Home » forums » EGLUG » Website » What to do about blogs
Submitted by Alaa on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 04:12.
( categories: Website)

as you can see in the [charter]] page, blogs are a source of controversy here.

the point of having blogs is allowing some freedom in the website without having to tolerate off topic content in the important sections.

user blogs are not the focus of eglug at all, they're a social tool.

since the blogs will follow different posting guidelines than the rest of the forum (what exactly is yet to be decided, state your opinion in the [charter]] discussion), we need to make it very clear that blogs are more or less seperate from the rest of the site.

how to do that?

I suggest we disable the blogs block, remove blogs from the default search and from the recent posts tracker, if you want to visit a blog you have to manualy browse to the blog area.

if you want to track a blog you have to follow its rss feed.

if you want to promote an entery in somone's blog link to it from your own blog, tell your friends privately about it, throw the URL on IRC, or link to it from your signature.

we could try to add a profile entry where you can point to the blogs you like (kinda like firends/fans in slashdot) and where you point to interesting blog enteries.

I think this is more in line with the idea that blogs are a tool to strengthen social interaction, since they're treated different than other content and rely solely on social interaction to get read at all.

what do you think?

since occasionaly blogs may have very useful content I think we should add a feature where members rate blog enteries, enteries with higher rating would get a link in a special block.

what do you guys think?

or we could classify blog enteries according to a topical taxonomy (and it has to be correct, ya3ni if its humor then its humor not classified under the topic the blogger is mocking), which will allows members to browse blog enteries according to interest.

feedback please?

cheers, Alaa

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well..
OneOfOne's picture
Submitted by OneOfOne on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 04:28.

Although I believe in free-speech but you have a point, alot of our *nice* members could use this in a bad manner. so i agree to "since occasionaly blogs may have very useful content I think we should add a feature where members rate blog enteries, enteries with higher rating would get a link in a special block. "

Peace


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classifying blog enteries
Manal's picture
Submitted by Manal on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 05:23.

I like the idea of classifying blog enteries according to a topical taxonomy, but not all the enteries..the highly rated ones only.
-- Manal


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think about procedures
Alaa's picture
Submitted by Alaa on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 05:32.

ya gama3a think about procedures.

only moderators can modify classification, if we say only highly rated blog enteries get classified this adds a huge moderation overhead.

the whole point of having blogs is take the load of policing off topic discussions of the moderators.

the blog owner is the one responsible for classifying his enteries, moderators should not realy touch blogs at all unless they severly violate the rules.

cheers, Alaa

http://www.manalaa.net


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agree with everything alaa me
Submitted by NewComer on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 05:43.

agree with everything alaa mentioned here.

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no you don't
Alaa's picture
Submitted by Alaa on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 06:05.

we've had a long an interesting discussion on IRC about this whole thing, I would appreciate it if you summarize your view about how to handle off topic content so we can continue the discussion.

cheers, Alaa

http://www.manalaa.net


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Yes I do!
Submitted by NewComer on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 18:00.

Everything you mentioned here is about the blogs, u didn't even mention ur opinion to restrict off topic discussions to the blogs.

So yes, I agree about all what you mentioned here

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i noticed that MadFarmAnimalz
ramez.hanna's picture
Submitted by ramez.hanna on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 09:34.

i noticed that MadFarmAnimalz in his blog used some offensive words that even in free speech shouldn't exist i think it should be mentioned in the charter

the best things in life are free --- so as myself


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Vote?
YoussefAssad's picture
Submitted by YoussefAssad on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 09:40.

Everyone here seems to have a clear opinion on whether profanity should be allowed in blogs.

Shall we have a vote on this matter?

-- Linux Egypt Lice Resident


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agree
ramez.hanna's picture
Submitted by ramez.hanna on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 10:36.

yes let's vote

the best things in life are free --- so as myself


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Its getting messy here, we ha
Submitted by NewComer on Wed, 02/06/2004 - 18:05.

Its getting messy here, we have discussions about the blogs nearly everywhere. The charter, the poll, the controversial blog and here!

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yes
whirlpool's picture
Submitted by whirlpool on Thu, 03/06/2004 - 09:47.

well, navigation is confusing right now, it won't be like that on the official launch. But it is being worked upon. Why don't you help us and discuss what you find messy at The challenges


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Why hide ??
ShErbO's picture
Submitted by ShErbO on Fri, 04/06/2004 - 18:29.

The poll's more likely to give out "No swearing, personal attacks & no hate speech"

so, why don't we just keep the block ??


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off topic
Alaa's picture
Submitted by Alaa on Fri, 04/06/2004 - 20:34.

The reason for hiding the blocks was never because of profanity, the reason was to keep them seperated fromt the rest of the site and to aid them in fulfilling their goals instead of become a source of random off topic noise.

the blogs should not be pushed to the front page or promoted in anyway because we don't want to encourage off topic over in topic discussion.

and because we want to encourage the process of social interaction in which you seek people to read their blogs.

and because casual viewers may not be able to determine the difference between blogs and other areas of the site if they only click on latest links in blocks (to them its all simply new content).

however we could allow the latest blog entery block as an optional block to be enabled in the user preferences.

I would still prefer to come up with a different browsing paradigm for the blogs wi 7'alas, some members tend to enable everything the moment they register and then all of a sudden the same problem occurs.

or we could make the latest blog entery block appear in the blogs section only (ya3ni whenever you read anyones blog, or you're browsing the blogs the block is displayed).

or we could have a combination of both.

http://www.manalaa.net


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remove the blogs block
ramez.hanna's picture
Submitted by ramez.hanna on Wed, 09/06/2004 - 13:53.

i think the blogs block should be disabled but the blog entry in the top or at least there will be a link to a page with all the registered users' nicks so i can access their blogs or their profiles

the best things in life are free --- so as myself


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