Reactions should not be implemented exclusively from the top or by a group of power users. That's why I've refrained from making specific suggestions on changes, additions or deletions of the reactions here.

The entire community should be included in the conversation as "they" are going to be the ones to use them or not if they don't meet their collective needs.

Maps have keys to convey the various icons used. There might be value in providing a page (or pages if you have different reactions throughout your site) that shows each reaction along with their appropriate usage. This should help set community-wide expectations on their usage.

 

Edited April 12, 2021 by Chris Anderson

[Sonya*]

On 4/8/2021 at 11:04 PM, Chris Anderson said:

This is a product support board, not an emotional support board.  Enough with all the touchy feely emojis, gifs and any other means of expressing emotions, whether positive or negative.  All communications should be done in a completely neutral fashion.

I would miss something like this https://invisioncommunity.com/forums/topic/459696-flag-ipsdbselect_sql_calc_found_rows-not-working/ if there would be complete neutral fashion. IPS could you please stay a bit ... unneutral? 🙂

 

[Jordan Miller]

I hear you guys. I can see what you mean about wanting to use a "sad" reaction as a means to show someone you saw their comment, but may not necessarily have the words at the moment to write a reply. I think that's interesting. I'd like to challenge you to explore that: why not write something out every time you feel compelled to use a sad reaction? I imagine it'd make the person you're quoting feel seen and heard far more than a sad reaction. 

I'm not completely opposed to adding the sad reaction back, but I am also having trouble advocating for this change. Communities are designed for members to contribute and convey emotion. Sadness is an emotion (imo) that deserves some extra attention. 

4 hours ago, Chris Anderson said:

The choice of reactions should be readily identifiable by the whole community and shouldn't be tied too closely with any particular administrator as they come and go. 

😕

[Chris Anderson]

6 hours ago, Jordan Invision said:

I hear you guys. I can see what you mean about wanting to use a "sad" reaction as a means to show someone you saw their comment, but may not necessarily have the words at the moment to write a reply. I think that's interesting. I'd like to challenge you to explore that: why not write something out every time you feel compelled to use a sad reaction? I imagine it'd make the person you're quoting feel seen and heard far more than a sad reaction. 

I'm not completely opposed to adding the sad reaction back, but I am also having trouble advocating for this change. Communities are designed for members to contribute and convey emotion. Sadness is an emotion (imo) that deserves some extra attention. 

Additional Quote:

The choice of reactions should be readily identifiable by the whole community and shouldn't be tied too closely with any particular administrator as they come and go. 

😕

@Jordan InvisionI imagine you were feeling a bit sad at the thought of leaving us one day... Well the feeling is mutual. 

Instead of expressing that "sadness" you didn't write words, you resorted to a single emoji as there wasn't an appropriate reaction to capture what you were feeling.  Why did you not write something out like you advocated for above?  Don't you deserve that little extra attention?

How many different interpretations of a single emoji are there likely to be from everyone that skims through this thread? Did I read your emoji accurately?  Maybe, maybe not.  Alas, forum communication can become quite nuanced and what might seem obvious to the writer might not be so to the intended reader or the rest of the community.

Edited April 12, 2021 by Chris Anderson

[The Old Man]

5 hours ago, Jordan Invision said:

I'd like to challenge you to explore that: why not write something out every time you feel compelled to use a sad reaction?

Hi Jordan,

Thanks for your thoughts. Not having a go, but to be honest, personally I don't really want or expect to be challenged! To be fair, I've already answered this in previous responses and others have too. I don't feel that you have really answered some of my points that I clarified. 

Funnily enough, your stance on not backtracking isn't exactly coming across as being open to flexibility when it comes to the changes you're making to this community and the response did actually make me want to reach for a confused reaction! If ever there was a reason to use it, I feel it's representative of my reaction in response to your post. 😊

We seem to be going backwards with this community, against a backdrop of pandemic's emotional and financial turmoil going on, ideally we need to either be moving forwards or finding some stability, especially as we're now practically mourning the unexpected departure of such a knowledgeable, respected, prolific and supportive member of the IPS team without a chance to wish him well. I know that people come and go but still, IMHO he's left such a massive void. I'm not wanting to draw conclusions and there's a lot of talent and knowledge within the IPS company, but just this morning I read that IPS is dropping the facility to copy custom Pages blocks in 4.6 because it's overly complicated; surely copying and duplicating blocks is a basic facility for any modern page builder or CMS software. I'd actually be embarrassed as a CEO if my CMS couldn't do this in 2021.

Also, apologies as I'm in my early fifties and I'm not firing on all thrusters these days, but I just don't understand the cat reaction! What does it actually mean or reference, if it wasn't solely an April Fool's day inspired joke to make us chuckle, which it did me? I mean I've used it for fun which I thought it was for, and I'm not against it, but going back to your challenge, why do feel that adding a cat is any different or more acceptable than that of a saddened/empathy reaction in that it should require a follow up post/comment?

I feel that there's perhaps other similar things going on at the moment. I mean I have absolutely no idea what this Hump Day thing is all about, or FBF topic prefixes or whatever that is. We keep getting told that this a professional forum community, one that is representative of commercial products, which obviously it is, but where do cats and these bizarre references come into the equation? It's not really feeling inclusive, it's feeling more exclusive, to those hip enough, or those who have the time to read every topic or those in the know.

I kind of feel that we are also somehow almost going backwards in terms of new feature announcements being vaguely revealed within these obscure topics, where as for years they've been properly revealed and well demonstrated in the corporate blog. When people started referring to a new feature called Awards, I then had to search for the subtle announcement.

Anyway, thanks for reading.